chapter 23 developmental factors in the sequence of studies from ways of knowing through the realms...

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23

DEVELOPMENTAL FACTORSIN THE SEQUENCE OF STUDIES

INSIGHTS

1. Meanings grow in active, developing persons.2. If instruction is to be effective, consideration

must be given to the patterns of human growth and development.

3. Of all the animals man is the learner par ex-cellence.

4. A human being’s behavior patterns are only to a very minor degree instinctive.

5. A human being is not solely a product of his environment.

6. There are limits to how one can be molded by environmental influences.

7. Possibilities of learning depend on the matu-ration of the biological organism.

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514 PART THREE:THE CURRICULUM FOR GENERAL EDUCATION

8. All instructional efforts that are not consistent with the empirical facts of maturation are certain to fail.

9. Maturation fixes the limit of expected achievement and to a considerable extent deter-mines the speed of learning.

10. The possibilities of learning are influenced by previous learning.

11. The ideal order of studies is one in which each experience is introduced at the most propi-tious time in the person’s development.

12. The best curriculum for any student is one that makes each learning experience available to him as soon as he is ready for it.

13. How well a person learns is greatly affected by the factor of motivation.

14. In planning the sequence of studies a basic developmental principle is that of continuity.

15. The successive experiences in learning should be sufficiently different to provide stimulus for growth but not so strange as to set up self-pro-tecting reactions in the student.

16. The teacher should be aware of the cultural patterns influencing his students, and he should take account of these patterns in planning the se-quence of studies.

17. The educator should use the facts of develop-mental psychology critically, ordering instruction so as not to expect the impossible of students and choosing from among the possible learnings those that will lead most directly to the fulfillment of meaning.

18. From the developmental standpoint the earli-est and most fundamental experiences are those of personal relations.

19. The entire course of a person’s life may be analyzed in terms of the development of personal meanings.

DEVELOPMENTAL FACTORS IN THE 515SEQUENCE OF STUDIES

20. Teaching should be planned so as to take ac-count of the particular tasks confronting the per-son at the stage in life in which he is living.

21. The educator needs to understand the sources of failure at any stage in the light of possi-ble failures of achievement at earlier stages, and be prepared to make available such remedial reeducation as may be necessary to shore up the weak foundations.

22. The stages of life are not separate and inde-pendent ways of functioning. They are continuous with each other, interrelated, and overlapping.

23. The development of personal relations is inti-mately connected with the development of other kinds of meanings.

24. Personal knowledge, ethics, morals, and inte-grative studies have pertinence to every stage of education, even if they may not come fully into their own until adult life.

25. The unique role of personal knowledge in all the realms of meaning is of great importance both to the teacher and to the student.

26. Since a meaning in any realm is a meaning to a person, the value of that meaning depends on personal well-being.

27. Intelligent and sensitive concern for persons is the one essential ingredient in good education.

28. Knowledge about language development can save the teacher both from starting a child to read before he is ready for it and from delaying reading instruction too long.

29. Language development studies show the great importance of skill in communication for the general well-being of the child.

30. When the normal patterns of cognitive growth are ignored and adult mathematical con-ceptions are introduced too early, the child may


develop an aversion to mathematics that will handicap him throughout life.

31. Scientific ideas, like those of language and mathematics, show a developmental progression.

32. The teacher needs to know what can and what cannot usefully be introduced at any given level of maturity.

33. It is the teacher’s function to provide a rich esthetic environment and ample encouragement for creative expression in the manner appropriate to the child’s physical, emotional, and intellectual attainment, giving special consideration in this do-main to the particular interests and capabilities of the individual child rather than relying on stan-dardized expectations.

34. Social and moral values are acquired largely through participation in the life of family, peer groups, and community.

35. If the teacher is aware of the source of moral values in the whole personal-social development process, he will be prepared to interpret students’ conduct intelligently and to introduce kinds of de-cision-making situations in which moral growth may occur.

36. Premature introduction of certain religious ideas may cause permanent distortion of beliefs, and neglect of religious instruction may deprive the person of needed resources for his personal growth.

