In one journal response this week I spoke about the “primacy of self discovery” (an EL Education design principle), as well as the “having of wonderful ideas” (EL). I reflected on how these two principles were present in my own education and how they had influenced me from the beginning. In the class-reading authored by John Dewey, I delved deeper into the role of education in society as a whole: Dewey is very much concerned with the role of education as the “fundamental method of social progress and reform” (Dewey 99). Despite Dewey’s long-windedness and rather roundabout manner, I found a great deal of insight in his text concerning the real importance of education and the process of learning. Something that I found particularly interesting was the way in which Dewey saw social life as the “basis of concentration” in a child’s development, and that education must be shaped accordingly.

It seems to me that the nature of education today seems to (at times) disregard this essential realization of Dewey’s regarding the social life of the child. Especially in curricula that stress the importance of STEM, or analytical thinking, the importance of social life is lost. This is why the study and production of literature is so essential to the formation of any child: “literature is the reflex expression and interpretation of social experience” (Dewey 96).

The unification of experience that literature provides the developing child with has been one of the most important aspects of my own educational experience. Literature was for me the most essential part of my education, being my hobby and favorite subject. Realizing the importance of literature to the development of a child is not surprising to me in the slightest, as I saw the production and study of literature as the most important academic venture that could be undertaken. This is part of why I am thinking about making an expeditionary program geared toward literature and poetry.