education") confront the situations
of life.

2. Open-mindedness. Partiality is, as we have seen, an accompaniment of
the existence of interest, since this means sharing, partaking, taking
sides in some movement. All the more reason, therefore, for an attitude
of mind which actively welcomes suggestions and relevant information
from all sides. In the chapter on Aims it was shown that foreseen ends
are factors in the development of a changing situation. They are
the means by which the direction of action is controlled. They are
subordinate to the situation, therefore, not the situation to them. They
are not ends in the sense of finalities to which everything must be bent
and sacrificed. They are, as foreseen, means of guiding the development
of a situation. A target is not the future goal of shooting; it is
the centering factor in a present shooting. Openness of mind means
accessibility of mind to any and every consideration that will throw
light upon the situation that needs to be cleared up, and that will help
determine the consequences of acting this way or that. Efficiency in
accomplishing ends which have been settled upon as unalterable can
coexist with a narrowly opened mind. But intellectual growth means
constant expansion of horizons and consequent formation of new purposes
and new responses. These are impossible without an active disposition
to welcome points of view hitherto alien; an active desire to entertain
considerations which modify existing purposes. Retention of capacity
to grow is the reward of such intellectual hospitality. The worst
thing about stubbornness of mind, about prejudices, is that they arrest
development; they shut the mind off from new stimuli. Open-mindedness
means retention of the childlike attitude; closed-mindedness means
premature intellectual old age.

Exorbitant desire for uniformity of procedure and for prompt external
results are the chief foes which the open-minded attitude meets in
school. The teacher who does not permit and encourage diversity of
operation in dealing with questions is imposing intellectual blinders
upon pupils--restricting their vision to the one path the teacher's mind
happens to approve. Probably the chief cause of devotion to rigidity
of method is, however, that it seems to promise speedy, accurately
measurable, correct results. The zeal for "answers" is the explanation
of much of the zeal for rigid and mechanical methods. Forcing and
overpressure have th