Research Theory, Design, and Methods (RSCH - 8100D - 5) Dichotomy of values: Europe to Asia vocational, technical, and general education Mike Bonnie michael.bonnie@waldenu.edu Student ID Number: Program: PhD in General Education KAM Assessor: Faculty Mentor: Walden University April 30, 2010 Introduction The following describes the philosophies of Confucius (Confucianism) and John Dewey (pragmatism/instrumentalism/experimentalism) and their views toward vocational, technical, general academic instruction, and the development of morals and values. These theorists’ beliefs have been espoused among the greatest of influences throughout Asia and America during a span of history from 551 BCE to the present day. This is not intended to present an entire picture of design purpose and implementation, however, will focus on the paths of these originators of theory from their earliest. The purpose behind investigating and presenting these individuals’ views is to identify and acknowledge the intellectual genealogy of inter-related theories and the process of synthesis that make current prevailing education philosophies and practices possible. Confucius: Pragmaticist and the first public school teacher Two authors should be credited with inscribing Chinese history and with so creating the legacy of the Qin Dynasty (221-201 BCE), scholarship in China as it is known today; Ssu-ma T’an (Sima T’an, birth date unknown - 110 BCE) and Ssu-ma Chi’en (Sima Qian, ca. 145 - 86 BCE). During the time they lived education centered on six arts: propriety, music, archery, chariot driving, writing and mathematics. Of the literature that has survived, according to T’an, the major philosophies of the day were recognized as the Hundred Schools of Thought who’s most enduring legacy includes the teachings of Confucius (Kongzi). Confucius was considered the first public school teacher in China, breaking the monopoly of private schools under control of the emperor. He is said to have taught nearly 3,000 students. During his lifetime, although he traveled extensively throughout China’s kingdoms, he never reached a level of prominence among rulers. Confucius is credited with establishing the content and methods of teaching, and the concept of how people should relate to one another. He taught the concept of “filial piety (Five Relationships),” the hierarchy of relationships from the national level to the household and community. Government is to have a role in making the lives of people better and absolute ethical values exist. The order of filial piety is: allegiance and respect between king-minister, father-son, husband-wife, older brother-younger brother and, friend-friend. The husband and wife relationship is the only one which crosses genders. Within the Five Relationships, Confucius defined “Five Virtues”: benevolence (generosity), righteousness (doing the right things), propriety (behaving correctly in society), knowledge (learning) and sincerity (genuineness). The universal “Golden Rule” or (in the negative) “Silver Rule” as it is sometimes called, is attributed to Confucius. “What you do not like done to you, do not do to others.” The rule applied to all. Confucius maintained that a ruler must be virtuous and strive to better peoples’ lives. Civilization is to be valued and humans are more important than nature. According to Confucius the so-called “superior man” did not exist. Although most of Confucius’ work was destroyed during the Qin Dynasty, enough survived to piece together the essence of meaning and detail to form a picture of his work. He is credited with having written or edited the Five Classics text: Book of Changes (I Ching), Classic of Odes (poetry and the arts), Classic of History (Shi), Classic of Rites (social propriety); the Spring and Autumn Annals a record of the state of Lu, Confucius’ home State, is the only book he specifically claims to have written. The Analects is a collection of conversations Confucius is said to have had with rulers of the time. His followers formed the school of thought known as the Literati (Ju chia). Among the scholars who developed and refined Confucius’ philosophies is Mencius (Mengzi, 371-289 BCE) who preached a humanist point of view that men are by nature good. Mencius made clear that rulers empowered to rule responsibly through the Mandate from Heaven. Rulers were accountable to the people and, so long as a kingdom was at peace rulers maintained their status. Diametrically opposed to Mencius, Xunzi (c. 300-237 BCE) viewed mankind as inherently evil and viewed heaven as merely the natural world. Xunzi’s pragmatic inclinations were soon adapted into the Legalist School of Thought (Fa chia) and by the Qin Dynasty (221-206 BC) as a method of grasping and maintaining control of the population. According to Xunzi human desires are innate at birth and virtue is obtained through education. Later, during the Song Dynasty (960—1279 CE) a resurgence of Confucius’ thoughts fueled the Neo-Confucius Movement, an amalgam