[54.] In early childhood and with healthy children, government is, on the whole, easy. It continues to be easy after they have once formed habits of obedience. But it should not be interrupted. Even if children have been left to themselves or in charge of strangers only a few days, the change is noticeable. It requires an effort to tighten the reins again—something not to be done too suddenly.
Where boys have been allowed to run wild, the attempt to bring them back to orderly conduct reveals the differences of individuality. Some are easily made to return to appropriate work by kindness combined with a moderate measure of forbearance, others have sense enough to fear threats and to avoid penalties; but we may unfortunately also expect to find a few whose sole thought is to escape from supervision, however unpleasant for them the consequences may be.
Where home ties are wanting, this spirit may develop even during boyhood with ominous rapidity; during adolescence the difficulty of checking it may grow to be insuperable.
[55.] As a rule, it is reasonable to assume that youth will try to break through restraints as soon as these are felt. A sufficient amount of satisfying activity, together with uniform firmness of the lines of restraint, will, indeed, soon put an end to persistent attempts of this kind; yet they will be repeated from time to time. As boys grow older there is a change of pursuits; now the restraining boundaries must gradually be enlarged. The question now is whether education has progressed sufficiently far to make government less indispensable. Moreover, the choice of work comes to be determined by the prospects opening before the young man, according to his rank and means, together with his native capabilities and acquired knowledge. To encourage such pursuits as being appropriate for him, and, on the other hand, to reduce mere hobbies and diversions to harmless proportions, still remains the function of government. In any case government should not be wholly surrendered too early, least of all when the environment is such as to justify apprehension of temptation.
Though American teachers are perhaps not accustomed to emphasize the distinction between government for order and training for character, the difference, nevertheless, exists, often in an exaggerated form. Just as fever is looked upon as the measure of functional disturbance in the body, so disorder in the schoolroom is looked upon as the measure of the teacher’s failure. As fever is the universal symptom of disease, so disorder is the index of failure. The diagnosis may err in either case as to what the seat of the difficulty really is, but that something is wrong is plain to all. The fact that the public usually gauge a teacher’s efficiency by the order he keeps has led in the past to an exaggerated emphasis upon school discipline. The means for securing good order have greatly changed since Herbart’s time. A growing sense of social solidarity in the community, together with the all but universal employment of women as teachers in the elementary grades, has transferred the basis of discipline from the teacher to the community. It is social pressure in and out of the school that is the main reliance for regularity, punctuality, and order. Herbart wonders what will become of the bad boy if he is expelled. The modern answer is, he will be sent to the reform school or to the truant school. The teacher still stands as of old at the point of contact between the institution and the individual; nor can he entirely escape the heat generated at times by such contact, but, after all, it is society that now supplies the pressure formerly exerted by will and birch. The teacher is now more of a mediator between the pupil and the organized community, than an avenger of broken law.
[ SECTION II
INSTRUCTION]
CHAPTER I
The Relation of Instruction to Government and Training
[56.] Instruction furnishes a part of those occupations which lie at the basis of government; how large a part depends on circumstances.
Children must be kept employed at all events, because idleness leads to misbehavior and lawlessness. Now if the employment consists of useful labor, say in the workshop or on the farm, so much the better. Better still, if the work teaches the child something that will contribute to his further education. But not all employment is instruction; and in cases where the mere government of children is a difficult matter, lessons are not always the most adequate employment. Many a growing boy will be taught orderly conduct much sooner when placed with a mechanic or merchant or farmer than in school. The scope of government is wider than that of instruction.