Note.—Children are sent to school from many homes simply because they are in the way and their parents do not wish them to be idle. The school is regarded as an institution whose chief function is to govern, but which incidentally also imparts useful knowledge. Here there is a lack of insight into the nature of true mental culture; teachers, on the contrary, sometimes forget that they are giving pupils work, and that work should not exceed reasonable limits.
[ CHAPTER II
The Aim of Instruction]
[62.] The ultimate purpose of instruction is contained in the notion, virtue. But in order to realize the final aim, another and nearer one must be set up. We may term it, many-sidedness of interest. The word interest stands in general for that kind of mental activity which it is the business of instruction to incite. Mere information does not suffice; for this we think of as a supply or store of facts, which a person might possess or lack, and still remain the same being. But he who lays hold of his information and reaches out for more, takes an interest in it. Since, however, this mental activity, is varied ([60]), we need to add the further determination supplied by the term many-sidedness.
It has been pointed out[3] what the content of the word virtue must be, if this word is to be an adequate expression for the ultimate purpose of instruction. Virtue must embrace not only what is purely individual, or subjective, such as piety and humaneness of disposition, but it must likewise include what is objective, or social, in conduct. This fact lends a new significance to the doctrine of interest, for though a normal child is not naturally interested in introspective analysis of his feelings, he is spontaneously interested in what is objective and within the range of his experience. The enterprises of his mates, the regulations of his school or home, the erection of houses, the introduction of new machinery, the social doings of the neighborhood, the havoc created by the elements, the prominent features of the changing year—all these claim his closest attention. The common school studies deal with these very things. Literature (reading) and history reveal to him the conduct of men; the one considering it ideally, the other historically. Mathematics teaches the mastery of material when considered quantitatively, whether in trade or manufacture or construction. Nature studies bring the child into intimate touch with the significant in his natural environment. Geography shows him the most obvious features of the industrial activity about him. It shows him the chief conditions of production in crops and manufactures; it also gives him hints of the great business of commerce. In all these studies, the natural inclinations of the mind are directly appealed to. Not a little of the importance of the doctrine of interest in instruction depends upon these facts; for both the insight and the disposition that instruction is capable of imparting to the pupil relates specifically to the objective side of his character, the one most in need of development and most susceptible of it.
[63.] We may speak also of indirect as distinguished from direct interest. But a predominance of indirect interest tends to one-sidedness, if not to selfishness. The interest of the selfish man in anything extends only so far as he can see advantages or disadvantages to himself. In this respect the one-sided man approximates the selfish man, although the fact may escape his own observation; since he relates everything to the narrow sphere for which he lives and thinks. Here lies his intellectual power, and whatever does not interest him as means to his limited ends, becomes an impediment.
It is important for the teacher to see the full scope of the doctrine of interest in its relation to effort. In Herbart’s psychology it assumes a most important place, since the primacy of mental life is, in this system, ascribed to ideas. In other systems, notably those of Kant, Schopenhauer, Von Hartmann, Paulsen, primacy is ascribed to the will, first in unconscious or subconscious striving, later in conscious volition. This fundamental difference in standpoint will account for the emphasis laid now upon interest, now upon effort. Herbart conceives that conscious feelings, desires, motives, and the like have their source in ideas, and that volition in turn arises from the various emotional states aroused by the ideas. Interest with him thus becomes a permanent or ever renewed, ever changing, ever growing desire for the accomplishment of certain ends. It is, consequently, a direct, necessary stimulus to the will. Systems, however, that regard the will as the primary factor in mental life, conceiving of ideas only as a means for revealing more clearly the ends of volition, together with the best methods of reaching them, are naturally prone to place the emphasis upon effort, leaving to interest but a secondary or quite incidental function. Dr. John Dewey has attempted to reconcile these two views.[4] Interest and effort are complementary, not opposing ideas. To emphasize one at the expense of the other, is to assume that the ends for which we act lie quite outside of our personality, so that these ends would, on the one hand, have to be made interesting, or, on the other, struggled for without regard to interest. This assumption is an error. The ends for which we strive must be conceived as internal, our efforts being regarded as attempts at self-realization in definite directions. The purpose of our action is therefore an end desired. In this we have an interest surely. As an educational doctrine, however, interest concerns chiefly the means of reaching these ends. If interest in the means is wanting, the child works with a divided attention. He gives only so much to the means as he must; the remainder is devoted to his own affairs,—the past or coming ball-game, the picnic, the walk in the woods, the private enterprises of home or school. But if a lively interest is felt in the means to the end, then the whole self is actively employed for the time being in the accomplishment of the purpose of the hour. The attention is no longer divided, it is concentrated upon the matter in hand. This in the school is work. When the attention is divided we have drudgery. This signifies that the interest felt in the end, say a dollar, is not felt in the means of attaining it, say a day’s labor. However inevitable drudgery may be in life, it should have no place in the schoolroom. The teacher must so present the studies that the pupil can perceive at least a fraction of their bearing upon life. This awakens an interest in them as ends. He must, then, by conformity to the psychological order of learning, by enthusiasm and ingenuity, so teach the subjects that the natural interest in the end will be constantly enhanced through a lively interest in the daily lesson as the means of reaching it. The result is unified attention, zeal in the pursuit of knowledge, hospitality for ethical ideals.
[4] “Interest as Related to the Will,” second supplement to the Herbart Year Book, revised and reprinted, Chicago University Press, 1899.