Evening star., 1945-03-18
Armys Use Of Visual Aids in Mass Education
Viewed as Key to Postwar Teochinq Methods

Engineers Progrom
Shown in Exhibit
At Fort BeIvoir
BY CARTER BROOKE JONES,
Star Staff Correspondent.
FORT BELVOIR, Va, Mar. IT,
Out of the tragedies of war are GER
tain to come benefits to harassed hui
manity, among them new methods
Of education, those who should know
agree.
A striking picture of some new
ways Of educating people quickly Is
found in an exhibit which has Just
opened at this great engineer school,
ing center. It's display of what
the Army simply and modestly calls
training aids"
There are visual aids. These sug-
gest pictures, perhaps plaster mod
els and movies. Actually they're far
more than that. You'll find, in this
extensive exhibition OF how the
Army imparts technical information
In a hurry, models Of machinery
functioning under glass, stripped
skeletons Of engines and gears and
brakes, small gadgets blown up to
sufficient size really to study, models
OF bridges and pieces Of ordnance
with their parts painted In glaring
colors and labeled for proper scru-I
tiny. You'n see a Diesel engine in
action, its explosive forces shooting
flames like tongues of an adder.
Tangible at Times.
And these "aids" are not only
visual, but auditory and tangible at
times. All the senses are used when
helpful. The eyes pick up every sort
of picture, still and animated, photo
graphic or painted, as the case may
be, every type of raised model
whatever may show on the instant
what the teacher is driving at. The
ears catch sounds significant in war.
The hands learn how certain things
feel.
If you're studying how a truck
operates, how an antiaircraft or
machine gun fires, what makes a
grenade do what it does, you see the
operation as through an X-ray, just
as the medical student studies from
a model the circulation of the blood
or the way brain cells are formed.
The Army, said Brig. Gen. Gordon
r. Young, commanding Fort Belvoir,
undoubtedly has gone far beyond
the schools and colleges of the
country in progressive education.
The Army-the Corps of Engi-
neers in particular-was confronted
with the tough job of teaching highly
technical subjects as swiftly as pos
sible. There's no doubt in the gen.
erals mind of how efficient these
training aids have proved in facili-
tating the program.
Regarded rs Revolutionary.
Listen to another officer who is an
expert in the line. Maj. E. w. Zol-
Ter came to the Army from Pennsyl-
vania State College, where he was
administrative head of the junior
college. At Belvoir he prepares in
struction for the instructors. He is
sort of chief of staff of engineer
teaching.
He regards these training aids as
something revolutionary in educa-
ton. After the war, he foresees
conflict between conservative peda-
gogues and those who have come
under the realism Of military educa-
tional methods.
Universities, he pointed out, have
hardly touched the field of visual
aids. They have been used to any
extent only in technical schools, he
explained, and have almost endless
possibilities. They are, he said, as
practical for liberal arts courses as
for the laboratory.
''Our universities" he commented,
have beer content to cling to the
old ways of teaching. If they
couldn't interest the students, that
was too bad. They had the wide
purpose OF training people for a.
richer life. In the Army our objec-
tive is quite simple. We teach men
to stay alive. But we've found short
cuts and ways to hold the interest
of our students which are bound to
have an effect on our educational
system in the years to come"
Stimulate Interest.
A young lieutenant was giving a
brief lecture to q group of officers
who had been detailed as instructors
and were getting oriented in their
new work And he snapped aside
the curtains from big charts. He
was explaining to them how valu-
able they would find the training
aids they were about to study in the
big exhibit room and any others
they might devise-and he was tell
ing them with the help of training
aids.
why Use Aids?" questioned big
caption on one chart. And the lieut.
tenants pointer bore down on the
answers. They stimulate interest,
increase vividness, provide fiexibil-
ity, save time"