Educational theory

“ Principles of education, philosophy of education, theory of education, educational psychology, genetic psychology, experimental education, child study, adolescence, moral education, educational sociology, social aspects of education. Educational theory may be divided into courses which are elementary in character, and those which are advanced. The purpose of the former is to present to beginning students the fundamentals of reasonably well-tested principles and laws, and to indicate to them something of the various phases of education. ”

“ The experience of our ancestors, floating in a vast number of educational maxims, is handed on from lip to lip; and few or many of these maxims form the educational code of every household.
But we hardly take in how complete a revolution advancing science is effecting in the theory of education. ”

“ The practical tendency of modern education, by which discipline and culture may be given while at the same time preparing the student for the active duties of life, makes education more necessary for all persons and classes. The great changes that have taken place in methods of instruction and in the materials of scientific investigation, and the tendency to develop the man as well as to furnish him with information, evince the masterly progress of educational systems, and demonstrate their great worth. ”

“ We need especially, now that the purpose of education is adequately defined, an adequate doctrine of educational values and a rich and vital infusion of the spirit of experimental science. For efficiency in the work of instruction and training, we need to know the influence of different types of experience in controlling human conduct,—we need to know just what degree of efficiency is exerted by our arithmetic and literature, our geography and history, our drawing and manual training, our Latin and Greek, our ethics and psychology. ”

“ But we have no unifying principle, no definite aim; in fact, no philosophy of education. As a stream can rise no higher than its source, so it is probable that no educational effort can rise above the whole scheme of thought which gives it birth ”

“ Every one subscribes to the statement that the business of education is the preparation of pupils for life, every one knows that the value of such a preparation can be made certain only by being brought under the acid test of the actual conditions of social life, but few there are that realize [Pg 45] that one of the ever-present problems of educational efficiency is due to the fact that the thinking that influences the purposes and methods of teachers mostly originates within the profession itself. ”

“ I am anxious to bring a quite successful educational experiment before the public at a moment when we are told on authority that “Education must be ... an appeal to the spirit if it is to be made interesting.” Here is Education which is as interesting and fascinating as a fine art to parents, children and teachers.
During the last thirty years thousands of children educated on these lines have grown up in love with Knowledge and manifesting a ‘right judgment in all things’ so far as a pretty wide curriculum gives them data. ”

“ The study of the principles of education should come first, as it is closely related to preceding work in the natural and mental sciences, especially biology, physiology, sociology, and psychology; it also gives a point of view from which to continue the study of education, some standard of judgment. The study of educational methods, such as general method in teaching, special method for different subjects, the technique of instruction, class management, organization and administration of schools, should come last in the course, because it will be soonest used. ”

“ The pupil’s view is narrow because he comes in contact with the school only at the point of application of educational methods to his own life. The scientific view of education is broad because it places the school in its proper relations to other social activities, because it defines the relation of the pupils and teachers to one another and to the material used for instruction, and because it opens up all the results of school work to full inspection and evaluation. This broad scientific view is the one which the teacher and the community at large should adopt. ”

“ More vocational education will come, and better education, because it will be based on quantitative studies of aims, needs, and values—of educational processes and results,measured with precision. Even in school administration, guesses, opinions, and prejudices are gradually giving way to science. ”

“ It may be granted that the progress of learning is made possible or at least accentuated by educational institutions; but the fact remains 77 that the school is founded on pre-existing knowledge. Science, arts, customs must exist before they can be taught to others, and they do exist, but not in the spirit of the one who is to acquire them, who must appropriate them as they are in themselves. ”

“ Modern educational thought and modern practice, in all sections where excellent schools are found, confirm the belief that there is a profound philosophy on which educational methods are based, and that careful study of this philosophy and its application under expert guidance are essential to making fit the man born to teach. ”

“ This is the real educational difficulty in schools for all classes, for pupils of all ages,—the enormous field of knowledge which it is necessary to cover in order to live with intelligence and moral insight. Know one thing well and you have the power to apprehend many things is the academic solution, which has not worked altogether badly, but it cannot be stretched to fit our present occasion,—the “Enlightenment of the Masses.” What we [289] may call the ‘academic’ doctrine assumes that mind like body is capable of development in various directions by means of due exercise. ”

“ Yet, in general, the educational policy, matters touching the curriculum, and all the discipline of the student body, as almost a matter of divine right, whether or not by custom or by statute, belong to the men whose craft and experience is in lines of education. ”

“ Among the decisive and important steps marking the revival of educational interest among us, is that looking to the introduction into our primary schools of the simple lessons for what is called the 'education of the senses,' and what is in fact the solicitation of the perceptive faculties, and the storing of them, with their proper ideas, through the avenues of sense. ”

“ The benefits accruing to education, from [Pg 54] successfully imitating Nature in this department of her process, will be incalculable; not only in adding to the amount of knowledge communicated, but in the ease and delight which the young will experience in acquiring it. All must admit that the pleasure, as well as the rapidity, of the educational process in the young, continues only during the time that Nature is their teacher;—and that her operations are generally checked, or neutralized by the mismanagement of those who supersede her work, and begin to theorize for themselves. ”

