John Dewey, who visited Turkey in 1924, prepared a report on Turkish Education in which he emphasized the importance of progressive education. The report was translated into Turkish. However, the translated version does not transform the idea of ‘progressive education,’ and the concept of ‘progressive’ education has hardly been discussed as a philosophical approach in Turkish education system, instead remained to be a term that has been interpreted with different corresponding words in Turkish at different times. This paper focuses on the discrepancy between the English and Turkish versions of the term “progressive” as a philosophy of education, and the implications Dewey’s report created in teacher education along with non-progressive practices in the field of education in Turkey.

Education is the means by which society provides for the transmission or advancement of its culture and it is formally done at schools that are the arena of human interaction aimed at producing learning. But some people in that interaction aimed at producing learning cannot achieve as much as the others due to some social or individual factors especially when the society is not homogeneous in terms of culture, language, etc.All cultures do not require the same kinds of knowledge and all may have distinct goals and expectations in education. This study aims at presenting the consensus and conflict in perspectives of students of different ethnic origins on general goals of education and expectations from schools in East and Southeast Turkey. The results will be used to generate a rationale to assume that the failure of students in East and Southeast Turkey where majority of population is ethnically diverse, may be because of the lack of divergent goals and expectations set for school curriculum or that the failure of students is dependent on some other factors except the unique school curriculum unresponsive to cultural or ethnic diversity. For this purpose, the goals of general education (1973, Law number 1739, Item number 2), and school expectations developed by House (1973) were prepared as questionnaire items, piloted, validated and administered to 9373 secondary school students in east and southeast Turkey. The findings of this study were that the students of different ethnic origins value the goals and expectations set for school curriculum in Turkey in significantly different ways.

Whole language is a dynamic and generative philosophy of education that started as a grass roots teacher movement. Throughout its history it has been lauded worldwide as well as being attacked. This article explores whole language through two lenses. First it examines the history of whole language through the eyes of someone who participated in the grass-roots movement. Secondly, the future of whole language is examined through the voices of whole language and literacy leaders. Their answers to questions about whole language’s fit with progressive education, its greatest accomplishment and its future direction offer support and encouragement for progressive, holistic educators around the world.

How is history used? What are the ways history is used? In this book review, Nihat Kahveci analyzes how Bernard Lewis’s History: Remembered, Recovered, Invented seeks the answers to these important questions. Lewis states in the preface that the historian sometimes “needs to leave his period, his area, and his topic, and take a boarder look at the nature of his vocation and discipline”. The book is such reflection on nature of historical knowledge and discipline of history. Organizing different examples of historical events, the book takes a broad look at the discipline of history.