Learning a Unifying Process.—It has been seen that the learner, in gaining control of new knowledge, must organize into the new experience elements selected from former experiences. For instance, when a person gains a knowledge of a new fruit (guava), he not only brings forward in consciousness from his former knowledge the ideas—rind, flesh, seed, etc.,—to interpret the strange object, but also associates these into a single experience, a new fruit. So long also as the person referred to in an earlier chapter retained in his consciousness as distinct factors three experiences—seeing a boy at the fence, seeing the vineyard, and finally, seeing the boy eating grapes—these would not, as three such distinct experiences, constitute a knowledge of grape-stealing. On the other hand, as soon as these are combined, or associated by a relating act of thought, the different factors are organized into a new idea symbolized by the expression, grape-stealing.

Examples From School-room Procedure.—A similar relating process is involved when the learner faces a definite school problem. When, for instance, the pupil gains a knowledge of the sign ÷, he must not only bring forward in consciousness from his former knowledge distinct ideas of a line, of two dots, and of a certain mathematical process, but must also associate these into a new idea, division-sign. So also a person may know that air takes up more moisture as it becomes warmer, that the north-east trade-winds blow over the Sahara from land areas, and that the Sahara is situated just north of the equator. But the mind must unify these into a single experience in order to gain a knowledge of the condition of the rainfall in that quarter.

NATURE OF SYNTHESIS

Deals with Former Experiences.—This mental organizing, or unifying, of the elements of past experiences to secure control of the new experience, is usually spoken of as a process of synthesis. The term synthesis, however, must be used with the same care as was noted in regard to the term analysis. Synthesis does not mean that totally new elements are being unified, but merely that whatever selected elements of old knowledge the mind is able to read into a presented problem, are built, or organized, into a new system; and constitute, for the time being, one's knowledge and control of that problem. This is well exemplified by noting the growth of a person's knowledge of any object or topic. Thus, so long as the child is able to apperceive only the three sides and three angles of a triangle, his idea of triangle includes a synthesis of these. When later, through the building up of his geometric knowledge, he is able to apperceive that the interior angles equal two right angles, his knowledge of a triangle expands through the synthesis of this with the former knowledge.

All Knowledge a Synthesis.—The fact that all knowledge is an organization from earlier experiences becomes evident by looking at the process from the other direction. The adult who has complete knowledge of an orange has it as a single experience. This experience is found, however, to represent a co-ordination of other experiences, as touch, taste, colour, etc. Moreover, each of these separate characteristics is an association of simpler experiences. Experiencing the touch of the orange, for instance, is itself a complex made up of certain muscular, touch, and temperature sensations. From this it is evident that the knowledge of an orange, although a unity of experience in adult life, is really a complex, or synthesis, made up of a large number of different elements.

What is true of our idea of an orange is true of every other idea. Whether it be the understanding of a plant, an animal, a city, a picture, a poem, an historical event, an arithmetical problem, or a scientific experiment, the process is always the same. The apperceptive process of interpreting the new by selecting and relating elements of former experience, or the process of analysis-synthesis, is universal in learning. Expressed in another form, what is at first indistinct and indefinite becomes clear and defined through attention selecting, for the interpretation of the new presentation, suitable old ideas and setting up relationships among them. Analysis, or selection, is incomplete without an accompanying unification, or synthesis; synthesis, or organization, is impossible without analysis, or selection. It is on account of the mind's ability to unify a number of mental factors into a single experience, that the process of unification, or synthesis, is said to imply economy within our experiences. This fact will become even more evident, however, when later we study such mental processes as sense perception and conception.

INTERACTION OF PROCESSES

It is to be noted, however, that the selecting and the relating of the different interpreting ideas during the learning process are not necessarily separate and distinct parts of the lesson. In other words, the mind does not first select out of its former knowledge a whole mass of disconnected elements, and then later build them up into a new organic experience. There is, rather, in almost every case, a continual interplay between the selecting and relating activity, or between analysis and synthesis, throughout the whole learning process. As soon, for instance, as a certain feature, or characteristic, is noted, this naturally relates itself to the central problem. When later, another characteristic is noted, this may relate itself at once both with the topic and with the formerly observed characteristic into a more complete knowledge of the object. Thus during a lesson we find a gradual growth of knowledge similar to that illustrated in the case of the scholar's knowledge of the triangle, involving a continual interplay of analysis and synthesis, or of selecting and relating different groups of ideas relative to the topic. This would he illustrated by noting a pupil's study of the cat. The child may first note that the cat catches and eats rats and mice, and picks meat from bones. These facts will at once relate themselves into a certain measure of knowledge regarding the food of the animal. Later he may note that the cat has sharp claws, padded feet, long pointed canines, and a rough tongue; these facts being also related as knowledge concerning the mouth and feet of the animal. In addition to this, however, the latter facts will further relate themselves to the former as cases of adaptation, when the child notes that the teeth and tongue are suited to tearing food and cleaning it from the bones, and that its claws and padded feet are suited to surprising and seizing its living prey.

Example from Study of Conjunctive Pronoun.—This continuous selecting and relating throughout a process of learning is also well illustrated in the pupil's process of learning the conjunctive pronoun. By bringing his old knowledge to bear on such a sentence as "The men who brought it returned at once"; the pupil may be asked first to apperceive the subordinate clause, who brought it. This will not likely be connected by the pupil at first with the problem of the value of who. From this, however, he passes to a consideration of the value of the clause and its relation. Hereupon, these various ideas at once co-ordinate themselves into the larger idea that who is conjunctive. Next, he may be called upon to analyse the subordinate clause. This, at first, also may seem to the child a disconnected experience. From this, however, he passes to the idea of who as subject, and thence to the fact that it signifies man. Thereupon these ideas unify themselves with the word who under the idea pronoun. Thereupon a still higher synthesis combines these two co-ordinated systems into the more complex system, or idea—conjunctive pronoun.

figure

This progressive interaction of analysis and synthesis is illustrated by the accompanying figure, in which the word who represents the presented unknown problem; a, b, and c, the selecting and relating process which results in the knowledge, conjunction; a', b', and c', the building up of the pronoun notion; and the circle, the final organization of these two smaller systems into a single notion, conjunctive pronoun.

The learning of any fact in history, the mastery of a poem, the study of a plant or animal, will furnish excellent examples of these subordinate stages of analysis and synthesis within a lesson. It is to be noted further that this feature of the learning process causes many lessons to fall into certain well marked sub-divisions. Each of these minor co-ordinations clustering around a sub-topic of the larger problem, the whole lesson separates itself into a number of more or less distinct parts. Moreover, the child's knowledge of the whole lesson will largely depend upon the extent to which he realizes these parts both as separate co-ordinations and also as related parts of the whole lesson problem.

ALL KNOWLEDGE UNIFIED

Nor does this relating activity of mind confine itself within the single lesson. As each lesson is organized, it will, if fully apprehended, be more or less directly related with former lessons in the same subject. In this way the student should discover a unity within the lessons of a single subject, such as arithmetic or grammar. In like manner, various groups of lessons organize themselves into larger divisions within the subject, in accordance with important relations which the pupil may read into their data. Thus, in grammar, one sequence of lessons is organized into a complete knowledge of sentences; another group, into a complete knowledge of inflection; a smaller group within the latter, into a complete knowledge of tense or mood. It is thus that the mind is able to construct its mass of knowledge into organized groups known as sciences, and the various smaller divisions into topics.