In The School-room.
[Footnote 25]
[Footnote 25: In the School-Room; Chapters in the Philosophy of Education. John S. Hart, LL.D., Principal of the New Jersey State Normal School. Eldredge & Brother: Philadelphia.
The Scientific Basis of Education, demonstrated by an analysis of the temperaments and of phrenological facts, in a series of letters to the Department of Public Instruction in the city of New York. By John Hecker. Published by the Author, 56 Rutgers Street, New York.]
The author of this volume has evidently spent much time in the school-room, and has not spent it in vain. He writes like a practical man, in a clear, vigorous style. As he says in his preface, he takes "a pretty free range over the whole practical field of inquiry among professional teachers, and presents to us thoughts suggested in the school-room itself in short, detached chapters." The work is not a philosophy of education, but rather a laudable attempt to contribute something toward it.
In the first chapter, on "What is Teaching?" he brings out forcibly the truth that teaching is not simply telling, nor is talking to a class necessarily teaching, as experience shows that a class may be told a thing twenty times over, and talked to in the most fluent manner, and still make little advancement in knowledge.
This truth deserves more attention from those engaged in teaching. The work of universal education which is required in our country is so vast, that necessity has forced many to assume the office of teachers who have very little knowledge of what teaching is. "Teaching," as the author well says, "is causing one to know. Now, no one can be made to know a thing but by the act of his own powers. His own senses, his own memory, his own powers of reason, perception, and judgment must be exercised. The function of the teacher is to bring about this exercise of the pupil's faculties."
The second chapter, on "The Art of Questioning," states that a "most important and difficult part" of the teacher's art is to know how to ask a question, but he gives none of the principles that underlie the art. The earnest reader will say: If so much depends on skilful questioning, why does he not tell us how to do it? The little work of J. G. Filch, M.A., on The Art of Questioning appears to us much more philosophical and satisfactory. According to him, questions as employed by teachers may be divided into three classes, according to the purposes which they may be intended to serve. There is, first, the preliminary or experimental question, by which an instructor feels his way, sounds the depths of his pupil's knowledge, and prepares him for the reception of what it is designed to teach.
There is, secondly, the question employed in actual instruction, by means of which the thoughts of the learner are exercised, and he is compelled, so to speak, to take a share in giving himself the lesson.
Thirdly, there is the question of examination, by which a teacher tests his own work, after he has given a lesson, and ascertains whether it has been soundly and thoroughly learned. By this method, as an eminent teacher has said, one first questions the knowledge into the minds of the children, and then questions it out of them again.
The following chapters on the order of development of the mental faculties are very good. We think, however, he lays too much stress on the necessity of knowledge before memory. The memory, being strongest and most retentive in youth, should then be stored with those germinating formulas which will bear fruit in after life. When the reasoning powers are developed at a later period, they then have something upon which to act.
The chapters on "Loving the Children" and "Gaining their Affections" are excellent.
The high salaries paid in our public schools induce many to engage in teaching, merely because it affords them honorable and lucrative employment. They have no love for the children, and are, therefore, unfit for the work. They have no sympathy for the children of the poor with bright eyes and tattered garments. It is painful to go into the school of such teachers. They seem to regard the children as pawns on a chessboard, or as things which they are paid to manage and keep in order. Such teachers should study well the chapters on loving the children for what they are in themselves.
He then introduces a chapter on "Phrenology," in which he details several instances where a professor of phrenology, as he says, was misled, and gave an incorrect delineation of character. We suppose he wishes us to conclude, phrenology is therefore a humbug. But such an inference is evidently unwarranted from any data he has given. One might as well say that several instances of malpractice on the part of physicians prove the science of medicine to be a humbug. There is no doubt that, by phrenology, physiognomy, and various temperamental peculiarities, a person's general character and disposition may be discerned. The wise teacher will study these, that he may intelligently vary his government and teaching to suit the various characters of the pupils under his charge.
The work of Mr. John Hecker on The Scientific Basis of Education shows to how great an extent a knowledge of phrenology and of the different temperaments may assist the teacher in the instruction and government of children. His work is worthy the attention of every teacher.
The chapters on "Normal Schools" and "Practice Teaching" are important. It by no means follows that, because a person knows a thing, he is therefore prepared to teach.
The art of communicating one's knowledge to others is quite a distinct acquirement.
No one who has compared the results obtained by teachers who have been trained for the work with those who have not can fail to appreciate this. We hope the time will come when all who occupy the position of teachers will be required to attend to this matter, and keep pace with the progress made in the art of teaching.
The chapter on cultivating a habit of attention should be studied by every teacher.
The freaks into which an uncultivated ear may be led for the want of attention will be best illustrated by one of the author's examples. A class at the high-school was required to copy a passage from dictation. The clause,
"Every breach of veracity indicates some latent vice,"
appeared with the following variations:
Every breach of veracity indicates some latent vice.
Every bridge of rasality indicates some latest vice.
Every breech of ferocity indicates some latinet vice.
Every preach of erracity indicates some late device.
Every branch of vivacity indicates some great advice.
Every branch of veracity indicates some late advice.
Every branch of veracity indicates some ladovice.
Every branch of veracity indicates some ladened vice.
Every branch of veracity in the next some latent vice.
Every reach of their ascidity indicates some advice.
Every one who is called upon to give out "notices" or to speak in public knows full well how great a portion of what is said in the plainest manner is misapprehended for the want of this habit of attention.
