1st PIM Reading Group for 2021: Mondays Monthly Lunchtimes 12-1 pm

THE SPONTANEITY THEORY OF LEARNING

Revision of the Experimental Method in Science and the Philosophy of Education.

Author: J.L. Moreno

Excerpt from Section 1, EDUCATION AS A PROCESS in Psychodrama and Sociodrama in American Education, Ed. Robert Bartlett Haas, with an Introduction by J. L. Moreno, Beacon House, 1949

Sue Daniel is the moderator for this first Reading Group for 2021. Please contact her via the above PIM email address for all enquiries about the Reading Group, including the process of attending this group, receiving a copy of the article and payment details.

“Einstein postulated that knowledge of the physical universe is relative to the observer (italics SD). By making the observer a part of the experiment he created a revolution in physics. The revision of the experimental method inaugurated by sociometry for the social sciences has gone one step further. It postulated that knowledge of the social universe is relative to its constituent actors and to the relations between them (italics SD). It has not only been one of re-introducing the observer but of changing the status, that of the social investigator to that of partner and member of the group and particularly in changing the status of all observed ones into that of social investigators…this revision has two consequences…real and dynamic learning can take place…the teacher becomes a partner and a member of the group instead of an authoritative, unrelated outsider…(he) is now a teacher and a learner (italics Moreno), outside and inside the group.