Reflections on Elwyn Richardson Commemoration

Abstract

This article was written as the final presentation to be delivered at our day of reflection on the educational work of Elwyn Richardson. As such, the tone is somewhat different to that which is usual for this journal, but I elect to leave it substantially the same as it was when delivered. I address first the question of what we do when we mourn or remember someone like Elwyn Richardson, who made an important contribution to New Zealand’s educational history. Then I turn to a ‘whakapapa’ or genealogy of progressivist ideas in education in New Zealand, and finally look to where we might take the spirit of these ways of thinking in the future.

Keywords:

• Elwyn Richardson
• Dewey
• New Zealand educational history
• progressivism

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Notes

1. Helen May at this conference gave a wonderful example of deterritorialising and reterritorialising knowledge in the child composing music using the letter names of notes on a xylophone—Music? Literacy? Coding?