Tutorial

“ But time will be economised and many advantages added, if large classes are split up into sections for tutorial work, to supplement the careful presentation of the subject made in the systematic lectures delivered to the whole class in each case. ”

“ Each morning for five days of the week each student spends one hour in a language tutorial and one hour in a mathematics tutorial. One afternoon a week each student spends three hours in the laboratory during the first two years; in the last two years, two afternoons a week. Two evenings from eight to ten each student attends a seminar in organized conversation and discussion of the scheduled readings. On one or two evenings there are formal lectures. Nineteen or twenty hours per week are spent in regular classes. ”

“ And, as in the other school laboratories, each tool, upon its first presentation to the class, forms the subject of a brief lecture—a practical lecture too, for the instructor uses the tool while he sketches its history and perhaps that of its inventor, shows what place it holds in the order of machine-tool development, and how admirably it is adapted to its particular work, and makes suggestions as to its care. Sometimes a lesson involves the use of a drawing made by the students a year before, and the piece of iron in which it is wrought is the product of a previous lesson in forging ”

“ Finally the student reaches the engine, every part of which is made the subject of exhaustive study; the facts of every part are represented on paper, working drawings of every part are made, and every part is reproduced in steel and iron in miniature, and, as a triumph of drawing, a representation on paper of the completed engine is produced.
The value of drawing as an educational agency is simply incalculable. It is the first step in manual training. It brings the eye and the mind into relations of the closest intimacy, and makes the hand the organ of both. ”

“ Throughout the course, one hour per day, or more, will be given to drawing, and not less than two hours per day to laboratory work. The remainder of the school day will be devoted to study and recitation. Before graduating, each pupil will be required to construct a machine from drawings and patterns made by himself. A diploma will be given on graduation.
The new education is a blending of manual and mental training. It recognizes the fact that science discovers and art utilizes, and that these two forces move the modern world. ”

“ In fact, it is suggested that after the third lesson students be permitted to stand as they work, and if in a drawing classroom or showcard studio where practical work is done, the regular drawing tables can be used.
The thorough mastery of the fundamentals is absolutely essential to good work, and particular care should be taken with the first four or five lessons that all students master these details. If the student is without an instructor, he should exert every effort to be painstaking, and never hurry the work in the early stages of practice. ”

“ If a student has had an opportunity to study a subject from either a textbook or a printed copy of the lecture notes, then comments by the teacher explaining some difficult point, or describing some later development, or showing some other application or consequence of the principle, may be both instructive and inspiring; but the main work of teaching engineering subjects should be from carefully prepared textbooks. ”

“ Experience has convinced the instructors that any course, particularly an introductory one, which deals in specious generalizations and vague trends of development to the exclusion of a thorough drill in concrete facts will, of necessity, be a failure; and so the methods of instruction are designed, first of all, to secure an accurate knowledge of events,—to make the student master the fundamental data upon which any real comprehension of a great movement as a whole must be based. ”

“ Foley, namely, that the student of the manual training school acquires as much knowledge in one hundred and twenty hours as the apprentice of the machine-shop does in two years. In a word, it shows exactly why scientific education is so incomparably superior to automatic education. Mr. Foley asserts, in substance, that the scientific methods of the manual training school are twenty times as valuable to the student as the unscientific methods of the trade-shop are to the apprentice. ”

“ Guided by the automatic slide-rest, the sharp point of the tool chips away the revolving wood until it assumes the form of the drawing lying under the eye of the operator. Thus the lesson proceeds to the end of the prescribed period—two hours. The master watches every step of its progress. If a student is puzzled he receives prompt assistance, so that no time may be lost. Indeed the relations between instructor and students are such, or ought to be such, that the question is asked before the puzzled mind falls into a rut of profitless speculation through revolving in a circle. ”

“ The manual training school student is an investigator—as much so as a student in chemistry. His mind must always guide his hand, his reasoning opens new fields of thought with every stroke of the chisel. ”

“ These questions are purposely put in an incomplete form so that the instructor must needs formulate them before putting them to the pupil. They are intended, as are any public speaker’s notes, merely to enable him to carry on the discussion or recitation in a systematic and logical manner, missing none of the important facts to be brought out.
The whole time taken in any one lesson for recitation, preparation for demonstration and demonstration should not exceed, ordinarily, twenty-five or thirty minutes.
It is a skilled teacher who can present a lesson to the best advantage. ”

“ The textbook and topical recitation affords an excellent opportunity to teach the student to analyze, to observe, to discriminate, to train him in the use of clear and correct language, and in the presentation of his thoughts in logical order—an object worthy of any teacher and an opportunity to employ the highest ability of any person. In the conduct of such a recitation in engineering subjects, there is abundant opportunity to supplement the textbook by calling attention to new discoveries and other applications, and to introduce interesting historic references. ”

“ The instructor should use his own knowledge and imagination and enlarge upon it.
There is much useful technical knowledge which he might incidentally impart to his boys, either himself or by getting friends to come and demonstrate (I don't say "lecture") on such points as the principles of steam or petrol-engines, or electricity; the work of sailors, soldiers, firemen, police, and so on; pioneer work such as bridging with models, road making, building, etc., also carpentering, modelling, casting, plumbing, gardening, etc. ”

