Innovative education has become quite a ubiquitous issue in policy discussion today. Yet, in some ways it remains elusive in practice, murky and contentious in concept. The root of this controversy is as old as the inception of the term “innovative education” more than two decades ago by James Bodkin, an American pedagogue. The irreversible and complete revision aspect resulted to massive criticism of Bodkin’s concept. In this light, this paper dwells on the irreversible and complete revision of the very principles of conventional educational theories that were considered self evident. To adequately show the complete and irreversible revision, a comparative analysis is provided on both the traditional education and innovative education.

To begin with, whilst the traditional considered the core value of the educational procedure to be the transferred knowledge to students, James Bodkin’s innovative education presented the knowledge as a means instead of an end, concurrently orienting at development of the personality of a student through knowledge . Consequently, Bodkin’s complete and irreversible concept was less concerned with the control of the educational process thereby attempting to create situations in which a student establish her or his own objectives and attain them, whilst transforming themselves and self regulating the process of studying.

On the other hand, the traditional education proved to be more or less stable in terms of structures, evident in the fact that it had not undergone some dramatic changes throughout the years. In such an arrangement, knowledge accumulation did not change, except in subject and topics where it was hard to avoid, for instance, literature and history, which were normally expanded from time to time. According to a study done by Martinez and Mimi (2009) the curriculum for pure science such as mathematics and physics usually takes decades to change. In contrast, Bodkin offered another decision that presupposed that the education system is an ever-changing, and a dynamic structure which is constantly regrouped and renewed, with new programs, as well as, educational discipline introduced all the time. As such, there is no opportunity of reversing to the conventional programs and disciplines that were in place sometimes back.

As opposed to the reproductive essence of conventional education where students perceived information, in addition to, reproducing it, the innovative education was supposed to be the specifically and only creative process. It would teach students to come up with texts irrespective of their subjects, comprehend information regardless of the fact that it had never been imagined by such students . Moreover, it expected students to solve problems through the means of autonomous thinking instead of applying memorized and pre-existing solutions. Lastly, Bodkin saw any sort of external control to be harmful and instead advocated for self control coordination and mutual control.

Conclusion:

In sum, the irreversible and complete revision of principles of conventional educational theories concept was introduced by James Bodkin. He believed that education system is an ever-changing, and a dynamic structure which is constantly regrouped and renewed, with new programs, as well as, educational discipline introduced all the time. In effect, this does not provide the stakeholders with an opportunity of reverting to the conventional programs and disciplines that were in place sometimes back.

Bibliography:

Erickson, Lee. 1999. The economy of literary form: English literature and the industrialization of publishing, 1800-1850. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press.

Martinez, Mario, and Mimi Wolverton. 2009. Innovative strategy making in higher education. Charlotte, NC: Information Age Pub.