| CM SERIES HOME | CONCISE SUMMARIES | PARAPHRASED IN MODERN ENGLISH |
Charlotte Mason in Modern English
Charlotte Mason's ideas are too important not to be understood and implemented in the 21st century, but her Victorian style of writing sometimes prevents parents from attempting to read her books. This is an imperfect attempt to make Charlotte's words accessible to modern parents. You may read these, print them out, share them freely--but they are copyrighted to me, so please don't post or publish them without asking.
~L. N. Laurio
School Education
Volume 3 of
Charlotte Mason's Original Homeschool Series
Table of Contents
Preface
Ch 1 Submission And Authority In The Home And In The
School . . . pg. 1
Ch 2 Docility And Authority In The Home And The
School Pt II How Authority Behaves . . . pg. 13
Ch 3 'Masterly Inactivity' . . . pg. 25
Ch 4 Some Of The Rights Of Children As Persons . . .
pg. 36
Ch 5 Psychology as it Relates to Current Thinking .
. . pg. 44
Ch 6 Examining Some Educational Theories . . . pg. 56
Ch 7 An Adequate Educational Theory . . . pg. 68
Ch 8 Certain Relationships that are Proper for
Children . . . pg. 79
Ch 9 A Review of A Great Educationalist . . . pg. 91
Ch 10 Some Aspects of Physical Training That We
Don't Usually Consider . . . pg. 101
Ch 11 Some Aspects of Intellectual Training That We
Don't Usually Consider . . . pg. 113
Ch 12 Some Aspects of Moral Training That We Don't
Usually Consider . . . pg. 126
Ch 13 Some Aspects of Religious Training That We
Don't Usually Consider . . . pg. 137
Ch 14 A Master-Thought . . . pg. 148
Ch 15 School Books and How They Bring About
Education . . . pg. 164
Ch 16 How To Use School-Books . . . pg. 174
Ch 17 Education as the Science of Relationships: We
are Educated by Our Intimacies as Illustrated by Wordworth's Prelude
and Ruskin's Praeterita . . . pg. 182
Ch 18 We Are Educated By Our Intimacies: Part II -
More Affinities . . . pg. 194
Ch 19 We Are Educated By Our Intimacies: We Are
Educated By Our Intimacies: Pt III - Vocation . . . pg. 204
An Educational Manifesto . . . pg. 214
Ch 20 Suggestions Regarding Curriculum (For children
under 14) Pt I . . . pg. 215
Ch 21 Suggestions Regarding Curriculum: Pt II -
School-Books . . . pg. 228
Ch 22 Suggestions Regarding Curriculum: Pt III The
Love of Knowledge . . . pg. 240
Appendix (Study Questions) . . . pg 248
Appendix . . . . pg. 271 (student narrations; what a child should know
by age twelve; sample exams; examples of oral lessons for teachers) (in
progress)
Preface
to the 'Home Education' Series
The future of education both in England and overseas is vague and
depressing. We hear various urgent pleas--science should be the focus
of education, we need to reform the way we teach foreign language or
math, we should incorporate more crafts and nature study to train the
eye and hand, students need to learn how to write English and must
therefore be familiar with history and literature. And on the other
hand, we're being pressured to make education more vocational and
utilitarian. But there's no coherent principle, no real aim. There's no
philosophy of education. A stream can't rise any higher than the lake
it flows from. In the same way, no educational work can rise above the
thought and purpose behind it. Maybe this is the reason for all the
failures and disappointments of our educational system.
Those of us who have spent many years researching the gentle, elusive
vision of education have come to understand that various approaches
have a law behind them, but we haven't yet discovered what it is. We
can make out a dim outline of it, but that's it. We know that it's
all-encompassing. There's no part of a child's home life or school work
that isn't affected by that law. It's illuminating. It shows the value
(or worthlessness) of all the thousands of various educational systems
and programs. It isn't just a light, it's also a measure. It sets the
standard by which to measure all educational work, whether small or
great. That law is impartial and gracious. It will embrace
anything that's true, honest, and respected. It sets no limits or
obstacles, except where too much would be harmful. And the educational
path that the law reveals is continuous and always advancing forward.
There is no magical transition stage, progress is steady from birth to
old age, except that, whatever habits are learned in youth will
determine what choices are made even in adulthood. When we finally see
the law for what it is, we'll find that certain German thinkers--Kant,
Herbart, Lotze, Froebel--were right when they said that it's
necessary to believe in God, so the most important thing to learn is
knowledge of God. That should be the priority of education. There's one
more way that we'll be able to recognize this perfect law that gives
educational freedom when we see it. It's been said that, 'The best
thing about absolute truth is that it works under every condition we
can think of.' And that will be true of this law. No matter what
experimental test or logical investigation we give it, it will pass.
We still haven't seen an outline or summary of this law. So, until we
have something definite, we'll have to fall back on Froebel or Herbart,
or, if we adhere to a different school of thought, Locke or Spencer.
But we aren't content. We feel dissatisfied. Is it a divine discontent?
If we found a workable, effective philosophy of education, we'd welcome
it as deliverance from our perplexity. Before we find this great
deliverance, there will probably be lots of tentative attempts. They'll
all have the characters of a philosophy, more or less. Specifically,
they'll have a central idea, a basic concept with various details
working in harmony with it. This workable, effective theory of
education could be called a system of psychology. It would have to work
well with the accepted ideas of the time. It wouldn't think of
education as an isolated, shut-off compartment, but as a natural part
of life, like birth, growing, marriage, or work. It would create a bond
between the student and the great wide world, connected at many
different points where interest was sparked. I know that some
educational experts want to create that connection in many subjects,
but their attempts are too random. They give a saying here, an idea
there, but there's no common foundation to unify and support education
as a complete unit.
Fools rush in where angels fear to tread. I don't want to seem
presumptuous. I hope that there will be lots of ideas submitted towards
a working philosophy of education, and that each one will bring us one
step closer to discovering the best possible education. In that spirit,
I offer my idea. The central foundational thought of my idea will sound
rather obvious: the child is a whole, complete person with all the possibilities
and capabilities already included in his personality. Some of the
implications of this idea have been exploited by educational experts,
and fragments of this idea are already pretty commonly accepted by
common sense. For instance, take the aspect that education is the science of making
relationships. That concept seems to solve the curriculum
question. It shows that the main purpose of education is putting the
child in living touch with as much of nature and thoughts as possible.
If you add a couple of skills that help the child self-educate, then
the student will go into the world after graduation with some ability
to manage and control himself, a few hobbies to enrich his leisure
time, and an interest in lots of things. I have two reasons for even
attempting to offer my educational idea, even if my idea is tentative
and will probably be replaced by an even better idea. For the last
30-40 years, I've worked unceasingly to come up with a philosophical
educational theory that works practically. Also, each of the following
educational principles is something that came about by inductive
processes, and has been proved with long and varied experiments. I
hesitate
to share my findings because I know that, in the field of education,
there are many workers more capable and more knowledgeable than I am.
Even they aren't bold enough to offer answers because the footing is so
precarious! They are like the 'angels who fear to tread.'
But, if only to encourage their effort, I offer an amended version of a
synopsis I included in the other volumes of my 'Home Education Series.'
My approach isn't methodic. It's more incidental--here a little, there
a little. That seemed like the best way to make it practical for
parents and teachers. I should add that the various essays in this book
were originally written for the Parents National Educational Union
(PNEU) to provide the society with a unified theory.
'As soon as the soul spots truth, the soul recognizes it as her first
and oldest friend.'
'The repercussions of truth are great. Therefore we must not neglect to
correctly judge what's true, and what's not.'
--Benjamin Whichcote
Whichcote said that the end result of truth is so great that we must be
careful to make sure that what we live by is, indeed, the truth.
1. Children are born persons - they are not blank slates or embryonic
oysters who have the potential of becoming persons. They already are
persons.
2. Although children are born with a sin nature, they are neither all
bad, nor all good. Children from all walks of life and backgrounds may
make choices for good or evil.
3. The concepts of authority and obedience are true for all people
whether they accept it or not. Submission to authority is necessary for
any society or group or family to run smoothly.
4. Authority is not a license to abuse children, or to play upon their
emotions or other desires, and adults are not free to limit a child's
education or use fear, love, power of suggestion, or their own
influence over a child to make a child learn.
5. The only three means a teacher may use to educate children are the
child's natural environment, the training of good habits and exposure
to living ideas and concepts. This is what CM's motto "Education is an
atmosphere, a discipline, a life" means.
6. "Education is an atmosphere" doesn't mean that we should create an
artificial environment for children, but that we use the opportunities
in the environment he already lives in to educate him. Children learn
from real things in the real world.
7. "Education is a discipline" means that we train a child to have good
habits and self-control, both in actions and in thought.
8. "Education is a life" means that education should apply to body,
soul and spirit. The mind needs ideas of all kinds, so the child's
curriculum should be varied and generous with many subjects included.
9. The child's mind is not a bucket to be filled with facts that bunch
up into thought-groups, as Herbart said.
10. The child's mind is also not a bag for holding knowledge. It is a
living thing and needs knowledge to grow. As the stomach was designed
to digest food, the mind is designed to digest knowledge and needs no
special training or exercises to make it ready to learn.
11. This is not just splitting hairs; Herbart's philosophy that the
mind is like an empty stage waiting for bits of information to be
inserted puts too much responsibility on the teacher to prepare
detailed lessons. Students taught this way have lots of knowledge
taught at them, without getting much out of it.
12. Instead, we believe that children's minds are capable of digesting
real knowledge, so we provide a rich, generous curriculum that exposes
children to many interesting, living ideas and concepts. From this
principle, we can deduce that--
13. "Education is the science of relations," which means that children
have minds capable of making their own connections with knowledge and
experiences, so we make sure the child learns about nature, science and
art, knows how to make things, reads many living books and that they
are physically fit. Our job isn't to teach everything about everything,
but to inspire interests that will help children make connections with
the world around him.
14. Children have two guides to help them in their moral and
intellectual growth--"the way of the will," and "the way of reason."
15. Children must learn the difference between "I want" and "I will."
They must learn to distract their thoughts when tempted to do what they
may want but know is not right, and think of something else, or do
something else, interesting enough to occupy their mind. After a short
diversion, their mind will be refreshed and able to will with renewed
strength.
16. Children must learn not to lean too heavily on their own reasoning.
Reasoning is good for logically demonstrating mathematical truth, but
unreliable when judging ideas because our reasoning will justify all
kinds of erroneous ideas if we really want to believe them.
17. Knowing that reason is not to be trusted as the final authority in
forming opinions, children must learn that their greatest
responsibility is choosing which ideas to accept or reject. Good habits
of behavior and lots of knowledge will provide the discipline and
experience to help them do this.
Principles 15, 16 and 17 should save children from the sort of careless
thinking that causes people to exist at a lower level of life than they
need to.
18. We teach children that all truths are God's truths, and that
secular subjects are just as divine as religious ones. Children don't
go back and forth between two worlds when they focus on God and then
their school subjects; there is unity among both because both are of
God and, whatever children study or do, God is always with them.
These books are called the 'Home
Education Series' based on the title of the first volume, not because
they deal wholly or in principle with 'home' as opposed to 'school'
education.
Preface
The purpose of Volume 3 is to give some curriculum suggestions for
students under the age of twelve. But a curriculum doesn't exist in
isolation. It is related to so many other things that affect it, and
that are influenced by it. The kind of curriculum I have in mind is the
result of a specific educational theory. I believe that, if this theory
were used, education would rest on more solid ground.
The primary principles of authority and submission are discussed first
because they're so foundational. But, since they are so foundational, they should be
present, but they shouldn't be noticable, in the same way that
the foundation of a house is there providing structure but isn't
visible. And submission to authority should be instilled by respecting
the children's personalities. In order to give children the space to
develop freely in the way that's right for them, parents and teachers
need to adopt an attitude of 'masterly inactivity.'
After discussing the relationship between teachers and students, the
next chapters discuss the relationship between education and current
educational philosophy. Education should be flowing and constantly
evolving and changing, not sealed and static. Of the current popular
ideas about education, there are some that can help us as we strive to
find the ideal kind of education. These include reverence for
children's personalities, a sense of the brotherhood of man, and an
awareness of how things evolve and progress.
As I wrote about training children in the areas of physical, mental,
moral and religious aspects, I assumed that it wouldn't be necessary to
explain what's already commonly accepted knowledge. Instead, I focused
on aspects of education that are likely to be overlooked in each
category. For instance, where I discuss the phrase, 'Education is a
life,' I tried to show how necessary it is to feed the mind's
intellectual life with ideas--therefore, school books should be used as
a way to get ideas, not as compilations of dry facts. In the chapter
'Education is the science of relations,' I showed how that relates to
the natural desire that normal children have for knowledge, and their
right to be exposed to suitable knowledge of all kinds.
These factors help us understand how to choose a curriculum.
The kind of curriculum I have in mind should give children an education
about Things and Books. Current educational theory
already understands the importance of teaching about Things, and already has some good
methods for doing that, so I didn't think I needed to go into that. The
failures we have seem to stem from the failure of schools to form the
habit of reading worthwhile books in children while they're under
twelve years old. With free use of books, spelling and easy, flowing
composition will take care of themselves--without any direct lessons in
those things.
I think that the Appendices prove that using books this way works as
well in practice as in theory, and it saves time and work for both
teachers and students, especially the tedious, boring time spent by
both of them to correct work.
Diluted, over-condensed lectures are replaced with carefully selected,
well-planned, consecutive books--living
books where facts are presented in the context of living ideas.
Children educated this way are distinguished by the fact that they love
to
learn. They do well on any exam they need to prepare for and, more
importantly, they're ready to experience their full share of all the
intellectual and practical interests that life has to offer.
AMBLESIDE, November 1904
Note - When appropriate, please
substitute 'teachers' for 'parents.'
pg 1
Chapter
1 - Submission and Authority in the Home and in the School
Better
Relationships between Children and Adults
All of us who feel that education is our calling are very aware of the
changes we see in the way children behave and how they act. In at least
one thing we can take pride: relationships between children and their
parents, in fact, between children and all of their grown-up friends,
are much closer, open and friendly than they were in the past. There
doesn't seem to be a gaping gulf anymore between child thought and
adult thought. Those of us who are older remember trying to bridge that
gulf with desperate attempts, but with no success. When we were little,
the
heads of the household were as authoritarian as the Czar of Russia.
Everything we received, whether bread and milk or mother's love, came
from their hands, and we received it with submission, if not gratitude.
If our parents had nagging questions about what was best for us,
pg 2
they kept them to themselves. From our position, everything was
commanded, and all commands were final. There might have been a few
rebellious children, maybe one in twenty, or even one in a hundred, but
their rebellion had to have the courage of Satan in Milton's Paradise
Lost. They dared everything and stood firm in bold opposition. These
were blatant rebels who were doomed to come to bad ends. At least,
that's what we were told, and we secretly believed it. For all other
children, there was no other option but to submit. They were brought
under the
subjection of arbitrary rule without appeal.
The
Elder Generation of Parents Were Autocratic
That's the way children were brought up 40 or 50 years ago [around 1850]. Even many of today's
young parents grew up under a benevolent dictatorship that, although it
may have been happy, loving and wise, was, above all things,
unquestioningly arbitrary. There were a few homes that Scottish people
called 'ill guided.' Those were the kinds of homes where the children
did whatever they wanted. As long as there are weak, lazy parents who
don't care about their responsibility, these kinds of homes will
continue to exist. But they were the exception. In most middle-class
homes, the norm and tradition was a well-ordered, well-governed
childhood. Every biography of the people who made their mark on history
in the first half of the 1800's proves this. John Stuart Mill, John
Ruskin, the Lawrences [probably
brothers John and Henry, who served in India in the mid 1800's],
Alfred Tennyson--almost everyone who made a name for himself grew up
under absolute authority. In fact, it was just the other day that we
heard of another case. This was a man who remembered 70 years ago, when
he'd been twelve or thirteen years old, he was out shooting rabbits one
winter
day. He came home just as it was getting dark, and the evening was
bitterly cold. His father
pg 3
asked him which gate he had come through as he entered their property.
The boy named the gate. 'Did you shut it?' 'I don't remember.' 'Go back
and check.' And he went, even though he was already exhausted and the
gate was over a mile away from the house! That kind of thing would
hardly happen these days. The boy would protest, complain about how
cold and tired he was, or suggest that a man go shut the gate if it was
that important--and the story doesn't seem to indicate that it was. Yet
this man was considered a kind father who was both loved and honored by
his children. Arbitrary rule and unquestioning obedience were simply
the habits of the household. And this style of household government
still exists. The other day I heard about a Scottish father who
confined his eighteen-year-old daughter to her room for a week because
of a breach of discipline that wasn't even very serious. But where this
kind of parent exists, it's because he's out of touch with
current thought and culture. A few decades ago, parents were expected
to have certain principles. The more cultivated and intelligent they
were, the more they were expected to abide by such principles.
Arbitrary
Rule Isn't Always a Failure
We have to admit that arbitrary rule wasn't a complete failure. It
turned out men and women who were reliable, competent, trained,
self-controlled, and well-mannered. In our own moments of doubt, we
look at the children of our day and age and wonder whether they'll
measure up to their fathers and grandfathers. But we don't
need to worry. Educational thought evolves like the incoming tide. The
waves come and go and you can't tell whether the tide is ebbing or
flowing, but if you wait an hour, it will be obvious.
pg 4
Better,
Truer Educational Philosophy Results in Better, Worthier Character
Aside from allowances for ebb and flow, with a few mistakes and
failures here and there along the way, any truer educational thinking
can only be distinguished by producing worthier character in the
students it influences. The arbitrary nature of the old system was
needed because of limitations--parents knew that they had to govern
first and foremost. Abraham, the righteous father who 'ruled his house'
was their example. It's easier to govern from a position of superiority
than it is if you maintain an intimate relationship as equals. At the
same time, inferiors can't be open and casual with authoritarians who
are so obviously in a higher plane or order--at least, not if the
inferiors are little boys. And this is one of the reasons why little
children are so impenetrably secretive. Even when they're in good
spirits, they carry on all kinds of chatter--but they keep it all to
themselves, within the hidden depths of their own inner minds. All of
us can remember some distressing anxiety we had as children that a
simple word could have dispelled, but that became a dark secret,
clouding
years of our childhood. Mrs. Charles wrote in her autobiography about a
troubling dream that haunted her childhood. In her dream, she had lost
her mother and searched for her for hours in the rooms and endless
halls of an unknown building without finding her. Her parents assumed
her distress was caused by fear of the dark--she never told her loving
mother about the dream. I doubt that any amount of loving care will
permanently open the locked doors of a child's inner world. This
mysterious burden of this confusing world is probably rooted early in
the conscious soul, and each person has to make sense of his conception
of the world for himself. But it's immensely helpful for a child simply
to know that it's okay to ask questions. It's a relief to know that he
can talk about things that
pg 5
trouble him, and that there are answers to the things that confuse him.
But it's a mistake to respond with gushing sympathy. That will either
bore the child or make him feel patronized. It's enough just to know
that you can ask and talk about things. For the parent, this provides a
means to direct the child. For the child, it allows more free, natural
development.
The
Concept of Infallible Reason
As one line of educational thought becomes more prominent, another one
fades away. In this case, the thought that's fading away is an
important principle. Early in the century [1800's], authority was everything
when it came to governing a household. The submission of the children
was assumed as a given, except for the few cases of true rebel spirits.
Although we may not realize it, the evolution of English philosophical
thinking has greatly impacted the way parents and children in every
home relate to each other. Two hundred years ago, John Locke promoted
the concept of infallible reason. Once that concept is accepted,
individual reason becomes the ultimate authority and every person is
free to do whatever seems right in his own eyes. Locke qualified
himself by stipulating that
reason is infallible only if the reason is fully trained and the mind
has the information that pertains to each particular case in question.
But that qualification was overlooked, and only the general concept
remained. The old Puritan-style of faith and traditions of the elders
related to bringing up children, as well as Locke's own religious
sentiments and instincts to duty were too strong to allow the doctrine
of infallible reason to take root in England. But France was ripe for
such an idea, and John Locke was eagerly read there because his
opinions corresponded to the popular thought of the time. His
principles were put into practice in France and his conclusions were
worked out to the bitter
pg 6
end. Intelligent writers have suggested that Locke, in spite of being a
religious, cultivated English gentleman, can't be excused from guilt
for his role in the atrocities of the French Revolution.
The
Concept of Infallible Reason Leads to the Dethroning of Authority
In the twentieth century, we've lost some of the safeguards that kept
seventeenth century society in check. We have our own philosopher who
is perhaps even greater than Locke. He carries Locke's concepts to the
inevitable conclusions that even Locke himself didn't broach. That
philosopher is
Herbert Spencer. He proclaims, as they did in France, the exaltation of
Reason. Just like France, he sees that the principle of infallible
reason is opposed to the concept of authority. And he traces this
concept to its logical conclusion and final source. As long as people
acknowledge God, they have to acknowledge the concept of authority,
whether it's supreme authority, or delegated. But Spencer says that
every man can find his own final authority in his own reason. He is
passionate about his convictions. He realizes, as they did in France,
that exalting Reason means dethroning God. By the process of exhaustive
reasoning, he concludes that,
'We're on our own burial ground with no owner,
And we have no idea where we came from or who we belong to.'
Once God Almighty is dethroned, all human authority follows--kings,
those given roles of authority in nations, even parents in authority
over their own families. This teaching says that every act of authority
is an infringement of the rights of man or child [could this be where the concept of
non-coercive parenting comes from?] Children are to be brought
up right from the start deciding for themselves, doing what seems right
in their own
pg 7
eyes. They're governed by their own reason, which supposedly learns to
choose the right thing from its own mistakes by experiencing right and
wrong choices. Life has natural consequences for those who violate the
law of reason. Children should be allowed to learn those laws by
experiencing the penalties of those consequences. 'You must' and 'you
mustn't' are to be eliminated from a parent's vocabulary. Spencer's
scheme for the emancipation of children is so complete and thorough
that he even objects to studying languages in school because, as he
says, the rules of grammar violate the concept of liberty!
Authority is not Automatic or Inborn, but
Appointed
Spencer's contributions to educational thought are so valuable that
many parents read his work and embrace all of it without realizing that
his educational ideas are a small part of his whole philosophy--and
they might not agree with rest of his ideas. They accept his teaching
when it says to bring up children without any authority so that they'll
have room for self-development without realizing that Spencer's life
work as a social Darwinist is to eradicate the concept of authority
from the universe. He renounces the authority of parents as one link in
the chain binding the universe to God. And he's correct that none of us
has any right to exercise authority in anything, great or small, unless
we acknowledge and accept our authority roles as positions appointed by
the one supreme and ultimate Authority. When we peruse his book about
education, [Essays on
Education? The
Rights of Children?]
although it's small and easy to read, we need to remember that, by
reading it, we're putting ourselves under the leading of a philosopher
who doesn't overlook or leave out anything. He regards the most trivial
pg 8
things from the far-sighted perspective of their final result. He
doesn't want children obediently doing as they're told because he's
afraid that they'll grow up and learn to obey another authority outside
their own reason--that authority which we believe is ordained by God [or perhaps even God Himself].
'Quick
as Thought'
Spencer's rationalistic thought isn't limited to those who read his
books, or to those who read his ideas about education. 'Quick as
thought' is a common expression, but I wonder how quick thought really
is? It would be interesting to measure the rate of intensity,
vitality and speed of an idea as it progresses through the world.
How soon is it before an idea conceived at a man's reading desk is a
household word? By the time the common man on the street thinks of it
as his own possession, its original source is often long forgotten. We
have no way of measuring the speed of an idea. But there's hardly a
home, even in the lowest socio-economic neighborhood, where Spencer's
educational concept hasn't been consciously adopted or rejected, even
though the people considering the concept may never have heard of
Spencer. Once an idea takes off, it's 'out there' in the world. It's
similar to the Holy Spirit--we don't know where it comes from, or where
it goes.
