In education, the progressive movement is the disintegration mode of thought.In progressive education, man is primarily an actor rather than a thinker and actions and the concrete have primacy over the abstract and thought. A child must learn by doing activities.In reading,the commitment to the concrete as against the abstract take the form of the whole word method rather than phonics.
The progressive program for the schools is not reform, but demolition of subjects, facts, lessons, texts, structure, intellect, teaching, and learning. Above all, the movement represents the equation of education with the perceptual level mentality. It is the anti-conceptual mentality embracing the pre-conceptual child and training him to remain in that state for life.
Children who are not taught History and cannot read well enough to pursue it easily on their own never learn what has worked in society and nations and what doesn't work. Their minds are not cramped by reality and can be taught to believe that impossible utopias can be instituted by politicians and wise leaders.