Commenting on Sidney Hook's theory of education in a democracy – Part 2

By Geoffrey Moore

Author – The Infinite Staircase: What the Universe Tells Us About Life, Ethics, and Mortality

As mentioned in the earlier post, Sidney Hook was a contemporary of John Dewey, and like Dewey, he was deeply interested in education and its role in supporting democracy. A recent blog post on Feedspot focused on Hook’s ideas, organized around seven key claims (see below). I think it is worth spending some time discussing each one of these claims, specifically in light of America’s current struggles with its democratic institutions and what it will take for a coming generation to address them. In the prior post I commented on the first two on the list. In this post I want to discuss the following two:

1. Education should aim to develop the powers of critical, independent thought.
2. It should attempt to induce sensitiveness of perception, significantly associated with the different receptiveness to new ideas, imaginative sympathy with the experiences of others.
3. It should produce an awareness of the main streams of our cultural, literary, and scientific traditions.
4. It should make available important bodies of knowledge concerning nature, society, ourselves, our country, and its history.
5. It should strive to cultivate an intelligent loyalty to the ideals of the democratic community and to deepen understanding of the heritage of freedom and the prospects of its survival.
6. At some level, it should equip young men and women with the general skills and techniques and the specialized knowledge which, together with the virtues and aptitudes already mentioned, will make it possible for them to do some productive work related to their capacities and interests.
7. It should strengthen those inner resources and traits of character which enable the individual, when necessary, to stand alone. (55)

With respect to claim #3, traditionally liberal arts education has organized itself around canons of great works across the various domains of culture, touchstones by which we could assess current events. But in the past century the Western intellectual tradition has deconstructed this practice to the point where these works no longer have authority. To be fair, this was to some extent a good thing because it made clear how the norms embedded in canonical works over-privileged white males of European descent at the expense of virtually every other constituency on the planet. 

Like many things worth doing, however, it has led to over-doing, and that is where we are today. Critique has replaced critical independent thinking in the academic domain, and its penchant for incessant carping has now suffused across social communication in general. In short, we have succeeded in undercutting our past while failing to lay a proper foundation for our present and future. This is not a stable state, and to move forward with any success, we must rectify it.

The fix is not all that hard to execute. We need a mix of traditional and modern, juxtaposed to explore the tensions between the two, setting up dialogs with multiple perspectives, each of which we can learn to both honor, even as we embrace or reject their claims. This is how we teach the process of critical thinking, the foundational skill that is needed to sustain a culture of democracy. The key is the mix. You can be as radical as you want on one side, but then you need to counterbalance that with something equally challenging from the other. And, of course, there are not just two sides, there are many, so the real trick is assembling a buffet where everyone can sample and then go back for seconds where they want to double down.

The vehicle for teaching this kind of dialog is the seminar. Traditionally, we have thought of seminars as pertaining to higher education, but that is a mistake. We should be using seminars from the very start of elementary school, initially perhaps just to teach kids how to speak their minds and listen to others, but over time, how to develop their ideas and build on those of others. By the fourth or fifth grade, kids should be expert in seminar skills, able to advocate for minority positions, challenge orthodoxies, and call out verbal bullying. At the same time, they can be developing their own core beliefs, the things they want to stand for, the ideals they want to live up to. And they can watch their peers doing the same thing, often coming to different conclusions from theirs, something they need to learn to process over time.

Finally, to organize the liberal arts element in education around a seminar model, we will want teachers who embrace the method and its values. They don’t have to be particularly experienced—often our youngest teachers are some of the most talented in this sort of interaction. Indeed, classroom aides can often serve as great discussion moderators. The point is, we need lots of them. The seminar model does not scale. It takes time, talent, and attention, all of which imply investment. That said, I cannot think of any other investment that has a higher return.

That’s what I think. What do you think?

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