The
Finality of Human Reason is an Intolerable Concept
For the very reason that philosophical thought is so subtle and such a
permeating influence, we need to be careful to scrutinize every
principle
that comes our way. Once we're able to be aware and safeguard
ourselves, we'll be able to benefit from the bit of good in works
that are largely full of errors. It's possible that the early years of
this century [1900's] may see
the rise of the greatest philosopher England has ever seen--a
philosopher who won't be confined by the limitations
pg 9
of rationalistic or materialistic thought. Men have become bored and
tired of themselves. The concept that human reason is final has itself
become an intolerable limitation. Nothing less than the Infinite will
satisfy man's spirit. Once again, we recognize that we're made for God
and we'll have no rest or peace until we find Him. Current philosophic
thought both in England and around the world has left man's search for
answers to the spiritual yearnings of his heart unsatisfied, so people
are finding answers elsewhere.
Authority
and Submission are Fundamental Principles
One of the answers is reconstructing a whole new philosophy. This new
philosophy is like a new temple for our spirits, like a house not built
by human hands. Part of its foundation is restoring the concept of
Authority to its traditional place, accepting it as a fact. It can't be
accounted for any more than the law of gravity can. The concept of
Authority is as binding and universal in the moral sense as gravity is
in the physical sense. And fitting together with the concept of
Authority like a ball fits into a socket is Submission. The concept of
Submission is also universal and fundamental. Authority and Submission
work together like two halves of a pair of scissors. All possibilities
of law and order, government and progress hang on the joint concept of
Authority and Submission. Benjamin Kidd's book Social Evolution helped draw
attention to these two fundamental concepts. He asked questions such
as, Why should a football team obey its captain? Why should an army
obey its commanding officer? Why should a crowd on the street be
controlled by two or three policemen? Why should anybody bother to
respect property when so many want what so few have? To be more direct,
why should there be rule and order in the world instead of anarchy?
Benjamin Kidd turns to Reason to answer these questions--but she has no
answer to give. The best she can offer is the appeal to
pg 10
self-interest: individually and as a group, we tend to do whatever is
shown to be in our best interest. But how does that account for the
sailors who stood at attention when commanded and drowned as their ship
'The Royal George' sank? Or the six hundred who rode 'into the valley
of death' because it was,
'Theirs not to make reply,
Theirs not to reason why,
Theirs but to do and die'?
Deep reflection can find only one possible motivation for that
kind of sacrificial obedience: the single simple motive of authority
acting on submission. These men were told to do something, so they did
it. It's as simple as that. And our hearts confirm that they did the
right thing. We consider such things heroic, but we should note that
these wonderful examples of human nature at its best can be boiled down
to willingly obeying authority. Abuse of authority causes slavery and
tyranny, but even they couldn't exist if they weren't founded on
fundamental principles of human nature. All of us have it in us to
serve or to lead, depending on the need of situation. To dream of
complete freedom with every man his own sole governor is as pointless
as dreaming of a world where apples don't always drop to the ground
from the tree, but fly off in all different directions.
The
Work of Rationalistic Philosophers is Inevitable
What is Authority? The fact that we're even asking the question shows
how inevitable the work of
rationalistic philosophers has been in the evolution of thinking. We
owe them our deliverance from tyrants in both governments and families.
pg 11
Rationalistic philosophers have provided a service by asserting and
proving that every soul is born free with an inalienable right to
liberty, and that offending the liberty of another human is a serious
crime. They're right. Children are so submissive and weak that it's
tempting for teachers and parents to become like dictators and say, 'Do
this because I said so.' Therefore, it's teachers and parents, more
than anyone else, who are indebted to rationalistic philosophers for
reminding them about freedom, especially children's right to freedom
within the family. This seems to be the way God educates the world. It
isn't just one good custom that can 'corrupt a world,' but one
infallible principle can corrupt, too. When a true principle comes to
light in the mind of a philosopher, he sees its truth. It possesses him
until that's all he sees and he forgets that it's not the whole
truth. So he proclaims it as if it's the only truth there is until he
becomes ridiculous. Then, in reaction, the totally opposite point is
illuminated and glorified in the same way by the next school of
thought. Finally, it's discerned that neither principle is the complete
truth, but that men need the balance of both to live by.
Authority
is Vested in the Office
It's this point and counterpoint of minds that has helped us to correct
our concept of authority. It wasn't long ago, in fact, within our
lifetimes, that we were on dangerous ground. We acted like authority
was vested in certain people,
and
that arbitrary actions were appropriate for them, and that it was good
for others to slavishly obey them. We got that notion of government
from religion. We believed in the 'divine right' of kings and parents
because we thought it was God's arbitrary will for it to be that way.
But now we know
pg 12
better. Now we know that authority rests in the office and not the person. The
moment the person in the authoritative role acts like dictating is his
personal attribute, he forfeits his authority. A person in authority is
a person who has been authorized.
And he's been authorized by someone that he's under authority to himself. A
person under authority is holding and fulfilling a trust. Every time he
asserts his own self, or
commands
on the whim of his own will, he stops being authorized and
authoritative, and becomes arbitrary and domineering. Arbitrary
domineering tyrants require punishments for minor infractions to stay
in control. That's where the confusion about the relationship between
authority and punishment comes from. A tyrant rules by terror. He
punishes right and left to maintain his power. But a person who's
vested with authority doesn't need punishment to back him up because a
higher authority is behind him, and the corresponding principle of
submission is in front of him.
pg 13
Chapter 2 - Submission and Authority in the
Home and in the School
Part
II. How Authority Behaves
Mistakes
made on Principle
Mr. Augustus Hare has what some would call a bad memory--he
remembers every single insult and offense that's ever been done to him
since his birth! That's why his book, The
Story of My Life, isn't pleasant reading, even though it's full
of interesting details. But that's just more evidence we need to
consider about childhood. Hare has provided us with a very valuable
lesson about childhood--although his instruction tells us more about
what not to do! His adoptive
mother's fine character and beautiful nature might never have been
known to the world if he hadn't published her book, Memorials of a Quiet Life. She
dearly loved the son she adopted, but she misinterpreted her role as
mother. Yet the mistakes aren't the errors of an unworthy or even an
ordinary woman. Mrs. Hare always acted on principle. When she erred, it
was because the principle was faulty. She mixed up the two
pg 14
principles of authority and absolute rule. She thought there was some
intrinsic value in the arbitrary actions of a parent, and the better a
child is at doing what he's told, the better a person he is. The more
outrageous the command, the better the child for obeying it. Here's an
example [from Augustus's memoirs]
of what even a loving mother can do under such confusion: 'In the past,
I had never been allowed to have anything but roast mutton and rice
pudding for dinner. But now everything was different. The most
delicious puddings were talked about, described in tempting,
mouth-watering detail, until I became, not so much greedy, but curious
in wonder about them. Finally, the grand moment arrived. The wonderful
puddings were set on the table right in front of me. But then, just as
I was about to take my first bite, they were snatched away and I was
ordered to get up and take them to a poor family who lived in the
village. I remember that, although I didn't care a bit about the
deprivation of the delicacies, I did care about Lea the cook's outrage
at the fate of her beautiful puddings. But, after all, it wasn't my
fault.' And here's another example of an arbitrary ruling: 'Even the
pleasures of being home on Sundays were spoiled in the summer because
my mother gave in to Aunt Esther's suggestion that I should be locked
in the church vestry [a
room where clergy store robes and/or hold meetings]
between services with a sandwich for dinner. The three hours I had to
spend there every week were miserable. Although I didn't expect to see
ghosts, the total isolation of Hurstmonceaux church, which was in the
middle of nowhere, made me feel eerie during my imprisonment. Sometimes
I would climb over the tomb of the two Lords Dacre. It rises like a
screen up one side of the room. I'd be overtaken with a vague horror by
the two statues lying down on top of it
pg 15
silently and unearthly still, making even a rat scampering across the
floor seem as loud as a whirlwind. . . . It was sort of a comfort to me
during the church service to forcefully repeat all the curses in
Psalms, the ones where David showed his most shocking hatred, and apply
them to Aunt Esther and people like her. I supposed that, since all the
Psalms were considered beautiful and used by the Church of England for
edification, their sentiments must have been acceptable.'
And yet, when his mother trusted her own instinct instead of unsound
principles, she was actually very wise: 'I find that, when giving an
order to a child, it's always better not to check up on him to see if
he obeys, but to take it for granted that he'll do it. If a parent
seems to doubt that the child will obey, then there's room for the
child to hesitate, 'Should I do it, yes or no?' If you don't even
appear to question the possibility that he might not comply, he'll feel
that a trust has been committed to him, and he'll keep it. It's best to
never repeat a command, or to answer questions about why it should be
done.'
The
Difference Between Authority and Absolute Rule
Like many other rulers, Mrs. Hare seems to have erred, not because of
laziness or harshness, but because she never defined for herself the
nature of the authority she had to exercise. Absolute Rule is
independent or self-derived power. Authority, on the other hand, is
neither independent nor self-derived. In Matthew 8:9, the centurion
says, 'I'm also a man placed under authority, and in charge of
soldiers. I say to one, 'Go,' and he goes; to another I say, 'Come,'
and he comes, and to my servant, 'Do this,' and he does it.'
pg 16
This shows us the powers and limits of authority. The centurion is
placed under authority, or, we might say, authorized. That's why he's able to
say to one soldier, 'go,' and to another, 'come,' and to a third, 'do
this,' with the calm assurance that it will all be done just the way he
said. He holds his very position for that purpose--to make sure that
specific things get done. He is himself a servant with specific tasks,
although his are the tasks of authority. Even Jesus Himself assumed
this position. He said, 'I didn't come to do my own will, but the will
of Him who sent me.' That was His appointment, and the permanent rule
of His life. That's why He was able to speak as someone who had
authority. He Himself knew that he had been given that commission and
was backed up by a higher authority.
How
Absolute Rule Acts
True authority isn't unpredictable--demanding one minute, harsh the
next, and then suddenly indulgent. That's how absolute rule acts. Since
it's self-derived, it has to stay in power by its own force. That's why
it has to be impatient, resentful, always on guard for the slightest
transgression, and quickly offended. Absolute Rule has a stiff code of
penalties, whether it's in a kingdom, a school, or a family. It has a
long list of commands and rules to provide a stern barrier, protecting
the terrible majesty of the tyrant. We all have a natural tendency to
assume self-derived power, even the meekest ones of us. That's why we
need to be on guard. This tendency is exhibited just as much in letting
duties slide and granting special privileges as in inflicting
punishments. It's flattering when a child approaches us in that
charming, pleading way that any monkey can mimic, and begs, 'Pleeease let me stay home with you
this morning, just this once!' If we give in, the next stage becomes,
'I don't want to go!' and
finally, 'I
pg 17
won't!' At that point, the
parent or teacher who's been relying on the power of his own autocracy
will learn that children can be dictators, too--they can be alarmingly
stubborn and belligerent.
How
Authority Acts
Authority isn't harsh or
indulgent. She is gentle, and easy to reason with about nonessential
matters--because she's uncompromising when it comes to matters of real
importance. For those matters, there's always an established principle.
For example, parents and teachers have no right to trifle with issues
that affect the health or duty of their children. They don't have
authority to allow excessive indulgences--like too much candy--or
habits that compromise health. They also can't allow children to shirk
any clear-cut duty regarding obedience, courtesy, respect or work.
Authority is always alert. She always knows what's going on and where
the tendencies towards weakness are. She fulfills the command that 'he
who rules should do so with conscientiousness.' [Romans
12:8] But she's also strong enough to fulfill the other part of
that command: 'Let the person who shows mercy do so cheerfully.'
Leniency at the right time, giving in when it's needed, is the secret
of a strong government. Sometimes it's children, and not their parents,
who are right about an issue. They register a complaint or resist a
mandate, and now it's the children against the parent or teacher. It's
best for the parent or teacher to be in the habit of quickly reviewing
the situation without being obvious. Then, if the children are right,
it will be possible for the adult to gather his wits in time to yield
the point graciously, and send the children away warmed with love and
loyalty.
The
Qualities a Ruler Should Have
Nobody understood this better than Queen Elizabeth. She managed
pg 18
to compartmentalize her personality in such a way that she could be a
model ruler, and, at the same time, a woman who had all the
distinguishing delicacies and vulnerabilities of her femininity. It was
said that she knew when and how to give in. Her skill at dealing with
dangerous crises was highly praised by historians. But it's possible
that it wasn't so much skill as it was tact that comes from having the
qualities that people in authority should have. Those qualities include
the humble reserve of one who's been given an appointed duty, the
willingness to think through an issue and listen to advice and consider
suggestions, the realization that she wasn't the be-all and end-all
because she was a queen, but that she existed to serve her people, and
the quick, compassionate, open-minded sympathy that made her able to
see other sides of an issue besides her own, or, often, in preference
to her own. These qualities are just as appropriate for the 'ruler' of
a family or classroom as they are for the ruler of a kingdom. If a
parent has these qualities, he'll be able to manage and control a
lively young brood full of energy and high spirits as well as Elizabeth
was able to manage her kingdom at a time when men's minds were
grappling with new
ways of thinking and life was intoxicating with the delights of new
possibilities.
Mechanical
Obedience and Reasonable Obedience
It's not easy to distinguish the line between mechanical and reasonable
obedience. I heard a very successful mother say, 'I teach my children
obedience by the time they're a year old,' and that does seem to me the
age when children should begin to have the habit of obeying lawful
authority that will make their lives easier and more comfortable. Mr.
Huxley told a story of a man who had been a private but had left the
army. He had bought his Sunday dinner from the deli and was carrying it
home. A sergeant
pg 19
recognized by the way he walked that he was a retired soldier and
decided to play a practical joke on him. He called out, 'Atten-TION!'
and the man snapped to attention while his meat and potatoes rolled
into the gutter. This kind of response is a matter of nerves and
muscles, an automatic habit that has nothing to do with deliberate
moral consciousness. It's fashionable these days to write off anything
except reasonable obedience, as if we were creatures made of nothing
but mind and spirit, or as if our bodies responded to a bidding of the
spirit as immediately as a ship responds to the turn of the helm. But,
unfortunately, we're weak. Our bodies only respond to spiritual
biddings if we've trained them to respond in automatic mechanical
obedience. We all know children who are wholeheartedly willing to do
the right thing mentally, but their bodily inertia is strong enough to
resist torrents of good intentions and noble resolutions. If we want
our children to be able to keep their bodies under control when they
grow up, we need to do it for
them now, while they're still young.
Submission's
Response to Authority is a Natural Function
The daily routine of obedience in small things helps children to
fulfill a
natural function--submission's response to authority. Some might say
that a child who has acquired the habit of involuntary, mechanical
response has lost that much power as a free moral agent. But the
actions that are usually trained in this way are physical efforts:
'Hurry back,' 'Sit up straight,' 'Tie your shoes quickly.' They're part
of the same training that it takes to master the body so that it's a
machine that's able
to do many different things.
pg 20
To be able to manipulate a machine like a computer keyboard or a
bicycle, the most important element is practice. It takes being able to
do it automatically, without having to think about it. Giving a child
this kind of power over his own human machine, in the beginning because
someone else is making him, but later because he's making him do it
himself, helps to make a man of him.
The
Habit of Prompt Obedience
We hear all the time that people don't fail in life because they lack
good intentions. Usually it's that their physical bodies have never
acquired the habit of prompt, involuntary obedience. The man who has
the power to make himself do what his mind wills can achieve anything.
It's up to parents to give their children this kind of power by making
it a matter of habit. Someone may ask, isn't it better and superior to
train children to always respond to spiritual direction as it speaks
through their conscience? The answer is that we can do both. Most
conscientious parents are going to involve their child's conscience in
the course of their upbringing. And life itself will provide enough
opportunities in the lives of both children and grown ups when
decisions will need to made based on spiritual reasons, times when it
will be up to us to consciously and voluntarily choose good and refuse
evil because we know that's God's will for us.
The
Effort of Decision
One famous preacher was right when he said that the effort of decision
is the greatest effort in life. We know it's true from our own
experience:
should we take this action or that? Should we buy cut pile or loop pile
carpet? Should we send our son to this school, or that one? We all know
how difficult such decisions can be, and the stress
pg 21
and wear on the nerves caused by a heavy decision is apparent by the
nervous headache we sometimes get afterwards. That's why it's a
blessing that we're created so that many of our decisions are already
made for us. Ninety nine out of a hundred things we do are done, for
better or worse, by habit. Our brain tissues have a wonderful ability
to record repeated actions and, with the right stimulus, reproduce
them. That helps to ease the burden of life, making it easier for us to
be light and happy like children, which is what God intended. Yet, even
with this provision for building habits, it's an appalling shock to
find that there are lots of thoughtful parents whose children spend
their lives in day-long struggles over decisions that their parents
should have settled for them. Megan is nervous, high-strung, her mind
can't keep still, she's obsessively organized, looks pale, and is
developing compulsive mannerisms. She's taken to the doctor. He doesn't
know much about her home life and decides that she's exhibiting
symptoms of over-pressure. He suggests that Megan not do school lessons
for six months, be taken to a different location for a change of air,
and be put on a bland diet. Somehow none of that helps. She doesn't
improve, and the parents fail to see that it wasn't the routine of her
school lessons causing the exhaustion, but the fact that poor Megan is
having to go through the labor of decision-making twenty times a day.
Added to that is the stress of daily battles of will to get her own
way. Every trivial matter in the course of a day becomes an issue of
debate, nothing is ever just a matter of course. The child always wants
to do it some other way, or to do something else altogether, and
usually does. No wonder she's so worn out!
pg 22
Authority
Tries Not To Offend
On the other hand, children are, if nothing else, reasonable beings. To
some acute, intelligent children, an arbitrary command that appears
unreasonable is severely unnerving. It's not a good idea to indulge
children with detailed explanations every time they want to know why a
command is given, but wise parents will find a balance. They're careful
to develop habits in their children that will make the routine of day
to day life run smoothly. In the unusual event that requires a new
regulation, they might casually comment on the reason for doing so, but
if that's not convenient or possible, they don't mind resorting to the
most important reason for obedience: 'because it's the right thing to
do.' To put it plainly, authority tries its best not to give reason for
offense.
Authority
is Alert
Another illustration of the appropriate use of authority is the way a
well-run government works. The role of prevention is fully recognized. The
police, army and navy are mostly preventive forces. And the family
authority is wise to follow their example and have its own Advance
Notification System. It's good to give some warning before potential
scenes of conflict: 'We'll have just enough time to finish this chapter
before the
clock strikes seven,' or, 'We'll be able to play one more time around
before bedtime.' Wise mothers know well how important it is to
give children time to collect themselves for a decisive moment. This
time should be spent finishing something enjoyable. Every moment of
indecisiveness at this critical time helps to set up the inertia that
works against obedience, and that inertia is difficult to overcome
because the child's own willpower is in a state of suspended animation.
A little forethought and planning helps to arrange things so that games
and projects come to an end at the right moment and bedtime doesn't
pg 23
arrive right in the middle of a chapter, or at the most exciting part
of a game. If that happens, Authority, from its perspective of seeing
past and future, might
graciously afford to give a five minutes grace period, but wouldn't
allow that to extend to dawdling indefinitely while saying good-night.
Who
Gave You This Authority?
We hardly need to add that authority is just and faithful when it comes
to keeping promises. It's also considerate, which is why a good mother
makes the best Ruler in a home--she's in touch with her children, knows
their unspoken ambitions and understands their half-formed dreams. If
she can't give in, she tries to divert and redirect. She never rules by
crushing with a sledge-hammer--a tool of power that children somehow
never sympathize with.
Diversion, or changing children's thoughts, is such an important tool
when it comes to forming habits. Let's not 'despise the day of small
things' or 'grow weary in doing good.' If we train our children from
the youngest ages to prompt mechanical obedience, we'll reap our
reward. But if we haven't done that, we'll just have to work towards it
little by little with ever-vigilant efforts. We'll have to use
authority that never procrastinates and never gets aggressive. Our
children will gain 'the joy of self-control,' and the delight of
obedience that's like proud chivalry and considers a command an
opportunity to serve. It's a happy irony that 'difficult' children who
resist direct commands the most stubbornly are often the quickest to
respond to the novelty of a new idea. The skill of knowing how to
present an inspiring idea is a delicate art that I've discussed
elsewhere.
This is no one-sided arrangement, with all the authority on the
parent's side, and the child having no part but submission.
pg 24
After all, there never was a child who didn't wield some kind of
authority, even if only over dolls or plastic soldiers. And we adults
who are in the role of authority in our families and classrooms are
submissive to anyone who will bother to tell us we need to do this or
that. We don't need to worry that our authority will stifle the
independence of children. It won't.
Authority is more than a gift, it's a grace.
'In the same way that every shade of the rainbow is light,
So every one of the graces is a different shade of love.'
Authority is just one part of the love that parents give to their
children. Parents know that it's love because, to them, it means
continual self-denial, self-repression and self-sacrifice. Children
recognize it as love because, to them, it means quiet peace and joy in
their hearts. Perhaps the best help for those in authority over their
families is to ask themselves every day the same question that was
asked presumptuously of Jesus: 'Who gave you this authority?'
pg 25
Chapter 3 - Masterly Inactivity
Increased
Sense of Responsibility
It would be interesting if an expert in literature could trace how the
word 'responsibility' symbolized ethical thought throughout the last
few decades. In the 1850's and 60's, people were very responsible, even
children. But their responsibility was for their own character, action
and manners. We don't seem to be as responsible these days. We tend to
accept that we're the way we are, and to make allowances for our own
little peculiarities and idiosyncrasies. We sometimes lack the gift of
humor that should give us the ability,
'To see ourselves the way others see us.'
A
Sign of Moral Progress
We may take ourselves lightly, but we tend to be harder on ourselves
when it comes to our obligations to others. We still have a weight of
responsibility that feels as 'heavy as frost,' but we've shifted it
from one shoulder to the other. Those of us who are more serious by
nature can become downright burdened with our sense of obligation about
what we owe to people near and far away. Men can be less troubled by
the weight than women because most of them
pg 26
have jobs where each day has its own work that needs to be done, and
that keeps them busy. But women have more time to think about their
relationships and the duties related to them. It's an interesting
commentary on our times that the modern scholars who translated Matt
6:25 phrased it as, 'Don't be anxious for your life,' instead of the
old translation. ['take no thought
for your life']. Women may feel the daily constant wear of
responsibility for others more unceasingly than men, but if a man hears
about some urgent crisis, such as the conditions in the slums of East
London, or Home Rule, or the recent massacres in Armenia, he'll feel it
more intensely and passionately. This sharpened sensitivity isn't a
weakness of our modern era, it's just a sign of the times.
Those of us who feel like life itself is an education because we never
stop learning are encouraged to see this general sense of
responsibility for others. It seems to show that we really are
receiving some direction from God, and that we're making progress.
Parental
Responsibility
It's good if we feel empathy for people who are distressed, suffering,
sick, mentally ill, handicapped, uneducated, or spiritually lost. If
only we all felt the burden of the lost more! Yet thinking people feel
one particular responsibility with even more acute awareness--and
that's the heavy responsibility for their own offspring. Parental
responsibility is the big issue in educational discussions these days.
People believe that it's possible to bring up their children to be even
better people than they are themselves, and, knowing this, they feel
that they have an obligation and a duty to do that. In fact, the
success of the PNEU is the result of parents who feel a keen sense of
their responsibility to their children.
Anxiety
Marks Every Transitional Stage
Every step of progress, whether it's mechanical or spiritual, takes a
time of adjustment before it can be fully used. In the arena of
science, there's always a long period of time between
Pg 27
the moment when a new discovery is made, such as the X-Ray and the
time when the world can enjoy its practical application with all of its
benefits and without it displacing other things that are just as
necessary. For instance, we should be suspicious of any claim that
x-ray technology can do everything that a stethoscope, thermometer and
any other equipment can do. It's the same way in the moral sphere. The
weight of responsibility we feel comes from our newly aroused feelings
of high-minded charity. It makes us able to feel more love for more
people. We have more of the Holy Spirit's agape love in us, even if we
don't realize that our greater love comes from God. But knowing that we
need to do much more, and knowing what to do and how to do it,
are two different things. Rather than adding to our fullness and joy in
life, it frustrates us. We become worried, anxious and restless. [This sounds typical of new
homeschoolers who feel compelled to homeschool, but don't know how to
do it!] There's a transition time between the learning
curve where the how's and why's are acquired and fine-tuned, and the
time when the process is actually working and we're happier and more
useful.
