University of Massachusetts Amherst ScholarWorks@UMass Amherst Doctoral Dissertations 1896 - February 2014 1-1-1976 The e s t experience : a contextual approach to education. Frank Siccone University of Massachusetts Amherst Follow this and additional works at: https://scholarworks.umass.edu/dissertations_1 Recommended Citation Siccone, Frank, "The e s t experience : a contextual approach to education." (1976). Doctoral Dissertations 1896 - February 2014. 3091. https://scholarworks.umass.edu/dissertations_1/3091 This Open Access Dissertation is brought to you for free and open access by ScholarWorks@UMass Amherst. It has been accepted for inclusion in Doctoral Dissertations 1896 - February 2014 by an authorized administrator of ScholarWorks@UMass Amherst. For more information, please contact [email protected]. THE e 8 t EXPERIENCE: A CONTEXTUAL APPROACH TO EDUCATION A Dissertation Presented By FRANK RONALD SICCONE Submitted to the Graduate School of the University of Massachusetts in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree DOCTOR OF EDUCATION May 1976 Major Subject: Education (c) Frank R. Siccone 1976 All Rights Reserved ii THE eat EXPERIENCE: A CONTEXTUAL APPROACH TO EDUCATION A Dissertation by Frank Ronald Siccone May, 1976 . ACKNOWLEDGMENTS I would like to express my appreciation: To the members of my dissertation committee for their intelligent counsel. To the staff at e s t , an educational corporation, for their support; in particular, Don Cox, Vic Gioscia, Bill Bartley, Laurel Scheaf, Joan Holmes and Elizabeth Russell To the e s t graduates with whom I've shared space-- for their inspiration. To my family and friends for their warmth and love, in particular my mother whom I cherish. To Werner for having discovered the game and having the integrity to let me in on it. iv The e s t EXPERIENCE: A CONTEXTUAL APPROACH TO EDUCATION (May 1976) Frank Ronald Siccone, B.F.A., M.Ed. University of Massachusetts Directed by: Dr. Peter A. Wagschal ABSTRACT Erhard Seminars Training, ( e s t ) , is an experience which occurs during two weekend training periods. The purpose of the e s t training is to transform your ability to experience living so that the situations you have been trying to change or have been putting up with, clear up just in the process of life itself. The purpose as a of this study is to describe the e s t experience contextual approach to education. e s t is identified the basis foi a in terms of an experience of Being and as being is pre- mode of being- in- the -world. This mode of contents of life, in- sented as the context in which the cluding education, occur. v . The context that is e s t contains the awareness of freedom, responsibility and choice, and allows for the experience of satisfaction. This project offers a study of an e s t Children's Training conducted in a fifth grade inner city school in California. The purpose of the study was to substantiate informal reports by the principal, teachers and parents of the children, that the behavior of these children had improved . The findings in all but one measure of academic achievement were inconclusive. The project also addresses itself to the translation, by teachers, of the e s t experience into education. The translation takes the form of descriptions of experience, consistent with the existential nature of the document. Implications of this study are discussed. They address themselves to the point of view of the paper which is that it is not education which doesn't work, but rather it is the context which contains the informa- tion we have about education that prevents it from working e s t is presented as an experience which creates a context in which education can occur in a way that produces aliveness and satisfaction. vi TABLE OF CONTENTS Page ABSTRACT . v LIST OF TABLES ix LIST OF FIGURES xi ILLUSTRATIONS • • • • • • • • xii CHAPTER PURPOSE AND OVERVIEW • • • • 1 Introduction • • • • • • Rationale 3 • 5 Description of the e s t Experience 16 II THEORETICAL CONTEXT .... • • • 21 Introduction • • • • • • • • 23 The Experience of Being and Mode of being 26 Mode of being as Context • * 33 III ON THE TRAINING OF CHILDREN Case Study: A Title I Elementary School 42 Introduction 44 Description of the Training 46 Purpose of the Study 51 Scope of the Study 52 Hypotheses 56 Operational Definitions 58 Instrumentation 61 Analysis and Results 70 Discussion 109 Recommendations 114 Conclusion 116 vii CHAPTER Page IV. THE e s t EXPERIENCE: CONTEXT FOR EDUCATION 119 Introduction 121 Context for Education: the Student 126 Context for Education: the Teacher 135 V. IMPLICATIONS AND CONCLUSION .... 156 Introduction . • • • • 158 Implications of Chapter I ... 159 Implications of Chapter II . 161 Implications of Chapter Ill . 164 Implications of Chapter IV . 166 Conclusion . 168 COMPREHENSIVE BIBLIOGRAPHY 170 APPENDICES A. Abstract of the Behaviordyne Report on Psycho- logical Changes Measured After Taking the Erhard Seminars Training .... 17 6 B. Summative Evaluation Report on Castro Valley Unified School District Title III Project "Parents as Partners" 181 C. Instrumentation Case Study: A Title I Elementary School 196 Vlll LIST OF TABLES Table Page 1. Selected References to the experience of Being and mode of being 31 2. Characteristics and Qualities of being 32 3. Teacher-Parent-Child Rating Scale Communication 4. Teacher-Parent-Child Rating Scale Participation 76 5. Attendance 77 6 . Proportion of Students Whose Attendance was Above the Median Value 8 0 7. Teacher-Parent-Child Rating Scale Responsibility 82 8 . Reading Achievement 85 9. Math Achievement 8 6 10. Analysis of Variance for CTBS Reading Scores 38 11. Analysis of Variance for Reading Grades 90 12. Analysis of Variance for CTBS Math Scores 93 13. Analysis of Variance for Math Grades 99 14. Comprehensive Tests of Basic Skills 100 15. Semantic Differential Instrument Me 103 16. Semantic Differential Instrument Classmates 106 17. Semantic Differential Instrument School 108 ix Table Page 18. Case Study School Test Results for 1974-75 113 x LIST OF FIGURES Figure Page 1. Attendance 77 2. CTBS Reading Scores 89 3. Report Card - Grades Reading . 91 4 . CTBS Math Scores 94 5. Report Card Grades - Math • • • • • 96 6. CTBS Reading Scores -Title I • • • • 97 7. CTBS Math Scores - Title I • • • • • 98 8. Lewin's "Life Space" 122 xi s LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS Illustration Page 1. Searching for the Ox • • • • • • 2 2. Seeing the Traces • • • • • • • • 20 3. Seeing the Ox • • • • • • • • • 22 4. Catching the Ox • • • • • • • • 41 5. Herding the Ox • • • • • • • • 43 6. Coming Home on the Ox ' Back • • • 118 7. The Ox Forgotten, Leaving the Man Alone 120 8. The Ox and the Man Both Gone Out of Sight 155 9. Returning to the Origin Back to , the Source 157 10. Entering the City with Bliss-bestowing Hands 169 The author of these "Ten Oxherding Pictures" is said to be a Zen master of the Sung Dynasty known as Kaku-an Shi-en (Kuo-an Shih-yuan) belonging to the Rinzai school. He is also the author of the poems and introductory words attached to the pictures. Daisetz Teitaro Suzuki CHAPTER I. PURPOSE AND OVERVIEW . !. , Searching for the Ox The beast has never gone astray, and what is the use of searching for him? The reason why the oxherd is not on intimate terms with him is because the oxherd himself has violated his own inmost nature. The beast is lost, for the oxherd has himself been led out of the way through his deluding senses . His home is receding farther away from him, and byways and crossways are ever confused . Desire for gain and fear of loss burn like fire ; ideas of right and wrong shoot up like a phalanx Alone in the wilderness, lost in the jungle, the boy is searching , searching The swelling waters, the far-away mountains and the unending path; Exhausted and in despair, he knows not where to go, He only hears the evening cicadas singing in the ma pi e-woods Introduction This Chapter presents arguments some have used that education doesn't work and it begins "seeing the traces" that an experience called e s t has the potential to transform people's ability to experience, so that the context in which education occurs is transformed. The purpose of this study is to describe the e s t experience as a contextual approach to education and to identify the implications of such an approach. The e s t experience will be identified in terms of an "experience of Being" which experience is the basis . for a "mode of being -in -the-world " Theoretical refer- ences from the disciplines of philosophy, psychology and education will be included relative to this. The implications of this experience for education will be looked at from the points of view of both the V student and the teacher. For the student, a case study of an e s t Children's Training conducted in November 1973, in a fifth grade class of a Title I Elementary School in Los Angeles will be presented. The principal, teachers and parents at that school say that the children a who participated in this training are now demonstrating respon- greater degree of communication, participation, and that sibility and expanded ability to produce results 4 their general attitude toward self, others and environment has shown change in a positive direction. The study looks at these assertions. The e s t experience, from the point of view of the teacher, will be discussed in terms of the creation of a context for education. The characteristics, qualities, essential elements or component parts of such a context will be identified. These elements will be identified with the intention that teachers, by expanding their aware- ness of these elements, strengthen their ability to consciously participate in the creation of this context.