The art of teaching; a manual for teachers, superintendents, teachers' reading circles, normal schools, training classes, and other persons interested in the right training of the young

Front matter

Class ^ .LBiD^S^

Book __^_WiiiL__

Copyright N^

Preface

This is not a treatise on education, or even on school education. Its purpose is limited to the study of one of the arts included in school education, — tJie art of teaching. Teaching is only a part of the comprehensive function of the school, but it is a very important part, and its mastery is essential to success in school training. The narrower field has been chosen that its survey may be definite and helpful.

An obvious advantage in the separate treatment of the art of teaching is its practical removal from the domain of philosophy, and, especially, the uncertain philosophy of education. Many conscientious teachers have been baffled in their earnest but vain attempts to apply some new philosophy of education in the details of actual teaching. It can but afford needed relief for such teachers to see clearly that philosophy sheds no helpful light on the teaching process, the ends to be realized being subjective and immediate, not objective and ultimate. The guiding principles of the art of teaching are chiefly derived from psychology, and happily from its facts.

In the study of methods it has been the author's aim to treat thoroughly and practically those that are generic and comprehensive, presenting thern in the light of the fundamental principles of teaching and also in the light of the best practical experience. Special pains

4 PREFACE.

have been taken to point out the functions and limitations of special methods, and this with the view of guarding teachers against the error of accepting them as general methods, and making them hobbies.

But the treatise is not a manual of methods and devices. It is increasingly clear that what is needed to attain higher success in teaching is not the copying of pattern methods, but a clear grasp by teachers of the fundamental principles of their art, and a more intelligent and conscientious application of these guiding principles in practice. The vital need of school training is to be grounded. To this end it has been the author's earnest endeavor to present what is fundamental in the art of teaching in a clear, practical, and helpful manner.

The present volume supplements the author's earlier treatise, the Elements of Pedagogy, which has been so widely useful in estabhshing sound principles of teaching. It is also the complement of the author's School Management, chiefly devoted to school organization and discipline and moral training ; and it is hoped that it may be at least equally useful in the improvement of school training. The two volumes present the two most important elements in school education.

Columbus, Ohio.

Contents

I. Introduction ....

II. Ends in Teaching .

A Trinity of Ends .

Introduction

Education is a complex process. In its widest sense it includes all those processes, activities, and influences that occasion subjective changes in man, Education whether these changes are physical, mental, Defined, moral, or spiritual. The home, the school, the church, civil society, the state, industry, physical environment, and all else that touches man, are, in this wide sense, educational agencies, and each contributes something to the complex result called education.

'' Men are educated," says Dr. Fitch, of England, " from infancy to the grave by all the sights and sounds, the joys and sorrows, which they encounter, by the character and behavior of their friends, the nature of their surroundings, and by the books they read."

'* In its largest acceptance," says John Stuart Mill, " education comprehends even the indirect effects produced on character and on the human faculties by things the direct purposes of which are different, by laws, by forms of government, by the industrial arts, by modes of social life ; even by physical facts not dependent on the human will, by cHmate, soil, and local position."

Dr. W. T. Harris defines education as ''that development of the individual, effected through his intellect and will, which enables him to combine with his fellow-men helpfully in performing the functions of the institutions of society, family, civil society, state, and church, only a part, although an important part, of this education being received in the school ; other essential parts being received through the family, the industrial community, the political state, and the church."

Dr. B. A. Hinsdale defines education in its widest sense as " the process of transformation wrought in a man by all the agents and powers of whatever kind that act on him from the cradle to the grave."

It is thus seen that the term education has, in its widest significance, a large and indefinite content,— so large, indeed, that no writer on education has been

More

Limited able to get anything helpful out of it. In Meaning, qj-^j^j- |-q \xq,2X cducatiou either scientifically or practically, the term must be used in a more limited and definite sense. Mr. Mill narrows the term to include "whatever we do for ourselves, and whatever is done for us by others, for the express purpose of bringing us nearer to the perfection of our nature," and then, for his immediate purpose (the St. Andrews address), he Hmits the term to ''the culture which each generation purposely gives to those who are to be its successor in order to quahfy them for at least keeping up and, if possible, for raising the improvement which has been attained."

" Education in its ideal or formal aspect," says Dr. W. H. Payne, "aims at the realization of the typical man, and comprises all the agencies that can be brought under human control for the attainment of this end ; " but, as a basis for the science of pedagogy, he narrows

INTRODUCTION. 9

the term to so much of the art of education ** as falls within the province of the school."

But even school education is a very complex process, including as it does all the activities and influences that enter into school hfe. Some of these factors school are designed and purposely directed ; others Education, are spontaneous, and still others are personal and unconscious, as the influence of teacher and fellow-pupils, physical environment, etc. Dr. Bain found that education limited to the work of the school needed " a little more paring and rounding to give it scientific form," and so in his "Science of Education" he treats education " as the arts and methods employed by the school master."

Most writers on education dodge all attempts at definition. To the reader is left the discovery of the sense in which the term is used, not always an easy task, and especially when the term is used by the same writer in different senses. Instead of definition, writers on the philosophy of education usually work from some ultimate end to be attained, as '' the harmonious and equable evolution of the human powers"; "the preparation of man for complete living " ; " the moral revelation of the world," etc.

The term teaching has a much narrower meaning than education ; much narrower than school education ; narrower, indeed, than school training. Teach- Teaching ing is one of the arts included in education. defined. Teaching may be defined as the occasioning of those activities in the learner that result in knowledge, power, and skill. This is the definite sense in which the word is used when one speaks of teaching history or botany or the arts of reading, writing, language, etc. Teaching always involves two factors, a teacher and a pupil, the latter endowed with the power of responsive activity, as well as self-activity, and hence teacJiablc. The teacher may act upon the pupil directly, in person ; or indirectly, as by means of a book. The determining element in the teaching process is the piipiVs activity. The teacher is only the occasioner of this activity. It is thus seen that teaching is only a part of school education. It is, however, an important part, and its mastery is essential to success in school work.

It is not meant that the teaching process is in practice always separate from the other elements of school train- Teaching ing. This is no more true than that memory as an Art. qj. e^^otion is a separate state of consciousness. There are, however, most important pedagogical advantages in the separate consideration of teaching as an art. Among these advantages is the fact that teaching is thus practically removed from the domain of philosophy, and especially the uncertain philosophy of education.

Philosophy seeks ultimate ends, universal principles, and these are too remote and comprehensive to be a Function of practical guide in any of the definite arts. Philosophy. ^^^ particularly the art of teaching. '* Philosophy bakes no bread." It may determine the ultimate ends of human existence, and the knowledge essential to their realization, but it cannot tell Jioiv this knozvledge ca?i be taught. The method of teaching a human mind knowledge involves the process by which the mind acquires such knowledge, and for this we must go to psychology. Philosophy has its pedagogic value in determining the ultimate ends of education, and thus the general function of the school, its general course of

INTRODUCTION. II

Study, etc., but it throws little light upon the teaching process. ** No philosophical study of ultimate questions," says Professor Royce of Harvard University, "has any direct bearing upon the technical problems of educational methods or upon the similarly practical problems of any other art." It seems increasingly clear that the so-called philosophies of education, now clamoring for recognition, will never prove a helpful guide in the art of teaching, whatever may be their value in the other functions of the school, and whatever may be their scholastic value to the student.

It may be true that philosophy is far-reaching enough to touch all human conduct and endeavor ; that " one's view of the world " is really embodied in his ^,.,

•' Pnilosopny

life. It does not, however, follow that all and men have an intelligent view of the world, much less are consciously conforming their lives to such a view. It is certain that the arts are not thus guided. It is more poetic than true to say that the shoemaker's view of the world shapes his last and guides the process of making a shoe. The same is true in the art of teaching. The ends that guide in the teaching process are hnmediatc, not ultimate, and the highest success may be reached in the absence of philosophic knowledge.

The principles on which the art of teaching is based are scientific. Every branch of knowledge, every art, has its principles, its science, and so there are philosophy many sciences. Thus we have a science of and chemistry, a science of mathematics, a science of music, etc. Philosophy seeks for the ultimate unity, the final cause of all science, and hence there are many sciences, but only one true philosophy.

Philosophy is what Fichte aptly calls *' the science of science."

It is fortunate that the guiding principles of the teaching art are not the ultimates of philosophy, for few Philosophic teachers are capable of grasping, much

Insight. iggg Qf applying, such principles. Philosophic insight is the highest form of the reason, and without this insight philosophy is empty and vain. Certainly no teacher is helped by familiarity with philosophic terms and phrases which have no definite content. On the contrary, many earnest teachers have been confused and muddled by attempts to embody some new philosophy of education in actual teaching. Moreover, if philosophy were the only practical guide in teaching, only philosophers could be successful teachers, and this would seem to exclude those who do not know the tnie philosophy ; and who can be certain here.? The history of philosophy presents one continued struggle of philosophic systems, one philosophy succeeding another, the newer often returning to the older, thus presenting what has been aptly termed '' the cycles of philosophy." Several distinct schools of philosophy are now contending for the control of American education.

We are not discrediting the value of philosophy in determining the ultimate ends and function of school

Value of education. All systems of education are Philosophy, based on some philosophic end, and there may be as many systems as there are ends that can be made philosophic ultimates. The acceptance of a wrong end results in a wrong system of education ; and the acceptance of narrow and partial ends results in narrow and partial systems. Indeed, all partial systems

INTR on UC 1 ION. 1 3

of education have their origin in the acceptance of a partial end as an ultimate. Shallow philosophizing is the source of hobbies and fads. Our earnest contention is that philosophy throws no guiding Hght on the teaching process. What could be done in actual teaching with the philosophic principle (if it be one) that '* the end of education is to put man in right relations to the universe " "t The results of the teaching art are wrought in tJie pupil} and hence they are subjective and immediate— not objective and ultimate. In actual teaching, even the philosopher must set before himself and strive to attain immediate ends.

We thus reach the important fact that the guiding principles of tJie teaching art are derived from psycho logy ^ and happily from its facts. It will be shown later that these principles can be clearly stated and intelligently applied.

It may be objected that the necessary psychical facts for a science of teaching are not yet known ; that the advent of such a science must wait for a new psychology. It is not claimed that all psychical facts are now known ; that there is nothing more to be learned in psychology. Not only experiment and observation but introspection may add new facts and widen and otherwise modify facts now known. Psychology is a pro- science of gressive science ; but it is now a science, and as Psychology, such presents a body of facts respecting physical activity and growth of fundamental importance in education. To assert the contrary is to raise a strong presumption that there will never be such a science as psychology,

1 " Each object and each situation, every act of man and every refusal to act causes a reaction in the soul educative in its effect.^'' — Dr. W. T. Harris in " Psychologic Foundations of Education."

and, as a consequence, there will never be a psychical basis for the art of teaching.

No one of the new methods of psychical research has set aside a psychical fact discovered by introspection No New and attested by experience, and no objective Psychology, or physiological discovery has dimmed the clear light of consciousness. While new facts are discovered, the certitude of the facts of consciousness remains unimpeached. Modern psychologists who have given much attention to the so-called physiological psychology, are now affirming that the physiological laboratory is not discrediting or superseding the ascertained facts of consciousness ; that there is no new psychology in the sense in which the term is often used. The term new when applied to psychology is inclusive of the old, not exclusive. The new psychology includes the facts of consciousness or it has no message.

In the introductory chapter of his *' Talks to Teachers on Psychology," Professor William James, of Harvard University, says : —

" So I say at once that in my humble opinion there is no new psychology worthy of the name. There is nothing but the old psychology, which began in Locke's time, plus a little physiology of brain and sense and theory of evolution and a few refinements of introspective detail for the most part without adaptation to the teacher's use. It is only the fundamental conceptions of psychology which are of real value to the teacher, and they, apart from the aforesaid theory of evolution, are very far from being new."

Professor Royce, of Harvard University, bears similar testimony. In an able paper read before the National Council of Education in 1898 he shows that psychology was never exclusively introspective, while introspection is a notable factor in the psychology of

INTR OD UC TION. 1 5

to-day.i The ''psychology of the armchair" is largely a figment of the imagination.

Modern psychology is an organization of psychical facts, whether old or hew, and howsoever ascertained. Such modern psychologists as Porter, Hoff- Modem ding, Ladd, and James survey the entire field Psychology, of psychical research. Whatever is known of the activities, growth, states, and susceptibilities of the human soul is appropriated by modern psychology. Hence its value as a basis for the science of education, and especially for the science of teaching. From the psychical facts thus presented it is not difficult to derive fundamental principles of teaching, principles which constitute a science of teaching and are guiding and fruitful in practice. Even Professor Miinsterberg, of Harvard, who is bearing such emphatic and repeated testimony against the value of the laboratory study of physiological psychology to the teacher in actual school work, admits that psychology has "some of its best fruits for the work of education." Whatever may be the practical value of laboratory psychical research to the teacher, the known facts of psychology are undeniably of great value in determining the guiding principles of the teaching art.

There is nothing gained in pedagogy by attempts to make distinctions in the value of different kinds of psychical knowledge. Whether psychical

r 1 1 .1 11 Value of

facts belong to rational psychology or em- Psychical pirical psychology or physiological psychology knowledge. is not material, provided they are facts^ and as such are attested by consciousness and experience.

1 Proceedings of the National Educational Association, Washington, D.C., 1898, pp. 554-570-

It is not claimed that the principles of teaching are all derived from psychology. While this furnishes what may be called the basal principles of the teaching art, other principles of practical value are furnished by other sciences.