A
Fussy and Restless Habit
I want to address this gap of time during the transition by presenting
the concept of 'masterly inactivity' to parents and teachers. There are
so many things that we should do for our children, and so much that's
possible to provide for them, that we can start to think that
everything rests with us. We begin to feel like we can't let up even
for a minute in our conscious thinking about our efforts in training up
our children's young minds and hearts. As a result, our efforts become
over-controlling and micro-managed. We're with our children every
minute of the day, always on their backs. Even when we can't get them
to comply, we try to dominate them too much. We don't realize that wise
pg 28
deliberate letting
alone is the best part of education. The defect that makes us
take too much on ourselves isn't serious. We just need to make a few
adjustments, and that's what I'm going to discuss.
'Masterly
Inactivity'
[Apparently, 'masterly inactivity'
was a term used in CM's time to describe a 'wait and see' attitude by
legislators in response to political incidents, or, as one
British letter puts it, 'trusting
to the helping influences of time.']
It's a blessing that our minds are made so that, once we receive an
idea, it will work itself out in our mind and actions without too much
after-effort from us. If we allow the concept of 'masterly inactivity'
as an aspect of education, we'll find ourselves relating with children
from this standpoint without even consciously thinking about it. But we
need to have an accurate idea of what we mean when we say 'masterly
inactivity.' The phrase used by Carlyle has nothing to do with the
attitude of, 'who cares?' or 'why bother?' and it has even less to do
with the sheer neglect that just lets things happen because it's too
much trouble to take any action to influence the outcome. 'Masterly
inactivity' indicates an exquisitely capable moral attitude, and it's
worth our time to analyze it. The concept is perhaps most accurately
phrased in Wordsworth's words: 'wise passiveness.' It suggests the
ability and authority to take action, a concern for the outcome, with
the insight and restraint that keeps a person from interfering. But,
for our purposes, the phrase conveys one more idea. It isn't just that
we're restraining ourselves from direct involvement, there's also a
sense of our authority that our children need to be aware of whether
we're giving them a command or not. The sense of authority is the
foundation of the parental relationship. If our children don't respect
our authority, then I doubt that either our direct involvement or our
inactivity will do much good. This element of strength
pg 29
is the backbone on which our position as parents rests. 'We couldn't
even if we wanted to,' and the children know it. They're free under
authority, which is liberty. To be free without any authority is
license.
Good-Naturedness
The next element of masterly inactivity is a sense of
agreeability--candid, friendly, natural, good-natured ease. This is
very different from lack of concern or a general giving in to childen's
every whim. One comes from a foundation of strength; the other from
weakness. Children are good at spotting the difference! 'Please, Mom,
can't we pick blackberries this afternoon instead of doing school?' A
masterly 'yes,' and a defeated 'yes' are two different things. The
first makes the break doubly enjoyable, but the second creates a
restless desire to see what else can be gotten away with.
Self-Confidence
The next element is confidence. Parents should have more faith in
themselves. It doesn't take a whirlwind of restless activity to get
things accomplished. The mere presence of a proper parental
relationship, with the rightful authority that goes along with it, is
to the children what sunshine and water are to seeds in fertile soil.
But a parent who's picky, anxious, constantly explaining, demanding,
making excuses, over-restraining, too interfering, or who is simply
with the children too much, destroys the dignity and simplicity of the
parent/child relationship. Like all of the best and most delicate
things in life, that relationship suffers if it has to be asserted or
defended.
The
Casual, Easy Attitude of Fathers
Fathers are often more comfortable than mothers assuming that casual,
easy attitude with their children that comes
pg 30
with their relationship. But that's just because fathers tend to be
preoccupied with so many outside things, while the mother is often
wrapped up in her children. It shames all of us to see a careless,
selfish mother whose children are her personal slaves and are happy
rushing around to serve her whims. The point isn't that mothers
shouldn't be careless and selfish, but that they should provide their
children with the space and freedom that come from letting them alone.
Young people shouldn't be oppressed with the concerns and worries of
their parents. A ten-year-old who wants to know if she's performing as
well as average ten-year-olds, or who discusses his bad habits with you
and asks for suggestions to get rid of them is a cause for concern. We
instinctively feel that such a child is worried about things that
should be the parent's concern. The burden of a child's training is the
parent's responsibility, but the parent should bear it with an easy
grace and erect posture, like a Spanish peasant carrying a water-jug.
Confidence
in Their Children
The next element is that parents should have confidence, not only in
themselves, but in their children. This should be a goal for them to
try to live up to. If the parent trusts in the relationship between
them and the child, the child will believe in it, too, and rise to the
occasion to fulfill his part. This will happen if the children aren't
worried [flustered and over-burdened
with too many
demands].
The
All-Knowing Wisdom of Parents and Teachers
Parents and teachers must, of course, be omniscient. Their children
expect them to be. A mother or father who can be fooled is a person
who's easy to be taken in, even in the mind of the best child. Children
are always playing a game of half chance, half
pg 31
skill, to see how far they can go, how much control they can get of
their own lives, and how much they have to leave in the hands of the
stronger authority. A mother who isn't wise to her children is at their
mercy, and shouldn't expect them to go easy on her. But her omniscience
must be the kind that sees without watching, knows without telling, is
always on the alert without being obvious about it. Her attitude must
be open-eyed, but calm like a sphinx. The children should know that
they've been left alone, whether it's to do their assigned duty, or to
amuse themselves. The constraining power of authority must be
ever-present, but passive so that the child doesn't feel like he's
confined against his will. The pattern and role model is man's free
will. For ages and ages, having a free will has been good exercise for
faithful souls who would have preferred the easy way out by being
coerced into obedience and righteousness. A child who behaves because
he isn't given any other choice will lose more in his ability to
have initiative than he'll ever gain with the appearance of good
behavior. Every time that a child feels like he's behaving because he
made a free choice of his own accord, his initiative is strengthened.
Parents must not control children with bearing reins [or, with a short leash]. When it
occurs to
a child to reflect on his own actions and behavior, he should have
enough of a sense of freedom that his good behavior feels like
something that was his own choice and preference.
'Fate'
and 'Freewill'
This is the kind of freedom that a child has when his parents trust him
as far as his comings and goings and his childhood activities, all the
time within the bounds of parental authority. Such a child is getting
the training that a person needs as a being whose life is conditioned
by 'fate' and 'freewill.' His liberty has a sense of 'must'
behind it. That relieves him of the kind of anxiety that
pg 32
comes from the constant stress of having to make decisions. He's free
to do what he should, but in his deepest heart, he knows very well that
he's not free to do what he shouldn't. But the child who grows up with
no strong sense of authority behind what he does, who hears over and
over again to 'be good,' is aware that he can choose good or evil, he
can decide to obey or not, he can tell the truth or he can lie. Even
when he chooses to do the right thing, the decision-making process
itself causes him some stress. His parents have removed the support of
their authority, which is supposed to sustain him in the difficult
choice to do
right, so he's left all alone in the most difficult effort of all--the
effort of decision. Is it too subtle a distinction, the difference
between freedom to choose the right thing by one's own choice, but not
being free to choose to do wrong? Is that difference too elusive to
grasp? Maybe, but it's the very distinction that we ourselves are aware
of in our own lives when we consciously keep ourselves under God's
Kingship. We're free to walk in the ways of righteous living, and we
have the delightful sense of liberty to choose--yet we know that the
way of the transgressor is hard. We're aware of a restraining hand in
the here and now, and we know that there's sure, certain punishment in
the
future. This is precisely the subtle distinction that we need to aim
for with our own child. He needs to be treated with full confidence,
and he must feel like choosing the right thing is his own free choice
that his parents trust him to make. But he must also be aware of a
deterring force in the background that's always alert and ready to
hinder him
when he wants to makes the wrong choice.
The
Component Parts of Masterly Inactivity
We've listed authority, cheerfulness, self-confidence,
pg 33
confidence in our children, as some of the elements of masterly
inactivity. But there are other components that have to be there, too.
A healthy, sound mind and body is necessary. If a sound body is
impossible, then get the mind sound. A nervous, anxious, worried mother
can't have an easy, happy relationship with her child. She might be the
best mother in the world in all other respects, but all her children
will pick up from her when she's like that is a touch of her nerves,
which is the most contagious of bad habits. She'll perceive her
children as grouchy, rebellious, and unmanageable, but she won't
realize that it's her own fault--not the fault of her actions, but the
fault of her mood.
The
Serenity of a Madonna
There's a reason why the old painters, no matter how different their
ideas about other matters might have been, all had the same idea about
the proper role model for a Mother. The Madonna, no matter whose
painting you look at, is always serene. This is a great truth. If
seeing this lesson with the eyes would have a calming influence on the
heart, then it would be worthwhile to hang our walls with Madonnas from
all the early Master painters! Does this seem unattainable for mothers
in these anxious, stressful days? It may seem hard, but it's not
impossible. If mothers would learn to do for themselves what they do
for their children when they're over-stimulated, households would all
be happier. Let the mother go out to play! She should have the courage
to let everything go when life becomes too stressful, and just take a
day, or even a half day, alone, to go out into the fields, or enjoy a
favorite book, or go to the art gallery and gaze long and intensely at
just two or three pictures, or relax in bed, without the children. Life would go
on more smoothly
pg 34
for both parents and children. The mother would be more able to have
the attitude of 'wise passiveness,' and she wouldn't frustrate her
children with her continual interference, even if her involvement is
only with her hand or eye. Instead, she'd just let them be.
Leisure
Another necessary element is leisure. Sometimes we're in a hurry
because of events. But, we have to admit, sometimes we're hurried
simply because we enjoy the excitement of a bit of a rush. The children
like it, too, at first--Dad's birthday is coming and Nicole must recite
a poem for him, but the little performance was only thought of a week
in advance, so Nicole is summoned at all sorts of random moments to
have some lines of the poem crammed into her. At first, she's pleased
to have so much attention, and enjoys the task of memorizing. But
gradually, it starts to become a nuisance. She starts to resist and
gets sulky about it. She's reprimanded for not loving her father,
tearfully learns her verses, and although she finally delivers the
performance charmingly enough, Nicole has suffered physically and
morally. Yet if the project had been thought of a month earlier, the
whole process could have been healthy and fun. It's even worse for
children after their mother or teacher has had a busy day. Company is
coming for dinner, or the family's summer clothes need to be taken care
of, or drawers and cabinets need to be cleaned out, or there's a test
coming. It's one of those busy, fussy days that women tend to love. We
try to do more than we can really handle ourselves, our nerves are on
end, we're tired, and, with all the stress, everyone in the school or
house feels uncomfortable because of the pressure. The children seem to
take advantage of this stress to act up. The truth is, their mother's
mood has affected them and made them whiny and annoying. The result of
the mother's bottled nervous stress will probably be tantrums in the
children's room.
pg 35
Idle time to relax, and a sense of calm leisure in the adults around
them is as necessary to children as the strong, kind parental attitude
I'm talking about.
Faith
There are more ingredients in the recipe of 'masterly inactivity,' but
I only have space to list one more. The highest form of confidence is
what we know as faith. There can't be full rest and peace of mind and
behavior without it. We need to recognize and remember that God doesn't
leave the training totally up to their parents. He Himself works in
ways that it's not our place to hinder. He helps the training of every
child. When we understand this, then we'll learn passiveness, humility
and wisdom. We'll feel better about giving children space to develop
their own character in their own individual way, and we'll know the
best way to intervene effectively to prevent the bad tendencies that
their particular character is prone to.
Next, we'll consider some of the different phases of children's lives
that need some 'masterly inactivity' from their parents and teachers.
pg 36
Chapter 4 - Some of the Rights of Children
as Persons
Children
Should Be Free in Their Play
We've just finished discussing how right and wise it is to include
'wise passiveness' or 'masterly inactivity' in our plan of bringing up
our children. Now we need to look at the different areas of a child's
life where we should use 'masterly inactivity.' The first area is in
the child's play. In these days when there's so much emphasis on
education, we risk crowding out time to play, or, just as bad, managing
and arranging it until children have no more choice in the way
they play than they do in their work. We have nothing against the
educational value of games. We know that there's a lot to be learned
from sports. The qualities we think of when we think of an English
gentleman are mostly learned from such games. There's a move to bring
these games with their benefits to girls, so that they too can grow up
with a concept of abiding by rules, moral stamina, and resourcefulness
that usually result from playing organized sports.
Organized
Sports are Not Play
Although there are benefits to organized
pg 37
sports, they are not the same as playing in the sense we're talking
about. Children need time to make up episodes, carry on pretend
adventures, live heroic lives, lay sieges and defend forts, even if the
fort is only an old armchair. Adults must not interfere or tell the
children what to play. They need to accept the fact that this is
something they don't understand, and, even more, their very presence
carries the cold breath of reality that makes the pretend illusion
dissipate and fade away. Think what it must be like for a commanding
general leading his soldiers when some intruder into his play-world
tells him to tie his shoes! There's an idea going around that children
need to be taught how to play--and that we need to teach them to
pretend how to be little fishies and lambs and butterflies [Froebel's novel idea called 'kindergarten!']
Children undoubtedly enjoy these games that are made up for them, but
they carry a risk. A child who gets used to crutches may never learn to
walk on his own. Children who spend a lot of time playing with
grown-ups won't learn to create their own games and make believe, so
they miss the education that comes from being allowed to go their own
way and live
'As if his whole job
Was continual imitation.'
Personal
Initiative in Work
Even in children's work, adults tend to interfere too much. We all know
how much personal initiative is valued and how much children love doing
anything that they're allowed to do their own way. They love doing
anything that gives room for building skills, using their imagination,
or developing their thinking ability. Our current philosophies of
education don't leave much room for children to have any personal
initiative. There's so much busy work to be finished, so many things
that need to be learned about (but not really learned), that it's only
pg 38
rarely that a child gets an opportunity to create anything himself. We
should use opportunities as they come up. At the School Field at
Hackney (1884–1905), Edmund
Beale Sargent tried an interesting and eye-opening experiment.
He got eighty children together much like any other elementary
school except that he personally paid for his school instead of
it being funded by educational taxes or private tuition. The results
were wonderful. The students learned to draw very well. That's probably
because, as soon as they could outline the flower and leaves of a
specific plant, they were encouraged to create designs using those
shapes. After just a short period of art training, these children were
able to create truly beautiful floral designs that might surprise other
parents whose children have had years of art training but still can't
draw. These students at School Field produced much of their own school
magazine, too. They wrote stories, poems and essays--not because it was
assigned as school work, but because they wanted to. Their minds had
been stimulated to think so that they felt like they had something to
say about topics like a doll's ball, or Peter, the school cat. They
experienced the feeling of thinking and creating for themselves. Our
failure in education is largely due to the fact that we carry our
children through their school work instead of letting them expend their
own effort and concentration.
Children
Need To Succeed or Fail by Their Own Efforts
There's another way that we don't leave children alone enough to do
their work, and this is even more in our control. We prod them
constantly and don't let
pg 39
them stand or fall as a result of their own efforts. One of the
characteristics (and disastrous features) of modern society is that
we've become lazy and dependent on being prodded. We've encouraged a
whole system of various prods to get us to do anything. We have to be
prodded to do our social duties. If we help support a charitable
institution, we expect to be reminded when it's time to pay. If we go
to an event, do we go on our own because we've decided we want to, or
do we go because someone else asked us to and reminded us of the day
and time a half dozen times? Maybe the odd division of labor is a
result of our hurried lives--our society seems to be divided into those
who prod, and those who are prodded [prodders and proddees?] I don't
mean that some people do nothing but pressure everyone else about
everything, and some people just suffer under the pressure. What's more
accurate is that all of us prod in some situations, and all of us are
prodded in others. An occasional prick to remind us can be healthy and
stimulating, but the sluggishness of human nature makes us more willing
to lean against a wall that has spikes than to stand unsupported in our
strength! When we train children, we need to be careful that they don't
get into the habit of needing to be reminded to do every one of their
duties, and prodded to make any kind of effort. Our entire educational
structure is mostly a system of prods. A system of prods is likely to
obscure a child's sense of 'must' and 'ought' if he gets used to
mentally and morally resisting prods.
Children
are Generally Dutiful
It would be better for children to suffer the consequences of not doing
their work from time to time, rather than to always do their work
because they were so urged and prodded from all sides that they were
never given a choice in the matter. The more
pg 40
we're prodded, the lazier we get and the less we're able to expend the
effort of our will, which is supposed to get us started on our tasks
and help us follow through and complete them. Children are, for the
most part, good enough to want to do what they should. If we expect a
chore to be done at a certain time without urging, pleading, rewarding
or punishing, nine times out of ten, it will be done. The mistake that
many of us make is in relying on our own wisdom and our own efforts
instead of trusting the dutiful impulse within our children that will
carry them through the work that's expected of them.
Children
Should Choose Their Own Friends
When it comes to choosing friends and people to hang out with, we
should train children so that we'll feel we can trust them with a
generous confidence. If we give them that kind of confidence, we'll
find that they will be worthy of it. If Franklin has started spending
time with Haskell Jones and Haskell isn't a very nice boy, Franklin
will figure that out as quickly as his mother if he's left alone. He'll
probably come and ask for advice and suggestions for getting out of a
friendship that he doesn't feel comfortable with. But if the parents
ban Haskell and forbid Franklin from doing things with him, or put
different boundaries on what they can do together, then Franklin, if
he's a kind-hearted child, will feel bound in honor to side with his
friend. As a result, a friendship that might have been easily discarded
becomes cemented. Emily won't understand why she, as the daughter of an
upper middle class family, shouldn't make friends with Melissa, who
sits next to her at school and is from a lower-class neighborhood. But
these are minor issues and should be left to chance. A mother who
questions her children's choice of friends on the basis of outward
things like social class or appearance
pg 41
is clouding the consideration of the more important issue of character,
which is the most common cause of ruined lives. In this matter, just
like other matters, the parent's inactivity must be masterly. In other
words, the child should be able to tell whether his parents would
approve or disapprove, and he should be able to base that on general
principles of character and conduct, even though his parents never say
anything or even give disapproving looks about this week's new buddy.
Children
Should Be Free To Spend Their Own Pocket Money
Spending pocket money is one more opportunity to give children
initiative and give parents practice in restraining themselves. The
father who distributes the weekly pocket money has probably never given
his children any principles about handling money--namely, that no
matter how small an income is, it can be divided into a portion to give
away, a portion to keep, and some to save so that after a few weeks or
months, there's enough to buy something that's really worth having. As
far as wasting money on treats, that should be a rare indulgence, and
only if we're going to be sharing it. As far as thinking carefully
before making a purchase, the lesson of Rosamund and the Purple Jar
will be useful. If a father hasn't taught his children these things,
then he shouldn't be surprised when his children think of money merely
as a way to indulge themselves. Lessons like these shouldn't have any
bearing on the week's pocket money. That should be theirs to spend
however they want, after they've had some instruction about handling
money. Little by little, weekly allowance should include the cost of
belts and scarves until, finally, when a girl is
pg 42
in her late teens, she can be trusted with her own allowance for
clothing and personal expenses. If a parent can't trust their older
child with money after training them, then they haven't properly
prepared their child to survive in a world where wise, fair and
generous handling of money is a mark of character.
Children
Should Form Their Own Opinions
We only have room to mention one more area where we should practice
'masterly inactivity.' There are compelling issues being discussed
these days, controversial opinions burning in people's minds--issues of
religion, politics, science, literature, art, every kind of social
project, and we all tend to have strong opinions. A person who hasn't
kept abreast of the latest evolution of thought in the world about
these matters should be ashamed of himself. It's our responsibility to
form opinions carefully, and to hold them loyally unless facts persuade
us to change our mind. But we have no right to pass these opinions on
to our children. It's so easy to make strong partisan followers of our
children, at least children who appear to be loyal. But with every
action comes an equal and opposite reaction, and the swinging of the
pendulum will probably carry our children to the totally opposite
opinion of ours. The mother of the Newmans [probably Huegenot Jemima Fourdrinier,
mother of Cardinal John Henry Newman and atheist Charles Robert Newman]
was a devoted evangelical. When they were children, she passed her
ready-made opinions over to her sons. Maybe she thought that the ideas
they received from her on the matter was their own reasoned opinion.
But when they were out from under her domineering influence, one allied
himself with the Catholic Church in Rome,
pg 43
and another refused to have any restriction on his freedom to think and
do what he wanted, so he chose to create his own creed, which was a
rejection of God altogether. Perhaps this religious mother would have
saved herself some grief if she had given her children the living
principles of Christianity, which aren't matters of opinion. Then she
could have let them accept her particular denomination as children
without requiring that they believe that her evangelical opinion was
the only real way of salvation.
In politics, too, children should be allowed to proud of their country
and taught what their duties are. But it's best to keep them away from
the partisan conflict of elections. Children are more likely to adopt
their parent's opinions when they reach the age where they're ripe for
forming opinions if their parent's opinions haven't been forced on them
all their lives, when they were too inexperienced and lacked knowledge
to form opinions for themselves. It's only by 'masterly
inactivity,' or 'wise passiveness,' or capable 'letting alone' that a
child can be trained
'To respect his conscience enough to let it rule him.'
Spontaneity
Being naturally good, as if spontaneously, is something we all admire.
But, even in children, this grace isn't something inborn, like a native
wild-flower. It's the result of training. It's the product of years of
pleasant chats about the general principles of how we should act, and
years of self-restraint from parents who were practicing 'masterly
inactivity' to let their children work out those guidelines in their
own lives as they saw fit. Parents have the ability to guide the
direction that the next generation takes. Since they have such a big
responsibility, they need to be even more careful [not to make their children mirror-images
of themselves, but allow them to choose their own paths, live their own
lives, decide what's best for themselves. The old ways of the parents
must give way to the new ways of the next generation.]
'The old ways change and are replaced by new ones
And God fulfills Himself in many ways
So that one good custom doesn't corrupt the world.'
[from Tennyson, The Passing of Arthur]
[One preacher noted
about the Tennyson quote, 'It is ordained, the new generation must have
their chance to test their ideas and skills.']
pg 44
Chapter
5 - Psychology as it Relates to Current Thinking
Educational
Thought in the 1700's
The end of the eighteen century and the end of the nineteenth century
have one thing in common. They both view education as one of the chief
ends of mankind. The people in the 1700's had it the best. They had
clear revelations from their philosophers Locke and Rousseau. They knew
exactly what they wanted to do, and their enthusiasm in doing it was
charming. That period of time is full of memoirs, and it's fun to read
about the children of more thoughtful families being brought up
consistently and with philosophical goals in mind. They had
convictions, and they had enough faith in them to put them into
practice. We aren't so fortunate. Just a few decades ago we too were
all excited and impassioned about education. All over England and
around the world, educational 'movement' schools, colleges, lectures,
higher education for women, public day schools for girls, and exams for
reassurance about each point were booming. It was a progressive
movement, and it brought us immeasurable benefits. But one other thing
it brought us is our current
pg 45
dissatisfaction and depression. We tend to wonder if we're on the wrong
track. If the best kind of educational work hadn't been going on for
the last 20 or 30 years, we wouldn't have arrived at this discontent,
which I believe is from God. It's pretty obvious that it's time to
change our tactics. First we hear that elementary schools are a
failure, then we hear that girls' high schools are a failure, then
public boarding schools and colleges. They accomplish a lot, they say,
but is what they're accomplishing worth doing? Is it even education?
The bolder critics focus their attacks on our two oldest universities,
but those universities will probably weather the criticism pretty well
because of the very inertness, or 'masterly inactivity' that their
opponents disdain. The universities are good at 'leaving alone.'
General
Dissatisfaction with Education
Our general discontent with the education is a healthy sign. It
probably means that a wiser theory and better practices are just around
the corner. One thing is more clear than ever--a stream can't rise any
higher than its source. In the same way, successful work can't succeed
without sound theory as its source. We begin to wonder if we were too
hasty at adopting educational schemes and methods without considering
the theory behind them first. Now we realize that we can't get good
results
from bad theories. These days, psychologists advise us, where 20 or 30
years ago, it was the schoolmaster [teacher].
Psychologies
are a Dime a Dozen
But, unfortunately, psychologies abound, and educational schools of
theory bitterly fight each other. We need to find some kind of a test
to discern whether a working psychology
pg 46
will be effective in our age. Psychology, like every other science, is
progressive [evolves with the times
and new information]. What worked fifty years ago won't work
today. What suits our needs now won't be effective fifty years from
now. There's no such thing as a final word on education. It evolves as
man's needs change. The fact that there are at least six systems being
used, and none of them seem entirely perfect, even to the people using
it, should indicate that those of us working in the field of education
need to try to find out what's needed in a well-constructed system of
psychology.
