Outlines of Educational Doctrine

by Johann Friedrich Herbart

Owing to the fact that absorption and reflection may refer to very short and also to comparatively long periods, they may be studied with respect to their bearing in conducting recitations, and to their importance in fixing courses of study. The former aspect of the two processes will in this connection chiefly occupy our attention.

[5] “Philosophy of Education,” pp. 27, 28, New York, D. Appleton & Co.

[67.] Some teachers lay great stress on the explication, step by step, of the smaller and smallest components of the subject, and insist on a similar reproduction on the part of the pupils. Others prefer to teach by conversation, and allow themselves and their pupils great freedom of expression. Others, again, call especially for the leading thoughts, but demand that these be given with accuracy and precision, and in the prescribed order. Others, finally, are not satisfied until their pupils are self-actively exercising their minds in systematic thinking.

Various methods of teaching may thus arise; it is not necessary, however, that one should be habitually employed to the exclusion of the rest. We may ask rather whether each does not contribute its share to a many-sided culture. In order that a multitude of facts may be apprehended, explications or analyses are needed to prevent confusion; but since a synthesis is equally essential, the latter process may be started by conversation, continued by lifting into prominence the cardinal thoughts, and completed by the methodical independent thinking of the pupil: clearness, association, system, method.

In teaching we need to have (1) clearness in the presentation of specific facts, or the elements of what is to be mastered; (2) association of these facts with one another, and with other related facts formerly acquired, in order that assimilation, or apperception, may be adequately complete; (3) when sufficient facts have been clearly presented and sufficiently assimilated, they must be systematically ordered, so that our knowledge will be more perfectly unified than it could be did we stop short of thorough classification, as in the study of botany, or of the perception of rules and principles, as in mathematics and grammar; (4) finally the facts, rules, principles, and classifications thus far assumed must be secured for all time by their efficient methodical application in exercises that call forth the vigorous self-activity of the pupil. These four stages of teaching may be considered fundamental, though varying greatly according to the nature of the subject and the ability of the pupil. It is good exercise for a pupil to take long, rapid steps when able to do so; it is hopeless confusion to undertake them when they are too great or too rapid for his capacity. These four stages in methods of teaching conceived to be essential, form the nucleus of an interesting development in the Herbartian school, under the title of “The Formal [i.e. Essential] Steps of Instruction.” The leading ideas will be further described in a subsequent paragraph ([70]).

[68.] On closer inspection we find that instead of being mutually exclusive, these various modes of instruction are requisite, one by one, in the order given above, for every group, small or large, of subjects to be taught.

For, first, the beginner is able to advance but slowly. For him the shortest steps are the safest steps. He must stop at each point as long as is necessary to make him apprehend distinctly each individual fact. To this he must give his whole thought. During the initial stage, the teacher’s art consists, therefore, preëminently in knowing how to resolve his subject into very small parts. In this way he will avoid taking sudden leaps without being aware that he is doing so.

Secondly, association cannot be effected solely by a systematic mode of treatment, least of all at first. In the system each part has its own fixed place. At this place it is connected directly with the nearest other parts, but also separated from other more remote parts by a definite distance, and connected with these only by way of determinate intervening members, or links. Besides, the nature of this connection is not the same everywhere. Furthermore, a system is not to be learned merely. It is to be used, applied, and often needs to be supplemented by additions inserted in appropriate places. To be able to do this requires skill in diverting one’s thoughts from any given starting-point to every other point, forward, backward, sideways. Hence two things are requisite; preparation for the system, and application of the system. Preparation is involved in association; exercise in systematic thinking must follow.

[69.] During the first stage, when the clear apprehension of the individual object or fact is the main thing, the shortest and most familiar words and sentences are the most appropriate. The teacher will often find it advisable also to have some, if not all, of the pupils repeat them accurately after him. As is well known, even speaking in concert has been tried in many schools not entirely without success, and for young beginners this method may indeed at times answer very well.

For association, the best mode of procedure is informal conversation, because it gives the pupil an opportunity to test and to change the accidental union of his thoughts, to multiply the links of connection, and to assimilate, after his own fashion, what he has learned. It enables him, besides, to do at least a part of all this in any way that happens to be the easiest and most convenient. He will thus escape the inflexibility of thought that results from a purely systematic learning.