SECTION I
GOVERNMENT OF CHILDREN CHAPTER I
Theoretical Aspects 45. We assume at the outset the existence of all the care and nurture requisite for physical growth and well-being; a bringing up that shall be as free from pampering as from dangerous hardening. There must be no actual want to lead a child astray, nor undue indulgence to create unnecessary demands. How much hardening it is safe to risk will depend in each case on the child’s constitution. 46. The foundation of government consists in keeping children employed. No account is taken as yet of the prospective gain to mental culture; the time is to be fully occupied, at all events, even if the immediate purpose be merely the avoidance of disorder. This purpose, however, involves the requirement of ample provision, according to the ages of pupils, for the need of physical activity, that the cause of natural restlessness may be removed. This need is more urgent with some than with others; there are children that seem ungovernable because compelled to sit still. 47. Other things being equal, self-chosen occupations deserve the preference; but it rarely happens that children know how to keep themselves busy sufficiently and continuously. Specific tasks, not to be abandoned until completed, assure order much better than random playing, which is apt to end in ennui. It is desirable that adults possessing the requisite patience assist children, if not always, at least frequently, in their games; that they explain pictures, tell stories, have them retold, etc. With advancing maturity, a steadily increasing proportion of the occupations assumes the character of instruction or of exercises growing out of it; this work should be properly balanced by recreations. 48. Next in order comes supervision, and with it numerous commands and prohibitions. Under this head several things must be considered. In the first place this: Whether under certain circumstances one might withdraw a command or permit what has once been forbidden. It is ill-advised to give an order more sweeping than the execution is meant to be; and it weakens government to yield to the entreaties, the tears, or, worse still, the impetuous insistence of children. Also this question: Whether it is possible to make sure of obedience. Where children are not kept busy and are left without oversight, the issue becomes doubtful. The difficulty grows at a rapid rate with an increase in numbers. This is true especially of larger educational institutions, but, on account of the coming and going of pupils, applies in a measure also to common day schools. 49. The usual solution is greater strictness of supervision. But this involves the risk of utter failure to receive voluntary obedience, and of inciting a match game in shrewdness. As to voluntary obedience, much depends on the ratio of restraint to the freedom that still remains. Ordinarily, youth submits readily enough to many restrictions, provided such restrictions bear upon specific fixed points, and leave elbow room for independent action. In the work of supervision the teacher will find it hard to rely on himself entirely, particularly if he has charge of classes only at stated times. Others must assist him; he himself will have to resort occasionally to surprises. Supervision is always an evil when coupled with unnecessary distrust. It is essential, therefore, to make those who do not merit distrust understand that the measures adopted are not directed against them. CHAPTER II
Practical Aspects 50. Since supervision is not to be vigorous to the point of ever felt pressure, child government, to be effective, requires both gentle and severe measures. In general, this effectiveness results from the natural superiority of the adult, a fact of which teachers sometimes need to be reminded. Whatever the plan of supervision, there must be coupled with it an adequate mode of disciplinary procedure. A record should be kept in schools, not for the law-abiding pupils, but for those guilty of repeated acts of disobedience. These remarks do not thus far include any reference to marks and records pertaining to education proper; they are confined to what is popularly, but loosely, called discipline, that is, the training of pupils to conform to the system of order that obtains in the school. Home training seldom requires such bookkeeping; but even here it may at times be useful. Of course, the individual child knows in any case that some one is keeping an eye on his actions, but the fact becomes more deeply impressed upon his memory if the reproofs incurred by him are recorded. 51. It would be in vain to attempt to banish entirely the corporal punishments usually administered after fruitless reprimands; but use should be made of them so sparingly that they be feared rather than actually inflicted. Recollection of the rod does not hurt a boy. Nor is there any harm in his present conviction that a flogging is henceforth as much beyond the range of possibility as his meriting such treatment. But it would, no doubt, be injurious to actually violate his self-respect by a blow, however little he might mind the physical pain. And pernicious in the highest degree, although, nevertheless, not quite obsolete yet, is the practice of continuing to beat children already hardened to blows. Brutish insensibility is the consequence, and the hope is almost vain that even a long period of now unavoidable indulgence will restore a normal state of feeling. There is less objection to making use, for a few hours, of hunger as a corrective. Here only an act of deprivation takes place, not one involving a direct insult. Curtailment of freedom is the most commonly employed form of punishment; justly so, provided it be properly adjusted to the offence. Moreover, it admits of the most varied gradations from standing in a corner to confinement in a dark room, perhaps even with hands tied together behind the back. Only, for several serious reasons, this punishment must not be of long duration. A whole hour is more than enough unless there is careful supervision. Besides, the place must be chosen judiciously. Solitary confinement, especially in a dark room, is seldom if ever resorted to in American public schools. For remarks upon the social basis of modern school punishments, see 55. 52. Corrections of such severity, as removal from home or expulsion from an institution, are to be administered only in extreme cases; for what is to become of the expelled pupil? A burden to another school? And in case the transfer implies the same freedom, the old disorderly conduct will usually be resumed. Such pupils must, therefore, be placed under very strict supervision and given new occupations. We must trust to the new environment to obliterate gradually the old vitiated circle of thought. 53. It is a well-known fact that authority and love are surer means of securing order than harsh measures are. But authority cannot be created by every one at will. It implies obvious superiority in mind, in knowledge, in physique, in external circumstances. Love can, indeed, be gained in the course of time by a complaisant manner—the love of well-disposed pupils; but just where government becomes most necessary, complaisance has to cease. Love must not be purchased at the expense of weak indulgence; it is of value only when united with the necessary severity. 54. In early childhood and with healthy children, government is, on the whole, easy. It continues to be easy after they have once formed habits of obedience. But it should not be interrupted. Even if children have been left to themselves or in charge of strangers only a few days, the change is noticeable. It requires an effort to tighten the reins again—something not to be done too suddenly. Where boys have been allowed to run wild, the attempt to bring them back to orderly conduct reveals the differences of individuality. Some are easily made to return to appropriate work by kindness combined with a moderate measure of forbearance, others have sense enough to fear threats and to avoid penalties; but we may unfortunately also expect to find a few whose sole thought is to escape from supervision, however unpleasant for them the consequences may be. Where home ties are wanting, this spirit may develop even during boyhood with ominous rapidity; during adolescence the difficulty of checking it may grow to be insuperable. 55. As a rule, it is reasonable to assume that youth will try to break through restraints as soon as these are felt. A sufficient amount of satisfying activity, together with uniform firmness of the lines of restraint, will, indeed, soon put an end to persistent attempts of this kind; yet they will be repeated from time to time. As boys grow older there is a change of pursuits; now the restraining boundaries must gradually be enlarged. The question now is whether education has progressed sufficiently far to make government less indispensable. Moreover, the choice of work comes to be determined by the prospects opening before the young man, according to his rank and means, together with his native capabilities and acquired knowledge. To encourage such pursuits as being appropriate for him, and, on the other hand, to reduce mere hobbies and diversions to harmless proportions, still remains the function of government. In any case government should not be wholly surrendered too early, least of all when the environment is such as to justify apprehension of temptation. Though American teachers are perhaps not accustomed to emphasize the distinction between government for order and training for character, the difference, nevertheless, exists, often in an exaggerated form. Just as fever is looked upon as the measure of functional disturbance in the body, so disorder in the schoolroom is looked upon as the measure of the teacher’s failure. As fever is the universal symptom of disease, so disorder is the index of failure. The diagnosis may err in either case as to what the seat of the difficulty really is, but that something is wrong is plain to all. The fact that the public usually gauge a teacher’s efficiency by the order he keeps has led in the past to an exaggerated emphasis upon school discipline. The means for securing good order have greatly changed since Herbart’s time. A growing sense of social solidarity in the community, together with the all but universal employment of women as teachers in the elementary grades, has transferred the basis of discipline from the teacher to the community. It is social pressure in and out of the school that is the main reliance for regularity, punctuality, and order. Herbart wonders what will become of the bad boy if he is expelled. The modern answer is, he will be sent to the reform school or to the truant school. The teacher still stands as of old at the point of contact between the institution and the individual; nor can he entirely escape the heat generated at times by such contact, but, after all, it is society that now supplies the pressure formerly exerted by will and birch. The teacher is now more of a mediator between the pupil and the organized community, than an avenger of broken law.
SECTION II
INSTRUCTION CHAPTER I
The Relation of Instruction to Government and Training 56. Instruction furnishes a part of those occupations which lie at the basis of government; how large a part depends on circumstances. Children must be kept employed at all events, because idleness leads to misbehavior and lawlessness. Now if the employment consists of useful labor, say in the workshop or on the farm, so much the better. Better still, if the work teaches the child something that will contribute to his further education. But not all employment is instruction; and in cases where the mere government of children is a difficult matter, lessons are not always the most adequate employment. Many a growing boy will be taught orderly conduct much sooner when placed with a mechanic or merchant or farmer than in school. The scope of government is wider than that of instruction. Teachers of manual training everywhere testify to the quieting effect of directed physical labor upon stormy spirits. Even a truant school or a school for incorrigibles becomes an attractive place to the inmates when adequate provision is made for the exercise of the motor powers. Most children can be controlled through mental occupation, but there are some to whom motor activity is indispensable. That a judicious apportionment of sensory and motor activity would favorably affect the development of all children is not to be questioned. 57. Instruction and training have this in common, that each makes for education and hence for the future, while government provides for the present. A distinction should, however, be made here. Instruction is far from being always educative or pedagogical. Where acquisition of wealth and external success or strong personal preference supply the motives for study, no heed is paid to the question: What will be the gain or loss to character? One actuated by such motives sets out, such as he is, to learn one thing or another, no matter whether for good or bad or for indifferent ends; to him the best teacher is he who imparts tuto, cito, jucunde, the proficiency desired. Instruction of this kind is excluded from our discussion; we are concerned here only with instruction that educates in the moral sense of the term. 58. Man’s worth does not, it is true, lie in his knowing, but in his willing. But there is no such thing as an independent faculty of will. Volition has its roots in thought; not, indeed, in the details one knows, but certainly in the combinations and total effect of the acquired ideas. The same reason, therefore, which in psychology accounts for considering the formation of ideas first, and then desire and volition, necessitates a corresponding order in pedagogics: first the theory of instruction, then that of training. Note.—Formerly, strange to say, no distinction was made between government and training, although it is obvious that the immediate present demands attention more urgently than does the future. Still less was instruction given its true place. The greater or smaller amount of knowledge, regarded as a matter of secondary importance in comparison with personal culture, was taken up last. The treatment of education as the development of character preceded that of instruction, just as though the former could be realized without the latter. During the last decades, however, a demand has arisen for greater activity on the part of schools, primarily the higher schools. Humanistic studies are to bestow humanity, or culture. It has come to be understood that the human being is more easily approached from the side of knowledge than from the side of moral sentiments and disposition. Furthermore, examinations might be set on the former, but not on the latter. Now the time for instruction was found to be too limited—a want that the old Latin schools had felt but little. This led to discussions as to the relative amount due each branch of study. We shall treat chiefly of the correlation of studies, for whatever remains isolated is of little significance. 59. In educative teaching, the mental activity incited by it is all important. This activity instruction is to increase, not to lessen; to ennoble, not to debase. Note.—A diminution of mental activity ensues, when, because of much study and of sitting—especially at all sorts of written work, often useless—physical growth is interfered with in a way sooner or later to the injury of health. Hence the encouragement given in recent years to gymnastic exercises, which may, however, become too violent. Deterioration sets in when knowledge is made subservient to ostentation and external advantages—the objectionable feature of many public examinations. Schools ought not to be called upon to display all they accomplish. By such methods instruction not only works against its own true end, but also conflicts with training, whose aim for the whole future of the pupil is—mens sana in corpore sano. 60. If all mental activity were of only one kind, the subject-matter of instruction would be of no consequence. But we need not go beyond experience to see that the opposite is true, that there is a great diversity of intellectual endowment. Yet while instruction must thus be differentiated, it should not be made so special as to cultivate only the more prominent gifts; otherwise the pupil’s less vigorous mental functions would be wholly neglected and perhaps suppressed. Instruction must rather be manifold, and its manifoldness being the same for many pupils in so far as it may help to correct inequalities in mental tendencies. Not only is subject-matter to be varied on account of mental diversity, but also for social reasons as well. For an enlargement of this theme, see the annotation to paragraph65. 61. What is to be taught and learned is, accordingly, not left for caprice and conventionality to decide. In this respect instruction differs in a striking manner from government, for which, if only idleness is prevented, it hardly matters what work children are given to do. Note.—Children are sent to school from many homes simply because they are in the way and their parents do not wish them to be idle. The school is regarded as an institution whose chief function is to govern, but which incidentally also imparts useful knowledge. Here there is a lack of insight into the nature of true mental culture; teachers, on the contrary, sometimes forget that they are giving pupils work, and that work should not exceed reasonable limits.
CHAPTER II
The Aim of Instruction 62. The ultimate purpose of instruction is contained in the notion, virtue. But in order to realize the final aim, another and nearer one must be set up. We may term it, many-sidedness of interest. The word interest stands in general for that kind of mental activity which it is the business of instruction to incite. Mere information does not suffice; for this we think of as a supply or store of facts, which a person might possess or lack, and still remain the same being. But he who lays hold of his information and reaches out for more, takes an interest in it. Since, however, this mental activity, is varied(60), we need to add the further determination supplied by the term many-sidedness. It has been pointed out[3] what the content of the word virtue must be, if this word is to be an adequate expression for the ultimate purpose of instruction. Virtue must embrace not only what is purely individual, or subjective, such as piety and humaneness of disposition, but it must likewise include what is objective, or social, in conduct. This fact lends a new significance to the doctrine of interest, for though a normal child is not naturally interested in introspective analysis of his feelings, he is spontaneously interested in what is objective and within the range of his experience. The enterprises of his mates, the regulations of his school or home, the erection of houses, the introduction of new machinery, the social doings of the neighborhood, the havoc created by the elements, the prominent features of the changing year—all these claim his closest attention. The common school studies deal with these very things. Literature (reading) and history reveal to him the conduct of men; the one considering it ideally, the other historically. Mathematics teaches the mastery of material when considered quantitatively, whether in trade or manufacture or construction. Nature studies bring the child into intimate touch with the significant in his natural environment. Geography shows him the most obvious features of the industrial activity about him. It shows him the chief conditions of production in crops and manufactures; it also gives him hints of the great business of commerce. In all these studies, the natural inclinations of the mind are directly appealed to. Not a little of the importance of the doctrine of interest in instruction depends upon these facts; for both the insight and the disposition that instruction is capable of imparting to the pupil relates specifically to the objective side of his character, the one most in need of development and most susceptible of it. 63. We may speak also of indirect as distinguished from direct interest. But a predominance of indirect interest tends to one-sidedness, if not to selfishness. The interest of the selfish man in anything extends only so far as he can see advantages or disadvantages to himself. In this respect the one-sided man approximates the selfish man, although the fact may escape his own observation; since he relates everything to the narrow sphere for which he lives and thinks. Here lies his intellectual power, and whatever does not interest him as means to his limited ends, becomes an impediment. It is important for the teacher to see the full scope of the doctrine of interest in its relation to effort. In Herbart’s psychology it assumes a most important place, since the primacy of mental life is, in this system, ascribed to ideas. In other systems, notably those of Kant, Schopenhauer, VonHartmann, Paulsen, primacy is ascribed to the will, first in unconscious or subconscious striving, later in conscious volition. This fundamental difference in standpoint will account for the emphasis laid now upon interest, now upon effort. Herbart conceives that conscious feelings, desires, motives, and the like have their source in ideas, and that volition in turn arises from the various emotional states aroused by the ideas. Interest with him thus becomes a permanent or ever renewed, ever changing, ever growing desire for the accomplishment of certain ends. It is, consequently, a direct, necessary stimulus to the will. Systems, however, that regard the will as the primary factor in mental life, conceiving of ideas only as a means for revealing more clearly the ends of volition, together with the best methods of reaching them, are naturally prone to place the emphasis upon effort, leaving to interest but a secondary or quite incidental function. Dr.John Dewey has attempted to reconcile these two views.[4] Interest and effort are complementary, not opposing ideas. To emphasize one at the expense of the other, is to assume that the ends for which we act lie quite outside of our personality, so that these ends would, on the one hand, have to be made interesting, or, on the other, struggled for without regard to interest. This assumption is an error. The ends for which we strive must be conceived as internal, our efforts being regarded as attempts at self-realization in definite directions. The purpose of our action is therefore an end desired. In this we have an interest surely. As an educational doctrine, however, interest concerns chiefly the means of reaching these ends. If interest in the means is wanting, the child works with a divided attention. He gives only so much to the means as he must; the remainder is devoted to his own affairs,—the past or coming ball-game, the picnic, the walk in the woods, the private enterprises of home or school. But if a lively interest is felt in the means to the end, then the whole self is actively employed for the time being in the accomplishment of the purpose of the hour. The attention is no longer divided, it is concentrated upon the matter in hand. This in the school is work. When the attention is divided we have drudgery. This signifies that the interest felt in the end, say a dollar, is not felt in the means of attaining it, say a day’s labor. However inevitable drudgery may be in life, it should have no place in the schoolroom. The teacher must so present the studies that the pupil can perceive at least a fraction of their bearing upon life. This awakens an interest in them as ends. He must, then, by conformity to the psychological order of learning, by enthusiasm and ingenuity, so teach the subjects that the natural interest in the end will be constantly enhanced through a lively interest in the daily lesson as the means of reaching it. The result is unified attention, zeal in the pursuit of knowledge, hospitality for ethical ideals.
64. As regards the bearings of interest on virtue, we need to remember that many-sidedness of interest alone, even of direct interest such as instruction is to engender, is yet far from being identical with virtue itself; also that, conversely, the weaker the original mental activity, the less likelihood that virtue will be realized at all, not to speak of the variety of manifestation possible in action. Imbeciles cannot be virtuous. Virtue involves an awakening of mind. The conception, that by awakening many-sided direct interest in the studies we can powerfully affect character, is perhaps peculiar to the thought of Herbart. Yet when we consider that the knowledge taught in the school goes to the root of every vital human relation, that, in other words, the studies may be made instruments for progressively revealing to the child his place and function in the world, it follows as a necessary consequence, that to interest the pupil thoroughly in these branches of learning, is to work at the foundation of his character, so far, at least, as insight into duty and disposition to do it are concerned. Even if interest in ethical things is not of itself virtue, it is an important means for securing virtue. This idea adds to the teacher’s resources for the development of character. It also opens up to him a new realm for research. All literature, history, science, mathematics, geography, language, may be examined from this new standpoint, both with respect to selection and to methods of presentation. Select the portions that pertain intimately to life; teach them so that their important bearing upon it may be seen. Note.—As has been stated already(17), the most immediate of the practical ideas demanding recognition from the teacher is the idea of perfection. Now, with reference to this idea, three factors are to be considered: the intensity, the range, the unification of intellectual effort. Intensity is implied in the word interest; extension is connoted by many-sidedness; what is meant by unification will be briefly indicated in the next paragraph. 65. Scattering no less than one-sidedness forms an antithesis to many-sidedness. Many-sidedness is to be the basis of virtue; but the latter is an attribute of personality, hence it is evident that the unity of self-consciousness must not be impaired. The business of instruction is to form the person on many sides, and accordingly to avoid a distracting or dissipating effect. And instruction has successfully avoided this in the case of one who with ease surveys his well-arranged knowledge in all of its unifying relations and holds it together as his very own. This section points to the correlation of studies, a subject to be considered hereafter in detail. It also throws light upon the modern system of elective courses or elective studies in secondary and higher education. The teachable subjects have now become so numerous that election is imperative unless what is to be taught is determined arbitrarily without regard to the needs or inclinations of students. Furthermore, election is made imperative by the fact that the higher education is now open to all minds of all social classes, and that differentiated industry calls for many kinds of education. But the need for mental symmetry, no less imperative now than in the past, is reinforced by the need for social symmetry. Education must put the student into sympathetic touch with the whole of life, not a mere segment of it. Since many-sidedness cannot be interpreted to mean knowledge of all subjects, this being impossible, it must be interpreted to mean knowledge of all departments of learning. Election may be permitted to emphasize departments of study, but not to ignore them entirely. There are four or more languages worth teaching, many departments of history, numerous sciences, and various branches of mathematics, not to speak of the economic, political, and social sciences. Enough of each department being given to insure intelligent sympathy with the aspect of civilization it presents, the student may be allowed to place the emphasis upon such groups of studies as best conserve his tastes, his ability, and his destination in life.