Conditions
of an Adequate System
Any system that's going to be of any use to practical people in
providing educational purpose, unity and progressive sequence must
satisfy certain requirements. It must be thorough enough to include the
whole nature of man and his relationships with everything outside of
himself. It must be the only one that's necessary, it must be more
adequate than any other psychology that's out there. It must relate to
the living
thought of our age and not be a complicated topic that's only discussed
by a few specialists. Any intelligent common person should feel like
its movement is in step with two or three of the great ideas that are
helping to educate the world.
Sacredness
of the Person
Of all the ideas that vague popular thought is using to raise us to a
higher level, I think the most important one is the sacredness of the
individual. Every person seems interesting to us these days. An
interviewer does more than satisfy our common curiosity about people.
What he draws out of those he interviews is interesting to us, whether
he interviews a London street sweeper, a grocer, the librarian, a
common
middle-aged couple on an outing, an ambassador, an
pg 47
author, an artist or a member of the royal family. Every detail that
helps us to understand the personality of someone else is welcome. It's
the same with Kailyard
literature [regional over-sentimental
stories, usually Scottish]. It's popular for a good reason. It
may
or may not have literary quality, but it tells us what we want to know.
It gives everyday details about the people of any country or region.
Slang dictionaries, collections of legends, long biographies that give
trivial details like how a man eats and what he has for breakfast,
where he walks and how he sleeps--all of these give us mental food to
think about. We greatly value people, and our interest is only
increasing. Any system of psychology that's going to appeal to us will
have to put great priority on the individual person. People can be
influenced by one thing or another or marred by one sin or another. But
we recognize that the indefinable person is present even while the
person is still a baby, and will have to make his own way in life and
shape for himself all of the experiences, environment and education
that will influence who he becomes. A system of psychology that accepts
man in this kind of relationship to his education is one we should
adopt. This is the kind of psychology that every mother, teacher or
manager already knows about.
The
Evolution of the Individual
The next requirement of education is that it should help the individual
evolve and progress. Not only should it make persons its priority, but
its goal should be making the most of the person intellectually,
morally and physically. What we don't want is to amass mere dead facts
of knowledge, or the external ornament of mere accomplishment. We want
an education
pg 48
that will be assimilated so that it becomes a part of who the person
is. A psychology that can show us how to educate our children this way
will satisfy our requirements. The doctrine of scientific evolution has
brought about more philosophical overthrow than we realize, and we
shall soon find that a real education must mean the evolution and
growth of the human being in every way. Merely acquiring knowledge
isn't necessarily education at all.
The
Solidarity of the Race
One other idea that seems to be helping to raise mankind is the concept
of the solidarity of the race. The American poet Walt Whitman expresses
one aspect of this concept when he writes that he experiences victory
with every triumphant general, bleeds with every wounded soldier,
shares the spring morning and the wind and the open road with every
traveler. In fact, he writes that he lives in all other lives that
touch him in any way, even in the imagination. This is something more
than the brotherhood of man, which is limited to the present time. Our
sense of oneness with humanity crosses the barrier of time and space,
giving us reverence for every antique relic of our own people or
any other people. It gives a joyous hope in every advance of science
that seems to be the promise of generations that will live hundreds of
years after us. Shouldn't we expect psychology to acknowledge this
great educational force as well as the other two I mentioned? These
aren't the only ideas of our current age, but I think they're the ones
we're all the most aware of. Any system of psychology
pg 49
that doesn't take one or all of these into account can't be the basis
of the educational theory and practice that we're looking for.
The
Best Thought is Common Thought
Now let's consider three or four of the most widely influential
psychologies of today. I don't mean this to be a criticism, but as
inheritors of the thoughts of other men, we should stop and take stock
of what we have and how we can best use it. After all, the best thought
of any age is common thought. The men who write it down in books are
merely expressing what's in everyone else's minds. But we have to
remember that truth often works like a country gate that's allowed to
swing back and forth until it finally closes. First it swings a long
way in one direction, then in the other, and the swings get shorter and
shorter until the gate stops and the latch catches. A reformer or
investigator latches onto one aspect of truth and it seems to be the
whole truth to him. He works to advance that part of the truth to the
exclusion of other aspects of truth. The next reformer seems to be
reacting in opposition, but what he's really doing is bringing up a
different aspect of the truth. We common people of average minds have
our work cut out for us. We have to consider each side, find a balance
in what's been written, and figure out where the truth is. It might be
in the middle, or even as a side issue that the original thinkers on
both sides missed. But we value the contributions that have been made.
They serve as a bridge to carry us along.
Locke's
'States of Consciousness'
We don't need to go any further back than Locke. He represents the more
traditional ideas about education of upper middle class parents. People
who claim to raise their children with good old 'common sense' the way
they were raised and their own parents were raised may not realize that
pg 50
their child-rearing ideas come from a great-great grandfather who read
Locke. Locke didn't concern himself with the mind or soul of man. He
focused on 'states of consciousness.' He believed that ideas and images
could only come through the five senses. A person couldn't know
anything unless he experienced it with his own senses and comprehended
it with his own understanding. As far as which ideas and images should
be experienced in order to educate, Locke's recommendation was to
expose students to 'what's proper for a gentleman to know.' The mind
(which implies the soul or inner man) doesn't seem to have much spirit
or character of its own. It only has specific abilities and actions to
put to use whatever ideas come into it. To explain these abilities and
actions, Locke came up with the notion that has probably done more
damage in the area of education than any other--the fallacy of
'faculties of the mind.'
This
Doesn't Explain Personal Growth in Individuals
Let's measure Locke's psychology against the standards we set up.
Remember that his psychology is obliged, as much as any other
psychology, to raise a higher standard. An education that stops at
'what's proper for a gentleman to know' and what a gentleman's
accomplishments should be doesn't have the unity of an inspiring idea.
It lacks natural progress, continuity and a noble goal. The important
inner person hardly appears at all in Locke's psychology. The person is
reduced to the semi-mechanical actions of his 'faculties.' You might as
well say that he's no more than the combined collection of the images
and experiences gathered through his senses. There's no recognition for
the personal growth, evolution, or expansion of the individual in his
own unique direction. According to Locke, each person is isolated in
his own skin, but is taught to behave himself so that he appears to be
what's expected of him. But what about the intellectual exchange of
ideas?
pg 51
Men who have long since died are still able to communicate their living
thoughts through the works they've left behind, and these ideas are
like the links of an endless chain that connect all people to one
another, and allow people to influence each other across the boundaries
of time and space. But ideas have no place in a philosophy where people
can only know what's assimilated by their own mind after coming through
their own senses. If we want to realize all of the goals and hopes
we've set for ourselves in our own day, we'll need to reject Locke's
philosophy, although we still have gratitude and even affection for him.
Modern
Physiological Psychology
The modern school that thinks of psychology as strictly a 'natural
science' is working mostly with Locke's ideas, and adding the
illumination of some knowledge of biology. This school of thought
agrees with Locke that the mind amounts to nothing more than 'states of
consciousness.' A person can only get knowledge through his senses.
That knowledge reaches the brain in the form of ideas or images. To
represent this 'rational psychology,' I'll use some quotes from
Professor [William?] James of
Harvard University. Even people who disagree with him have to respect
him and admit that he explains the subject with wisdom and balance. He
begins with a limiting definition of psychology: 'the description and
explanation of states of consciousness.' He treats psychology as if it
was natural science [i.e., purely
chemical/physical, disregarding the soul/spirit of man]. He
states facts that are already familiar to most of us, showing the
intimate connection between acts of thought and the physical brain.
Then he says, 'Considering all of these facts, the simple and radical
idea dawns on us: mental action must be uniformly and absolutely a
function of brain action. It varies according to the individual brain,
and is to the brain action what effect is to cause. This concept is the
pg 52
foundation of all current physiological psychology.' This isn't very
different from the Frenchman who announced that the brain secretes
thoughts in the same way that the liver secretes bile. Both processes
are totally physical and mechanical. According to this logic, the only
thing needed for the most profound kind of thinking is a healthy,
well-nourished brain.
Unjustifiable
Materialism
No wonder Mr. James has to admit that, to some of his readers, 'this
kind of conclusion will seem like the most unjustifiable kind of
materialism.' He admits that this might make discussion of the inner
self very difficult, but that difficulty is easily dealt with. 'The
logical conclusion is that all psychology needs to do its work is
states of consciousness. Metaphysics or theology might prove the
existence of the soul, but in the field of psychology, the theory of
this kind of principle of unity is unnecessary.' In other words, the
important inner part of myself that I call me is nothing more than continually
changing states of consciousness that the brain causes. The
identifiable character of the person, which might seem to be the one
solid anchor in a shifting, changing sea, ends up being nothing more
than the brain being conscious of the same objects today that it was
conscious of years ago.
Psychology
is a Phase of Uncertainty
In his thick book Outlines of
Psychology, Professor James proves with great clearness and
power that all of the phenomena of intelligent life may have their sole
source in the physical brain. Yet he concludes that 'when we say that
psychology is a natural science, that doesn't necessarily mean that
it's the kind of psychology that
pg 53
finally has its roots in solid ground. In fact, it means just the
opposite. It means that it's an especially fragile psychology, and the
waters of metaphysical criticism leak in at every seam. All of its
foundational assumptions and evidences need to be thought of as they
relate to other areas, and translated into other terms. In other words,
the phrase is meant in hesitation, not arrogance. It's surprising to
hear people talk exultantly about the 'new psychology' and writing
'histories of psychology' when the first glimpses of clear insight into
the elements and forces of psychology still don't exist. All we have is
a string of raw facts, a little gossip, some debatable opinions, a few
classifications and generalizations about basic descriptions--but not
one single law, or one single premise that can be used to draw any
causal deductions.' This is reassuring, and we close Professor James's
book with satisfaction. But, unfortunately, not all 'new' psychologists
are quite so modest. In fact, if I may dare to say so, some are
downright arrogant. Even worse, students who read this psychology
text-book are likely to assume that it's a proven fact that psychology
is a natural science and--like poet Peter Bell's primrose--'nothing
more.' Reading that disclaimer on the last page isn't going to motivate
a student to re-evaluate his opinion.
We
Become Devitalized
It's depressing to learn that a person might not be anybody after all,
just a passing state of consciousness. It kind of drains the hope out
of life, since it doesn't leave anything pleasant to look forward to.
After all, even if something really good should happen next year,
there's no 'me' to enjoy it. There's only a 'state of consciousness' at
some point in the future. There can't be any such thing as faith if
pg 54
everything that happens just is,
and other people and even we ourselves are nothing more than additional
circumstances that add experiential data to the moment. If there are no
real persons, then the divine idea that we call enthusiasm can't exist.
There can be no recognition of a higher plane that we define by saying,
'This is what I believe,' and no recognition of the divine Being that
we know by faith. So we lose heart. Life no longer has any meaning. We
throw ourselves into whatever task is at hand with desperate but dreary
energy, just to get through the day. We are glad to be amused, but even
more grateful to keep busy with a feverish pace of work. Yet even the
work we do is as meaningless and lifeless as we are. It has no living
idea and no higher purpose. Our manner becomes apathetic, our
expression dreary and uncaring. This change has already come over too
many intelligent teachers. Those same teachers might have been inspired
by high ideals and noble passions if they hadn't been filled with an
educational attitude that responds to all hopes with the question,
'who's going to benefit from it?' We give what we have. We can't give
what we don't have. What do teachers like that have to pass on to the
students under their care?
The
System is Inadequate, Unnecessary and Out of Harmony
But we don't need to settle and accept this ruinous philosophy. Even
their best prophets, like Mr. James, admit that it's inadequate. There
is more to man than this philosophy has ever even dreamed of. This
philosophy isn't
necessary. There are other philosophical explanations that do a better,
though not perfect job, of accounting for the aspects of the human
psyche. It isn't even in harmony with the times. It denies the
individual personality that our age
pg 55
tends to revere and magnify, and to take humanitarian interest in, even
when the person has been degraded. It loses the popular feeling of
solidarity, and loosens the bond of social ties and family devotion.
After
all, what kind of binding ties can there be between us if we're nothing
more than states of consciousness?
Personal
Growth is Impeded
The evolution and personal growth of the individual stops where
mechanical perfection begins. Mechanical perfection might turn out good
mathematicians and analytical scientists, but it leaves no place for
the higher planes of the human experience like hope, reflection and
devotion. We need to keep as close a watch at the psychology that
undergirds our educational ideals and methods as we would watch a place
where water is let loose to gush out. There's a satisfying certainty in
a science like anthropometrics that uses body measurements to compare
and classify. It's easy to draw specific conclusions about a child by
the physical way he stretches out his arm. And, in fact, there's much
good being done in the field of science these days. In the area of
disease, for example, scientific tests can reveal hidden symptoms or
dispositions and then prescribe medical treatment. But there's a danger
that we might go too far, taking a part as if it was whole by letting
this new science of psychology usurp the entire field of education.
pg 56
Chapter
6 - Examining Some Educational Theories
The
Theories of Pestalozzi and Froebel: The Advent of Kindergarten
It's refreshing to turn our minds to the school of German thought that
gave us two great apostles, Pestalozzi and Froebel. From them we've
gained an appreciation for childhood's enthusiasm, teachers who are
loving and pleasant, and cheerful school days for children. It's
unworthy to look
a gift horse in the mouth, so it might seem ungrateful to criticize any
weakness in a psychology that's brought so much good to education. But
no stream can rise higher than its source, and I imagine that the
concept that children are like cherished plants in a cultured garden
has some kind of weakness. Maybe the children are tended a little too
carefully. Maybe Nature is helped along too eagerly. Maybe the
environment is too artificially perfect. It's possible that the
rough-and-tumble routine of normal family life provides a better
environment for acquiring the dignity and growth of personal character
than the delightful contrived child garden [kindergarten literally means 'child's
garden']. I think we've all noticed
that children show keener intelligence and more independent thinking
when they're playing at home and
pg 57
talking with family members than the angelic little creatures we
see in kindergartens. In Fra Angelico's painting of 'The Last
Judgment,' one of the scenes is of a circle of monks dancing around
hand in hand with the angels on their way to Paradise. It's as if
they've become as little children. They're obviously happy and very
good--but, somehow, something seems to be missing. They seem to have
lost the force of individual personality. They look incapable of making
any kind of decision for themselves. And this may be a danger of
kindergarten.
Lacking
the Element of Personality
It's very true that 'if you make children happy, they'll be good.' But
does that help them develop the kind of steadfast character that's the
first condition of virtue? The other side of the coin is, 'Be good, and
you'll be happy.' Kindergarten teachers are doing beautiful work, but
too many of them are held back because they can't get away from the
'children are plants' metaphor. And that idea is totally lacking in the
element of personality. Cherishing and developing a child's individual
personality is a sacred and vital part of education. But the
German philosophers thought of man as an impersonal part of the Cosmos.
All that's needed according to them is to place things in their proper
condition in order for them
to develop according to their nature.
The
Struggle for Existence is a Part of Life
The weakness of this way of looking at things is that man seems to be
under the laws of two universes--the physical and the spiritual.
Energizing, resisting, repelling is the law of his existence. It might
not seem to be necessary of children--perhaps their struggle for
existence can begin after a peaceful, happy childhood has been provided
for them. But the transition from the artificially peaceful world of
kindergarten to real life must violate the principles of unity and
continuity
pg 58
that should rule education. Surely all thoughtful kindergarten teachers
recognize where the weakness of their Founder lies and have made some
modifications accordingly. After all, no man is perfect. One example of
their progress towards more modern thinking is using free brush-drawing
that allows children to have some initiative, instead of the cramped
pencil drawing of the old days of kindergarten. Nevertheless, we all
need to remember our origins so that we can recognize and avoid
pitfalls.
Herbartian
Psychology
I only have room to touch on one more psychology. Interestingly enough,
this one is setting Americans apart from the school of thought that
considers psychology a purely physical science, and even British
teachers are beginning to snatch at this idea like a drowning man
grasping for a floating piece of straw. This is the psychology of
Johann Friedrich
Herbart. He's also
German, and lived during the time of Pestalozzi and Froebel. His ideas
about the nature of man are as different from the men we've already
discussed
as the north pole is from the south. And there's no denying that it
gives a temporary working base for education. It isn't until we examine
Herbart's ideas in connection with a couple of other great thoughts
upon
which the world is being educated that we see the weakness of his
theory. Herbart begins to account for man, but without admitting the
person. (Person is meant in the common, everyday sense.) He admits that
there's a soul--but then he redefines it and says, 'The soul has no
ability or tools to either receive or produce anything. On its own, it
doesn't have
pg 59
ideas, feelings or desires. It has no awareness of itself or anything
else. Not only that, but within itself, it has no form of intuition, no
thought, no willing or acting, and no kind of predisposition whatsoever
to any of this.' (Lehrbuch zur Psychologie, Part III, sects. 152--see
Herbartian Psychology, by James Adams). There are still two
possibilities for the soul, says Herbart: a passive inertness, and the
ability to react to an idea. By this, he means that the soul isn't
quite
the same after it's been affected by an idea.
The
Person is an Effect, Not a Cause
Well, anyway, Herbart simplifies our problem. He reduces all of the
messy complexities of intellect, will, feeling, etc. to nothing! The
soul is simply tossed out to the mercy of ideas, a free field with no
limits for ideas, which are like living entities, in the way that Plato
meant,
and the ideas crowd and jostle each other to get in, and then, once in,
they vie for the best spot. The sneaky little things lie just below the
soul's front porch, just watching and waiting for a chance to slip in.
Then, once in the door, they hurry to join their friends, the ideas
that are most like themselves. They cling and stick to their own kind,
forming clumps that Herbart calls 'apperception masses.' These masses
take up a fairly permanent place in the soul. And what does the soul
do? Apparently nothing, except to provide an empty stage for this
rushing and clumping of ideas. The self, or soul of the person,
whatever we call him, is the end result of this collection of idea
clumps. He's an effect, not a cause, a resulting product, not an
original essence from the outset.
Any philosopher who emphasizes the power of ideas deserves some credit
in the field of education. Herbart gives us some glimpses of the
perfect theory, and our function in supplying the child with suitable
ideas,
pg 60
and with the best ideas, and how we should take care to select and
arrange these ideas so that they naturally congregate together and form
strong 'apperception masses' once they've managed to squeeze through
the door.
A
Tempting Concept: The Basis for Unit Studies
This presents a fascinating opportunity for us. If Herbart is right,
then education is clear and simple. All it takes is selecting the right
ideas to turn out a man made to order. This is a very tempting scheme
of unity and continuity! It might be possible to spend an entire month
on lessons planned specifically to create one single 'apperception
mass,' perhaps about 'books.' We might plan object lessons on colors,
shapes and sizes of
books, as well as more advanced object lessons about paper-making and
book-binding. There could be hands-on crafts about sewing and binding
books, and age-appropriate lessons about the contents of books. Tots
could learn ABC's and Little Bo Peep, while older students could focus
on poetry and philosophy. A month in which the entire school, all
grades, could arrange their education in groups of ideas that could
clump into one big apperception mass around the concept of 'books.'
This sort of thing was actually done a while ago in London. 'Apple' was
the central idea of the apperception mass.
Personality
is Eliminated
Finding principles that unify and provide continuity among ideas
presented to the mind is fine. But we believe that this unity and
continuity should originate from the soul of the person
himself--otherwise this tempting collection of related ideas might
result in a collection of random information that the mind never
assimilates.
Turns
Out Duplicates
Or, if you take two souls and provide them with the exact
pg 61
same ideas in the same exact order and don't allow any other ideas to
get in, you could create carbon copies of the same person. This
possibility would forever destroy the great concept of the solidarity
of the race. I'll ask again, how does Herbartian theory advance our
interest in individual personality, our sense of the sacredness of the
person? The person becomes a non-entity. He's nothing more than the
manifestation of the ideas that take hold of him. He doesn't have so
much as an inkling of natural tendency to prefer one set of ideas over
another. Everything is random. As far as the personal growth and
evolution of he individual, there's no personal individual to grow. The
person is merely clumps of ideas, and that's what expands and grows.
The man is simply a handy jar to give the ideas a place to collect so
they can do what they need to do. Herbartian psychology has lots of
interesting concepts, but we can't accept it as our educational ideal
without sacrificing a few leading principles that are popular in
current thought.
Each
System Has Failed To Pass Our Test
We've looked at three or four psychologies that are prevalent in
education these days. We see that each has some truth, but none has the
whole truth, or even enough truth for us to base educational practice
on. So educators are having to get by on trial and error, or they
borrow a bit from here and there as they need it. They're like students
who are trying to solve a hard math problem where they know what the
answer is supposed to be, so they try division, and then
multiplication, and then subtraction until they get the answer they're
looking for. I'm sure there are many capable psychologists who haven't
written books yet, but who work out the complexities of education, not
looking for the answer, but according to a code of
pg 62
inherent principles that they've already figured out for themselves.
A
Psychology that Meets the Demands Upon It
What psychology do I offer as one that meets the criteria I indicated?
I don't claim to be a philosopher. We're just modest, practical people
looking for a sure foundation to base education on. We've brought our
own unbiased minds and a few basic principles to the problem. We might
not have put all the pieces of the puzzle together, but maybe we've
found a bit of the border here, or a corner there that indicate not so
much the different separate psychologies, but a shadowy form beginning
to take shape of a coherent, living educational principle that will get
clearer and more distinct until we finally recognize it as our
educational truth. That discovery would be the reward and triumph of
our age. I'll try to humbly explain what we've discovered. I realize
that no one person or society can claim, 'This truth is mine, and that
truth is yours.' All truth belongs to all of us, and nobody can know
how much they've taken or how much they've added.
Educational
Truth is Owned by Everyone
For years, the PNEU has been working definitely and consistently on a
philosophy that looks pretty adequate to me. It seems necessary and it
appears to be in touch with the common thinking of modern times. (The
references that follow are all from the PNEU.) Children raised with
this theory of education have certain qualifies in common, no matter
where they live. They are all oddly enlivened. They're not bored. They
don't perk up when it's time for recess, and then slump in their seats
pg 63
when they're at their desks, or at their home lessons with their tutor,
which are known for their dullness. There's unity and harmony in their
lives--they aren't one person when they're with their playmates, and
somebody else with grown-ups. No matter who they're with, they're open,
eager, sincerely interested in whatever's going on. There's also
continuity in their education. Very young children are always excited
about learning, but this desire for knowledge rarely survives two or
three years of school lessons. Yet the natural progression of people
goes from infancy to toddlerhood to childhood to youth to
adult--there's no transition stage, just a natural, gradual living
progression. What I propose for these children can't just be based on
the evidence of a few unusual cases. It needs to be based on principles
that are true for everyone.
We
Think of Children as People
First of all, we take children seriously. After all, they're persons
just like we are--in fact, even more so. The first thing we need to
clarify is what we mean by persons.
We believe that the thinking, intangible soul is one with the acting,
visible body in such a close union that,
'The body helps the soul every bit as much as the soul helps the body.'
If God hadn't revealed the doctrine of bodily resurrection to us, then
we'd have had to imagine it anyway, because we can't even conceive of
an individual without a physical, bodily form. Our friend's mannerisms
and the thousand subtle changes of his expression that express his
moods, the elegant power of his skilled hands, his familiar
and endearing way of walking--we're unable to separate these from our
concept of
him. Physiological science and rational psychology has advanced our
understanding of what the amazing brain cortex is capable of. It's the
very root of our consciousness. It provides us with images and impulses
and is
pg 64
the source that gets the motor nerves to act. In other words, the brain
is where habit starts. Education has an unlimited potential to teach a
child the best habits of behavior, and the most noble habits of
thought. Education can make sure that these wonderful habits are etched
deep into the mind, ready to be spurred to action with the right
stimulus. We believe all of this. Even more, we believe that the
possibility for a rational education depends on the physiological
foundation of habits etched in the brain. This is a new discovery, only
learned in our generation.
The
Person Wills, Thinks, and Feels
We believe that this ability of the brain to record habits isn't all
there is to it. A person needs some way of expressing and relating to
the world outside himself. We also believe that the person wills, and
thinks and feels. The inner part of a person that makes him who he is
is always there, even when he has no conscious awareness of himself.
