Correlated courses in woodwork and mechanical drawing

by Ira Samuel Griffith

CHAPTER I.
FOREWORD—AIMS

Foreword.

It is assumed that woodworking and mechanical drawing have subject matter and that it is desirable to have an orderly arrangement. Such an assumption may seem unwarranted to some—to those who labor in private institutions where the instruction is individual or nearly so. It is believed, however, that to teachers of these subjects in the public schools, where for economic reasons, classes of considerable numbers must be cared for, the necessity for a careful selection and arrangement of subject matter is very evident.

It has taken some years for the manual training movement to recover from the extremes into which the late psychology and child study movement had led it. The exaltation of the “individual” and the reign of the “self-expressionist,” it would seem, is about over. Not that this latter movement was an evil—far from it. Its influence was needed and came none too soon. Like other great movements, however, it led some teachers to extremes, causing them to overlook the good in the old with the result that the new alone has proven no more desirable than the old alone. The pendulum of opinion is returning and in not a few important places, is already swinging to the other extreme. It is for manual training teachers to try to determine by an exchange of ideas where the sanest position lies.

In this discussion, we should ever keep in mind that the American public school system is maintained mainly to prepare boys and girls for good and useful citizenship; that this is a democracy in which neither individual nor class is to be exalted unduly and that our system of education must result neither in the chaos of anarchy nor in the dull formalism of a despotism. To the writer it appears that manual training as practiced before the psychologist took possession was quite typical of the countries from which its influence came, Russia and Sweden-formalism. Under the influence of the most radical of the psychologists, manual training became synonymous with educational anarchy.

The best American citizenship cannot be developed by means of either the new alone or the old alone. There must be due attention paid to the development of the individual but that same individual must learn that he is but one of many and that he must do some things because they make it possible for all to enjoy equal rights and privileges. With this thought in mind, irrespective of any consideration of economic advantages, orderly arrangement of subject matter and class instruction, made necessary in large schools, must be looked upon as helpful rather than harmful in the preparation of the individual for citizenship.

Superintendent L. D. Harvey has said:

Members of society may be roughly classed into four groups: those who think without doing; those who do without thinking; those who neither think nor do; and those who think and do because of their thinking. This fourth class comprise the productive, constructive, organizing element of society. It is the function of the public schools to produce members of this fourth class. It must be evident to all that for the production of a thinking and doing individual the two forms of activity should be carried on side by side; the doing growing out of the thinking, and the thinking made clear and definite thru the doing.

In this statement the writer sees the proper relation of those two essential elements that make manual training valuable as a school subject—the thought element and the element of skill. Manual training suffered by having the one—skill—unduly emphasized when our European importations were made. Recently, it has suffered by having the other—the thought side—unduly magnified. Both of these elements are important.

In the author’s experience the practical application of a system that would make the most of each of these elements has been a source of no little disappointment. Effort in one direction seemed always to result in a sacrifice in the other. That is, when the thought side was emphasized there was a falling off in the accuracy of the results. When skill was magnified it was attained only with a sacrifice of the thought element. With many misgivings the conclusion was reached that the introduction of original thinking on the part of the pupil must mean somewhat of a sacrifice on the skill side. Concerning this phase of the subject Professor Richards writes: