CHAPTER XIII
FORMS OF LESSON PRESENTATION
The chief office of the teacher, in controlling the pupils' process of learning, being to direct their self-activity in making a selection of ideas from their former knowledge which shall stand in vital connection with the problem, and lead finally to its solution, the question arises in what form the teacher is to conduct the process in order to obtain this desired result. Three different modes of directing the selecting activity of the student are recognized and more or less practised by teachers. These are usually designated the lecture method, the text-book method, and the developing method.
THE LECTURE METHOD
Example of Lecture Method.—In the lecture method so-called, the teacher tells the students in direct words the facts involved in the new problem, and expects these words to enable the pupils to call up from their old knowledge the ideas which will give the teacher's words meaning, and thus lead to a solution of the problem. For example, in teaching the meaning of alluvial fans in geography, a teacher might seek to awaken the interpreting ideas by merely stating in words the characteristic of a fan. This would involve telling the pupils that an alluvial fan is a formation on the floor of a main river valley, resulting from the depositing of detritus carried down the steep side of the valley by a tributary stream and deposited in the form of a fan, when the force of the water is weakened as it enters the more level floor of the valley. To interpret this verbal description, however, the pupil must first interpret the words of the teacher as sounds, and then convert these into ideas by bringing his former knowledge to bear upon the word symbols. If we could take it for granted that the pupil will readily grasp the ideas here signified by such words as, formation, main river valley, depositing, detritus, steep side, etc., and at once feel the relation of these several ideas to the more or less unknown object—alluvial fan—this method would undoubtedly give the pupil the knowledge required.
The Method Difficult.—To expect of young children a ready ability in thus interpreting words would, however, be an evident mistake. To translate such sound symbols into ideas, and immediately adjust them to the problem, demands a power of language interpretation and of reflection not usually found in school children. The purely lecture method, therefore, has very small place with young children, whatever may be its value with advanced students. Pupils in the primary grades have not sufficient power of attention to listen to a long lecture on any subject, and no teacher should think of conducting a lesson by that method alone. The purpose of the lecture is merely to give information, and that is seldom the sole purpose of a lesson in elementary classes. There the more important purposes are to train pupils to acquire knowledge by thinking for themselves, and to express themselves, both of which are well-nigh impossible if the purely lecture method is followed.
Does not Insure Selection.—The weakness of such a method is well illustrated in the case of the young teacher who, in giving her class a conception of the equator, followed the above method, and carefully explained to the pupils that the equator is an imaginary line running around the earth equally distant from the two poles. When the teacher came later to review the work with the class, one bright lad described the equator as a menagerie lion running around the earth. Here evidently the child, true to the law of apperception, had interpreted, or rather misinterpreted, the words of the teacher, by means of the only ideas in his possession which seemed to fit the uttered sounds. It is evident, therefore, that too often in this method the pupils will either thus misinterpret the meaning of the teacher's words, or else fail to interpret them at all, because they are not able to call up any definite images from what the teacher may be telling them.
When to be Used.—It may be noted, however, that there is some place for the method in teaching. For example, when young children are presented with a suitable story, they will usually have no difficulty in fitting ideas to words, and thus building up the story. It requires, in fact, the continuity found in the telling method to keep the children's attention on the story, the tone of voice and gesture of the reciter going a long way in helping the child to call up the ideas which enable him to construct the story plot. Moreover, some telling must be done by the teacher in every lesson. Everything cannot be discovered by the pupils themselves. Even if it were possible, it would often be undesirable. Some facts are relatively unimportant, and it is much better to tell these outright than to spend a long time in trying to lead pupils to discover them. The lecture method, or telling method, should be used, then, to supply pupils with information they could not find out for themselves, or which they could find out only by spending an amount of time disproportionate to the importance of the facts. The teacher must use good judgment in discriminating between those facts which the pupils may reasonably be expected to find out for themselves and those facts which had better be told. Many teachers tell too much and do not throw the pupils sufficiently on their own resources. On the other hand, many teachers tell too little and waste valuable time in trying to "draw" from the pupils what they do not know, with the result that the pupils fall back upon the pernicious practice of guessing. The teacher needs to be on his guard against "the toil of dropping buckets into empty wells, and growing old in drawing nothing up."
It may be added further that, in practical life, man is constantly required to interpret through spoken language. For this reason, therefore, all children should become proficient in securing knowledge through spoken language, that is, by means of the lecture, or telling, method.