He's not made of separate parts or faculties that act individually.
Whenever he does something, whether it's taking a walk or writing a
book, all of him is involved.
We're used to thinking of people in dual terms--body and soul--but we
need to correct our thinking. Man is one whole entity. A person is one,
not several. He's neither a collection of ideas nor a bundle of muscles
and nerves--he's both. Yes, he needs both bodily and mental food, but
that doesn't make him two people. Deliciously prepared food makes
people smile, and wine can make their hearts glad. We all know how even
our spirits are refreshed after a much needed meal. On the other hand,
a person can be well-fed, but have dull eyes and a lifeless expression
because he isn't receiving the ideas that feed his mind. Vital,
pg 65
living thought is as necessary for the physical body to be healthy as
it is for the soul to be happy and healthy.
An
Adequate Doctrine
Since this is our perspective, we believe that our own philosophy is
adequate. We're following advances in biological psychology with great
interest, and we're using every new thing that's useful to us. At the
same time, we're also following the evolution of philosophy. We realize
that physical science and philosophy both see the changing human animal
from a different angle--people include both aspects while being more
than the sum total of them. Our educational philosophy may not be
conclusive, but at least it isn't narrow and limited. We haven't cone
up against any issue of life or of the mind that our philosophy doesn't
encompass. I'm not sure how necessary
our philosophy is, but I have to accept that a philosophy that's
thorough enough to include the whole nature of man and, at the same
time, scientific advances, is necessary. We find that, unlike the other
theories, ours is in touch with the three great ideas that seem to be
popular right now. We view the child's person as very sacred. We don't
obscure his individual personality behind his academic mind or his
conscience or even his soul. In this day and age, perhaps we should
also include his physical development. A person is a combination of all of these, and yet still more.
Our philosophy protects the child's individual initiative and demands
that the teacher take a back seat. Even when the teacher is the parent,
the child's individuality shouldn't be overwhelmed. It's way too easy
to bury the child's character with 'personal influence,' which was so
prevalent in the 1850's.
Education
is the Process of Making Relationships
We think of education as the art of making relationships, or,
pg 66
to be more clear, we think of education as the consideration of which
relationship are appropriate for human beings and how those
relationships can best be established. Humans come into the world with
the capacity to make lots of different relationships. We as teachers
have two concerns. First, we need to facilitate this by exposing
children to the right ideas at the right time, and making sure that
children have good habits that will allow them to make the most of
their
exposure to these ideas. And second, we need to stay out of the way so
that our interference doesn't prevent the very relationships we want
them to form.
Teaching
Must Not Be Pushy
Half the teaching people get is so pushy. Oral lessons, lectures with
their outline handouts, leave no room for a mind to form its own
relationship with the material, even though the information originated
from various great minds. When a student learns his science from a dull
textbook, even though he sees the information illustrated in nature, or
gets information from object-lessons, he never has a chance of forming
his own relationships with natural phenomena because his
well-intentioned teacher has led him to believe that knowing about things is the same as
experiencing them personally. Yet every child knows that knowing about young Prince Edward isn't the
same as knowing him personally. You might say that a teacher should
master the art of stepping aside and staying out of the way. People
sometimes say that the usefulness of a school consists in the books on
its shelves. But they sometimes miss the fact that the choice of books is a huge part
education, because the books are infused with the ideas of minds that
will directly connect with the minds of the students, and those are the
connections that students will form relationships with.
The
Art of Staying Out Of The Way
I've known of teachers who have gone so far as
pg 67
to even compose the songs and poems their students use. Imagine! Not
even our immortal poets are allowed to come between the poor child and
the mediocre minds of our teachers! The art of staying out of the way
means that the child is allowed the freedom to develop the
relationships that are right for him. That is the art of education:
when a teacher recognizes the two things he needs to do, and how to do
them. The natural result of the teacher's success in doing these two
things is the personal growth of the individual student.
I hope to explain more fully how our theory advances the solidarity of
the race. One of the ways we accomplish this is that, instead of giving
students outlines of history [that
list off all the events that happened], we put them directly in
contact with one of the thinkers who lived then. And we're not
satisfied that they only learn the history of their own country. We
also try to give them some interest and knowledge of what was going on
at the same time in the other countries in Europe. To make sure that
the history we teach seems more real to the children, we also use some
of the literature from the same historical era, and the best historical
fiction and poetry about that period. And we do the same with other
subjects.
Nothing in this is new. What we're claiming isn't that we've discovered
a new idea, but that our theory and work is unified and energized by a
comprehensive philosophy of education and a solid psychological
foundation.
pg 68
Chapter
7 - An Adequate Educational Theory
A
Human Being
I've presented a working hypothesis to my readers that proposes that
man is a consistent whole--a spiritual being that has a physical body.
He's
able to respond to spiritual forces. His body is what he uses to
express himself, to take in information and impressions of his
environment, and to establish relationships with the world around him.
His will, conscience, affection, and reason aren't different entities
inside him. They're different things that the one person does.
His Capacities: Man is capable of relating to lots of things, so he has
different actions that he can do. If he has enough relationships with
his world, his
ability for personal growth seems to be unlimited and incalculable.
His Limitations: If he's deprived of all the relationships he should
have, he is unable to develop in those ways, although he never seems to
lose the potential to grow even in those aspects.
His Education: We also suggested that, once a relationship is made, it
leaves a permanent mark in the tissue of the brain. In other words,
pg 69
the physical impression that a thought or experiential memory leaves on
the brain has the potential to become a habit. About ninety percent of
our lives run according to habit. So, if we want to be successful at
education, we need to know something about the psychological and
physical aspects of habit. We need to know how to start a habit and how
to develop it. And we need to understand that a person being educated
has two tasks--forming habits and assimilating ideas.
How
Ideas Behave
Physiologists and 'rational psychologists' have helped us to understand
the foundation of habit so that now everyone can employ the concept of
habit development. The nature of ideas,
what they do, how they behave, the ability of ideas to impact brain
tissue and make a very real, physical impression--all of these things
are vague and we can only guess about them. But that's okay. Other
equally necessary facts of our existence, like sleeping and life and
death, are also things we can't explain. Every branch of science has
foundational facts that we have to accept without fully understanding.
When a working theory is needed, the best thing to do is to accept the
foundational facts that seem the most effective and adequate. So let's
just agree with Plato that an idea is its own separate being, a living
thing related to the mind.
No
One Creates an Idea by Himself
Apparently, nobody has the ability to come up with an original idea on
his own. Ideas appear to be the offspring of two minds. We sometimes
say,
'Such-and-such put it in my head,' and that does seem to be how ideas
work, whether they're simple or deeply profound. But, once an idea is
born, it seems to live forever. It might be painted into a picture, or
written
pg 70
into a book, carved into a chair, or simply spoken to a friend who
tells it to someone else, who tells it to still another person, so that
the idea goes on being spoken about indefinitely. Who can tell how long
an idea goes on and on? One of the most striking things that a history
student notices is the persistent way that ideas recur. The other
striking thing is that ideas sometimes elude discovery until the right
occasion brings them to notice. The children we birth physically will
die someday and be buried. But who knows what will become of the ideas
that are birthed?
Certain
People Attract Certain Ideas
Maybe we can indulge one more hypothesis. In the same way that ideas
pass from one mind to the next, an idea from someone else's mind means
nothing to us until it goes through a process of growth inside our own
mind. That's why different ideas seem to appeal to different people. It
isn't that ideas have minds of their own and indulge their personal
yearning to form into 'apperception masses.' It's because people have
inside themselves, probably by inheritance, what they need to attract
certain ideas. To help make it clearer, we'll illustrate the concept
with something visible. The relationship is something like pollen and
the ovule that it's supposed to fertilize. There are various random
ways of carrying the pollen to the ovule, but there's nothing haphazard
about the result. The correct pollen always gets to the appropriate
ovule so that the plant can bear seeds after its own kind. This is the
way people bring forth ideas according to their own personal kind.
The
Idea That 'Strikes' Us
The question is, how can an invisible, spiritual idea make a
real, physical impression on material substance--even substance as
delicate as brain tissue? We don't know. But we have a bit of physical
evidence that it does in the fact that
pg 71
we experience lots of physical reflex reactions whenever an idea
'strikes' us. Our eyes brighten, our pulse quickens, our color perks
up,
our whole body becomes more alive, capable, strengthened, no longer
weighed down under our burden of flesh. Every habit we've ever formed
originated with an initial idea. And every idea we receive is capable
of initiating a habit of thinking or doing. Every human has the ability
to communicate with others, and, after he dies, this ability can
outlive him in the work he's done or things he's said. Life is so
boundless! Once we recognize ourselves as spiritual beings, we're
convinced that God's Holy Spirit has the same kind of
intimate power that corresponds with the human spirit.
Expansion
and Activity of the Person
This crowd of ideas comes to us with order and purpose even beyond our
own busy efforts and good intentions. It's almost as if a new human
being came into the world with the potential to make an unlimited
number of relationships, but with a preference to certain of those
relationships. But ideas have no way of adapting to fit different
relationships. It's education's job to make sure that the person is
adapted to the relationships most appropriate for him, and to be sure
that the person expands and stays active. This is done with two things:
ideas and habits. Every relationship needs to be initiated by its own
'captain' idea (see Coleridge's Method), which must be sustained by
other appropriate ideas. These are infused onto the person's brain with
proper habits. This is the job we have before us.
To explain what I mean more clearly, I'll go over the story of Kaspar
Hauser,
pg 72
the 'child of Nuremberg.' They say that a unique experiment was tried
with him, although the experiment is cruel and should never be
repeated. The truth of the story has as much evidence as most of our
other data, but we'll assume that it's true if only because his
experience matches up with what we know of a infant's experience, or an
adult who is suddenly able to see for the first time in years! On May
28, 1828, a cobbler noticed a strange young man, about 17 years
old, leaning against the wall as if he couldn't support his
weight. He was uttering a moaning sound. When the cobbler came up to
him, he started moaning something incoherent. He had blond hair and
blue eyes, and the lower part of his face stuck out a little bit, like
a
monkey's. Those who watched him agreed that, although he had the body
of a nearly grown man, his mind was like a two-year-old's. Yet he
wasn't unintelligent--he immediately started picking up words and
phrases. He had a wonderful memory. He never forgot a face he had seen
once, and he never forgot a name. At first, he was placed in the
jailhouse for safe-keeping. The jailer's children taught him to walk
and talk in the same way they taught their baby sister. He wasn't
afraid of anything. After six or seven weeks, the townspeople decided
to adopt him as the official 'child of Nuremberg.' He was placed under
the
care of a schoolteacher named Friedrich Daumer, who attempted the
difficult task of developing his mind to better match his body. Later,
Dr. Daumer questioned the boy and found out a little about his life
before he had been found. This is what he learned: 'He doesn't
pg 73
know who he is or where he came from. He always lived in a hole where
he sat on some straw on the ground. He never heard a sound or saw any
bright light. He would wake up, go to sleep, wake up, and go to sleep
again. When he woke up, he'd find a loaf of bread and pitcher of water
beside him. Sometimes the water was nasty-tasting. He'd go back to
sleep again. He never saw the face of the man who came for him, but the
man
finally taught him to stand up and then to walk. One day, the man
carried him out of his hole' [and
that's when he was found in Nuremberg.] For months after he was
found, he refused to eat anything but bread and water. Even the smell
of meat, beer, wine or milk made him very sick. For the first four
months that he was with Daumer, his senses of sight, taste, hearing and
smell were hyper-sensitive and very acute. He could see in the dark,
and, in the daytime, could see farther than most people. Yet he
couldn't tell the difference between a real thing and a picture of the
thing. For a long time, he couldn't judge distances because he only saw
things in two dimensions. He thought balls rolled because they had
minds of their own and he couldn't understand why animals didn't use
table manners at the table like people. His sense of smell was so
sensitive that he'd get sick from the dye in his clothes or the smell
of paper. He could distinguish the leaves from different trees by
smell. In about three months, Dr. Daumer was able to teach him things
beyond the use of his senses. He encouraged him to write letters and
essays, and to use his hands to do all kinds of things, like digging in
the garden. For the next eleven months, he lived a simple, happy life
with Daumer, who was his friend as well as his teacher. Daumer noticed
that the acuteness of his senses gradually began
pg 74
to fade away, but he never lost the charming, compliant, child-like
innocence that had won the town's heart.
What
Nature Does For a Child
This is an example, although it's the only known instance, of what
Nature alone, unhindered, can do for a child. Kaspar Hauser came out of
his long confinement unusually intelligent, with intensely acute
senses, and a 'sweet, docile' disposition. This is an object lesson
that would be illegal to try again, and, unfortunately, it takes more
than
one occurrence to prove any hypothesis. But, at any rate, this is an
illuminating story, more fascinating because he emerged from his hole
in many respects like an infant. He knew nothing about the concepts of
round, flat,
far, near, hot or cold. He'd had no experience with those things. In
other respects, he was like a bright two-year-old. He had keen powers
of perception, an excellent memory, and a child-like sweetness.
Kaspar's story and our own personal experience prove that the work we
educators
do to 'develop the faculties' or 'cultivate the senses' is a waste of
time. Nature doesn't need our help in these things. Even in the worst
conceivable conditions, Nature can work wonders if we leave her alone.
What Nature can't deal with is our misdirected efforts that hinder
and impede her kind-hearted work. If left to herself, Nature presents
to parents and teachers a child in the same condition as
Kaspar--acutely
perceptive, keenly intelligent, sweet and morally teachable. Just this
one incident shows that Nature can keep a person innocently child-like
until they reach adulthood.
A
Child Has Every Ability He'll Ever Need to Serve Him
pg 75
Well, then, what is it that we, as educators, do for the child? We
obviously don't need to develop the person; the person is already there
and probably already has every ability he'll ever need to serve him for
his entire journey through life. Some day even the word 'education'
will be out of fashion, perceived as belonging to the days when
teachers thought their job was to draw the 'faculties' forth from the
child. Instead, there will be a new word for what goes on between
teachers and students--maybe something like 'applied wisdom.' After
all, wisdom is the science of relationships, and the thing we need to
do is to do our best to put students in touch with all the
relationships that are proper for them.
Fullness
of Life Depends on Establishing Relationships
We begin to understand what kinds of habits we need to help students
form, and that troubling question of what subjects children should be
taught. We no longer debate the benefits of a classical education vs. a
modern one. We no longer wonder whether it's better to master just a
few subjects thoroughly, or to get exposed to a smattering of lots of
different things. We realize that these questions miss the point. When
I discuss the relationships that we may initiate for a child, I'll
begin with what some might think of as the lowest rung on a ladder.
Let's assume that a baby is placed in this wonderful world for the
specific purpose of forming connections of intimacy, joy, association
and knowledge with all the living, moving things in that world, as well
as what St. Francis called brother mountain, brother ant, and brother
stars. A full life, and joy in existence, depend on establishing these
relationships. But what do we do instead? We
pg 76
think over the matter carefully. We decide that children will get
confused if they learn science in more than one or two fields. We ask
our friends, 'Which kinds of science will get the best grades on the
SAT?' and, 'What's the easiest science to learn?' We research to find
out which is the best science text in a specialized area of study. The
student learns what he's supposed to from the book, he listens to the
lectures, draws diagrams, watches demonstrations. The result is a
student who has 'learned' a science. He can regurgitate facts and
figures about that one specialized branch of science, at least, he can
for a while. But he hasn't gained any affectionate intimacy with
Nature. Let me describe what seems like a better way for the child.
The
Ability to Recognize
This child's parents understand that recognition is the first step in
intimacy. So they don't measure his educational progress only by his
proficiency in the 3 R's. They also want to know how many living and
growing things he knows by name, sight and habitat. A six year old can
eagerly note the sequence when each different kind of tree puts on its
leaves in the spring. He can tell you whether to look in the hedge, the
meadow or the bushes for meadow eyebright, wood-sorrel or ground
ivy. He won't think that flowers were made only to be picked, because,
'He believes that every flower
Enjoys the air that it breathes.'
He'll take his friends to see where the milk-wort grows, or the marsh
trefoil, or the meadow fern. He doesn't take the birds in the air for
granted. He soon knows when and where to expect the redstart and the
titlark each spring. He admires the water-skater and dragonfly as
interesting acquaintances. He's experienced the beauty of crystals with
sparkling eyes, and
pg 77
he knows what lime and quartz look like, although he may not have been
able to find them in their natural environment. He knows the lovely
pink of felspar and lots of other minerals.
Aesthetic
Appreciation
Appreciation for beauty usually comes after recognition. Notice how,
from the time he's little,
this young child tries to capture a flower's
beautiful color and graceful form with his own paintbrush. A wise
mother
is careful to make her child aware and appreciative of stylized art.
She has him look at a wild cherry tree from a distance, or a willow
tree with its soft pussy willows. Then she shows him how the picture on
a Japanese screen has captured the very look of the thing without being
an exact representation. When he compares a single pussy willow or
cherry blossom with the ones in the picture, he can see that the
pictures aren't attempts at exact duplication. From an early age, he
learns the difference between painting what we actually see, and
painting what we know is there even if we don't see it. He learns that
it's more satisfying to try to paint what is actually seen.
First-hand
Knowledge
Soon the child goes from nodding acquaintance to pleasant recognition
of familiarity, to real knowledge--the kind of knowledge that we'd call
science. He starts to notice a similarity between wild roses and apple
blossoms, a resemblance between buttercups and windflowers, and some
sameness between the large rhododendron and the tiny clustered heather
flower. At his mother's suggestion, he'll initiate his own research to
find out what specifically makes them alike--and then he'll discover
the concept of plant families. His little discovery is real science
because it came first-hand. In his own small way, he's like Carl
Linneus.
Appreciative
Knowledge vs. Exact Knowledge
All this time, the child is storing up delightful associations that
will come back to him and give him pleasure
pg 78
when he's an old man. With this kind of educated appreciation of things
from the beginning, his foundation of exact scientific data won't be
merely some dull facts picked up in text books to pass a test. He'll
want this information because a natural desire to know about it has
been planted in him. It works the same way with art appreciation. The
child who has been taught to really see will appreciate pictures with
an educated, discriminating eye.
How a
Child Sets Up a New Relationship
This is how a child goes to work setting up a new relationship: one
little seven-year-old girl was rowing in a boat for her first time. She
commented, 'There sure is a lot of crab-water today!' The next day she
remarked, 'There's not as much crab-water today.' When asked, 'How can
you tell when there's crab-water?' she answered, 'It's so tough, and
you can't get your oar through, and it knocks you off your seat!' Her
facts were all wrong, but she was getting a taste of real science and
would soon be on the right track. This is so much better than learning
from a text-book that, 'the particles which constitute water have no
cohesion, and may be easily separated by a solid substance.'
When we consider that our main moral and intellectual priority in life
is setting up relationships, and that the function of education is to
put children in contact with the relationships that are appropriate for
them, and to offer the inspiring idea that will initiate a
relationship, we understand that little incidents like the one I just
told are much more important than passing a test.
pg 79
Chapter
8 - Certain Relationships that are Proper for Children
Geology, mineralogy, physical geography, botany, nature, biology,
astronomy--the entire realm of science is like a beautiful fenced green
field and we need to bring the child to the gate and leave it open for
him. He doesn't need a thorough collection of facts. He needs what
Huxley calls 'common information' so that he'll feel some connection
with things on the earth and in the heavens. He'll feel as interested
as if he owned it all--the same way that a man does when his parents
die and he inherits their old house with its reminiscent heirlooms.
We expect more than the Jesuits did. They wanted to have a child until
he was seven to educate him. But we want a child until he's twelve or
fourteen, if not longer. After that, it hardly matters what anyone does
with him--with this time to establish relationships, we'll be able to
turn him out as a capable man, enthusiastic, energetic, full of living
interests, available and able to be of service to the world. I think
he'll even be able to pass his SAT's, since his education will teach
him how to find interest in even the most boring tasks.
Dynamic
Relationships
But we aren't done with his relationships with the earth yet. We still
have to establish what I call dynamic relationships. He needs to stand
and walk and run and jump
pg 80
easily and gracefully. He needs to skate and swim and ride and throw
and dance and row and sail. He should feel free on the earth to do
whatever gravity will let him do. This relationship between him and his
environment is foundational, and nothing can compensate for it if he
doesn't get it.
Power
Over Material Resources
Another foundational relationship that every child should learn and be
encouraged in is the power to handle materials. All children make sand
castles, mud pies and paper boats. They should also experience working
with clay, wood, brass, iron, leather, fabric, food, and furniture.
They should be able to make things with their hands, and this should be
a fun and satisfying experience for them.
Intimacy
with Animals
The fourth relationship is between them and the animal kingdom. This
relationship should be one of intelligent understanding and kindness.
We should all be on friendly terms with the 'inmates of our house and
garden.' Every child wants to be friends with the creatures around him,
and,
'The one who prays best is the one who best loves
All things, both big and small;
Because the wonderful God who loves us,
Has made and loves them all.'
The
Great Human Relationships
Perhaps the major part of a child's education should be concerned with
the great human relationships--relationships that consist of love and
service, authority and obedience, reverence and pity and kindness,
relationships with family, friends, neighbors, causes, country,
like-minds, people in the past, and people in the present. In one way
or another, history, literature, archaeology, art, ancient and modern
languages, travel, adventurous journeys all record or
pg 81
express the feelings and thoughts of real people. Because we're human,
we're interested in all other people. After all, we're all one flesh,
and of one spirit. Anything that one of us does or experiences is
interesting to the rest of us. There are thousands of children in our
schools today who could become apostles, evangelists, missionaries to
Asia who could unite east and west, great archaeologists who might make
us aware of people who lived thousands of years ago. But we need to
approach these children with living thought and living books in order
to awaken in them a sense of a personal bond with others in the world.
The
Awakening Idea
It's up to us to expose them to the awakening idea, and then to help
them form a habit of thinking and living. Here's an example of what a
young person could do. Quoting from the Academy: 'From the beginning of
his career, young Henry Rawlinson was interested in the history and
antiquities of Persia. He attributed his interest to his conversations
with Sir John Malcolm the first time he had come to India, and when he
had happened to be stationed in Kirmanshah, in Persian Kurdistan. The
Rock of Behistun stands near there. It has an inscription carved on its
face in three different languages. Now we know that the inscription is
from Darius Hystaspes, who restored Cyrus' Empire. The wedge-shaped
cuneiform letters it was written in had baffled all attempts to
decipher the inscription. Risking life and injury, Rawlinson tried to
climb the rock, which is almost inaccessible, so he could copy the
easiest of the three inscriptions. After studying it for a long time,
he figured out that it was Persian. Two years later he had discovered
how Persian words were translated
pg 82
into cuneiform characters.' And what was the result? 'Now we can access
the chronicles of empires that were more highly organized than any of
the states in Greece, going back to dates much earlier than science had
said man first appeared on the earth. The changes in our thinking as a
result of this new information, can't even be estimated.' And it's all
because Rawlinson climbed up the Behistun Rock, which was due to his
interest sparked by talking with Sir John Malcolm.
Human
Intelligence is Limited to Human Interests
We can't all be like Henry Rawlinson. But it does seem probable that
the only thing that limits our intelligence is lack of interest. What I
mean is that we don't establish enough personal connections with
humanity itself--with those we love, those who we owe duty to, those
we're responsible for, and, most of all, we fail to make real, living
relationships with those who are near or far off in time and place. Our
scholars work away at the drudgery of learning one or two foreign
languages, and at the end of ten to twelve years, they still don't know
them very well. But if you give him a motive by introducing him to
people
he longs to know but can only communicate with in that language, then
he could probably be like Sir Richard Burton and speak in almost any
known language.
The
Full Human Life
I think we could have a great revolution in education if we stopped
thinking of people as a collection of assorted 'faculties' and realized
that we are people whose mission is to get in touch with other people
of all kinds
pg 83
and in all conditions, from all countries and climates, and from all
times, both past and present. If we realized that, then history would
seem fascinating. Literature would be like a magic mirror, showing us
other people's minds. Anthropology would become a duty and a delight.
We
would tend to become responsive, wise, humble and reverent people,
recognizing the responsibilities and joys of the full, abundant human
experience. Of course, it isn't realistic to accomplish all of that in
a student's education, but we can look to that as our goal.