CHAPTER III
The Conditions of Many-sidedness 66. It becomes obvious at once that a many-sided culture cannot be brought about quickly. The requisite store of ideas is acquired only by successive efforts; but unification, a view of the whole, and assimilation are to be attained besides(65), whence an alternation, in time, of absorption and reflection. The apprehension of the manifold is of necessity a gradual process, and the same is true of the unification of knowledge. In absorption the mind surrenders itself to the acquisition or contemplation of facts. Thus a child will stand in open-eyed wonder at beholding a novel spectacle, the scientist becomes absorbed in watching the outcome of a new experiment, the philosopher loses consciousness to all about him in the unfolding of some new train of thought. Not only may absorption concern momentary experiences, but it may in a broad way be said to cover considerable periods of life, as, for instance, when a student becomes absorbed in the mastery of foreign languages having no immediate relation to his daily life. Reflection is the assimilation of the knowledge gained by absorption. The mind, recovering from its absorption in what is external, relates its new-found experience to the sum of its former experiences. New items of knowledge in this way find their appropriate places in the organic structure of the mind. They are apperceived. The many-sided thus comes to unity. Rosenkranz calls absorption and reflection, self-estrangement and its removal. “All culture,” he says, “whatever may be its special purport, must pass through these two stages,—of estrangement, and its removal.” Again, he says, “The mind is (1)immediate (or potential); but (2)it must estrange itself from itself, as it were, so that it may place itself over against itself as a special object of attention; (3)this estrangement is finally removed through a further acquaintance with the object ... it feels itself at home in that on which it looks, and returns again enriched to the form of immediateness (to unity with itself). That which at first appeared to be another than itself is now seen to be itself.”[5] This is an abstract statement of the fact that (1)in learning the mind becomes absorbed for a time in external objects, ignoring temporarily their inner meaning and relation to self, and (2)this period of absorption is succeeded by one of reflection, in which the mind perceives the significance of what has been observed, noting the laws and principles underlying the phenomena and thus assimilating them to what it conceives to be rational. Owing to the fact that absorption and reflection may refer to very short and also to comparatively long periods, they may be studied with respect to their bearing in conducting recitations, and to their importance in fixing courses of study. The former aspect of the two processes will in this connection chiefly occupy our attention. 67. Some teachers lay great stress on the explication, step by step, of the smaller and smallest components of the subject, and insist on a similar reproduction on the part of the pupils. Others prefer to teach by conversation, and allow themselves and their pupils great freedom of expression. Others, again, call especially for the leading thoughts, but demand that these be given with accuracy and precision, and in the prescribed order. Others, finally, are not satisfied until their pupils are self-actively exercising their minds in systematic thinking. Various methods of teaching may thus arise; it is not necessary, however, that one should be habitually employed to the exclusion of the rest. We may ask rather whether each does not contribute its share to a many-sided culture. In order that a multitude of facts may be apprehended, explications or analyses are needed to prevent confusion; but since a synthesis is equally essential, the latter process may be started by conversation, continued by lifting into prominence the cardinal thoughts, and completed by the methodical independent thinking of the pupil: clearness, association, system, method. In teaching we need to have (1)clearness in the presentation of specific facts, or the elements of what is to be mastered; (2)association of these facts with one another, and with other related facts formerly acquired, in order that assimilation, or apperception, may be adequately complete; (3)when sufficient facts have been clearly presented and sufficiently assimilated, they must be systematically ordered, so that our knowledge will be more perfectly unified than it could be did we stop short of thorough classification, as in the study of botany, or of the perception of rules and principles, as in mathematics and grammar; (4)finally the facts, rules, principles, and classifications thus far assumed must be secured for all time by their efficient methodical application in exercises that call forth the vigorous self-activity of the pupil. These four stages of teaching may be considered fundamental, though varying greatly according to the nature of the subject and the ability of the pupil. It is good exercise for a pupil to take long, rapid steps when able to do so; it is hopeless confusion to undertake them when they are too great or too rapid for his capacity. These four stages in methods of teaching conceived to be essential, form the nucleus of an interesting development in the Herbartian school, under the title of “The Formal [i.e. Essential] Steps of Instruction.” The leading ideas will be further described in a subsequent paragraph(70). 68. On closer inspection we find that instead of being mutually exclusive, these various modes of instruction are requisite, one by one, in the order given above, for every group, small or large, of subjects to be taught. For, first, the beginner is able to advance but slowly. For him the shortest steps are the safest steps. He must stop at each point as long as is necessary to make him apprehend distinctly each individual fact. To this he must give his whole thought. During the initial stage, the teacher’s art consists, therefore, preËminently in knowing how to resolve his subject into very small parts. In this way he will avoid taking sudden leaps without being aware that he is doing so. Secondly, association cannot be effected solely by a systematic mode of treatment, least of all at first. In the system each part has its own fixed place. At this place it is connected directly with the nearest other parts, but also separated from other more remote parts by a definite distance, and connected with these only by way of determinate intervening members, or links. Besides, the nature of this connection is not the same everywhere. Furthermore, a system is not to be learned merely. It is to be used, applied, and often needs to be supplemented by additions inserted in appropriate places. To be able to do this requires skill in diverting one’s thoughts from any given starting-point to every other point, forward, backward, sideways. Hence two things are requisite; preparation for the system, and application of the system. Preparation is involved in association; exercise in systematic thinking must follow. 69. During the first stage, when the clear apprehension of the individual object or fact is the main thing, the shortest and most familiar words and sentences are the most appropriate. The teacher will often find it advisable also to have some, if not all, of the pupils repeat them accurately after him. As is well known, even speaking in concert has been tried in many schools not entirely without success, and for young beginners this method may indeed at times answer very well. For association, the best mode of procedure is informal conversation, because it gives the pupil an opportunity to test and to change the accidental union of his thoughts, to multiply the links of connection, and to assimilate, after his own fashion, what he has learned. It enables him, besides, to do at least a part of all this in any way that happens to be the easiest and most convenient. He will thus escape the inflexibility of thought that results from a purely systematic learning. System, on the other hand, calls for a more connected discourse, and the period of presentation must be separated more sharply from the period of repetition. By exhibiting and emphasizing the leading principles, system impresses upon the minds of pupils the value of organized knowledge; through its greater completeness it enriches their store of information. But pupils are incapable of appreciating either advantage when the systematic presentation is introduced too early. Skill in systematic thinking the pupil will obtain through the solution of assigned tasks, his own independent attempts, and their correction. For such work will show whether he has fully grasped the general principles, and whether he is able to recognize them in and apply them to particulars. 70. These remarks on the initial analysis and the subsequent gradual uniting of the matter taught, hold true, in general and in detail, of the most diverse objects and branches of instruction. Much remains to be added, however, to define with precision the application of these principles to a given subject and to the age of the pupil. It will suffice, for the present, if we remind ourselves that instruction provides a portion of the occupations necessary to government(56). Now, instruction produces fatigue in proportion to its duration; more or less, of course, according to individual differences. But the more fatiguing it is, the less it accomplishes as employment. This fact alone shows clearly the necessity of intermissions and change of work. If the pupil has become actually tired, that is, has not lost merely inclination to work, this feeling must be allowed, as far as is practicable, to pass away, at any rate to diminish, before the same subject is resumed in a somewhat modified form. In order to have time enough for this, the systematic presentation must in many cases be postponed until long after the first lessons in the elements have begun, and conversely, the rudiments of a subject frequently have to be at least touched upon long before connected instruction can be thought of. Many a principle needs to be approached from a great distance. Herbart found his basis for the four steps of method, viz. clearness, association, system, method, in the ideas of absorption and reflection, the alternate pulsation of consciousness in absorbing and assimilating knowledge. Others, adopting this classification as essentially correct, have related these steps to customary psychological analysis. Thus DÖrpfeld and Wiget point out that the mind goes through three well-marked processes when it performs the complete act of learning, namely, perception of new facts; thought, or the bringing of ideas into logical relations; and application, or the exercise of the motor activities of the mind in putting knowledge into use. Perception gives the percept, thought gives the conception (or rule, principle, generalization), and application gives power. In other words, the receptive and reflective capacities of the mind come to their full fruition when they result in adequate motor activities. With respect to perception a good method will first prepare the mind for facts and will then present them so that they may be apperceived. The first two steps are therefore preparation and presentation. The first step, as Ziller pointed out, is essentially analytic in character, since it analyzes the present store of consciousness in order to bring facts to the front that are closely related to those of the present lesson; the second step, i.e., presentation, is essentially synthetic, since its function is to add the matter of the new lesson to related knowledge already in possession. Both together constitute the initial stages of apperception. Thought consists of two processes that may also be termed steps, and that are more or less observable in all good teaching; they are (1)the association of newly apperceived facts with one another and with older and more firmly established ideas in order that rational connection may be established in what one knows, and especially in order that what is general and essential in given facts may be grasped by the mind; and (2)the condensation of knowledge into a system, such for instance as we see in the classifications of botany and zoÖlogy, or in the interdependence of principles as in arithmetic. Thought, in brief, involves the association of ideas and the derivation of generalizations such as are appropriate to the matter in hand and to the thought power of the pupils. The third stage, that of application, is not subdivided. Most other followers of Herbart, both German and American, though varying in methods of approach, conform essentially to the results of this analysis, distinguishing five steps, as follows:— | 1.Preparation—Analysis | | Apperception of percepts. | | 2.Presentation—Synthesis | | | 3.Association | | Thought. The derivation and arrangement of rule, principle, or class. | | 4.Systemization | | | 5.Application. From knowing to doing: use of motor powers. | The reader is referred to the following-named works for extended discussion of this topic: McMurray, “General Method”; DeGarmo, “Essentials of Method”; Lange, “Apperception,” pp.200–245; Rein (VanLiew’s translation), “Outlines of Pedagogy”; Herbart (Felkins’ translation), “Science of Education”; McMurray, C.A. & F.M., “The Method of the Recitation.” A comparative view of the treatment of the Steps of Instruction by various authors is found in VanLiew’s translation of Rein’s “Outlines of Pedagogy,” p.145.
CHAPTER IV
The Conditions Determining Interest 71. Interest means self-activity. The demand for a many-sided interest is, therefore, a demand for many-sided self-activity. But not all self-activity, only the right degree of the right kind, is desirable; else lively children might very well be left to themselves. There would be no need of educating or even of governing them. It is the purpose of instruction to give the right direction to their thoughts and impulses, to incline these toward the morally good and true. Children are thus in a measure passive. But this passivity should by no means involve suppression of self-activity. It should, on the contrary, imply a stimulation of all that is best in the child. At this point a psychological distinction becomes necessary, namely, that between designedly reproduced, or “given,” and spontaneous representations. In recitations of what has been learned we have an example of the former; the latter appear in the games and fancies of children. A method of study that issues in mere reproduction leaves children largely in a passive state, for it crowds out for the time being the thoughts they would otherwise have had. In games, however, and in the free play of fancy, and accordingly also in that kind of instruction which finds an echo here, free activity predominates. This distinction is not intended to affirm the existence of two compartments in which the ideas, separated once for all, would, of necessity, have to remain. Ideas that must by effort be raised into consciousness because they do not rise spontaneously, may become spontaneous by gradual strengthening. But this development we cannot count on unless instruction, advancing step by step, bring it about. Interest must be conceived as self-propulsive activity toward an end. It is a part of the teacher’s function to assist the pupil in making the appropriate ideas strong and spontaneous. Occasionally a mere suggestion will change the whole mental attitude toward an end and the means for reaching it. A student one day approached his instructor with this query: “How can I get through this study with the least expenditure of time and effort?” The desired answer was first given. The instructor then remarked that there was another way of viewing the matter, viz., that one might consider how to get the most rather than the least out of the study. He then briefly unfolded its nature and possibilities, whereupon the student became one of the most interested members of the class. He had come with only an indirect interest in the subject as an end; he regarded the study as a required task and the means of passing upon it as so much drudgery; but he so changed his attitude toward it, that the study became an end personally desired, and the daily effort a pleasurable exercise of his self-directed power of thought. The interest that the instructor had aroused in the end was transferred to the means. 72. It is the teacher’s business, while giving instruction, to observe whether the ideas of his pupils rise spontaneously or not. If they do, the pupils are said to be attentive; the lesson has won their interest. If not, attention is, indeed, not always wholly gone. It may, moreover, be enforced for a time before actual fatigue sets in. But doubt arises whether instruction can effect a future interest in the same subjects. Attention is a factor of such importance to education as to call for a more detailed treatment. 73. Attention may be broadly defined as an attitude of mind in which there is readiness to form new ideas. Such readiness is either voluntary or involuntary. If voluntary, it depends on a resolution; the teacher frequently secures this through admonitions or threats. Far more desirable and fruitful is involuntary attention. It is this attention that the art of teaching must seek to induce. Herein lies the kind of interest to be sought by the teacher. Forced and spontaneous are more truly expressive terms than voluntary and involuntary in this connection. It is not meant that interested activity is against the will, or even indifferent to it. On the contrary, it is a form of activity that calls every resource of the mind into full play. The will is never so promptly active as when it is doing the things in which it is most interested; it is, however, a spontaneous, not a forced activity. There is, as Dr. John Dewey points out,[6] a contradiction between Herbart’s Pedagogy and his Psychology, as follows: the Pedagogy regards interest as the lever of education, the means for securing spontaneous activity of mind; the Psychology regards interest as a feeling arising from the relation of ideas. Ideas must therefore be given, in right relations, to arouse interest, while interest is in turn conceived as the means of arousing them. This is reasoning in a circle. The difficulty arises from asserting the primacy of ideas in mental life, and then speaking of self-activity, which presupposes the primacy of motor, or impulsive activities. The reader will avoid all contradictions in educational theory by accepting the modern view of the primacy, not of ideas, but of what may broadly be termed will. The latter view is in accord with biological and historical science. Ideas are a later production of mind; they serve to define more clearly the ends for which we work, at the same time giving us insight into the best means of attaining them. For an interesting discussion of the primacy of the will, the reader is referred to Professor Paulsen’s “Introduction to Philosophy,” pp.111–122.[7] 74. Involuntary [spontaneous] attention is subdivided into primitive and apperceiving. The latter especially is of the greatest importance in teaching, but it rests on the former, the conditions of which must constantly be taken into account. Apperception, or assimilation, takes place through the reproduction of previously acquired ideas and their union with the new element, the most energetic apperception, although not necessarily the best, being effected by the ideas rising spontaneously. This topic will be treated more fully below(77). Here it suffices to say that the apperceiving attention obviously presupposes the primitive attention; otherwise apperceiving ideas would never have been formed. The psychological and educational importance of the idea of apperception, or the assimilation of knowledge, has been much emphasized in recent years. For a psychological interpretation of the theory, the reader is referred to Wundt’s “Human and Animal Psychology,”[8] pp.235–251. The educational significance of the doctrine has been well brought out by Dr.Karl Lange, in his able monograph on “Apperception.”[9] The subject has been more popularly treated in Dr.McMurray’s “General Method,”[10] and in the writer’s “Essentials of Method”[11]; also in a number of other works. 75. The primitive or original attention depends primarily on the strength of the sense-impression. Bright colors and loud speaking are more easily noticed than dark colors and low tones. It would be an error, however, to infer that the strongest sense-perceptions are at the same time the most adequate. These quickly blunt the receptivity, while weak sense-impressions may, in the course of time, engender ideation as energetic as that produced by originally obtrusive perceptions. For this reason, a middle course must be chosen from the first. For children, however, the direct sense-perception, even of a picture, if the object itself is not to be had, is altogether preferable to mere description. The presence in the minds of children of ideas—those supplied by instruction itself not excepted—contrary to the new representations to be mastered, acts as a hindrance or check. This very fact explains why clearness of apprehension is not gained where instruction piles up one thing upon another in too rapid succession. It is essential, therefore, in the case of beginners, so to single out each fact, to separate part from part, and to proceed step by step, that apprehension may be rendered easy for them. A second hindrance to attention is of a more temporary character, but may nevertheless work much mischief. It makes a vast difference whether the ideas aroused are in a state of equilibrium or not. Long sentences in speech and in books are less easily apprehended than short ones. They excite a movement of many albeit connected thoughts, which do not at once subside into their proper places. Now, just as in reading and writing pauses must be observed, which is done more easily in short than in long sentences, instruction in general must have its chosen stopping-places and resting-points at which the child may tarry as long as may be necessary. Otherwise the accumulation of thoughts will become excessive, crowding in upon what follows, and this upon the next new element, until finally the pupils arrive at a state where they no longer hear anything. 76. The four essentials then for primitive attention are: strength of sense-impression, economy of receptivity, avoidance of harmful antitheses to existing ideas, and delay until the aroused ideas have recovered their equilibrium. But in actual teaching it will be found difficult to do justice to all of these requirements simultaneously. Sameness of presentation should not be carried too far lest the child’s receptivity be taxed too heavily. Monotony produces weariness. But a sudden change of subject frequently discloses the fact that the new is too remote from what has preceded, and that the old thoughts refuse to give way. If the change is delayed too long the lesson drags. Too little variety causes ennui. The pupils begin to think of something else, and with that their attention is gone completely. The teacher should by all means study literary masterpieces for the purpose of learning from great authors how they escaped these difficulties. That he may strike the right chord in the earlier stages of instruction, he should turn particularly to simple popular writers, Homer, for example, whose story-telling is, on the other hand, too general and naÏve for older pupils who have lost the power to put themselves back into a past period of culture. Yet it is safe to say in general, that classic writers seldom take sudden leaps and never stand still entirely. Their method of unfolding consists in a scarcely perceptible, at any rate an always easy, advance. They dwell, indeed, long on the same thought, but nevertheless achieve, little by little, most powerful contrasts. Poor writers, on the contrary, pile up the most glaring antitheses without other than the natural result—the antagonistic ideas expel each other and the mind is left empty. The same result threatens the teacher who aims at brilliancy of presentation. 77. The apperceiving, or assimilating, attention(74), though not the first in time, is yet observed very early. It shows itself when little children catch and repeat aloud single, familiar words of an otherwise unintelligible conversation between adults; when a little later they name, in their own way, the well-known objects that they come upon in their picture-books; when later still, while learning to read, they pick out from the book single names coinciding with their recollection; and so on in innumerable other instances. From within ideas are suddenly bursting forth to unite with whatever similar elements present themselves. Now this apperceiving activity must be exercised constantly in all instruction. For instruction is given in words only; the ideas constituting their meaning must be supplied by the hearer. But words are not meant to be understood merely; they are intended to elicit interest. And this requires a higher grade and greater facility of apperception. Universally popular poems do not produce their pleasing effect by teaching something new. They portray what is already known and utter what every one feels. Ideas already possessed are aroused, expanded, condensed, and consequently put in order and strengthened. On the other hand, when defects are apperceived, e.g., misprints, grammatical blunders, faulty drawings, false notes, etc., the successive unfolding of the series of ideas is interrupted so that their interlacing cannot take place properly. Here we see how instruction must proceed and what it must avoid in order to secure interest. Note.—The apperceiving attention is of so great importance in instruction that a word or two more will be in place. The highest stage of this kind of attention is indicated by the words—gaze, scrutinize, listen, handle. The idea of the examined object is already present in consciousness, as is likewise the idea of the class of sense-perceptions looked for. The psychic result turns on the ensuing sense-impressions, on their contrasts, combinations, and reproductions. These are able to induce the corresponding mental states unhindered, because disturbing foreign elements have already been removed and remain excluded. Passing from this highest grade to lower degrees of attention, we find that the idea of the object is not yet—at least not prominently—present, that this itself first needs to be reproduced and made more vivid. The question arises whether this can be accomplished directly or only indirectly. In the former case the idea must be in itself strong enough; in the second it must be sufficiently united with other ideas which it is possible to arouse directly. Moreover, the obstacles to reproduction must be such that they can be overcome. When the apperceiving attention is once under way, it should be utilized and not disturbed. The teaching must take the promised direction until it has satisfied expectation. The solutions must correspond clearly to the problems. Everything must be connected. The attention is disturbed by untimely pauses and the presence of extraneous matter. It is also disturbed by apperceptions that bring into light that which should remain in shadow. This is true of words and phrases too often repeated, of mannerisms of speech—of everything that gives prominence to the language at the expense of the subject-matter, even rhymes, verse-forms, and rhetorical adornment when used in the wrong place. But that which is too simple must be avoided also. In this case the apperception is soon completed; it does not give enough to do. The fullest unit possible is to be sought. A rule of vital importance is that, before setting his pupils at work, the teacher should take them into the field of ideas wherein their work is to be done. He can accomplish this at the beginning of a recitation hour by means of a brief outline view of the ground to be covered in the lesson or lecture. 78. Instruction is to supplement that which has been gained already by experience and by intercourse with others(36); these foundations must exist when instruction begins. If they are wanting, they must be firmly established first. Any deficiency here means a loss to instruction, because the pupils lack the thoughts which they need in order to interpret the words of the teacher. In the same way, knowledge derived from earlier lessons must be extended and deepened by subsequent instruction. This presupposes such an organization of the whole work of instruction that that which comes later shall always find present the earlier knowledge with which it is to be united. 79. Ordinarily, because their eyes are fixed solely on the facts to be learned, teachers concern themselves little with the ideas already possessed by the pupils. Consequently they make an effort in behalf of the necessary attention only when it is failing and progress is checked. Now they have recourse to voluntary attention(73), and to obtain this rely on inducements, or, more often, on reprimands and penalties. Indirect interest is thus substituted for direct interest, with the result that the resolution of the pupil to be attentive fails to effect energetic apprehension and realizes but little coherence. It wavers constantly, and often enough gives way to disgust. In the most favorable case, if instruction is thorough, i.e., scientific, a foundation of elementary knowledge is gradually laid sufficiently solid for later years to build on; in other words, out of the elementary knowledge an apperceiving mass is created in the mind of the pupil which will aid him in his future studies. There may be several of such masses; but each constitutes by itself its own kind of one-sided learning, and it is after all doubtful whether even here direct interest is implied. For there is small hope that this interest will be aroused in the youth when the years of boyhood have been devoted merely to the mastering of preliminary knowledge. The prospects of future station and calling are opening before him and the examinations are at hand. 80. The fact should not be overlooked, however, that even the best method cannot secure an adequate degree of apperceiving attention(75–78) from every pupil; recourse must accordingly be had to the voluntary attention, i.e., the pupil’s resolution. But for the necessary measures the teacher must depend, not merely on rewards and punishments, but chiefly on habit and custom. Instruction unites at this point with government and training. In all cases where the pupil begins his work not entirely without compulsion, it is particularly important that he should soon become aware of his own progress. The several steps must be distinctly and suitably pointed out to him; they must at the same time be easy of execution and succeed each other slowly. The instruction should be given with accuracy, even strictness, seriousness, and patience. 81. The voluntary attention is most frequently demanded for memorizing, for which, apart from all else, the presence of interest is not always a perfectly favorable condition. This is true even of spontaneous interest, for the ideas that rise spontaneously have a movement of their own, which by deviating from the given sequence may lead to surreptitious substitutions. Like observation, intentional memorizing presupposes a certain amount of self-control. At this point a question arises as to the proper place of learning by heart. Committing to memory is very necessary; use is made of it in every department of knowledge. But memorizing should never be the first thing except when it is done without effort. For if the memorizing of new matter, which the pupil cannot as yet have associated incorrectly, costs him an effort, it is plain that the single presentations encounter some opposition or other by which they are repelled too quickly for their mutual association to take place. The teacher must in this case talk the subject over first, set the pupil to work upon it, make him more familiar with it, and must sometimes even wait for a more opportune moment. Where clearness in single perceptions and their association(67 et seq.) are still deficient, these must be attended to first of all. After the ideas have been strengthened in this way, memorizing will be accomplished more easily. The assigned series should not be too long. Three foreign words are often more than enough. Many pupils have to be shown how to memorize. Left to themselves they will begin over and over again, then halt, and try in vain to go on. A fundamental rule is that the starting-point be shifted. If, for example, the name Methuselah is to be learned, the teacher would, perhaps, say successively: lah,—selah,—thuselah,—Methuselah. Some have to be warned against trying to get through quickly. We have to do here with a physical mechanism which requires time and whose operation the pupil himself as little as the teacher should endeavor to over-accelerate. Slow at first, then faster. It is not always advisable to put a stop to all bodily movements. Many memorize by way of speaking aloud, others through copying, some through drawing. Reciting in concert also may prove feasible at times. Incorrect associations are very much to be feared; they are tenacious. A great deal, to be sure, may be accomplished through severity; but when interest in the subject-matter is wholly lacking, the pupil begins by memorizing incorrectly, then ceases to memorize at all, and simply wastes time. The absolute failure of some pupils in memory work may perhaps be partly owing to unknown physical peculiarities. Very often, however, the cause of the evil lies in the state of false tension into which such pupils put themselves while attempting with reluctance what they regard as an almost impossible task. A teacher’s injudicious attitude during the first period, his remarks, for instance, about learning by heart as a thing of toil and trouble, may lead to this state of mind, for which perhaps awkward first steps in learning to read have prepared the way. It is foolish to look for means of lightening still more the exercises of children that retain and recite with facility; but, on the other hand, great caution is necessary because there are also others who may be rendered unfit for memorizing by the first attempt of the teacher to make them recite, or even only to repeat after him, a certain series of words. In attempting, by such early tests, to find out whether children retain and reproduce easily, it is essential that the teacher put them in good humor, that he select his matter with this end in view, and that he go on only so long as they feel they can do what is asked of them. The results of his observations must determine the further mode of procedure. 82. However carefully the process of memorizing may have been performed, the question remains: How long will the memorized matter be retained? On this point teachers deceive themselves time and again, in spite of universally common experiences. Now, in the first place, not everything that is learned by heart needs to be retained. Many an exercise serves its purpose when it prepares the way for the next, and renders further development possible. In this way a short poem is sometimes learned as a temporary means for an exercise in declamation; or chapters from Latin authors are committed to memory in order to speed the writing and speaking of Latin. In many cases it is sufficient for later years if the pupil knows how to look for literary helps, and how to make use of them. But if, secondly, that which has been memorized is to remain impressed on the memory for a long time, forever if possible, it is only a questionable expedient to reassign the same thing as often as it is forgotten. The feeling of weary disgust may more than offset the possible gain. There is only one efficient method—practice; practice consisting in the constant application of that which is to be retained to that which actually interests the pupils, in other words, that which continually engages the ideas rising spontaneously. Here we find the principle that governs the choice of material for successful memorizing. And as to the amount—so much as is needed for the immediate future; for excessive quantity promotes an early forgetting. Besides, in instruction, as in experience, there is a great deal that may not be accurately remembered, but nevertheless renders abundant service by stimulating the mind and qualifying it for further work. CHAPTER V
The Main Kinds of Interest 83. Instruction is to be linked to the knowledge that experience provides, and to the ethical sentiments that arise from social intercourse(36). Empirical interest relates directly to experience; sympathetic interest to human association. Discursive reflection on the objects of experience involves the development of speculative interest, reflection on the wider relations of society that of social interest. With these we group, on the one hand Æsthetic, on the other religious interest, both of which have their origin not so much in discursive thought as in a non-progressing contemplation of things and of human destiny. The classification of interests into two groups, namely, (a)those which arise from knowledge, and (b)those which arise from association with others, and the subdivision of each of these into three groups, making six in all, is one not of necessity, but of convenience. The knowledge interests are, (a)empirical, (b)speculative, (c)Æsthetic; the interests arising from association are, (a)sympathetic, (b)social, (c)religious. This classification is adopted without criticism by most Herbartian writers. That the classification is made simply for convenience may be seen from such considerations as the following:— - 1. Strictly speaking, all interests arise from experience, the social no less than the speculative; hence experience is not a basis for classification at all.
