Fran. For this relief much thanks: 'tis bitter cold. And I am sick at heart.
Ber. Have you had a quiet guard?
Here we see the guard on duty challenged by his relief, a most unusual procedure. Why does this experienced guard so far forget the customary forms as to challenge the guard on duty? What possible reason can there be for this? How would you read the second line? What words must be emphasized to show the surprise of the challenged guard? If the entire hour were given to the whole of Act I and all the questions sought to reveal to the students Shakespeare's power of dramatic structure, a definite and lasting impression would be carried away. Act I should be assigned again, but with a different aim. The teacher now seeks to make clear to the student the dramatist's method of character portrayal. A third hour may be spent on certain portions of this act in which attention is given to significant facts of language, choice of words, or poetic form. When a guiding aim controls, all questions, suggestions, explanations, and illustrations tend to create in the mind of the pupil a rich and unified impression. Where no distinct aim gives direction to the work, the student is confused by a variety of facts—isolated facts—that are displaced by another group of disjointed bits of information. Aimless teaching leads to mental wandering on the part of the student; teaching governed by a definite aim leads to mental development and to the acquisition of new viewpoints and new power.
The educational aim vs. the instructional aim
We must distinguish clearly between the general or educational aim and the specific or instructional aim. The former sums up the hope of an entire course or an entire subject. In the teaching of literature we hope to develop a vital interest in reading, a discriminating taste, an enlivened imagination and a quickened perception which enable the student to visualize the situations and to acquire the thought on the printed page. The instructional aim, however, is much more specific; it posits a task that can be accomplished in a very limited time; it seeks to give an insight into Shakespeare's mastery of words, or into his power of character portrayal, or into his methods of enhancing dramatic interest. Each of these two types of aims has its unmistakable influence on methods of teaching.
The variety of aims that may govern teaching
What aim should we select to guide us in formulating principles of collegiate teaching? The question is almost basic, for the selection of a proper aim gives color and direction to all our teaching. In brief, the aim may be one of the following:
(a) The informational aim. A given course in chemistry or physics may be designed to sum up for the student the vital facts necessary for an intelligent comprehension of common phenomena. With such an aim, it is obvious that only so much laboratory work will be assigned as will give the student a general knowledge of the tools and methods of laboratory work; that the major portion of the work will be divided into occasional lectures, regular book assignments, and extensive applications of knowledge gained to surrounding chemical and physical phenomena. A language course may seek to give pupils a stock of words designed to develop power to read the language in a very short time. Obviously, grammatical work and translations into the mother tongue will now be minimized, and those devices which give the eye the power to find thought in new symbols will be emphasized. There is no standard for determining the relative importance of this informational or utilitarian aim when compared to other aims. The significant thing is, not so much to discover its relative importance, but, having adopted it, to devise methods which clearly tend to bring the students to an effective realization of it.
(b) The disciplinary aim. On the other hand, the controlling aim in any subject may be to develop the power to reason about natural phenomena, the power to observe, and the power to discriminate between vital and inconsequential details. If this be the aim, the assignment of subject matter must be reduced, the phenomena studied must be submitted in the forms of problems, first-hand observations must be made, and students must be led to see the errors in their observations and their reasoning. The course which is extensive in subject matter and which relies on the lecture method sacrifices mental discipline for information. From the teaching point of view, the result of the time-honored quarrel between the disciplinists and the utilitarians is not so important as the adoption of a definite aim, and the formulation of consistent methods of teaching in order to attain that aim. Ineffective teaching is not caused by the selection of the one aim or of the other, but by systems of instruction devoid of any aim at all.
(c) The appreciative or æsthetic aim. It is obvious that a subject may be taught for the power it develops for æsthetic appreciation of the arts of life. We have here a legitimate aim of coördinate importance with the two preceding ones; and if we adopt it, the vital thing in teaching is to allow this appreciative aim to mold all instructional effort. It is obvious that a college course in æsthetics must be inspirational, must seek to develop a real appreciation of the beauty of line, of color and of sound. Such a course must, therefore, encourage contact with the products of art, rather than promote the study of texts on the history of any of the arts. So, too, courses in music or in literature which do not send the student away with an intense desire to hear, to see, to feel the masterpieces of music or literature must be judged dismal failures. The formalization of an art course given to the general student, kills the live material and leaves the student himself cold.