The Child under Eight Part 6

The rest of the morning we made curtains, and the children loved it.

There was much discussion and at first the children suggested making them all different, but they agreed that curtains at windows were usually alike. Mr. and Mrs. Harry nearly quarrelled, as one wanted green and the other pink. I suggested tr.i.m.m.i.n.g the green with a strip of pink, and they were quite pleased. Mrs. Loo and Nurse chose green which was to be sewn with red silk. Sylvia said, "A pattern," and I said, "You saw something red and green to-day," and she called out, "Oh! cherries." She cut out a round of paper and tried to sew round it, holding it in place with her other hand. I suggested putting in a st.i.tch to hold the paper.

Cecil was absorbed in sewing, and it seemed quieting for such an excitable boy and good for his weak hands. One child said, "Fancy a boy sewing," so I told how soldiers and sailors sewed. They sewed just as they liked.

These notes are continued in Chapter IX., where they are used to show children's att.i.tude towards Nature. Though separated here for a special purpose it is clear that there neither is nor ought to be any real separation in the lives of the children. Their lives are wholes and they continually pa.s.s from one "subject" to another, because life and its circ.u.mstances are making new demands. If it rains and you cannot gather the lettuces you have grown from seed, you take refuge in happy pretence; if it clears and the sun calls you out of doors, you take your doll-babies for their walk.

CHAPTER VII

JOY IN MAKING

I, too, will something make, and joy in the making.

ROBERT BRIDGES.

Built by that only Law, that Use be suggester of Beauty.

ARTHUR CLOUGH.

There has always been _making_ in the Kindergarten, since to Froebel the impulse to create was a characteristic of self-conscious humanity.

Stopford Brooke points out that Browning's Caliban, though almost brute, shows himself human, in that, besides thinking out his natural religion, he also dramatises and creates, "falls to make something."

'Tis solace making baubles, ay, and sport.

Tasteth, himself, no finer good i' the world Than trying what to do with wit and strength--

What does a child gain from his ceaseless attempts at making? Froebel's answer was that intellectually, through making he gains ideas, which, received in words, remain mere words. "To learn through life and action is more developing than to learn through words: expression in plastic material, united with thought and speech, is far more developing than mere repet.i.tion of words." Morally, it is through impressing himself on his surroundings, that the child reaches the human attributes of self-consciousness and self-control. One of the most important pa.s.sages Froebel ever wrote is this:

"The deepest craving of the child's life is to see itself mirrored in some external object. Through such reflection, he learns to know his own activity, its essence, direction and aim, and learns to determine his activity in accordance with outer things. Such mirroring of the inner life is essential, for through it the child comes to self-consciousness, and learns to order, determine and master himself."

It is from the point of view of expression alone that Froebel regards Art, and drawing, he takes to be "the first revelation of the creative power within the child." The very earliest drawing to which he refers is what he calls "sketching the object on itself," that is, the tracing round the outlines of things, whereby the child learns form by co-ordinating sight and motor perceptions, a stage on which Dr.

Montessori has also laid much stress. Besides noting how children draw "round scissors and boxes, leaves and twigs, their own hands, and even shadows," he sees that from experimentation with any pointed stick or sc.r.a.p of red stone or chalk, may come what Mr. E. Cooke called a language of line, and now "the horse of lines, the man of lines" will give much pleasure. After this it is true that "whatever a child knows he will put into his drawing," and the teacher's business is to see that he has abundant perceptions and images to express.

Another kind of drawing which children seem to find for themselves is what they call making patterns. Out of this came the old-fas.h.i.+oned chequer drawing, now condemned as injurious to eyesight and of little value.

When children see anything rich in colour the general cry is "Let's paint it," which is their way of taking in the beauty. We should not, says Froebel, give them paints and brushes inconsiderately, to throw about, but give them the help they need, and he describes quite a sensible lesson given to boys "whose own painting did not seem to paint them long."

Teachers who want real help in the art training of children should read the excellent papers by Miss Findlay in _School and Life_, where we are told that we must rescue the term "design" from the limited uses to which it is often condemned in the drawing cla.s.s, viz. the construction of pleasing arrangements of colour and form for surface decoration. "We shall use it in its full popular significance in constructive work....

The term will cover building houses, making kettles, laying out streets, planning rooms, dressing hair, as well as making patterns for cus.h.i.+on covers and cathedral windows.... In thus widening our art studies, we shall be harking back in a slight degree to the kind of training that in past ages produced the great masters.... Giotto designed his Campanile primarily for the bells that were to summon the Florentines to their cathedral; the Venetians wanted facades for their palaces, and made facades to delight their eyes; the j.a.panese have wanted small furniture for their small rooms, and have developed wonderful skill and taste in designing it. Neither art nor science can remain long afloat in high abstract regions above the needs and interests of human life. To quote A.H. Clough:

'A Cathedral Pure and Perfect.

Built by that only Law, that Use be suggester of Beauty; Nothing concealed that is, done, but all things done to adornment; Meanest utilities seized as occasions to grace and embellish.'"

If this is true of the interests of the professional artist, much more must it be true of the art training of the child. We must not then despise the rough and ready productions of a child, nor force upon him a standard for which he is not ready.