“ No cheating at model drawing by forbidden measurements, or looking for assistance at our neighbour. For as no two persons can possibly obtain the same view of the cube, or whatever it may be, from the different dispositions of their seats, every student is thrown entirely upon his or her own resources for the completion of the task. Once or twice during the lecture the master examines carefully each individual copy, and then returns to his stand to await the termination of their labour. ”

“ If the pupil in the Manual Training School makes as rapid progress intellectually as the pupil in the public or private school of corresponding grade, it follows that whatever skill in the use of tools is acquired, and whatever knowledge of practical mechanics is gained—these stand for the net gain of the pupil of the new system of education. ”

“ The final test in any course or group of drawing courses may be measured by the student's ability to solve problems met with in engineering practice. Measured upon this basis, the newer types of courses discussed herein, those founded upon the analytic method and developed largely as a progressive series of working drawings, seem to be meeting with better results than did those of the older type in which the synthetic method predominated and in which abstract problems were principally used. ”

“ We do not mean to imply that manual training and vocational training are the same, but we do mean to say that the educative value of any shop training, whether given from the point of view of general culture or of special preparation for life’s work, is evidenced in the attitude which pupils are allowed to assume toward their work. Incorrect and slovenly habits of thinking and doing have no more place in manual [2] training than in vocational training. Organization of subject matter is as essential in manual training as in any other line of endeavor. ”

“ The field of business is so wide and embraces so many subjects that the methods of teaching giving the best results will be varied and used in different combinations with different subjects. Those subjects which are practical and largely habit forming, such as stenography, typewriting, bookkeeping, and the manipulation of mechanical and labor-saving office devices, are of course taught by some method of training which will insure quick reaction. ”

“ The whole subject of design as it relates to the manual training shop is one that has demanded thought on the part of the author. It is one of those places where teaching theory failed to bring efficiency either in the results obtained in design or in the reaction upon the boy. He has been forced to the opinion, from his own experience and from his observation of the efforts of others to teach design to grammar school pupils, that the cause for dissatisfaction and discouragement is due to our insistence upon one and only one method of presentation—the inductive or synthetic. ”

“ For the hand stands for use, for service, and for unyielding integrity; and it may be confidently asserted on the conviction of observation, experience, and a studious consideration of historic facts, that its drill and discipline as enforced in the world’s workshops, and in the best of existing Manual-training schools, results in a far greater degree of mind development than is produced by any exclusively academic course, and hence that Manual Training is the most important of all methods of education. ”

“ One course will be of a definitely practical character designed for the needs of those who are fitted to occupy leading positions in industry. Handwork will form a prominent feature, and a broad technical training will be given on cultural lines. The work will not be directly vocational in intention, nor will book-learning of the usual kind be entirely neglected: the object will be to provide a training of the greatest educational value for students of a certain [60] type. ”

“ The method above described is called "cutting in boards," and is superior to any other.
[pg 73]
It is of the utmost importance to the young workman that he should pursue and acquire a methodical system in all his operations. Select the best method, as a matter of course, and then adhere to it. Do not, every time you perform one particular process, do it in a different manner. For instance: in backing or in turning up your books, it is better to always have the head towards you; in cutting head and tail, to have the back nearest you. In laying your work down, always do it in one way. ”

“ The whole course of training centres round the School of Observation and Practice. The lecturers on method also teach in the school, and are responsible there for the teaching of their own special subjects. They give lessons on these, which are listened to by the students, and they also criticise lessons given by the latter. A good deal of the time devoted to the study of methods is employed in the learning how to make simple apparatus and illustrations. ”

“ Naturally, methods of teaching the subject vary exceedingly in the different institutions. Each instructor to a large extent follows his own individual inclinations. Probably the great majority pursue the lecture method to a considerable extent. The lectures are generally accompanied by readings either from some textbook or from collateral readings. ”

“ The object is not always to teach the “technic” of an industry, because that can be done only in the workshop, but it may be to teach the science and art upon which all technics are really based. Manual training is of course training to manual labor, which has been called the “study of the external world.” While in all technical education the sciences and arts must be illustrated by practical examples, the main object is to so instruct masters and workmen that they can pursue their craft with [Pg 283] dignity and intelligence, without professing to teach the craft itself. ”

“ We may conclude from this brief statement of the situation that it is desirable to organize and have courses in our manual training and mechanical drawing and that whatever system is adopted it must make allowance for emphasis upon both the thought element and upon skill. ”

“ And the student becomes too painfully aware, for his own educational good, of a chasmal separation between his textbook and his collateral reading. The present manual is designed to supply a narrative of such proportions that the need of additional reading will be somewhat lessened, and at the same time it is provided with critical bibliographies and so arranged as to enable the judicious instructor more easily to make substitutions here and there from other works or to pass over this or that section entirely. ”

“ One is the lecture method, by which the instructor gives the lesson to the class in the form of a lecture, placing the outline upon the blackboard as he proceeds, calling upon the students to read the texts cited, and frequently reviewing the outline in a concert drill. ”