Next will follow, not grammatical definitions and rules to be learned, but the discovery of classification, just as in the case of botany, through observation—the discovery of rules inductively; then, when the need is felt for a shortening of the process, the collections made by grammarians may be produced, as the book of dried specimens, say of ferns, which the child had not time and opportunity to collect for herself. Afterwards will come reading and reflection upon the relationship of words, like the systems of scientific classification of flowers, and later the age of poetry and philosophy. It is the giving the grammatical abstractions to children who are at the stage of observation merely, which creates the distaste for school learning; it is the giving dead languages at a time when children are at the active, intuitive age, and have not the powers of thought necessary to disentangle the classical authors, that makes so much of our teaching a failure.
So with history. First the simple tales, e.g., Jack and the Giant—no complications of character there—good and bad, black and white—stories of fairies and hobgoblins, beings so unlike ourselves, that we are not troubled too much with moral scruples; they are like dream people. Then old-world heroes, in whom the moral emerges—not the priggish boys and girls, to cramp the character, but boys and girls, writ large. Then passing from the individual to the general, the specimen to the species, we have family life enlarged to the state under a kingly constitution, as in ancient patriarchal times, the first teachings of which are best gathered from the Old Testament. As in the nature teachings we shall lead children to feel underlying all, the sense as of an unseen presence, a King of Kings ruling the course of this world, leading and guiding the mind of man to work with Him as in the nature realm. And lastly in the highest teachings, which have to do, not with the objective surroundings, but with the man himself, with his thoughts and aspirations, with the expression of these in literature, in art, in ethics, and politics, and philosophy, the student will find enough to develop the highest powers of thought, as he wrestles with the problems of life, when he has reached the later period of study.
And the same order is observed in religion. The objective first—the Divine acts seen in nature, in the acts of the good, in the punishment of evil; at first the thought of God is more objective, since it must be so in the early life of the child under parental government. Later more subjective, through conscience. Sin is at first regarded chiefly as an act against a loving person, later it is felt to be the degradation of our nature, or that of others, by taking in a poison as it were; or as ἁμαρτια, the frustration of the true ends of our being, the exclusion from the light and life and joy of the Divine presence, which is the soul’s sunlight, into outer darkness—the conceptions formed will be different, the underlying truths one, the thoughts will pass from the physical to the panpsychical, and later to the highest conceivable by us—the anthropomorphic, stripped of the transitory and the finite, but embracing all those eternal things by which we know that we are more than creatures of time, since we gladly throw from us all that would then be our highest good, for the things which eye sees not and ear hears not, but which can come to us by revelation only of the spiritual; things which all men, in all ages, have felt to be the best, whatever their actions may have been, truth, love, righteousness, justice, the eternal things.
The worst man knows in his conscience more
Than the best man does, whom we bow before.
THE TEACHING OF THE BIOLOGICAL SCIENCES.
By Charlotte L. Laurie.
Introduction.The biological sciences deal with the manifestations of life. This distinguishes them at once from the physical and chemical sciences; not, indeed, that it is possible to understand the life of any organism without some knowledge of physics and chemistry; thus to explain intelligibly the circulation of the blood some acquaintance with mechanics is necessary, but organisms have certain properties which belong to them from the very fact of their being endowed with life; the inherent properties of protoplasm, its contractility, irritability, etc., are all vital properties due to the presence of life.
The first point then that a teacher of biology has to decide in order to teach this subject rightly is: What is it possible to teach about life? Is this nineteenth century with its marvellous electrical discoveries any nearer the secret of life? Although it may fairly be claimed that the manifestations of life are better understood, yet scientists will be the first to confess that what life itself is still remains a mystery; therefore the teacher of biology must never be satisfied without arousing in the minds of his pupils a growing consciousness of the limitations of knowledge, the basis of true reverence. Any teaching of science, not only of biology, which fails to do this is defective.
Development of observation (a) in class and home work.The teacher of biology then will desire first of all to develop a reverent attitude of mind, so that the facts of life may be understood aright. Observation of vital phenomena is by no means an easy thing; it needs much accuracy, constant patience and minute attention to detail. In school teaching the foundations of accurate observation ought to be laid. Botany affords much scope for this. In planning lessons, in choosing specimens for home work, the teacher should aim at developing this faculty. A lesson on a buttercup may very well be followed by home work on a marsh marigold. The two plants belong to the same order and have great similarity in structure, but certain important differences; the tendency of unobservant pupils will be to conclude that the same description will apply to both, and possibly nectaries will be described as present on the sepals of the marsh marigold instead of on the carpels, etc. As a rule, home work should demand original observation on the part of the pupils; it should not be a mere repetition of what has been done in class; thus, supposing the sweet-pea has been worked through in class, clover may be set for home work, provided of course that the class is sufficiently advanced.