Essays On Education And Kindred Subjects (Fiscle Part- 11), Herbert Spencer [historical books to read .txt] 📗

To

Get Materials On Which To Exercise Its Perceptions As It Is To Get

Supplies For Its Stomach. Unable To Prepare Its Own Food, It Is In Like

Manner Unable To Reduce Many Kinds Of    Knowledge To A Fit Form For

Assimilation. The   Language Through Which All Higher Truths Are To Be

Gained, It Wholly Derives From Those Surrounding It. And We See In Such

An Example As The   Wild Boy Of    Aveyron, The   Arrest Of    Development That

Results When No Help Is Received From Parents And Nurses. Thus, In

Providing From Day To Day The   Right Kind Of    Facts, Prepared In The   Right

Manner, And Giving Them In Due Abundance At Appropriate Intervals, There

Is As Much Scope For Active Ministration To A Child's Mind As To Its

Body. In Either Case, It Is The   Chief Function Of    Parents To See That

The _Conditions_ Requisite To Growth Are Maintained. And As, In

Supplying Aliment, And Clothing, And Shelter, They May Fulfil This

Function Without At All Interfering With The   Spontaneous Development Of

The Limbs And Viscera, Either In Their Order Or Mode; So, They May

Supply Sounds For Imitation, Objects For Examination, Books For Reading,

Problems For Solution, And, If They Use Neither Direct Nor Indirect

Coercion, May Do This Without In Any Way Disturbing The   Normal Process

Of Mental Evolution; Or Rather, May Greatly Facilitate That Process.

Hence The   Admission Of    The   Doctrines Enunciated Does Not, As Some Might

Argue, Involve The   Abandonment Of    Teaching; But Leaves Ample Room For An

Active And Elaborate Course Of    Culture.

 

 

Passing From Generalities To Special Considerations, It Is To Be

Remarked That In Practice The   Pestalozzian System Seems Scarcely To Have

Fulfilled The   Promise Of    Its Theory. We Hear Of    Children Not At All

Interested In Its Lessons,--Disgusted With Them Rather; And, So Far As

We Can Gather, The   Pestalozzian School Have Not Turned Out Any Unusual

Proportion Of    Distinguished Men: If Even They Have Reached The   Average.

We Are Not Surprised At This. The   Success Of    Every Appliance Depends

Mainly Upon The   Intelligence With Which It Is Used. It Is A Trite

Remark That, Having The   Choicest Tools, An Unskilful Artisan Will Botch

His Work; And Bad Teachers Will Fail Even With The   Best Methods. Indeed,

The Goodness Of    The   Method Becomes In Such Case A Cause Of    Failure; As,

To Continue The   Simile, The   Perfection Of    The   Tool Becomes In

Undisciplined Hands A Source Of    Imperfection In Results. A Simple,

Unchanging, Almost Mechanical Routine Of    Tuition, May Be Carried Out By

The Commonest Intellects, With Such Small Beneficial Effect As It Is

Capable Of    Producing; But A Complete System--A System As Heterogeneous

In Its Appliances As The   Mind In Its Faculties--A System Proposing A

Special Means For Each Special End, Demands For Its Right Employment

Powers Such As Few Teachers Possess. The   Mistress Of    A Dame-School Can

Hear Spelling-Lessons; And Any Hedge-Schoolmaster Can Drill Boys In The

Multiplication-Table. But To Teach Spelling Rightly By Using The   Powers

Of The   Letters Instead Of    Their Names, Or To Instruct In Numerical

Combinations By Experimental Synthesis, A Modicum Of    Understanding Is

Needful; And To Pursue A Like Rational Course Throughout The   Entire

Range Of    Studies, Asks An Amount Of    Judgment, Of    Invention, Of

Intellectual Sympathy, Of    Analytical Faculty, Which We Shall Never See

Applied To It While The   Tutorial Official Is Held In Such Small Esteem.

True Education Is Practicable Only By A True Philosopher. Judge, Then,

What Prospect A Philosophical Method Now Has Of    Being Acted Out! Knowing

So Little As We Yet Do Of    Psychology, And Ignorant As Our Teachers Are

Of That Little, What Chance Has A System Which Requires Psychology For

Its Basis?

 

 

 

Further Hindrance And Discouragement Has Arisen From Confounding The

Pestalozzian Principle With The   Forms In Which It Has Been Embodied.

