College Teaching Part 37

"A teacher has not the right to spend any considerable part of the time of a cla.s.s in finding out by oral questions ... whether or not the student has done the work a.s.signed to him. The good student does not need the questions and is bored by the stumbling replies which he hears; and even the poor student does not get what he needs, which is either instruction _a deux_, or else a corrected written recitation.... Not in this futile way should the instructor squander the short hours spent with his students. The purpose of these hours is twofold: first, to give to the students such necessary information as they cannot gain, or cannot so expediently gain, in some other way; second, and most important, to incite them to 'psychologize' for themselves. The first of these purposes is best gained by the lecture, the second by guided discussion. 'Guided discussion' does not mean a reversal of the recitation process--an hour in which students ask questions in any order, and of any degree of relevancy and seriousness, which the instructor answers. On the contrary, the instructor initiates and leads the discussion; he chooses its subject, maps out its field, pulls it back when it threatens to transgress its bonds, and, from time to time, summarizes its results. This he does, however, with the least possible show of his hand. He puts his question and leaves it to the student interested to answer him; he restates the bungling answer and the confused question; he leaves one student to answer the difficulties of another.... The advantage of the discussion over the lecture is, thus, that it fosters in the student the active att.i.tude of the thinker in place of the pa.s.sive att.i.tude of the listener.... Obviously it is simplest to teach large cla.s.ses by lecturing to them. Yet a spirited and relevant discussion may be conducted in a cla.s.s of a hundred or so. Of course no more than eight or twelve, or, at most, twenty of these will take even a small part on a given day; perhaps a half or two thirds will never take part; and some will remain uninterested. But there will be many intelligent listeners as well as active partic.i.p.ants; and these gain more, I believe, by the give and take of a good discussion than by constant lectures however effective."

=Cla.s.s experiments=

Brief mention should be made of a form of cla.s.s exercise peculiar to psychology, the "cla.s.s experiment." This is in some respects like a demonstration, but differs from that in calling for a more active partic.i.p.ation on the part of the student. Any psychological experiment is performed _on_ a human (or animal) subject, and many experiments can be performed on a group of subjects together, each of them being called on to perform a certain task or to make a certain observation.

Each of the cla.s.s having made his individual record, the instructor may gather them together into an average or summary statement, and the individual variations as well as the general tendency may thus be brought to light. Very satisfactory and even scientific experiments can thus be performed, with genuine results instructive to the cla.s.s.

=Checking the work of the students=

Of methods of holding the student to his work, mention has already been made of the much-used written recitation. The usual plan is to have frequent, very brief written examinations. Sometimes the practice is to correct and return all the papers; sometimes to place them all on file and correct samples chosen at random for determining the student's "term mark." A plan that has some psychological merit is to follow the examination immediately by a statement of the correct answers, with brief discussion of difficulties that may arise, and to ask each student to estimate the value of his own paper in the standard marking system. The papers are then collected and examined, and returned with the instructor's estimate.

Since an examination is, in effect, a form of psychological test, it is natural that psychologists should have attempted to introduce some of the technique of psychological testing into the work of examining students, in the interest of economy of the student's time as well as that of the examiner. The teacher prepares blanks which the student can quickly fill out if he knows the subject, not otherwise. To discover how far the student has attained a psychological point of view, written work or examination questions often demand some independence in the application to new cases of what has been learned.

Far-reaching tests of the later value to the student of a course in psychology have not as yet been attempted.

=Place of psychology in the college course=

No attempt has yet been made to obtain the consensus of opinion among psychologists as to whether the introductory course should be required of all arts students, and probably opinions would differ, without anything definitive to be said on either side. In quite a number of colleges psychology forms part of a required general course in philosophy. Where a separation has occurred between philosophy and psychology, the latter is seldom absolutely required. As a general rule, however, the introductory course, even if not required, is taken by a large share of the arts students. The traditional position for the course in psychology is late in the college curriculum, originally in the senior but more recently in the junior year. In many of the larger colleges it is now open to soph.o.m.ores or even to freshmen. One motive for pus.h.i.+ng the introductory course back into the earlier years is naturally to provide for more advanced courses in the subject; and another is the desire to make psychology prerequisite for courses in philosophy, education, or sociology. Still another motive tending in the same direction is the desire to make the practical benefits of psychological study available for the student in the further conduct of his work as a student in whatever field. If considerable attention is devoted in the introductory course to questions of mental hygiene and efficiency, the advantage of bringing these matters early to the attention of the student outweighs the objection which is often raised by teachers of psychology, as of other subjects, to admitting the younger students, on the ground of immaturity. The teachers who get the younger students may have to put up with immaturity in order that the benefit of their teaching may be carried over by the students into later parts of the curriculum.