37. Both logical and developmental factors are relevant to decisions about the order of instruc-tion.

____________________


In addition to logical factors, the findings of develop-mental psychology can be used to help decide the or-der of studies. The logic of sequence is not a sufficient guide because education is not a process of construct-ing a complex of disembodied meanings, but of facili-tating learning in real people. Meanings grow in active, developing persons. If instruction is to be effective, con-sideration must be given to the patterns of human growth and development.

MAN IS THE LEARNER PAR EXCELLENCE

One elementary fact to be noted at the start is that of all the animals man is the learner par excel-lence. In contrast with many of the lower animals, a hu-man being’s behavior patterns are only to a very minor degree instinctive. They are learned through interaction with the environment; they do not emerge simply from internal growth processes. Human nature is plastic. It is capable of being shaped by external influences so as to produce any of many different kinds of behavior.

On the other hand, a human being is not solely a product of his environment. There are limits to how one can be molded by environmental influences. A person is not simply a sum of the forces that have acted upon him.

If a person were entirely governed by instinct, ed-ucation would have no meaning and the order of per-sonal development would be wholly dictated by genetic factors in the organism. If a person were exclusively de-termined by his environment, then the sequence of learning could be decided entirely on the basis of the logic of the subject fields without regard to psychologi-cal factors.

THE APPROPRIATENESS OF DEVELOPMENTAL PSYCHOLOGY

The pertinence of developmental psychology arises from the fact that a person is neither purely a


creature of instinct nor of environment, but develops by a complicated series of interactions between the grow-ing self and various surrounding entities. At every stage of development the nature of the person affects what can and what cannot be learned, and how easily any-thing can be learned.

MaturationIn part, the possibilities of learning depend on the

maturation of the biological organism. No behavior pat-tern can be learned unless a suitable physical and neu-tral basis exists for it. All instructional efforts that are not consistent with the empirical facts of maturation are certain to fail. Knowledge of maturational se-quences provides one type of clue to the sequence of studies. Maturation fixes the limit of expected achieve-ment and to a considerable extent determines the speed of learning.

ReadinessBesides maturation, the possibilities of learning

are influenced by previous learning. The combination of maturation and earlier learning determines what a per-son is capable of learning at any given time. The devel-opmental concept of readiness refers to the condition of being optimally prepared for some particular learning experience. The ideal order of studies is one in which each experience is introduced at the most propitious time in the person’s development. If some experience comes too early, it cannot be grasped at all or only at the price of excessive strain and frustration. If it comes too late, other learning dependent upon it will be post-poned and the whole development of the person will be retarded. The best curriculum for any student is one that makes each learning experience available to him as soon as he is ready for it.

Human Beings are Made Ready


For Learning and Maximum EconomyThe readiness concept, like any other idea applied

mechanically or interpreted rigidly, can become a blinder, reflecting traditional prejudices. Human beings are extraordinarily adaptable, and by appropriate preparation may be made ready for learning that does not fit any standard readiness schedule. The principle of readiness is really an aspect of the more fundamental principle of maximum economy in learning.

MotivationHow well a person learns is also greatly affected

by the factor of motivation. If one has powerful needs to fill, one quickly learns how to satisfy them. If one’s goals are clear and urgent, one learns more readily how to reach them than he would if he had weak purposes. A person is not really ready to learn anything unless he has strong motivation in relation to it. Motives are often a result of temporary conditions, and they may well be controlled to some degree by external factors, such as rewards and punishments. More deeply rooted in the personality are those motives that reflect the basic ori-entation of the developing person. These basic goals of the self are of great importance to the teacher, for they determine the direction in which effective learning can occur in the student. They represent an inner hospital-ity to certain kinds of experience, making the person ripe for development in the indicated directions.

ContinuityIn planning the sequence of studies a basic devel-

opmental principle is that of continuity. The growing person is an organism and not simply an aggregation. This means that each step in development must fit into previous steps so as to form a consistent whole. The or-ganism is an “open system” seeking to maintain itself with stability amid change. To ensure this, whatever new influences are brought to bear must be such as not


to threaten the continuing integrity of the person. The successive experiences in learning should be suffi-ciently different to provide stimulus for growth but not so strange as to set up self-protecting reactions in the student. The experiences in learning should also be such as to form a coherent succession rather than a miscellaneous and random collection. The experiences of the student should be consistent both among them-selves and with the basic orientation of the learner as revealed in his enduring motivations.

