Dewey, Peirce, and the Categories of Learning

John Dewey proposes the “educative” experience as the goal of instruction. Yet, in focusing on the educative experience, Dewey may discount other sorts of learning which occur in school, and indeed in life. This piece proposes a recapitulation of Dewey’s theory through Peirce’s categorical system of experience, leading to three categories of learning. The three proposed categories, “accepting,” “analytical,” and “evaluative,” correspond roughly to learning “what”, learning “how”, and learning “why.” The intent here is not to reduce the importance of the educative experience, but rather to broaden the application of Dewey’s work by portraying learning as a multifaceted phenomenon