=Length of the introductory course=

When the introductory course in psychology forms part of a course in philosophy, it is usually restricted to one semester, with three hours of cla.s.s work per week. When psychology is an independent subject in the curriculum, a two-semester course is usually provided, since it is the feeling of psychologists that this amount of time is needed in order to make the student really at home in the subject, and to realize for him the values that are looked for from psychology. Often there is a break between the two semesters of such a course, the second being devoted to advanced or social or applied psychology.

Sometimes, on the other hand, the two-semester course is treated as a unit, the various topics being distributed over the year; this latter procedure is probably the one that finds most favor with psychologists. Still, good results can be obtained with the semester course supplemented by other courses.

=Content of advanced courses in psychology=

The most frequent advanced course is one in experimental psychology.

This is taken by only a small fraction of those who have taken the introductory course, partly because the laboratory work attached to the experimental course demands considerable time from the student, partly because students are not encouraged to go into the laboratory unless they have a pretty serious interest in the subject. For a student who has it in him to become somewhat of an "insider" in psychology, no course is the equal of the laboratory course, supplemented by judicious readings in the original sources or in advanced treatises. Next in frequency to the experimental course stands that in applied psychology, since the recent applications of psychology to business, industry, vocational guidance, law, and medicine appeal to a considerable number of college students. Other courses which appear not infrequently in college curricula are those in social, abnormal, and animal psychology. No precise order is necessary in the taking of these courses, and it is not customary to make any beyond the introductory course prerequisite for the others.

ROBERT S. WOODWORTH _Columbia University_

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Many of the textbooks contain, in their prefaces, important suggestions toward the teaching of the subject. There are also frequent articles in the psychological journals on apparatus for demonstrations and cla.s.s or laboratory experiments.

1. Report of the Committee of the American Psychological a.s.sociation on the Teaching of Psychology. _Psychological Monographs_, No. 51, 1910.

2. American Psychological a.s.sociation, Report of the Committee on the Academic Status of Psychology, 1915: "The Academic Status of Psychology in the Normal Schools."

3. Same Committee, 1916: "A Survey of Psychological Investigations with Reference to Differentiations between Psychological Experiments and Mental Tests." Concerned with the availability of mental tests as material for the experimental course.

4. Courses in Psychology for the Students' Army Training Corps.

_Psychological Bulletin_, 1918, 15, 129-136. See also the Outlines of parts of the course in the same journal, pages 137-167, 177-206; and a note on the success of the courses by Edgar S. Brightman, in the _Bulletin_ for 1919, pages 24-26.

Footnotes:

[53] In Report, pages 50-51.

[54] By Sanford, 1, page 66.

[55] Calkins, 1, pages 47-48.

XVII

THE TEACHING OF EDUCATION

A. TEACHING THE HISTORY OF EDUCATION IN COLLEGE

=Kinds of educational values=

There are three main kinds of educational value; viz., practical, cultural, and disciplinary. These three types of educational value probably originated in the order in which they are here mentioned. In early educational periods, all values are practical, or utilitarian.

With the growth of social cla.s.ses, some values become cultural; viz., those pursued by the upper cla.s.ses. The disciplinary values are recognized when studies cease to have the practical and cultural values.

=Meaning of educational values=

By the "educational value" of a subject we mean, of course, the service which the pursuit of that subject renders. Any one subject will naturally have all three values, but no two subjects will have the same values mixed in the same proportion. The practical value of a subject depends on the use in life to which it can be put, especially its use in making a living. The cultural value of a subject depends largely on the enjoyment it contributes to life. While culture does not make a living, it makes it worth while that a living should be made. The disciplinary value of a subject depends on the amount of mental training that subject affords. Such mental training is available in further pursuit of the same, or a similar, subject. It is the fas.h.i.+on of educational thinking in our day to put greatest stress on the practical values, less on the cultural, and least on the disciplinary. There is no denying the reality of each type of value.

