PRAGMATISM

Submitted by:
Salazar, Ruth, A.

EDFD 241 (51392 Thu 2:30-5:30 PM)


1st Semester, AY 2019-2020
Prof. Abigail Thea O. Canuto

October 26, 2019

Introduction

Pragmatism is also called Instrumentalism or Functionalism because it impacts on

"learning by doing" or Experimentalism due to "learning by experience." The word
"pragma" was derived from the Greek word which means "practice" or "action." Thus,
pragmatism means activity, work done or to make or to accomplish. (Thayer and
Rosenthal, 2017)

Pragmatism is a philosophical way of looking at the world. It challenged the traditional

philosophical assumptions of a completed and perfect universe that could be
approached through metaphysical speculation into the nature of ultimate reality. (Gutek,
2011)

Pragmatists would reject the philosophical security provided by absolute truth and
values. Instead, they saw the world as pluralistic, tentative, open, and changing. Human
beings were engaged in interactions with the environment and in relationships with each
other that were flexible, malleable, and always in need of reappraisal and readjustment.
These philosophers saw ideas not as the reflection of ultimate and unalterable truths as
the Platonic and Hegelian idealists professed but rather as instruments, or hypotheses,
arrived at by humans, to be derived, acted on, and tested in the reality of experience.
(Gutek, 2011)

I. The Three Pragmatists

Charles Peirce
Charles Peirce (1839 - 1914) was a mathematician-turned-philosopher developed
"pragmatism." For us to make sense of the ever-changing world, he advised that we use
probability. Since certain actions bring about reactions in a way that can be counted, it is
probable that such reactions will occur in the future. However, it is necessary to
understand that actions and reactions never occur in exactly the same way. Our
knowledge about something is probable and tentative rather than certain. However

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probability provides us with a sense of intelligent direction and possible action. With
enough work, investigation, and thought, it is possible that we can formulate tentative
generalizations, never ironclad laws, about how the world works. (Gutek, 2011)

The Pragmatic Maxim

According to Peirce, the Pragmatic Maxim enabled a higher ("third") grade of clarity, that
supplemented the verbal definition with a description of how the concept is employed in
practice. (McDermid, 2019)

In order to have a full understanding of a certain concept, we must not only be familiar
with it but also be able to offer a definition of it. We must also know what effects to
expect from holding that concept to be true. The pragmatic maxim is also inclined
towards the scientific, as it explains the concept towards a higher grade of clarity. (Atkin
2019)

Peirce identifies three grades of clarity or understanding. One of the examples given
was the vinegar. At the first grade of clarity, one knows it is diluted acetic acid or it is
sharp to taste. The next higher level of understanding is when one knows what will
happen if certain condition is applied. For example, if litmus paper is dipped into the
vinegar, then it will turn that paper red (a reaction of acid to litmus paper). However, the
pragmatic maxim came out with another explanation making it an expression of
meaning in terms of action or expectations. (Atkin, 2019)

William James
William James (1841 - 1910) was a psychologist-turned-philosopher regarded ideas as
stimulated by the human need to choose between possible ways of acting in a situation.
Our beliefs give us rules that we can call good and true, right and wrong, while realizing
that we may and likely will keep revising the guidelines as we encounter different
situations in the course of life.

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Truth and Belief
The theory of meaning in Peirce's work becomes a theory of truth to James. (Atkin,
2019).

According to James, the “reality” with which truths must agree has three dimensions:
(1) matters of fact, (2) relations of ideas (such as the eternal truths of mathematics), and
(3) the entire set of other truths to which we are committed. To be able to say that our
truths must “agree” with such realities pragmatically, it means that they must lead us to
useful consequences. All existential truths as, in theory, revisable given new
experience. They involve a relationship between facts and our ideas or beliefs.
Because the facts, and our experience of them, change, we must beware of regarding
such truths as absolute. (Pomerleau, 2019)

All inquiry must terminate in belief or disbelief or doubt; disbelief is merely a negative
belief and doubt is the true opposite of both. Believing in anything involves conceiving
of it as somehow real; when we dismiss something as unreal (disbelief), it is typically
because it somehow contradicts what we think of as real. Some of our most
fundamental and valuable beliefs do not seem sufficiently justified to be regarded as
known. In his work, the "Sentiment of Rationality,” he identifies four postulates of
rationality as value-related, but unknowable (difficult to prove), matters of belief; these
are God, immortality, freedom, and moral duty. (Pomerleau, 2019)

John Dewey
John Dewey (1859 - 1952) was one of USA's most influential philosophers and
educators. He would be a witness to his country's transformation from predominantly
rural and agricultural economy and society to an industrial and technological one. He
would actively participate in the major social, economic, and political changes caused
by the progressive movement, the Great Depression, the New Deal, and the two world
wars. The United States would be a global power and locked in the Cold War with the
Soviet Union at the end of his life. (Gutek, 2011)

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Dewey grew up in a religious family that participated in their community in a small town
in Vermont, New England. He was able to develop the value of personal responsibility
for one's actions and a need to do good for others through social service. It was in this
community, with face-to-face town meeting, that shaped his emphasis on community's
role in forming social consciousness and participation. (Gutek, 2011)

II. John Dewey's Philosophy of Education

Dewey was a bright student but he would eventually develop his own philosophy of
education. He would reject the compartmentalized curriculum and emphasis on
recitations that he had experienced in elementary school in favor of experience-based
active learning. (Gutek, 2011)

Through the study of philosophy, it led him to the works of Hegel, Kant, and Schelling.
Hegel, an Idealist, played a major influence to Dewey about the Absolute Mind, the Mind
of the Creator, with its perfect intelligence and rationality that gives order to a purposeful
world. The concept of change would also be of interest to Dewey. (Gutek, 2011)

Eventually, he would abandon idealism to create his own experimental version of

pragmatism. As a naturalist and pragmatist, he discounted Hegel's Absolute as an entity
that was unverifiable in human experience. He also rejected Hegel's view that change
was directed to an inevitable, predetermined, ultimate goal. Rather, change for him was
a process of interactions produced by the human connection to the natural and social
environments.

Dewey rejected the concept of growth coming from internal spiritual forces within the
child; growth was a process in which the child interacted and responded to the
environment. His concept of a great society was one in which private interests would be
absorbed in the good of the community based on mutual and reciprocal shared
interests. (Gutek, 2011)

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Community, according to Dewey, would mean togetherness, collaboration, and sharing.
The need for a community was too important and meaningful for him. Thus, when he
developed his philosophical agenda, he incorporated a revitalized sense of community.
It was one that retained the essence of face-to-face sharing of the small town but placed
placed the modern community in the context of interdependency, industrialisation, and
technology. In this manner, the sense of community could be restored. (Gutek, 2011)

Dewey also looked to children to rebuild the community in a more complicated future.
He envisioned the school as a miniature society that would be the catalyst for creating a
new sense of community. The inheritance of the American past (the frontier,
individualism, and community), according to Dewey, were neither dead nor sacrosanct
relics that were never to change. Rather, they were concepts that could be
reconstructed to meet the needs of an ever-changing society. (Gutek, 2011)

He was highly interested in science and the scientific method. He was also influenced
by Darwin's theory of evolution, but rejected Spencer's interpretation -- human beings
locked in competitive struggle for survival. As a doctoral student in John Hopkins
University, the seminar method had a profound effect on Dewey, who came to see
education as the means of creating knowledge through inquiry rather than the
transmission of extant information. (Gutek, 2011)

Again, Dewey would develop his own philosophy, with his own ethics of cooperation and
shared community. He would also reconceptualize John Stuart Mill's ideas on the
individual into his own philosophy. According to Mill, the locus of freedom squarely
planted in the individual person, who was free to think and act as he or she wished to
the point that there was no injury to others. (Gutek, 2011)

Dewey had an opportunity to test his ideas on education in a school setting in 1896. He
established the University of Chicago Laboratory School, as an experimental setting to
test his ideas on child psychology and learning. This would be widely read in The
School and Society (1899). He called it "a miniature society," an "embryonic