Because Particular Plans Have Not Answered Expectation, Discredit Has

Been Cast Upon The   Doctrine Associated With Them: No Inquiry Being Made

Part 1 Chapter 2 (Intellectual Education) Pg 27

Whether These Plans Truly Conform To The   Doctrine. Judging As Usual By

The Concrete Rather Than The   Abstract, Men Have Blamed The   Theory For

The Bunglings Of    The   Practice. It Is As Though The   First Futile Attempt

To Construct A Steam-Engine Had Been Held To Prove That Steam Could Not

Be Used As A Motive Power. Let It Be Constantly Borne In Mind That While

Right In His Fundamental Ideas, Pestalozzi Was Not Therefore Right In

All His Applications Of    Them. As Described Even By His Admirers,

Pestalozzi Was A Man Of    Partial Intuitions--A Man Who Had Occasional

Flashes Of    Insight Rather Than A Man Of    Systematic Thought. His First

Great Success At Stantz Was Achieved When He Had No Books Or Appliances

Of Ordinary Teaching, And When "The Only Object Of    His Attention Was To

Find Out At Each Moment What Instruction His Children Stood Peculiarly

In Need Of, And What Was The   Best Manner Of    Connecting It With The

Knowledge They Already Possessed." Much Of    His Power Was Due, Not To

Calmly Reasoned-Out Plans Of    Culture, But To His Profound Sympathy,

Which Gave Him A Quick Perception Of    Childish Needs And Difficulties. He

Lacked The   Ability Logically To Co-Ordinate And Develop The   Truths Which

He Thus From Time To Time Laid Hold Of; And Had In Great Measure To

Leave This To His Assistants, Kruesi, Tobler, Buss, Niederer, And

Schmid. The   Result Is, That In Their Details His Own Plans, And Those

Vicariously Devised, Contain Numerous Crudities And Inconsistencies. His

Nursery-Method, Described In _The Mother's Manual_, Beginning As It Does

With A Nomenclature Of    The   Different Parts Of    The   Body, And Proceeding

Next To Specify Their Relative Positions, And Next Their Connections,

May Be Proved Not At All In Accordance With The   Initial Stages Of    Mental

Evolution. His Process Of    Teaching The   Mother-Tongue By Formal Exercises

In The   Meanings Of    Words And In The   Construction Of    Sentences, Is Quite

Needless, And Must Entail On The   Pupil Loss Of    Time, Labour, And

Happiness. His Proposed Lessons In Geography Are Utterly Unpestalozzian.

And Often Where His Plans Are Essentially Sound, They Are Either

Incomplete Or Vitiated By Some Remnant Of    The   Old Regime. While,

Therefore, We Would Defend In Its Entire Extent The   General Doctrine

Which Pestalozzi Inaugurated, We Think Great Evil Likely To Result From

An Uncritical Reception Of    His Specific Methods. That Tendency,

Constantly Exhibited By Mankind, To Canonise The   Forms And Practices

Along With Which Any Great Truth Has Been Bequeathed To Them--Their

Liability To Prostrate Their Intellects Before The   Prophet, And Swear By

His Every Word--Their Proneness To Mistake The   Clothing Of    The   Idea For

The Idea Itself; Renders It Needful To Insist Strongly Upon The

Distinction Between The   Fundamental Principle Of    The   Pestalozzian

System, And The   Set Of    Expedients Devised For Its Practice; And To

Suggest That While The   One May Be Considered As Established, The   Other

Is Probably Nothing But An Adumbration Of    The   Normal Course. Indeed, On

Looking At The   State Of    Our Knowledge, We May Be Quite Sure That Is The

Case. Before Educational Methods Can Be Made To Harmonise In Character

And Arrangement With The   Faculties In Their Mode And Order Of    Unfolding,

It Is First Needful That We Ascertain With Some Completeness How The

Faculties _Do_ Unfold. At Present We Have Acquired, On This Point, Only

A Few General Notions. These General Notions Must Be Developed In

Detail--Must Be Transformed Into A Multitude Of    Specific Propositions,

Before We Can Be Said To Possess That _Science_ On Which The   _Art_ Of

Education Must Be Based. And Then, When We Have Definitely Made Out In

What Succession And In What Combinations The   Mental Powers Become

Active, It Remains To Choose Out Of    The   Many Possible Ways Of    Exercising

Each Of    Them, That Which Best Conforms To Its Natural Mode Of    Action.

