Fables for Children, Stories for Children, Natural Science Stories, Popular Education, Decembrists, Moral Tales

by graf Leo Tolstoy

But how are they to be controlled, watched, and taught, if they breed by the hundred in each county? In my opinion the work of the County Council and school council ought to consist in nothing but watching the pedagogical side of the business, and that is feasible, if these means will be taken: in every County Council, which has taken upon itself the duty of the dissemination of popular education, or the coöperation with it, there ought to be one person—whether it be an unpaid member of the school council, or a man at a salary of not less than one thousand roubles, hired by the County Council—who is to attend to the pedagogical side of the business in the county. That person ought to have a general, fresh education within the limits of a gymnasium course, that is, he must know Russian thoroughly and Church-Slavic partly, arithmetic and algebra thoroughly, and be a teacher, that is, know the practice of pedagogy. This person must be freshly educated, because I have observed that frequently the information of a man who has long ago finished his course even in a university, and who has not refreshed his education, is insufficient, not only for the guidance of teachers, but even for the examination of a village school. This person must by all means be a teacher himself in the same locality, in order that in his demands and instructions he may always have in view that pedagogical material with which the other teachers have to deal, and that he may sustain in himself that live relation to reality which is the chief preservative against error and delusion. If a County Council does not possess such a man and does not wish to employ one, it has, in my opinion, absolutely nothing to do with the popular education, except to give money, because every interference with the administrative side of the matter, in the way it is done now, can only be injurious.

This member of the County Council, or the educated person hired by it, must have the best model school, with an assistant, in the county. In addition to conducting this school and applying to it all the newest methods of instruction, this head teacher ought to keep an eye on all the other schools. This school is not to be a model in the sense of introducing into it all kinds of cubes and pictures and all kinds of nonsense invented by the Germans, but the teacher in this school should experiment on just such peasant children as the other schools consist of, in order to determine the simplest methods which may be adopted by the majority of the teachers, sextons, and soldiers, who form the bulk of all the schools. Since with the arrangement which I propose there will certainly be formed large complete schools in the larger centres (as I think, in the proportion of one to twenty of all the other schools), and in these large schools the teachers will be of a grade of education equal to that of the seminarists who have finished a course in a theological school, the head teacher will visit all these larger schools, bring together these teachers on Sundays, point out to them the defects, propose new methods, give counsel and books for their own education, and invite them to his school on Sundays. The library of the head teacher ought to consist of several copies of the Bible, of Church-Slavic and Russian grammars, arithmetic, and algebra. The head teacher, whenever he has time, will visit also the small schools and invite their teachers to come to see him; but the duty of watching the minor teachers is imposed on the older teachers, who just in the same way visit their district and invite those teachers to come to see them on Sundays and on week-days. The County Council either pays the teachers for travelling, or, in adding its portion to what the Communes levy, makes it a condition that the Communes furnish transportation. The meetings of the teachers and the visits in similar or better schools are one of the chief conditions for the successful conduct of the business of education, and so the County Council ought to direct its main attention to the organization of these meetings, and not spare any money for them.

Besides, in the large schools, where there will be more than fifty pupils, there ought to be chosen, instead of the assistants which they now have, such of the pupils, of either sex, as show marked ability for a teacher's calling, and they should be made assistants, two or three in each school. These assistants should receive a salary of fifty kopeks to one rouble per month, and the teacher should work with them separately in the evenings, so that they may not fall behind the others. These assistants, chosen from among the best, are to form the future teachers, to take the place of the lowest in the minor schools.

Naturally the organization of these teachers' meetings, both for the smaller and the larger schools, and the head teacher's visits of inspection, and the formation of teachers from pupils acting as assistants may take place in a large variety of ways; the main point is that the surveillance of any number of schools (even though it may reach the norm of one school to every one hundred souls) is possible in this manner. With such an arrangement the teachers of both the large and the small schools will feel that their labours are appreciated, that they have not buried themselves in the backwoods without hope of salvation, that they have companions and guides, and that in the matter of instruction, both for their own further education and for the improvement of their situation, they have means for advancement. With such an arrangement, the devotee and the sexton who are able to learn will learn; while those who are unable or unwilling to do so will be replaced by some one else.