The science of ethics sheds a clear Hght upon the training of the will, including the use of motives, the freedom of the will, etc. Whatever may be true of the influence of true methods of teaching on moral character, it is certain that ethical conditions modify intellectual training and hmit its efficiency. Indeed, the psychology from which the art of teaching derives its guiding principles clearly includes the science of ethics.

Modern physiology includes facts that condition and

limit psychical as well as physical activity, and so have

an important place in the science of teach-

ysio ogy. .^^^^ Physiological research is adding to our knowledge these and other facts that must be considered in school training. It is increasingly seen that physiology has a message of great value in pedagogy. But it must ever be remembered that psychical and physiological facts are not identical. No fact is both psychical and physiological, though the one may be related to the other. The phenomena of the human body may be susceptible of physical testing and measurement, but psychical phenomena have no material quality or equivalent. Ideas, feelings, and purposes cannot be measured like physical substances and energies. Professor Miinsterberg and other psychologists have clearly shown that psychical and physical phenomena have no common quahty or measure.

INTR OD UCTION. \ y

The value of psychology as a guide in teaching is at present most evident in primary instruction. The recent happy changes in methods of teaching young Primary children have been effected in the light of a instruction, truer knowledge of child life, or, if preferred, a truer child psychology. Pestalozzi, Froebel, and other reformers of elementary education derived their principles from what they believed to be known of the activity and development of the soul in childhood.

The difference between primary and advanced methods of teaching correspond to the difference in what Professor James calls *' the behavior of the mind " in childhood and adult life. No Advanced psychical theory has been the source of more ^^thods. error in teaching than the assumption that the mind of a child differs from the mind of an adult in no respect except in strength ; that children are little adults. This led to the old pedagogical error that young pupils in the primary school may be taught the same kinds of knowledge and in essentially the same way as pupils in the high school ; that the only real difference between primary and advanced methods of teaching is the length of lessons ; that is, the amount of knowledge taught in a given exercise.

There is a surprising revival of this serious error in the recent tendency to force down into lower grades subjects that have taxed the powers of unwise much older pupils. What is needed to cor- Tendency, rect this unwise tendency is a clearer recognition of the fact that the mind of the child differs from the mind of the adult, not simply in strength, but in the relative activity and energy • of the several mental powers ; the perceptive powers, for example, being more active in infancy than the thought powers.^ The mental condition of pupils as they advance from the kindergarten to the high school is characterized by changes in the relative activity of the several mental powers.

It is evident that methods and processes of teaching must be adapted to these psychical changes; and here Adaptation the vital question is not what pupils can be to Changes, f orccd or trained to do in the successive grades, but what they ought to do in their psychical and physical condition. It follows that true primary methods of teaching involve a knowledge of the psychical as well as the physical nature of children.

It is a question whether observation or insight has contributed most to this knowledge. What is known as child study has no meanine: except as the phenom-

Child study. \ , ,. 7T,.

ena observed are correctly interp7'eted, and this can be done only in the clear light of consciousness ; and here insight is more important than outsight. The biographers of Froebel leave no doubt that his marvelous insight into child nature was made possible by the memories of his own childhood. It seems probable that Froebel's memory put back in time some of the experiences of his early youth, otherwise he was an extraordinary child. Few memories of the first four years of infancy appear in later consciousness, few associations being possible.^ Not only is this true, but, as a consequence, it is difficult to interpret the observations on children made at this early age, and much more difficult to make them the basis of a scientific generahzation. Moreover, it is not possible to apply what is shown in one period

1 " Elements of Pedagogy," pp. 84-93.

2 " We have a large group of psychic facts that vanish long before maturity is attained, and leave no sign." — Dr. G. Stanley Hall.

INTRODUCTION. 1 9

of child life to another period. The changes in child experiences are too great. It is doubtful whether the psychic manifestations of children before the age of five throw any clear light on the period of school training.

It further seems evident that child study can give results of scientific value only when carried on by observers specially fitted for the difficult work. No

^ •' Scientific

one but a practical psychologist is competent vaiue of to make a scientific study of a child, and still ^^"'^ ^'"^yhigher abihty and attainments are required to generalize the results of such study. In an article in the Forimt (August, 1900), Dr. G. Stanley Hall states that child study is now represented by two thousand books and articles well worth reading, " not comprising the yet larger mass of chaff." If more than half of the titles on child study are, in the judgment of so eminent an expert as Dr. Hall, ''chaff,'' what must be true of the still greater mass of unpublished papers, reports, etc., which have had a hearing in the past ten years } Has any expert yet appeared who is competent to detect and weed out the errors even in the titles declared by Dr. Hall to be worth reading } To most psychologists this seems an impossible task. The only course that promises success in obtaining reliable data for scientific purposes is to exclude all observations not made by competent experts. To the lay mind there is so far small promise that child study will ever give us a new psychology, and even the promised child psychology is in the future, and seemingly not a very near future. But we are told that "this is an expert problem, and only the opinions of experts have value."

