The Progress And Enlightenment Of The Present Age Of Tao Xingzhi Sincizing The "Education Is Life" Theory Of Dewey

Tao Xingzhi is one of the most famous educators in the20thof China. He advocatedLiving Education theory and successively engaged in the Chinese EducationMovement and Country Education Movement and so on. Tao successfully sinicizedDewey’s educational thought, including “Life is Education”,“Education Serves as aSchool” and “Combination of Teaching, Learning and Working”, and try to unifyeducation and life in order to change the reality of Chinese education with the heart ofchanging the situation of Chinese education. No matter in the early20thcentury or intoday’s influence of new educational tendency, it will always an indelible mark on thehistory of the development of educational theory for the series of practical explorationand theoretical contribution which Tao has done to sinicize Dewey’s educationalthought.The learning experience at home and abroad has influenced the whole life of Tao,he learnt the unity of knowing and doing of Wang Yangming in Jin Ling Universityand Dewey’s educational thought in Columbia University, and these two theoreticalthought were the foundation of Tao’s Living Education theory. Dewey’s “Education isLife” theory is one of the most important theoretical sources of Tao’s LivingEducation theory, so Tao returned to China with the educational theory of Dewey, andfinally knew the meaning of living education after eight years’ educational practices.At that time, the traditional private school cannot carry the responsibility of reformingsociety, and the general working people have no chance to study at school, so that theeducational thought of Tao had a significant practice sense in that era.The process of clarify the sinicization of Dewey’s educational theory can reflect therecognization the theory and practice of the “Life is Education” and the grasp of theconversion process creative thinking. In terms of thought, Tao can accept Dewey’sidea of education, make people can understand another culture because of the role ofcommon denominator and the very special mode if operations. There is commonground between Dewey’s education ideas and other perspective, such as the kindhearted view of Confucian culture, knowing and doing theory, the populist of theMohist, and the spirit of self-sacrifice and service of religious culture. In practice, Taoinvest into the work of mass education after the guide of Yan Yangchu, after the deepinvestigations, Tao recognize the relationship between life and education, and achievethe sinicization of the theory. This process provides the important enlightenment forthe educational explorer to learn from the Western education theories.