The elements of general method

Preface

THE Herbart school of Pedagogy has created much stir in Germany in the last thirty years. It has developed a large number of vigorous writers on all phases of education and psychology, and numbers a thousand or more positive disciples among the energetic teachers of Germany.

Those American teachers and students who have come in contact with the ideas of this school have been greatly stimulated.

In such a miscellaneous and many-sided thing as practical education it is deeply gratifying to find a clear and definite leading purpose that prevails throughout and a set of mutually related and supporting principles, which in practice contribute to the realization of this purpose.

The following chapters can not be regarded as a full, exact and painfully scientific account of Herbartian ideas, but as a simple explanation of their leading principles in their relations to each other and in their application to our own school problems.

It gives me pleasure to acknowledge the friendly encouragement of Dr. Wilhelm Rein, Professor of Pedagogy at the University of Jena. It is the author's judgment that his lectures, practice-school, and Seminar furnish the

4 PREFACE.

best opportunity for the study of common-school work both theoretically and practically.

"Die acht Schuljahren," of Dr. Rein, an extensive work covering the eight grades of the public school, are a rich fund of materials from which I have freely drawn.

In the last chapter extensive extracts from Rein's "Das erste Schuljahr" and Wiget's "Die formalen Stuphen des Unterrichts" have been incorporated.

Chapter I. The Chief Aim Of Education

What is the central purpose of education? If we include under this term all the things commonly assigned to it, its many phases as represented by the great variety of teachers and pupils, the many branches of knowledge and the various and even conflicting methods in bringing up children, it is difficult to find a definition sufficiently broad and definite to compass its meaning. In fact we shall not attempt in the beginning to make a definition. We are in search not so much of a comprehensive definition as of a central truth, a key to the situation, an aim that will simplify and brighten all the work of teachers. Keeping in view the end from the beginning, we need a central organizing principle which shall dictate for teacher and pupil the highway over which they shall travel together.

We will assume at least that education means the whole bringing up of a child from infancy to maturity, not simply his school training. The reason for this assumption is that home, school, companions, environment and natural endowment, working through a series of years, produce a character which is a unit as the resultant of these different influences and growths. Again we are compelled to assume that this aim, whatever it is, is the same for all.

Now what will the average man, picked up at random, say to our question? What is the chief end in the education of your son? A farmer wishes his boy to read, write and cipher so as to meet successfully the needs of a farmer's life. The merchant in town desires that his boy get a wider reach of knowledge and experience so as to succeed in a livelier sort of business competition. A university professor would lay out a liberal course of training for his son so as to prepare him for intellectual pursuits among scholars and people of culture. This utilitarian view, which points to success in life in the ordinary sense, is the prevailing one. We could probably sum up the wishes of a great majority of the common people by saying, "They desire to give their children through education a better chance in life than they themselves have had. " Yet even these people, if pressed to give reasons, would admit that the purely utilitarian view is a low one and that there is something better for every boy and girl than the mere ability to make a successful living.

Turn for a moment to the great systems of education which have held their own for centuries and examine their aims. The Jesuits, the Humanists and the Natural Scientists. They all claimed to be liberal, cultivating and preparatory to great things, yet we only need to quote from the histories of education to show their narrowness and incompleteness. The training of the Jesuits was linguistic and rhetorical, and almost entirely apart from our present notion of human development. The Humanists or Classicists, who for so many centuries constituted the educational elite, belonged to the past with its glories. Though standing in the present they were almost blind to the great problems and opportunities it offered. They stood in bold contrast to the growth of the modern spirit in history, literature arid natural science. But in spite of their predominating influence over

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education for centuries there has never been the shadow of a chance for making the classics of antiquity the basis of common, popular education. The modern school of Natural Scientists is just as one-sided as the Humanists in supposing that human nature is narrow enough to be compressed within the bonds of natural science studies.

But the systems of education in vogue have always lagged behind the clear views of educational reformers. Two hundred fifty years ago Comenius projected a plan of education for every boy and girl of the common people. His aim was to teach all men all things from the highest truths of religion to the commonest things of daily experience. Being a man of simple and profound religious faith, religion and morality were at the foundation of his system. But even the principles of intellectual training so clearly advocated by Comenius have not yet found a ready hearing among teachers, to say nothing of his great moral-religious purpose. ^ Among later writers Locke, Rousseau and Pestalozzi have set up ideals of education that have had much influence. But Locke's "gentleman" can never be the ideal of all because it is intrinsically aristocratic and education has become with us broadly democratic. After all, Locke's "gentleman" is a noble ideal and should powerfully impress teachers. The perfect human animal that Rousseau dreamed of in the Emile, is best illustrated in the noble savage, but we are not in danger of adopting this ideal. In spite of his merits the noblest savage falls short in a hundred ways. Yet it is important in education to perfect the animal development in every child. Pestalozzi touched the hearts of even the weakest and morally frailest children, and tried to make intellectual culture contribute to heart culture, or rather to combine the two in strong moral characters. He came close upon the highest aim of education and was able to illustrate his doctrine in practice. The educational reformers have gone far ahead of the schoolmasters in setting up a high aim in education.

Let us examine a few well-known definitions of education by great thinkers, and try to discover a central idea.

"The purpose of education is to give to the body and to the soul all the beauty and all the perfection of which they are capable." — Plato.

"Education includes 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." — John Stuart Mill

"Education is the preparation for complete living." — Herbert Spencer.

"Education is the harmonious and equable evolution of the human faculties by a method based upon the nature of the mind for developing all the faculties of the soul, for stirring up and nourishing all the principles of life, while shunning all one-sided culture and taking account of the sentiments upon which the strength and worth of men depend." — Stein.

"Education is the sum of the reflective efforts by which we aid nature in the development of the physical, intellectual and moral faculties of man in view of his perfection, his happiness, and his social destination." — Cornpay re.

These attempts to bring the task of education into a comprehensive scientific formula are of interest and are yet disappointing. They agree in giving great breadth to education. But in the attempt to be comprehensive.

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to omit nothing, they fail to specify that wherein the true worth of man consists; they fail to bring out into relief the highest aim as an organizing idea in its complicated work.

We desire therefore to approach nearer to this problem. What is the highest aim of education?

We will do so by an inquiry into the aims and tendencies of our public schools. To an outward observer the schools of to-day confine their attention almost exclusively to intellectual training, to the mental discipline and power that come from a varied and vigorous exercise of the faculties. The great majority of good schoolmasters stand squarely upon this platform. But they are none the less deeply conscious that this is not the highest aim of education. We scarcely need to be told that a person may be fully equipped with the best that this style of education can give, and still remain a criminal. A good and wise parent will inevitably seek for a better result in his child than mere intellectual ability and power. All good schoolmasters know that behind school studies and cares is the still greater task of developing manly and womanly character. Perhaps, however, this is too high and sacred a thing to formulate. Perhaps in the attempt to reduce it to a scientific form we^ should lose its spirit. Admitting that strong moral character is the noblest result of right training, is it not still incidental to the regular school work? Perhaps it lies in the teacher and in his manner of treating subjects and not in the subject-matter itself.

This is exactly the point at which we wish to apply the lever and to lift into prominence' the moral characterbuilding aim a§ the central one in education. This aim should be like a loadstone, attracting and subordinating to GENERAL METHOD.

all other purposes to itself. It should dominate in the choice, arrangement and method of studies. Let us examine more carefully the convictions upon which the moral aim rests. Every wise and benevolent parent knows that the first and last question to ask and answer regarding a child is "What are his moral quality and strength? " Now, who is better able to judge of the true aim than thoughtful and solicitous parents? In the second place, it is inconceivable that a conscientious teacher should close his eyes to all except the intellectual training of his pupils. It is as natural for him to touch and awaken the moral qualities as it is for birds to sing. Again, the state is more concerned to see the growth of just and virtuous citizens than in seeing the prosperity of scholars, inventors and merchants. It is also concerned with the success of the latter, but chiefly when their knowledge, skill and wealth are equaled by their virtues. Our country may have vast resources and great opportunities, but everything in the end depends upon the moral quality of its men and women. Undermine and corrupt this and we all know that there is nothing to hope for. The perpetual enticement and blandishment of worldly success so universal in our time can not move us if we found one theory and practice upon the central doctrine of moral education. Education, therefore, in its popular, untrammeled, moral sense is the greatest concern of society.

In projecting a general plan of popular education we are beholden to the prejudices of no man nor class of men. Not even the traditional prejudices of the great body of teachers should stand in the way of setting up the noblest ideal of education. Educational thinkers are in duty bound to free themselves from utilitarian notions

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and narrowness, and to. adopt the best platform that children by natural birthright can stand upon. They are called upon to find the best and to apply it to as many as possible. Let it be remembered that each child has a complete growth before him. His own possibilities and not the attainments of his parents and elders are the things to consider.

Shall we seek to avoid responsibility for the moral aim by throwing it upon the family and the church? But the more we probe into educational problems the more we shall find the essential unity of all educational forces. If asked to define the relation of the school to the home we shall quickly see that they are one in spirit and leading purpose, that instead of being separated they should be brought closer together. They are the two sides of the shield.

In conclusion, therefore, shall we make moral charac-'^ ter the clear and conscious aim of school education, and then subordinate school studies and discipline, mental training and conduct to this aim? It will be a great stimulus to thousands of teachers to discover that this is the real purpose of school work, and that there are abundant means not yet utilized of realizing it. Having once firmly grasped this idea, they will find that there is no other having half its potency. It will put a substantial foundation under educational labors, both theoretical and practical, which will make them the noblest of enterprises.

Is it reasonable to suppose that the rank and file of our teachers will realize the importance of this aim in teaching so long as it has no recognition in our public system of instruction? The moral element is largely present among educators as an instinct^ but it ought to be evolved into a clear 2->'^(^rpose with definite means of accomplishment. It is an open secret in fact, that while our public instruction is ostensibly secular, having nothing to do directly with religion or morals, there is nothing about which good teachers are more thoughtful and anxious than about the means of moral influence. Occasionally some one from the outside attacks our public schools as without morals and godless, but there is no lack of stauncti defenders on moral grounds. Theoretically and even practically, to a considerable extent, we are all agreed upon the great value of moral education. But there is a striking inconsistency in our whole position on the school problem. While the supreme value of the moral aim will be generally admitted, it has no open recognition in our school course, either as a principal or as a subordinate aim of instruction. Moral education is not germane to the avowed purposes of the public school. If it gets in at all it is by the back door. It is incidental, not primary.

How to establish the moral aim in the center of the school course, how to subordinate and realize the other educational aims while keeping this chiefly in view, how to make instruction and school discipline contribute unitedly to the formation of vigorous moral character, and how to unite home, school and other life experiences of a child in perfecting the one great aim of education, are some of the problems whose solution will be sought in the following chapters.

It will be especially our purpose to show how school instruction can be brought into the direct service of character-building. This is the point upon which most teachers are skeptical. In one whole set of school studies, and that the most important (reading, literature and his-

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tory), there is opportunity through all the grades for a vivid and direct cultivation of moral ideas and convictions. The second great series of studies, the natural sciences, come in to support the moral aims, while the personal example and influence of the teacher, and the common experiences and incidents of school life and conduct give abundant occasion to apply and enforce moral ideas.

That the other justifiable aims of education, such as physical training, mental discipline, orderly habits, gentlemanly conduct, practical utility of knowledge, liberal culture, and the free development of individuality will not be weakened by placing the moral aim in th^ forefront of educational motives, we are convinced. To some extent these questions will be discussed in the following pages.

The importance of making the leading aim of education clear to teachers, is great. If their conviction on this point is not clear they will certainly not concentrate their attention and efforts upon its realization. Again, in a business like education, where there are so many important and necessary results to be reached, it is very easy and common to put forward a subordinate aim, and to lift it into undue prominence, even allowing it to swallow up all the energies of teacher and pupils. Owing to this diversity of opinions among teachers as to the results to be reached, our public schools exhibit a chaos of conflicting theory and practice, and a numberless brood of hobby-riders.

Chapter II. Relative Value Of Studies

Having established the leading aim of education, it remains to inquire into the relative value of different studies and their adaptability to accomplish this aim. As measured upon this cardinal purpose what is the intrinsic value of each of the school studies and what the amount of time that should be consumed by each? These questions are not new. Since the time of Comenius, to say the least, they have seriously disturbed educators. But few have had the courage, industry and breadth of mind of a Comenius, to sound the educational waters and to lay out a profitable chart. In spite of Comenius' labors, however, and those of other educational reformers, be they never so energetic, practical progress toward a final answer, as registered in school courses, has been extremely slow.

Herbert Spencer says: "If there needs any further evidence of the rude, undeveloped character of our education, we have it in the fact that the comparative worths of the different kinds of knowledge have been as yet scarcely even discussed, much less discussed in a methodic way with definite results. Not only is it that no standard of relative values has yet been agreed upon, but the existence of any such staiidard has not been conceived in any clear manner. And not only is it that the existence of such a standard has not been clearly conceived, but the need of it seems to have been scarcely even felt. Men read books on this topic and attend lectures upon that, decide that their children shall be instructed in these branches and not in those; and all under guidance of mere custom, or liking, or prejudice, without ever considering the enormous importance of determining in some rational way what things are really most worth learning. * * ^ * * Men dress their children's minds as they do their bodies, in the prevailing fashion."