of Confucianism and Buddhism. Legalism lent well to controlling the largely uneducated population by the feudal hierarchy of princes, lords and kings. The country was still widely divided into territories and as the kingdoms grew through the collapse and overtaking of smaller fiefdoms, a strong centralized government was needed. The Legalists were known to extol and reward the virtue of social propriety and punish vice. Legalism and Confucianism evolved to form a national system of control and protections during the Han Dynasty (206 BCE–220 CE) that would direct the central government of China through the end of all dynasties in the early 20th century. We know Confucianism and Legalism today particularly as it was represented the Imperial Examination (Kējǔ) system which officially began during the Sui Dynasty (581-618 CE) and ended in 1905. The “Cadre System” of ranking Party leaders, civil servants in administrative institutions, public organizations and (in a separate category) military leaders, was borrowed from Russia during the 1950’s was also loosely based on Kējǔ. The National College Entrance Examination (NCEE; Gao Kao) we know it today was established in 1952 under the Ministry of Education. John Dewey: Education in America At the end of a 1993 study based on two related surveys ten years apart, the authors state ”Therefore, it seems fair to conclude that Dewey, Bonser, Warner, and Maley have contributed to the development of technology education philosophy and that the philosophy they have espoused is still the basis for making curriculum decisions in technology education.” (Kirkwood, Foster, and Bartow, 1994) Through Dewey’s visits between 1919 and 1921 he became widely known in China as the “Western Confucius.” The title was attributed to Dewey for his effective lectures and writing but, also for his struggle for acceptance of his teachings and rejection of his philosophies, similar to that of Confucius. His teachings have not gone without detractors even in more modern times, from people of both China and the West; educational traditions are deeply rooted in culture. “In discussing Dewey's thinking, it is easy to draw a conceptual map linking the words experience, truth, knowledge, freedom, education, democracy, and community. The outcome of making a sentence with these words could be knowledge is a common good, obtained from experience, by educated persons, in a democratic system. This system warrants the pursuit and communication of truth in an environment of personal freedom” (Otaola, 2004) Dewey was born in Burlington, Vermont, October 20, 1859, three years following the end of the Civil War, and coincidently one month before the release of Charles Darwin’s Origin of the Species. Darwin’s writing would have great influence on Dewey’s belief system as both an evolutionist in terms of education and democracy. Dewey’s father was a merchant who served as quartermaster in the Civil War and mother devoutly religious. He attended public schools and in 1875 attended University of Vermont; majoring in philosophy. In 1882, Dewey attended Johns Hopkins University where he studied philosophy and psychology. At the beginning of his studies Dewey’s philosophical bend typified contemporary beliefs early in his academic career; he was heavily influenced by the Hegelian (Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel, (1770-1831). Dewey’ singular Christian orientation stressed "idealistic" metaphysics, the notion of absolute transcendence, humans directing nature, and a structure of ethics to attaining “self-realization.” It was at Johns Hopkins where Dewey met Charles Sanders Peirce, originator of philosophical pragmatism. During his tenure as professor of philosophy (age 24) at the University of Michigan-Ann Arbor (1884-1888), Dewey met George Sylvester Morris; with Morris guidance Dewey completed his dissertation (now lost) focusing on psychology espoused by Emmanuel Kant (1724–1804), and further, by Max Weber (1864-1920) and Jean Piaget (1896-1980). Dewey replaced his Hegelian metaphysical understanding with a more naturalistic perception. It was at Johns Hopkins where Dewey also met Edward Alesworth Ross (1866-1951), whose academic history is both lauded and condemned as a proponent of social design. Leading the way in Dewey’s transformation of beliefs was William James (1892-1924). “James' The Principles of Psychology (1890) was one of the most influential books Dewey ever read, the basis of which focused on functionalism in psychology and pragmatism. James' theory of mind as ‘the objective, conscious process by which the organism and its environment become integrated,’ and his view ‘that organism and environment mutually determine each other, that thinking is simply a function of the interaction between the two, like breathing and walking,’ became central to Dewey's own views.” (Dykhuizen, 1973) Dewey’s brand of pragmatism has come to be associated with the naturalistic view that as he expressed as a continuum (seamlessness) between the philosophies of logic and the natural sciences. Dewey referred to his philosophy not as pragmatism, but as “instrumentalism” or “experimentalism,” which he held the belief that truth (small “t”) is an instrument used by human beings to solve their problems. Large “T” is the universal truth that may be revealed at the end of time. Since problems change, then so must truth ergo; since problems change, truth changes, and therefore reality is not eternal. Dewey wrote many articles and books throughout his life, his earliest works included: Psychology (1887) and My Pedagogic Creed (1897). With an overtly Hegelian emphasis Psychology became a commercial success but was heavily criticized by William James and other renowned educators of the time for its metaphysical basis. His second book, The School and Society (1889), was a collection of talks to parents of the University Elementary School together with some previously published essays. Dewey’s most enduring writing came in 1901 with The Child and the Curriculum in which his theories and beliefs toward education are best described: The theoretical gap between child-centered and subject-centered curriculum is due to failure to recognize interaction between child and curriculum. Emphasis on need for "studies" to be “psychologized“ in order to be taught to children. Directions for growth found in child's own activities. Interests provide leverage for growth. Teacher's job to select appropriate stimuli to bring out desired interests and impulses. Students MUST experience in order to learn. Tendency to use "interest" extrinsically rather than intrinsically criticized. Dewey’s books on education also include: Democracy and Education: An Introduction to the Philosophy of Education (1916); How We Think: A Restatement of the Relation of Reflective Thinking to the Educative Process (1933); and, Experience and Education (1938). John Dewey: Education in China Dewey arrived in Shanghai the day before the New Culture Movement erupted in the streets, May 3, 1919. The following day, May 4th was marked by student demonstrations in Beijing. Working class people began expressing their frustrations over the powerlessness and corruption of the Republican government, foreign extraterritoriality, and the failure to reunited Shandong Province (home of Confucius) through the Treaty of Versailles following WWI. Though the common people felt they had sacrificed in the war effort right to the province was taken from Germany and awarded to Japan, not China. At the same time frustration toward China’s imperialists grew; public opinion swayed toward Marxist philosophy as Russians plunged into violent revolt against their government. During the following 2 year and 2 month period, Dewey toured and lectured in Japan and China. He spoke from some 78 different podiums to audiences, some in series of 15-20 times (Keenen, p. 30-31) and brought with him his views of teaching, learning, and democracy. In his in 1899 book titled School and Society, Dewey wrote “Democracy has to be born anew every generation, and education is its midwife.” Dewey’s views have dramatically altered education philosophy in China and opened the door to a melding of East and West not to be undone by time or political change. “Today, there are people who claim Dewey was not an adult education theorist. That was not how it appeared in 1920s China, where he claimed that teachers and learners should be on an equal footing: Teachers should consider themselves learners. The context for learning was important, and education and democracy were inextricably linked. Dewey had an immense impact on all forms of Chinese education and, in the minds of leading comparativists (e.g., Gu, 2001), reinforced reformist impulses of the May Fourth (1919) science and democracy movement.” (Mitter, 2004; as cited in Boshier and Yan, 2007) A brief discourse on manual education v. social studies As the Industrial Era grew out of competition toward and fear of growing military power taking place in Germany, education began a slow sway toward correcting the inefficiencies of manual education, the arts and crafts model of training brought to America through Solyd schools, designed by Uno Cynaeous and Otto Salomon, gave way to industry demands and a wave of immigrants more eager to work in sweat shops to earn a living than to sit in cold barren classrooms. The Russian education model demonstrated by Victor Della Voss, of the Moscow Imperial Technology School, at the Philadelphia Centennial Exposition of 1876 impressed top American educators including John O. Runkle, president of Massachusetts Institute of Technology and professor of mathematics and Calvin M. Woodward, dean of the Polytechnic faculty at Washington University in St. Louis. The two found a way of meeting the needs of industry and filling the desires of the working class with school to work programs of curriculum. A great many of the philosophies addressing vocational (career development) and arts (including development of the whole child) developed in the early 1900’s overlap and are interwoven. Smith-Hughes National Vocational Education Act of 1917 established funding for vocational education but also requiring states to set up boards, essentially creating a divide between vocational education and the general curriculum. The next great leaps in advancement toward the current state of education in America did not take place until the President Truman’s Higher Education for American Democracy report (Truman Commission Report) in 1947 following WWII, preceding the Russian launch of the satellite Sputnik (1957); A Nation at Risk: The Imperative For Educational Reform, President Ronald Reagan’s commissioned report conducted in 1983, and President George W. Bush's, A Test of Leadership, sometimes referred to as the Spellings Report (2005) impact changes marking differences between the subtle origins of education and it’ latest shape Annotated Bibliography The following annotated bibliography focuses on vocational, technical, and general academic instruction; development of morals and values as espoused by major contributors to education in Asia, Russia, Europe and America during a span of history from 551 B.C.E. to1949 C.E. The primary theorists to be examined are Confucius (Confucianism) and John Dewey (pragmatism/experimentalism). These books and articles annotated are not intended to present an entire picture of design purpose and implementation, however, will focus on industrial arts/technology education (IA/TE) and general education (GE), shown in path from their originators of theory (industrial focused and whole child development) at their earliest conception, systemic divides of ideology, and more recently attempts at compromises in goals. The purpose behind annotating these particular texts is to identify and acknowledge the intellectual genealogy of inter-related theories and the process of synthesis that make current prevailing philosophies and practices possible. A few other relevant contributors to the theories of Confucius and John Dewey can be referred to including: Mencius, Ssu-ma T’an (Sima T’an) and Ssu-ma Chi’en (Sima Qian), Victor della Vos, Uno Cygnaeus, Otto Salomon, Charles Darwin, Johann Heinrich Pestalozzi, Friedrich Froebel, Karl Marx, William James, Hu Shi, Frederick Gordon Bonser, Charles Sanders Peirce, W.E. B. Du Bois, Bertrand Russell, Anna "Lois" Coffey Mossman, and Evelyn Dewey (The Dalton Laboratory Plan). Competing theorist and advocates in America include: Friedrich W. Taylor (Taylorism), David Samuel Snedden (1868-1951), William Heard Kilpatrick, and E. L. Thorndike (The Project Method). Noteworthy domestic and world events, politics and legislation, affecting vocational, technical, adult education and general studies have taken place during decisive and/or affecting periods of change in dominant education philosophies. In chronological order the list includes: the Open Door Policy (China, 1839-1979), Taiping Rebellion (China, 1850-64), the 1876 Centennial-Philadelphia, the Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882, the Boxer Rebellion (China, 1898-1901), collapse of Imperial China (1911) World War I (1914-18), Treaty of Versailles (1919), Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere (Japan, 1940), Tripartite Agreement (Japan, Italy, Germany, 1940), World War II (1939-45), the Yalta Agreement (1945), and establishment of the People’s Republic of China (1949). Dewey, John. (1916). Democracy and education: An introduction to the philosophy of education. Retrieved from http://www.gutenberg.org/files/852/852-h/852-h.htm Written in 1916, Democracy and Education is encompassed in Dewey’s “Middle Years” of studies (1899 – 1924) which formed the principle basis of all his later works. Within Democracy and Education Dewey’s foundation of understanding of Charles Darwin’ Origin of the Species clearly comes out, publicly replacing his earlier Hegelian metaphysical understanding with more naturalistic metaphysics toward the purposes of education as it relates to society as a whole. Dewey’ understanding of psychology, part that previously derived from William James and his book The Principles of Psychology (1890), and other related influences, form the basis of text describing functionalism in psychology and pragmatism. Dewey’s outspokenness at the time toward the U.S. entering World War I drew wide criticism of this work and his personal life as well as praise among academies. Dewey’s beliefs the education were key to a democratic society based on the premise that democracy was a symptom of a free society; that education and the ability to make wise decisions enable people to remain free. In his statement, “Democracy must be reborn with every generation and education is the midwife.”