The time of instruction ought to be, as is the wish of all peasants, during the seven winter months, and so the salary is to be determined by the month. With such an arrangement, leaving out the rapidity and the equal distribution of education, the advantage will be this, that the schools will be established in those centres where the necessity for them is felt by the masses, where they are established spontaneously and, therefore, firmly. Where the character of the population demands education it will be permanent. Just look: in the towns, the children of the innkeepers and well-to-do peasants learn to read in one way or another and never forget what they have learned; but in the backwoods, where a landed proprietor founds a school, the children learn well, but in ten years all is forgotten, and the population is as illiterate as ever. For this reason the centres, large or small, where the schools are established spontaneously, are particularly precious. Where such a school has germinated, no matter how poor it be, it will throw out roots, and sooner or later the population will be able to read and write. Consequently, these sprouts ought to be deemed precious, and not be treated, as they are everywhere,—they ought not to be forbidden, because the schools are not according to our taste, that is, the sprouts ought not to be killed, and branches stuck in the ground where they will not take root.

With merely such an arrangement, without the establishment of costly and artificial seminaries, the chosen ones—those selected from the best of the pupils themselves, and those who are educated in the schools—will form that contingent of cheap popular teachers who will take the place of the soldiers and sextons and will fully satisfy all the demands of the masses and of the educated classes. The chief advantage of such an arrangement is that it alone gives the development of popular education a future, that is, takes us out from that blind alley into which the County Councils have gone, thanks to the expensive schools and to the absence of new sources for the increase of their numbers. Only when the masses themselves choose the centres for the schools, themselves choose teachers, determine the amount of the remuneration, and directly enjoy the advantages of the schools, will they be ready to add means for the schools if such should become necessary. I know Communes that paid fifty kopeks a soul for a school in each of their villages; but it is difficult to compel the peasants to pay fifteen kopeks for a school in the township, if not all of them can make use of it. For the whole county, for the County Council, the peasants will not add a single kopek, because they feel that they will not enjoy the advantages of their money. Only with such an arrangement will be found soon the means for the proper maintenance of all schools, of one to each one hundred souls, which seems so impossible in the present state of affairs.

In addition to this, with the arrangement which I propose, the interests of the peasant Communes and of the County Council, as the representative of the intelligence of the locality, will indissolubly be connected. Let us say that the County Council gives one-third of what the peasants give. In furnishing this amount, it will evidently, in one way or another, see to it that the money is not wasted, and, consequently, will also keep an eye on the two-thirds given by the peasant Communes. The peasant Commune sees that the County Council gives its part, and so admits the right of the Council to follow the progress of the instruction. At the same time, it has an object-lesson in the difference which exists between a school maintained at a smaller and that maintained at a greater expense, and chooses the one which it needs or which is more accessible to it in accordance with its means.

I will again take Krapívensk County, with which I am familiar, to show what difference the proposed arrangement would make. I cannot have the slightest doubt that the moment permission is granted to open schools, wherever wanted and of any description desired, there will at once appear very many schools. I am convinced that in Krapívensk County, in which there are fifty parishes, there will always be a school in each parish, because the parishes are always centres of population, and because among the church servants there will always be found one who is capable of teaching, likes to teach, and will find his advantage in it. In addition to the schools maintained by the church servants there will be opened those forty schools that have been closed (more correctly thirty, because ten of them were church schools), and there will be opened very many new schools, so that in a very short time there will be not far from four hundred instead of the twenty at present.

I may be believed or not, but I will assume that in Krapívensk County 380 additional schools will be opened, the moment they are given over to the masses, so that there will be four hundred in all, and I will try to determine whether the existence of these four hundred schools, that is, of twenty times as many as at present, is possible under the conditions which I have assumed in discussing the existing order.

Assuming that all peasants pay fifteen kopeks per soul, and the County Council gives three thousand roubles, there will be nine thousand roubles, which will suffice only for thirty schools with the former arrangement. But with the new arrangement: