Progressive Learning

Introducing

Progressive Education

Junior High & Middle School

By : Nicole Barkley

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What is Progressive Education?

Progressive Education is based on the principle, espoused by John Dewey and others, that education must prepare students for active participation in democratic, global society. Thus the focus is on raising critcal thinkers and inquirers who are active rather than passive learners.

Progressivist Educators

• Are outcome focused and don't simply impart learned facts.
• Teachers are less concerned with passing on existing culture
• Teachers strive to allow students to develop an individual appraoch to tasks provided to them

What a Progressive Classroom Might Look Like

John Dewey

Proposed that people learn best by social interaction and problem-solving

Developed the scientific method of problem solving and experimentalism

As a result of the varied opinions emerging from the movement -

Progressivism was not developed in a formalized, documented educational philosophy

Progressivists did want to move away from certain characteristics of traditional schools

Jean Jacques Rousseau

Supported education in nature

• Away from the city and the influences of civilization
• Exploring the child's interests as opposed to a written set of guidelines
• Rousseau maintained that people are good by nature and that society is responsible for corrupting them.

Common Sights in the Progressive Classroom

The Progressive Classroom

• Small Groups Debating
• Custom-made activities
• Learning stations

• Is about exploration and experience
• Teachers act as facilitators in a classroom
• Students explore physical, mental, moral, and social growth

A need for Junior High & Middle school

The need for a bridge between elementary and high school became apparent as the high school developed into a 4- year institution and the courses taught there became more standardized in content.

High School teachers and administrators asked for basic preparation in algebra and English before high school.

G. Stanley Hall began recognizing a period of like call adolescence and acknowledging that adolescence was different from childhood. This new viewpoint led to a change in the configuration of schools.

A shift in schools

New Configuration in Schools

• Elementary schools shifted from eight grades to five or six.
• The remaining 2-3 grades became junior high schools.
• Later in the century, junior high most frequently encompassed grades 7-9.

The Middle School

In the 1960s, another concept of schooling was formed to meet the unique needs of young adolescents: The Middle School. Rather than videwing grades 5-8 or 6-8 as merely a time of preparation for high school, middle school philosophy called for regonition of the unique developmental qualities of young adolescents and use of developmental appropriatness in the school, in both curriculum and instruction.

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