The Kenosha telegraph. [volume] (Kenosha, Wis.) 1860-1888, 1875-07-08
educational.
u. p. BRIGGS, Editor.
D. Fl. FLETT, KENosHA, REFEREE IN GRAMMAR.
D. A. mAHoNHr. wooDwoRrH M KEFERn5 IN
From The Teacher.
WHAT Is TEACHING?

/
twenty times over, and yet not know it
Talking to class is not necessarily
teaching. | have known many teachers
who were brimful of Information. and
we're good takers, and who discourse6
to their classes with ready Gtterance a
large part of the time allotted to in.
struction; yet an examination IF Their
classes showed little advancement in
knowledge.
There are several time-honored
metaphors on this subject, which need
TO be received wIthsome grains of allow
ance, if we would get at an exact idea oil
what teaching is. Cbiselling the rude
marble into the finished statue; giving
the impression of the seal upon the soft
wax; pouring water into an empty ves-
sel;-all these comparisons lack one es-
sentIal element of lik eness The mind
Is, indeed, In one sense, empty, and
needs to be filled. 1t is yielding, and
needs to be i'm pressed. 1t is rude, and
neeos polishing. But it is not, like the
marble, the wax, or the vessel, passive
recipient of external influences. It is
itself living power. 1t is acted upon
only by stirring up its own activities
The operative upon mind, unlike the
operative upon matter, INST have the
active, voluntary cooperation os that
upon which he works. The teacher is
doing his work only so far as he gets
work from the scholar. The very cs-
sence ard root of the work are in the
scholar, not in the teacher. No one, in
fact, in an important sense, is taught
at all, except so far as he is selftaught.
line teacher may be useful, as an aux
Hilary, in causing this action on the part
of the scholar. But the one, indispen-
sable, vital thing in all learning, Is in
the scholar himself. The old Romans.
their word education (educers, to draw
out), seem to have come nearer to the
true idea than any other people have
doEe. The teacher is to draw ent the
resources of the pupil. Yet even this
word comes short of the exac3 truth.
The teecher must put in. as well as draw
ont No process of Inere pumping will
draw out from chiid's mind knowledge
which IS not there. All the power CT
the Socratic method, could it be applied
by Socrates himself, would be unwilling
to draw from a child's mind. by mere
questioning, a knowledge, for instance,
of chemlca! affinity, of the solar system.
OF the temperature of the Gulf Stream,
OF the doctrine of the resurrection.
What, then, IS teaching?
Teaching is causing any one o know.
Now no one can be uade to know a
thing but bg the act of his own powers.
His own senses, his own memory, his
own powers of reason, perez ption, and
judgment, must be exercised. The func-
ton OF the teacher is to bring about
this exercise of the pupils faculties.
The means TO do this are Infinite in
variety. They should be varied accord
ing to the wants and the character of
the individual to be taught. One needs
to be told thing; he learns most readily
by the ear. Another needs to uss his
eye; he must see thing, either in the
book or In nature. But neither eve nor
ear, nor any other sense or faculty, will
avail 10 the acquisition of knowledge.
unless the power of attention is cultiva-
led. Attention, then, ia the first act or
power nf the mind that must be aroused.
L. IS the very foundation Of al progress
IN knowledge, aud the means of awaken
ing it constitute the first step in the
educational art.
''-SHt ~ 0AJ biOSbcS QOSlIlVG huOWi-
edge, facts. are once in possession of the
mind, something must next be done to
prevent their slipping away. You may
tell class the history of certain event;
or y"u may give them description of a
certain place or person; or you may let
them read it; and you may secure such
q degree of attention that, at tie time of
the reading or the description, they
shall have fair, intelligib,e comnr.-
hensi"n Of what has been described or
read. The facts are. for the time, ac
tuaily IN the possession of the mind.
Now, # the mind was, according to the
old notion, merely vessel to be filled,
the process would be conDlete. Bnt