At some pointa child appears ready to

learn meaningful knowledge. Atsome point a person’s generativity

causeshim/her to decide that he/she must

passon the knowledge that he/she hasacquired. What if father and son

do not reach this point at thesame time? What happens if the child has no interest in

what the father does?


Picture


GENERALIZATIONS ABOUT PATTERNS OF GROWTH

In planning curricula in the light of studies in hu-man development, use may be made of certain gener-alizations about patterns of growth. It is possible to pre-dict in broad terms what kinds of experience will be ap-propriate to children and young people at successive periods in their development. These generalizations are useful only as a first approximation, as an estimate of probable average conditions within a particular culture. In reality every person is different, and in principle a different curriculum is needed for every person to take account of the way he uniquely develops. In practice, ways can be found to effect a reasonable compromise between a curriculum that is the same for all within a given society and individual courses of study. Examples of such compromises are the various systems of group-ing students by age and ability and the methods of or-ganizing instruction to permit each individual student to proceed at his own pace, independently or with individ-ual guidance, and to make his own special contributions to group efforts.

Because environment is such a large factor in hu-man development, the patterns of growth vary not only from person to person, but also from culture to culture. There is no single universal average developmental se-quence. Each social group exerts influences upon its members that they internalize and that become impor-tant factors in learning. The teacher should be aware of the cultural patterns influencing his students, and he should take account of these patterns in planning the sequence of studies.

PLANNING THE CURRICULUM: ACTUALITY,POSSIBILITY, AND IDEALITY

In using knowledge from the field of human devel-opment for planning the curriculum, a threefold distinc-tion should be kept in mind, namely, the distinction be-tween actuality, possibility, and ideality. Developmental


inquiries yield knowledge of how certain persons have actually developed. This knowledge is not necessarily an appropriate direct basis for making curriculum deci-sions. The conditions of growth may have been neither optimal nor comparable to the situation of the students for whom the curriculum is being planned. The inquiries may show that under certain conditions specified learn-ings are possible. But the demonstration of possibility is no guarantee of ideality, for it does not follow from the fact that a person can learn something at a given stage in his growth that he ought to learn it then. The educa-tor should use the facts of developmental psychology critically, ordering instruction so as not to expect the impossible of students and choosing from among the possible learnings those that will lead most directly to the fulfillment of meaning.

THE MOST FUNDAMENTAL EXPERIENCES ARE

THOSE OF PERSONAL RELATIONS

From the developmental standpoint the earliest and most fundamental experiences are those of per-sonal relations. From the moment of birth, or even ear-lier, the child lives in relation, first to his mother, then to other persons in the family, and as he grows older, to wider and wider circles of persons and things. The en-tire course of a person’s life may be analyzed in terms of the development of personal meanings. For example, the psychoanalyst Erik Erikson in Childhood and Soci-ety1 describes eight stages in the personal career. He says that in the first period the task is to establish a basic sense of trust, or confidence in the goodness of existence and in the reliability of those on whom one depends. The second stage is that of autonomy, in which the child learns to “stand on his own feet,” with-out shame or doubt. The third stage, initiative, marks the ability to do and to make, as the waxing powers of movement and manipulation appear. Fourth comes 1 W. W. Norton & Company, Inc., New York, 1950.


the period of industry and the use of tools, in which the child discovers the wider world of things into which he sees he can enter as an active producer. In the fifth pe-riod, adolescence, the main task is achieving a sense of identity, by internalizing and integrating the various so-cial roles in which one is cast. The sixth stage is that of intimacy, in which the person learns to find fulfillment by losing himself in loving others. The seventh period is that of generativity, where the person assumes re-sponsibility for bringing into being and guiding the next generation, whether as a parent or otherwise. Finally, the eighth stage is that of achieving integrity, includ-ing an assurance of order and meaning, a feeling of personal dignity, and absence of the fear of death.