The volume closes with a lengthy "Argument for Common Schools." It would be more properly called an "apology." His first point is, "that without common schools we cannot maintain permanently our popular institutions." The necessity of universal education to secure the permanence of our popular institutions is conceded by all. But education, according to the author's own definition, is the "developing in due order and proportion whatever is good and desirable in human nature." Therefore, not only the intellect, but also the moral and religious nature must be developed. This the common schools fail to do.
A man is not necessarily a good citizen because he is intelligent, without he also possesses moral integrity. According to the author's own admission, his education is incomplete. As the public schools fail to give any moral training, they fail to make reliable citizens, and are therefore insufficient to secure the permanence of our democratic form of government.
To this objection he replies "that many of the teachers are professing Christians, and exert a continual Christian influence." But many more are non-professors, and exert an anti-christian influence.
In visiting schools, we have been able to tell the religious status of the teachers in charge by the general tone of the exercises. One presided over by a zealous Methodist resembled a Methodist Sunday-school or conference meeting. Another, under the care of a "smart young man," delighted in love songs, boating songs, etc., and had the general tone of a young folks' glee-club. In another of our most celebrated public schools, one of the professors was an atheist, and it was a matter of common remark among the boys that Prof. —— said there was no God.
In another, one of the teachers was overheard sneering at a child because she believed in our Lord Jesus Christ, and had a reverence for religious things. We admit that the familiar intercourse and intimate relations of the teachers with the children give them a great influence over their plastic minds, but, to our sorrow, we know that it is not always for good. We do not, therefore, consider it a recommendation of a system to say that the moral tone of its teaching depends altogether on the caprice and character of the different teachers it happens to employ.
Again, he says the law of trial by jury requires that every citizen should be intelligent, as they are thus called to take part in the administration of justice. True; but it requires much more that jurymen should possess moral principle. What makes courts of justice so often a mockery, but the want of principle and of conscience in those who administer the law? If his estate, life, or reputation depended on the decision of twelve men, would he feel easy if he knew them to be unprincipled, immoral men, open to bribery and corruption, however intelligent they might be? No; the constitution of our government, the popular institutions of our country, require that here, more than in any country of the world, the young should receive a sound moral and religious training, which cannot be done where, as here, religion is excluded from our common schools.
But, he says, the children attend the Sunday-school, which supplements the instructions of the weekday-school. True; but every earnest pastor who has any positive creed or doctrine to teach his children will tell you that one or two brief meetings on Sunday are not enough for this purpose. We ourselves are forced to the painful conclusion that the Sunday-school system does not give sufficient control over the children to form in them any earnest Christian character. It is like reserving the salt which should season our food during the week, and taking it all in a dose on Sunday.
The Sunday-school should be diligently used to supply, as far as may be, the lack of religious instruction in the common schools, but that it alone is inadequate to this purpose is shown by the constantly increasing number of our young who follow not the footsteps of their parents in the ways of a Christian life.
The author then, changing his base, argues that intellectual education alone tends to prevent sensuality and crime, and adduces statistics to show that the majority of convicts in our prisons are from the uneducated class. But if he attended to other statistics recently brought to light by Rev. Dr. Todd, Dr. Storer, of Boston, and others, he would discover that sensuality, only more refined, is permeating American society, and that hidden crime is depopulating some of the fairest portions of our land. It is true, perhaps, that those crimes which are taken cognizance of by the police courts may be more numerous among the uneducated, but it is those secret crimes against God and the moral law that corrupt society and endanger a nation's life.
In New England, which the author holds up as the ideal of what the common-school system can produce, physicians testify that immorality and hidden crime prevail to such an extent that the native American stock is literally dying out, the number of deaths far exceeding the number of births. Intellectual culture alone will not preserve American society from corruption, any more than it did pagan Greece and Rome.
The author seems to feel the force of this objection, which, as he says, "is urged with seriousness by men whose purity of motive is above question, and whose personal character gives great weight to their opinions," and admits that "religious teaching does not hold that prominent position in the course of study that it should hold; but he seems forced, like many of his fellow-educators whom we have known, to argue and apologize for the common-school system, because they see no way of securing universal education and at the same time providing for proper religious training. If they turn, however, to the educational systems of France, Austria, or Prussia, they would find the problem solved. Even in Canada, the British Parliament has avoided by its provisions those serious errors under which we labor, and which are making our system daily more and more unpopular.
By "An Act to restore to Roman Catholics in Upper Canada certain rights in respect to Separate Schools," passed May 5th, 1863, they provided that "the Roman Catholic separate schools shall be entitled to a share in the fund annually granted by the legislature of the province for the support of common-schools, and shall be entitled also to a share in all other public grants, investments, and allotments for common-school purposes now made or hereafter to be made by the municipal authorities, according to the average number of pupils attending such school as compared with the whole average number of pupils attending schools in the same city, town, village, or township." (Cap. 5, sec. 20.)
And also that "the Roman Catholic separate schools (with their registers) shall be subject to such inspection as may be directed from time to time by the chief superintendent of public instruction." (Cap. 5, sec. 26.)
Let our separate schools that have been and may be established, in which the children receive a proper religious training, receive their due proportion of the public fund, and by the inspection of a board of education be kept up to the highest standard of secular learning, and the grievances under which we now suffer will be removed.
From the German