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community," in which children learned collaboratively by working together to solve
problems. Through group-based learning, children developed their mutual relations and
learned to become participants in the larger society. The school was organized
according to activities that centered on the "methods of life," or human occupations, in
relationship to their social use. On the basis of these activities, children would be
brought gradually to subjects that arose from these activities. For example, the activities
of producing items, "making and doing," would lead to economics. Learning to
cooperate in democratic decision making would lead to citizenship and politics. Tested
educational theories validated by actual experience of teaching and learning could be
disseminated to a larger educational audience. Unfortunately, Dewey had
disagreements with the president (Harper) about the administration of the Lab School.
Dewey resigned in 1904. (Gutek, 2011)

Dewey accepted professorship in Columbia University's Department of Philosophy until

he retired in 1930. He was able to form close associations and friendships with
professors of education at the Teacher College. Several of these professors
incorporated Dewey's experimentalism into their own educational theories. For example,
William Heard Kilpatrick used Dewey's emphasis on problem solving as the basis of his
project method. John Child became an exponent of Dewey's pragmatism in his own
work in philosophy of education. George S. Counts incorporated Dewey's emphasis on
the reconstruction of experience into his philosophy of social reconstructionism. He also
encountered William C. Bagley and Isaac Kandel, who had reservations about some
aspects of Dewey's philosophy of education. The influence of the Teachers College
professors radiated outward from Columbia University throughout the United States and
even into the world. (Gutek, 2011)

The pragmatists asserted that the philosopher's genuine enterprise was to work to
define and solve human problems. They contend that truth is tentative, a warranted
assertion, rather than universal, eternal, and absolute. Based on human experience,
truth involves testing or verifying an idea by acting on it and determining if the
consequences of such action resolve the particular problem. Pragmatism's predilection

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to tentativeness, empiricism, and change stands in opposition to Plato's metaphysics.
According to Platonic idealism, truth reflects unchanging, perfect, universal, and eternal
ideas to which human behavior should conform. In contrast, pragmatism fits the
American temperament, perhaps derived from the frontier experience, that sees human
behavior as the interaction of people with changing environmental situations.
Educationally, a goal based on pragmatism would encourage learners to be open and
willing to accept the challenge of change. (Gutek, 2011)

Dewey redefined activity as an organic whole in which a person acted with knowledge
of the results of the activity. Learning, thus, becomes an activity by which a person
adapts to the environment in a unified way instead of in a series of disconnected
reactions. By this kind of unified, purposeful action, learning takes place.

Complete Act of Thought

Dewey designed a series of problem-solving steps that approximate what he considers
to be the scientific method. Dewey's experimental, or process-oriented, method
consisted of the following phases:
1. The person encounters something different, a new experience or deviant particular
that stops the flow of ongoing activity. Educationally, the problematic situation when
student or group of students encounters a problem needing to be solved.
2. To solve the problem, the element that is blocking activity must be located and
defined. In education, learning how to locate and define the problem correctly is an
important skill. The definition should point the learner to the resources needed to
solve the problem.
3. After the problem has been located and defined, it is then possible to gather
information, do research, and consult previous experience that will shed light on the
problem and point to its resolution. In education, this phase may involve researching
in the library or on the Internet, conducting interviews, and collecting information.
The teacher functions as a resource guide who facilitates students' research
activities.

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4. The conjectural stage, in which tentative hypotheses of possible action are
structured. The person or group reflects on the possible actions and intellectually
explores the consequences of each should it be acted upon. Question such as, "If I
do this, what is likely to result?" In education, the goal is to develop reflective
attitudes that contribute to planning skills. Plans called "ends in view," gives direction
to experience.
5. The final stage involves acting on the selected tentative hypothesis that is likely to
resolve the problem by effecting the projected and desired consequences. If the
problem is solved, the procedures of the complete act of thought have been followed
correctly. If not, the process needs to be reexamined to identify mistakes that may
have interfered with its solution. If the problem is solved, the person resumes activity
and adds the particular problem-solving episode to his or her network of experience.
In the educational situation, the final step of the problem-solving sequence is of
crucial importance. Dewey's process requires action, it is this stage that avoids
dualism of theory and practice and integrates them into complete thinking. (Gutek,
2011)