- 2. Æsthetic interests, resting upon contemplation, need not be put into a group with those that rest upon the perception of cause and effect, or other relations perceived by discursive reflection.
- 3. The same is true for those empirical interests that are supposed to rest upon immediate sense apprehension, such as the interest in color, shape, sound, taste, odor.
- 4. If perception, reasoning, and sensibility are made bases for the classification of interests, why should not the active volitional powers of the mind become a basis likewise? Some claim that pleasure and pain rest primarily upon the motor side of our activity, rather than upon the sensory. Our interest in doing is antecedent to our interest in knowing or feeling. This fact is fully recognized by all Herbartians in the theory of methods, though it finds no recognition in their classification of interests.
It must be granted, however, that Herbart’s classification is convenient, even if not especially scientific. The empirical interest is the mental eagerness aroused by direct appeal to the senses, as by novel shapes, colors, sounds, odors, and the like. Its first stage is wonder, admiration, fear, awe. The child that drops his picture-book to chase a butterfly abandons one empirical interest for a stronger one. This form of interest is usually transient; unless it develops into a new kind of interest, it is soon abandoned for some other attraction. A primary teacher may catch but cannot hold the attention of a child by sensuous devices leading to nothing beyond themselves. The speculative interest is more permanent than the empirical. It rests primarily on the perception of the relations of cause and effect; it seeks to know the reasons of things. On this account it is a higher form of apperception, or mental assimilation. The most fundamental idea in the speculative interest is that of purpose. We want to know the purpose of things, the function they are to perform, the end they are expected to reach. Thus a child has a key to the understanding of even so complicated a machine as a self-binder, or a printing press, provided he sees clearly the purpose of each. Until this is perceived the facts are an unintelligible jumble of particulars. A crude form of the speculative interest is seen very early in the child, when he demands a reason for everything. It always remains the mainspring of intellectual life; when it ceases to be a motive power to thinking, thought is dead. The Æsthetic interest rests upon the enjoyment of contemplation, when an ideal, sometimes distinct, sometimes vague, can be perceived through a sense medium. In the Greek statue of Apollo Belvidere, a divinity is represented in marble. In the painting, Breaking Home Ties, the feelings of a lad and his mother upon parting are portrayed upon canvas. In music the ideal is usually vague, in poetry it is clear and distinct. The Æsthetic value of the latter is enhanced by good oral recitation, both because appeal is made to an additional sense, and because the ears of men were attuned to beautiful poetry long before the eye learned to apprehend it. All of these interests, the empirical, the speculative, and the Æsthetic, may be classed as individual, since they rest upon purely subjective grounds. They might belong to any Robinson Crusoe who became isolated from his fellows. But the remaining groups, the sympathetic, the social, and the religious, rest upon the idea of intercourse with others. They are, therefore, of supreme importance for civilized life. Without the sympathetic coÖperation of men civilization would become impossible. Mephistopheles in “Faust” defines himself as “the Spirit that ever denies.”[12] Consequently any man who becomes so absorbed in his individual concerns as to deny all social duties and renounce all social benefits becomes thereby a kind of civic devil. The cynics of old repudiated all social obligations, thus making themselves bitter civic devils, while the Cyrenaics, choosing self-indulgence, but denying likewise social duties, transformed themselves into sensualistic civic devils. It is an imperative duty of the teacher, therefore, to arouse the social and civic interests of the children, since upon these as active forces the welfare and possibly the stability of society rest. The school is the place, the studies and daily intercourse the means, whereby this class of interests may be aroused. Pupils brought up in isolation by private tutors are likely to become non-social in their disposition. Idiosyncrasies are fostered, there being little or no development of ideals of social coÖperation. The kindergarten, however, when rightly conducted, is nearly always able to foster the social instincts so powerfully that even the lack of later education is not able to obliterate them. When this training is reinforced by the well-governed school, a solid foundation for civic character is likely to be laid. The studies most important for the fostering of social and civic interests are literature, history, civil government, and geography, though others have a more or less intimate relation to them. [12] “Ich bin der Geist der stets verneint.” 84. We cannot expect to see all of these interests unfold equally in every individual; but among a number of pupils we may confidently look for them all. The demand for many-sidedness will accordingly be satisfied the better, the nearer the single individual likewise approaches a state of mental culture in which all these kinds of interest are active with equal energy. 85. As has already been suggested(37), these six kinds of interest arise from two sources to which historical and nature studies respectively correspond. With this the facts observed in classical high schools (Gymnasia) coincide: pupils usually lean toward one side or the other. It would be a serious blunder, however, to affirm, on this account, an antithesis between the historical and the natural science interest; or, worse still, to speak of a philological and a mathematical interest instead—as is, indeed, not infrequently done. Such confusion in ideas should not continue; it would lead to utterly erroneous views of the whole management of instruction. The easiest means to counteract the evil is a consideration of the multitude of one-sided tendencies that occur even within the six kinds of interest; we shall be able, at all events, to bring out still more clearly the manifold phases of interest that must be taken into account. For the possible cases of one-sidedness are differentiated far more minutely than could be shown by the discrimination of only six kinds of interest. “Is the ideal education classical or scientific?” This question, which is still debated, really means, shall we cultivate chiefly the social or the knowledge interests. The historical, or culture, studies belong preËminently on the one side, the natural sciences most largely on the other. Herbert Spencer in 1860 made a special plea for science studies in his monograph, “Education,” claiming that such studies are of chief worth both for knowledge and training. At that time classical, or culture, studies had possession of almost every institution for higher education, so that Spencer’s special plea was justified. At present, however, science, which has developed its own methods of instruction, holds an equal place with social studies in the colleges and universities. When we are asked which half of human interests we will choose, the knowledge or the social, our reply can only be: We will abandon neither, but choose both. Both are essential to human happiness; both are necessary for social and material advance. 86. Empirical interest becomes one-sided in its way when it seizes upon one kind of objects of experience to the neglect of the rest. When, for instance, a person wants to be a botanist exclusively, a mineralogist, a zoÖlogist; or when he likes languages only, perhaps only the ancient or only the modern, or of all these only one; or when as a traveller he wishes to see, like many so-called tourists, only the countries that everybody talks about, in order to have seen them too; or when, as a collector of curiosities, he confines himself to one or the other fancy; or when, in the capacity of historian, he cares only about the information bearing on one country, or one period, etc. Speculative interest becomes one-sided by confining itself to logic or to mathematics, mathematics perhaps only as treated by the old geometricians; or to metaphysics restricted possibly to one system; or to physics narrowed down perhaps to one hypothesis; or to pragmatic history. Æsthetic interest in one case is concentrated exclusively on painting and sculpture; in another on poetry, perhaps only on lyric or dramatic poetry; in still another on music, or perhaps only on a certain species of music, etc. Sympathetic interest is one-sided when a man is willing to live only with his social peers, or only with fellow-countrymen, or only with members of his own family; while a fellow-feeling for all others is wanting. Social interest grows one-sided if one gives himself up wholly to one political party, and measures weal or woe only by party success or failure. Religious interest becomes one-sided according to differences of creed and sect, to one of which allegiance is given, while those who hold a different view are regarded as unworthy of esteem. Much of this one-sidedness is brought about in later life by one’s vocation. But a man’s vocation must not isolate him. Yet this would happen if such narrowness should make headway in youth. 87. A still more detailed analysis of the varieties of one-sidedness would be possible; it is not needed, however, for ascertaining the position of the above-mentioned high school studies among the subjects of instruction calculated to stimulate interest. Languages, to begin with, form a part of the curriculum; but why among so many languages is the preference given to Latin and Greek? Obviously because of the literature and history opened through them. Literature with its poets and orators falls under Æsthetic interest; history awakens sympathy with distinguished men and the weal and woe of society, indirectly contributing in either case even to religious interest. No better focus for so many different stimuli can be found. Even speculative interest is not slighted if inquiries into the grammatical structure of these languages are added. Moreover, the study of history does not stop with the ancients; the knowledge of literature also is widened that the various interests may be developed still more completely. History, if taught pragmatically, assists speculative interest from another direction. In this respect, however, mathematics has precedence; only, in order to effect a sure entrance and abiding results, it must unite with the natural sciences, which appeal at once to the empirical and the speculative interest. If now these studies coÖperate properly, a great deal will be done, in conjunction with religious instruction, toward turning the youthful mind in the directions that answer to a many-sided interest. But if, on the contrary, the languages and mathematics were allowed to fall apart, if the connecting links were removed, and every pupil were permitted to choose one or the other branch of study, according to his preferences, mere bald one-sidedness of the kind sufficiently characterized above would be the outcome. 88. It is admitted now that not only classical but also public high schools in general should provide for this same many-sided culture, that is, should take account of the same main classes of interests. The only difference lies in the fact that for the pupils of the classical high schools the practice of a vocation is not so near at hand; whereas, in the public high schools, there is a certain preponderance of modern literature and history, together with inability to equip completely with the helps to a manifold mental activity those who purpose to go on. Much the same is true of all the lower schools whose aim is to educate. It is different with trade schools and polytechnic institutes; in short, with those schools which presuppose a completed education—completed to the extent permitted by circumstances. If, then, the programme of a public high school is of the right sort, it will show as well as the curriculum of a classical preparatory school does, that an attempt is being made to guard against such one-sidedness as would be the outcome if one of the six main classes of interest were slighted. How one-sidedness under an elective system may be avoided is discussed in a previous section(65).
89. But no instruction is able to prevent the special varieties of one-sidedness that may develop within the limits of each main group. When observation, reflection, the sense of beauty, sympathy, public spirit, and religious aspiration have once been awakened, although perhaps only within a small range of objects, the farther extension over a greater number and variety of objects must be left largely to the individual and to opportunity. To pupils of talent, above all of genius, instruction may give the necessary outlook by enabling them to see what talent and genius achieve elsewhere; but their own distinguishing traits they must themselves answer for and retain. Moreover, the above-mentioned forms of one-sidedness are not all equally detrimental, because they do not assert themselves with the same degree of exclusiveness. Each may, indeed, lead to self-conceit; but this tendency does not attach to all in the same measure. Holding to the idea of many-sided interest, what justification is there for elective studies? To this, the reply must be made that in elementary and in a part of secondary education the principle of indiscriminate election must be rejected. The only rational election in secondary education, as already explained(65), is election among the various members of a group of similar studies. In this way the destination and ability of the pupil may be regarded, without sacrificing the needed many-sidedness. The case is different in higher education, however, for election and many-sidedness are here quite reconcilable. Higher education is the comparative study of a few branches. Thus, for example, on the social side, the whole civilization of Greece is focussed now in her political history, now in her art, now in her language, now in her education, now in her philosophy. The student who studies any one of these subjects thoroughly gets a comparative view of the whole of Greek life. It is not necessary for him to study them all. The same is true of each important country or epoch. Every culture study is an eminence from which the whole is seen. Likewise in science, to study a typical form of life exhaustively by the comparative method gives one an insight into all related life, as well as many glimpses into physical and chemical science. In a large sense, therefore, we study all nature, whether we elect biology, physics, or chemistry, provided we use the comparative method of higher education. In the college or university, therefore, a large amount of election is justifiable. That would be a one-sided course which neglected entirely all social or all science studies. 90. Under favorable circumstances of time and opportunity, such as obtain in classical and other high schools, effort, as we know, is not restricted to the initial stimulation. Hence the question arises: In what sequence shall the aroused interests be further developed? Of instruction-material there is no lack; we must select and arrange, guided in the main by what was said on the conditions of many-sidedness and of interest. Thus to recapitulate: there must be progress from the simple to the more complex, and solicitous endeavor to make spontaneous interest possible. But in applying these principles we must not shut our eyes to the particular requirements and the difficulties in our way. 91. The empirical material of languages, history, geography, etc., calls for specific complications and series of ideas, together with the network of their interrelations. As to language, even words are complex wholes, made up of stems plus whatever elements enter into inflection and derivation, and further resolvable into single speech sounds. History has its time-series, geography its network of spatial relations. The psychological laws of reproduction determine the processes of memorizing and of retaining. The mother-tongue serves as a medium through which foreign languages become intelligible, but at the same time offers resistance to the foreign sounds and constructions. Furthermore, it takes a young boy a long time to get familiar with the thought that far away in time and in space there have been and are human beings who spoke and speak languages other than his own, and about whom he need concern himself at all. Teachers, moreover, very commonly proceed on the fallacious and very mischievous assumption that, because their mode of expression is clear, it will, of course, be understood by the pupil. The resources of child-language increase but slowly. Such impediments as these must be removed. Geography extends the knowledge of spatial distances, but the inhabitant of a flat country lacks the sense-images of mountain ranges; one who grows up in a valley is without the sense-perception of a plain; the majority of pupils lack the concrete idea of an ocean. That the earth is a sphere revolving about its own axis and about the sun, for a long time sounds to children more like a fairy-tale than like a statement of fact; and even educated young men sometimes hesitate to accept the theory of the planetary system because they are unable to comprehend how it is possible to know such things. Difficulties of this kind must be met and not massed together unnecessarily.—For history, old ruins might serve as starting-points if only the material they furnish do not prove altogether too scanty and is not too recent, when the object is to take pupils at an early age into the times and places of Jewish, Greek, and Roman antiquity. Here the only satisfactory helps are stories that excite a very lively interest; these establish points of support for the realization in thought of a time long vanished. There is still lacking, however, a correct estimate of chronological distances down to our own time. This is attained only very gradually through the insertion of intermediate data. 92. Material for the exercise of reflection, and so for the excitation of speculative interest, is supplied by whatever in nature, in human affairs, in the structure of languages, and in religion, permits us to discover, or even merely to surmise, a connection according to general laws. But everywhere—the most common school studies, such as elementary arithmetic and grammar not excepted—the pupil encounters concepts, judgments, and inferences. But he clings to the particular, to the familiar, to the sensuous. The abstract is foreign to his mind; even the geometrical figures traced for the eye are to him particular things whose general significance he finds it hard to grasp. The general is to displace individual peculiarities in his thoughts; but in his habitual thought-series the well-known concrete crowds to the front. Of the general there remains in his mind almost nothing beyond the words used to designate it. Called upon to draw an inference, he loses one premise while pondering the next; the teacher is obliged to go back to the beginning again and again, to give examples, and from them lead up to generalizations; to separate and to connect concepts, and by degrees to bring the propositions closer to one another. When the middle terms and extremes have been successfully fused in the premises, they are still only loosely connected at first. The same propositions are repeatedly forgotten, and yet must not be reviewed too many times for fear of killing instead of quickening interest. Since forgetting cannot be prevented, it is wise to abandon for a time a large portion of that into which pupils have gained an insight, but later on to go back to the essentials by other paths. The first preliminary exercises serve their purpose if the particulars are made to reveal the general before generalizations become the material for technical propositions, and before propositions are combined into inference-series. The processes of association(69) must not be omitted between the first pointing out of common features and the systematic teaching of their rational connections. 93. Æsthetic contemplation may, indeed, receive its impulse from many interests other than the Æsthetic, as also from aroused emotions. Art itself, however, is possible only in a state of mind sufficiently tranquil to permit an accurate and coherent apprehension of the simultaneously beautiful, and to experience the mental activity corresponding to the successively beautiful. Æsthetic objects adapted to the pupil’s power of appreciation must be provided; but the teacher should refrain from forcing contemplation. He may, of course, repress unseemly manifestations, above all the damaging of objects possessing Æsthetic value and entitled to respectful treatment. Frequently imitative attempts—although very crude at first—in drawing, singing, reading aloud, and, at a later period, in translating, are indications of Æsthetic attention. Such efforts may be encouraged, but should not be praised. The genuine warmth of emotion, which in Æsthetic culture kindles of itself, is easily vitiated by intensifying artifices. Excess of quantity is injurious. Works of art appealing to a higher state of culture must not be brought down to a lower plane. Art judgments and criticisms should not be obtruded. 94. The sympathetic interests depend still more on social intercourse and family life than the foregoing classes of interests do on experience in the world of sense. If the social environment changes frequently, children cannot become deeply attached anywhere. The mere change of teachers and of schools is fraught with harm. Pupils make comparisons in their own way; authority that is not permanent has little weight with them, whereas the impulse to throw off restraint gains in strength. Instruction is powerless to obviate such evils, especially since instruction itself must often change its form, thereby giving the impression of a real difference in teachers. This fact makes it all the more necessary that the instruction in history impart to pupils the glow of sympathy due to historical characters and events. For this reason—a reason of momentous significance to the whole process of education—history should not be made to present to pupils the appearance of a chronological skeleton. This rule should be observed with special care during the earlier lessons in history, since on these depends largely what sort of impression the whole subject will produce at a future time. Of religious instruction, needless to say, we demand that it shall bring home to pupils the dependent condition of man, and we confidently expect that it will not leave their hearts cold. But historical instruction must coÖperate with religious instruction, otherwise the truths of religion stand isolated, and there is ground for fearing that they will fail to enter as potent factors into the teaching and learning of the remaining subjects. CHAPTER VI
The Material of Instruction from Different Points of View 95. Differences in point of view give rise to conflicting opinions concerning not only the treatment, but also the choice of subject-matter for instruction. If, now, first one opinion then another wins predominance over the rest, the harmony of the purposes underlying both learning and teaching is wanting. Not only that, but the pupils suffer also directly through the lack of consistency where work is begun on one plan and continued on another. 96. The teacher in charge of a given branch of study only too often lays out his work without taking account of pedagogical considerations. His specialty, he thinks, suffices to suggest a plan; the successive steps in its organized content will, of course, be the proper sequence for instruction to follow. In teaching a language, he insists that pupils must master declensions and conjunctions in order that he may read an author with them later. He expects them to understand ordinary prose before he passes on to elucidate the finished style of a poet, etc. In mathematics, he demands that pupils bring to the subject perfect facility in common arithmetic; at a more advanced stage they must be able to handle logarithms with ease before formulÆ requiring their use are reached, etc. In history, the first thing for him to do is to erect a solid chronological framework to hold the historical facts to be inserted afterward. For ancient history, he presupposes a knowledge of ancient geography, etc. This same view which derives the principle determining the sequence of studies from the instruction-material itself, as though it had been unconditionally and finally settled that such and such things must be taught, asserts itself on a larger scale in requirements for admission to higher grades or schools. Children are to be able to read, write, and cipher well before being allowed to enter the grammar school; promotions to higher grades are to take place only when the goal set for the grade immediately preceding has been reached. The good pupil, accordingly, is one who fits into and willingly submits to these arrangements. The natural consequence of all this is, that little heed is paid to the condition of attention, namely, the gradual progress of interest. 97. But still another consequence ensues, occasioning a different point of view. Pupils are commiserated on the ground that they are overburdened. All sorts of doubts spring up as to the wisdom of teaching the branches causing the trouble. Their future utility is called in question. A host of instances is adduced of adults neglecting and forgetting—forgetting without appreciable loss—that which it cost them so much toil to learn. Of course, examples showing the opposite to be true may also be cited, but that does not settle the question. It cannot be denied that there are many, even among the educated, who aspire to nothing higher than freedom from care by means of a lucrative calling, or a life of social enjoyment, and who, accordingly, estimate the value of their knowledge by this standard. Such a state of things is not mended by a kind of instruction that awakens little interest, and that in after years constitutes the dark side of reminiscences connected with early youth. 98. What is urged in reply is, generally speaking, true: youth must be kept busy; we cannot let children grow up wild. And their occupation has to be serious and severe, for government(45–55) must not be weak. But now, more than ever, doubt fastens on the choice of studies. Might not more useful things be offered for employment? If, by way of rejoinder, the ancient languages are commended as being preËminently suited to give pupils diversity of work, this fact is accounted for by the faulty methods pursued in teaching the other subjects. With the proper method the same many-sided activity would be called forth. For the modern languages especially, the claim is made that they, too, are language studies involving reading, writing, translating, and training in the forms of thought. To this argument the unfortunate answer should not be returned, that the classical high schools must retain their Latin and Greek because they are educating future officials to whom the ancient languages are just as useful, nay, indispensable, as the modern languages to other classes. For, if the classical studies have once been degraded to the level of the useful and necessary, the door is thrown open to those who go a step farther still and demand to know of what use Hebrew is to the country parson, and Greek to the practising jurist or physician. 99. Controversies like these have often been conducted as if the humaniora or humanistic studies were radically opposed to the realia and could not admit them to partnership. In reality, the latter are at least as much a legitimate part of a complete education as the former. The whole matter has been made worse by the practice of some of the older generation of teachers who, in order to make the prescribed studies more palatable, descended to all kinds of amusement and play, instead of laying stress on abiding and growing interest. A view that regards the end as a necessary evil to be rendered endurable by means of sweetmeats, implies an utter confusion of ideas; and if pupils are not given serious tasks to perform, they will not find out what they are able to do. We must, however, note in this connection that there are legitimate occasions even for the sweetening of study, just as in medicine there is a place for palliatives, notwithstanding the firm conviction of the physician that remedies promising a radical cure deserve the preference. Harmful and reprehensible as habitual playing with a subject is when it usurps the place of serious and thorough instruction, in cases where a task is not difficult, but seems so to the pupil, it often becomes necessary to start him by a dexterous, cheerful, almost playlike presentation of that which he is to imitate. Superfluous prolixity and clumsiness, through the ennui alone that they produce, cause failure in the easiest things. All this applies especially to the teaching of younger children and to the first lessons in a new subject, e.g., learning to read Greek, the beginning of algebra, etc. 100. If, among the conflicting opinions referred to, there is any vital point of controversy, it lies in the a priori assumption that certain subjects must be taught(96). Such an assumption educative instruction cannot allow to be severed from the end aimed at: the intellectual self-activity of the pupil. This, and not mere knowledge, any more than utility, determines the point of view with regard to the instruction-material. Experience and social intercourse are the primary sources of the pupil’s ideas. It is with reference to these two factors that we estimate strength or weakness in the ideas, and decide what instruction may accomplish with comparative ease or difficulty, at an earlier or at a later period. Good child literature turns to these sources even while children are only just learning to read, and gradually enlarges their range of thoughts. Not until this has been done can the question of instruction in one or the other department of knowledge claim consideration. The term educative instruction frequently occurs. It means, primarily, instruction that has, in the broad sense, an ethical bearing, or an influence upon character. It is based on the idea that, not school discipline alone, but also school instruction in the common branches should be of service to the child in moral and especially in social growth. The studies help to reveal to him his place and function in the world, they form his disposition toward men and things, they give him insight into ethical relations. Instruction that contains this element of moral training is therefore called educative instruction (Erziehender Unterricht). 