Every life is shaped by the ideal it sets for itself. We hear
discussion about lost ideals, but maybe they're not really lost, just
changed. When the ideal we focus on for ourselves and our children
becomes prosperity and comfort, we may get it, but that's all we get,
and nothing more.
Duty
is Not Within the Scope of Current Psychology
Current psychology has had an odd effect on our sense of duty. If
humans are nothing but 'states of consciousness,' then they can hardly
be expected to live up to moral responsibilities, except the ones that
sound appealing at the moment. Duty that's imposed from a higher
authority or due to our fellow man out of brotherly love, has no place
in current psychology. It would be interesting to see how many ten year
olds could recite the Ten Commandments, and if they knew what the 'duty
to God and my neighbor' means. Or, if they're not members of the Church
of England, if they knew how their own denomination interprets the duty
of man. Children used to get a pretty thorough Biblically-based ethics
education using the Ten Commandments as a foundation. They knew St.
Paul's commands to 'love your brother,' 'Fear God,' 'Honor the king,'
pg 84
'Honor all men.' 'Seek to live a quiet life.' They understood that
having thoughts of hatred and contempt were related to murder. They
knew what King Solomon said about virtuous women, sluggards and fools.
They didn't just know the precepts. They could show examples of
spiritual laws from both Biblical and secular history. We English may
not have the treasure of moral teaching carved in wood and stone, like
some countries are proud of. But, up until this generation, our moral
teaching has still been systematic and thorough enough.
Casual
Ethical Teaching
Look at common experience to see if this is true. We reject all stories
with morals for our children (and usually for good reason). We want
their books to be entertaining, and that's about all we ask. We prefer
that they be literary and maybe somewhat educational. But we don't look
for a moral stimulus 'fitly given.' It's not that we totally neglect
teaching ethics, but our teaching is hit or miss. If we happen to
stumble onto a story that's heroic or displays self-denial, we're happy
to point that out to our children. But they rarely learn that there's a
specific ethical system that rests on the foundation of the universal
brotherhood of mankind. We're impressed if a child can merely parrot
the words, 'My duty towards my neighbor is to love him as myself, and
to do unto him what I'd want him to do unto me.' A lot of wonderful
things are written these days about the brotherhood of man and the
solidarity of the race, but nothing that gets to the heart of the
matter like the simple Biblical command.
The
Moral Relationship of One Person to Another
If we accept that the priority of education should be
pg 85
establishing relationships, then the relationships between our fellow
human beings should be the most important ones to establish. Any
relationships that aren't founded on the duty to our neighbor--such as
relationships founded on common likes in art or literature--are likely
to degenerate into sentimental attachments. And, oddly enough, the
ability to think independently seems to vanish when moral insight
disappears. You might wonder, 'how are we supposed to get a systematic
plan to teach our children ethics?' I really don't know how to do it if
we choose to forego the Ten Commandments and old-fashioned expositional
teaching illustrated with examples. There are thousands of
supplementary ways to teach ethics, but they need to rest on a solid
foundation of awareness of the duty God placed on us and our
responsibility to others, whether we accept it or not. Without that
foundation, supplementary teaching will probably be casual and not very
binding. The moral responsibility of one person to another is the
foundation of all other relationships. We have an obligation to past
generations to make use of what they discovered, and to advance mankind
from where they left off. We owe it to those who will come after us
to prepare the next generation to be better than we are. And we owe it
to the present generation to live full lives, to enlarge our hearts and
broaden our souls. We all need to come out of ourselves and reach out
to all the relationships we're meant to have.
Our
Sense of Responsibility Doesn't Come Instinctively
We're responsible for bringing knowledge to the ignorant, comfort to
people who are distressed, healing to those who are sick, and
reverence, courtesy and kindness to everyone, especially the people who
we're connected with because they're in our family or neighborhood.
This sense of duty doesn't come naturally. All of us know shallow young
men and women who don't care about any of these things. But do we wonder
pg 86
why that's the case? And do we ask ourselves how many children today
are growing up in decent homes, yet just as untrained about their moral
obligations concerning relationships as those shallow youths that we
revile and blame? Yet maybe they don't deserve all the blame, because
they were neglected children in their upbringing.
A
Person's Relationship With Himself
There's another way in which we need to prepare a young person for his
relationships in life. He needs to be familiar with a working
psychology/philosophy that will help him as he relates to himself and
others. Maybe the world isn't ready for a true science of life, but,
unfortunately, we're more limited than the ancient world. They took
full advantage of what they had, and the result was that they produced
men like Marcus Aerelius, Epictetus the Stoic and Socrates. They didn't
think
their youth were ready for their futures until they had learned
philosophy. Modern science has added a lot of knowledge that will help
us relate to our own individual selves in such areas as
self-management, self-control, self-respect, self-love, self-help,
self-denial, and so on. This knowledge is even more important because
our ability to handle our relationships with others is dependent on our
relation to ourselves. Every person carries the key to human nature
within himself. The more we're able to use this key, the more tolerant,
gentle, helpful, wise and reverent we'll be. A person who has 'given up
on expecting anything' from his servants, his children, his
employees
or other workers is displaying how ignorant he is about the wellspring
of conduct within each of us.
pg 87
I think our own Parents' National Educational Union can claim some
progress in this area. Most of the people who are associated with us
are familiar with our perspective on the five senses, how the will
works, how to handle our temper, the concept of attention, the desires
and affections that are where conduct springs from, and other practical
aspects of managing one's own self. We've heard that some people are
using that great old children's method of 'changing your thoughts' with
angry, delirious, or even depressed patients--and it's working! We (of
the PNEU) feel like we have a wonderful tool in our hands, and we know
how to make it work. At any rate, the principle seems right. If
we blunder in applying the principle, we don't give up, we try again,
both for ourselves and for our children. We know that 'one good habit
can replace a bad one,' and that one idea can displace another one. We
don't give up and abandon a child to his selfishness, greed, or
laziness. These are faults that can be treated. A child who has
experienced a bad habit cured with his mother's help will be more
likely to believe in the possibility that others can be reformed, and
that simple, practical methods can be effective.
Intimacy
With People From All Walks of Life
Sociology is a long word, but it implies a practical relationship with
people that children need, and it gives them one kind of knowledge that
they're ready for. The carpenter, the gardener, the butcher, the baker,
the candlestick maker are all fascinating people. It's surprising how
much a child at a port can get to know about boats and sails and
fishermen's lives that adults totally miss because they aren't
observant. Most working men will be upfront with a child and answer his
questions. The child is able to notice the men and their craft behind
their veil of words. In his 'Book of Trades,' which is like a Who's Who
for the common people, he'll look up names in the Recreation section,
shoemaker section, tailor section, factory section, as much as he'll
look up famous authors or a member of Parliament. There's nothing as
good as early intimacy to help a child get to know different kinds of
people. Abraham Lincoln knew how to get along with everybody because he
had been intimate with all kinds of people in all kinds of situations
ever since he was little.
Being
a Capable Citizen
We are realizing more and more how valuable clubs and committees and
debate societies for youth that are governed by their own members are.
Organizing skills, business habits and some ability to speak in public
should be something that every citizen knows how to do. To teach public
speaking, I think it would be a good idea to encourage more narration
instead of written compositions. For the most part, it's better to be
able to speak than write. A person who can speak well can usually write
well, too.
Relationships
With Each Other
The topic of human relationships with one another is inexhaustible.
I'll just bring up a few points and repeat my conviction that a system
of education should make it its focus to establish children's
relationships in as many varied directions as possible--rather than
mastery of certain 'subjects.'
pg 89
The
Relationship with Almighty God
I've tried to show that human beings don't come into the world to
develop their faculties or to acquire knowledge or even to earn a
living. They're here to establish relationships, and these
relationships provide immeasurable broadening of the human experience
and fullness of life. We've already discussed two kinds of these
relationships--the physical universe, and mankind. To complete his
education, one more relationship needs to be considered--the
relationship
with Almighty God. How many children today learn as toddlers from their
mother to say in all the fullness of its meaning, every day and every
hour, 'My duty towards God is to believe in Him, to fear Him, and to
love Him with all my heart, all my mind, all my soul and all my
strength; to worship Him, to thank Him, to fully trust Him, to call
upon Him, to honor His holy name and His word, and to serve Him all the
days of my life'? The exact wording that children learn about their
duty to God isn't what's important. But most of us will agree that the
wording I quoted doesn't ask any more of us than yielding to
our duty. Unfortunately, many children never even learn this minimum
requirement. The concept of duty isn't woven into the very fiber of
their beings as it should be, and their duty to God, which ought to be
the very foundation of their lives, is the most neglected of all.
Children are growing up with religious sentiments and religious
feelings, and they say quaint and surprising things, which shows that
they have an insight of their own into their spiritual life.
pg 90
Sentiment
is Not the Same as Duty
But duty and sentiment are two different things. Sentiment is optional.
Young people grow up thinking that belief in God, fear of God and love
for God is an option. They don't learn that these are things that must be done. There's no free
choice about loving and serving God, that's their duty. Loving God with
their whole heart, mind, soul and strength is what they owe to God, but
that's rarely taught or understood properly these days. Even if we have
tender religious sentiments, our doctrines are often vague and lax.
Children even of kind, religious parents grow up without having an
intimate, always open, always friendly, continual communicative
relationship with Almighty God. That relationship is the very
fulfillment of life. Whoever has it, has eternal life. Whoever doesn't
have that relationship is ice-cold and dead in their heart, like
Coleridge's 'lovely Lady Geraldine,' no matter how much they strive for
success in all their other relationships.
'I want, I'm made for, I must have a God
Before I can be anything or do anything.
I don't want merely a Name.
I want the real thing, and everything that
proves it.
In other words, I want a relationship between
that Thing and me,
Touching everything from my head to my toes,
And when I feel this Touch,
I gain everything else--I gain life itself!'
[loosely paraphrased from Browning]
pg 91
Chapter 9 - A Review of A Great
Educationalist
Looking
Towards Germany for Educational Reform
Every now and then, we in England need to stop and see what others are
doing about education in Europe. We still refer back to long-past
German educational reformers. We may not be as familiar with Comenius,
Johann
Basedow or Wolfgang
Ratich (or Ratke), but we all know something about Pestalozzi and
Froebel. But what do we know about Johann Friedrich Herbart, the man
who succeeded these two and has pretty much displaced them in the area
of teaching methods?
Herbartian
Thought is the Most Advanced in Europe
German educators are using Herbart's methods and nothing else. This is
evident when you realize that the amount of books written about his
method are more than all English books written about education put
together! A small book called Outlines
of Pedagogics by Professor W. Rein from the University of Jena,
translated into English by C. C. and Ida J. Van Liew, gives a brief
introduction to Herbart
pg 92
and his method. The author even makes allowances for advances that have
been made in the decades since Herbart died.
Since Herbart and those who rely on his method represent the most
advanced school of thought in Europe, I think it will be interesting to
compare the educational ideas I'm suggesting, and Herbart's ideas,
which have had so much influence in Germany.
Compared
with P.N.E.U. Thinking
One of the most characteristic distinctives of Herbartian thought, the
idea that makes it a new school of educational thought, is that it
rejects the concept of separate mental faculties. The earlier
reformers, most notably Pestalozzi and Froebel, divided the faculties
with the precision of a phrenologist [i.e.
one who feels the shape of a person's skull to pronounce mental capacity].
To them, the priority of education was to 'develop the faculties.'
Developing
the Faculties
There's an orderly neatness about this concept that makes it very
attractive. We like to know exactly what we need to do. With this
method, you simply develop the 'perception' faculties here, then work
on the 'conceptual' faculty, then do a lesson on 'judgment,' then
exercise the 'affection' faculty, until you've covered them all. Each
'faculty' receives its proper share of development exercises. But
Herbart and his followers have changed all of that. They see the mind
as being like a cloud in Wordsworth's poem. When it moves at all, the
whole thing moves together as a single unit. [Creativity, beauty appreciation,
reasoning, math readiness, comprehension, imagination, reflection, etc.
aren't separate 'faculties' that need to be developed; children were
born already having these things.]
Like
Herbart, We Discard the Notion of 'Faculties,' Too
This might seem to be just a slight difference in the foundation. But
when it's recognized, education itself changes its front. The whole
contrived system of carefully
pg 93
organized lessons designed to develop one faculty or another, becomes
questionable. The whole reason for doing specialized intellectual
gymnastics is questionable if there are no such thing as muscle
'faculties' to develop. Education must have some other goal. And if
education has a totally different goal, then the methods, since they're
the means
to the end, will need to change to reflect that. This far, we're in
total agreement with Herbart. We agree that 'faculties' don't exist, we
agree that it's a waste of time to try to develop them, and we agree
that the purpose of lessons is not 'faculty' development. This will
necessarily change the entire course of education and the method we use
to teach.
The
Persuasiveness of Dominant Ideas
We're still nodding in agreement with Herbart when he recognizes that
an idea has a force of its own--especially ideas that are trendy at the
moment. 'The family circle and public discussion are both influenced by
forces that are active in the social world. Those forces penetrate the
entire atmosphere of human life via invisible paths. Nobody knows where
these forces come from, but they are there. They influence humanity's
moods, dreams, and inclinations. Nobody, no matter how powerful they
are, can avoid their effects. No king can command their direction.
Often, these forces originate as the idea of some genius, and once it
makes its way into the public arena, it's swept up by the masses who
don't remember its author. Then the idea, active in public
thought, impels individuals to take some kind of action with
conviction. Thus, it comes full circle. These ideas begin in the minds
of highly gifted people, but permeate all of society. They don't reach
just the
pg 94
adults, but even the young fall under their spell. Eventually, they
come back around to other highly gifted people who refine them and
elevate them to a definite form.
'Is the force of these ideas greater in the individual, or in society?
It doesn't matter. The important thing is, their effect on one results
in a proportional reaction in the other, and their influence
undoubtedly affects the younger generation.'
The
Zeitgeist [the general spirit
of the times]
We agree wholeheartedly with Herbart that nobody can escape the
influence of the Zeitgeist. The Zeitgeist, in fact, is one of the most
powerful spiritual forces in education. Parents, teachers and anyone
else connected with training children need to recognize its existence
and be prepared to make adjustments accordingly.
The
Child's Teachers
Nature, family relations, social dialog, this 'Zeitgeist' force, the
church, government--all of these are influences that children are
raised under, says Professor Rein as he interprets Herbart. He says
that these are our children's schoolmasters, and we'd be wise to think
about that thought. 'Education starts with the family; from there it
goes
out...' says Herbart. Just like us, he considers that what happens in
the family is the most valuable part of education. This is because of
the union shared in common, the dependence on the head [inferring first-hand experience with the
concept of authority/submission?], and the fact that the
youngest members
are so intimately known and understood.
A
Noble Piety
All the members of a family look to the head. This sense of being
dependent fosters the proper attitude for receiving the most precious
thing for mankind--which is
pg 95
the religious feeling. If the home atmosphere is permeated with a noble
reverence, then a sincere faith can take root in the hearts of the
children. A child's faithful devotion to guiding parents in his youth
grows into faithful devotion to God who controls human destinies.
Herbart expressed this idea beautifully: 'A child should see his family
as the symbol of order in the world. His parents should provide him
with the ideals of God's divine characteristics.'
A
Medieval Concept of Education
We have always strived to present education as something that springs
from and rests on our relationship to God. We are firmly committed to
this idea. We don't seek to provide a 'religious education' as an
alternative to some other kind of education, like secular education. We
believe that all education is
divine. Every good gift of knowledge and insight comes from God. God
the Spirit is, ultimately, the One who educates mankind. The
culmination of all education (which is approachable even for a little
child) is personal knowledge of God, and an intimate relationship with
Him. In that relationship, our being finds its fullest perfection. In
fact, we agree with the great concept of education that the Medieval
Church held. It's illustrated on the walls of the Spanish chapel in
Florence. It shows the Holy Spirit coming down on the twelve apostles.
Directly under them, fully covered by the illuminating rays of the
Spirit, are seven noble figures representing the seven liberal arts:
grammar, rhetoric, logic, music, astronomy, geometry and arithmetic.
Under these are pictured the seven men who received and expressed the
original concept
pg 96
in each of those subjects, as far as the artist could tell. Pictured
are such men as Pythagoras, Zoroaster and Euclid. We might think of
them as pagans, but the early church recognized that they had received
divine knowledge and enlightenment.
The
Family Principle
This next quote of Herbart's is one we fully endorse, because it
contains the very goal of our society. 'Of all the duties of the
family, the highest and most holy is the education of the children. The
welfare, civilization, and culture of society essentially depend on how
successful education is at home. Religious life and educational
life meet and revolve around the point of the family principle.
Compared with the influence of family, even a king's command seems
powerless.'
By the way, I'll mention that Dr. Rein's mention of Rousseau is a
little misleading. It's true that in his book Emile, the parents are displaced,
but notwithstanding that fact, perhaps no other educationalist has done
so much to make parents aware of their great responsibility in
educating their children. After discussing the conditions of training
at home, Dr. Rein begins to discuss schools a) as they exist for real
in Germany, and b) as he envisions them in his own ideal. This topic
should be very interesting to parents.
Uncertainty
About The Purpose of Education
Teleology (the theory of the purpose of education) is the subject of
the next chapter in Rein's book, and it's very informative. It's good
for us to realize how much uncertainty there is on this fundamental
point. In fact, few of us are clear about our own goals and ideals in
our children's education. We don't know how much is possible, so, since
pg 97
since people don't usually achieve more than they aim for, our
education ends up inadequate and disappointing,
Some
Attempts to Fix the Purpose of Education
'Should educators follow Rousseau's advice and bring up a child of
nature in the middle of a society of civilized people? As Herbart
showed, doing that would only cause us to repeat the entire progression
of the evils from the beginning that have already been overcome as
we've progressed. Or should we listen to Locke and prepare our children
to be secular participants in a secular society? The next step is to
follow the teachings of Basedow and train our children to be truly
useful members of human society. But we'd always have nagging doubts
about whether that was the best ideal purpose after all, and whether we
sometimes feel like our students are at odds with the way the rest of
the world operates. But if we think about man's unlimited potential for
self-improvement, then we realize that we need to have high ideals if
we want to reach the lofty goals we have in mind.
'Therefore, educators need to have an ideal and a goal in mind.
Pestalozzi might help in providing information and forming an ideal,
since his very nature demonstrated such ideal tendencies. He wanted all
of mankind to benefit by harmoniously cultivating all abilities. But
most people don't really know what's included in his multiplicity of
mental powers, or what he meant by harmony of various powers. The
phrases sound good, but aren't satisfactory. The purely formal aims
of education won't be any more appealing to educators. 'Educate the
student to make him totally independent,' or, 'Teach the student to
teach
pg 98
himself,' or, 'Educate the student so that 'it' will be better than
'its' teacher.' (Hermann and Dorothea, Hector and Astyanax in the
Iliad.) These kinds of attempts to fix education's purpose are abundant
in the history of teaching, but they don't bring us any closer to the
goal. For instance, they don't say what kind of independence the
student should have, what kind of subjects should be taught, what goals
the teacher should keep in mind, or which direction it should to go in.
The student who finally realizes the goal of becoming independent can
freely use his independence for good or evil.'
Herbart's
Ethical Theory
As far as we can tell, Herbart's own theory of education is mostly
ethical rather than intellectual. In other words, developing and
sustaining the intellect is only secondary. Building character is
the first priority for humans, because, a) if we train character, then
intellectual 'development' will take care of itself, and, b) the
lessons created for intellectual learning have high value for the
character, either by training the discipline or stimulating
character. We're familiar with this concept. We've always taught
that building character is the goal of education. So far, we're in
total agreement with Herbart, but, if we may say so, what we've
learned of physiology has brought us to a clearly defined aim that
Herbart desired but never could reach.
Obscurity
of Psychology
Herbart says that we must appeal to psychology, but then he adds, 'of
course, we can't expect an agreeable answer from all of the
psychologists. There is still some confusion
pg 99
here, in the difference of perspectives about the nature of the
human soul, and the great difficulty met by the empirical method of
research. A final explanation can hardly be expected, under the
circumstances.'
Two
Shining Principles
This may be the case with psychology alone, but when psychology is
illuminated with physiology, it's a different story. Studying the vague
area between mind and matter is what's most helpful to educators. The
brain is where habit originates. The culture of habit is a physical
endeavor, to a certain degree. The discipline of habit makes up a third
of education. The advances in the field of physical science give us an
advantage that Herbart didn't have fifty years ago. We 're in total
agreement with him about the importance of great formative ideas in the
education of children, but in addition to formative ideas, we believe
in the forming of habits, and we work to form habits that will effect
the physical tissue of the brain. Character doesn't just come from exposing children to
great ideas. It's also the result of habits that we strive to instill
based on those ideas. We recognize both
principles--idea and habit. The result is that we have a wide range of
possibilities in education, practical methods, and definite aim. Our
goal is to produce a human being who is the best he can be physically,
intellectually, ethically and spiritually; a person who will have the
enthusiasm of religion, full life, nature, knowledge, art, and physical
work. And we're not clueless about how to achieve it. I've tried to
share in a previous chapter what I see as the root problem with
Herbart's educational philosophy: it tends to eliminate individual
personality, and therefore leads to odd
pg 100
futilities in teaching. It's more pleasing to note that certain basic
ideas that have been around for a long time and are part of our own
educational scheme, also appealed just as much to a brilliant, original
thinker like Herbart.
pg 101
Chapter
10 - Some Aspects of Physical Training That We Don't Usually Consider
England seems obsessed with physical fitness these days. I doubt this
much attention has been focused on physical training since the original
Greek Olympics. But this obsession seems to suffer from a lack of
unity, and from devotion to any real purpose. That lack makes a large
amount of our educational efforts worthless.
Does
Our Physical Training Create Heroes?
We want to create a fine specimen of a human, with a fit physique and
good health, and that's exactly what we get. The progress in women's
development, especially in the last twenty years, is amazing. I heard
someone comment recently that the stiff little brocaded dresses that we
still see in a few places from the days of our great-grandmothers seem
to be made for tiny women, while the girls we're rearing today who will
be tomorrow's grandmothers show promise of being much larger women. So
far, so good. Yet I doubt that we're creating heroes--and, for the
Olympians of Greece, training heroes was the object of their physical
training. Men needed to be heroes. How else could they fulfill the
heavy tasks that the gods required of them? Heroes aren't made in a
day, so boys
pg 102
were trained to do heroic exercises from their infancy, and girls were
brought up to be mothers of heroes. Glimpses of heroic character can
still be spotted to this day in the little country of Greece, with its
great historic legacy. A few years ago, the mother of a fallen soldier
was told, 'Your son behaved like a hero.' And she replied, 'That's what
I raised him for.' Englishmen can die like heroes, too--but can they
live like heroes? Too often, the purpose for English men and women
developing a healthy, strong body is the poor and narrow goal of
getting the most out of life, especially physical enjoyment. So our
youth go to extremes, training their body to endure hardships, and then
pampering them with comfort and self-indulgence. Both are done for
their own pleasure. Pampering is even more enjoyable when it follows
training, and training is a pleasant change of pace from the softness
of pampering.
Is A
Fit Body All We Want From Physical Training?
Some British youths prefer enduring hardness all the time, so they go
off in the spirit of a reckless Viking warrior looking for adventures.
But even that's not the best we could do. The object of athletics and
gymnastics should be kept constantly before us. There's nothing wrong
with pleasure and enjoyment, but it shouldn't be the end goal. The end
goal should be a prepared body that's trained and ready from head to
toe for whatever request 'the gods' may ask of us. It's odd that we,
who have the benefit of God's revealed Word, have less of a concept of
vocation and preparation than the heathens of the ancient world who had
only 'a few faint, weak' rays to enlighten them about the meaning and
purpose of life. 'You're your own,' seems to be the unspoken thought
pg 103
of most of our youth these days. They seem to think they belong to
themselves and are free to do whatever they want with their bodies.
Therefore, excess in sports, too much casual fun, obsessive amounts of
studying, an abundance of pointless reading, careless disregard for
health, any excess they feel like is okay if they think it's worth
their while. This isn't outright sin, but it's a loose kind of morality
regarding their physical responsibility, and it's probably the reason
why the world doesn't benefit as much as it could from such a robust,
strong generation of young people.
You
Are Not Your Own
Children should be brought up from their earliest years with the
concept that, 'You are not
your own.' The divine Author of your being has given you life, and He
has given you a body perfectly adapted to serve Him. He's given you the
job of keeping your body healthy, nourished to be strong, and trained
to be fit so that it will be ready for whatever special work He gives
you in this world. If children grew up with that idea stamped into
their psyche, then they would be more content to embrace a Spartan-type
of regimen. They would want to be available for service. Physical
neglect and excess, no matter how harmless it seems, would be
unacceptable to someone who felt that it would be like trifling with a
sacred trust.
It's worthwhile to keep the concept of living under authority, whether
exercising or serving, in the forefront of children's minds. A
heroic impulse is strong in children, and they're usually glad to
embrace a disciplined life of their own accord. This doesn't mean
that we'd decrease the pleasures of youth by even a fraction. Actually,
it would increase, because a disciplined person is more able to
experience fresh enjoyment than someone who's undisciplined. Also, it's
not right for parents to impose unnecessary hardships on their
children. Parents made that mistake in the 1700's and even the early
pg 104
1800's. Hunger, cold, and denial (but not self-denial) were thought to be
good for children. All we're saying is that every child should be
brought up with a sense that they're under authority when it comes to
governing, managing and training their bodies. They should recognize
that health is their responsibility, and that toying with their health,
either deliberately or by being careless, is related to suicide. Their
life is held in trust by a Supreme Authority.
It might be helpful to parents and teachers, and beneficial to
children, to read about these kinds of subjects:
Greek games and Greek heroes
How a child can be trained so that he's fit for meeting his
responsibilities
What the body is supposed to be used for
Extremes that seem innocent but are excessive
What's acceptable and what's wrong when it comes to home discipline
The heroic impulse
How games can be used for physical training
The uses and abuses of sports
Parental authority as it relates to physical matters
The right uses of self-denial
Governing, managing and training the body
The responsibility of staying healthy
Use
of Habit in Physical Training
It's good for a child to learn to control his body and keep it under
subjection to his parents, and, as he matures, to his own will, and,
even more than that, to the God who made him. We always need to keep
ourselves under subjection to God because that's the very least that's
required of
us. But if we had to constantly make ourselves be subject to those in
authority over us all the time, it
pg 105
would take a constant amount of conscious deliberate work, and life
would be a struggle of constant effort. That's why staying under
authority needs to become a matter of automatic habit. We all know a
little about how a habit starts, and most of us recognize that habits
have a physical aspect. If you say or do something often enough, it
will leave a physical mark on the brain tissue, like a rut, that makes
it easier to do it again, and eventually becomes automatic. When it
comes to
our physical body, it's easy to see that after you do something a
hundred times, it starts to get easy, and after a thousand times, it
becomes mechanical so that it's as easy to do it as it is to not do it.
This principle is used all the time in baseball, boating, golf,
cycling, and the other labors that we enjoy. But athletics develop
habits of life that are half physical, half moral. If those habits
aren't practiced steadily and regularly at home, then they become
associated with the sport and are put on and taken off with the team
uniform. It's the duty of parents to give their children these habits.
They do make up part of the training of well-raised children, and it's
still good to keep them in focus and not to lose sight of this aspect
of raising children.
Self-restraint
Most educated mothers carefully train their children to have a habit of
restraining themselves in the area of indulgences. They feed their
children healthy, appetizing foods, and their children don't crave a
little of this or a taste of that. It doesn't seem to matter to these
children whether they're limited to one or two pieces of candy a day,
or none. Children in lower economic areas, even when they get plenty to
eat and are sufficiently clothed, still seem to have an animal instinct
to bask in the heat of the fire. But the real danger is that, after
learning good habits at home and in the early years of school, children
might lapse into bad habits as they get older. It's so easy
pg 106
to get in the habit of lounging on the sofa with a novel in between
scheduled amusements. In past days, this kind of idleness was a matter
of principle. Lazy, loitering intervals simply weren't allowed. When
people weren't using their time for physical work, they were doing
something useful. We might not value the cross-stitch that our
grandmothers left behind, but it was better for them morally and
physically than the leisure of lounging around with some light book.
Maybe we tire ourselves too much with strenuous sports. It's worth
considering whether it's healthy to exercise so frequently and so
intensely that we have no mental or moral energy left when we're done
playing.
Self-control
Children who aspire to live a disciplined life should be trained from
the beginning to have the habit of self-control in a crisis. This stems
from having a general habit of self-control. We've all seen how ice
accidents, boat accidents, fires (like the tragic disaster in Paris
recently - possibly referring to the
Paris Metro train fire of 1903?) could have been minimized if
just one person there had kept his head and been able to organize and
lead everyone else. Having presence of mind in an emergency comes from
keeping control of oneself, being unaffected by small annoyances,
staying cheerful about minor inconveniences, and being ready to act in
minor crises. If children went into the world fully equipped with
presence of mind, then we wouldn't have so many embarrassing examples
of ill-tempered British men and fussy British women at foreign customs.
pg 107
There wouldn't be so many people jostling for the best spots at public
events. Women wouldn't be so fretted and stressed by mistakes that
their maids make. All kinds of little hassles of social life would be
soothed if children were trained to tolerate little physical
discomforts and emotional offenses gracefully. It's good to teach
children not to show when they're annoyed, because every kind of
exasperation, impatience, resentfulness, or nervous irritability
usually increases if it's vented, but decreases with self-control. It's
good to remember that our physical actions affect our mental state as
much as our mental attitudes affect us physically.
Self-discipline
Disciplining a person's habits is never complete until he has
self-disciplined habits. :-) It's not a trivial thing that doesn't
matter when a preschooler makes a mess at the table, spills his milk,
breaks his toys, and dawdles about his little tasks. A well-trained
child enjoys achieving good habits in these things. He knows that being
clean, neat, brisk and orderly are helping to make him a man, and, in
his mind, a man is like a hero. Some parents don't secure good habits
in their child before he starts school. They assume that school will
take care of it. But habits that are only practiced at school and never
at home because 'it's summer vacation,' don't really become life-long
habits.
Local
Habits
Habits can have a tendency to become local--in one house, a child will
be neat, alert, and diligent, but he'll be messy, dawdling and lazy in
another. This just shows how important it is for even young children to
have self-discipline.
'Self-reverence, self-knowledge, self-control,
Only these three lead life to sovereign power.'
pg 108
We all understand the concept of training the proper habits so well
that I don't need to convince anyone that these habits aren't really
habits if the child only does them while someone is making sure he does
them. Children need constant supervision at first while they're
learning, but gradually they're left to do what they should be doing on
their
own. Habits of behavior, posture, addressing others, tones of voice,
etc., are all the habits of a gentlemanly bearing and courteous manner.
They're part of the self-discipline of the physical body.
'When you first arrived, there was such courtesy
In your every movement and even in your voice, that I knew
You had to be one of the men who dines with King Arthur.'
Alertness
Many good men and women regret the opportunities in their lives that
have slipped through their fingers because of their passiveness. They
missed the chance to do some little service or act of courtesy because
they didn't notice it in time. It's a good idea to bring children up to
feel a certain sense of failure if they miss a chance to relay a
message, open a door, carry a package, or do some other small act of
kindness that presents itself. They should also learn to seize every
opportunity to learn something. It's natural for children to regard
every adult they meet as a fountainhead of knowledge about some
particular subject. They should be trained so that they never grow out
of this inquisitiveness. Success in life depends to a large extent on
how alert they are at seizing opportunities, and this skill belongs to
the
category of physical habits. Opportunity is often symbolized as a
figure flying by so fast that there's no way to catch it except
pg 109
by grabbing its forelock as it approaches.
Quick
Perception
Closely connected to alertness is the habit of quickly perceiving
everything there is to see, hear, feel, taste and smell in a world that
gives out unlimited information that can only be taken in through our
five senses. A Mr. Grant did some studies of character in Naples and
described the training of a young Camorrist (Camorrists are a dangerous
political group notorious for violence and blackmail; nevertheless,
their training methods are worth looking at). 'The major goal of his
training was to teach him the habit of being observant to every minute
detail, and with accuracy. Here's how they would do it: They'd be
walking down the street and suddenly the instructor would ask, 'What
was the woman wearing who was sitting by door of the fourth house on
the last street we passed?' or, 'What were those two men talking about
that we met at the corner of the third to the last street?' or, 'Where
was cab number 234 asked to drive to?' or maybe, 'How tall is that
house, and how wide is its upper window?' or, 'Where does that man
live?' ' This is also a habit that falls under the category of physical
skill, and is trained by learning to be observant in other areas. Young
children are naturally quick to notice everything, but that can't be
relied on. As they get older, especially as they get preoccupied with
school lessons, they lose the powers of perception they had when they
were
little. But if they're trained to see everything around them, and to
hear
all there is to hear, that habit will stay with them all their lives. I
don't have time to talk about any more of the physical habits that help
develop a child's mental and moral habits, but it might be useful to
pg 110
read about and reflect more on the teaching of these subjects:
Self-control in emergencies.
Self-restraint in indulgences.
Self-discipline in habits.
Alertness to seize opportunities.
Promptness and energy in physically exercises.
Quickly perceiving everything there is to see, hear, feel, taste and
smell.
Stimulating
Ideas
The ability for a habit to become morally binding depends on how much
inspiring power the idea
behind it has. When I was little, I had a book of sayings translated
from Greek and Roman classics. The fine, rolling sentences full of
substance made a big impression on me. It's easy to understand how
Greek and Roman boys who were brought up on these kinds of literary
ideas developed virtues that we seem to lack. In the same way,
the early Church brought to life three
evangelical virtues, four
cardinal virtues, and the seven deadly sins. If
we want our children to take up the mission of disciplining their
habits, we'll need to revive this kind of teaching. When it comes to
developing our children's habits, all we can do is get them started.
Fortitude
If you touch the right well-spring of inspiration, children will prove
to be
capable of an amazing amount of persistent effort. A ten year old I
know made up his mind to run three miles a day by himself during his
hot summer vacation because he was going to be in a race when school
started again in the fall. And it wasn't that he was so interested in
sports, but his older brother had made a name for himself by winning
races and he wanted to do the same thing. When we consider
pg 111
how we as adults seem so unable to do the things we put on our to-do
lists every day, it makes us appreciate the compelling power of
children when they have the right inspiration. Fortitude is a big word,
but it's what little boys need when they're sitting in the dentist's
chair. It's helpful for a child to think of Fortitude as a manly,
knightly power to tolerate pain and inconvenience without showing
discomfort. The story of the Spartan boy who hid a fox under his shirt
will cause a child to admire the boy's Fortitude, perhaps inspiring a
girl not to fuss about physical irritations. She'll have the same shame
in complaining as the disciples did when Jesus asked, 'Couldn't you
watch with Me for even one hour?' and she'll brace herself to bear up
so she can be of service. Brutus's wife Portia showed what she was made
of when she hurt her sensitive skin to prove that she was strong enough
to share her husband's concerns.
Service
Service is another knightly quality. A child should be so inspired by
heroic examples to serve, that he hates letting an opportunity to serve
pass by him.
Courage
Courage should also be developed as a habit rather than a rash impulse.
All children have courage in them naturally. They only need heroic
examples to fan the flame of their bravery, and they need to learn that
the task that needs doing is always more important than the person
doing the task.
Caution
Caution is also part of chivalric service, whether we're serving our
country or our family. Courage without caution is recklessness. But, as
it relates to the physical body, caution is mostly concerned with the
duty to stay healthy. I once heard about a boy at a school where a lot
of instruction had been given about matters of health and hygiene. He
got very anxious and stressed about the care of his health. That kind
of worry isn't
pg 112
what I mean by caution. The kind of caution I'm talking about should
think of every power within our physical means as a way of serving and
defending what's right. It's a shameful thing to do something
carelessly or recklessly that would make any part of the body unfit for
that kind of service.
Purity
The highest inspirational impulse we can have when it comes to physical
purity is the scripture that says, 'Your body is the temple of the Holy
Spirit.' But we present the concept so inadequately! There are so many
inspiring ideas that should support the physical training and teaching
that our children need. Teaching such virtues as purity, perseverance,
courage, stability, caution, and moderation using inspiring examples
should help teachers and parents to prepare their children better for
their life responsibilities. Parents are wise to make sure that their
children are fit and ready for service It's not just important that
they maintain their physical health and cleanliness, but they also need
to be able to manage and control their own bodies. Parents do this by
training the proper habits and inspiring them with examples of
chivalric service.
pg 113
Chapter
11 - Some Aspects of Intellectual Training That We Don't Usually
Consider
We
are All Naturally Law-abiding in Physical and Moral Matters
All of us recognize that our bodies are subject to physical laws. We
know that if you put your finger in the fire, it will burn, if you're
exposed to a virus, you'll get sick, if you live an active, balanced
life, you'll be rewarded with good health. We know very well that we
experience the law's penalties or rewards in everything we do
physically. Some people go even beyond that and feel a personal sense
of God's hand as Lawgiver in matters concerning their health. When
we're sick, we have a special feeling that God is dealing with us, and
it makes us examine ourselves and try to learn what He's trying to
teach us. We live under a moral law, too. Sometimes we don't think
through
our actions and we make bad decisions, but we have a feeling of regret
and
we're very aware of the penalties.
But
That's Not the Case with Intellectual Matters
But in intellectual matters, we tend to hold onto our rights. We don't
acknowledge any authority or abide by any law. We believe that every
person is free to their own opinion, no matter how casually they form
it. Every man kindles the wisdom within him, as if it's a little light,
and feels that all that's expected of him is to live up to that wisdom
within himself. In fact, our attitude regarding
pg 114
our own intellectual processes is what gives us a disturbing sense of
having a dual nature. That misperception causes the ruin of many lives,
anxiety in many others, and a casual, shiftless drifting of even more.
Our intellectual thoughts aren't a separate thing from our outward
actions and spiritual prayers, or even from our physical state of
being. Man isn't a combination of separate entities. He is one spirit
that lives in a visible physical form, and he's able to do many
different things. He can work ethically, love unconditionally, pray
faithfully and live righteously--but all of these actions are the
outpouring of his thought-life and the kinds of things he thinks about.
Three
Ultimate Facts That Are Not open to Question
We tend to offend the law intellectually, opposing authority, in two
ways. First, we tend to think that everything is an open question. We
forget that there are three things that man's reasoning will never be
able to prove or disprove, even though men in every age have tried.
God, Self and the World are the three things. Active scientific western
minds try to confirm again and again that there's no place for God in
the world. They've developed such a pleasant, eager concept of Self
that one major school of philosophy has gone so far as to demonstrate
that the world isn't really here, it's just a mirage that we're
projecting from our own minds. The more passive Eastern mind, on the
other hand, tends to regard Self as a passing phase always in a state
of being absorbed by the deity/universe. But God is, Self is, and the
World is. They exist with all that their existences imply, no matter
what we think or what we 'prove.' Once we accept that, then we have a
more humble
pg 115
attitude. We suddenly realize that all around us, above us, behind us,
inside us, there are 'more things than we could ever dream up in any of
our philosophies.' We get a proper perspective of ourselves as persons.
We're confined to our own little corner of the universe, and we live
and breathe and move in and under a supreme authority. We can't assume
that everybody realizes these things. We may all have heard something
about it, but very few people have a real, living realization of this
ultimate reality.
The
Limitations of our Reason
The second area where we need to recognize our limitations is the
nature of our Reason and what it does. At least, we call it Reason, but
it would be more accurate to describe it as our power of reasoning. We
all know what it's like to go to bed with some issue on our mind. We
say we'll sleep on it, and, in the morning, viola! The whole problem
has come into focus. We see what it involves and we know exactly what
we need to do. We're so used to taking this kind of miracle for granted
because it happens so often that it becomes routine. It doesn't even
occur to us to be surprised. We even have a rational explanation for
it. We say that the mind is clearer after a night's sleep, even though
that should make no difference since it isn't a clear mind in the
morning that solved the problem--we didn't solve the problem at all.
The solution seemed to have come all by itself. In fact, when we stop
to think about it, most of the decisions we arrive at seem to come to
us in this way. We can't honestly say that we've thought out a certain
matter, because the solution comes to us in an inspired flash, or
intuition, or whatever you want to call it. This is a broad subject,
but the only thing I want to emphasize is that children should
understand that a lot of our reasoning and thinking out is actually
involuntary. It's a natural function in the same way as our blood
circulation. This very fact means that the Reason has to be limited.
pg 116
Reason
Provides Logical Proof for Any Idea We Entertain
Certain individuals might or might not be trusted to come to a morally
right conclusion about any premise on their minds. In any case, the
reasoning ability itself acts in a mostly mechanical and involuntary
way. It doesn't necessarily arrive at the right conclusion. The only
job Reason does for us is to logically prove any idea that we decide to
entertain. For example, we've already said that schools of philosophy
in both eastern and western thought entertain the idea that the real,
physical world doesn't exist, it's man's conception. Logical proofs of
this concept pour into their minds so much that books proving this
seemingly absurd idea abound. We all know that if we entertain the
notion that a servant is dishonest, or that a friend isn't really our
friend, or that a certain dress makes us look fat, some power from
within us that's unconscious to us will go to work collecting evidence
and presenting clear-cut evidence to confirm it to us. This is how wars
and persecutions and family feuds all over the world have started.
That's why it's so important for children to learn that their
reason is limited. Then they won't confuse logical arguments with
eternal truth. They'll know that the important thing is the ideas they
allow
themselves to entertain. The conclusions they draw from those ideas
aren't foolproof because they evolve all by themselves.
A
Third Fallacy: Intellect is Man's Own Sphere, and Knowledge is His
Personal Discovery
There's a third fallacy that lies at the root of our thinking, and
therefore, needs to be addressed in our education. We all admit that
nature, morality, and theology are pretty much divine in
pg 117
origin and what they relate to. But we tend to assume that intellect is
man's own sphere and his exclusive domain. Even knowledge--clever
inventions, knowledge about mankind, nature, art, literature, the
heavens and earth--is assumed to be man's own discovery. He thinks he
found it out all by himself, thought it out for himself, observed,
reasoned, collected, worked, gathered his forces, all of his own accord
for his own purposes as an independent agent. This is intellectual
pride and it comes from man's arrogance. It isn't just true of our
modern age, which I think is the best age the world has seen, but in
every age, mankind has tended to lift his head and say,
'We are the only people who matter. There's never been anyone as
advanced as us
before, and there never will be.' But when we come to our senses, we
realize that our Creator and Father has not given over any aspect of
our lives to our sole care.
Great
Eras Come from Time to Time
The knowledge that's given to us seems to come to us in meals. There
are great eras of scientific discovery or ages of literary activity or
poetic insight or artistic creativity that seem to come from time to
time, followed by long intervals so that there's time for the world to
assimilate the new knowledge or idea. After that, the world seems to be
swept off its feet with a flurry of great minds involved with that
idea. Yet we haven't learned to discern the signs of the time, or
realize that this is the routine way that God provides us with
knowledge which
is, after all, just as divine as God's nurture and admonition. The
medieval church recognized this great truth. John Ruskin eloquently
explained how the 'Captain Figures,' or inventors, of grammar, music,
astronomy,
pg 118
geometry, arithmetic and logic all spoke what had been put inside them
as a result of the direct outpouring of the Holy Spirit--even though
none of them had any recognition of God as we know Him. We could
revolutionize education if we could understand that seemingly dry and
dull subjects like grammar and math are supposed to come to children in
a living form, revealed by the power of the Spirit who 'shall teach you
all things.'
Nothing
is as Practical as Great Ideas
It might seem like the line of thought I'm suggesting is interesting
but impractical. Yet nothing is as practical as a great idea
because nothing else produces so much practical effort. We must not
shun philosophy. Education is nothing more than the application of
philosophy. It's
our job to train children according to the wisdom we have within us,
rather than according to the latest new trend in educational
methodology.
'Man, know yourself,' is good advice that we might rephrase as,
'Child, know yourself, and know your relationships to God and mankind
and nature.' In order to give children the preparation they need to
live, parents need to know a little bit about the laws of the mind and
where knowledge comes from.
Forming
Intellectual Habits
The second part of our subject is forming intellectual habits. It
shouldn't take long to discuss it. We know that 'ability' means having
about a half dozen of these intellectual habits. They make a person
able to do whatever he wants to with his mental ability, and to use
only a tenth of the wasted brain tissue to do the same amount of mental
work as a person without disciplined mental
pg 119
habits. We also know that the mental habits we're talking about are
acquired by training, they aren't a natural gift. It's been said that
even genius itself is really only an unlimited ability to exert
oneself. We might say that genius is the habit of exerting oneself with
infinite pains, and every child is born with the capacity to do that.
We
Put Blind Trust in Disciplined Subjects
We put too much blind trust in the training that's supposed to give
certain mental habits. We suppose that the classics cultivate one
habit,
math cultivates another mental ability, and science still another. And
they do, as far as each of those subjects is concerned, but they
probably don't form those habits in a general sense like we expect. If
you take a mathematician out of his field of math, he's no more
superior than anyone else. In fact, he's apt to make a blunder like
making a big hole in a door for a big cat, and a little hole for a
little kitten! Studying the humanities don't always make a man
humane--meaning broad-minded, tolerant, gentle and honest when it comes
to the opinions and situations of others. It isn't the fault of the
individual subjects. It's our lazy habit of trying to misuse each of
these subjects as if it was some sort of a mechanical tool for plowing
and planting that's to blame. Parents don't get off the hook. Even more
than teachers and curriculums, it's up
to them to form the mental
habits that will give their children an intellectual advantage all
their lives.
Some
Intellectual Habits
I don't need to refer again to how habits begin. But perhaps most of us
are more diligent and definite when it comes to forming physical and
moral habits than we are about intellectual habits. I'll just mention a
few intellectual habits that should be carefully trained in children
pg 120
during their early childhood. Attention
is the ability to focus the whole mind on the subject at hand. Concentration is a bit different
from attention because it's actively working with some problem instead
of just being passively receptive. Thoroughness
is the habit of not being satisfied with a vague, fuzzy understanding
of a subject; the mind feels unsettled until it can gain a clearer
knowledge of the subject. An encyclopedia is a great help in clearing
up any confusing points. Intellectual
Determination is the ability to make ourselves think of a
specific subject at any given time. Most of us know how unruly our own
minds are. But, if a child gets used to enjoying effort for the sake of
effort, then he'll find it easier as an adult to make himself think
about what he wants to think about when he wants to think about it. Accuracy isn't only taught via
math. It's also taught through repeating little statements, delivering
small messages and doing daily routine tasks and errands. Reflecting is the ability to mull
over ideas and thoughts. It's usually well-developed in children, but
it somehow gets lost with a lot of other precious natural abilities as
they mature. Nothing is more pitiful than the way we let intellectual
impressions pass through our minds without even making an effort to
consider and retain them.
Meditation
I'll just mention one more mental habit. Mr. Romanes, a young
scientist, asked Darwin how he maintained his intellectual life.
'Meditation,' was his answer. Apparently Romanes placed great value on
this advice. Meditation is another habit that children should acquire.
Actually, it needs to be preserved more than acquired, because we
believe that children are born knowing how to meditate, just like
they're born knowing how to reflect. Reflection and meditation are
closely related. When we
pg 121
reflect, we mull over knowledge we've received. When we meditate, we
don't just go over the past, we let our minds wander and consider the
subject from all angles and to its logical conclusion. Christians have
known for a long time that spiritual progress depends a lot on
meditation. In the same way, intellectual progress needs more than mere
reading and studying a subject diligently. It takes an active
surrendering of all of the mind's abilities to work on the task at
hand. That's what the word meditate infers. It would be easy for any of
us to add a dozen more intellectual habits to this list, and
considering them would undoubtedly be valuable and interesting.
Living
Ideas Provide Sustenance
Intellectual life, like all the other facets of spiritual life, can
only live and grow on one food: the nourishment of living ideas. I
can't repeat this too many times or emphasize it too insistently. This
is probably the area we fail in most often when raising children.
