I have just come across a small book entitled Hints on School
Discipline, by Ernest F. Row, B.Sc.
"Boys will only respect a master whom they fear," he says. I have been preaching this doctrine for years . . . that respect always has fear behind it . . . and it pleases me to find that an exponent of the old methods should support my argument.
When I began to read the book I was amazed.
"Good Lord!" I cried, "this chap should have published his book in the year 1820. He advocates a system that modern psychology has shown to be fatal to the child. It is army discipline applied to schools."
I found it hard to finish the book, but I read every word of it and then I said to myself: "The majority is on the side of Row. Eton, Harrow, many elementary teachers would agree with him. He is evidently an honest sort of fellow, and he must be reckoned with. I must try to see his point of view."
And I think I see it. He accepts current education with its set subjects, time-tables, order, morality, and he is trying to adapt the young teacher to what is established. Hence to maintain all these things, we must have stern discipline and swift punishment. But I wonder if Row has thought of the other side of the question; I wonder if he has asked himself whether order and time-tables and obedience and respect are really necessary. I should like to meet him and have a chat; I think I should like him, and further, I think that I could convert him to the other way . . . if he is under forty.
Ah! Horrid thought! Is it possible that Row is pulling our legs? No, he writes as an honest man. Perhaps he knows all about the modern movement; perhaps he has studied Montessori, Freud, Jung, Homer Lane, Edmond Holmes, and found that they are all pathetically wrong. Mayhap he has proved that the child is a sinner.
"The young teacher should never address a boy by his Christian name or nickname," he says.
Oh, surely he is pulling our legs!
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