(p. 81, 87), Dewey sums up the importance of having school classrooms free from the influenced of industrialization, and focused on the moral, ethical, and spiritual development of youth as was as the intellectual. Ebrey, Patricia B., Walthall, Anne & Palais, James B. (2006). East Asia: A cultural, social, and political history. Boston, MA: Houghton-Mifflin Co. Ebrey is standard text in many graduate and post-graduate college courses presenting study of Asia that geographically includes: China, Japan, Korea, India, Mongolia, Tibet and surrounding nations that have exchanged people and culture. East Asia is considered a standard of excellence and accuracy in names, dates, timetables, places and events. Ebrey chronicles the earliest records including the rise and fall of families, tribes, groups, villages, cities, and nations. Superstitions, beliefs, inventions, and enduring philosophies that grew and have held for centuries, faded and dissolved, leaders, proponents and detractors are brought to life, as well as groups that followed or opposed one another. Formations of cultures, lifestyles, customs, traditions, mythic and real leaders of people living in Asia from the largest of present-day groups (the Han) to the smallest cultures of this area of the world are presented in facts and figures, maps, drawings, photographs, charts and tables. Fengzhen, Yang (2002). Education in China. Educational Philosophy & Theory. 34(2), 135-144. doi: 10.1080/00131850120102204. Mr. Yang provides a comprehensive view of China’s education system, detailing the demographics of the student population, numbers of schools available in each grade level, and disbursements between urban and rural locations. The general goals of each level of education from primary to secondary and continuing education are explained as well as China’s National College Entrance Examination. At present all students receive 9-year compulsory education. This essay explores China’s advances in school diversification, opening the doors to privatized schools, in response to changes in the economy and demand for of country’s labor needs. Yang explains in detail the reform system China is undertaking to improve education at the primary and secondary levels in the attempt to broaden student knowledge from a system with narrowly tracks students from beginning to employment. According to Yang, China is making use of advances and improvement in technology to balance the economies of various regions of the country through long-distance learning. Yang gives little attention is given to how well the system is working, the attitudes of school administration and teacher acceptance of the reforms and if students are benefiting from the new system. Yang is not clear the goals are of changing methods of education delivery, including the grading systems, will raise the basic education level of all students above 9th grade. This article provides a broad general view of China’s education systems and social demands for improvement. The author is thorough in providing a view of complex issues that need to be resolved and approaches that are being undertaken to address those issues. Education in China could be considered a good starting point for researching in further detail each issue, their value in terms of comparing to other successful education methods and prioritizing efforts being made. Keenan, Berry (1977). The Dewey experiment in China: Education reform and political power in the early republic. Cambridge. MA: Counsel of East Asia Studies-Harvard University Press. Keenan’s book began as a dissertation for Clarement Graduate School and received support in publishing from notables at Columbia College, where John Dewey taught from 1904 at both the University and Teachers College until his death in 1952, and the East Asian Research Center at Harvard University. Keenan chronicles the circumstances that brought students to the Teacher College from China, their stories while receiving an education and in return to invite Dewey to lecture in China, at the crest of civil unrest and inevitable change in the nation’ educational policies. Presented are the motives and passions of Dewey’s students and supporters and those who opposed his philosophies of education and democracy. The book describes in vivid detail the crossroads major institutions and their leaders faced in protecting and preserving traditional culture and advancing the cause of moving the nation forward in social progress. Keenan projects the detail in China’s emergence on the world stage of politics; learning while struggling to address issues of competing internal and external forces. The Communist government formed in 1949 rejected much of what Dewey taught due to it’ representing Western influence, but not before academia was able to absorb and proceed the application of what was taught during the brief period of history. Kirkwood, James J., Foster, Patrick N. & Bartow, Sue M. (1994, fall). Historical leaders in technological education philosophy. Journal of Industrial Technological Education, 32(1). Retrieved from http://scholar.lib.vt.edu/ejournals/JITE/v32n1/Kirkwood.html Historical Leaders in Technological Education Philosophy