How to Study and Teaching How to Study

by Frank M. McMurry

2. Studying for one's own benefit.

The average "good" student scarcely gets beyond the first of the four stages of study outlined, i. e., the collection of the crude materials of knowledge. One very important reason tor this is that he fixes his eyes too intently upon his teacher in the preparation of his lessons; he studies to satisfy her rather than himself, as though somehow the school was established for her benefit. This subordination to the teacher is shown in the attitude toward marks; many a college student, even, waits helplessly until he can learn his mark before he knows whether or not he has done well; he seems to lack any conviction of his own about the matter. The student who feels responsibility primarily to himself, and therefore bothers little about marks, is rare.

Yet the selection of that portion of the subject-matter that promises profit, and its conversion into experience, presuppose the ability to subordinate both author and teacher to the self, indeed to forget about both. No teacher can direct a student just what to select, or inform him when it has become experience with him; the real student must have a self big enough to carry that responsibility alone. Weakness in this respect manifests itself very early. Many a child is so absorbed in his teacher as not to know when he knows a thing until the teacher's approval is given. In some schools probably half of the pupils ten to twelve years of age fall into such a halting, apologetic frame of mind, that they would scarcely risk a meal on the accuracy of any statement that they make. In comparison, the boy who won't study, who plays hookey on warm spring days in spite of his teacher's warnings, and who otherwise defies his teacher, is to be admired; he is preserving his individuality, his most important possession.

It is largely the teacher's fault if children show no power to discriminate the values of facts to themselves, and to determine when they know a thing. They will not always show wisdom in their selections, and will not always be right when they feel sure. A good degree of reliability in these respects is something that has to be acquired by long training. But the spirit of self-reliance is a child's birthright, and if it is lacking in his study it is because his nature has been undermined. Teachers, therefore, should take great pains to avoid a dogmatic manner toward children; they should impress upon them the fact that they are primarily responsible to themselves in their study, and that teachers are only advisers or assistants in intellectual matters, and not masters. No doubt many a college student finds it next to impossible to accomplish the second and third stages in study here outlined, simply because he finds no individual self within him to satisfy; it has been so long and so fully subordinated to others that it has become dwarfed, or has lost its native power to react; on that account independent selection is difficult and the sense of ownership is weak.

3. Means of influencing pupils to use their knowledge. (1). "The recitation."

The principal means on which the teacher must rely for influencing children to include the using of knowledge as a part of their study, is the recitation. Since at least most of the recitation period is necessarily spent in talking, it might at first seem that it could accomplish little in the way of applying what one learns. But when it is remembered that perhaps the main use of knowledge is found in conversation and discussion, the situation need not seem so hopeless.

The great thing, then, is to see that the talk of the class room takes place under as natural conditions as serious conversation and discussion elsewhere, thus duplicating real life. We know that children may spell words correctly in lists that they will miss in writing letters, and that they can solve problems in arithmetic correctly in school that seem quite beyond them when accidentally met as actual problems outside. Such facts emphasize the truth that only actual life secures a full and normal test of knowledge, and, therefore, that the recitation secures it only to the extent that it duplicates life.

Here is seen a fundamental weakness of the customary recitation. It tests only the presence of facts in the minds of pupils, while the outside world tests their ability to use these facts, which is another and far more difficult matter, requiring true assimilation. Not merely that; but the customary recitation makes a sympathetic teacher the center of activity, she putting most of the questions, interpreting the answers, foreknowing what the children are trying to say, and deciding all issues. The children are not expected to offer ideas that are new to any one present, and they even acknowledge responsibility only to the teacher, looking toward her, addressing their statements to her, and usually endeavoring only to make her hear. All this holds largely in college recitations as well as elsewhere,—in case the students have the privilege of doing anything beyond listening to teachers there. This is an extremely unnatural situation and an inadequate test, as is indicated by the fact that the replies to the teacher's questions seldom convey clear meaning to strangers present. Such recitations secure far less individuality of thought and far less directness and force in its expression than is acceptable anywhere outside of the academic atmosphere.

The special importance of having the school periods duplicate life conditions is seen in the fact that the character of the recitation determines the character of the preparation for it. Both the child and the more mature student will ordinarily go only so far in preparation as is necessary in order to meet the demands made upon them in class. If, therefore, the recitation does nothing more than give a weak test of the presence of facts, the preparation will include little selection and reorganization of facts and little effort to translate them into experience.

How, then, should the customary recitation be modified? Let the young people come together much of the time for the same purpose that they have in serious conversation outside; i.e., not to rehearse or recite, but to talk over earnestly points that are worth talking over. With an assigned topic for a lesson, and with a teacher present as adviser and critic, let them compare their conceptions of what seem to them the principal facts, supplementing, rejecting, and selecting what seems to them fit. The relationship that they would bear toward one another might be the same as in any social gathering; but since it would be real work and not entertainment that they were attempting, attention would be centered on a definite subject and remarks would be more pointed. While the teacher would preserve order in the usual fashion, and might often come to their aid by correcting and advising, responsibility for taking the initiative and for making fair progress would rest primarily upon the children, so that they would be adopting an attitude and a method that could be directly transferred to the home and elsewhere. This is the ideal that Dr. Dewey urges in his School and Society when he says: "The recitation becomes a social meeting place; it is to the school what the spontaneous conversation is at home, except that it is more organized, following definite lines. The recitation becomes the social clearing house, where experiences and ideas are exchanged and subjected to criticism, where misconceptions are corrected, and new lines of thought and inquiry are set up." [Footnote: Dr. John Dewey, School and Society, p. 65.] The recitation then becomes a period where children talk before the teacher rather than to her; and in questioning and answering one another in a natural way they not only learn pointedness in thinking, but they increase and test their knowledge by using it. Thus they give witness to the truth of Bacon's words: "Whosoever hath his mind fraught with many thoughts, his wits and understanding do clarify and break up in the communicating and discoursing with another; he tosseth his thoughts more easily; he marshalleth them more orderly; he seeth how they look when they are turned into words; finally, he waxeth wiser than himself; and that more by an hour's discourse than by a day's meditation….A man were better relate himself to a statue or picture, than to suffer his thoughts to pass in smother." [Footnote: Bacon's Essays, Of Friendship.] When many of the school periods are occupied in this way, the lessons are not likely to be prepared with the teacher first in mind; what the others will say, what they will accept and reject and enjoy, as well as what one can one's self present and maintain, will chiefly occupy the attention. The child will then be selective in his study, having a view-point of his own; and he may even practice the forcible presentation of his ideas in the privacy of his study—before "a statue or picture" if need be. Moreover, with the use of his knowledge in prospect, he will cease to rely weakly upon his teacher to tell him whether or not he knows, because he will carry his own standard.