Spencer certainly does not solve the problem. It can scarcely be said that any Englishman or American has seriously grappled with it. G-reat changes and reforms indeed have been started, especially within the last fifty years, but they have been undertaken under the pressure of general popular demands and have resulted in comprom-ises between traditional forces and urgent popular needs. A fair philosophical inquiry into the relative merit of studies and their adaptability to nurture mental and moral qualities has not been made.

The Germans have worked to a better purpose. Quite a number of able thinkers among them have given their best years to the study of this problem of relative educational values and to a working out of its results. Herbart, Ziller, Stoy and Rein have been deeply interested in philosophy and psychology as life long teachers of these subjects at the University, but in their practice schools in the same place they also stood daily face to face with the primary difficulties of ordinary teaching. At the outset, and before laying out a course of study, they were compelled to meet and settle the aim of education and the problem of relative values. Having answered these questions to their own satisfaction, they proceeded to work out in detail a common school course.

The Herbart school of teachers has presumed to call its interpretation of educational ideas "scientific pedagogy," a somewhat pretentious name in view of the fact that many leading educators in Germany, England and elsewhere deny the existence of such a science. The exposition of principles that follows is chiefly derived from them.

With us the present time is favorable ' to a rational inquiry into relative educational values and to a thorough-going application of the results to school courses and methods.

In the first place the old classical monopoly is finally and completely broken, at least so far as the common school is concerned. It ruled education for several centuries, but now even its methods of discipline are losing their antique hold. The natural sciences, modern history and literature have assumed an equal place with the old classical studies in college courses. Freed from old traditions and prejudice our common school is now grounded in the vernacular, in the national history and literature, and in home geography and natural science. Its roots go deep into native soil. Secondly^ the door of the common school has been thrown open to the new studies and they have entered in a troop. History, drawing, natural science, modern literature, and physical culture have been added to the old reading, writing and arithmetic. The common school was never so untrammeled. It is free to absorb into its course the select materials of the best studies. Teachers really enjoy more freedom in selecting and arranging subjects and in introducing new thiugs, than they know how to make use of. There is no one in high authority to check the reform spirit and even local boards are often among the advocates of change. In the third place^ by multiplying studies, the common school course has grown more complex and heterogeneous. The old reading, writing, arithmetic and grammar could not be shelved for the sake of the new studies and the same amount of time must be divided now among many branches. It is not to be wondered at if all the studies are treated in a shallow and fragmentary way. Some of the new studies, especially, are not well taught. There is less of unity in higher education now than there was before the classical studies lost their supremacy. Our common school course has become a batch of miscellanies.' We are iu danger of overloading pupils, as well as of making a superficial hodge-podge of all branches. There is imperative need for sifting the studies according to their value, as well as for bringing them into right connexion and dependence upon one another. Fourthly, since we are in the midst of such a breaking-up period, we need to take our bearings. In order to avoid mistakes and excesses there is a call for deep, impartial and many-sided thinking on educational problems. Supposing that we know what the controlling aim of education is, we are next led to inquire about and to determine the relative value of studies as tributary to this aim.

It is not however our purpose to give an original solution to this problem and to those which follow it. We must decline to attempt a philosophical inquiry into fundamental principles and their origin. Ours is the humbler task of explaining and applying principles already worked out by others, that is, to give the results of Herbartian pedagogy as applied to our schools.

Instead of discussing the many branches of study one after another, it will be well to make a broad division of them into three classes and observe the marked features and value of each. First, history^ including the subject matter of reading, history'', story and other parts of literature. Second, the natural sciences. Third, the

formal studies, grammar, writing, much of arithmetic and the symbols used in reading.

The first two open up the great fields of real knowledge and experience, the world of man and of external nature, the two great reservoirs of interesting facts. We will first examine these two fields and consider their value as constituent parts of the school course.

"^^ History, in our present sense, includes what we usually understand by it, as U. S. history, modern and ancient history, also biography, tradition, fiction as expressing human life in the novel or romance, and historical and literary masterpieces of all sorts so far as they delineate man's experience and character. In a still broader sense history includes language as the expression of men's thoughts and feelings. But this is the formal side of history with which we are not at present concerned. History deals with men's motives and actions as individuals or in society, with their dispositions, habits and institutions, and with the monuments and literature they have left.

