Evening star., 1900-10-06
A Harvard Instructors Fears as to
the New Methods.
THE DANGERS l'OP SPECIALlSM
Are Students Being Deprived Of
Wholesome Training?
D IFFIC U LTIES AVOIDED
Monthlr.

II. Ia. d.
| Monthly.
Doubts is my title, not Views" and,
as this title indicates my paper is the ex-
| preston of a mood rather than conviction.
A mere observer of educational methods is
| often bothered by doubts as to the relative
value of the old educational product and of
the new. The new product, the educated
man or today, is in some measure the neces-
sity OF the time. The demands of special
calling require preparation early and SO
long that the all-round man-that invalua-
BILE species which has leavened and civilized
all society-bids fair to be soon as extinct
as the dodo. No one denies that the rare
being who, in spite of the elective principle
persists in getting a general education first
and special one later, IS q man of more
power than If he had been driven through a
general b education by some other will than
his own; yet with the kindergarten at one
end of our education and with the elective
system at the other, we see seem to see.
a falling off in the vigor with which men
attack distastefu but useful thines-a
shrinking from the old, resolute education.
The new education has made three dscov-
cries
1. Education should always recognize the
fitness Of different minds for different work
z The process of education need not be-
and should not be, forbidding.
g. In earlier systems of education, natural
science had not a fair place.
The Elective System.
No wonder that the new education seems
to some men proclamation Of freedom
The elective system, with it's branches and
connections, is the natural reaction from
the unintelligently rigid ignoring of men,
tai difference in individuals Its funda-
mental idea Is practical, and at times in
spring. When there are so many more
things worth knowing than anybody can
master, to force everybody through lin
ited number definite tasks before calling
him educated. to make him give years to
studies in which he may be Ounce. with
out glimpse Except stolen glimpses) of
other studies for which he may have pc
culiar aptitude, seems flying in the face of
Providence. Again, people are more inter-
estng for being different-for not being put
through the same mill. Uneducated coun-
try people, for example, are far more inter-
esting, far more individual, than meagerly
educated city people than semi educated
school teachers who are graduates of some
one inferior normal school We do not
want men to be alike. We cannot make
them alike; why do we try?
The old plan of learning the whole Latin
grammar by heart was to some minds
torture. Why should the early exercise of
our powers and the training of those DOW
ers to higher service be repellant or even
austere? Life is hard enough without our
Wantonly making it harder: let US suffer
our boys and girls to enjoy education.
are the birds and the flowers. Why shut
out the study of these for Greek, Latin
and mathematics? Are the humanities hu-
man.? Is mathematics either so agreeable
or SO useful as betany or zoology?
Extreme, characterization.
Every one of these questions is emanc-
patory; but the emancipation may be car
ried too far. Look, for example at the
elective system. No persons lay them
sol
absurdum than advocates of the elective
system Everybody believes in the elective
syste mat some stage of education: the
question is where to begin. Yet extension
after extension is advocated on general
grounds of liberty (such liberty nv the
way as nobody has in active life): and
propositions are brought forward which
If We accept them, give the elective system
no logical end. Down it goes, through col
lege. through high school and grammar
school. until not even the alphabet can
stop it.
Doubt I. Are we sure that we do not be-
gin the elective system too early or that
we shall not begin it too early?
Educational Entertainment.
The attempt to make education less for
bidding has called forth various devices,
among them the method of teaching chill
dren to read without teaching them to spell:
and the kindergarten is responsible for va
they are playing games when they are or
should be, studying.
A modern textbook on the study of lam
guage remarks that in walking out we see
various kinds of birdS-sparroWs robins
mems. and what not: and that just as there
are various kinds of birds so there are va
rlouS kinds of words-nouns. verbs adiec-
tlves l see signs of a reaction from these
deblitated methods, in particular in the
method which teaches children reading
without spelling. but the effect of these
methods is with still.
Doubt III. Are we sure that the enjoy
ment which we wish to put into education
Is sufficiently robust?
No imaginative Device however feeble
VIII take away the manliness of boy who
knows that work is work. and makes play
of 1t when he honestly can; but nothing de-
bil1tates boy more effectively than the
notion that teachers exist for his amuse-
ment. and that If education does not allure
MIN so much the worse for education.
Whim and Incidence.
Again, we are told-and If / am not mis-
taken we are told by enthusiastic advo-
Gates of new methods-that the object of
education is not knowledge so much as
power: in Greek. for example, we no longer
ask a boy to know three books Of the
Had, "omitting the catalogue of the ships''
we ask him to translate Homer at sight;
yet modern doctrine fails to see, except in
glimpses, that no better way of gaining
overcoming of difficulties. The fear old
fashioned people have about new-fashioned
education is that too much depends on
whim. and that whim may be born of in
dolence.
Take the old system in its most mon
strous form-take learning Latin grammar
by heart before translating any Latin au-
thor; nobody now defends a practice so
stupid; yet that wonderful feat of memory
strengthened many memory for other
wonderful feats The boy who mastered
Andrews and StOddard knew the power of
patient effort, the strength of drudgery
well done Through a natural reaction,
memory is underrateds now. Education at
the time when memory is trained easiest
and best must be saved from the barren
ness of memory work and must be EN-
riched." Even the multiplication table is
threatened with sbanishment. We leave the
straight and narrow way and wabble all
over the 1owery meadows We are held
down to accuracy little that 1t is next
to impossible toifnd asyouth who can copy
a list of printed narnes without misspelling.
We have boys who cannot spell, men who
cannot spell teachersfof English who can
not spell, college professors who cannot
spell and who dave Il mean opinion of
spelling. IL 90
The Line Of Lesfst Resistance.