101. The realia—natural history, geography, history—possess this one unquestionable advantage, viz., easy association with experience and intercourse. Partially, at least, the pupil’s spontaneous ideas(71) may go out toward them. Properly used, collections of plants, picture-books, maps, will contribute their share. In history, the fondness of youth for stories is utilized. The fact that these stories are partly taken from old books written in foreign languages, and that these languages were once actually spoken, has often to be mentioned in passing, before the study of these languages themselves is taken up, nay, even after they have been begun. It is useless to undertake a demonstration of the utility of the realia. The young do not act for the sake of the more remote ends. Pupils work when they feel they can do something; and this consciousness of power to do must be created. The remark that it is useless to undertake to demonstrate to the young the ultimate utility of natural science studies leads naturally to a distinction between interest in the studies as ultimate ends and as immediate ends. It is suggested in this paragraph that pupils are interested in showing their capacity to accomplish results. It is very evident that one of the teacher’s chief anxieties must be to awaken an interest in the studies as ends, not perhaps in their final utility in life, but as fields in which useful work can be done even in the immediate present. The chief category by which to measure the pupil’s interest in the various activities of the schoolroom is the quality of work that he can be taught to accomplish. One need not go far to learn that children like those studies best in which they can do the best work. This is true in several respects. They are interested in the artistic perfection of what they can accomplish, as in drawing, painting, writing, the arrangement of arithmetical problems, so that the page presents a neat appearance, and so that all the processes are plainly revealed to the eye. They are interested in reading when they can call the words with facility, with neatness, without stumbling, mispronouncing or miscalling—when the tones of the voice are agreeable. The quality of the work, however, which appeals perhaps most powerfully to the children, is that of intellectual comprehension. In the reading class it is a constant delight to discover the finer shades of meaning, to express them with the voice, to detect in others any deviation from the true thought. Reading in English is particularly susceptible to this kind of treatment. For the English language being largely devoid of inflections does not show through the form of the words the finer distinctions of thought, but the mind must perceive these from a text largely devoid of grammatical inflections. It is quite possible, therefore, to read in such a manner as to miss all but the most salient points of the matter presented. There is in reading an intensive and an extensive magnitude. Our older method of teaching reading was to devote the time to a few extracts from literary masterpieces, which were exhausted by minute study. The more recent tendency in elementary education is to neglect this side of reading and to devote the time to the cursory reading, not of extracts, but of whole masterpieces of literature. The danger of such a proceeding is that the finer qualities of reading will be neglected for the sake of quantitative mastery of a large amount of reading matter. A middle course between the two would doubtless bring better results. It would, on the one hand, secure an interest that attaches to masterpieces as wholes, and, on the other, the literary appreciation that comes from minute analysis both in thought and expression of the finer distinctions of thought. In mathematical studies, the Æsthetic interest of form, or the active interest of actual performance of problems, is not the sole or even the chief interest that should be appealed to. But the pupil should feel that he is making a progressive mastery of the principles of number. It is a pleasure to apply a rule, to solve a problem neatly; but it is a still greater pleasure to comprehend thoroughly the meaning of the rule, to grasp and to feel its universality, so that although it is not worth while, as Herbart suggests, to urge the ultimate function of mathematics in the life of the world, it is quite worth while to set up those immediate ends of interest such as appear in the activity of solving problems, in the Æsthetic appearance of the work upon paper or board or slate, and in the comprehension of mathematical principles. These ends are near at hand; they can be made to appeal to the pupil through the quality of the work that the teacher demands of him. The same is true in the natural sciences. Even though the ultimate function of biology is an idea too remote or too complex for the child to grasp with enthusiasm, the immediate mastery of a principle in physics, or the discovery of a law of plant life, or of a fact in chemistry, may be an end in which the pupil’s most intense interest can be excited. 102. Geometry has other advantages of association, advantages we have begun only recently to turn to account in earnest. Figures made of wood or pasteboard, drawings, pegs, bars, flexible wires, strings, the use of the ruler, of compasses, of the square, counted coins arranged in long or short, in parallel or diverging series,—all these may be offered to the eye ad libitum and connected with other concrete objects. They may be made the basis of systematic employment and exercises, and this will be done more and more when the fact is once grasped that concrete ideas possessing the proper degree of strength constitute the surest foundation of a branch of instruction whose success depends on the manner in which the pupil forms in his mind the ideas of spatial relations. This is not grasped, of course, by those who regard space once for all as a form of sense-perception common to all minds alike. A careful study of the data of experience will convince the practical educator that the opposite is true; for in this respect individual differences are very marked. Pupils rarely hit upon geometrical constructions unaided; the aptitude for drawing, that is, for imitating the objects seen, is met with more often. It is easy by abstraction to form arithmetical concepts out of the apprehension of geometrical relations. To do so should not be regarded as superfluous, not even when the pupil has already fully entered upon his work in arithmetic. 103. To Germans the two ancient classical languages do not offer the advantages of easy transition. On the other hand, the study of Latin, even if only moderately advanced, prepares the soil for the most indispensable modern foreign languages. Herein lies an argument against beginning with French, as was often done formerly. The linking of Latin to French will, moreover, hardly win the approval of students of languages, since, not to mention other reasons, Gallicisms are a source of no little danger to Latinity. The ancient languages require long-continued labor. This fact alone renders it advisable to begin them early. The strangeness of Latin for Germans should not lead to the conclusion that the study of Latin should be commenced late, but rather that during the earlier years of boyhood it should be carried on slowly. The sounds of foreign languages must be heard early, in order that the strangeness may wear off. Single Latin words will be easily mastered even by a child. These may soon be followed by short sentences consisting of two or three words. No matter if they are forgotten again for a time. That which is said to be forgotten is not on that account lost. The real difficulty lies in the multitude of strange elements that accumulate in relatively long sentences; it lies also in the many ways of connecting subordinate clauses, in the qualifying insertions, in the order of words, and in the structure of the period. Furthermore, we must not overlook the fact that children are very slow to acquire the use of dependent clauses, even in German; their speech for a long time consists merely of a stringing together of the simplest sentences. The attempt to advance them more rapidly in the syntactical forms of Latin than is possible in their mother-tongue is a waste of time; and, besides, their inclination to study is put to a very severe test. Perhaps the most serious defect of secondary education in the United States is its brevity. Languages are not begun until the pupil is well on to fifteen years old. A reform most urgently needed in this country is the extension of high school influence to the two grades of the grammar school lying immediately below the high school. This would enable pupils to begin foreign languages at about the age of twelve, or two years later than they are now begun in Germany. 104. The foregoing remarks show plainly enough that in educative instruction some subjects will be found a comparatively easy and sure means of awakening intellectual activity, while others involve a more strenuous effort, which, under certain circumstances, may end in failure. The concrete studies are nearest to the pupil; mathematics requires some apparatus to render it tangible and vivid; to get pupils started properly in modern languages can be but a slow process. But this difference is, after all, not fundamental enough, nor does it affect the whole course of instruction sufficiently, to constitute a serious pedagogical objection to the study of foreign languages, so long as there is time to teach them. Their fruits mature later. CHAPTER VII
The Process of Instruction 105. Whether or not instruction will begin well and go on properly depends on a combination of three factors,—the teacher, the pupil, and the subject taught. Failure of the subject-matter to excite the pupil’s interest is followed by evil consequences moving in a circle. The pupil seeks to avoid the task set for him; he remains silent or returns wrong answers; the teacher insists on getting a correct answer; the lesson is at a standstill; the pupil’s dislike grows more intense. To conquer dislike and indolence, the teacher now refuses altogether the assistance he could give; as best he may, he compels the pupil to collect his thoughts, to work by himself, to prepare his lesson, to memorize, even to apply in written exercises what he knows but imperfectly, etc. The presentation proper has come to an end; at all events it has ceased to be consecutive. Now the right kind of an example is wanting, which the teacher should set—one of reading, thinking, writing, that implies complete absorption in the subject. And yet it is this example concretely illustrating how to take hold of the subject, how to present it, and how to associate it with related subjects, which effects the best results in good instruction. The teacher must set such an example, the pupil must imitate it as well as he can; the teacher must render him active assistance. 106. Instruction is either synthetic or analytic. In general, the term synthetic may be applied wherever the teacher himself determines directly the sequence and grouping of the parts of the lesson; the term analytic, wherever the pupil’s own thoughts are expressed first, and these thoughts, such as they chance to be, are then, with the teacher’s help, analyzed, corrected, and supplemented. But there are many things under this head that need to be defined and discriminated more sharply. There are analyses of experience, of facts learned in school, and of opinions. There is one kind of synthesis which imitates experience; there is another kind which consists in constructing designedly a whole whose component parts have been presented one by one previously. Here, again, many differences arise, owing to diversities inherent in the subject-matter. 107. Since instruction builds on the pupil’s experience, we shall deal first with that form of synthesis which imitates, or copies experience. We may name it purely presentative instruction. The term synthetic, on the other hand, will henceforth be reserved for that form of instruction which reveals clearly the process of building up a whole out of parts presented singly beforehand. The purely presentative method of instruction, although practicable only to a limited extent, is nevertheless so effectual as to entitle it to separate treatment, so effectual that the teacher—and this is the main thing—will do well to train himself carefully in its use. Skill in this direction is the surest means of securing interest. It is customary to demand that the pupil acquire facility in narration and description, but we ought not to forget that here above all the teacher must lead the way by setting a good example. To be sure, there is an abundance of printed narrative and description, but reading does not produce the effect that hearing does. Viva vox docet. As a rule, we cannot take for granted that a boy has even the skill and patience required for reading; and if perfect facility has been attained, the reading is done too rapidly. There is too much hurry to get to the end, or too much delay over the wrong passages, so that the connection is lost. At the most, we may let the pupils that read exceptionally well read aloud to the class. By far the surer means to the end in view is the oral presentation by the teacher. But in order that such presentation may produce its effect undisturbed, it needs to be perfectly free and untrammelled. 108. The first requisite for free oral presentation is a cultivated style of speaking. Many teachers need to be warned against the use of set phrases, against mere expletives, faulty enunciation, pauses filled in with inarticulate sounds, against fragments of sentences, clumsy parentheses, etc. In the second place, adaptation of the vocabulary employed, both to the subject-matter and to the intelligence of the pupils, and adjustment of phraseology to the pupil’s stage of culture are essential. Lastly, careful memorizing. At first this should be done almost verbatim. At all events, the teacher must prepare his lesson as though he had his pupils before him and were talking to them. Later on he must memorize at least the facts and turning-points of the subject to be presented, in order that he may not be compelled to consult books or look at notes. A few remarks on some particular points will be made farther on. 109. The effect of the teacher’s narrative and description should be to make the pupil realize events and objects as vividly as if they were actually present to his eye and ear. The pupil must, therefore, have actually heard and seen much previously. This recalls to our minds the necessity, pointed out before, of first enlarging the young pupil’s range of experience, when found too limited, through excursions and the exhibition of objects. Again, this form of instruction is adapted only to things that might be heard or seen. We must therefore avail ourselves of all the help pictures can give. If the presentation has been a success, the reproduction by the pupils will show that they recall, not merely the main facts, but largely even the teacher’s language. They have retained more exactly than they have been asked to do. Besides, the teacher who narrates and describes well gains a strong hold on the affections of his pupils; he will find them more obedient in matters pertaining to discipline. The foregoing paragraphs on presentative instruction may seem strange to the American teacher. We must remember, however, that they were written before the modern era of text-books, when, in point of fact, the teacher was practically the sole reliance for the facts that the children were to learn. It is the custom, even to the present, in the lower schools of Germany, to rely very largely upon the teacher for the information which the children are to acquire. In American schools, this method is not followed, for so enormous has been the development of text-book industry, that in every field of education the richest material is offered to the schools in the form of text-books. There is, however, still a legitimate field for purely presentative instruction in the earlier grades of the elementary school, especially in literature and in the beginnings of history. The most primitive method of instruction, as we see clearly in the earlier periods of Grecian education, was the narrative. The children of those days received their instruction in history, mythology, literature, geography, by listening to the tales of heroes and heroic deeds narrated by their parents, by wandering minstrels and rhapsodists. To this day, the teacher who can narrate biographical or literary matter in an attractive manner is sure to awaken intense interest in the children under her control. Perhaps one facility which the modern teacher needs to acquire more than any other is the capacity of happy, vivacious, interesting narrative cast, at the same time, into simple yet excellent literary form. Such a teacher is an undoubted treasure in the primary school. There is occasion, moreover, in nearly all school study for the presentation of supplementary material in almost every school study. This is true especially in literature and history. It is also true in geography and in mathematics, as where, for instance, the teacher narrates the methods of the ancient Egyptians in the development of geometrical ideas, or those of the Greeks. If one is teaching a foreign language, one may always find happy opportunities for introducing bits of history, biography, or other illuminating material. In the sciences nothing is more interesting to children, more stimulative of renewed effort, than narratives concerning our great scientists, their desire for education, their struggle to attain knowledge, their misfortunes, and their triumphs. Every aspect of instruction may be supplemented and illumined by instruction given in the purely presentative form of narration. 110. While skilful presentation produces results akin to an extension of the pupil’s range of actual experience, analysis helps to make experience more instructive. For, left to itself, experience is not a teacher whose instruction is systematic. It does not obey the law of actual progress from the simple to the complex. Things and events crowd in upon the mind in masses; the result is often chaotic apprehension. Inasmuch, then, as experience presents aggregates before it gives the component particulars, it becomes the task of instruction to reverse this order and to adjust the facts of experience to the sequence demanded in teaching. Experience, it is true, associates its content; but if this earlier association is to have the share in the work of the school that it should have, that which has been experienced and that which has been learned must be made to harmonize. With this end in view we need to supplement experience. The facts it has furnished have to be made clearer and more definite than they are, and must be given an appropriate embodiment in language. 111. Let us consider first the earliest stage of analytic instruction. In order to understand the significance of this method of teaching, we must examine the nature of a child’s experience. Children are indeed in the habit of familiarizing themselves with their surroundings; but the strongest impressions predominate. Objects in motion have greater attraction for them than objects at rest. They tear up and destroy without troubling themselves much about the real connection between the parts of a whole. In spite of their many why’s and what for’s, they make use of every tool or utensil without regard for its purpose; they are satisfied if it serves the impulse of the moment. Their eyes are keen, but they rarely observe; the real character of things does not deter them from making a plaything of everything, as their fancy may direct, and from making one thing stand for every other thing. They receive total impressions of similar objects, but do not derive concepts; the abstract does not enter their minds of itself. These and similar observations, however, apply by no means equally to every child. On the contrary, children differ greatly from one another; and, with the child’s individuality, his one-sidedness already begins. 112. It follows at once that the first thing to be done, in a school where many children are to be taught together, is to make the children more alike in their knowledge. To this end the store of experiences which they bring with them must be worked over. But the homogeneity of pupils, desirable as it is, is not the sole aim. We must take care also that the whole of instruction acts upon the particular stock of ideas of each pupil taken individually. We must seek those points of contact and departure to which attention has repeatedly been called above, and hence cannot leave the pupil’s mass of ideas in its original crude state. Thoughtful teachers have long since testified to the necessity of this requirement, which mere scholars in their zeal for learning fail again and again to appreciate. Niemeyer, in his widely read work, opens his treatment of the particular laws of instruction with a chapter entitled: “The First Steps in awakening Attention and Reflection through Instruction, or Exercises in Thinking.” These exercises are no other than the elementary processes of analytic instruction. He says: “When the age, the health, and the strength of children have made instruction proper seem expedient, the first lesson should be one of the kind described in the chapter heading. Such exercises might be profitably continued in some form or other until the ninth or tenth year, and probably even later. The fact that it is not easy to describe them in a word very likely explains why we fail to find them in most programmes of private and public schools. That at last some attention is being given even in the common schools to this matter is one of the venerable Canon Rochow’s imperishable services to education.” Pestalozzi, in his book for mothers, strikes out in the same direction. It will not serve the purpose, to be sure, to confine oneself, as he does, to a single object; still, the kind of exercises is indicated very definitely by him; indeed, more definitely, in some ways, than by Niemeyer. 113. The notions of pupils about surrounding objects, that is, notions in which the strongest impressions predominate(111), must be made to approach uniformity first. This is accomplished by uniform reproduction. On this point Niemeyer says, “The teacher should begin by talking with his pupils about those objects which are, at the time, affecting their senses directly. Pointing to these objects, he asks the pupils to name them. He then passes on to things that are not present, but that the children have seen or felt before. At the same time he exercises their powers of imagination and expression by making them enumerate what they are able to recall. Suitable material: everything in the schoolroom; the human body; everything pertaining to food, dress, comfort; things found in the fields, in the garden, in the yard; animals and plants so far as they are known by the children.” 114. The next step consists in pointing out the main facts of a given whole, the relative position of these parts, their connection, and their movability, if they can be moved without damage. To this are properly linked the simplest facts concerning the uses of things. At the same time children are taught how they must not use things, and how, instead of ruining them, they ought to look after them and use them with care. The abundance and number of things, their size, form, and weight, should likewise be referred to as early as this stage, and should furnish occasion for comparisons. But something more is needed to give distinctness to the ideas of pupils, and to prepare the way for future abstract thinking. Beginning first with the objects, we derive from them the predicates by searching out the attributes; this done, we must in turn make the predicates our starting-point, and classify the objects under the heads thus obtained. This distinction has been made before by Pestalozzi; it is one of fundamental importance in the preparation for generalization. While engaged in such work pupils will of themselves learn to compare, to discriminate, and, in some instances, to observe more accurately: erroneous notions due to an active imagination will be corrected by the appeal to experience as the source of knowledge. 115. Of what remains to be done, the most important task consists in securing a comprehensive view of a somewhat extended time-series, of which objects, together with their natural or artificial origins, are members. An elementary knowledge will thus be gained, especially of the simplest facts about manufacturing processes, and about intercourse among human beings, which facts will serve subsequently as the groundwork for instruction in natural history and geography. But for history also the way must be prepared by referring, although only in the most general way, to times when the utensils and tools of the present had not yet been invented, when the arts of to-day were as yet unknown, and when people were still without those materials that are now imported from foreign countries. 116. It does not follow, because no definite periods are set apart for the instruction described, that it is not being given at all. We may find it incorporated, to a large extent, with something else, particularly with the interpretation of elementary reading matter, which forms part of the first work in the mother-tongue. Nevertheless, a subject that is taught only incidentally is always liable to suffer, if not from indifference, at least from inadequate treatment. On the other hand, we cannot fail to recognize that the appointment of separate periods for analytic instruction may prove difficult, owing to the fact that the rate of progress depends so largely on the stock of ideas pupils bring with them, and on their readiness to utter what they think and feel. Besides, while Niemeyer expressly says, “Children taught in this manner know nothing of tedium,” he also hastens to add, “but it is easy to spoil them by too rapid changes of subject.” The same, or similar bad consequences, may result from other school exercises where the teacher himself supplies a profusion of instruction-material, and so relieves his pupils of the trouble of gathering such material from their own recollections. On the whole, therefore, it will be well enough to set apart but few hours, or weeks, for the first attempts; and these can be made a part of the lessons in the mother-tongue. In private instruction the difficulty spoken of is not encountered. Besides, the ample opportunities afforded for observing the pupil’s store of ideas make it easy to devise a suitable plan for the earliest analytic teaching. In the foregoing paragraphs on analytical instruction, the question naturally arises, “Is such instruction to be regarded as an end in itself, or as a means for preparing the mind for more perfect assimilation of the subject-matter to be presented from day to day in the various studies?” Since the time these paragraphs were written, not only Germany herself, but also America has gone through a varied experience with respect to what we call object teaching. It was at one time conceived that a specific hour should be set apart each day for instructing the children in the observation of objects. In other words, object lessons were a distinct part of the programme. It was supposed that in this way the children could be made conscious of the significance of their environment, and that it was highly desirable that such an end should be brought about. In Germany the same effort was undertaken under the name of Anschauungsunterricht, but since the multiplication of text-books, and the increased pressure upon the schools brought about through the introduction of new subjects of study, it has been found inadvisable to devote a specific period of the day to isolated analytic instruction upon objects. Such instruction, however, has by no means passed from the field of usefulness, even in our very best schools. The necessity of appealing powerfully to previous experience, in and out of the schoolroom, as a basis for understanding a matter presented in the daily lessons, is everywhere recognized. From being an end of school work, therefore, analytic instruction has passed to the realm of a useful means for arousing the mental activity of the children concerning the regular lessons of the schoolroom. It is, in modern terms, an apperceptive basis for all instruction. 