THE SEQUENCE OF LEARNING EXPERIENCES

This is only one scheme among many that have been devised to chart the general pattern of growth of the self-in-relation. It may serve as the focus for dis-cussing several important points about the sequence of learning experiences. The first point is that the appro-priate lessons in the realm of personal relations vary according to the stage in life. One should not expect to teach a child industry when he is concentrating on au-tonomy or identity. Teaching should be planned so as to take account of the particular tasks confronting the per-son at the stage in life in which he is living.

Second, the several tasks of personal growth are hierarchically ordered. Each stage presupposes the suc-cessful completion of the earlier stages. Until one has attained the initial capacity for trust, he cannot enjoy a secure autonomy. Without autonomy he cannot well ex-ercise initiative, and so on from stage to stage. The ed-ucator needs to understand the sources of failure at any stage in the light of possible failures of achieve-ment at earlier stages, and be prepared to make avail-able such remedial reeducation as may be necessary to shore up the weak foundations.


Third, the stages of life are not separate and inde-pendent ways of functioning. They are continuous with each other, interrelated, and overlapping. At every stage all the ego goals of the other stages are present to some degree. Even in the very young child the inte-gration of maturity is in some measure an aim, and in the mature adult the trust of the infant is still in need of perfecting. The stages represent functional emphases in various periods of life rather than discrete lessons to be mastered once and for all.

Fourth, the development of personal relations is intimately connected with the development of other kinds of meanings. The first appearance of language may be regarded as one evidence of growing auton-omy, as the child feels the need to communicate with others across a separating difference. The stage of ini-tiative may relate to the beginnings of esthetic cre-ativeness, and the period of industry may correspond to the exploration of rational and empirical meanings. Clearly the stages of identity and intimacy pertain most directly to personal meanings. The stage of generativ-ity, with its emphasis on responsibility, is concerned with moral meanings, and the stage of integration cor-responds to the synoptic realm.

Priority of Realms of meaning Based on LogicThis developmental analysis, in some measure,

confirms the earlier conclusions as to the relative prior-ity of the realms based on logical considerations. Devel-opmentally, language clearly comes first (Symbolics) and integrative studies come last (Synoptics). Moral meanings (Ethics) appear relatively late, after a firm sense of oneself and of one’s relationships with others has been established (Synnoetics). As between sci-ence and art, the priority developmentally seems to rest with art (Esthetics), this being the more immedi-ate and intuitive ground from which the rationalistic


and generalizing scientific (Empirics) meanings subse-quently develop.

The Need For Continuing Education Throughout Life

What a life-span sequence like Erikson’s suggests (discussed earlier) is that persons may not ordinarily be ready for mature understanding of self and others, for moral insight, and for integrative perspectives until they have passed beyond the usual period of formal general education. Such a conclusion points to the need for continuing general education throughout life, partic-ularly in the fields of applied psychology (especially guidance and counseling on an individual or group basis with an existential emphasis),


Not all childrendevelop at the same rate.

Not all children develop the sameinterest as others. Not all children

havethe same learning styles as others.

Peoplecannot look at children and decide that

simply because they are at a certain age

and in a certain grade that they are ready

to or even be capable of learning at acertain level. How can a teacher deter-

minethe level of knowledge that a student

can understand, and then teachtwenty or more students the

same lesson at the same time?


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morals, history, religion, and philosophy. It may be that the average person can profit most fully from such studies after assuming adult roles. From a developmen-tal standpoint, it can then be argued that during the years of formal schooling through adolescence the ma-jor emphasis in general education should be on the lan-guages, arts, and sciences, (symbolics, esthetics, empirics), all of which can be learned effectively within the developmental framework of childhood and youth, and that the remaining three realms of meaning, (ethics, synnoetics, and synoptics), should be the chief concerns of adult general education.

GENERAL EDUCATION CAN EXTEND BEYOND

THE USUAL PERIOD

Developmental considerations thus suggest that general education can profitably extend beyond the usual period of 12 to 16 years of formal schooling. If economic and social factors limit the period of formal education, then it is important to make provision for continuing education on an informal basis. The mass media of communication can play a significant role in this respect. It is clear that in such information educa-tion special attention should be given to personal knowledge, ethics, and the synoptic disciplines, these being the domains in which adults can especially bene-fit from continuing opportunities to learn. Opportunities for continuing education in the other realms of meaning should also be provided.

