Pragmatism Script

John Dewey in which he is known for the saying….

He believed that learning was active and children came to school to do things. He also
believe that reality is constantly changing and that we learn best through applying our
experiences and thoughts to problems, as they arise.

But it is a typical American school of philosophy. It is intimately related with the

American life and mind. It is the product of practical experiences of life.68
According to Study of Kaushik and Walsh (2019), this philosophy holds that human
actions can never be separated from the past experiences and from the beliefs that have
originated from those experiences.
The universe is evolving, when you evolve, you change nothing can be permanent. To a
pragmatist, that is exactly the basis of his or her philosophy. Nothing is permanent and
change is going to happen. We might buy the change, live with it, worked with it, and
teach through that change.
Change happens through the focus of pragmatism which is experience. It is now moving
to what you really encounter. How do we bring that change into our classroom?

The philosophy that encourages people to find processes that work in order to achieve
their desired ends. Pragmatists believe that reality is constantly changing and that we
learn best through applying our experiences and thoughts to problems, as they arise
In pragmatism, truth and meaning of ideas are evaluated
How? According to their physical consequences and practical value

According to evidences shown, without enough evidences, then certain ideas, opinions,
cases, or news are enough to be called FAKE NEWS

In pragmatism class, the need to test the validity of ideas are emphasized
How to test the validity of ideas?
In this philosophy, to validate ideas empirically, use the scientific method to understand
more about pragmatism, think of this phrase, “if something works, it is true”
The reason why students should be encouraged to do researches and apply them to the
solution of a problem
Now, you know the root of research

Aims
Pragmatism does not lay down any aims of education in advance. It believes that there
can be no fixed aims of education. Life is dynamic and subject to constant change, and
hence the aims of education are bound to be dynamic. Education deals with human life.
It must help the children to fulfill their biological and social needs.

The only aim of education, according to pragmatism, is to enable the child to create
values in his life. In the words of Ross, education must create new values: “the main task
of educator is to put the educand into a position to develop values for himself’.

The pragmatist educator aims at the harmonious development of the educand —

physical, intellectual, social and aesthetic. The aim of education, therefore, is to direct
“the impulses, interests, desires and abilities towards ‘the satisfaction of the felt wants of
the child in his environment.”

Since the pragmatists believe that man is primarily a biological and social organism,
education should aim at the development of social efficiency in man. Every child should
be an effective member of the society. Education must fulfill his own needs as well as
the needs of the society.

The children should be so trained that they may be able to solve their present-day
problems efficiency and to adjust themselves to their social environment. They should be
creative and effective members of the society. Their outlook should be so dynamic that
they can change with the changing situations.
What pragmatism wants to achieve through education is the cultivation of a dynamic,
adaptable mind which will be resourceful and enterprising in all situations, the mind
which will have powers to create values in an unknown future. Education must foster
competence in the children that they may be able to tackle the problems of future life.

Teachers and Pragma

In Pragmatism the teacher is not either of the two. He stands midway. According to
Pragmatism a teacher is useful, even though not indispensable.

The position of the teacher is of a guide and adviser. He is the helper and prompter. He
should teach “his pupils to think and act for themselves to do rather than to know, to
originate rather than to repeat.”

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His importance lies in the fact that he has to suggest suitable problems only to his
students and to motivate them in such a way that they can solve the problems with tact,
intelligence and cooperation. He is not required to provide raw information to the
students from the textbooks. The pupils will gain knowledge and skill at their own
initiative. Doing is more important than knowing.

Roles of Students
Curriculum
Hence those subjects, which have utility to the students should be included in the
curriculum. The subjects which carry occupational or vocational utility should find a
place in the curriculum. Language, hygiene, history, geography, physics, mathematics,
sciences, domestic science for girls, agriculture for boys should be incorporated in the
curriculum.