But whatever may be true of the scientific results of child study, as now carried on, it is throwing some light, though not always dear or certain, on the training of the young. It is doing a great service by calling Its Practical needed attention to the physical defects of

Value. children, particularly those of sight and hearing, and many children thus afflicted are being relieved. It is disclosing the physical conditions of attention, the signs of fatigue,^ and other physiological facts of practical value, and it is giving new emphasis to the old truth that a knowledge of the individual pupil, not necessarily scientific, but personal and sympathetic, must guide in his training. But the most important results yet attained are indirect and incidental. These include the changed attitude and spirit of teachers, especially primary teachers, toward their pupils, and the increased mutual interest between the home and the school.

Since it is conceded by the best judges that the great mass of even recorded child observations are not trustworthy, it behooves teachers to be slow in their attempts to apply these observations in the training of children. It would seem wiser to wait until experts, who may be competent to separate the wheat from the chaff, have put reliable results into usable form. It will certainly be wise for teachers to pay little attention to generalizations based on syllabi averages, howsoever attractive they may appear.

Whatever may be the sources of psychical science, its facts hold a fundamental relation to the art of teaching.

1 The reported results of experiments to determine the facts respecting the mental fatigue of school children have been somewhat discredited by the more recent experiments of Dr. Thorndike {^Psychological Review^ November, 1900). It is doubtful whether we are yet in possession of any nexv facts of practical value in arranging the school program.

IN TR ODUC TION. 2 1

Psychology not only has light for the teacher, but its light is essential and guiding. It is an axiom of pedagogy that teaching, both in subject-matter and method, must be adapted to the capability of the Axiom of learner, but such adaptation is not possible Pedagogy, if the teacher be ignorant of the capability of his pupil. He must know not only the subject-matter to be taught, but also how the pupil can best acquire such knowledge. For these guiding facts he must go to psychology.

Every rational method of teaching presupposes that the pupil acquires knowledge in known ways, and that the several mental powers are developed in a known order. It is not claimed that these ways and this order are perfectly known. Modern psychical research is throwing new light upon these facts, so fundamental in teaching, and there is promise of clearer and fuller knowledge. Psychology has not spoken its last word.

Chapter II. Ends In Teaching

The first question in the art of teaching is the end to be attained. This is not only the first but the essential question. It largely determines means and methods and is the decisive test of their value. This will be made evident by a glance at several of the more obvious relations of the ends sought to the teaching process.

1. The end to be attained in teaching guides the process. There can be no skill in any art in the absence of End guides definite aims. The more clearly the end to the Process, "^g attained is seen, the greater the inspiring interest and the higher the skill. This is true in the simplest arts, as the pitching of a ball or a quoit, and it is eminently true in the art of teaching, the art of arts. All aimless teaching is poor, whatever may be the teacher's zeal. The end is the guiding ideal in teaching. Moreover, the result to be attained in a teaching exercise must be seen from the beginning, and every step of the process be thus guided. This will give unity to the exercise and secure concentration of effort, a necessary condition of successful teaching. Scatteration is not teaching.

As already shown (p. lo), ultimate ends may determine the comprehensive function of the school and its general course of training, but such ends are too objec-

ENDS IN TEACHING. 23

tive and remote to enter helpfully into the teaching process. The guiding ends in teaching must be definite, immediate, and subjective ; that is, they must Guiding be results wrought in the pupil. Moreover, ^"'^^• they must be true ends. A wrong end is always subversive of effort whatever may be its skill.

2. The end to be attained in teaching is a ^neasnre of success. A teaching exercise that attains the results sought is so far successful. In the absence Measure of of a definite end there can be no sure evidence success, of success, and, as a consequence, the satisfaction and inspiration which flow from conscious success are wanting. The teacher needs a sure and satisfying evidence of success, and this not only for encouragement, but also to make further progress possible.

It is not easy to overstate the importance of such a measure of success in teaching. At the close of every exercise the teacher needs to know whether he has succeeded or failed, and the degree of his success or failure. This is essential to the taking of the next step wisely. Aimless teaching is blind and sorry plodding. The teacher needs not only guidance, but also inspiration. In the absence of such inspiration teaching is " the sorriest of trades." It may be added that, while even the successful attainment of a wrong end in teaching is failure, the failure is in the wrong end sought, and not in its attainment.