THE PRINCIPLE OF UNITY AND INTERRELATIONS OF MEANING REQUIRES STUDY IN ALL SIX REALMS OF

MEANING

On the other hand, the principle of the unity and interrelations of meanings in the education of a whole person argues for some study of all of the six realms throughout education, as recommended in Chapter 21. This fundamental principle should not be nullified by at-


tending exclusively to the emphases indicated by de-velopmental considerations. Personal knowledge, ethics, morals, and integrative studies have pertinence to every stage of education, even if they may not come fully into their own until adult life. These studies can be of particular importance in providing a basis for the in-telligent use of informal education resources in later years. On these grounds it is still reasonable to affirm the position taken earlier that all six realms of meaning belong within the curriculum of formal general educa-tion and that particular emphasis should be given in the latter years of the curriculum to the ethical and synop-tic realms—to which the realm of personal knowledge may now be added as a further culminating emphasis.

MEANINGS IN PERSONAL KNOWLEDGE PLAY APIVOTAL ROLE IN ALL OTHER MEANINGS

The consideration of education from a develop-mental standpoint indicates that meanings in the fourth realm, personal knowledge, play a pivotal role in all the other meanings. As pointed out in Chapter 16, personal knowledge may be regarded as the primordial basis for all understanding, prior even to language. “In the be-ginning was the relation.” At the same time, there is a distinctive logic of personal meanings that allows them to be arranged alongside empirical, esthetic, and ethi-cal meanings as a relatively autonomous type. This dual role is evident in the developmental analysis, which is concerned with the person at every stage in development, even though the characteristic synnoetic meanings (existential awareness of self and others) first appear fully in the period between adolescence and adulthood.

PERSONAL KNOWLEDGE IS OF GREAT IMPORTANCE

TO THE TEACHER AND THE STUDENT

This unique role of personal knowledge in all the realms of meaning is of great importance both to the


teacher and to the student. Every linguistic attainment, every empirical insight, every esthetic perception, ev-ery moral judgment, every integrative perspective be-longs to a developing person and is colored by the qual-ity of his relations to himself and others. Since a mean-ing in any realm is a meaning to a person, the value of that meaning depends on personal well-being. In more familiar terms, though one speak many tongues, know all the secrets of nature, create things of beauty, per-form deeds of the highest virtue, and have the com-bined wisdom of Socrates and Solomon, if he has no love, these profit him nothing.

INTELLIGENT AND SENSITIVE CONCERN FOR PEOPLE ISESSENTIAL IN PROVIDING A GOOD EDUCATION

This is not to say that love is the one thing needful and that all education should be solely directed toward personal understanding. Love is not enough. Indeed, love cannot be fulfilled apart from language, science, creative activity, morality, and integrative vision. But these without love have no human worth. It is for this reason that intelligent and sensitive concern for per-sons is the one essential ingredient in good education.

FINDINGS IN DEVELOPMENTAL PSYCHOLOGY INDICATE FIELDS OF STUDY THAT HELP LEARNERS OF VARIOUS LEVELS OF

MATURITY

The findings of developmental psychology are not only of value in suggesting the general sequence of study emphases, as discussed above, but also in indi-cating for particular fields of study the kinds of learning experiences that are likely to be appropriate to learners of various levels of maturity.

Knowledge of Language DevelopmentFor example, knowledge about language develop-

ment, of which numerous studies have been made, can save the teacher both from starting a child to read be-


fore he is ready for it and from delaying reading instruc-tion too long. Such knowledge can also aid in selecting materials that fall within the vocabulary capability of the student, neither being so far beyond him as to frus-trate understanding nor so familiar to him as to provide no challenge to new understanding. Language develop-ment studies show the great importance of skill in com-munication for the general well-being of the child. They make clear the close relation between the language habits, social environment, and emotional life of the child, and they suggest ways of diagnosing and correct-ing language deficiencies in individual children.