While deciding the subjects of curriculum the nature of the child, his tendencies,
interests, impulses at the various stages of his growth and multiple activities of daily life
should be taken into consideration. The subjects like psychology and sociology — which
deal with human behaviour — should be included in the curriculum.
The pragmatists advocate that the pupils should not be taught dead facts and theories
because these may not help them to solve the problems of life. The subjects which help
to solve the practical problems of life should be included in the school curriculum,
particularly at the elementary stage.

What else about pragmatism?

Relating to education it believes that the function of education is to enhance human
potential to be able to adapt to constantly changing world
I guess this works for now
The reason why one of the goals of education is to serve the learners with quality
education for them to reach their highest human potential because these God’s given
potentials would be their weapon to survive in constantly changing world.

If you see that learners are very good in singing, let them sing. If they have potential in
dancing, let them dance. Build their self esteem and confidence to show to the world
what they can do.

Under Pragmatism

Encourage the learners to DO RESEARCHES and apply them to the solution of a

problem. Enhance human potential to be able to adapt to a constantly changing world.

This time let’s talk about the pragmatist teachers.

Pragmatist teachers are those who believed that education is an experimental process.
For example, suppose I want to know your academic stress. Can I come to a conclusion
that your academic stress is your teacher/instructor or number of units per semester by
just asking your opinion? Of course not.
To have a valid and reliable data, I need to do a research about it. To do a research, I
need to read a lot of studies and a lot of related literature that would help me in making
the research. Then, after that, I need to study the methods that I will be using. When the
method is already polished, validation of the reliability of questionnaires comes next.
After that, I may use the questionnaire to gather the data that I need in my study.

Now, if we are going to analyze it under pragmatism, education is an experimental

process, pro research. Again, pragmatism is pro research.
This concept of pragmatism is applicable when we are making a major final decision
especially if it affects the members of the group.

Pragmatist teachers believed that children should learn how to make difficult decisions
by considering the consequences of their actions on others.

Yes, teach the learners how to catch fish, teach them the reality of life, and learn to
accept and face challenges in life.

If you want to improve yourself, then wake up and do your part. Work for your dreams.
Do not wait for it. When you fall in your decision, stand again and learn to accept the
consequences of it. If you did your best, then, nothing to worry. If you win or lose, then
that’s the true battle of life.

Pragmatist Teachers believed that education should focus in real life problems to be
prepared to live fully and effectively in society. This is the root of contextualizing or
localizing the concepts that the teachers used nowadays in teaching. Educators nowadays
are encouraged to contextualized or localized the educational materials that are used in
teaching.
Learners will understand more the concept if we relate them to their real-life situations.
Give examples that are available in their community.

Example: Th topic is about fruit. Instead of using imported fruits why not use local
fruits? Or fruits that are known to their place?
This is what pragmatism mean

Teachers believed that gone are the days that the students are just sitting and listening to
the teacher.

Imagine when you were still in elementary and high school. Can you still remember the
days when you were asked to find the answer to a certain problem? Or in Science, can
you still remember the days when you had experiment or you just sit and listen to your
teachers?

Which of the two, did you enjoy? Is it the time when you solve problems with your
classmates? Is it the time when you were asked to go outside and do an experiment? In
this manner, we learned with our friends. We are learning. Meaning as educators, we
should not let our learners stay in the four corners of the room. Let them learn with
others. Let them involve in collaborative learning where they could share their interest
and problems. That’s what I mean that students should learn the process of problem
solving rather than by being passive learners as knowledge is being transmitted to them.

Believed in values clarification rather than blindly accepting inherited values. It is better
for us as human beings. This is part of searching for truth. As rationalized beings, since
we are given capacity to think, evaluate the valued that we encounter before we imbibe it
to our life.

Believed that communication technologies provide opportunities to share ideas, insights

and experiences. Is tis pragmatism true nowadays? Yes.
Relating to our situation now. Yes, it is true and this is actually the platform why we can
still conduct classes even in this time of pandemic.
This is now the trend in education.
Gagne
This is important because this will help you to present your lesson in a logical or
scientific manner
n 1965 Robert Gagne published his book entitled The Conditions of Learning. In his
book, Gagne (1965) described the analysis of learning objectives, and how these
different classes of learning objectives relate to the appropriate instructional designs.
Robert Gagne describes conditions of learning as a means through which individuals and
groups acquire relevant skills to be accepted in society. Learning is a direct result of
human behaviour which is influenced by the environment and the individual thinking
process of learners.

