Waterbury Democrat., 1902-05-13
THE TRAINING OF TEACHERS
Ones Sided Training-What Teache
 Should Look Out For.

One Sided Training-What a Teacher
 Should Look Out For.
 A visitor was recently shown through the rooms in which psychol- ogy Is taught in one of Americas s famous schools for the training of teachers. The walls were covered with excellent diagrams and charts, showing the different parts of the ner- yous system. The rooms were well supplied with expensive models of the brain and with delicate apparatus for testing the various kinds of nerve ac- ton. When the visitor was about to leave. the teacher told him she had no time to discuss thinking with her classes. Since this school is called the state normal school, and is the only training school for teachers maintain ed at state expense in that common wealth, the visitor went away wonder ing whether that state would not ere long become missionary ground for the apostles of true education. To train, develop and discipline the mind surely means more than the education of the spinal cord and the gray matter of the brain. It involves more than the formation of habits based upon re- peated nerve action. Important as the brain and the nervous system are in education, careful study of their func- tions cannot atone for the neglect of inquiry into the nature of thinking. The true test by which genuine teach ing can be distinguished from its coun- terfeit, rote teaching, Is found in thinking. The impression conveyed to the mind through the gateWays of Knowledge must be interpreted and or ganized in thought; otherwise obserya- ton lessons have little value as factors in the mental growth of the child
 Many a young teacher has filled her mind with facts relating to nervous action, and with statements of the principals which are supposed to guide good teachers in all their teaching. Although these facts may prove yalu- able In the management of the indi- vidual the needed preparation for giv- ing a lesson, yet in the absorbing inter est and enthusiasm which character ize instruction when it is at it's best, these facts and principals sink into the sub-conscious realm, even if they are not intirely forgotten. At each step t- the recitation the teachers chief care IS lO IudAe lu0 puplIS luluk Iu0 thoughts which the words enshrine; and the supervisor tests the quality of the thinking which the teacher begcts in the pupils. If they repeat words without comprehending the meaning, the teaching Is justly stigmatized as parrot work. If, on the other hand, they think the thoughts which the words embody. the class work. even if not above criticism. belongs to the category of good teaching. Mere nerve action may beget good habits; but if it does not involve the exercise of thought it cannot produce intelli- gent men and women. Routine work seldom appeals to the understanding, and review lessons which do not con tain an element Of new thought invari- ably tend to deaden intellectual life Whenever mental activity sinks to the level of mechanical routine, by the use of ratio blocks or in the manipu- lation of the ten digits, the intelligence is apt to become dormant, and habit takes the place of thinking, although the exercises strike the casual obser- yer as marvellous exhibitions of good teaching.-Nathan c. Shaeffer In the Forum.