117. At a later time analytic instruction reappears in other forms, those of review and the correction of written exercises. The teacher has presented a body of facts; he has furnished the helps necessary for the solution of certain problems. What he has given, the pupils are expected to produce again in their review exercises and essays. Where necessary, their work is analyzed and corrected. In conducting reviews a pedagogical blunder is apt to be made—a blunder that brings on the evils specified in a former paragraph(105); review is confounded with examination. The two are radically different. If the teacher could be sure of both perfect attention and full comprehension, he himself would go over the ground covered by his first talk once more for the purpose of assisting the memory; the pupils would not be called upon to take part. In this case, we should have neither analytic instruction nor anything resembling an examination. As a matter of fact, however, pupils are usually asked to reproduce what and as much as they remember. This is easily taken to mean that they should have retained everything, which, strictly speaking, is not expected even in an examination. The purpose of an examination is to ascertain the actual state of knowledge, whatever it may prove to be; reviews are conducted for the purpose of increasing and deepening knowledge. If an examination is followed by praise or censure, well and good; a review has nothing to do with either. Since reviewing and drilling, which resembles the former, claim the larger portion of the time devoted to school work, it will be worth while to examine the subject somewhat more closely. 118. Repetition of several ideas intensifies those ideas. It does more than that. If they are of opposed nature, the reciprocal arrest that ensues resists their fusion less during the reproduction than it did in the original act of apprehension. The fusion increases in completeness, and, besides, becomes more uniform, i.e., the weaker ideas hold their own better alongside of the stronger. Again, if a series of successive ideas is repeated, the first members of the series of themselves tend to reproduce those that follow before the latter are repeated—a tendency gathering energy in proportion to the frequency of repetition. This fact underlies the increase in rapidity which comes with growing skill. Extraneous thoughts, however, very easily interrupt the psychical process of reproduction. Let us assume that the teacher’s presentation has been an adequate one and has lasted no longer than the capacity of the pupils permitted, only a few minutes, perhaps. He himself might now repeat; but asks his pupils to do so, lest their thoughts begin to wander from the subject in hand. He comes to their aid and repeats only when their own attempts have failed. But very often they have retained some things and forgotten others. In this case it becomes his business to reinforce the ideas striving to rise into consciousness, but without disturbing their movement. In other words, he should prompt neither more nor less, should lend aid neither sooner nor later, than will serve to make the pupil’s train of thought coincide as nearly as possible with that of the presentation properly given. Unless this is done, the reproduction fails to effect the required association and facility. The same ground is gone over again and again in vain; fatigue sets in, and the wrong association takes place—a matter for grave apprehension. If the pupils are in an unresponsive mood, the teacher must go slow, for the time being; if interest is lacking, he cannot incite the proper movement of ideas. If the teacher is not conducting the repetition with skill, the fragmentary answers of the pupils indicate well enough after a time that the desired current of thought has not been generated. 119. We have taken it for granted that the presentation was an adequate one—one that might serve as a model(105). Where this adjustment of means and ends extends, as it may, even to the language, the latter should be closely followed in the repetition, but without pedantic insistence on unimportant details. But very frequently the essential feature of the presentation is found in the sequence of thought. In that case expression will vary, and the teacher is satisfied at first if, in repeating, the pupils furnish evidence that they understand; he allows them to use their own words, though less appropriate. He must, still, however, look carefully after the given sequence, which the repetition is to reproduce with the greatest possible coherence. 120. The case is different when later on larger sections of a course of successful instruction are to be repeated. During all the earlier stage particular facts were moved far apart(68) for the sake of clearness; by means of conversation, or of incidental mention in other recitations, or through experience itself(110), provision was made also for association of various kinds. Now it becomes the business of repetition in the first place to gather together into a smaller compass what has been expanded; next it subserves the purpose of systematic arrangement, and lastly, is often of use for making the instruction more complete and for adding the difficult to the comparatively easy. Here the mode of presentation itself changes to meet the requirements of a more advanced grade of work. But repetition immediately after the presentation, or, perhaps, during the next hour, will, as a rule, remain necessary even at this higher stage. 121. Here, where compression and insertions are to modify the material of instruction, we need to inquire into the forms of connection peculiar to the objects, together with those essential for use, and to determine accordingly the series and web of ideas to be formed in the mind of the pupil. For such organization of ideas, repetition is, at all events, far better adapted than presentation, which can traverse only one of several series at a time, and which passes into repetition the moment an effort is made to bring the other series forward also. In natural history, for example, various classifications occur, in history the ethnographic divisions are crossed by the synchronistic, while the history of culture demands yet another basis of association; in geography each noted city is to be a landmark, enabling the pupil to take his bearings in every direction, but cities on rivers suggest river basins and mountain ranges; in mathematics each theorem is to be kept ready for separate application, but it has also its special place in the chain of demonstrations; grammatical rules, too, should be available when called for, but it is very necessary at the same time that the pupil become perfectly at home in his grammar and know where to look for information. The teacher who, by skilful repetition, does justice to these multiform associations, is not always the one who shows most skill in systematic presentation, and who knows best how to make prominent the main thoughts, and to link to them those that are subordinate. 122. The impulse to repeat must, as a rule, come from points with which pupils are familiar. It is further requisite that the teacher, in conducting the repetition, adapt himself to their train of thought; he must not adhere strictly to an inflexible plan. The necessary corrections require delay here and there; the corrected statements often constitute new points from which to take bearings. At times the pupils themselves should feel free to indicate which topics it seems most necessary to repeat. By so doing they assume a certain responsibility as to the rest, and are made to realize all the more their obligation to make up deficiencies. 123. The correction of written work likewise falls under the head of analytic instruction, but the toil exceeds the profit if written work is demanded too early. While writing the pupil consolidates his ideas. Now if he does so incorrectly, the effect is mischievous, his mistakes cling to him. Moreover, the teacher has to be on his guard lest, while orally correcting and reading over the composition, he overestimate the pupil’s attention. When many slips occur, when a whole forest of mistakes is found to have sprung up, the pupil becomes indifferent to them all; they make humble, but they also dishearten. Such tasks should, therefore, be very brief, if the pupil is weak; nay, it is preferable to have none at all, as long as progress is being made more surely by a different kind of exercises. The teacher who assigns home work with a view to saving labor in school miscalculates utterly; his work will soon have become all the harder. To many it seems that the exercises they assign should be very easy, rather than short; and to make them easy, outlines, turns of expression, everything, is indicated as definitely as possible. This is a delusion. If composition has any purpose, it consists in making the pupil try to see what he can do without the teacher. Now if the pupil actually gets started on the exercise, the teacher ought not to step in his way with all sorts of prescriptions. If the pupil fails to make headway, the attempt was premature. We must either wait or else shorten the task, no matter if it should shrink to no more than three lines. Three lines of the pupil’s own work are better than three pages written by direction. It may take years before the self-deception due to leading-string methods is superseded by a true estimate of the pupil’s actual power. 124. The case is quite different if, before writing, the pupil has been assisted orally in developing his thoughts. This kind of analysis is of special importance in later boyhood; but the teacher should see to it that the pupil gives free expression to his own opinion. If he does, a theme has been furnished for discussion during which the teacher will avoid harsh dissent in proportion to his eagerness to accomplish something with his pupil. To rebuke presuming boldness or impudence is a different matter, of course. Self-chosen themes are preferable by far to those that are assigned, only they cannot be expected of the majority of pupils. But when they do turn up, the character of the choice alone, but still more the execution, will throw light on the opinions current among the pupils, and on the impressions which not only the school, but experience and society as well, have been constantly at work to produce. The writer’s individuality reveals itself even more distinctly. Every teacher must be prepared to come upon these individual traits, however much he might prefer to have his pupils reflect himself. It would be futile if he attempted to correct their essays by interpolating his own view; he would not by that means make the latter their own. The mode of treatment can be corrected; but other opportunities will have to serve for the rectification of opinions—provided this can ever be undertaken successfully. 125. With regard to synthetic instruction, we assume at the outset that it will be supported during the whole course of training by the merely presentative and the analytic methods of teaching, wherever these are in place. Otherwise the ultimate result will always remain problematical, particularly the union of learning and life. Synthetic instruction brings in much that is new and strange; and we must take advantage of the universal charm of novelty. It must coÖperate with acquired habits of application, and with the interest peculiar to each subject taught. The affairs, not of Italy alone, but also those of Greece and the Orient, have become a matter of everyday discussion. There has been a general diffusion of knowledge about the facts and laws of nature. Hence even younger children cannot help but pick up many things now that will tend to forestall the indifference or aversion with which school studies were regarded not longer than fifty years ago. They seemed to be something foreign to life. At present, it cannot prove difficult to turn curiosity in the direction of distant lands, and of past ages even, especially where collections of rare articles and antiquities are accessible. This stimulation would not persist long, however, in the face of the labor of learning, if there did not exist at the same time a widespread conviction of the necessity of study, a conviction reinforced by the legal requirements of schools, particularly of the gymnasia. Accordingly, families exert a good influence with respect to the industry of children; and with the right sort of government and training in school, willingness to learn is easily secured. Less easy is it to incite a genuinely scientific desire to know, one that will endure beyond examinations. This brings us back to many-sidedness of interest(83–94). If interest were not already the end of instruction, we should have to look upon it as the only means whereby the results of teaching can be given permanence. Interest depends partly, it is true, on native capacity, which the school cannot create; but it depends also on the subject-matter of instruction. 126. Synthetic instruction must offer subjects capable of arousing lasting and spontaneously radiating interest. That which affords only temporary pleasure or light entertainment is of too little consequence to determine the plan of operation. Nor can the choice of such studies be recommended as stand isolated, as do not lead to continued effort; for, other reasons aside, we are unable to decide beforehand to which of the main classes of interest(83–94) the individual pupil will especially incline. The first place belongs rather to those studies which appeal to the mind in a variety of ways and are capable of stimulating each pupil according to his individuality. For such subjects ample time must be allowed; they must be made the object of prolonged, diligent effort. We may then hope that they will take hold in some way, and we shall be in a position to know what kind of interest they have inspired in one pupil or another. Where, on the contrary, the end of the thread of work is soon reached, it remains questionable whether any effort at all will be produced, let alone a lasting impression. 127. The subject-matter having been chosen, the treatment must be adjusted to it in such a way as to bring it within reach of the pupils. For the exercises growing out of such treatment, the well-known rule holds in general: the easy before the difficult, or, more specifically, that which prepares the way before that which cannot be firmly grasped without preliminary knowledge. To insist, however, on perfect mastery in this respect, is often equivalent to scaring away interest. Absolute proficiency in preliminary knowledge is a late achievement, nor is it attained without fatigue. The teacher has to be satisfied if the mastery acquired is such that what is lacking can, without serious delay, be added by him in practice. To make the road so level as to do away entirely with the necessity for occasional leaps(96), means to provide for the convenience of the teacher rather than for that of the pupils. The young love to climb and jump; they do not take kindly to an absolutely level path. But they are afraid in the dark. There must be light enough for them to see by; in other words, the subject must lie spread out before their eyes with such distinctness that each step is seen to be a step forward, which brings them perceptibly nearer to a distant goal. 128. With regard to the sequence of studies we need to distinguish first of all between preparatory knowledge and ability to do. As is well known, the latter, even when it has been fully attained, can be secured against loss only by long-continued practice. Hence the practice of the pupil’s skill must go on constantly from the time when he first learns to apply what he knows. But merely preliminary knowledge, which produced fatigue before it was mastered, may be allowed to drop out of the memory. Enough remains to make it easier to resume the subject at a later time(92, 103). Accordingly, not the preliminary knowledge just referred to, but the pupil’s facility in doing, supplies the principle determining sequence. In the case of all essential elementary information—knowledge of rudiments of grammar, arithmetic, and geometry—it will be found expedient to begin with the simplest elements long before any practical application is made. In such first lessons individual facts only are presented. These are made clear to the pupils(68, 69); here and there they are associated. Fatigue is avoided if possible. Even if the earliest attempts at memorizing should prove successful, it will be safer, instead of relying on this fact, to postpone the whole matter for a time. At a later period the same subject is resumed from the beginning without any demand on the teacher’s part that some things should have been retained. This time, however, it will be possible to introduce a somewhat larger quantity of the instruction-material, and it will not be too early to make pupils perceive the connection between individual facts. If pupils experience difficulty in comprehending, we should be careful not to advance too rapidly; the greater the difficulty, the greater the need for caution. When the time comes for practical application, an earnest, diligent effort must be insisted on, but only for tasks of moderate length, and without exacting too much by harsh means. Not every pupil can do everything. Sometimes a pupil will at a later period acquire the power he does not possess now, if only his chances for success have not been spoiled by earlier blindness on the part of his teacher. 129. Again, corresponding to each stage of instruction, there is a certain capacity for apperceiving attention(77) which deserves careful consideration. For we ought to avail ourselves of the comparatively easy in order to facilitate indirectly what would otherwise prove difficult and time-consuming. We need to distinguish between insertion and continuation, and to connect this distinction with the division of ideas into spontaneous and induced(71). It is easier to fill in between familiar points than it is to continue, because the continued series is in close contact with the well known only at the starting-point. Easiest of all is insertion between free-rising ideas, between those ideas that occur to the pupil spontaneously, when he has been led into a certain field of consciousness. Hardest of all, and least certain of success, is the continuation of lessons that can be revived in consciousness only by a laborious effort of memory. Intermediate in difficulty are the insertion of new elements between induced or reproduced ideas, and continuation on the basis of free-rising, or spontaneous, ideas. That there may be many gradations besides is of course self-evident. The teacher who knows his pupils well will be able to make frequent use of these distinctions. Only a very general outline of their application can be given here. The realia and mathematics can be connected more easily than other studies with the pupil’s experience(101, 102). If the teacher has properly availed himself of this advantage, he may count on ideas that rise spontaneously, and his task will then consist in first establishing a few suitable cardinal points so that insertions may be made farther on. Languages present more serious difficulties. It is true that progress in the vernacular is made through apperception by the pupil’s earlier attainments in his mother-tongue, and through the insertion of the new into the old. But in foreign languages, which associate themselves with the mother-tongue only gradually, apperception and insertion cannot take place until after some knowledge of the language has been acquired. And this knowledge must grow considerably before we can reasonably look for spontaneous ideas. If now the reproduced ideas become encumbered with additional new ones, worst of all through mere continuation, we need not wonder if the result is useless chaos. This explains, no doubt, why the attempts to teach the ancient languages ex usu, after the manner in which the language of a foreign country is easily learned by residence in that country, had to end in failure. One who learns French in France has persons and actions before his eyes; he easily infers that which concerns him. Such apperception takes place undoubtedly by means of spontaneous ideas with which the foreign language becomes associated. Before long the language itself becomes an apperceiving factor and participates in the process of learning. For the ancient languages, on the contrary, a grammatical working basis is needed first, especially a knowledge of inflectional endings, pronouns, and particles. The blunder should not be made, to be sure, of beginning with a marshalling of the hosts of grammar, as though grammar itself needed no base of operations. Long practice of what is most necessary must precede. But the worst plan would be to start in with cursory reading; in other words, to continue without making sure of anything. Even cursory reading, however, produces good results under one condition; namely, the existence of a lively interest in the contents. 130. When the thoughts of the reader hasten on in advance of the words and get hold of the general sense correctly, the required apperception is performed by means of spontaneous ideas together with the insertion of whatever was not inferred. But this presupposes a very favorable relation of the book to the reader. Hence texts used in the teaching of a language must be chosen with very great care, and their contents explained. Such work should not be slighted in favor of grammar; on the other hand, as much grammar must be given as is necessary. Some of the essentials will have to precede the reading; complementary facts will be presented in connection with the reading; other portions of the grammatical apparatus will be introduced at suitable halting-places. Written exercises belong elsewhere and stand in a different relation to grammar. The interest in an author depends very largely on historical preparation; here we cannot fail to discover connection between philology and the so-called real studies. CHAPTER VIII
Remarks on the Plan of Instruction as a Whole 131. Where many diverse means are to coÖperate for the attainment of one end, where many obstacles have to be overcome, where persons of higher, equal, and lower rank enter as factors requiring consideration, it is always a difficult matter to keep the end itself, the one fixed goal, steadily in view. In instruction the difficulty is increased by the fact that no one single teacher can impart the whole, and that consequently a number of teachers are obliged to depend on one another. But for this very reason, however much circumstances may vary the courses of study, the common end, namely, many-sided, well-balanced, well-connected interest, in the achievement of which the true development of mental powers consists, needs to be lifted into prominence as the one thing toward which all details of procedure should point. 132. No more time, we need to realize at the outset, should be demanded for instruction than is consistent with the proviso that the pupils retain their natural buoyancy of spirits. This must be insisted on, and not merely for the sake of health and physical vigor; a more direct argument for our present purpose lies in the fact that all art and labor employed to keep the attention awake will be thwarted by the disinclination to study caused by sitting too long, and even by excessive mental application alone. Forced attention does not suffice for instruction, even though it may be had through disciplinary measures. It is urgently necessary that every school have not only spacious schoolrooms, but also a playground; it is further necessary that each recitation be followed by an intermission, that after the first two periods permission be granted for exercise in the open air, and that the same permission be given after the third period if there is a fourth to follow. Still more urgent is the demand that pupils shall not be deprived of their hours of needed recreation by an excessive amount of school work to be done at home. The teacher who loads pupils down with home tasks in order to dispense as much as possible with perhaps uncertain home supervision, substitutes a certain and general evil for a possible and partial one. The neglect of such precautions has given rise in recent times to very bitter complaints, which will continue to be heard in future for similar reasons. Violent gymnastic exercise is not the means to put a stop to them. They threaten to lead to another extreme—such restrictions upon instruction as will make an inner unity of work impossible. The subjects of fatigue and school hygiene have now grown to unexpected dimensions. Many periodicals are devoted to them, while the volume of literature bearing upon them has passed the stage where one person can be expected to command it all. In his “Bibliography of School Hygiene,” published in the “Proceedings of the National Educational Association for 1898,” Professor WilliamH. Burnham enumerates four hundred and thirty-six standard works, articles, and journals dedicated to this cause. Many of these books, like those of Eulenberg and Bach, or Burgerstein and Netolitzky, comprise hundreds of pages, being based on extended experiment and research. 133. The time properly belonging to instruction must not be scattered. The deep-rooted practice of assigning two hours per week to one study and two hours to another, each lesson separated from the next by an interval of two or three days, is absurd, because incompatible with continuity of presentation. Of course, if the teacher can stand this arrangement, the pupils will have to endure it. The subjects of instruction must be taken up in order that each may have its share of continuous time. To give a whole term to each is not always practicable; frequently shorter periods will have to suffice. Again, one subject must not be split into several, according to the names of its branches. If, for example, we should set apart separate hours for Greek and Roman antiquities and again for mythology in addition to the time designated for the reading of ancient authors, separate hours for the systematic survey of the branches of knowledge besides those reserved for German in the highest class of the gymnasium, separate hours for analytic geometry alongside of algebra, we should tear asunder where we ought to join together, and should dissipate the time at our disposal. Saving time depends on methods better than these,—on proficiency in presenting a subject and skill in conducting recitations. Despite the protest here entered, German schools still adhere to the plan of presenting many subjects simultaneously, few hours per week being devoted to each. American schools are fairly free from the reproach, it being an exception to find standard subjects taught less than four or five times per week. 134. As boys grow older, they may derive a great deal of profit from reading and doing many things by themselves. Following their own choice, they develop in accordance with their individual traits. We question, however, the wisdom of calling for reports on such outside pursuits. Pupils of ordinary capacity should not be made ambitious to imitate what they are not fitted for; extensive reading must not impair feeling and thinking. Breadth of learning is not identical with depth, and cannot make up for lack of depth. Instead of reading, some engage in the study of a fine art. Others are compelled at an early age to give lessons in order to support themselves. These learn while teaching. The essentials of a coherent scheme of studies must not be dependent on outside reading; they must be embraced in the plan of instruction itself. 135. From beginning to end the course of study must be arranged so as to provide for each of the main classes of interest. The empirical interest, to be sure, is called forth everywhere more easily than any of the other kinds. But religious instruction always fosters sympathetic interest; in this it must have the assistance of history and language study. Æsthetic culture at first depends on the work in the mother-tongue; it is desirable to have, in addition, instruction in singing, which at the same time promotes the health of the pupil. Later on, the ancient classics contribute their share of influence. Training in thinking is afforded by analytic, grammatical, and mathematical instruction; toward the end, also, by the study of history, which then becomes a search for causes and effects. CoÖperation of this sort is to be sought everywhere; the authors to be studied must be selected with this end in view, and interpreted accordingly. If there is a defect in Herbart’s scheme of interests as a guide to the selection of the studies of the curriculum, it lies in the fact that the interests named are too exclusively applied to the pupil’s individual life, and not enough to his life as a member of the social whole. There is an important sense in which even natural science, which may be expected to cultivate the speculative interests, is social; for science becomes truly significant only when it contributes to the service of men. The fact that we now live in an industrial age, that life is preserved from disease in so large a measure, that the well-being of every community is advancing so rapidly, that universal education is now a fact rather than a dream, is due to the application of science to human welfare. Consequently, we are not restricted to a few humanitarian topics, like history and literature, for the development of our social interests. We find that every study has its sociological as well as its personal bearings. On the other hand, since all studies are both subjective and objective in the interests they arouse, it would be possible to awaken all the six classes of interest enumerated by teaching but a fraction of what we now consider needful in a good curriculum. It would seem, therefore, that the six classes of interest, at best, indicate what the quality of our teaching should be, not with sufficient accuracy what subjects should be taught. The latter is determined quite as much by social as by psychological needs.
