| Show NORMAL DEPARTMENT r f. f Rousseau and r 1 tk FROM THE FRENCH OF MADAME DE J r I. I IT may seem at first unreasonable to praise the ancient method which made the study of languages the basis of education education education edu edu- cation and at the same time to regard the school of as a's one of the best institutions of our century j I believe believe believe be be- lieve nevertheless that these two points of view may be reconciled Of all an studies that in which obtained the best results was mathematics But it seems to me that that- his method is equally applicable to several other parts of instruction and that it would secure sure and rapid progress Rousseau felt that children before the age of twelve or thirteen years had not the necessary intelligence ce to understand the studies which men demanded of th them m or rather for the method of study to which they were were submitted They repeat without understanding they work without at attain attaining attaining at- at tain ng skill and often ohen receive nothing from education but the habit of pe performing performing per per- forming their tasks without knowing them and evading the power of the master by the cunning of the pupil All that Rousseau Rousseau said pid against such routine education is perfectly true but hut as often happens the remedy he proposes proposes proposes pro pro- poses is even worse than the evil A child who according to the system of Rousseau has learned nothing up to the age of twelve years has lost six precious years of his life j his intellectual intellectual intellectual organs will never acquire that flexibility flexibility flexibility flex flex- which the exercise of the first years of childhood alone can give them Habits of idleness will vill have taken such firm root in him that the idea of work will render him far more unhappy when suggested for the first time at the age of twelve years th than n if he had been from the first accustomed to to look upon k r iL i I it as a necessary condition of life Be Besides Besides Be- Be sides the kind of care which Rousseau demands of the teacher in order to td supplement instruction and to bring it about by necessity would oblige everyman every everyman everyman man to devote his entire life to the education education education edu edu- cation of another and none but grandfathers grandfathers grandfathers grand grand- fathers would be at at liberty to enter upon a personal career Such projects are chimerical while the method of is real real applicable and capable capable capable cap cap- able of exercising a great influence upon the future progress of the human mind Rousseau said rightly that children do donot donot donot not comprehend that which they learn and he concluded therefore that they ought to learn nothing profoundly profoundly pro pro- studied the reasons why children children chil dren do not com comprehend and his method simplifies and graduates ideas in such a away away away way that they are placed within the reach of childhood and that the child mind arrives without fatigue at the most profound results By passing with exactitude through all the degrees of reasoning placed the child in a position to discover for himself that which he ought to learn In the method of a thing is understood or oc or it is not understood for all propositions touch each other so nearly that the second reason is always the consequence of the first Rousseau says that the the the minds mind of of- children are fatigued by the studies which are exacted of them always conducted them by a route so easy and so positive that tha the initiation into the most abstract sciences cost them no more effort than was was required for the most simple Each step in these sciences is isas as easy easy easy-by by reference to the preceding step step step-as as the most natural inference drawn from the most ordinary circum circum- stances That which tires ch children ildren is making them skip the intermediate steps making them m advance without knowing that which they think they have learned There is always in their I minds a sort of confusion which makes every examination n seem formidable to them and which inspires them with an invincible distaste for work There does not exist a trace of these evils with children are amused with their studies not that they should be made a play to them as I have al already already already al- al ready said bringing ennui into pleasure and frivolity into study but because they taste in childhood the pleasures of knowing comprehending and finishing whatever they are set to do The method of like all that is truly good is not an entirely new discovery but an enlightened and persevering persevering persevering per per- severing application of truths already known Patience observation and the philosophic study of the processes of the human mind enabled him to distinguish distinguish distinguish dis dis- what is elementary in thought and nd the order of thought development and he carried farther than any other the theory and practice of the gradation I of instruction H His is method has been successfully applied to grammar geography geography geography I phy and music but it is much to be desired that the learned professors who have adopted his principles should apply a them to all kinds of knowledge Particularly Particularly Partie- Partie our knowledge of history is yet very imperfect Literary ideas cannot be graduated like those of problems in science Finally much remains remains to bedone ba be badone be- be done to bring education to its highest development that development that is to say the art of placing ones one's self behind what one knows in order to make it understood by others r r G |
