1. ORGANIZATION AND ADAPTATION IN RECOGNITION OF THE INDIVIDUAL DIFFERENCES IN ABILITIES AND INTERESTS
If the school failures are to be substantially reduced, the teaching of the school subjects with the chief emphasis on the pupil must surely replace the practice of teaching the subjects primarily for their own sake. This 'subject first' treatment must give place to the 'pupil first' idea. No subject then will overshadow the pupil's welfare, and the pupil will not be subjected to the subject. Education in terms of subject-matter is well designed to produce a large crop of failures. Neither the addition or subtraction of subjects is urged primarily, but the adaptation and utilization of the school agencies so as to make the pupils as efficient and as productive as possible, by recognizing first of all their essential lack of uniformity in reference to capacities and interests,—not only as between different individuals, but in the same individual at different ages, at different stages of maturity, and in different kinds of subjects. This conception precludes the school employment of subjects and methods for all alike which are obviously better adapted to the younger than to the older. Neither does it overlook the fact that the attitude of more mature pupils toward authority and discipline is essentialy different from that of the younger boys and girls; that a subject congenial to some pupils will be intolerable and nearly if not quite impossible for others; or that an appeal designed mainly to reach the girls will not reach boys equally well. In brief, the treatment proposed here is neither radical nor novel, but it is simply the institution of applied psychology as pertaining to school procedure. What the more modern experimental psychology has established must be utilized in the school, at the expense of the more obsolete and traditional. Psychology now generally recognizes the existence of what the general school procedure implies does not exist, namely, the wide range of individual differences.
The situation clearly demands that our public schools shall not, by clinging to precedent and convention, fall notably behind industry and government in appropriating the fruits of modern scientific research. As the doctor varies the diet to the needs of each patient and each affliction, so must the school serve the intellectual and social needs of the pupils by such an organization and attitude that the selection of subjects for each pupil may take an actual and specific regard of the individual to be served. The change all important is not necessarily in the school subject or curriculum, but rather a change in the attitude as to how a subject shall be presented—to whom and by whom. The latter will also determine the character of the pupil's response and the subject's educational value to him. By securing a genuine response from the pupils a subject or course of study is thereby translated into pupil achievement and human results. The authority of the school is impotent to get these results by merely commanding them or by requiring all to pursue the same subject. An experience, in order to have truly educational value, must come within the range of the pupils comprehension and interest. Quoting Newman,[55a] "To get the most out of an experience there must be more or less understanding of its better possibilities. The social and ethical implications must somewhere and at some time be lifted very definitely into conscious understanding and volition." The pupil's responsiveness is then much more important both for securing results and for reducing failures than is any subject content or method that is not effective in securing a tolerable and satisfying sort of mental activity.