Before any other construction is possible to him, a child can _make_ with sand, and this is a constant joy, from the endless puddings that are turned out of patty pans, up to such models as that of the whole "Isle of Wight" with its tunnelled cliffs and system of railways, made by an ex-Kindergarten boy as yet innocent of geography lessons.

The child then who is making, especially making for use, is to a certain extent developing himself as an artist.

The little boys at Keilhau were well provided with sand, moss, etc., to use with their building blocks, and it was a former Keilhau boy who suggested to his old master that some kind of sand-box would make a good plaything for the children in his new Kindergarten. Miss Wiggin tells us that indirectly we owe the children's sand-heaps in the public parks to Froebel, since these were the result of a suggestion made by Frau Schrader to the Empress Frederick, and the idea was carried out during her husband's too brief reign.

Another very early "making" is the arranging of furniture for shops, carriages, trains, and the "s.h.i.+ps upon the stairs," which made bright pictures in Stevenson's memory.

Building blocks are truly, as Froebel puts it, "the finest and most variable material that can be offered a boy for purposes of representation." The little boxes a.s.sociated with the Kindergarten were originally planned for the use of nursery children two to three years of age, and in most if not in all Kindergartens these have been replaced by larger bricks. It is many years now since, at Miss Payne's suggestion, we bought some hundreds of road paving blocks, and these are such a source of pleasure that the children often dream about them. Living out the life around presents much opportunity for making, which may be done with blocks, but which even in the Kindergarten can be done with tools.

Care must be exercised, but children have quite a strong instinct for self-preservation, and if shown how real workmen handle their tools, they are often more careful than at a much later stage. To make a workable railway signal is more interesting and much more educative than to use one that came from a shop. The teacher may make illuminating discoveries in the process, as when one set of children desired to make a counter for a shop, and arranged their piece of wood vertically so that the counter had no top. It was found that to these very little people the most important part was the high front against which they were accustomed to stand, not the flat top which they seldom saw.

Another set of children made a cart on which the farmer was to carry his corn, and exemplified Dewey's "concrete logic of action." At first they only wanted a board on wheels, but the corn fell off, so they nailed on sides, but the cart never had either back or front and resembled some seen in Early English pictures.

Any kind of cooking that can be done is a most important kind of making; even the very little ones can help, and they thoroughly enjoy watching.

"Her hands were in the dough from three years old," said a north-country mother, "so I taught her how to bake, and now (at seven) she can bake as well as I can."

Children delight in carrying out the processes involved in the making of flour, and they can easily thrash a little wheat, then winnow, grind between stones and sift it. Their best efforts produce but a tiny quant.i.ty of flour, but the experience is real, interest is great, and a new significance attaches to the shop flour from which bread is ultimately produced.

b.u.t.ter and cheese can easily be made, also jam, and even a Christmas pudding. In very early Kindergartens we read of the growing, digging and cooking of potatoes, and of the extraction of starch to be used as paste.

Special anniversaries require special making. We possess a doll of 1794 to whom her old mother bequeathed her birthday. The doll's birthday is a great event, and on the previous day each cla.s.s in turn bakes tiny loaves, or cakes or pastry for the party.

Christmas creates a need for decorations, Christmas cards and presents, and Empire Day and Trafalgar Day for flags, while in many places there is an annual sale on behalf of a charity.

It does not do to be too modern and to despise all the old-fas.h.i.+oned "makings," which gave such pleasure some years ago. Kindergarten Paper-folding has fallen into an undeserved oblivion. The making of boats or c.o.c.ked-hats from old newspaper is a great achievement for a child, and to make pigs and purses, corner cupboards and chairs for paper dolls is still a delight, and calls forth real concentration and effort.

Making in connection with some whole, such as the continuous representation of life around us, and, at a later stage, the re-inventing of primitive industries, or making which arises out of some special interest may have a higher educational value, but apart from this, children want to make for making's sake. "Can't I make something in wood like Boy does?" asked a little girl. There is joy in the making, joy in being a cause, and for this the children need opportunity, s.p.a.ce and time. There is a lesson to many of us in some verses by Miss F.

Sharpley, lately published (_Educational Handwork_), which should be ent.i.tled, "When can I make my little s.h.i.+p?"

I'd like to cut, and cut, and cut, And over the bare floor To strew my papers all about, And then to cut some more.

I'd sweep them up so neatly, too, But mother says, "Oh no!

There is no time, it's seven o'clock; To bed you quickly go!"

In school, I'd just begun to make A pretty little s.h.i.+p, But I was slow, and all the rest Stood up to dance and skip.

When shall I make my little s.h.i.+p?

At home there is no gloy, And father builds it by himself Or goes to buy a toy.

CHAPTER VIII

STORIES

Let me tell the stories and I care not who makes the textbooks.

STANLEY HALL.

"Is it Bible story to-day or any _kind_ of a story?" was the greeting of an eager child one morning. "Usually they were persuading him to tell stories," writes Ebers, from his recollections of Froebel as an old man at Keilhau. "He was never seen crossing the courtyard without a group of the younger pupils hanging to his coat tails and clasping his arms.

Usually they were persuading him to tell stories, and when he condescended to do so, the older ones flocked around him, too, and they were never disappointed. What fire, what animation the old man had retained!"