is a comparative report of a two related studies taking place in 1983 and 1993. The purpose of the earlier Master’s thesis study was to determine through questionnaire survey, among highly qualified educators, prevailing perceptions toward which educators, in each of three time periods, had the greatest influence on technological arts education. The principle author of the earlier study (Bartow, Sue M.) also participated in the later study. The second study was conducted to either validate or disprove any consistency in the earlier findings. The time span considered in both studies was broken down into three frames: 1900-1925, a time approximately covering the beginning of the industrial arts period; 1917-1957, the passage of the Smith-Hughes Act of 1917 to the Russian launch of the space satellite Sputnik; and, 1957-to 1983, debatably the beginning of the science and technology era. Among a vast array of theorist with complimentary and diverging views, four were consistently reported most influential on the course of education philosophy generally implemented in U.S. schools: John Dewey (1859-1952), Frederich G. Bonser (1875-1931), Donald Maley (1918-1993), and William E. Warner (1897-1971). Although this report was presented 17 years ago (from this time, 2010), it’ contents have historical value in describing who renowned educators considered the most influential theologians during earlier times. A similar research study perhaps conducted in 2003 or later, might show lasting or more pervasive influence, or shifts toward wide-spread following of philosophic influence by more current theorists. Labaree, David F. (2010, January). How Dewey lost: The victory of David Snedden and social efficiency in the reform of American education. Centro Stefano, Franscini, Monte Verità, a revised version of a paper presented at the conference on Pragmatism as the Recitle of Modernization: Concepts, Contexts, Critiques, Ascona, Switzerland, September 2008. In summary, How Dewey Lost is a concise and detailed description of the circumstances and debates between David Snedden, a man virtually lost from history text, and John Dewey (1859-1952) who’ influence is considered among the greatest in education studies. The term “lost” in the context used refers to the debates culminated in passage of the Smith-Hughes Act of 1917, thereby establishing vocational education boards and funding for worker training programs. Passage of the act symbolizes and firmly established separation of education philosophies during the early 20th century of Progressivism in education. Snedden, who is more thoroughly investigated for this report due to his relative obscurity now, represented “administrative progressivism” or the “social efficiency movement” envisioned education as a vehicle for dividing and training future industrial leaders into separate schools from ones being trained as workers, creating a stratified nation-wide education system. Dewey, represented “pedagogical progressivism” focused on development of child-centered curriculum that brings out the natural talents of individuals, a movement influenced by individuals including Jean-Jaques Rosseau,, Friedrich Froebel, Hienrich Pestalozzi, and John Hebert. This investigation reveals the character and moral values of David Snedden, rarely encountered in education instruction texts. Snedden a man educated at Stanford University (where his strongest relationship was with Edward A. Ross) and taught at Columbia Teachers College rose to prominence as a result of the debates, chronicled through publication in the New Republic magazine. Following passage of the Smith-Hughes legislation Snedden went on the become Commissioner of Education for the State of Massachusetts to attempt enacting his vision of education. In a footnote by the author, “Kliebard puts it this way: Relentlessly, Snedden pursued to their most far-reaching conclusions the doctrine of social efficiency and the extension of principles of vocational education to the curriculum as a whole. The question of his actual influence is moot; what his work illustrates is his ability not to transform or transcend the direction the curriculum was taking in his time but to articulate and epitomize it. (Kliebard, 1999, p. 122)” Sim, May (2009). Dewey and Confucius: On moral education. Journal of Chinese Philosophy: Special Issue on Chinese Philosophy and American Pragmatism, 36(1), 3-8 & 85-105. Retrieved from http://college.holycross.edu/faculty/msim/#research According to Sim, although in consistent agreement on significant issues including the importance of education, and insistence on “radical entwinement of ethics and politics” (p. 90), Dewey and Confucius mirror one another in philosophies; on issues of morality beliefs vary widely. The nature of government in Dewey’s beliefs is best founded on democracy, empowerment of individuals to set their own direction and adapt to changes in social structure, whereas Confucianism follows a fixed structure, a hierarchy of