SCIENCE AND THE ABILITY TO THINK
this is a chapter from Renner's book (renner was leyden's teacher one summer in oklahoma). In the Piaget optional module you can read another chapter from this book -- "the child." I've edited bits and pieces.
Most American citizens spend the majority of their first 18 years in school. Within the last thirty years, the number of persons seeking education beyond the twelfth grade has sharply increased. But not only is the amount of time which our citizen devote to education increasing, the amount of material resources which are poured into the nation's schools is also rapidly rising. The fields of publishing, film production and equipment, and apparatus manufacture are but areas that depend heavily on "the school business" either partially or completely for their existence, The teaching population represents one of the largest common interest groups in our country and the common professional organization for teachers, the National Education Association, is the largest professional organization in the world.

Leyden note: you will be in "the labor movement" as a teacher

When all of these facts are examined, there can be no doubt. that the. American educational enterprise constitutes a major concern. of the citizenry of the United States. So important is that enterprise that those within the profession must consistently address themselves to the question.

"Why do we have schools?"

because only if the responsibilities ponsibilities of schools are examined from within the profession can a course of action for continuance of a program or a change in purpose and or direction be implemented. What, then, is the purpose (or purposes) for having schools?"

A determined group of English settlers arrived on the eastern shores of this country in 1620. There is no doubt that informal and neighborhood education went on during those years immediately after the Pilgrims landed, and the first elementary school was opened in New York (Nieuw Amsterdam) in 1638. In 1642 what is now the state of Massachusetts passed the first law in the Western Hemisphere which required that children be taught to read and write. In 1647 Massachusetts required every town of over fifty families to establish a school to accomplish the task of teaching children to read and write. The first residents of this country were a very religious group, and the law of 1647 is often called the "Old Deluder, Satan" law. It was so named because these early American citizens felt that if children could read he Bible, they would be better equipped to cope with that "Old Deluder, Satan."

If you were to trace the historical development of the American public school, you would find that many of the laws and customs which have shaped it have been no more a part of a general educational scheme than was the Old Deluder law. The history of American education also reveals that many important educational decisions were based on expediency rather than on a sound, farsighted educational philosophy. But as the National Science Foundation director has stated: "Today's education must now be geared to the needs of the individual throughout his life, as he lives it in a changing, science-based society." Perhaps the pressures on society in the early centuries of this country were not as great as they are today. But regardless of the reason, the schools of this country have not been built to serve the future; they have evolved to suit the present. John W. Gardner saysis that we can no longer afford the luxury of not knowing where our schools are headed. We must know in what direction we are going and, what is more important, why we are headed there. In short, we must know what the purposes of American education are.

We can not simply evaluate the effectiveness of our schools by judging how the capabilities of our children compared to those of children of the same age a century ago or in another country. We must educate our children not only to live in a science-based, rapidly-changing society, but a society in which each person bears the responsibility of government by the people. Does this not make the purposes of American education somewhat unique?

p37 Communality in Education Whatever educational direction we choose, that direction leads us toward the mental, physical, and social development of the learner. If these three types of development are examined, it will be seen that they are not mutually exclusive.

Suppose, for example, that we make the assumption that the child's physical development can proceed independently. Under the authority of the school and teacher, the child can be made to perform the type of exercise and eat the kind of food that will provide him with a reasonably healthy body (assuming, of course, that his body does not have- organic defects). If, however, he does not develop an understanding of and proper mental attitude toward physical health, what he does outside the school environment can detract from, if not completely frustrate, the attempt of the school to develop him into a sound physical specimen. An even more serious consideration is what will become of this learner when he has completed his education or reaches a point in that experience where physical activity and education are no longer demanded by the school. If during his education the learner has not developed a reasoned approach toward physical fitness, when he is left to make his own decisions his body is likely to suffer.

A type of logic identical with the foregoing can be applied to the social development of children. Teachers and schools can impose a definite code of behavior upon pupils and enforce that code (heteronomy). Or, in other words, children can be made to conform to behavior standards that are not their own. Frequently the quiet classroom is thought of as being the classroom where children are learning and have learned to get along with their peers. In many cases the only reason that the classroom is quiet and children are not having severe differences of opinion is that the teacher will not permit it. Learners in a situation such as this have not been allowed to develop an understanding of or a mental attitude toward the importance of living with other people. -- When these young citizens leave the schools, they lose the behavior standards they have been living by, and the insecurity that accompanies such an event often causes severe problems. And why shouldn't problems develop? These learners must now provide themselves with a basic mental attitude which should have been developed in school; they must now develop an understanding of what they must do for their fellow human beings in order to be treated as they wish to be treated. From a series of non supervised learning experiences (often painful and sometimes fatal EXPLORATION LESSONS) these young members of society collect information (data) that will ultimately enable most of them to develop behavior patterns, based upon reason, that are not offensive to society. The crime rate among young adults is evidence that not all of them develop such reasoned behavior.

---- The concept of mental capacity, the mind has to be developed, in education is "not unlike that of a keystone in an arch: the whole structure depends upon it; remove it and all collapses."

We can, therefore, conclude that regardless of the educational direction we select, we will be abruptly confronted with the inescapable truism that any educational process must be directly concerned with the mental development of the learner and how this mental development must take place. And on this latter point, the conduct of an individual's mental development, there is a wide divergence of opinion because "not everyone agrees on the basic nature and function of the mind."

What is the mind and how does it function?

The first part of that question, what is the mind, is a very broad, philosophical, and in many respects, theological question that is clearly beyond the scope of this work. Our purpose here is to develop an understanding of the function schools are to perform. and we have seen that function is clearly tied to the notions of mental development. Clearly, then, our attention must be confined to the latter part of the intr