Evidently, Therefore, It Is Not To Be Supposed That Even Our Most

Advanced Modes Of    Teaching Are The   Right Ones, Or Nearly The   Right Ones.

 

 

 

Bearing In Mind Then This Distinction Between The   Principle And The

Practice Of    Pestalozzi, And Inferring From The   Grounds Assigned That The

Last Must Necessarily Be Very Defective, The   Reader Will Rate At Its

True Worth The   Dissatisfaction With The   System Which Some Have

Expressed; And Will See That The   Realisation Of    The   Pestalozzian Idea

Remains To Be Achieved. Should He Argue, However, From What Has Just

Been Said, That No Such Realisation Is At Present Practicable, And That

All Effort Ought To Be Devoted To The   Preliminary Inquiry; We Reply,

That Though It Is Not Possible For A Scheme Of    Culture To Be Perfected

Either In Matter Or Form Until A Rational Psychology Has Been

Established, It Is Possible, With The   Aid Of    Certain Guiding Principles,

To Make Empirical Approximations Towards A Perfect Scheme. To Prepare

The Way For Further Research We Will Now Specify These Principles. Some

Of Them Have Been More Or Less Distinctly Implied In The   Foregoing

Pages; But It Will Be Well Here To State Them All In Logical Order.

 

 

 

1. That In Education We Should Proceed From The   Simple To The   Complex,

Is A Truth Which Has Always Been To Some Extent Acted Upon: Not

Professedly, Indeed, Nor By Any Means Consistently. The   Mind Develops.

Like All Things That Develop It Progresses From The   Homogeneous To The

Heterogeneous; And A Normal Training System, Being An Objective

Counterpart Of    This Subjective Process, Must Exhibit A Like Progression.

Moreover, Thus Interpreting It, We May See That This Formula Has Much

Wider Application Than At First Appears. For Its _Rationale_ Involves,

Not Only That We Should Proceed From The   Single To The   Combined In The

Teaching Of    Each Branch Of    Knowledge; But That We Should Do The   Like

With Knowledge As A Whole. As The   Mind, Consisting At First Of    But Few

Active Faculties, Has Its Later-Completed Faculties Successively Brought

Into Play, And Ultimately Comes To Have All Its Faculties In

Simultaneous Action; It Follows That Our Teaching Should Begin With But

Few Subjects At Once, And Successively Adding To These, Should Finally

Carry On All Subjects Abreast. Not Only In Its Details Should Education

Proceed From The   Simple To The   Complex, But In Its _Ensemble_ Also.

 

 

 

2. The   Development Of    The   Mind, As All Other Development, Is An Advance

From The   Indefinite To The   Definite. In Common With The   Rest Of    The

Organism, The   Brain Reaches Its Finished Structure Only At Maturity; And

In Proportion As Its Structure Is Unfinished, Its Actions Are Wanting In

Precision. Hence Like The   First Movements And The   First Attempts At

Speech, The   First Perceptions And Thoughts Are Extremely Vague. As From

A Rudimentary Eye, Discerning Only The   Difference Between Light And

Darkness, The   Progress Is To An Eye That Distinguishes Kinds And

Gradations Of    Colour, And Details Of    Form, With The   Greatest Exactness;

So, The   Intellect As A Whole And In Each Faculty, Beginning With The

Rudest Discriminations Among Objects And Actions, Advances Towards

Discriminations Of    Increasing Nicety And Distinctness. To This General

Law Our Educational Course And Methods Must Conform. It Is Not

Practicable, Nor Would It Be Desirable If Practicable, To Put Precise

Ideas Into The   Undeveloped Mind. We May Indeed At An Early Age

Communicate The   Verbal Forms In Which Such Ideas Are Wrapped Up; And

Teachers, Who Habitually Do This, Suppose That When The   Verbal Forms

Have Been Correctly Learnt, The   Ideas Which Should Fill Them Have Been

Acquired. But A Brief Cross-Examination Of    The   Pupil Proves The

Contrary. It Turns Out Either That The   Words Have Been Committed To

Memory With Little Or No Thought About Their Meaning, Or Else That The

Perception Of    Their Meaning Which Has Been Gained Is A Very Cloudy One.

Only As The   Multiplication Of    Experiences Gives Materials For Definite

Conceptions--Only As Observation Year By Year Discloses The   Less

Conspicuous Attributes Which Distinguish Things And Processes Previously