BUILDING A NEW

ORDER
George Sylvester Counts
Reporter:
MS. MARIE-CATHERINE A. PUASA

Short Background:

Born: December 9, 1889

Baldwin City, Kansas, USA

Died: November 10, 1974 (aged

84)
Belleville, Illinois USA

Religon: Methodist (Methodist

Church)

Influences:
Tertiary Level:
Baker University (1911)
Bachelor of Arts in Classical
Studies

Graduate Studies:
University of Chicago (1913)
Major: Education
Minor: Sociology and Social

Influences:

Doctorate in Education:
University of Chicago (1916)

His experience in studying

Sociology under Albion W. Small
during this period, is attributed for
encouraging Counts to concentrate
on the sociological dimension of
Educational Research.

PROFESSION: Early Career

Baker University:
- Science and Math Teacher
- Athletic Coach
- High School Pricipal

Delaware College (University of

Delaware)
- Head, Department of Education (19161918)

Harris Teachers College

Missouri)

(St. Louis,

PROFESSION: Early Career

University of Washington (19191920)

Yale University (1920-1926)
University of Chicago (1926-1927)
Teachers College, Columbia
University (1927-1956)
University of Pittsburgh (1959)
Michigan State University (1960)
Southern Illinois University (1962-

PROFESSION: Early Career

Published Books: (with J. Crosby
Chapman)

The Principles of Education (1924)

- This book provided a broad
overview of education from the
perspective of Progressive Education
of child-centered learning by John
Dewey.

American Road to Culture (1930)

- This contains a global perspective

EDUCATIONAL
PHILOSOPHIES:

Counts was interested in the study of social

conditions and problems and their relationship to
education.
Selective Character of American Secondary
Education (1992)

- Counts demonstrated a close relationship between

students perseverance in school and their parents
occupation
Social Composition of Boards of Education: A Study in the
Social Control of the Public Education (1927)

EDUCATIONAL
PHILOSOPHIES:

Counrtss educational philosophy was also an

outgrowth John Deweys, a principal figure in the
Progressive Education Movement, Philosophy

Both men believed in the enormous potential of

education to improve society and that schools
should reflect life rather than be isolated from it.

Building A New Order:

Accounts:
In 1932, Counts spoke before the Progressive
Education Association for not having a social theory
to guide education.
He, then, included the controversial speech in the
pamphlet Dare the School Build the Social Order?
In which he called for schools and teachers to help
foster a planned collective economy and argued
that teachers should serve as leaders, effecting

Building A New Order:

Accounts:
In 1934, Counts, along with other colleagues,
launched journal of social and educational
commentary The Social Frontier
The journal became the voice of educational theory
called Social Reconstructionism, which is based on
the theory that society can be reconstructed
through education.

Countss View on
Education:
the schools, instead of directing the course of
change, ate themselves driven by the very forces that
are transforming the rest of the social order..

Countss View on
Education:
Society is never redeemed without effort, struggle,
and sacrifice

PROGRESSIVE EDUCATION
According to Counts:
In this union of two of the great faiths of the
American People, the faith in progress and the faith in
education, we have reason to hope for light and
guidance

Characteristics Of
Progressive Education

They have focused their attention squarely upon the

child;
They have recognized the fundamental importance
of the interest of the learner;
They have defended the thesis that activity lies at
the root of all true education;
They have conceived learning in terms of life
situations and growth of character;
They have championed the rights of the child as a

Counts on Progressive
Education:
It constitutes too narrow a conception of the
meaning of education; it brings into the picture but
one-half of the landscape

Counts on Progressive
Education
Characteristics of a progressive educational
movement:

It must have ORIENTATION

It must possess DIRECTION

Counts on Progressive
Education
Characteristics of a progressive educational
movement:
face squarely and courageously every social issue
Come to grips with life in all its start reality
Establish an organic relation with the community
Develop a realistic and comprehensive theory of
welfare
Fashion a compelling and challenging vision of

Counts on Progressive
Education
What makes a good educational institution?

Fallacies on Educational
Beliefs:
1. The fallacy that man is born free.
- He is born helpless. He achieves freedom, as a
race and as an individual, through the medium of
culture.
2. The fallacy that the child is good by nature.
- An individual is neither good nor bad. The concept
of good and bad is by a culture. Good or bad society
is not given by nature.

Fallacies on Educational
Beliefs:
3. The fallacy that the child lives in a separate world
of his own.
- Place the child in a world of his own and you take from
him the most powerful incentives to grow and achievement
4. The fallacy that education is some pure and mystical
essence that remains unchanged from everlasting to
everlasting.
- This means that genuine education must be completely
divorced from politics and etc.

Fallacies on Educational
Beliefs:
5. The fallacy that the school should be impartial in
its emphasis, that no bias should be given
instruction.
- complete impartiality is utterly impossible, the school
must shape attitudes, develops tastes, and even impose
ideas
6. The fallacy that the great object of education is to
produce the college professor, that is, the individual
who
adopts an agnostic attitude towards every
important social issue.

Fallacies on Educational
Beliefs:
7.

8.

9.

10.

The fallacy that education is primarily

intellectualistic in its processes and goals.
The fallacy that the school is an all-powerful
educational agency.
The fallacy that ignorance rather than knowledge is
the way of wisdom.
The fallacy that in a dynamic society, the major
responsibility of education is to prepare the
individuals to adjust himself to social change.

Conclusion:

The teachers should deliberately reach for power

and then make the most of their conquest is my firm
conviction
Teachers must bridge the gap between school and
society and play some part in the fashioning of
those great common purposes which should bind
the two together.
The educational problem is not wholly intellectual in
nature.

Conclusion:
Only through such a legacy of spiritual values will
our children be enabled to find their place in the
world, be lifted out of the present morass of moral
indifference, be liberated from the senseless struggle
for material success, and be challenged to high
endeavour and achievement

END
THANK YOU