The foundations of Gagne’s Condition of learning lies in the theories of behaviourism.

He also mentioned that learning a specific skill depends on previous learning skills in a
logical and sequential manner that contributes to building a learning experience.

It is important to group learning goals according to their learning outcomes. Learning

outcomes are dependent on planning what is meant to be learned and what is required at
the end of the learning session. Gagne proposed a series of critical conditions of learning
which he then regarded as important in the learning of different outcomes. These
outcomes are distinct in terms of internal organisation in long term memory and required
mental processing:
5 cate

1. Students can say what they have learned.

2. These are also known as procedural skills. They involved rules, concepts
procedures that could be applied to real world scenario.

3. Here, the students develop a plans. This promote internal and external learning.

4. How learners carry their physical skills throughout the day

5. It influences behavior
Intellectual Skills
Example of learning outcome:
Distinguishing objects, features or symbols

Gagne’s Principles
1. The significance of these classification requires different types of instruction.
Definitely different topics and of course different subjects required different learning
outcomes. In each learning outcome, thre must be specific instruction that you have to
use.

There is no one instruction that fits to all

It is up to you what instruction will you use for these particular learning outcomes

Let see later on what conditions of learning that you have to meet as a teacher
Verbal Outcome
1. For example, identify phases of matter that is verbal information or identify the 14
learner psychological learner centered principles it still a recall of information, it is
very challenging to students to memorize concepts or facts.

What are the things will you consider as teachers to help your students retain the
facts or concepts that you’re teaching them. You can make use of these conditions.

Conditions of Learning

1. So, if you have given them a print material. Then you make sure that you have to
emphasized the important terms in there. How will you do that?
You can bolden, italicized, highlight the specific words, phrases or sentences in

It its verbal instruction or if its lecture, you can vary your pitch or you can vary the
tone of your voice to emphasize specific word.
You can increase the volume of your voice pertaining to an important term
2. Present information so that it can be made into chunks

You can present information through printed materials or you can make use of
verbal instruction. You can also present it using technology, so that after
presenting, your students can make use of graphic organizers so that they can
chunk the information

Remember that there is limitation in our memory

3. Provide a meaningful context for effective encoding of information

Since it is a recall of information, it’s better, you can contextualize your lesson.
How will you do that? Look at your lesson. How are your students going to apply
your lesson to their lives.

For examples, in this lesson, putting yourself in the situation, as a teacher how will
you apply the conditions of learning or what are the benefits of these to you?

4. Provide cues for effective recall and generalization of information

There are ways in recalling information, students can make use of mnemonics or
they can make use of mental pictures

Intellectual Skills

Example of learning outcome:

Distinguishing objects, features or symbols

Classifying biodegradable to non biodegradable
 If the information was not attended to, the, it will not be remembered. Direct their
attention to the most important information in your lesson

How many chunks of information can students grasp in their working memory. Do
not overwhelmed them with information. You have to balance that you provide to
the students or else they will not learn something

Students can make use of connections to the lesson at hand

This is when you give insturctions to your learners

After you taught them, after you delivered the lesson, then students have to deepen
their knowledge.
You can provide them activities so that they can practice the
Learning
• Use a variety of context to promote transfer.
Make sure that students can make use of contexts

• Describe and demonstrate the strategy

For example you introduce to them a microscope and you will demonstrate
how to use a microscope

You can group them for a cooperative learning have them practice how to use
something
You can let them present in front so that others can learn from their
classmates and for that you have to give them feedback regarding their
performance
1. Demonstration method will be used here
2. After demonstration, after observation, they cannot perform it perfectly.
You have to give them time for practice
3. In giving them practice, don’t just let them do what they want to do.
Monitor them if they are doing it correctly or not.

