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We are the sum of our experiences, therefore unique.

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Music is learned through school due to its complex system.

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Musicing to understand

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Aesthetic Education

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Five Processes

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Estelle and changing the future of Music Education

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Project MUSE - Transforming Music Education (review)

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The resegregation of schools, the "back to basics" movement, and public apathy about education are other indicators that transformation is needed. If these reasons are not enough, Jorgensen states that ongoing renewal will always be a necessity for education.

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Reimer's influence

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Aesthetic Music Education and the Influence of Bennett Reimer Research Paper Example

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An explicit concept since the late 1950s, aesthetic education first developed to provide a strong philosophical foundation for music education and continues to evolve as a solid theoretical orientation for current effective practices. Bennett Reimer has contributed much to the discussion and development of the value of aesthetic education for the teaching and learning of...

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He wasn't a musician, so why he's important? This is why

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Home Philosophy & Religion Philosophers
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Where was John Dewey educated?

How did John Dewey impact the world?

John Dewey (born October 20, 1859, Burlington, Vermont, U.S.-died June 1, 1952, New York, New York) was an American philosopher and educator who was a cofounder of the philosophical movement known as pragmatism, a pioneer in functional psychology, an innovative theorist of democracy, and a leader of the progressive movement in education in the United States.

Dewey graduated with a bachelor's degree from the University of Vermont in 1879. After receiving a doctorate in philosophy from Johns Hopkins University in 1884, he began teaching philosophy and psychology at the University of Michigan. There his interests gradually shifted from the philosophy of Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel to the new experimental psychology being advanced in the United States by G. Stanley Hall and the pragmatist philosopher and psychologist William James. Further study of child psychology prompted Dewey to develop a philosophy of education that would meet the needs of a changing democratic society. In 1894 he joined the faculty of philosophy at the University of Chicago, where he further developed his progressive pedagogy in the university's Laboratory Schools. In 1904 Dewey left Chicago for Columbia University in New York City, where he spent the majority of his career and wrote his most famous philosophical work, Experience and Nature (1925). His subsequent writing, which included articles in popular periodicals, treated topics in aesthetics, politics, and religion. The common theme underlying Dewey's philosophy was his belief that a democratic society of informed and engaged inquirers was the best means of promoting human interests.

In order to develop and articulate his philosophical system, Dewey first needed to expose what he regarded as the flaws of the existing tradition. He believed that the distinguishing feature of Western philosophy was its assumption that true being-that which is fully real or fully knowable-is changeless, perfect, and eternal and the source of whatever reality the world of experience may possess. Plato's forms (abstract entities corresponding to the properties of particular things) and the Christian conception of God were two examples of such a static, pure, and transcendent being, compared with which anything that undergoes change is imperfect and less real. According to one modern version of the assumption, developed by the 17th-century philosopher René Descartes, all experience is subjective, an exclusively mental phenomenon that cannot provide evidence of the existence or the nature of the physical world, the "matter" of which is ultimately nothing more than changeless extension in motion. The Western tradition thus made a radical distinction between true reality on the one hand and the endless varieties and variations of worldly human experience on the other.

Dewey held that this philosophy of nature was drastically impoverished. Rejecting any dualism between being and experience, he proposed that all things are subject to change and do change. There is no static being, and there is no changeless nature. Nor is experience purely subjective, because the human mind is itself part and parcel of nature. Human experiences are the outcomes of a range of interacting processes and are thus worldly events. The challenge to human life, therefore, is to determine how to live well with processes of change, not somehow to transcend them.

Nature and the construction of ends

Dewey developed a metaphysics that examined characteristics of nature that encompassed human experience but were either ignored by or misrepresented by more traditional philosophers. Three such characteristics-what he called the "precarious," "histories," and "ends"-were central to his philosophical project.

The precarious

For Dewey, a precarious event is one that somehow makes ongoing experience problematic; thus, any obstacle, disruption, danger, or surprise of any kind is precarious. As noted earlier, because humanity is a part of nature, all things that humans encounter in their daily experience, including other humans and the social institutions they inhabit, are natural events. The arbitrary cruelty of a tyrant or the kindness shown by a stranger is as natural and precarious as the destruction wrought by a flood or the vibrant colours of a sunset. Human ideas and moral norms must also be viewed in this way. Human knowledge is wholly intertwined with precarious, constantly changing nature.