SECTION III
TRAINING CHAPTER I
The Relation of Training to Government and to Instruction 136. Training looks toward the pupil’s future. It is founded on hope, and shows itself, to begin with, in patience. It tempers government, the object of which might perhaps be realized more speedily by greater rigor. It moderates even instruction in case the latter puts too great a strain upon the pupil. But it also combines with government as well as instruction, and lightens their work. Training consists primarily in a certain personal attitude, identical if possible with a kind way of treating pupils. This implies readiness on the part of the teacher to listen to the wishes and utterances of the pupil, who, in the midst of strangers, looks to his teacher (and to the family in charge of his education) for sympathy and support. But training becomes active where the pupil needs help, especially help against his own weaknesses and faults, which might frustrate the hopes centred in him. 137. Training insists on becoming conduct; it encourages cheerfulness of disposition. In either case it remains within limits compatible with the occupations connected with government and instruction. The pupil is never to lose sight of the subject on which he is engaged; it would be bad if a desire to show off, or to amuse himself, should take possession of him and cause him to forget his work. The wise teacher will be glad to make himself personally agreeable to his pupil as long as the conduct of the latter does not call for the opposite treatment. Supervision grows less irksome in consequence. Gentle words forestall, if anything can, all severer measures. 138. The teacher does not look upon the progress resulting from his teaching with feelings of indifference. His sympathy, even solicitude it may be, coÖperates powerfully with the greater or lesser degree of interest awakened in the learner. Training, however, can never be made a substitute where there is no interest or, worse still, where indifference has become positive dislike. 139. In instruction the presence of interest cannot be simply assumed; just as little can good intentions on the pupil’s part always be presupposed in training. One thing, however, must be taken for granted: the pupil must not have come to feel that the discipline is weak and the instruction poor. Any defect in either direction must therefore be traced to its source and remedied. When pupils feel free to do as they please, when they think they have good cause to blame the teacher for their failure to make progress, his manner will be of no avail; and futile attempts only make matters worse. 140. In some cases training becomes blended with government to such an extent that it can scarcely be distinguished from the latter. As an example, we may mention the large educational institutions conducted on a military basis, where the individual pupil is carried along by the general system, rather than made the object of special care. In other cases, training and government remain farther apart than is necessary; an instance of this is when a strict father keeps himself at a distance, and leaves the business of training, within the prescribed rigid limits, to the tutor of his children. At all events, a distinction must be made between the two concepts, training and government, in order that the teacher may know what he is doing, and may notice what is perhaps lacking; we are justified in adding, in order that he may save himself useless effort. For training is not uniformly effectual, regardless of circumstances; the teacher needs to be watchful in this matter in order that the opportune moment for doing what can be done may not escape him. CHAPTER II
The Aim of Training 141. While the aim of instruction was rendered sufficiently determinate, as we saw above(17, 64, 65), by the injunction, be perfect, the aim of training, which supplements educative instruction, comprehends virtue as a whole. Now virtue is an ideal, the approximation toward which is denoted by the term morality. Again, since, generally speaking, a child passes on from mere capacity for culture to culture itself, from the indeterminate to fixedness of knowledge, the approximation to virtue consists likewise in development toward stability. Where conduct in moral affairs vacillates, there is a deficiency; where something morally hateful becomes confirmed, there is a defect. Excluding both, we define the aim of training properly as moral strength of character. “Training” means such will-training as conduces to the formation of good character; “government” means such training as conduces to good order. The first is for a permanent, the second for an immediate, purpose. In government we can appeal both to a positive and a negative means. The positive means is interest in a study and the affairs of the schoolroom; the negative means is inhibition of disturbing impulses. As Professor James, in his “Talks on Psychology,”[13] points out, this inhibition may be of two sorts,—that of forcible suppression, and that of substitution. A teacher who uses negative means of inhibiting mischief or inattention, employs command or punishment. This method, though sometimes seemingly unavoidable, often results in mental strain, if not permanent alienation between teacher and pupil. The method of substitution attempts to secure inhibition of the undesirable state of mind by giving rise to a set of favorable ideas strong enough to displace it. “If, without saying anything about the street disturbances,” which may be distracting the attention of your pupils, “you open a counter attraction by starting some very interesting talk or demonstration yourself, they will altogether forget the distracting incident, and, without any effort, follow you along.” Training, however, has a more difficult task. It must succeed in implanting what may be called regulative principles in the mind. It must furthermore succeed in establishing habits of conduct that will enable the pupil to become self-governing. That is, we must establish in him habits of feeling and action that will enable him to substitute the higher for the lower good, or, at least, instantly to inhibit the temptation to evil. This is a task not for a day or a year, but for the whole school period. 142. In succeeding chapters character and moral conduct will each have to be differentiated more minutely. For our present purpose we need only to remind ourselves that the determinateness of the will, which is called character, depends not only on willing, but also on not willing. The latter is either a deficient or a denying willing, which repels or rejects. Stern methods of governing, which bar access to everything that might lead astray, are likely to produce a deficient will rather than the permanence of formed strength; with the end of school days, the dreaded opportunities arrive after all, and the pupil may quickly undergo a change beyond recognition. The task of training must therefore be thought of as embracing both affirmative willing and rejecting. CHAPTER III
Differentiation of Character 143. Our will activities result from ideas. Different masses of ideas give rise to different will action; hence the difficulty experienced in harmonizing and unifying the manifold acts of will. The various groups of ideas do not simply succeed one another in consciousness; the relation of one to the other may also be that of apperception. Apperceiving attention is not confined to sense-perception(77); it embraces inner perception as well. The process of apperception, however, consists rarely or never in mere perceiving. It involves more: one mass of ideas exerts a determining influence on the other. Now, since each may be the source of will action, it happens that often one act of will accepts or rejects another. Again, conscious of himself preËminently as a being that wills, man gives commands to himself and decides concerning himself; he seeks to acquire self-control. In such efforts he makes himself more and more the object of his own observation. That part of his will activity which his self-observation reveals to be already in existence, we call the objective part of character. To the new will action, on the other hand, which first springs into existence in and with self-examination, we give the name subjective part of character. The subjective side of character can attain its full development only during the years of maturity. Its beginnings, however, reach back into boyhood, and its normal growth during adolescence is noticeably rapid, due allowance being made for variations of kind and degree in different individuals. The assumption of the unconditional primacy of ideas can no longer be seriously entertained. Just as there is an unfolding of ideas in sensation, perception, apperception, and rational insight, so there is an unfolding of our volitional life in impulse, conscious will action, and the control of conduct in accordance with the regulative principles of moral obligation. Knowledge and will doubtless spring from a common root, but they are not primarily so related that volition waits on knowledge. Impulse is antecedent to idea, while in the last analysis and in the highest realm of mind, the actual is subordinate to the ideal, the ought is more powerful than the is. In other words, there is, as Dr.Harris maintains, a sense in which the will is self-determining, even though the extent to which this self-active control obtains is uncertain. As Natorp says,[14] “It is folly to call upon the weak to be strong, to concentrate consciousness upon the categorical imperative, so that the inflexible demands of the ought shall be complied with.” Yet even in the weak there is a bar of consciousness or perhaps conscience before which judgment must be pronounced as to the worthiness or unworthiness of a given line of conduct. It is the function of moral education—and this includes all education—to make the weak strong, to strengthen the good impulses, to clarify the insight, to accustom the mind to dwell on the right set of ideas, to cultivate desirable feelings and interests. In this process of moral development, the world of ideas has perhaps all the validity claimed for it by Herbart. What is here called the “subjective” side of character pertains to that regulation of conduct which arises from its examination before the bar of consciousness as to its agreement or disagreement with the regulative principles of moral obligation. It is that advanced stage of development in character in which the mind is consciously self-directive. Naturally it is later than the “objective” side, where action is more spontaneous, more governed by impulses, more subject to hypnotic suggestion; in short, more subordinated to “ideo-motor” activity and less governed by reflection. 144. In view of the very manifold volitional elements which the objective foundations of character may obviously contain, it will facilitate a survey if we distinguish (1)that which the pupil does or does not endure willingly, (2)that which he does or does not long to have, (3)that which he does or does not like to do. Now one, now the other class predominates, the strongest controlling and restricting the rest. But this restriction is not always an easy matter. Accordingly the objective phase of character attains at first to inner harmony only with difficulty. 145. In consequence of frequent repetitions of similar acts of will, general concepts are gradually formed in the subjective side of character, concepts comprehending both the similar will actions already present under similar circumstances, and the requirements man sets up for himself with a view to determining his willing one way or another. These requirements fall largely within the province of prudence; they pertain to forethought and cautious reserve, or, may be, to action, in order that an end may be gained by the choice of suitable means. The boy wants to be wiser than the child; the youth wiser than either. In this way man seeks to rise above himself. 146. Moral conduct is not always furthered by man’s effort to surpass himself, so that the teacher’s task becomes a twofold one,—a watching and directing not only of the objective but also of the subjective side of character. Temperament, native bent, habit, desire, and passion fall under the former; to the latter belong the frankness or cunning displayed by the pupil, and his habitual method of practical reasoning. 147. As a rule, we may consider it auspicious for character building if the pupil, instead of being swayed by moods and whims, is constant in his willing. Such uniformity as requires no effort we may designate by the expression memory of will. When a pupil possesses this natural advantage, the objective part of his character easily arrives at harmony with itself. He sees that among his many preferences relative to enduring, having, doing, one imposes restrictions upon the other; that it is often necessary to submit and endure in order to have and do that which is desired; that pursuits of which he is fond do not always yield what he longs to have, and so on. When these truths have become sufficiently clear to him, he soon comes to a point where he decides which things he cares about a great deal, and which less. He chooses, and choice largely determines character, primarily character in its objective aspects. In the course of the development of the subjective part of character, there are formed in succession resolves, maxims, and principles, a process involving subsumptions, conclusions, and motives. It will cost many a struggle before these motives can assert themselves. The strength of a character depends on the agreement between its two parts, the objective and the subjective. Where there is want of accord, the character is weak. But both must be morally good; where that is not the case, strength ceases to be desirable. CHAPTER IV
Differentiation of Morality 148. Pupils at once active and kindly are not rare, and so far as the ideas of perfection and good-will are concerned, give rise to no anxiety, at least not at first. With a firm government, moreover, they are easily induced to make the golden rule their own, and they soon become disposed to yield in contention, or rather, become more careful about picking a quarrel. Accordingly, with reference also to equity and justice, they cause little anxiety. In time they gain mental balance, the basis of genuine self-control, and are now on the road to inner freedom. In short, they are in possession of that which, in the light of fundamental ethical ideas, constitutes morality. But these constituents of moral conduct are not found together in every one, nor do they always remain together. Side by side with the praiseworthy traits mentioned, others of an opposite nature frequently manifest themselves; it becomes evident that the latter are not excluded, and thus the former do not determine the character. 149. In order to exclude the morally evil, the praiseworthy traits of the objective side of character need to be reinforced by the good resolutions of the subjective part. These resolutions, to be worth anything morally, must rest on that theoretical judgment whereby the pupil through examples comes to distinguish between better and worse in willing. As long as his judging lacks clearness, energy, and completeness, his resolutions are without a foundation in his mind and heart. They are hardly more than memorized words. When, on the other hand, the theoretical judgment has become interwoven with the totality of interest growing out of experience, social intercourse, and instruction, it creates a warm affection for the good wherever found, an affection which influences not only all of the pupil’s efforts of will, but also the manner in which he assimilates what instruction and life henceforth offer. 150. Finally, in order to fortify moral decisions, we must avail ourselves of the assistance derived from the logical cultivation of maxims, from the systematic unification of the same, and from their constant application in life. Here the organic connection between character growth and the formation of habits of reflection becomes apparent; training is, therefore, obviously unable to accomplish its work except in conjunction with instruction. As soon as a pupil gets a clear notion that a presented ideal of conduct promotes the true realization of his own being, he is in a position to acquire an interest in reaching that ideal. An end, hitherto remote, comes nearer, so that it begins to exercise influence upon the conduct that leads to it. Convention, appeal, or even compulsion from without, are now reinforced by the good resolutions arising from the pupil’s own subjective states. Here we see the interaction of intellectual and emotional capacities. The intellect perceives relations, thus bringing into consciousness a new ideal; this distant end is mediated inasmuch as desire or feeling impels the pupil to enter upon a course of conduct whose stages lead to the ideal goal.[15]
CHAPTER V
Helps in Training 151. The function of training does not consist, it is true, in always restraining and meddling; still less in ingrafting the practices of others to take the place of the pupil’s self-activity. Nevertheless, refusal and permission are so much a part of training that the pupil becomes far more dependent through training than mere government could make him. In government a few rules may be enforced very strictly, while in other respects the boy is left to himself; in training a similar relaxation of vigilance is scarcely ever permissible. Only the strongest grounds for confidence in a pupil would justify such a course. The watchful teacher, even without aiming to do so, always shows some degree of approbation or dissatisfaction. In many cases this is all that is necessary; at times, with sensitive pupils, even this is too much. Unaccustomed censure hurts them more than was intended, while no evidence, however slight, of approval, escapes their notice. The teacher should be considerate in his treatment of such sensibility. 152. With regard to restraint of freedom, keenness of sensibility is more common. In this connection another point also calls for consideration. Freedom is of the utmost direct importance to formation of character, provided it issues in well-weighed and successful action. For from success springs the confidence of will whereby desire ripens into decision. Where rational action may be looked for, freedom of action must be granted; where the opposite is true, the early appearance of a vivid consciousness of self-activity is fraught with danger. Frequent censure and curtailment of freedom generally blunt sensibility, rather more, however, sensibility to words than to restrictions. Accordingly, where repetition of censure is necessary, the language may and should vary. On the other hand, the teacher’s practice with respect to permission and prohibition must, where possible, be felt to be permanent, even if it were only to confine the granting of the same permission to stated times, in accordance with an adopted habit. Lack of uniformity, except for obvious reasons, impresses pupils as arbitrariness and caprice; fixed limits are endured more easily. 153. The sensibilities are irritated least by mere directions, by daily reminding, by calls at the appointed hour, without words of reproach. There are numerous details of daily life which must be placed under the rule of order, but it would be unwise to make more of them than they deserve. Sharp reprimands ought not to be wasted on petty acts of negligence; they are needed for important things. Rules must be obeyed; but a light punishment, one that does not wound the feelings, is more suitable here than harsh words could be. 154. Closely related to the foregoing is the cultivation of habits that imply endurance, or the bearing of deprivation without murmur, or even an inuring to positive hardships. In efforts tending in this direction it is not sufficient merely to refrain from hurting the pupil’s feelings; youthful good humor and love of fun must be allowed free expression besides. 155. Mischievous consequences follow if children become accustomed to frequent, unnecessary gratification of desires, or to a round of artificial pleasures which include neither work nor exercise. To mention only one such consequence, the attendant blunting of the sensibilities renders ineffectual numerous minor aids of training which may be employed to good advantage with unspoiled children. It takes little to give children a great variety of pleasures when great moderation is a matter of daily practice, and for this very reason we need to husband, as it were, our resources for giving enjoyment, in order that much may be accomplished with little. Harmless games, particularly, should not be spoiled for children by making them feel that they must cultivate the staid behavior of adults. Their own ambition fills them only too early with the desire to appear no longer as children. 156. The good teacher’s watchfulness will extend even to petty details, which may indeed prove momentous enough in his little world. These are not so important, however, as the mutual relations of the coÖperating factors:— - (1) Relation between Action and Rest. The powers of the child must be given something to do, but exercise is to further their growth and hence must not be carried to the point of exhaustion. Now and then a boy must convince himself by experience that great things may be achieved by strenuous effort, but severe tests of this kind must never be permitted to become the rule.
- (2) Relation between that which puts down and that which lifts up. The means of training that humble and those that encourage should balance as nearly as possible. That which rises of its own accord requires no raising up; but when along the whole course of training criticism perceptibly exceeds encouragement, it loses its effectiveness and often embitters pupils more than it benefits them.
- (3) Relation between Restraint and Freedom. The child’s surroundings and companionship should afford protection against temptation, but his environment must be sufficiently ample and rich to prevent much longing for that which is outside.
157. The outcome is uncertain in the case of those aids to training whose effect on the sensibilities of the pupils cannot be foreseen. Some of them are, nevertheless, well worth trying, final judgment being suspended until after the result has been observed. Under this head belong especially the strictly pedagogical punishments and rewards which are patterned after the natural consequences of doing or not doing. The boy who comes late loses the anticipated enjoyment; if he destroys his things, he must do without them; over-indulgence is followed by bitter medicine; tattling by removal from the circle in which matters requiring discretion are discussed, etc. Such punishments do not subserve moral improvement, but they warn and teach a lesson. To what extent they will do so we are often unable to tell beforehand; a profitable reminiscence may be retained at all events. The discipline of consequences has been much emphasized by Herbert Spencer in his “Education.” Its limited usefulness in moral training is pointed out in the foregoing section. Acting like a mechanical law, it tends to have the same effect upon the feelings that a physical law has. How could one’s moral sensibilities be impressed by the law of gravitation? Nature makes us prudent, but scarcely good. 158. Sometimes the question is how to set pupils on the right track again. They have grown listless, for instance, or pursue their tasks with reluctance. Here we may profitably resort to a sudden interruption by a change of employment. It happens occasionally that pupils, physically strong, are guilty of very bad behavior that persists in spite of admonitions and punishments, or reappears in another form, but which is, after all, at bottom, only the result of a state of ill humor that can easily be corrected. An unexpected, trifling present, an unusual act of attention, will very likely break down the pupil’s reserve, and when the cause of the trouble has once been ascertained, it will be possible to discover a remedy. 159. In the case of those that are weak physically, furtherance of health combined with persevering patience is the first and chief duty. But kindness should not degenerate into weak indulgence; on the other hand, close supervision must take the place of every form of harsh treatment. CHAPTER VI
General Method of Training 160. The distinctions relative to character and morality(143–150) furnish the thread of reflection on this subject. Concisely stated, the function of training is to support, to determine, and to regulate; to keep the pupil, on the whole, in a tranquil and serene frame of mind; to arouse him occasionally by approval and reproof; to remind at the proper moment, and to correct faults. A more definite significance will be imparted to this brief summary by a comparative study and application of the ideas analyzed in the preceding chapters. While we may accept the statement that the function of training is to support, to determine, and to regulate, we must not forget to ask: To what end shall it do these things? The answer is, that though the means of moral training are always psychological, the ends are always social. Support must hold the pupil up to social standards, the directive power of the teacher must be exercised for social ends, while all regulation of the pupil’s activities must point to the same result. There is scarcely a virtue to be named that does not find its ultimate meaning in its application to conduct as affecting others. This is true even in primitive society. In modern urban society it is not only true, but vastly important. The discussion in Chapter VI is psychological throughout. It must be the purpose of the annotation to point out the social implications. 161. First, what is meant by the supporting activity of training becomes clearer if we recall the remarks made concerning memory of the will(147) as opposed to the thoughtlessness usually ascribed to youth. The thoughtless boy does not remember past acts of will. He stands in need of being supported by training. This, further analysis shows, is done in two ways: by holding him back from the wrong course, and by holding him up to the right course. Training presupposes an efficient government and the obedience consequent to it. By implication, the pupil would not dare to disobey a command if given. But commands ought to be employed sparingly, and only when inevitable. Imposed too frequently, they would preclude self-development; if given to adolescents for any but obvious and urgent reasons, obedience would not long continue. In short, government acts at intervals. But the pupil cannot be permitted to live in a state of lawless liberty in the meantime. He must remain sensible, be it ever so little, of certain limits which he is not allowed to overstep. This result is the aim of the supporting function of training. But the pupil, even though he be generally obedient, does not obey every one, nor under all circumstances, nor always fully, promptly, and without opposition; and when he once fails to comply with gentle words, he will be still less ready to yield to a severe manner toward himself. Of course, the teacher must know on what support he may depend; the father needs to have made up his mind how far he would be willing to go with coercive measures if necessary; the private tutor, to what extent he may count on the backing of parents; the teacher in a public institution, how far his course of action would be upheld by his superiors. But all this involves an appeal from training to government, a step to be avoided as much as possible. Most of the unpleasant cases of intractability, where recourse to government becomes unavoidable, are the gradual result of continued weak indulgence. Of such cases no account is taken here, and justly so, since, apart from all else, even defiant obstinacy, provided restraint has not been cast off utterly, soon breaks down and gives way to remorse when it is met by serious and deliberate firmness. The most obvious ways that the school has of securing a good “memory of will” are those by which it enforces the well-known school virtues,—regularity, punctuality, silence, and industry. It is to the acquisition of these habits that the government, or discipline, of the school is chiefly directed. Dr.Wm.T. Harris has pointed out in detail the significance of this acquisition in the development of character.[16] It is interesting to note how the teacher’s personal authority is reinforced by social pressure both within and without the school. The Superintendent of a city of thirteen thousand inhabitants reports that but 1462 cases of tardiness occurred during a whole school year. The pupils of each room are given a brief holiday, from time to time, provided nobody in that room is tardy during the stated period. This brings an immense social pressure within the school to bear in securing prompt attendance. Happening to visit the Superintendent’s office in a city of some sixty thousand people, the writer observed the following scene: A young girl of perhaps fourteen years of age, accompanied by her father, who was a foreigner, unable to speak English fluently, entered the office. The girl began at once to make excuses for her brother who was a somewhat confirmed truant, and to beg that he might be excused and reinstated. To objections stated by the Superintendent, the father with much emotion replied, “Oh, Mr.Superintendent, won’t you give my boy another trial?” The boy had been ‘tried again’ so many times that father and daughter were referred to the judge, an officer having jurisdiction over such cases. The penalty for persistent truancy was attendance at a state reformatory school. This is a case in which the authority of the teacher in securing regularity of attendance was reinforced by the community outside the school. The constant pressure of school and community tend to establish habits of will memory that serve as an excellent foundation for later moral training. 162. Before training can have within itself the power to make up deficiencies in obedience, there must be awakened in the pupil a vivid feeling that the approval of his teacher is a valuable possession, which he would be loath to lose. This the teacher will bring about in proportion to the effective and welcome share he has in the life of his pupil. He must give before he can receive. Furthermore, if in his opinion the pupil needs to be turned in a different direction, he should not underestimate the difficulty of the task before him; he must proceed slowly. The initial steps in character training are admirably described by Niemeyer in the following words: “The teacher’s first duty is to study the positively good elements in the native character of the being to be educated. To preserve these, to strengthen them, to transform them into virtue, and to fortify them against every danger, should be his incessant endeavor. They should constitute the keynote, as it were, of his whole method of education. He should look for the good even in the spoilt and vicious pupil, and should try to bring it to light, no matter how many weeds may have sprung up alongside of it. For all subsequent moral education must start from this point.” Although this passage belongs in strictness to the discussion on moral education, it is plainly entitled to a place here also. An appeal to the pupil’s better nature promotes ready compliance on his part, especially when it is accompanied by those little courtesies that go with cultivated social intercourse. It is most effective with those who possess at the same time the strongest memory of will, which it will not be difficult for the supporting activity of training to strengthen still further. 163. On the other hand, the task of training grows arduous in proportion as the pupil fails to bear in mind his acts of will. But even here there is a difference between capricious unruliness and downright flightiness and levity. Cases may arise where the impetuosity of the pupil challenges the teacher to a kind of combat. Rather than accept such a challenge, he will usually find it sufficient at first to reprove calmly, to look on quietly, to wait until fatigue sets in. The embarrassing situations into which such a pupil gets himself will furnish occasions for making him feel ashamed, and now it remains to be seen whether or not he can be made to adopt a more equable behavior. Here and there training may in this way even make good the lack of government; scarcely, however, for large numbers, after unruliness has once begotten vicious habits. Combats of any kind between teacher and pupil are to be deplored. A good teacher is always strong enough in his mental superiority, his authority, and his influence as an executive to avoid it. Such a contest shows that the pupil has become self-conscious in a bad sense. He sets his personality over against that of the teacher. If the teacher is so weak as to meet him on his own ground, the pupil has a good chance for a bad victory—bad for himself, the teacher, and the school. It should be a constant aim of the teacher to supplant introspection, whether pertaining to feelings or to wilfulness, with motor activity. The pupil should always be doing something that will promote not only his own best good, but that of the school also. Authority should rarely so assert itself as to incite or to permit a personal contest with the pupil. It should be a strong but almost unseen presupposition of all school affairs. Here as elsewhere idleness is the mother of mischief. Lively action is sure to banish morbid introspection. 164. Thoughtlessness in the narrower sense, which manifests itself in forgetfulness, in negligence, in want of steadiness, and in so-called youthful escapades, is a defect in native capacity, and does not admit of a radical cure, imperceptible as it may become with age, by reason of repeated warnings and diminishing susceptibility to external impressions. All the more imperative is it in such cases to support by training, in order that the evil consequences of this character weakness may be prevented, or at least reduced to a minimum. For as soon as a thoughtlessly impulsive boy comes to take pleasure in his conduct, he will set himself against order and industry, and will strive to discover the means which promise to secure for him a life without restrictions. This danger must be forestalled by training. At the beginning, and before an evil will has had time to develop, training must take the place of will. It must bring home to the pupil that of which he had lost sight. To his fluctuating and roving impulses it must lend its own external firmness and uniformity, which cannot be created at once, if at all, within the pupil. Here is the proper place for the injunction, not to argue with children. “I cannot be too emphatic and outspoken in my warning against too much arguing,” says Caroline Rudolphi; and Schwarz, who quotes this passage, adds, “Once is too often.” Niemeyer, after speaking of the excesses of abnormal liveliness and characterizing thoughtlessness, which, he says, “causes inattention, a disregard for consequences, and hasty actions,” continues thus: “All these are not faults of the heart; still they are faults that need to be amended, and about the only sure educational method for amending them is to cultivate right habits. Positive punishments wisely chosen may indeed be employed as auxiliary means, but only when there are evidences of a lack of good intention, or when these faults have become ominously prominent.” He further advises teachers to insist on this, that pupils rectify on the spot what can be rectified, since vague recollections prove barren of good results. This does not, of course, dispose of the whole matter, but we are still discussing training as a supporting agency, and from this point of view it is true that argument should not be substituted for the cultivation of habits. 165. To restrain the lively but thoughtless boy is more difficult than to keep him properly active, for the latter is comparatively easy, in some cases at least, if instruction excites his interest. The reverse holds true for the sluggish boy because an attack has to be made on his indolence. Here the stimulation to physical exertion through association with wide-awake playmates is the first thing to be secured; and where hard lessons cannot as yet be managed successfully, lighter occupations will have to suffice. Where sluggishness is traceable to bodily feebleness, improvement may be hoped for from sanitary measures and increasing years. The following rule is to be observed everywhere: No exercise must exceed the pupil’s strength, but that which has once been begun must be completed. At the least, pupils must not be allowed to drop their work as they choose; they must look upon it as a whole, however small. 166. That the supporting procedure of training rests on the teacher’s own bearing—on the uniformity of his demeanor—need hardly be said; but this evenness must also stand out clearly before the eyes of the pupils. The teacher ought to guard particularly against causing the complaint that no one knows how to please him, that nothing one may do is done to his satisfaction. When matters have come to this pass, the first thing pupils do is to watch his moods as they might the weather, and to interchange observations. His ugly mood is dreaded; his pleasant mood is taken advantage of for importunate requests. The pupils try to move the firm centre which is to support them, and the faintest signs of success awaken and foster extravagant hopes. Gradually the after-effects of earlier government die out, and a renewal of severe measures draws with it a train of new evils. Goldsmith in his “Deserted Village” has well portrayed the “moody” teacher:— “A man severe he was, and stern to view; I knew him well, and every truant knew: Well had the boding tremblers learned to trace The day’s disasters in his morning face; Full well they laughed, with counterfeited glee, At all his jokes, for many a joke had he; Full well the busy whisper, circling round, Conveyed the dismal tidings when he frowned.” 167. Second. Training is to exert a determining influence; it is to induce the pupil to choose(147). Under this head falls the discrimination spoken of above between varieties of volitional impulse—the will to bear, to have, and to do; hence also experiential knowledge of the natural consequences of doing or of failure to do(157), for unless these are taken into consideration, the manifold of will cannot be reduced to harmony. Now the first point to be noticed in connection with this aspect of training is that the teacher does not choose for the pupil. The pupil himself must choose, for it is his own character that is to be determined. He must himself experience a part, although only the smallest part, of that which is desirable or harmful. That the flame burns that a pin pricks, that a fall or knock hurts, this lesson even the little child must learn; and similar experiences must be gained later, provided they do not carry the pupil to the verge of serious danger. Everything essential has been accomplished if, in consequence of actual experiences confirming the teacher’s words of warning, the pupil believes other warnings without waiting for confirmation. Not second in importance to the act of choosing is the content of the choice. If conduct must have a social outcome, all the activities of the school will focus at this point. In order to have rational choice there must be first of all social intelligence. This it is the function of instruction to develop. According to a well-known doctrine of Herbart, it is the chief duty of instruction to make a progressive revelation to the pupil of the ethical world, in order that his puny will may gradually be reinforced by race experience. The instruments for this revelation are the studies on the one hand, and the conduct of the school according to social principles on the other. In the second place, that the ethical choice may truly express the pupil’s inward state, rather than his outward constraint, it must grow out of his insight as suffused by his social responsiveness to ethical ideas. In other words, his disposition should confirm his intellectual perception of the right line of conduct. This raises the whole matter of interest as related to will.[17] Here again natural, spontaneous, almost unconscious attitude is vastly superior to morbid introspection, no matter how ‘good’ the pupil’s disposition may prove to be. A boy should not have to ‘reflect’ as to whether he will rob a bird’s nest or not. 168. Pleasure and pain arise so largely out of social relations that the pupil must grow up amidst a social environment in order to become somewhat acquainted with his natural place among men. This requirement gives rise accordingly to solicitous precautions against a bad example and rudeness. On the other hand, a boy’s companions should not be chosen with such anxious care as if the intention were to spare him the feeling of pressure which in all human society is generated by the efforts and counter-efforts of men. Too great complaisance on the part of playmates causes delusions as to the actual conditions of life. Again, society and seclusion must alternate. The social current is not to carry everything else along with it, and to become more powerful than education. Even the boy, and much more the youth, must learn to be alone, and to fill up his time profitably. Unbroken association of the child with his mates tends to bring him too exclusively under the influence of imitation and of acting impulsively upon those forms of unreasoning suggestion which sway the crowd, the gang, and the mob. To quote Professor Baldwin:[18] “The characteristics of the social suggestions upon which the crowd act show them to be strictly suggestions. They are not truths, nor arguments, nor insights, nor inventions.... The suggestible mind has very well known marks. Balzac hit off one of them in ‘EugÉnie Grandet’ in the question, ‘Can it be that collectively man has no memory?’ We might go through the list of mental functions asking the same question of them one by one. Has man collectively no thought, no sense of values, no deliberation, no self-control, no responsibility, no conscience, no will, no motive, no purpose? And the answer to each question would be the same, No, he has none. The suggestible consciousness is the consciousness that has no past, no future, no height, no depth, no development, no reference to anything; it is only in and out. It takes in and it acts out—that is all there is to it.” It is here that we find the source of the youthful escapade so common to street, school, and college, as well as of the adult deeds of diabolism that have so often shocked the moral sense of the American people. The child needs frequent opportunities to be alone, when he can “come to himself” as a responsible person. Even where the association with his mates is perfectly innocent, there is a growing responsiveness to mere suggestion. This tendency is corrected by attention to individual tasks and responsibilities. 169. By living alternately with his equals in age and with adults, the pupil grows familiar with diverse standards of honor. To unite these, and to subordinate one to the other in a proper manner, will prove an easy or a difficult part of training, according to the smaller or greater gap between the value set on brute force on the one hand, and the demand for good-breeding, as well as regard for talent and knowledge, on the other. The main thing is not to foster ambition artificially, though care must be taken at the same time to refrain from crushing out a natural and true self-esteem. Usually, however, those interested in the progress of a pupil stand in need themselves of guarding against the self-deception due to extravagant hopes. By giving themselves up to these, they involuntarily turn flatterers, and push the boy, and the young man still more, beyond the position he is able to maintain. Bitter experiences follow. The tendency to an abnormal overestimation of the value of physical excellence is seen in the attitude of the modern college toward athletics. Doubtless the public as a whole still underestimates the importance of fine physical development. Our modern life with its nerve-racking occupation will shatter the efficiency of large portions of the race, unless the physical organism is so developed as to withstand the strain. This, if true of men, is still more true of women, who are now undertaking many new lines of exhausting labor, not the easiest of which is teaching. But the college student is prone to adore muscle. The successful athlete is, for a brief period, praised, petted, and advertised far more than is the ablest student or professor in the institution. Scarcely do the noblest achievements of science or philanthropy receive so much notice as a successful full-back on a foot-ball team. The athlete goes up indeed like a rocket, startling the ear and dazzling the eye for a moment—then oblivion, or deserved obscurity. The teacher must endeavor to displace this false estimate of values by one more true if less exciting.