Dewey emphasized that human beings had the possibility of directing and controlling
the course of change using the scientific method. When a problem is encountered, the
scientific method should be used to solve that problem and obtain the desired
consequences. (Gutek, 2011)

The Experimentalist Curriculum

Briefly, the structure of Dewey's school program would be around three broad focusing
sets of activities: 1) making and doing, 2) history and geography, and 3) science. The
scientific method, broadly conceived as the complete act of thought, was used
throughout these sets of activities. (Gutek, 2011)

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Making and Doing
Activities children do in
their first years of school.
From the home into the
larger society.
Activities such as sweep
the floor, water plants, set
the table for lunch, go on
shopping trips.
Creates a school
community.
History and Geography
Related to time; space and
place.
Taught not as conventional
academic subjects but
designed to expand
children's perspective into
time and space.
Science
Investigation of various
subject-matter disciplines,
not in isolation from each
other.
A subject that could provide
ways in solving a problem.

Dewey believed that students would gain reflective inquiry and practical intelligence if
taught solving problems using the scientific method and group processes. Unlike other
progressivists, he did not totally reject or oppose traditionalism because it would be
inadequate for a democratic philosophy of education. He stressed on the learner's
experience and the intelligent activity of problem solving rather than relying solely on
textbooks in seeking for the solutions or information. (Gutek, 2011)

III. Analysis of the DepEd K-12 Curriculum

In the previous class discussions, we found out that the K-12 curriculum is
predominantly essentialist. However, other philosophies are also evident. In the paper
presented by Cabrera (2015), the Philippine educational system actually combines
traditional and contemporary elements. It is a practice known as eclecticism, the
schools attune course offerings and educational services to changing needs.
Perennialist and essentialist orientations are combined with elements of progressivism
and reconstructionism.

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The relevant educational philosophies and how they are manifested are the following:
Perennialism (time-tested core knowledge); Realism (students get to choose a study
track; the educational system responds to contextual realities); Experimentalism (what
is approved by the public is true and good); Idealism and Perennialism (the authorities
design the educational system; the student is free to find ways to succeed within that
system). (Cabrera, 2015)

Pragmatist philosophy is also related to Experimentalism in education for its "learning by

doing." It promotes individualism and experience-based learning. Relevant subjects to
promote social experience are Social Studies, Citizenship, Government, History, and
services such as Management, Business, and Entrepreneurship. Experience from
completing projects, problem-solving and social skills are encouraged. Furthermore,
subjects such as technical-vocational skill courses also promote experiential learning for
skills development. On-the-job-training, apprenticeship, and immersion are also
examples of experiential learning. At the elementary level, public schools would offer
Gardening, Woodworking, and field trips. Students will continue to experiment and find
their own voices and places in society. (Cabrera, 2015)

Moreover, the other elements of Experimentalism are: 1) the role of the teacher is to
help or acts as consultant, 2) the role of the students as active participant and
contributor, 3) realities are taught through Social Studies and History, 4) truths are
taught through problem solving or project method, 5) goodness or values are taught
through making group decisions in light of consequences. (Cabrera, 2015)

Looking closely at the K-12 Curriculum Framework, some of the features that would
reflect pragmatism or experimentalism are the emphasis given to the learner -- intellect,
free will, constructor of knowledge and active maker of meaning, life skills, preparation
for the world of work, and entrepreneurship. The needs of national and global
community are also included in order to reduce poverty, develop a strong sense of
nationalism, develop productive citizens who contribute to the building of a progressive,

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just and humane society (DepEd, 2016). Andaya (2018) also presented the pedagogical
approaches in K-12 are reflective, collaborative, constructivist, and inquiry-based.

Morales (2016) and Africa (2017) also cited Dewey, being a pragmatist, as reflected in
the K-12 curriculum. Africa (2017) mentioned three Deweyan principles such as 1) The
nature of the child is made the center of educative process (child-centeredness), 2) The
theory of self activity is made the center or basis of learning (learning by doing), 3)
Activity program is the core of the curriculum (experiential). He also mentioned inquiry-
based learning and constructivism. Morales (2016) also mentioned the curriculum as
learner-relevant. The inclusion of the topics such as Disaster Risk Reduction (DRR),
Climate Change Adaptation, and Information & Communication Technology (ICT) is
homage to Dewey’s view that education is a process of social activity and believed that
the school was related to the society that it served.

On the other hand, Jumawan (2016) considered the K-12 curriculum as not totally
pragmatic due to the inclusion of Sociology and Philosophy of Man in the Senior High.

IV. Analysis & Conclusions

After reading the reference materials about pragmatism, there seems to be diverse
views among the pragmatists. In one article it mentioned, that pragmatists do not really
have a single view on truth, realism, skepticism, perception, justification, fallibilism,
realism, etc.) Since it embraces pluralism, detractors would point out that pragmatism
would then stand for little or nothing in particular. (McDermid, 2019)

The prominent figure in pragmatism is Dewey. He was able to make significant

contributions to the field of education such as child-centeredness, problem-solving, and
learning by doing (experiential, constructivism). He also gave importance to the
scientific method to intelligently solve problems rather than transmitting bodies of
information.

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Pragmatism embraces pluralist culture, open society or open universe. It gives space to
everyone including the minority groups. But in the end, the interests of the majority may
prevail.

However, there is also an opposition to the views of Dewey, those that follow the Judeo-
Christian culture. They believe that a pluralist culture encourages a dangerous
relativism -- good and bad and right and wrong are relative to the traditions, convictions,
or practices of an individual or a group of people. (Gutek, 2011) They fear that moral
standards that schools should convey may not be acceptable to a particular religious
group. Thus, finding a common ground is the best way to establish healthy
relationships, both between people and between cultures. (Exploring Your Mind, 2018)

It is also considered that the promise of democracy is not finished and it is an ongoing
challenge. (Gutek, 2011)

V. Points to Ponder

Pragmatism is not as easy as it is described or applied in the field of teacher education.

Among teachers, pragmatism is usually portrayed as utilitarian or something that can be
used in our daily lives such as practical arts or the training of livelihood skills -- learning
by doing. It would also involve the use of tools as an aid to carry out the practical tasks
(example, cooking or sewing, carpentry, crafts).

In the field of philosophy, pragmatism has a deeper meaning and also involves the
scientific method or process in solving a problem that one encounters. The scientific
method or process is not limited to the science laboratory or scientific experiments.
Among pragmatists, especially Dewey, emphasized that the scientific method can also
be used in solving problems involving human affairs that can lead to better social
interactions or human situations.

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Surprisingly, the concept of democracy, that symbolizes the capitalist country United
States of America, was not viewed purely in economic terms by Dewey. His concept of
democracy is about community sharing and social responsibility of an individual person.
As mentioned by Gutek (2011), Dewey's political inclination is left leaning rather than
the right wing politics.

Bibliography:

Africa, Raymond Mitchel (2017). Dewey’s influence to Philippine Educational System. In

Mitchellium. Retrieved last October 25, 2019 from https://
mitchellium.wordpress.com/2017/07/06/deweys-influence-to-philippine-
educational-system/

Andaya, Jocelyn DR (2018). The K-12 Enhanced Basic Education Program. Retrieved
October 26, 2019 from http://www.cfo-pso.org.ph/pdf/
11thconferencepresentation/day2/dir_jocelyn_dr_andaya-
K_to_12_basic_education_program.pdf

Atkin, Albert (2019). Charles Sanders Peirce: Pragmatism. In Internet Encyclopedia of

Philosophy. Retrieved last October 24, 2019 from https://www.iep.utm.edu/
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Cabrera, Jaime (2015). Foreign Philosophic Influences on Philippine Education

Systems. Retrieved last October 26, 2019 from https://www.academia.edu/
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DepEd (2016). The K to 12 Curriculum and Its Support System. Retrieved last August
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Exploring Your Mind (2018). Moral Relativism. In Exploring Your Mind. Retrieved last
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Gutek, G. L. (2011). Chapter 20: John Dewey: Pragmatist Philosopher and Progressive
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Jumawan, Roel (2016). Pragmatism and Philippine Education. In Philosophical Essays.

Retrieved last October 26, 2019 from http://roeljumawan.blogspot.com/2016/09/

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