=Value of the history of education=

Now, what is the value of the history of education? There are no experimental studies as yet, nor scientific measurements, upon which to base an answer. The poor best we can do is to express an opinion.

This opinion is based on the views of others and on the writer's experience in teaching the history of education ten years in a liberal college (Dartmouth) and ten years in a professional graduate school (New York University). On this basis I should say that the aim of the history of education, at least as recorded in existing texts, is first cultural, then practical, and last disciplinary. Texts yet to be written for the use of teachers in training may s.h.i.+ft the places of the cultural and the practical. This new type of text will give the history, not of educational epochs in chronological succession, but of modern educational problems in their origin and development.[56]

=Its cultural value=

As cultural, the history of education is the record of the efforts of society to project its own ideals into the future through shaping the young and plastic generation. There comes into this purview the successive social organizations, their ideals, and the methods utilized in embodying these ideals in young lives. Interpretations of the nature of social progress, the contribution of education to such progress, and the goal of human progress, naturally arise for discussion, and the history of education well taught as the effort of man to improve himself is both informing and inspiring. This is the cultural value of the history of education. The sense of the meaning and value of human life is enhanced. As President Faunce says,[57] "A college of arts and sciences which has no place for the study of student life past and present, no serious consideration of the great schools which have largely created civilization, is a curiously one-sided and illiberal inst.i.tution."

=Its practical value=

As practical, the history of education, even when taught from the customary general texts, throws some light on such everyday school matters as educational organization, the best methods of teaching, the right principles of education for women, how to manage cla.s.ses, and the art of administering education. History cannot give the final answer to such questions, but it makes a contribution to the final answer in reporting the results of racial experience and in a.s.sisting students to understand present problems in the light of their past.

The history of education has a practical value, but it is not alone the source of guidance.

=Its disciplinary value=

As disciplinary, the history of education shows the value of all historical study. The appeal is mainly to the memory and the judgment.

The teaching is inadequate, if the appeal is only to the memory. The judgment must also be requisitioned in comparing, estimating, generalizing, and applying. Memory is indispensable in retaining the knowledge of the historical facts, and judgment is utilized in seeing the meaning of these facts. With all studies in general, history shares in training perceptive, a.s.sociative, and effortful activities.

Training in history is commonly supposed also to make one conservative, in contrast with training in science, which is supposed to make one progressive. But this result is not necessary, being dependent upon one's att.i.tude toward the past. If past events are viewed as a lapse from an ideal, the study of history makes one conservative and skeptical about progress. If, on the other hand, the past is viewed as progress toward an ideal, the study of history makes one progressive, and expectant of the best that is yet to be. But, even so, familiarity with the past breeds criticism of quick expedients whereby humanity is at last to arrive. On the whole, the disciplinary value of the history of education is attained as an incident of its cultural and practical values. We are no longer trying to discipline the mind by memorizing lists of names and dates, though they be such euphonious names as those of the native American Indian tribes, but we are striving to understand man's past and present efforts at conscious self-improvement.

=The various aims of students=

College students will elect a course in the history of education with many different motives. They may like the teacher, they may like history in any form, they may like the hours at which the cla.s.s is scheduled, some person who had the course recommended it, or they have an idea they may teach for a while after graduating. A few know they are going into teaching as a vocation in life, and appreciate in a measure the increasing exact.i.tudes of professional training. Thus, from the student standpoint, the aims are eclectic. The results with them will be that as human beings they have a wider view of life; as citizens, perhaps as members of school boards, they are more intelligent in school matters; and as teachers they make a start in their progressive equipment. The general course in the history of education is pursued by a group of students with varying but undifferentiated motives.

=A student's reaction=

Once I asked a group of college students to write a frank reaction on a sixty-hour course they had just completed in the general history of education. One wrote as follows: "The history of education makes me feel that a number of what we call innovations today are a renaissance of something as 'old as the hills.' We hear a lot about pupil self-government, and we find it back in the seventeenth century. The trade school also is not a modern tendency.