170. The regard for the value of things in their relation to the ordinary necessities of life develops somewhat more slowly than the natural sense of honor. This is true especially of money, which at first boys rarely know how to use. Instead of saying, either this or that, which a fixed sum will buy, the boy falls a victim to the deception that lurks in saying, this and that. In this respect also the pupil needs to gain experience on a small scale; he must, moreover, come to know the value of objects last, not merely in terms of money, but also in terms of the inconvenience of doing without them. Warnings against petty closeness are seldom necessary; not infrequently, however, a boy follows common talk, and it may happen that he practises parsimony by imitation, and squanders in obedience to his own impulses. Where faults of this sort are not conquered by the pupil’s own sense of honor, they fall within the province of moral education. A modern device for teaching children the value of money, and especially the usefulness of saving it, is the institution of school savings banks. Here the pupil develops his instincts for accumulation. At the same time he learns to inhibit his often inordinate fondness for spending. If indulgence to self, accompanied by penuriousness toward others, is permitted to grow into a habit in childhood and youth, it becomes a source of much unhappiness in later family life. Wife and children are often victims of this kind of selfishness. Now that women are in the main the teachers of children, they should have the interest of their sex sufficiently at heart to inculcate suitable ideals and habits respecting the gathering and spending of money. No form of selfishness is so obnoxious as self-indulgence at the expense of those who have a natural right to an equitable share of what is produced. The ‘meanness’ of such conduct if constantly unveiled will effect its own cure. 171. When experience has taught the pupil to what extent he must endure or need not endure the pressure of human society, and what honors, objects, enjoyments, he can have or must do without, the question arises: How does he connect all this with the pursuits which attract or repel him? The thoughtful pupil soon realizes, without being told, that one thing often makes another possible, that one thing involves or conditions another. But upon the thoughtless boy this truth does not impress itself with sufficient force; consequently, the teacher has to help him to deepen that impression, because a man without a settled mind regarding these matters remains devoid of character. Yet a lack of fixedness is often desirable rather than otherwise—a statement applying to those pupils whose intellectual interests it is the business of instruction to awaken, or whose moral and religious culture are as yet in a backward state. The objective part of character(142) should not become fixed too soon; and very often a large part of the value of training consists in retarding this process. Such an end is subserved by the restraint under which the pupil is kept by the subordinate position assigned to him in conformity with his age, and particularly by the refusal of freedom to act without permission, and according to his own inclination(152). The theoretical judgment of will relations(149) is frequently late in maturing, or remains weak in comparison with the impression produced by the experiences mentioned. In that case moral ardor is also wanting, and if the pupil were given liberty to do as he chose, his character would be formed, to be sure, but in the wrong way. Rather would it be better to encourage juvenile amusements, and even boyish games, beyond the usual age limit. 172. Third. Regulative training begins its work with the first appearance of the subjective part of character(143). For an earlier period the rule not to argue with children holds good(164); that is, it holds good as long as we can get along with it. That stage, however, is passed when the pupil begins to reason for himself; in other words, when his thinking has acquired such consecutiveness that his thoughts no longer come and go as momentary fancies, but attain to permanency and coherence. Reasoning processes of this sort ought not to be left to themselves, nor can they be repressed by dictatorial decrees. The educator must now enter into his pupil’s trains of reflection, must argue with him and prevent further development in the wrong direction. The tendency to set up rules reveals itself early; for example, in the games of children. Commands as to what to do are given every moment, only these imperatives are imperfectly obeyed and often changed. Neither is there lack of original, childish resolutions; but they can mean little so long as they do not remain the same. It is very different when they acquire stability, when means and ends combine into plans, when execution is attempted under difficulties, and finally when these resolves are thought in the forms of general concepts, thereby laying claim to validity in possible future instances, and becoming thus transformed into maxims. 173. The wise forethought essential to regulative training requires in the first place that the teacher shall rather tolerate an inconvenient discussion than check a frank expression of opinion, provided the objections of the pupil are indubitably sincere, and his vanity, we will say, is not flattered too much by the unexpected consideration accorded to his remarks. The same foresight is to be exercised in cases where it proves impossible to convince the pupil at once. Here the final judgment, instead of being insisted upon, should rather be postponed; it will always be easy to point out to the pupil his lack of adequate knowledge and to refer him to future studies. The positiveness that usually characterizes the assertions of boys and young men, generally has its roots in their great ignorance. They have not the least inkling of how many opinions have been held and disputed. Instruction will gradually cure them of their excessive self-confidence. Only in a pure despotism would the enforcement of unquestioning obedience to authority be admissible. No country aspiring to political liberty could tolerate such a system. Even if all political considerations were dismissed, the development of subjective character alone would demand a condemnation of such a method. But in a country like ours, where men are both personally and politically self-governing, education to leadership is not second to education to obedience. There comes a time, therefore, when argument is in place, provided its purpose is to clarify the pupil’s insight into prudence or duty. It will not be too much to insist upon obedience without argument with all pupils so far as the ordinary school virtues—regularity, punctuality, silence, and industry—are concerned. Old and young can see their necessity. When it comes to the more intricate phases of conduct, the grounds for authority, if it is still exercised, may be revealed through dialogue. It is the constant effort of training to establish regulative principles in the minds of the older pupils, so that within the range of their capacity they may become self-governing. In other words, the moral plateaus of Kant are to be attained, not at a bound, but by a gradual progress in moral autonomy. Herein we see the superiority of Herbart’s conception of moral training. What Kant gave up as an unsolvable problem, can be seen to be only a natural process. Says Kant, “How a law can of itself directly determine the will is for human reason an insoluble problem, for it is identical with the problem how a free will is possible.”[19] The difficulty with Kant’s theory was that he admitted no psychological means for attaining the free directive power of the mind. He could only say to the child: “You are free; be free. You are morally autonomous; exercise your power; be a free, self-governing citizen.” Kant regarded natural impulses, emotions, desires, pleasures, interests, as impure, hence to be rejected. They are indeed to be rejected as the final ends of character, but what Kant did not recognize is that they are the psychological means for attaining character. Primarily these feelings, far from being radically bad, as he thought, are radically good, since they help to furnish the necessary conditions of survival, both for the individual and for the race. Hunger, fear, courage, combativeness, prudence, sexual instinct, inquisitiveness, love of adornment, frugality, and a hundred other elemental passions have preserved the race from destruction in the past. A new set of social and intellectual impulses will in the future provide the instruments of survival, now that the field of evolution is transported from the jungle to the city. It is through intellectual insights that new ideals are formulated; it is through these elemental feelings that the active powers of the mind are stirred up to motor efficiency for their realization. From being biological means for physical survival, the feelings of man have now become psychological means for civic survival. Psychologically, therefore, men are not born free; they become free. To become free they must have opportunity to exercise freedom; at first within definite but widening limits while they are under the tuition of the school; later within the limits set by civil society; at last absolutely, when they have recognized that what is rational law in society is the law of their own being. 174. But the matter of greatest importance from the point of view of training is consistency or inconsistency of action. One who lightly sets up maxims must be made to feel the difficulty of living up to them. In this way a mirror is held up to the pupils, partly in order to put to rout untenable maxims, and partly to reinforce valid principles. Among the untenable maxims we include also those which, although in accord with prudence, would offend against morality. If the pupil does not see already that they cannot be maintained, the application, by exhibiting their objectionable consequences, must bring to light their true character. 175. Regulative training often calls for rousing words from the teacher. He has to remind the pupil of happenings in the past and predict future consequences in case his faults should continue; he has to induce him to look within himself for the purpose of tracing the causal connection of his actions to its source. If, however, this was done earlier, with a view to moral education, no long speeches are now needed. Moreover, the teacher’s remarks become calmer and briefer the more effective they have been, the more he is justified in expecting independent judgment on the part of the pupil, and finally the more fully the latter has entered upon that period during which he looks about him to observe the words and actions of strangers. For, at the time when he has begun to compare the new with the old, his receptivity for the old is very weak, and soon vanishes completely; unless, indeed, the old had been deeply impressed beforehand. The purpose of the “rousing word” is to stimulate the mind to exercise its dynamic force to moral ends. The pupil must not be permitted to assume the attitude of negation, or to be a mere passive observer, or an innocent, devoid alike of power and significance, but he must be roused into a responsible character, an efficient participant in life’s activities. Successful appeal may be made to insights already acquired, but theoretically held; to dispositions implanted, but not yet actively exercised; to the application of old habits to new uses. Even where appeal must be made against objectionable conduct, it is better to apply the “inhibition of substitution” to that of “negation.”[20] While protesting against the evil, point the way to the right road. 176. Fourth. The pupil is to be kept in a quiet frame of mind; his intellect in a state suitable for clear apprehension. To outbursts of passion this applies absolutely; not so generally to emotions. Above all, tranquillity is the condition for the formation of theoretical judgments and hence also, although not exclusively so, for laying the foundation of morality. Every desire may develop into passion, if the soul is so often and so long in a desiring state that thoughts become focussed in the object longed for, whereby plans shape themselves, hopes arise, and ill-will toward others strikes root. Accordingly, watchful attention must be given to all persistent and recurrent desires. 177. The most usual desires are those which arise from the physical need of food and of bodily activity. Now the first step to take is, while guarding against excess, to satisfy these natural impulses in order to subdue the unruliness springing from unsatisfied cravings. We ought not to permit hunger to tempt a boy to steal, nor encourage truancy by making him sit still too long. This warning is not superfluous. Such things happen even in families where less irrational practices might be expected. Over-indulgence, to be sure, is of far more frequent occurrence. When the natural wants have lost their sting, a positive and irrevocable refusal must be opposed to further desires. With it should be combined some occupation capable of diverting the attention. If the object which continues to excite desire can be removed, all the better. In one’s own home this is more often practicable, and more necessary as well, than in that of strangers. If the object cannot be removed, gratification may be put off until some future time. The foregoing statement may be illustrated by reference to the eating of fruit from the tree. An unconditional prohibition carries with it a dangerous temptation to disobedience, while unconditional permission would be equally inadmissible on account of the plucking of green fruit, let alone the possible injury to the orchards of others. Analogy will suggest many similar applications of the rule given. 178. Again, children must be watched at their games. The more free play of the imagination we discover, and the more change there is, the less cause for concern. But when the same game is frequently repeated according to the same fixed rules, when a species of study is devoted to it in order to attain special proficiency, passions may be generated, such, for instance, as an excessive fondness for playing at cards, even where no stakes are involved. Gambling must be forbidden entirely, and in case compliance with this prohibition is doubtful, obedience must be secured by watchful supervision. To what end shall a teacher watch the games of children? To prevent the bullying of the weak by the strong, to see that unfairness does not creep in, to ward off vulgarity and profanity—these and similar purposes will be in the mind of the teacher. One of the chief functions of play, however, is to cultivate social efficiency. This has two aspects, willingness to coÖperate with a group and ability to lead a group. It is necessary that there should be alternation of leadership and coÖperation. If one child is allowed to lead all the time, he becomes overbearing; if another is always compelled to follow, he becomes subservient. Each has a one-sided development. Without discouraging unduly natural capacity for leadership, it is well for the teacher quietly to see to it that each child has his chance, both to lead and to follow. Just as the kindergarten utilizes play to simulate the occupations of men, arousing sympathy with them and respect for them, so the school may by proper modification make the numerous group games, in which children delight, a potent means for securing coÖperative habits and a general aptitude for social activities. Not a little attention is now paid to the various forms of children’s play. This is especially true of such publications as the Pedagogical Seminary, published at Clark University, Worcester, Massachusetts. 179. An excellent means to avert the dangers connected with passionate tendencies is to engage in the acquisition of one of the fine arts, say music or drawing, even though there should be no more than a modicum of talent. The student must be given to understand, however, that he is not to take up the study of several musical instruments at once, nor give himself up to distracting attempts in sundry branches of pictorial representation. On the contrary, he is to strive consistently for proficiency in one definite direction. In the total absence of aptitude we may avail ourselves of preferences of one kind or other, such as fondness for collecting plants or shells, for work in papier-machÉ, for joinery, for gardening even, etc. Poetical talent, highly desirable in itself, nevertheless demands a solid counterweight in the shape of serious scholarly effort; for the young poet sets up claims that are likely to prove dangerous if he becomes absorbed in them. The importance of this suggestion can hardly be overestimated. It is a case of the permanent inhibition of a host of possible evil tendencies by substitution. The youth who can turn with pleasure to his violin at every spare moment, never seriously misses the companionship of his mates. He has, moreover, a never failing source of enjoyment when there is nothing to interfere with his happiness, and an equally inexhaustible source of consolation when the waves of life are rough. 180. Projects springing from passionate impulses, and betraying their existence by their interference with order, diligence, and the distribution of time, must be resolutely thwarted. This step is rendered all the more urgent when several share in the same plan, above all when ostentation, party spirit, and rivalry enter as impelling factors. Such things must not be allowed to gain ground; they very quickly vitiate the soil which education has been at such pains to prepare for tillage. 181. The passions being kept at a distance, the successful grounding of the pupil in morality depends in general on the manner in which instruction coÖperates with his occupations. The branch of instruction primarily most important in this respect is religious instruction. The most immediate source, however, of the development of disposition is found in the pupil’s social environment, and it becomes the business of training to cultivate a right spirit or disposition. Let us, therefore, take up the practical ideas one by one. England and Germany are a unit in insisting upon the necessity of religious instruction in the schools. Half the elementary schools of the former country are in charge of the Church of England, five per cent are controlled by Roman Catholics, three per cent by Wesleyans, and some forty-two per cent by public boards of education. All of these schools are subsidized by the state, yet all, with few exceptions, give religious instruction. In Germany there are but two strong religious organizations—the Roman Catholic Church, mostly at the south, and the Lutheran, mostly at the north. The state establishes all schools, furnishing most of the funds for sustaining them and controlling their administration in large measure; yet the morning hour of the day is devoted to instruction in religion. Not so in the United States. Here, religious teaching is, to all appearances, permanently excluded from the public schools. In this condition of affairs there is but one resource: we must the more diligently insist upon those things that reflect the content of religion. That is, we must teach children to live in close coÖperative union with their fellows. The subjective side of this training is portrayed in the sections that follow, where the transformation of ethical insights into ethical habits is discussed. 182. To speak of strife first, which cannot easily be wholly prevented among children, and which is present to their minds, at least as a possibility, self-help against unexpected bodily assaults cannot be forbidden. A determined self-defence is rather to be recommended, but self-defence paired with a merciful treatment of one’s assailant. On the other hand, it is necessary to prohibit absolutely any arbitrary appropriation of objects, even though these objects should consist of ownerless or discarded trifles. No one must imagine that his mere pleasure is a law unto others. On the contrary, children ought to get used to limitations on ownership. That which has been given them for a certain purpose is to be used for that purpose alone, and must be taken care of with that purpose in view. Promises among children should not lightly be declared void, however foolish and impossible of fulfilment. The boy who, by a hasty promise, puts himself in an embarrassing position must be made conscious of the fact. Let his perplexity serve as a warning for the future. But over-hasty promises are to be accepted as little as they are to be made; and here is where we have to begin in untying the knots in which children occasionally entangle themselves. It is not undesirable that pupils by their own acts furnish themselves with a few keenly-felt instances of complicated questions of rights. But pleasure in wrangling must be discountenanced; the pupils should learn to prevent and to avoid contention. They may gain enough familiarity with it to realize that it gives displeasure. 183. At this point two paths open to our reflection. In the first place, contention pleases children because it implies strength; in seeking it they are, as a rule, merely giving vent to excess of animal spirits. The outlet in this direction we must block, but we must furnish another elsewhere. Gymnastic exercises, too, are exhibitions of strength; emulation, which is not contention, is a welcome feature of sport and play. Mental activity likewise affords suitable opportunities for excelling; it also provides proper occasions for making comparisons; but relative excellence, children must understand distinctly, is not to be advanced by them as a basis for claims. Where the question is one of degree of attainment,—therefore one of perfice te,—the pupil is supplied with a practically useful standard by his own progress and retrogression. To hold up one pupil as a model for another to follow awakens envy; it will be much better, instead, to make allowances where a weak pupil cannot do more than he is actually doing. In all the ages of the past men have been the teachers of boys. Being men, they have naturally taken the man’s attitude toward youthful conduct. When one boy is gratuitously assaulted by another, they have upheld a sturdy self-defence as belonging to self-respect. In their eyes an unsuccessful defence is better than a cowardly retreat. With the advent of women as the teachers of boys it is natural that the doctrine of passive non-resistance should be emphasized. When women were only the physical mothers of the race, there was no danger of the decay of virility, but now that they have become the intellectual mothers as well, there may be such a danger. It is generally conceded that the English boys’ schools, like Eton, Harrow, and Rugby, have been the best English conservers of independent manhood, for there every boy stood on his own merits, having to fight his own battles, being responsible for his own conduct, and at the same time living under a high code of boyish honor. In our own public schools, where no such esprit de corps is possible, and where the doctrine of peace at any price is likely to be insisted upon, it is possible that there may be a distinct decline of virility in the boys. Such a result would be deplorable; it would work to the detriment of public education, and would decrease in public estimation the value of woman’s services in the schoolroom. While discouraging strife, a teacher may, by a word of approval or excuse, justify an exercise of primitive defence of the person against unwarranted assault. Manly social games, like foot-ball, basket-ball, base-ball, are our best resources in developing those phases of character that are closely associated with motor efficiency. Here under proper guidance, self-control, sense of power and efficiency, courage, and almost every characteristic of virility may be happily developed. That forethought and supervision are needed is most true, else unlovely traits of character may easily get the upper hand. 184. The second of the two ways alluded to takes us from the idea of rights to that of equity. Strife is displeasing, but revenge still more, notwithstanding the truth of the saying: what is fair for one is fair for another. Children may indeed exercise their ethical acumen by trying to determine how much one deserves to suffer or to receive at the hands of others for the liberties he has taken or the self-restraint he has practised, but they are not to arrogate to themselves the function of inflicting punishments or of bestowing rewards. Without surrendering their own insight, they must in this respect submit willingly to the authority of their superiors. A similar course is to be pursued with reference to the distribution of presents, enjoyments, and marks of approval. To avoid giving the appearance of favoritism, the teacher should not, except for very good reasons, depart from the principle of equal division; but, on the other hand, he should refuse to accord to the pupils a right to these free gifts. While permitting them to have an opinion on the appropriateness of a greater or smaller share, he will properly deny them any right to demand by virtue of this opinion. 185. In cases deeply engaging the children’s own sense of justice and equity, complaisance and readiness to yield should not be exacted on the spot. Children must have time to get to the end of their thoughts, and to weary of what is often very fruitless brooding, before they realize that to yield is after all a necessity, and hence in no sense a matter of magnanimous choice. At some future time they may be reminded that their path would have been smoother if the sentiment of good-will had been in control from the beginning and had arbitrated the dispute, or rather had prevented it entirely. Good-will is to be revered everywhere as higher than right; still the latter must be represented as something that cannot be set aside with impunity, unless it be by common agreement; that is, in consequence of the consent of the holders of rights. There are two distinct aspects to good-will,—the benevolent, and the coÖperative or social. The well-known story of the Jericho Road illustrates the first. He is the good neighbor who rescues the life of the man who has been assaulted by the way. But social good-will is more than benevolence; it is coÖperation for the accomplishment of common purposes. Among farmers it means mutual care to prevent aggression, because of unruly stock or bad fences; it involves combined efforts for good schools, good roads, public libraries, educational agencies for promoting successful farming, associations for promoting successful pleasures. In cities social good-will means coÖperation for paving and lighting streets, for the suppression of crime, for furnishing good water and efficient sewerage, for defence against fire, for rapid transit, besides the myriad agencies for promoting the mental, moral, and spiritual welfare of the people. A man in a city needs to be a good neighbor to everybody, even though he may know personally but one in a million. In other words, the civic man must be a brother, not only to him who falls among thieves, but to him who lives among them; not only to his brother in adversity, but also to his brother in prosperity. 186. Finally, the degrees of difference among older boys, and especially among young men, with respect to the nearness with which they approach the still distant realization of the idea of inner freedom, are, as a rule, sufficiently marked to be patent to all. The superior excellence of those distinguished for steady and rational conduct is usually dwelt on by the teacher rather too much than too little; children are themselves too keen in observing each other’s shortcomings not to see how far behind the best some are. We ought, therefore, rather to avoid stimulating in children the tendency to belittle others, than to turn their attention to that which does not escape them anyway. 187. The bad conduct of adults near to the pupils will not, of course, be exposed by the teacher; and if publicly known, the example set will repel more than allure, so long as self-interest does not prompt imitation or a search for excuses. But we need not entertain much hope either that a worthy example will be followed; youth is too prone to regard rectitude as a matter of course. Hence it will not be superfluous to call special attention to right conduct, and to give expression to the esteem which is its due. This applies particularly to the time when a growing boy’s outlook over society widens, and he begins to compare many things whose false glitter might deceive him. There are many aspects of inner freedom. It is possible for a narrow-minded man to live in perfect tranquillity, so far as his conscience is concerned. Even if one lived true to Kant’s categorical imperative, which says, “So act that the maxims, or rules, of your conduct might, through your own will, become universal laws,” it would still be possible for one to have a mind at peace with itself while doing things that a higher code of morality would forbid. For example, suppose I am an American Indian, and the question arises, Shall I torture my enemies? Of course: do not the traditions of my tribe prescribe it? This simply means that our ideals of conduct grow out of our environment; they are social in their genesis. This truth shows the infinite importance of making instruction reveal clearly the best ideals of religion and civilization, for there may be as much inward freedom, or good conscience, in the slums as in the wealthy districts of the city. Subjective peace of mind may mean much or little. A murderer may sleep as soundly as a missionary, but a man of high ideals is whipped as with scorpions, if his conduct be base. He feels that his higher self is outraged; he has no peace except through repentance, restitution, and reform. 188. Fifth. The pupil’s mind, we will suppose, has been properly directed, partly through the social relations obtaining among children, partly through examples and instruction, to the requirements of the various moral ideas, and he has learned accordingly to discriminate with some keenness between will relations. Now the time has arrived for moral education in the strict sense. For we cannot leave it to chance whether our young charges will, of their own initiative, synthesize for themselves noble actions on the one hand and base actions on the other, whether they will take time to reflect, and will, each for himself, apply the lessons taught. On the contrary, they all have to be told, each one individually has to be told, truths that no one is wont to hear with pleasure. The more thoroughly the teacher knows his pupils, the better. By showing them that he divines their thoughts, he supplies them with the most effectual incentive to self-observation. Now the basis of what is commonly known as moralizing is furnished by a retrospective view of the pupil’s conduct for some time past, by references to influences formerly at work within him, and by an analysis of his good and bad qualities. Such teaching is by no means to be condemned, nor even to be regarded as superfluous. In its proper place it is absolutely essential. Many, it is true, grow up without ever having heard a serious word of deserved censure, but no one ought to grow up in that way. 189. Only praise and censure are thought of here, not harsh words, much less harsh treatment. Reprimands and punishments following upon single acts are something different; they, too, may lead to moral reflections, but must first have become things of the past. Moral improvement is not brought about by the constraint of government, nor is it the result of those pedagogical punishments which warn the pupil and sharpen his wits by means of the natural consequences of actions(157). But it is brought about through the imitation of the language of conscience and of genuine honor, as seen in impartial spectators. Moreover, this does not exclude consideration of the excuses which every one readily finds in his heart. But while due allowance is made for mitigating circumstances, the pupil is cautioned against relying on them in future. 