Froebel as a pioneer in modern psychology

by E. R. Murray

For perception of movement, to which Froebel would have added perception of change of position, there are many plays with the ball as well as “Tic-tac,” “The Child and the Pigeons,” “The Lightbird,” “The Fish in the Brook,” etc.

Groos’ next class is Play with the Motor Apparatus and under this comes first Playful movement of the Bodily Organs. Here we have Froebel saying: “The first toys and occupations of the child come from himself: he plays with his own limbs.”—L., p. 108. “The child at this stage begins to play with his limbs—his hands, his fingers, his lips, his tongue, his feet, as well as with the expression of his eyes and face.”—E., p. 48.

Under playful locomotion, Groos actually quotes Froebel’s description of the child learning to walk, and we have also marching, running, and racing games; “the large majority,” says Froebel, “I have created simply by watching the children at play.… Thus I have prepared a limping-game because I see my boys always limping and hopping.”

Next comes Playful Movement of Foreign Bodies, and under this heading Groos gives “Hustling things about, pushing, pulling, shaking, seizing and pushing away, dabbling in water, handling sand and clay, kite-flying, and capture of insects.” Of these Froebel mentions pushing of carriages, kite-flying, hobby-horse riding; he makes much of play with water, sand and clay, and he speaks of the catching of insects, etc., desiring that it should be wisely checked by directing the activity into other channels.

As to Destructive or Analytic Movement Play, Froebel notes that: “The child wishes to know all the properties of the thing, for this reason he examines it on all sides; for this reason he tears and breaks it; for this reason he puts it in his mouth and bites it.”—E., p. 73. “The cruel treatment of insects and other animals originates in the little boy’s desire to obtain an insight into the life of the animal.”—E., p. 164.

Of Constructive or Synthetic Movement Play, so much has been said already, that it is not necessary to dwell on it. Froebel, in fact, gives a far more inclusive account of this than Groos himself, not omitting his “simplest form,” viz. moulding new forms with sand, etc., nor the collecting and arranging in rows which to Groos and to Froebel is a more primitive form of construction. Of Exercise of Endurance, too, we have spoken, in quoting passages where Froebel shows the boyish desire to measure and to increase strength. Throwing and Catching Plays have their place in the “Apprentice and Master Workman” game.

The important third class, the Playful Use of the Higher Mental Powers, includes according to Groos a good deal that he has dealt with under other heads, e.g. Memory Play includes (a) Recognition and (b) Reflective Memory. Under the former comes that pleasure in recognition of form which has already been dealt with, the pleasure given by pictures, often, says Groos, greater than is given by the reality. Froebel, too, says that if the father makes a sketch, “this man of lines, this horse of lines, will give the child more joy than an actual man, an actual horse will do.”—E., p. 77. Froebel, too, notes the pleasure it will give a child to name flowers through recognition of a form: “Spurred like a rider, circled like a snail, umbrellas, wheels, he’ll find the names.”—M., p. 181. There is also the recognition of animal and other noises, as in Froebel’s Yard Gate. Rote learning as a play Froebel hardly mentions.

As to the two groups which Groos brings under the heading of Imagination, viz. “Illusion either playful or serious,” and “the voluntary or involuntary transformation of our mental content,” these receive full recognition. Froebel notes how the stick becomes a horse or the knotted handkerchief the baby, as well as the play of listening to and inventing stories.

Under the head of Attention comes such games as Hide and Seek, because of the alternate stress and relaxation, and Froebel noted before Darwin did the pleasure of the baby in Bo-peep. Groos also brings curiosity under this heading, and we have seen that Froebel deals fully with such play as the outcome of the instinct of investigation, or the instinct for self-teaching.