ABSTRACT
Teachers need to incorporate a critical stance in our everyday lives in order to find ways to help children understand and analyze the social and political issues around them. Leading up to the turn of the 20th century and into the 21st, the flows of capital, information, and bodies across traditional borders seemed to "flatten" the world, enabling more people to participate in the negotiations of an increasingly global society. This chapter demonstrates that progressive teachers practice in all parts of the United States, working with all ages and groups. Facilitated by technological innovations and free trade political agreements, previous historical advantages among nations are being reduced, encouraging commercial and cultural exchanges under new, leveled conditions. According to Dewey, if we seek a socially just democracy, then schools must afford all students the requisite experiences of identifying, insisting on, and enacting democratic justice at some more basic, simplified level.