The constancy of change does not imply a complete lack of continuity with the past stages of natural processes. What Dewey meant by a history was a process of change with an identifiable outcome. When the constituent processes of a history are identified, they become subject to modification, and their outcome can be deliberately varied and secured. Dewey's conception of a history has an obvious implication for humanity: no person's fate is sealed by an antecedently given human nature, temperament, character, talent, or social role. This is why Dewey was so concerned with developing a philosophy of education. With an appropriate knowledge of the conditions necessary for human growth, an individual may develop in any of a variety of ways. The object of education is thus to promote the fruition of an active history of a specific kind-a human history.

Ends and goods

Since at least the time of Aristotle (384-322 bce), many Western philosophers have made use of the notion of end, or final cause-i.e., a cause conceived of as a natural purpose or goal ( see teleology). In ethics, ends are the natural or consciously determined goals of moral actions; they are moral absolutes, such as happiness or "the good," that human actions are designed to bring about. But such ends must be discerned before they can be fully attained. For Dewey, on the other hand, an end is a deliberately constructed outcome of a history. Hence, his expression "the construction of good" encapsulates much of the significance of his philosophy. A person confronted by a spontaneous intrusion of the precarious world into the seemingly steady course of his life will identify and analyze the constituents of his particular situation and then consider what changes he might introduce in order to produce, in Dewey's parlance, a "consummatory" end. Such an end is a fulfillment of these particular conditions, and it is unique to them. Similarly, there is no such thing as an absolute good against which actions may be evaluated; rather, any constructed end that promotes human flourishing while taking into account the precarious is a good.

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John Dewey | Biography, Philosophy, Pragmatism, & Education

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John Dewey, American philosopher and educator who was a cofounder of the philosophical movement known as pragmatism, a pioneer in functional psychology, an innovative theorist of democracy, and a leader of the progressive movement in education in the United States.

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Musicing and Praxial

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What is the praxial philosophy of music education? Very briefly, the praxial philosophy offers an explanation of the nature and values of music. Based on this foundation, I go on to explain the nature and values of music education.

I suggest that "multidimensional" captures the essence of this philosophy. In Music Matters I argue for a multidimensional concept of music and musical works, a multidimensional concept of musical understanding, a multidimensional concept of music's values in human life and a multiple approach to achieving these values. How? In short, by developing the musicianship of all music students ('general' music students and others) through the critically reflective and codependent actions of: performing-and-listening, improvising-and-listening, composing-and-listening, arranging-and-listening and conducting-and-listening. For the reasons I explain in Music Matters I suggest that music making (of all kinds) - and, of course, the rich kind of music listening required to make music well - should be at the center of the music curriculum.

Recorded music and "talk" about music have an important place in music teaching and learning (but not the central place). Recordings and information about music should be included in music teaching situations in such a way that they weave continuously in and out of a teacher's ongoing efforts to teach students how to listen intelligently and make music well (to perform and improvise music and, whenever possible, to compose, arrange and conduct music).

I propose, also, that developing our students' musical creativity (in all forms of music making) overlaps and extends the process of developing our students' musicianship.

In summary, the praxial philosophy urges a comprehensive and reflective approach to music teaching and learning. It is based on detailed arguments for the view that: (a) musical works involve many kinds of meanings; (b) "musical understanding" involves many closely related kinds of thinking and knowing; and (c) that the significance of music in human life can be explained in terms of many important "life values."

Accordingly, the aims of music education include the development of critically reflective listeners and musical amateurs who possess the understanding and motivation to give music an important place in their lives and the lives of others in their communities.

This philosophy recommends, further, that to achieve the values of music, music teachers ought to emphasize the interpretive nature of music as a performing and improvising art and that composing, arranging and conducting (all of which demand keen listening) should be taught frequently (and in direct relation) to a reasonable diversity of Musics (genres, or musical practices) during the course of our students' musical education.

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What is the praxial philosophy of music education? Very briefly, the praxial philosophy offers an explanation of the nature and values of music. Based on this foundation, I go on to explain the nature and values of music education. I suggest that "multidimensional" captures the essence of this philosophy.

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A little about Keith