Attitudes
 1. Give them expectations. You can give them your objectives
2. You can present them a known personality in which they can emulate.
There must be a model.

Each of these require different types of instruction

Apart from these special conditions of learning, there are nine levels of instruction
that are used as a starting point for all types of learning and instructional design.
These points help educators and trainers to maintain a checklist for all their
teaching or training activities. Each step highlights a form of communication and
when one step is completed, learners tend to retain and apply the skills taught in a
better and effective way.

These nine levels are;

Level 1: Gaining Attention (Reception)

Start the learning process by gaining the attention of your audience. It starts the
learning process when the learner is being receptive to the information received.
This may be achieved by calling names of learners during the discussion to
completely focus attention on learners.

Level 2: Informing learners of the objective (Expectancy)

Next, learners must know what they are about to learn and why. At the start of the
lecture, they should be aware of what they will have learned by the end of the
session, its benefit to them and the organisation.

For instance, explaining to learners why they will learn what they will learn and
how to apply the concept to your practice. This makes them more receptive to
learning.

Level 3: Stimulating recall of prior learning (Retrieval)

Matching the concept with what learners have learned previously. Prior
experiences can be used to solve new problems and resolve matters easily. This
may also take the form of a simple Q/A session to establish a link between specific
material knowledge.

Level 4: Presenting the Stimulus (Selective Perception)

Presenting new information in an effective manner using more examples, use of

timelines, diagrams, concept maps and student discussions. Try using different
media and styles such as visual cues and verbal instructions to suit people with
different learning styles.

Level 5: Providing learning guidance (Semantic Encoding)

Helping your team learn and retain most of the information by providing
alternative approaches to illustrate the information you are trying to convey to the
learner. Examples include; case studies and graphics. Giving time for discussion
and answering queries with relevant additional materials.

Level 6: Eliciting Performance (Responding)

Now is the time to see if learners can demonstrate their knowledge with what was
taught to them. Give them a brief test after each task/ unit to see if they can apply it
to their learning before moving forward.

Level 7: Providing feedback (Reinforcement)

After a clear demonstration of knowledge from the learners’ end, it's time to give
feedback to them and guide them on the points they missed. Your feedback and tips
will help them improve. Discuss their results, be professional with comments and
give them guidelines to work on. This is a healthy exercise if conducted properly.

Level 8: Assessing performance (Retrieval)

When learners have had a good opportunity to practice and refine their learning it
is time to assess their learning with a test at the end of the course or any other
measurement tool such as a case study or seminar to show learners have learned the
material or skill effectively. This test shall be completed without any assistance or
coaching.

Level 9: Enhancing retention and transfer (Generalisation)

At this stage, learners show the transfer of knowledge through the application of
skills and knowledge. They should then be provided with real-life examples to
apply the acquired knowledge.
 Gagne’s conditions of learning have its own pros and cons. People who have
learning issues may respond better to this regime that is clearly very systematic
where learners are provided with resources and a blueprint for learning. It can also
be adjusted to suit their needs. However, it also requires a great deal of assistance
overall where critical thinking and instructions can’t be avoided. This practice may
restrict learners’ imagination and exploration instinct. But overall, these 9 steps are
nine events of instruction, systematically designed as foundation blocks of learning
in modern classrooms.

9 events

1. Simply gaining students’ interest

2. Discussing what you are going to talk verbally or through a document
3. Asking questions about previous lesson
4. It is easier for the students to learn if they can connect to prior lessons.
5. Allows the students to practice the material and explore new ideas.
6. Have the students performed a task
7. Etalking your students individually. Provide constructive criticism and support
students by giving suggestions and encouraging collaborative thinking
8. Seeing how they comprehended the information
9. Giving students the tools that will help them remember the material. This could
include teaching them songs or adding movements

Stages 1 to 3 prepares the students for learning

3 through 6 allows the students to perform
6 to 9 allows the students to transfer knowledge

Gagne believes that

So that students can engage, explore, explain, and apply concepts.