The Jackson standard. [volume] (Jackson C.H., Ohio) 1847-1888, 1874-03-12
From the Scientific Americana
Education and Book Knowledge.

Educat10n ana BOOK AnoWIe0ge.
The high water mark of prevalent
theory in education is reached in an as
sertion, by one of the foremost educators
of the day, to the effect that what man
can write out fully and fairly concerning
any matter, that he knows and no more.
Whatever falls short of this simple and
certain test, we are told, is no better
than sheer ignorance. 48e7 vss
/ The phrase expresses, with automatic
terseness, the controlling spirit of the
schools; and for this reason, we suppose,
it has been echoed right and left as a
settled dogma in education. From the
primary school up to the highest, ex-
| cepting few scientific schools, the grand
test of knowledge is verbal expression.
The pupil that recites best wins the prize;
and as the most creditE goes to that
teacher whose pupils meet the standard
required most completely, the tendency
is to narrow the range of teaching to
those things which can be most readily
reproduced in formal phrases. The pre-
MUM is paid for swords, and naturally
the teacher gives more attention to them
than to the pupils mental health or
mental development.
Not that facility of verbal expression is
to be despised or neglected, 1t is an art
second to none, and worthy of proper
tionate culture. In many cases it is also
a first rate test of knowledge; but to
make it the ultimate test, in all cases,
involves a double fallacy, subversive of
the. highest aim in education. 1t implies
that all knowledge worth having can be
expressed in words and consequently can
be communicated by words, either for in
forming another or for testing his in
formation. 1t implies, too, that the pos
session of knowledge necessarily carries
with it the power of ready and accurate
expression.
The fact is on the contrary, that rela-
lively but small part of what one may
know can possibly be expressed in words;
and much even of that which can be
formulated may be thoroughly appre-
could not begin to set it down in logical
sentences.
Time was when book knowledge was
thought to be the sole basis of scholar
ship. All teaching was book teaching,
and it was no more than fair to expect
students to prove their knowledge in
book fashion. But that time is past.
The bookish estimate of culture no long
er satisfies. The library alone can no
longer make a scholar; and every
scheme of culture which pins the pupils
attention to letters is little better than
wall set around him to keep him from
learning what he ought to know That
much of what passes for legitimate
schooling is such wall is recognized by
everyb body except the pedagogue
Men of real culture are well aware that
ability to do is vastly superior to ability
to say; and they believe that the devel-
opment of skill and power ought to re-
ceive at least as much attention in school
ing as the mere accumulation of second
hand facts; but all that sort of basic cul-
ture is not merely sighted but suppressed
as soon as the test of verbal description
is made supreme.
There are less than fifty sounds in the
English language If they were all devo-
ted to the service of single sense, all
their possible combinations would be in
sufficient to express the distinctions
which that sense might be able to recog-
nize. There are FIVE thousand times
fifty fibrils in the optic nerve as estimated
by Helmholtz, each demonstrably capa-
BILE of conveying many degrees of sensa-
ton of the several primary colors. One
need not calculate the permutations of
two hundred and fifty thousand to real
ize how meager the richest possible
vocabulary of sight terms must be for
the expression of sight experiences.
when used for expressing the infinite dis
tinctions of thoughts and things which
the whole man is capable of apprehend-
ing. Relatively, indeed our words are
but clumsy sort of currency for certain
common needs, no more sufficient for the
complete expression of thoughts and
feelings than bank notes are for the
measurement of values. For the grosser
exchanges of life, for marketable values.
money answers well enough but how
shall one express in bankers figures, or
set phrases either. the value of kindly
word, a mothers love, or a cup of water
to one perishing with thirst?
The killing fault with the scholastic
test of knowledge is that, from its nature,
it fails to reach-as it fails to encourage
more than single phase of culture.
and that one of inferior grade. 1t meas
ures verbal acquisition only, not skill or
power; and since conduct rather than
words, ability to do rather than facility
in saying what has been done or ought
to be done, is the ultimate test in life,
and should be the paramount aim in ed
ucation, the word test is necessarily de-
ceptive as well as inadequate. The glib
art critic, scarcely able to draw a straight
line, might have at his tongues end
greater array of fine art phrases than
Michael Angelo; and if suddenly called
on to write out fully and fairly his
knowledge of sculpture or painting, the
master might be beaten by the mere the
orist. So, too, the veteran shipmaster of
a hundred successful voyages might make
off hand poorer display of nautical
knowledge than the cadet fresh from the
naval school, or possibly the concoctor of
sea stories for sensational newspaper