The relations of men to each other and to society give rise to morals. Whether in the life of David or of Shylock, or of the people whom they represent, the study of men is primarily a study of morals. It is in the hardships, struggles and mutual contact of men that motives and moral impulses are observed and judged. We are chiefly interested to know what qualities of mind and heart, for example, were shown by such men as Bunyan, William the Silent, or John Qiiincy Adams. Although history has many uses, its best influence is in illustrating and inculcating moral ideas. It will strike most teachers as a surprise to say that the chief use of history study is to form moral notions in children. We have not so regarded nor used history. It has been generally looked upon as a body of useful information that any intelligent person must possess. But there is no doubt that moral and religious dispositions are the best fruitage and test of value in men. Important economic, political and social questions also rest in the end upon moral principles. Some of the best historical materials (from biography, tradition and fiction) should be absorbed by children in each grade as an essential part of the substratum of moral ideas. This implies more than a collection of historical stories in a supplementary reader for intermediate grades. It means that history in the broad sense is to be an important study in ev^ry grade and that it shall become a center and reservoir from which reading books and language lessons draw their supplies. These biographies, stories and historical episodes must be the best which cur history and classic literature can furnish and whatever is of like virtue in the life of other kindred peoples, of England, Germany, Greece, etc.

If history in this sense can be made a strong auxiliary to moral education in common schools, the whole body of earnest teachers will be gratified. For there is no theme among them of such perennial interest and depth of meaning as moral culture in schools. The everrecurring, emphatic refrain from them is ^'■the example of the teacher;'' and surely there is no such means of instilling moral ideas as the presence and inspiration of a high-toned teacher. But after all he is only a guide. "He lures to brighter worlds and leads the way." No teacher can feel that he embodies in himself, except in a very imperfect way, the strong moral ideas that have made the history of good men worth reading. No matter what resources he may have in his own character, the teacher needs to employ forces which lie outside of himself, ideals toward which he struggles and toward which he inspires and leads others. In this sense it is a mistake to center all attention upon the conduct of the teacher. It is better for pupil and teacher to enter into the companionship of common aims and ideals. When these inspirations and aims have gradually changed into tendencies and habits, a child is morally full-fledged. It is, indeed, high ground upon which to land a youth, or aid in landing him, but it is clearly in view.

The common school age is the formative period. At six a child is morally immature, at fifteen the die has been stamped. This youthful wilderness must be crossed. We can't turn back. There is no other way of reaching the promised land. But there are rebellions and baitings and disorderly scenes.

Isn't there a quicker and easier way? The most speedily constructed road across this region is a short treatise on morals for teacher and pupils. In this way it is possible to have all the virtues and faults tabulated, and labeled and transferred in brief space to the minds of the children. But no such paved road is worth anything. We have tried it a dozen times in much less important fields of knowledge than morals. It has been demonstrated, for example, in our high schools during a series of years that botany, chemistry, physics and geology cannot be properly taught by such brief scientific compendia of rules and principles. "Words, words, words," as Hamlet said. We cannot learn geography from definitions and map questions, nor morals from catechisms. And just as in the fields of natural science we are resorting perforce to plants, animals and natural phenomena, so in morals we turn to the deeds and lives of men. We must get at moral ideas without moralizing, and drink in moral convictions without resorting to moral platitudes. Educators are losing faith in words, definitions and classifications. It is getting to be a truism that one can't learn chemistry and zoology from books alone or chiefly.

A little reflection will show that we are only demanding object lessons in the field of moral education, extensive, systematic, all-pervading object lessons, choice experiences and episodes from human life, painted in natural colors as shown by our best history and literature. To appreciate the virtues and vices, to sympathize with better impulses, we must travel beyond words and definitions till we come in contact with the personal deeds that first give rise to them. To get the impress of kindness we must see an act of kindness and feel the glow it produces. When Sir Philip Sidney, wounded on the battle field and suffering with thirst, reached out his hand for the cup of water that was brought, his glance fell upon a dying soldier who viewed the cup with great desire, Sidney handed him the water with the words, "Thy necessity is greater than mine." No one can refuse his approval for this act. After telling the story of the man who went down to Jericho, and fell among thieves, and then of the priest, the Levite and the Samaritan who passed that way, Jesus put the question to his critic, "Who was neighbor to him that fell among thieves ? " And the answer came even from unwilling lips, "He that showed mercy." Such moral judgments —2 as these spring up naturally and surely when we understand clearly the circumstances under which an act was performed. On the other hand it is natural to condemn wro7ig deeds when presented clearly and objectively in the action of another. Nero caused Christians to be falsely accused and then to be condemned to the claws of wild beasts in the arena. When cruelty is practiced against the innocent and helpless we condemn the act. But later the judgment must react upon our own conduct. When Columbus was thrown into chains instead of being rewarded, we condemn the Spaniards. In such cases it is possible to observe how moral judgments origincite and by repetition grow into convictions. In the same way the real world of persons about us, the acts of parents, companions and teachers are powerful in giving a good or bad tone to our sentiments, because, as living object lessons, their impress is directly and constantly upon us.