I don’t get to read John Dewey across long afternoons or evenings anymore, just me and some coffee and a legal pad, the whole “life-of-the-mind” thing. Now I get to look at my notes, my scribblings in margins, my occasionally typed up written responses. Anyway, I like to give out My Pedagogic Creed on the first day of the student teaching seminar. I’m asking them to re-write their philosophy of education (again) and I want them to look at someone else’s first. Who better than Dewey?

Here’s the quote that stuck with me today:

I believe that the teacher’s business is simply to determine on the basis of larger experience and riper wisdom, how the discipline of life shall come to the child.

It’s not just throwing stuff at kids and seeing what sticks. It’s not turning them loose to “inquire” while you read the “Inquirer.” It’s this — carefully measuring your own ideas, your students’ ideas, your understanding of the content — and figuring what the beast approach is to creating an intellectually rich classroom.