Growth of Mathematical IdeasThe growth of mathematical ideas in children has

also been intensively investigated. For example, some studies show that geometric ideas develop prior to arithmetical concepts and that nonnumerical concepts of quantity precede numerical ones. It is generally agreed that the high abstraction and rigor of pure mathematics are beyond the comprehension of young children and that they must begin with simple in-stances, only gradually moving on to generalized con-cepts. When the normal patterns of cognitive growth are ignored and adult mathematical conceptions are in-troduced too early, the child may develop an aversion to mathematics that will handicap him throughout life. On the other hand, modern research in the teaching of mathematics suggests that with proper methods of in-struction many important mathematical ideas can suc-cessfully be taught much earlier than was once thought possible or desirable.

Scientific IdeasScientific ideas, like those of language and mathe-

matics, show a scientific thought cannot be attained at once. As the child grows, he has an increasing body of memories upon which to draw, providing a basis for generalization and discrimination, both of which are necessary for the formation of scientific abstractions. The leading investigator of the development of chil-dren’s concepts is Jean Piaget, who has studied, among other things, the growth of the idea of physical causal-ity.2 Piaget holds that conceptual growth occurs in dis-crete stages. Up to the age of three, he says, the child believes things happen by magic. From three to seven or eight he thinks in egocentric and animistic terms, and from then on his thought becomes mechanistic and logical. Other investigators disagree with Piaget’s re-2 Jean Piaget, The Child’s Conception of Physical Causality, tr. by M. Gabain, Harcourt Brace & World, Inc., New York, 1930.


sults, holding that ideas of physical causation in space and time grow gradually and are not necessarily pre-ceded by magical and animistic stages. Regardless of how the matter is resolved, the point to be made here is that since the meaningfulness of scientific ideas is affected by the child’s development, the teacher needs to know what can and what cannot usefully be intro-duced at any given level of maturity.

Creative ExpressionIn the esthetic realm, the same gradual maturing

of understanding occurs. The child begins with simple geometric forms, colors, melodies, rhythms, and tales, and step by step becomes capable of enjoying more complex designs in pictures, sounds, bodily move-ments, and words. At each level of growth new expres-sive interests appear, together with new skills in execu-tion and perception. It is the teacher’s function to pro-vide a rich esthetic environment and ample encourage-ment for creative expression in the manner appropriate to the child’s physical, emotional, and intellectual at-tainment, giving special consideration in this domain to the particular interests and capabilities of the individual child rather than relying on standardized expectations. This concern for the individual does not negate the value of esthetic standards and of instruction in es-thetic principles by demonstration and critical evalua-tion when the student has reached a sufficiently ad-vanced stage of esthetic maturity.

Social and Moral ValuesSocial and moral values are acquired largely

through participation in the life of family, peer groups, and community. The young child tends to accept the value orientations of his parents and then as his hori-zons widen he takes on values from other significant as-sociations. If the teacher is aware of the source of moral values in the whole personal-social development


process, he will be prepared to interpret students’ con-duct intelligently and to introduce kinds of decision-making situations in which moral growth may occur. It has been amply demonstrated that mere verbal indoc-trination of moral ideas is not effective in the improve-ment of conduct and that a person is not ripe for moral learning until he is confronted with situations in which he must make personal choices. The wise provision of such experiences requires an understanding of the per-sonal maturity level of the students involved.

Growth of Religious ConsciousnessFinally, inquiries into the growth of religious con-

sciousness may be of great value in determining the desirable sequence of studies in religion. Advanced the-ological ideas are unintelligible to a child. Only gradu-ally does he succeed in grasping the more profound meanings of faith. He begins with concepts derived from his experiences in the home, where love, trust, and the goodness of existence, mediated by human re-lationships, are first disclosed to him. Later, these meanings may be generalized and deepened to provide the basis for a mature religious faith. Premature intro-duction of certain religious ideas may cause permanent distortion of beliefs, and neglect of religious instruction may deprive the person of needed resources for his personal growth. Here, as in all the other domains of meaning, developmental factors may be decisive in de-termining the order of instruction.