190. Ordinarily youth deserves neither strong commendation nor severe criticism, and it is well to guard carefully against exaggeration in either direction, if for no other reason than merely this, that exaggeration either detracts from effectiveness, or else causes, if not timidity, at least an unfortunate embarrassment. There is one species of magnifying, however, which subserves a good purpose, because it enables pupils to see more clearly the importance of trifles and the great significance of their own actions, and in this way helps to counteract thoughtlessness. We refer to viewing the present in the light of the future. The pettiest faults are liable to grow through habit; the faintest desire, unless kept under control, may turn into passion. Then, too, the future circumstances of one’s life are uncertain; allurements and temptations may come into it, or unlooked-for misfortunes. This prevision of the possibilities of the future is, of course, not prophecy, and no such claim should be made for it; nevertheless, it does good service as a warning. 191. When the pupil has been brought to the point where he regards his moral education as a matter of serious import, instruction in conjunction with a growing knowledge of the world may bring it about that a glow of moral sentiment permeates his whole thought, and that the idea of a moral order unites on the one hand with his religious concepts, and with his self-observation on the other. Henceforth the direct, emphatic expression of praise or censure will have to be less frequent. It will no longer be as easy as formerly to give a clearer account to the pupil of what goes on within him than he has already rendered to himself. We may still, however, come to his assistance from another direction, namely, that of general concepts,—a field in which advancing youthful reflection is little by little finding its bearings. 192. Sixth. It is the business of training to remind at the right moment and to correct faults. We may safely assume that, even after a young man has reached the plane of moral decisions, he will still stand in need of frequent reminders, although in this respect individuals exhibit great differences, which observation alone is able to reveal. But that which he is reminded of consists of resolves which lay claim to something like universal validity, but which are not likely to make good that claim when incorrectly formulated or conceived in the wrong connection. General considerations become predominant with only a very few at best; but youth especially sees and experiences so much that is new that the old is easily slighted for the new, and, accordingly, the general for the particular still more. Nevertheless, it is far easier for training to remind and to correct with success where a good, firm foundation has been laid, than it is to support(161–166) when in adolescence nothing is found by which the pupil might try to steady himself. 193. It is evident from the wide divergence among the principles which schools old and new have accepted as the basis of ethics and of systems of justice, that many conflicting, or at any rate, one-sided views may arise when the attempt is made to introduce order, definiteness, and consistency into existing ethical concepts. This whole conflict and one-sidedness of opinion, together with the innumerable fluctuations that may find a place here besides,—all this is likely to be reproduced in youthful minds, particularly where they make it a point of going their own way. Very frequently acquired principles adjust themselves to inclinations; the subjective side of character adapts itself to the objective. Now, while it is the business of instruction to correct error, training must avail itself of those opportunities that reveal a directing of thoughts by inclination. 194. When, however, the pupil has once established confidence in his disposition as well as in his principles, training must withdraw. Unnecessary judging and over-anxious observation would only impair naturalness, and give rise to extraneous motives. When once self-culture has been assumed, it should be left alone. SECTION IV
SYNOPSIS OF GENERAL PEDAGOGICS FROM THE POINT OF VIEW OF AGE CHAPTER I
The First Three Years 195. Owing to the delicate character of the thread of life during the earliest years, care for the body, a subject falling outside the limits of the present discussion, has precedence of everything else. The state of health, accordingly, implies great variations in the time available for profitable culture of the mind. But short as this time may be, it is extremely important, because of the great receptivity and susceptibility of the first period of life. The lines of study suggested by these few remarks upon infancy have been arduously pursued in recent years by Perez,[21] Preyer,[22] Baldwin,[23] and others. The attempt has been made in these works to show how the psychical and physical powers of the young child actually unfold. In this way it has been possible to correct many erroneous deductions from adult psychology, thus making elementary training more successful. 196. Those moments when the child is fully awake and free from suffering should always be utilized by presenting, but not obtruding, something for sense-perception. Powerful impressions are to be avoided. The same caution applies to violent changes; very slight variations often suffice to revive waning attention. It is desirable to secure a certain completeness of eye- and ear-impressions, so that the senses may be equally at home everywhere within the fields of sight and sound. 197. As far as safety permits, the spontaneous activity of the child should have free play, primarily that he may get practice in the use of every limb, but also in order that by his own attempts his observations of objects and their changeableness may be enlarged. 198. Unpleasant, repellent impressions of persons, whoever they are, must be most carefully guarded against. No one can be allowed to treat a child as a plaything. 199. On the other hand, no one must allow himself to be ruled by a child, least of all when the child becomes importunate. Otherwise, wilfulness will be the inevitable consequence, a result almost unavoidable with sickly children, by reason of the attention demanded by their sufferings. 200. A child must always feel the superiority of adults, and often his own helplessness. The necessary obedience is founded on this feeling. With consistent treatment, persons constantly about the child will secure obedience more readily than others who are rarely present. Outbursts of passion must be given time to subside unless circumstances urgently require a different course. 201. On rare occasions there may be an exhibition of force inspiring enough fear to make a threat effective and to check an excess of animal spirits. For if government is to escape the extremely harmful necessity of severe disciplinary measures later on, it must become firmly established during the earliest years of childhood. 202. The language of children demands scrupulous attention from the beginning, in order to prevent the formation of incorrect and careless habits of speech, which at a later period it usually requires much trouble and loss of time to eradicate. But literary forms of expression that are beyond the comprehension of children are to be strictly avoided. CHAPTER II
The Ages from Four to Eight 203. The real boundary line is fixed not by age, but by that stage of development when the helplessness of the first stage is superseded by control of the limbs and a connected use of language. And the mere fact that children are now able to free themselves from much momentary discomfort carries with it greater calmness and cheerfulness. 204. In proportion as the child learns to help himself, assistance from without must be withdrawn. At the same time government must increase in firmness, and with many children in severity, until the last traces of that wilfulness vanish, which the former period does not as a rule wholly escape. But this presupposes that no one provoke the child unnecessarily to any kind of resistance. The firmer the established order of things about the child, the readier his compliance. 205. The child must be given as much freedom as circumstances will permit, one purpose being to induce frank self-expression, and to obtain data for a study of his individuality. Still, the main thing at this age is to guard against bad habits, especially such as are connected with objectionable tendencies of disposition. 206. Two of the ethical ideas concern us here directly, each, however, in its own way. They are the ideas of good-will and perfection. Some particular aspects of the latter a child will almost always hit upon himself. The former less often springs up spontaneously; it has to be implanted, and this cannot always be done directly. 207. The ill-will, which many children exhibit frequently, is always a bad sign,—one that needs to be treated very seriously. A character once perverted in this respect can no longer be radically changed for the better. And this perversion sometimes begins very early. The steps to be taken in this connection are determined by the following considerations:— 208. In the first place, younger children are not to be left alone very much. Their life should be a social life, and their social circle one subject to strict order. This requirement fulfilled, all manifestations of ill-will are at variance with the rule; and as soon as they appear, the child finds himself opposed by the existing state of things. Now, the more he has grown accustomed to participation in the common will, to occupying his time, and being happy within its pale, the less will he be able to bear the feeling of isolation. To punish a child for an exhibition of ill-will, leave him alone. 209. But such punishment presupposes the undiminished sensitiveness of the younger child, who, on being left alone, begins to cry, and feels utterly helpless and weak, but who, on the other hand, becomes cheerful again the moment he is readmitted into the social circle. If this period has been neglected, if the ill-disposed child has already caused aversion in the circle in which he could have been happy, one feeling of ill-will begets another in return, and nothing remains but to insist on strict justice. 210. The mere social spirit which keeps ill-will at a distance, is, of course, very far from being good-will; children are even prone to look upon descriptive illustrations of the latter, in the ordinary run of books for children, as fables easily invented. Hence the first thing to make sure of is faith in good-will. We have in mind here especially the child who through force of habit has lost his appreciation of the kindnesses constantly showered upon him in the course of his education. Deprive him of some of the care to which he is accustomed; its renewal will then make him recognize and prize it as a voluntary act. When, on the contrary, children regard what is being done for them as their right, or as the effect of some sort of mechanism, this blunder of theirs becomes a fruitful source of the most manifold moral evils. 211. To the union of kindness with the necessary degree of severity, we must add friendliness, lest the heart of the child become chilled, and the germs of good-will perish. During the period under consideration, the child’s frame of mind is still determined directly by the treatment he receives. Continued unfriendliness of manner produces dull indifference. The twofold problem of lifting the idea of good-will into adequate prominence and of actually awakening sentiments of good-will can, it is true, not be solved as early as childhood. But much has been gained if sympathy, supported by sociable cheerfulness, unites with a belief in the good-will of those on whom the child feels dependent, as if they were higher beings. The soil is ready now for religious culture and its furthering influences. 212. The idea of perfection in its universal aspect is indeed as foreign to the child’s mind as that of good-will; nevertheless, the rudiments of what this idea implies can be imparted with far greater assurance of success. As the child grows and thrives, his strength and accomplishments increase likewise, and he takes pleasure in his own progress. But here innumerable differences in kind and in degree demand our observation, particularly in view of the purpose of linking instruction to the stage of growth. For it is during this period that synthetic as well as analytic instruction begins, although it does not as yet normally constitute the chief occupation of the child. 213. As the child’s sphere of free activity widens and his own attempts create a growing store of experiences, which the teacher will often find it very necessary to augment by purposely showing him about, the earlier fancies are gradually being overbalanced by experiential knowledge, although different individuals may exhibit great variations of ratio. From this impulse to appropriate the new, spring the numerous questions children put to the teacher, on the tacit assumption that he is omniscient. They are the outcome of the mood of the moment, they are purposeless, and most of them do not recur if not answered then and there. Many of them concern words alone, and cease on mention of some suitable designation of the object in question. Others relate to the connection of events, especially to motives underlying the actions of human beings, fictitious and real alike. Now, although many questions cannot, while others must not, be answered, the tendency to ask questions should, generally speaking, receive constant encouragement as a sign of native interest, of the absence of which the teacher often becomes painfully aware later on without being able by any skill on his part to revive it. Here an opportunity is presented for preparing the ground in many directions for future instruction. Only, the teacher has to refrain, in answering questions, from the prolixity of untimely thoroughness; what he ought to do is to sail on the waves of childish fancy. And this does not usually lend itself to experiments; its movements are, on the contrary, often inconveniently capricious. 214. So long as there can be no fixed time for the analytic lessons woven into answers to the questions of children, analytic instruction is coincident with the guidance of the child’s attention, with his social intercourse, with his occupations and the consequent cultivation of habits, with hardening exercises, ethical judgments, and the earliest religious impressions; in some measure also with reading exercises. 215. To the latter portion of this period belong the first steps in synthetic instruction, reading, writing, ciphering, the simplest modes of arrangement, and the first observation exercises. If the child is as yet incapable of uniform attention during a whole hour, the teacher will be satisfied with smaller divisions of time; the degree of attention is more important than its duration. Note that the subjects enumerated fall into different groups. Counting, arranging, observing, are different phases of the natural development of the mind. Instruction does not create these activities; its business is merely to accelerate them. At the beginning, therefore, our mode of procedure must be as much as possible analytic. On the other hand, reading and writing can be taught only synthetically, although on the basis of an antecedent analysis of speech sounds. (1) Arranging—commonly neglected, though wrongly so—is an exceedingly easy exercise in itself, and facilitates the performance of many other tasks. It is therefore appropriate for children. That three objects may change places from right to left (from front to rear, from above to below) and vice versa—this is the beginning. The next step is to show that three objects admit of six permutations in a straight line. To find how many pairs can be formed out of a given number of objects, is one of the easiest problems. How far to go, is a matter to be determined by circumstances. Not letters, however, but objects,—the children themselves,—should be changed about, permuted, and varied in position. The teaching of a subject like this must in a measure have the semblance of play. (2) The first observation exercises begin with straight lines drawn vertically or cross-wise. Use may be made also of knitting needles variously placed, side by side or across each other, of domino checks, and of similar objects. Next comes the circle, subdivided and presented in manifold ways. (3) For arithmetic, likewise, concrete objects are needed,—coins, for example, which are counted and arranged in different groups to illustrate sums, differences, and products. At first the highest number employed should not exceed, say, twelve or twenty. (4) For work in reading we may avail ourselves of letters and numbers printed on cards, which lend themselves to a variety of arrangements. If children are slow about learning to read, the blunder must not be made of neglecting their mental culture in other directions, as though reading were its necessary prerequisite. Reading often demands a large amount of patience, and should never be allowed to produce a feeling of aversion to teachers and books. (5) Writing is ushered in by the elementary drawing that must accompany observation exercises. Writing itself, when once well started, furthers reading. 216. But already at this point many fall behind. Puzzled at first by the demand upon them for the dull labor of learning, they surrender themselves later on to the feeling of incapacity. In large schools, where there are always some outstripping the rest, and where the majority are trying to keep up with the pace set, performance can be had more readily, although it is performance by imitation rather than by an inner sequence of thought. And even here we find thoroughly disheartened laggards. CHAPTER III
Boyhood 217. The boundary line between boyhood and early childhood is fixed, so far as this is possible at all, by the fact that the boy, if allowed to do so, will leave the company of adults. Formerly he felt insecure when left alone: now he considers himself fairly well acquainted with his immediate environment, beyond which vistas of all sorts are opening. Accordingly, at this stage it becomes incumbent on the adult to attach himself to the boy, to restrain him, to divide the time for him, and to circumscribe the fancies born of his self-confidence,—a course of action rendered all the more necessary by the circumstance that the boy is a stranger as yet to the timidity with which the youth joins the ranks of men. For boyhood is marked off from adolescence by this, that the boy’s aims are still unsettled; he plays and takes no thought of to-morrow. Moreover, his dream of manhood is one of arbitrary power. The play-impulse remains active for a long time, unless checked by conventionality. During this period, the work of linking instruction to sense-impression is by no means to be omitted entirely, not even where fair progress has already been made in scholarship. We must make sure of a solid foundation. 218. Our chief concern during the age of boyhood must be to prevent the premature fixation of the circle of ideas. It is for instruction to undertake the task of doing so. True, by far the greatest part of the process of learning, however manifold, is performed through the interpretation of words, the pupil supplying the meaning out of the mental store collected previously. But this very fact obviously implies that quantitively the pupil’s stock of ideas is for the most part complete; instruction merely works it up into new forms. Accordingly, such shaping must take place while the material is still in a plastic state; for with increasing years it gradually assumes a more solid character. 219. Boys differ from girls, individuals differ from one another; and the subjects taught, together with the methods of teaching them, should be differentiated accordingly. But here the family interposes the interests of rank or station, and claims the right to determine by these how much or how little instruction a boy needs. Looked at pedagogically, each study calls for a corresponding mental activity to be suited to the general condition of the individual. Its success must not involve exhaustion of the pupil’s powers, nor make demands upon them at the wrong time. But it would be an error to argue that one who is being initiated into one subject ought to combine with that subject a second, third, or fourth, on the ground that subjects one, two, three, and four are essentially interrelated. This conclusion holds for scholars, who, so far as they are personally concerned, have long passed beyond preliminary pedagogical considerations, and even in their case it applies only to those branches which are intimately connected with their specialties; it has nothing to do with the psychological conditions by which the course of education must be governed. Only too frequently do masses of ideas remain isolated despite the fact that the objects corresponding to them are most intimately and necessarily interconnected; and such isolation could not have been prevented by merely starting work in a large web of erudition in a number of places. The case is different where certain studies constitute the necessary preparation for thorough knowledge of one kind or another. Here we are right in concluding that one who cannot master the former is equally unable to get hold of the latter.[24] [24] These remarks upon correlation are instructive in view of later developments of the Herbartian school in Germany. The reader is referred to discussions in the First and Second Year-Books of the National Herbart Society. 220. It is difficult to deal with the rare instances of tardy development unless we find that they are due to neglected health, or to lack of assistance in enlarging the range of experience, and to failure to change the mode of instruction. Here an attempt may be made to supply what is wanting. But even where the rate of progress becomes more rapid at once, the teacher’s efforts will have turned out favorably only when the boy gives also clear proof of a vigorous striving for advancement. 221. To revert to fundamental ethical principles, particular mention of the ideas of justice and equity needs to be made in this connection. These ideas issue from reflection on human relations; they are consequently less accessible to early childhood, which finds itself subordinated everywhere to the family. The boy, on the other hand, lives more among his peers, and the necessary corrections are not always administered so promptly as to leave no time for independent judgment. Not infrequently voluntary association takes place among boys, personal authority plays a part, and even usurpation of power is not rare. Now, education has to provide for clear ethical concepts and for government and training besides. But not only that; it must also furnish the kind of instruction that will exhibit similar but remote relations, for purposes of unbiassed contemplation. Such instruction must borrow its material from poetry and history. 222. To history we are referred by still another consideration. As has already been shown(206–211), the idea of good-will points to the necessity of religious culture; and this relies for support on stories, old stories at that. The expansion of the pupil’s power of thought which is here demanded must be generally attained, even though very incompletely, in every course of instruction, that of the village school included. 223. Another fixed goal, the importance of which exceeds even that of reading and writing, is furnished by arithmetic, which gives clearness to the common concepts of experience, and is indispensable in the practical affairs of life. 224. Decimal arithmetic no pupil would be likely to think out by himself; he would very certainly not invent Bible history. Both must accordingly be regarded as belonging preËminently to the province of synthetic instruction, which always involves the difficult problem of how to assure its entrance, as a potent factor, into existing masses of ideas. As to this, it would be a blunder to conclude that, since Bible history and history as a whole, arithmetic and mathematics as a whole, hang together, there is also a corresponding pedagogical connection(219). But so much is certain, that the efficiency of a group of ideas increases with expansion and with multiplied association. It will be an advantage, therefore, to Bible history and to arithmetic, if as wide a range is given to historical and mathematical teaching as circumstances and ability permit, even if the conditions should be such that a many-sided culture is not to be expected. 225. The subjects next to be considered in the choice of material for instruction are poetry and natural history, great care being taken not to disregard the necessary sequence. The time for fables and stories should not be curtailed; it is important to make sure that boys do not lose the taste for them too early. The easiest and safest facts of zoÖlogy will have been presented already in connection with the picture-books of childhood. The right moment for introducing the elements of botany has arrived when the boy is collecting plants. Foreign languages would be assigned the lowest place, if particular circumstances did not in many cases lend them a special importance. The ancient classical languages, at any rate, form to such an extent the basis of the study of theology, of jurisprudence, and of medicine, they are so necessary to all higher scholarship, that they will always constitute the fundamental branches of instruction in academic preparatory schools. It is obvious, however, that the extent of instruction depends too much on external conditions of rank and means to permit a definite prescription of instruction-material for all cases. Far less dependent is the development of many-sided interest in its relation to branches of study. If the limits set to the latter are narrow, it is still the business of instruction to secure an approximation to many-sided culture; while under highly favorable circumstances the very abundance of educational help must put the teacher on his guard against losing sight of the real aim of instruction. 226. Frequently the burden of necessary and useful studies is made excessively heavy, a fact which the members of the teaching profession try to conceal from themselves, but which attracts the attention of outsiders. A few hours of gymnastics do not sufficiently counteract such evil effects. As an offset we have at best the prevention of the vices of idleness. From every point of view, for the mere reason that this matter calls for special attention and that the method of procedure has to be determined in accordance with the results of observation, the home must do its part toward relieving that natural strain which even good instruction exerts—and the school must not encroach on the time necessary for that purpose. In extreme cases, to be sure, it may be expressly demanded that the school engage the whole of a boy’s time. But, as a rule, outside school-work should take up, not the largest, but, on the contrary, the smallest amount of time possible. How the remaining hours are to be employed is for parents and guardians to decide according to individual needs, ascertained by observation; and it is on them that the responsibility for the consequences rests. CHAPTER IV
Youth 227. Whether instruction comes to an end or is continued during this period, all it can accomplish depends now on the fulfilment of the condition that the young man himself regard the retention and increase of his attainments as something valuable. Accordingly, the interrelations of knowledge, as well as its connection with action, must be brought before his mind with the greatest possible distinctness. He must be furnished, also, with the strongest incentives to reach the goal determined upon, provided the question is merely how to overcome indolence and thoughtlessness. For it is just at this stage that the teacher needs to fear and to prevent those wrong motives which would issue merely in an artificial semblance of talent. 228. Moreover, the allowance made for the child and the boy can no longer be made for the youth. His whole ability is to be put to the test, and his position in human society determined according to the outcome. He must experience something of the difficulty of obtaining a foothold among men. Positions for which he does not seem quite prepared are contested; he is surrounded by rivals, and is spurred on by expectations, which it is often difficult to moderate when most necessary. 229. If now the young man puts his trust in favorable circumstances, and, in spite of all appeals, gives himself up to the pursuit of ease and pleasure, education is at an end. It only remains to conclude with precepts and representations which future experiences may possibly recall. 230. If, on the other hand, the youth has his eyes fixed on a definite goal, the form of life which he is striving to attain, and the motives that impel him, will determine what else may be done for him. According as the ideals of honor that he makes his own are directed more outwardly or inwardly, they stand more or less midway between plans for actions and maxims. 231. The youth is no longer pliant, except when his failures have made him feel ashamed of himself. Such cases must be made use of for the purpose of making good deficiencies. But on the whole, duty requires that the stern demands of morality be held up to him without disguise. Perfect frankness can hardly be looked for any longer, and to insist on it is out of the question entirely. The reserve of the age of adolescence marks the natural beginning of self-control. These brief paragraphs on the development of the individual through infancy, childhood, boyhood, and youth, mark an early interest in what is now known as child-study, the literature of which has become voluminous. For a dissertation on the experimental study of children, and a bibliography of the subject, the reader is referred to the monograph by Arthur McDonald, of the United States Bureau of Education, entitled “Experimental Study of Children.” A smaller but more useful bibliography has been compiled by L.N.Wilson. It is found in Pedagogical Seminary for September, 1899.
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