AN EDUCATIONAL PIONEER.
It would be difficult to find a more unique or more interesting educational body than the so-called Brothers of the Christian Schools. Founded some two hundred years ago by the venerable John Baptist de la Salle, on lines which the best schools of to-day have not hesitated to adopt, the influence of this Institute has spread over all the civilised, and even to some regions of the uncivilised world. Its extension to Great Britain is but of recent date, and only seven schools have as yet been inaugurated. The thoroughness and practical value of the instruction given are mainly due to a strict adherence to the ‘object’ lesson principle.
Hitherto, we have been accustomed to associate this with the Kindergarten ideas of Pestalozzi and Froebel; but although their efforts to lighten the intellectual labours of the young were mainly instrumental in bringing ‘playwork’ to its present perfection, recent researches have shown that the venerable Dr de la Salle in his educational plan strongly urged that pupils should be taken to exhibitions and so forth, where their masters could give practical illustrations of special studies. Zoological or botanical gardens were in this way to be visited, that the uses and benefits of certain animals or plants might be demonstrated; and school museums, herbaria, geological, mineralogical, and other collections were afterwards to be formed by the pupils themselves. And not only did De la Salle institute object-teaching, but he was also the first to introduce class methods. Before his time, children were for the most part taught individually, or, where this was not so, large numbers were collected in one room, each in turn going to the teacher to have separate instruction, whilst the others were allowed to remain idle, free to torment one another or the little victim at the master’s table. Great care was taken by De la Salle in examining and placing the children committed to his care in the classes best fitted for them; and the success of his method was so great, that the numerous schools opened by the Brothers under his direction soon became overcrowded.
His great object was to reach the poor, and to train them to a knowledge of a holy life and an independent livelihood. The opposition he met with was at times very great. The ire of professional writing-masters was first aroused; the poor had necessarily been debarred from learning to write, because only the well-to-do could afford the stipulated fees, and writing-masters were therefore employed to do all the correspondence of those who could not write. So, when De la Salle undertook to teach every child who came to him what had been in some senses a secret art, their fury vented itself in an opposition so overpowering that they drove the Brothers from their schools in Paris and threw their furniture into the streets. The opposition was only temporary, however; and as time passed, fresh schools were opened, not only in France and her colonies, but in every European country, and many parts of America, as well as in one or two districts of Asia and Africa.
The Institute of the Brothers of the Christian Schools, though nominally Roman Catholic, is truly catholic in its widest sense, for, besides admitting children of every religious denomination, secular learning is admirably provided for. Their greatest successes have perhaps been achieved in the art of writing and drawing, as applied to all technical industries and art products. One illustration of the results of their method of teaching writing in a remote region where the pupils are not the easiest to train, may be cited as an example. When the treaty of commerce between France and Madagascar in 1868 was about to be signed, Queen Ranavalona was much struck by the beautiful caligraphy of the copy presented to her by the Chancellor of the French Consulate, and she determined that hers should not be inferior. The pupils in all the chief schools in the island furnished examples of handwriting to the queen’s prime-minister, but without satisfying her taste. At last, an officer who had seen the Brothers’ schools suggested that one of their pupils should compete. A young boy, Marc Rabily-Kely, sent in some beautiful specimens of different styles of writing; and the copying of the treaty was at once intrusted to him. When the two copies were presented side by side, a murmur of applause went round at the sight of Queen Ranavalona’s copy, and all cried out: ‘Resy ny vasoha’ (The whites are beaten). This is only one instance among many, and shows how much can be done by systematic training in the art of writing, a subject much neglected in the majority of schools.
But De la Salle did not stop short at educating the poor; he was the first to found training colleges for masters, and the first to institute regular boarding-schools in which everything relating to commerce, finance, military engineering, architecture, and mathematics was taught, and in which trades could be learned. Besides these, he founded an institution in which agriculture was taught as a science. At St Yon, where the first agricultural school was started, a large garden was devoted to the culture of specimens of fodder-plants, injurious plants, grain, plants peculiar to certain soils, fruits and flowers. The students of to-day study all this, and in addition to working on model farms, visit all the best farms around, are sent with special professors to attend certain markets and sales of live-stock, and have special field-days for practically studying botany, geology, and entomology. The innovations introduced by De la Salle extended to other matters than practical education. Before French boys in his day were allowed to study their own language, they were obliged to learn to read Latin, and thus years were sometimes spent in acquiring a certain facility in reading a language they never understood. De la Salle changed all this, in spite of repeated opposition, and succeeded in making the vernacular tongue the basis of their teaching instead of Latin. Owing to this change, the poor scholars progressed much more rapidly than those in other schools, and the Brothers’ Institutes were soon far ahead of all the elementary schools of their day. The way in which they have held their position even till to-day is shown by the results of the public examinations in Paris during the last thirty-five years. Out of sixteen hundred and thirty-five scholarships offered during this time, pupils of these schools have obtained thirteen hundred and sixteen. This in itself is an enormous proportion; but it is even greater than it appears, when we consider that seculars had more schools, fewer pupils per teacher, and thus a better chance to advance the individual scholar, and as a rule, a richer class of scholars to select from. These scholarship examinations have recently been discontinued, though not until after the Brothers’ pupils were excluded from competition in consequence of the so-called ‘laicisation’ of schools in 1880, after which the Brothers of Paris gave up their government schools and opened voluntary ones.
The whole educational scheme of De la Salle was admirably complete; but perhaps the most interesting feature of the whole—now that we are familiarised with his systems for teaching special subjects by their spread in their original or a modified form to most European countries—was his very simple plan for enforcing discipline. He was always loath to believe unfavourable accounts of any pupil, and in the first place took pains to discover whether the failings were the result of the misdirection of those in authority or of the pupil’s own wilfulness. When there was evidently a necessity for punishment, the culprit was put in a quiet and fairly comfortable cell. Once shut in alone, his notice was attracted to stands obviously intended for flowers, to empty cages and other things which reminded the little prisoner that there were good and beautiful enjoyments for those who deserved them. One of the first questions the boys generally asked was why there were nails for pictures, cages for birds, &c., and yet neither pictures nor birds. In answer, they were told that as they improved they would be supplied with all these good things; that if they left off using profane or bad language, a bird would be put in the cage; that as soon as they became industrious and worked well, their prison vases would be adorned with flowers; that when they acknowledged their previous wrong-doing, pleasant pictures would be hung on the panels; that when their repentance was seen to be sincere, they would rejoin their schoolfellows; and that in time they would be allowed to go back to their families.
The system worked so well, and is still found to succeed so thoroughly, that it is almost a wonder it has not become more general. It has certainly many advantages over the plan of giving boys so many hundred lines to write, which is a mere task, soon forgotten, and benefiting no one. But as there are only seven schools, and those of very recent foundation, in England, we may perhaps still have to wait before hearing that this discipline is at all general. In the meantime, all interested in the training of the young might derive valuable hints from studying this and other methods initiated by the pioneer of popular education not only in France, but in all Europe.