“ A good example is given by education. The American colleges and universities founded in the 18th and early 19th centuries attempted to follow the traditional model of learning for its own sake; that is, moral and intellectual improvement through study of the age-old classics. This lasted until various interest groups, in particular businessmen, questioned the validity of an educational program that had little or no pragmatic value. ”

“ On the other hand, since all studies are both subjective and objective in the interests they arouse, it would be possible to awaken all the six classes of interest enumerated by teaching but a fraction of what we now consider needful in a good curriculum. ”

“ Before educational methods can be made to harmonise in character and arrangement with the faculties in their mode and order of unfolding, it is first needful that we ascertain with some completeness how the faculties do unfold. At present we have acquired, on this point, only a few general notions. These general notions must be developed in detail—must be transformed into a multitude of specific propositions, before we can be said to possess that science on which the art of education must be based. ”

“ But it is also likely that pedagogy will have to recognize some new educational values before the subject can be considered in good standing by schoolmen. When educational ideals include the highest ideals of social efficiency the economic will, of course, be included. ”

“ First of all, no one has ever conceived the possibility of separating discipline from education. What is often done is to distinguish discipline from that part of education which is called instruction, and to consider the two as integrating the total concept of education. Mention is often made of the educational value of discipline. But this kind of co-ordination of the two forms of education—discipline and instruction—and their subordination to the generic concept of education are more easily formulated than comprehended. ”

“ He ventured to raise the whole question of the purpose of Preparation for complete living as the purpose of education. education. He held that “to prepare us for complete living is the function which education has to discharge; and the only rational mode of judging of any educational course is, to judge in what degree it discharges such function. Our first step must obviously be to classify, in the order of their importance, the leading kinds of activity which constitute human life. ”

“ Such a theory of education, which need not be careful to call itself a system of psychology, must be in harmony with the thought movements of the age; must regard education, not as a shut off compartment, but as being as much a part of life as birth or growth, marriage or work; and it must leave the pupil attached to the world at many points of contact. It is true that educationalists are already eager to establish such contact in several directions, but their efforts rest upon an axiom here and an idea there, and there is no broad unifying basis of thought to support the whole. ”

“ The fact that a pedagogical truth has been vaguely or even clearly stated a dozen times by prominent writers, is no reason for supposing that it has ever had any vital influence upon educators. The history of education shows conclusively that important educational ideas can be written about and talked about for centuries without finding their way to any great extent into school rooms. What we now need in education is definite and well-grounded theories and plans, backed up by honest and practical execution. ”

“ Education Has Been Universalized.—Having made education universal, educators are devoting their energies to fit the education to the needs of the student and to assist the student in choosing the course of instruction which will best fit him for his chosen life-work. The victory has been won to give every boy and girl an educational chance. To give him what he actually needs and see that he uses it for a definite purpose is the present problem of the educator. This means a careful inquiry into mental capacity and mental traits, into temperament, taste, ambition, and choice of vocation. ”

“ Under the phrase, 'Education is a life,' I have tried to show how necessary it is to sustain the intellectual life upon ideas, and, as a corollary, that a school-book should be a medium for ideas, and not merely a receptacle for facts. That normal children have a natural desire for, and a right of admission to, all fitting knowledge, appears to me to be suggested by the phrase, 'Education is the science of relations.'
These considerations clear the ground towards that of a curriculum. ”

“ In consequence of this scientific progress, the educational theorists began to introduce science and a knowledge of real things into the curriculum. It came to be widely felt that humanism gave a knowledge only of words, books, and opinions, and did not even at its best lead to a study of real things. ”

“ The common theory and practice of education are on trial. It is idle to ‘develop the faculties’ if there be no faculties, but only mind, which, like Wordsworth’s cloud, moves altogether when it moves at all. Therefore, those subjects whose raison d’être is to develop this and the other faculty are practically out of court and we must seek another basis for education. Subjects of instruction which would be valuable if reason, judgment, imagination, had to be ‘developed’ become as meretricious, as much ‘accomplishments,’ as those early Victorian accomplishments over which we make merry. ”

“ Teachers are looking out for the support of a sound theory, and such a theory must recognize with conviction the part mind plays in education and the conditions under which this prime agent acts. We want a philosophy of education which, admitting that thought alone appeals to mind, that thought begets thought, shall relegate to their proper subsidiary places all those sensory and muscular activities which are supposed to afford intellectual as well as physical training. ”

“ Here we find the sole justification of the scanty curricula provided in most of our schools, for the tortuous processes of our teaching, for the mischievous assertion that “it does not matter what a child learns but only how he learns it.” If we teach much and children learn little we comfort ourselves with the idea that we are ‘developing’ this or the other ‘faculty.’ A great future lies before the nation which shall perceive that knowledge is the sole concern of education proper, as distinguished from training, and that knowledge is the necessary daily food of the mind. ”