PSYCHOLOGICALLY JUSTIFIABLE SEQUENCE PATTERNS HAVE

BEEN DETERMINED FOR THE ORDERING OF INSTRUCTION

The foregoing brief comments about the growth of ideas in language, mathematics, science, art, morals, and religion are intended to illustrate the significance of knowledge of human development for the ordering of instruction. Some of the main subjects of school instruc-tion have been analyzed by scholars in relation to such


problems as maturation, readiness, and motivation. To some extent psychologically justifiable sequence pat-terns have been determined. Far too little is known about developmental factors in learning, and in every field much further research remains to be done.

Logical And Developmental Factors are Relevant to

Decisions About the Sequencing Of StudiesIn this and the preceding chapters it has been

shown that both logical and developmental factors are relevant to decisions about the order of instruction. These factors do not wholly determine the content of what should be taught. They do, however, set certain limits to the selection of materials and provide one kind of pattern for their organization.

WAYS OF KNOWING

1. How are human beings’ behavior patterns learned through interaction with the environment?

2. How does every stage of development in the nature of the person affect what can and what cannot be learned?

3. How does maturation limit expected achieve-ment and, to a considerable extent, determine the speed of learning?

4. Why is the best curriculum for any student one that makes each learning experience available to him as soon as he is ready for it?

5. What does “made ready for learning mean?”6. What does the fundamental principle of maxi-

mum economy in learning mean?7. How is how well a person learns greatly affected

by the factor of motivation?8. Why are the basic goals of students of great im-

portance to the teacher?


9. Why is it important in learning for the teacher to remember that each step in development must fit into previous steps so as to form a consistent whole?

10. In human development, what generalizations can be made about patterns of growth?

11. Why must the teacher be aware of the cultural patterns influencing the students?

12. Why must the teacher be aware of the cultural patterns influencing the students in planning the sequence of studies?

13. In using knowledge from the field of human de-velopment for planning the curriculum, discuss the threefold distinction between actuality, possibility, and ideality.

14. Why are the earliest and most fundamental ex-periences in personal relations important in life?

15. Why should appropriate lessons in the realm of personal relations vary according to the stage in life?

16. Why should teaching be planned so as to take account of the particular tasks confronting the per-son at the stage in life in which he is living?

17. Why does the educator need to understand the sources of failure at any stage in the light of possi-ble failures of achievement at earlier stages?

18. Why should the educator be prepared to make available such remedial reeducation as may be necessary to shore up the weak foundations?

19. Why is it important for the educator to know what the stages in life are continuous with each other, interrelated, and overlapping?

20. How is the development of personal relations in-timately connected with the development of other kinds of meanings?

21. How does developmental analysis confirm con-clusions as to the relative priority of the realms based on logical considerations?


22. Why is there a need for continuing general edu-cation throughout one’s life?

23. What specific studies can the average adult profit most fully from after assuming adult roles?

24. Why should general education extend beyond the usual period of twelve to sixteen years of for-mal schooling?

25. Why should personal knowledge, ethics, morals, and integrative studies have pertinence to every stage of education, even if they may not come fully into their own until a adult life?

26. Why do meanings in personal knowledge play a pivotal role?

27. Why is the unique role of personal knowledge in all the realms of meaning of great importance both to the teacher and to the student?

28. Why is it important that intelligent and sensitive concern for people is the one essential ingredient in providing a good education?

29. What are some findings in developmental psy-chology that help learners of various levels of ma-turity?

30. Why is it important for the teacher to know what can and what cannot usefully be introduced at any given age of maturity?

31. Why is it important for the teacher to provide a rich environment and ample encouragement for creative expression in the esthetic realm?

32. Why must the teacher pay close attention to the child’s physical, emotional, and intellectual attain-ment, rather than relying on standardized expec-tations?

33. Why should the teacher understand the per-sonal maturity level of students in trying to im-prove conduct where moral growth may occur?

34. How can premature introduction of certain reli-gious ideas cause permanent distortion of beliefs?


35. How can neglect of religious instruction deprive the person of needed resources for his personal growth?

36. Why are logical and developmental factors rele-vant to decisions about the sequence of studies?

chapter 23 developmental factors in the sequence of studies from ways of knowing through the realms...

Education

persons development

language development

persons life

personal wellbeing

developmental factors

life of family

stages of life

adult life