responsibilities to an exemplary individual, rule by a “virtuous emperor” (p. 89) Where Dewey might find Confucius’ philosophies burdened with structure and ritual, is own are least restrictive toward “growth and development” as phrase Dewey uses often in his writing. Confucius on the other hand might find Dewey-ians filled with petty concerns regarding money and economic, and self-absorbed in “self-reconstruction” (p.91). Confucius places great emphasis on harmony (attitude and intention) toward heaven (Li); Dewey, in turn, holds that multiple social relations are prerequisite to human development. Confucius and John Dewey are greatly referred to as world leaders in education philosophy. Although Confucius traveled extensively within China he never left his home country. He held discourse with leaders of fiefdoms, friendly, and war lord factions of government on all social related issues. Dewey’ travel lectures and writing include visits to Japan, China, Russia, Turkey and Mexico where he spoke not only on education but also on politics and religion, social issues Comparison of the two is essential to understanding education philosophies that cross nation-state borders and intra-cultural issues. This essay refines ground work set by David L. Hall and Roger T. Ames’ book Thinking through Confucius. (1987), primary and secondary sources of information to Confucius, and John Dewey, and Sim’s own previously published work. Taniguchi, Stacy T. (2004). Outdoor education and meaningful learning: Finding the attributes of meaningful learning experiences in an outdoor education program. (Doctoral dissertation). Available from ProQuest document ID: 765938011 Tanaguchi isolates the problem of identifying the common attributes of meaningful experience through conducting a qualitative study. Works of John Dewey including: Democracy and education (1916), Reconstruction in philosophy (1920), Experience and education (1938), The quest for certainty: A study of the relation of knowledge and action (1960) are cited throughout the dissertation as sources for the pragmatic view that a learner must be reflective and the experience must be meaningful to truly be educative. However as the author notes, reflective experience does not necessarily correlate with meaningful experiences. In an effort to address the problem the author digresses to ask a more fundamental question. What constitutes a meaningful experience? The method of study used to address the research question is demonstrated phenomenological (according to the theory presented by Vygotsky, (1978). Taniguchi’ understanding that to search for a common definition of what constitutes meaningful experience researchers/reflective learners must have a common definition of terms used to communicate. The method of surveying used was a mixed method of scripted interviews and data responses to questions. Following the conclusion of data collection, a sample of study participants was asked to review interpretations of their responses to confirm validity. According to the researcher, five major themes of meaningful learning experiences developed from the analysis of this research study each manifesting in sequence: awkwardness, fractional sublimation, reconstruction, and growth. “Each of these themes was redundant for those participants who found meaningful learning experiences from the outdoor activities identified in this study.” This study has implications for educators seeking to develop activities which produce meaningful experiences for students in keeping with the theory goals of Dewey (1916) and Posner (2003). References: Anderson, Theo (2007). One hundred years of pragmatism. Wilson Quarterly, 2(27). Retrieved from http://www.chinesepen.org/english/News/ArticlasAndNews/200710/english_11429.html Asia in the Schools: Preparing Young American for Today’s Interconnected World, A Report Prepared for the National Commission on Asia in the Schools, (June 2001), New York, NY: The Asia Society. Asia Society Business Roundtable Council of Chief State School Officers (2005, September) Education in China: Lessons for U.S. Educators, New York, NY. Retrieved from http://www.asiasociety.org/files/EdinChina2005.pdf Bonnie, Michael G. (2009). Knowledge Area Module 1: SBSF-7100-principles of organizational and social systems. Available from ERIC. Accession Number: ED505777 Bosner, Frederich G. (1921). The Elementary School Curriculum. Norwood Press, J.S. Cushing Co., Norwood, MA. Retrieved from http://www.archive.org/details/cu31924013402148 Boshier, Roger and Huang, Yan (2007). The untold story of "foreign evil" adult educators in Shanghai silk factories (1920 to 1949). Adult Education Quarterly, 57(4), 329-345. Univ. of British Columbia, Vancouver, Canada. Retrieved from EBSCOhost: Accession Number: 26049761 Brittain, Carrie-Ann (Fall 2003). Educational Sloyd. A class project by Dr. William Waite's TED 502 Graduate Class. SUNY at Oswego-Dept. of Technology. 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