All we feed them are dry, gray ashes from a fire of ideas whose spark
of original thought has long since been extinguished. We give children
inferior story books with tired clichés, unimaginative
situations, mere threads of other people's thoughts, and
unoriginal, worn-out attitudes. Our children complain that they
already know how the story is going to end! Even worse, they can
predict how every page will play out. Just the other day I heard
someone say that children don't like poetry, that they prefer an
exciting story told in prose. I have no doubt that they like the story,
but poetry does appeal to children, although in other ways. Shelley's Skylark will captivate a child
sooner than any touching tale. What
about art? We tend to hang their rooms with sentimental illustrations [such as this 'Christmas
number 'picture] and the
pictures in their books are
pg 122
even worse. Were getting a little better in the area of children's
illustrations, but there's still room for improvement.
Children's
Literature
There's been lots of discussion about 'children's literature,' and I
only have one more thing to add: children have no natural appetite for
twaddle. There's probably less need for a special genre of literature
for children than book publishers would have us believe. On any general
adult list of 'the hundred best books,' I think that seventy-five of
them would be well within the range of a seven or eight year old. They
would love Rasselas. Eöthen would be as fascinating
to them as Robinson Crusoe. The Faërie Queen, with its
allegory and adventures of knights and sense of traveling freely in
wild wooded areas, is right up their alley. What children want is to be
brought in touch with the very best living thought. If we bring it to
them, their intellect will feed on it with no meddlesome intervention
from us.
The
Independent Intellectual Development of Children
It's up to us to initiate and direct children's independent
intellectual development without controlling or dominating it--but
often, we don't even recognize its existence. I know a little nine year
old girl who brooded every day because the house she was visiting
didn't have her favorite Tennyson poems in any of their larger volumes
of books. She actually missed her favorite poems in the same way that a
child would miss a meal. And why not? The intellectual appetite is just
as real and just as compelling as physical hunger. Perhaps more so in
some cases. In H. King Lewis's book The
Child and Its Spiritual
Nature, there's a cute story told by Miss Martineau about the
intellectual awakening of 'a ten
year old boy who plopped himself down on his tummy with Southey's
pg 123
Thalaba on the floor in front
of him on the first day of his Easter vacation. In spite of his
inconvenient position, he turned the pages quickly as if he was looking
for something. A few hours later, he was done. He took it back to the
library and came back with Southey's Curse
of Keharna. He went on to do this with all of Southey's poems
and some others for the entire short vacation, hardly wanting to move
except to run to the library. After this process, he was so changed
that his family couldn't help noticing it. The look in his eyes, his
facial expression, the way he phrased things, even his walk was
different. In ten days he had matured years intellectually, and I've
always thought of this as the turning point in his life. His parents
were wise enough to kindly leave him alone. They were well aware that
school would end the opportunity to indulge in his new interest soon
enough.'
In the same way that a child who has been brought up always aware of
the presence of God won't usually have a dramatic conversion
experience, parents who have always satisfied the intellectual craving
of their children won't have the pleasure of witnessing a literary
awakening. One little girl whose parents had strong convictions against
alcohol said, 'I'm so sorry that my father isn't a drunk,' because she
wouldn't be able to rejoice in his conversion and reform. That's
exactly what we mean. :-)
Selecting
and Appropriating for Themselves
If children are provided with an abundant feast of ideas, they'll
naturally take on the process of selecting from them on their own.
Tennyson's lines--
'Our elm tree's ruddy-hearted blossom-flake is fluttering down,'
'Ruby-budded lime,'
'Black as ash-buds in the front of March'
pg 124
have done more to interest children in botany than any Science and Art
Department with all of their equipment, lectures and exams.
Browning also provides nature inspiration:
'Beside boulders with lichens that look
Like spots on a moth, and small ferns attach
Themselves to the polished rock.'
Concepts of nature, life, love, duty, heroism--children will discover
and select for themselves from the books they read. The authors of
the books children read contribute more to their education than any
deliberate
lessons. This is precisely why children need to choose these vital
ideas
and allocate them for themselves.
I'll discuss the burning question of what kind of curriculum will
provide children, not with the hard, dry bones of mere facts, but with
facts that are wearing warm flesh that's been made alive by having the
vital spirit of dynamic ideas breathed into them. The other day, a
teacher complained that it was difficult to teach from Freeman's Old
English History because it had too many stories--never
recognizing that
that it was the stories teaching living history, while all the rest was
dead.
Inherited
Stinginess Regarding Schoolbooks
Sometimes there's an unconscious inherited stingy attitude that came
down from the days when people had less money and there weren't as many
books. It can make parents unnecessarily restrict their children's
school books. Children should have living books, varied from time to
time, and not thumbed through from one generation of schoolchildren to
another until the mere sight of them is tedious. But the subject of
feeding children's minds with ideas is so
pg 125
extensive and important that I'll have to be satisfied with giving just
a few concise suggestions. For further study, books about these topics
should be helpful:
1) What kind of books children like in fiction, poetry, travel,
history, and biography, which is the most interesting subject.
2) The concepts about life and behavior that children assimilate from
their reading.
3) Concepts of duty that are assimilated in the same way.
4) The concepts of nature that children latch onto
5) The leading, life-giving ideas in school subjects such as geography,
grammar, history, astronomy, ancient history, etc.
Once more, I'd like to bring up John Ruskin's description of the
'Captain Figures' heading each of the Liberal Arts in his commentary
of the fresco
at the Spanish chapel from Mornings in Florence. And I'll
conclude with a wise quote by Coleridge about Plato's method, which
should always be on the mind of anyone involved with training children--
Plato's
Educational Aim
'He didn't want to help the passive mind store the various bits of
knowledge that were deemed most important, as if the human soul was
nothing more than a storage bin or banquet room. He wanted to place the
mind in the relationship of circumstance that would incite its growing
and germinating abilities so that it would produce new fruits of
thought, new concepts and imaginations and ideas.'
pg 126
Chapter
12 - Some Aspects of Moral Training
That We Don't Usually Consider
Much
of this chapter was delivered by Charlotte Mason at a PNEU conference,
which was printed in her Parents'
Review magazine.
Three
Foundational Principles
Here are three principles underlying the educational thought of the
PNEU. Some of us are passionate about advancing them. (a) Authority is
recognized as a fundamental principle. It's as universal and inevitable
in the moral world as gravity is in the physical world. (b) Habit has a
physical basis, and forming habits is an important part of education.
(c) Ideas are living and have the ability to inspire.
Authority
is the Foundation of Moral Teaching
First lets consider the principle of authority, which is the foundation
of moral teaching as well as religious teaching. The word 'ought' comes
from the verb 'to owe.' We owe a personal debt to a Lawgiver or Ruler,
or whatever people want to call the final authority. Even if some
choose to use the name of Buddha or Secular Humanism, they can't escape
from the sense that there's a moral authority. They recognize that what
they ought to do is the same as what they owe--it's a debt to some
higher power or person outside of themselves. God has created us in
such a
way that, no matter how much we're in the dark about God's name, we
can't for a minute escape from our sense of
pg 127
'ought,' which is the law. The farther we are from the light of
revealed truth, the more flesh-torturing and spirit-quenching the
awareness of 'ought' will be. The concept of authority holds no vague
anxiety for those of us who know the name of God and have the
revelation of Scripture. We know what's required of us. We understand
that the requirements are never dogmatic or frivolous. They're an
essential part of the way things are, necessary for the moral
government of the world, and necessary to satisfy the unquenchable
desire that every soul has of rising to a higher kind of existence.
Parents are great in the eyes of their children, and that's as it
should be, but that fact should make them more careful not to forget
that their authority is derived from Someone else.
Principles,
Not Rules
'God doesn't allow' us to do this or that shouldn't be said all the
time, but it should be consciously in the minds of parents. Parents
should study the nature of divine authority in the place where it's
revealed most fully: in the Gospels. There, they can see that authority
works by principles, not by rules. Since they're the deputy authorities
assigned to manage their household, they should consider the methods
that the Divine government uses. They should discern the signs of the
times, too. We tend to think that people can only act according to how
much information and wisdom they have within themselves, therefore,
it's right for them to do whatever seems to be right in their own eyes.
In other words, every man is his own final authority about what's right
and wrong. It's urgent that parents keep this tendency in mind so that
they can counteract it if they need to.
Limitations
of Authority
On the other hand, it's good for them to understand that authority has
its limitations. They must not force unwilling compliance. Even the
Divine authority doesn't compel. It shows the way and protects the
misguided traveler
pg 128
and strengthens and guides people's ability to compel themselves. It allows a person to
make a choice about whether to obey or not, rather than forcing him
whether he wants to or not. When we're trying to teach morals,
arbitrary actions almost always make children rebel. Parents think
they're
succeeding if they only rule
their household, but they don't always consider the nature of their
authority, the principles behind it, and its limitations.
Duty
Can Only Exist as Something That's Owed
An American who wrote about teaching children morals said, 'The school
teacher's job in teaching morals to children is to present the subject
matter to them. It isn't their job to confirm the validity of it.' This
has been disputed for at least two thousand years. Socrates opposed
this concept in his own day, although then it was expressed as, 'Man is
the measure of all things,' 'However
something appears to a person, that's the way it is for him,' or 'Truth
is relative.' These days we say that a person can only live by his
lights. In other words, there is no authority or truth or law beyond
what every person has within himself. The logical conclusion of this
kind of teaching is that God is unknowable. If there is a God, he
doesn't exist for us personally because we can't have any kind of
relationship with him. It's when they're little and still at home that
children need to learn that duty can only exist in the sense that it's
something we owe to God.
God's law is enormously extensive. It encompasses us like the air that
we breathe, only even more so because God's law even reaches to our
most secret thoughts. This isn't a truth that's difficult to live with.
It's a joy. Mothers love their children and want to make them happy all
day long--this is part of God's law. Children are happy when they're
being good, and unhappy when they're being
pg 129
naughty--this is also part of God's law. If Thomas drops his spoon, it
falls to the floor--this is God's law, too, although it's a different
kind of law. Mothers and teachers can't give children a better gift
than a constant sense of being ruled and surrounded by law. And that
law is just another name for God's will.
Morals
Don't Come Naturally
Every child is born with a conscience--a sense
that he ought to choose right and reject wrong. But children aren't
born with the ability to tell good from evil. An educated conscience is
rarer than we think. Every once in a while, we're all shocked when our
neighbors, who we've always considered conscientious, commit some
improprieties in
areas we consider obviously wrong. To be fair, our own moral
inconsistencies are probably just as shocking to our friends. It's the
fault of our inadequate moral education that resulted in us hardly even
being aware when we're confronted with some erroneous thinking or
insincere speech. We seem to think that, although Latin and Greek
require determined teaching, morals come naturally. A certain
makeshift kind of morality that varies according to our conditions does
come by heredity and environment. But that beautiful, delicate human
gift of an educated conscience only comes by teaching with authority,
and supplementing by example.
Children
Aren't Born Moral or Immoral
It's odd how educated people can be silent about the moral status of
children. A while ago I was listening to an interesting discussion
among members of an educational club about children and lying. It was
interesting that the group, which was made up of capable, intelligent
people, was equally divided into those who thought that children were
born pure, and those who thought that children were born corrupt.
pg 130
It didn't seem to occur to anybody to think back to his own childhood
or to even reflect on his own human condition at the current moment.
The issue was whether children are born moral or immoral. Nobody
recognized that every person comes into the world with unlimited
possibilities to do good, and, sadly, just as unlimited potential to do
evil. They may have inherited negative tendencies, but proper training
can cure that. Or they may have inherited good tendencies that a lack
of training can cancel out.
Moral
Teaching
We don't need to go any farther than the Ten Commandments and Jesus'
instruction about the moral law to find suggestions to help correct the
erratic, impulsive efforts at teaching what we think it is to 'be
good.' The best place to find a clear, practical commentary about the
moral law is in the Church Catechism. Bishop Ken, the venerable Father
of the Church, used to recite the 'duty towards God' and 'duty towards
my neighbor' every single day. It's not a bad habit to imitate, and it
wouldn't be a bad idea to let children of all denominations learn these
short summaries about the 'whole duty of man.'
The
Poets
The poets give us some wonderful help in this kind of teaching. Look at
this, for example, from Wordsworth's Ode
to Duty:
'You seem so stern, but yet you are
A truly blessed grace.
There isn't anything more fine
Than your kind smiling face.
The flowers even wait for you
With perfume for your feet,
You keep the stars from going wrong
So heaven's fresh and sweet.'
pg 131
Or Matthew Arnold's lines about Rugby
Chapel:
'Servants of God! Or maybe
I should call you sons because
You knew, not as mere servants,
Your Father's innermost thoughts,
He who unwillingly witnesses
One of His little ones lost
It's you who are to be credited if Mankind
Hasn't yet, in its weary journey,
Fainted and fallen and died!'
Or this from Tennyson:
'More than once in our fair island story
The way of Duty would have led to glory.
The person who always follows Duty's commands
Through toil of heart, or knees, or hands,
Through the long tunnel to the far light has won
An upward path and has prevailed.
The tops of the Duty's peaks that he has scaled
Are very close to those shining lands,
Where God Himself is the shining sun.'
Or Matthew Arnold's Morality:
'Tasks that are determined in moments of insight
Can be fulfilled through long gloomy hours.'
There might not be any better way to inspire children than by leading
them to reflect on some excellent poetic teachings, adding love to law,
and adding devotion to duty. Then children will know for themselves,
both by duty and prayer, that they are
'Bound by gold chains around God's feet.'
Ethical
Teaching of the Middle Ages
The medieval Church kept to classical traditions. It tried to answer
Socrates' question: 'What
pg 132
should we do, and what do we mean by the words 'should' and 'do'?' And
it answered the question as far as it could by using object
lessons--visible objects to symbolize spiritual truths. In the Arena
Chapel in Padua in Italy, there are pictures by
Giotto that depict Faith and Unfaithfulness, Generosity and Envy,
Love and Hostility, Justice and Injustice, Moderation and Excess, Hope
and Despair. They're illustrated very plainly so that even uneducated
and non-reading people can understand what they're supposed to be. In
the gothic Amiens
Cathedral that John Ruskin called 'The Bible of Amiens,' we can
study the same theme a little differently. [The stone
carvings are incredibly detailed and beautiful!] It
includes Pride and Humility, Moderation and Excess, Purity and Lust,
Love and Hatred, Hope and Despair, Faith and Idolatry, Perserverance
and Disbelief, Harmony and Conflict, Obedience and Rebellion, Courage
and Cowardice, Patience and Anger, Gentleness and Sarcasm. They're
paired in groups of four, one pair above the other, each group under
the feet of one of the Apostles [possibly
this?].
Each Apostle represents a specific virtue. But we don't have anything
to teach us which are cardinal virtues and which are deadly sins.
We
Have no Authoritative Teaching
We don't have any 'official' teaching by any authority in the area of
virtue. As a culture, we haven't sculpted any organized teaching in
marble, we haven't painted a program of virtue lessons on our walls,
and nothing about which evil vices should be avoided. Yes, our poets
speak out for us, but their moral sayings that sparkle like precious
jewels on the finger of time are scattered here and there. It's
casually left as a matter of chance that our children might happen to
glimpse the lines that will inspire them with the impulse to live
virtuous lives. Perhaps we neglect all supplemental ethical lessons
because we have the Bible. But how much and
pg 133
how often we use that? The Bible is the most perfect system of ethics.
It's the most inspiring and captivating collection of ethics lessons
that the world has ever seen. But I think we fail to spark our
children's hearts with the concept that they are required to be
perfect, 'even as your Father in heaven is perfect.'
High
Ideals
It's time for us to start seriously working on the moral education that
needs to be taught. The most important thing to do is to expose
children
to high ideals. 'Lives of great men remind us that we, too, can make
our lives something excellent.' Studying the lives of great people, and
reading about great defining moments in the lives of lesser people, is
very inspiring for children, especially when they realize what
strenuous childhoods some of these great people had. As we grow older,
we understand more and more that the fully matured person evolves from
the child so that 'the child is like the father to the man.' We're
amazed when we see so many people we know personally whose lives are
the result of fulfilled dreams they had since childhood and early
youth, and who consistently lived one day after the next virtuously.
The
Value of Biographies
The Bible is a treasure-house of inspiring biographies. But it would be
good if we could plan our teaching so that we brought out in each Bible
character the master-thought of his thinking. Queen Victoria did this
very tactfully and powerfully in the Albert Memorial Chapel. The
prophets and patriarchs are presented there showing the special virtue
of act of faith that seemed to be the keynote of his character. It's a
nice attempt to revive the kind of teaching they did in the medieval
era that I mentioned earlier. We see the same thing again in the
pg 134
Song School at St. Mary's
Episcopal Cathedral in Edinburgh. Phoebe Anna Traquair painted
frescoes on the walls to illustrate the Benedicte Omina Opera. 'Holy and
humble men of heart,' for example, is pictured as three men of our own
time from three different schools of thought. The only one I remember
is Cardinal Newman. The power that this kind of master-idea can have,
and the unity it can bring to a life, might be exemplified by our
beloved Victoria's prophetic childhood statement, 'I will be good.' Few
children in Britain haven't felt thrilled at that phrase. Maybe one day
Queen Victoria will know how much good was done because that simple
child's promise was fulfilled so well, and it inspired the whole Empire
to have a similar moral impulse.
Patriotic
Poems
After biographies, the most effective way to inspire children is with
the burning words of our poets, such as Ode to the Iron Duke by
Tennyson. Rudyard Kipling may be the poet who has done the most to stir
the flame of patriotism. His words, 'Our wistful mothers teach us to
consider old England our home,' open a flood of patriotic feelings. The
complete poems The Native-born
and The Flag of England both
fan our love for our country:
'No island is so small,
No sea is so alone
That over its clouds and palm trees
The English flag hasn't flown.'
This poem of Browning's inspires our hearts with patriotic feelings:
'Buy my English flowers
From Surrey and from Kent
Violets damp with water
From the English Channel sent.
pg 135
'Cowslips grown in Devon
Brambles colored bright;
Buy my English flowers
And you'll buy my heart's delight.'
Mottoes
When reading the Bible, or poetry, or the best prose, it's fun and
productive to collect mottoes, especially if they're kept in a book.
Headings may or may not be used. It would be a nice idea for children
to make a new book every year with a motto they find every day from
their own reading. It would be so encouraging to read a motto that you
selected yourself first thing in the morning instead of having someone
else's voice command, 'Follow the rules! Be quick to obey!' Mottoes
could be collected under countless subject headings, such as lives with
a keynote, Bible heroes, Greek heroes, morally inspiring poems,
patriotic poems, poems about responsibility or any other virtue, ethics
object lessons, where to find mottoes, etc.
The
Habit of Thinking Pleasant Thoughts
Moral habits--that's a subject that's on many of our minds: how to form
them, and the responsibility of every parent to send their children
into the world with a good collection of them. I don't need to go into
that any more here. Once the moral inspiration has been planted using
some of the inspiring ideas I've mentioned, the parent or teacher's
next job is to keep that moral impulse at the front of the child's
mind. This should be done with tact and delicacy, never with
insistence. And casual opportunities should be provided to try to put
those moral impulses into action. Children need to be constantly aware
that it's the kind of thoughts they
pg 136
think that count. When a child is young enough that the parent can tell
what they're thinking by looking at their face, the parent should work
to give the child the habit of thinking pleasant thoughts. Every time
the child's face betrays a selfish thought, or resentful or unkind
thought beginning, his thoughts must be changed before he's aware
of it.
Virtues
that Children Should be Trained to Have
One more thing: parents should make it a point to have a clear idea of
what kind of virtues they want their children to have. Impartiality,
backbone, moderation, patience, humility, courage, generosity--in fact,
the whole range of virtues would be an interesting subject for thinking
about, teaching and finding illustrative examples. But I'd like to
offer a word of caution. A child's whole concept of religion is 'being
good.' He needs to know that 'being good' isn't his whole
responsibility towards God, although it is a big part of it. A love
relationship with God and being of service are also his duty. He owes
that to God as a child owes love and service to his father, and as a
subject owes it to his King. That's more than just 'being good,'
although 'being good' also makes God pleased with His children.
pg 137
Chapter
13 - Some Aspects of Religious Training That We Don't Usually Consider
Authority
in Religious Education
Before I begin, I'd like to clarify that what I'm going to say about
religious education is in no way exhaustive. My aim in discussing this
topic is to give some practical methods, and I hope my readers won't
find that I've left things out or said things that I shouldn't have
said.
First, let's consider how the principle of Authority relates to
teaching religion. The sense of duty, whether it's been taught or
whether the person is ignorant of it, always relates to the person in
authority, the one whose place is to say what the rules are. Most of us
realize that we who are in authority are representing a higher
authority, and ultimately, the Supreme Authority. A child can't have a
true, lasting sense of duty until he's brought into contact with that
Supreme Authority. He is the source of the law, and pleasing Him turns
duty into joy. In our progressive times, perhaps no aspect of religious
teaching is more important than the immediate presence and continuous
going forth of God.
pg 138
'You're everywhere I walk, and around my bed, and You see everything I
do,' should be a thought that brings comfort, not dread, to every
child. This constant awareness of the presence of God's authority will
inspire the dual response of submission and reverence towards God. Some
people say that the children of our time are distinguished by their
defiance, and by a certain flippant attitude and lack of reverence. If
this is true, and in proportion to how much it's the case, it's because
children are brought up without the conscious realization of their
relationship to God, who should be as a Father to them. His divine
title of Father reminds us that authority is wrapped up in the One who
created us, and He is kind, compassionate, foreknowing, strong enough
to care for us, and wise enough to rule. These qualities are reflected
only very weakly even in the best human fathers.
Questions
on People's Minds
But there are questions on everyone's minds about the authenticity of
Scripture and things like that. We're all pretty much at the mercy of
words. So-called 'higher criticism' finds a lot to criticize and
question about the verbal accuracy of Scripture passages, which gives
us a vague idea that God's authority itself is in doubt. Part of the
PNEU's work is to encourage and strengthen parents by comforting them
with a sense that God's authority is behind theirs, always supporting
them in their role as authority over their families. Another notion
people are talking about is against the principle of authority itself,
favoring greater respect for individual personality and the right of
each individual to develop and evolve according to his own unique
character. But the truth is, authority isn't adverse to
pg 139
individual development unless it's a morally wrong kind of development.
How
Authority Works
God's Supreme Authority and all other deputies in roles of authority
work in the exact same way that fair, good governments do who make it
their job to defend the liberties of their people in every way, even if
they have to limit, repress and punish the license of those who
interfere with the rights of others and with the real freedom of the
criminal. The law, which is the stated form of authority, is for the
punishment of evil-doers and for the approval of those who do what's
right. When we associate harshness, punishment, force and arbitrary
rules with the concept of authority, even divine authority, we exhibit
the confusion of thought that most of our faulty actions can be traced
to. The truth is, it isn't authority that punishes. The penalties that
plague us throughout our lives [of which those in the family are a
faint foretaste] are the inevitable natural consequences of laws that
are broken, whether those laws are spiritual/moral or physical.
Authority, strong and good, is there to save us by preventing us from
breaking laws, and, when needed, to use lesser penalties in order to
teach us.
I think that reading and teaching about some of the following subjects
might help us to get our focus on the vitally important aspect of our
relationship to God's authority. It's not a relationship we choose to
enter into. It's as inevitable as the family relationships we're born
into. The subjects include the obligation to loyalty and the disgrace
of unfaithfulness; the duty of being reverent; the responsibility to
submit to God's will; incidences in the Bible where God is revealed as
the ruler of men such as telling Abraham, 'Go, and he goes,' or to
Cyrus, 'Do this, and he does it'; historical revelations that show that
God is the ruler of nations and the kind ruler of people and
pg 140
He makes His servants' ways prosper; how a sense of God's authority can
be instilled at home; how reverence for holy things can be imparted;
and direct Bible teaching about the principle of authority. This whole
subject has a lot of aspects to consider, and suggests rabbit trails
that are very important in these days.
Habits
of the Religious Life
The next thing we need to consider is laying down the habits that
distinguish a religious life. We don't need to go over the physical
evidence for the power that habits have. My purpose right now is to
look at how much we can use this power to help develop the religious
life of our children. Let's consider how religious habits relate to
thought, attitude, life, and words. Those are all actually the same
thing because everything we do and say starts in our thoughts, even
though we may not be consciously aware of what we're thinking.
The
Habit of Having God in our Thoughts
The Bible says that the wicked 'don't have God in all their thoughts.'
But it might be said that children have God in all of their thoughts: their
restful thoughts, their dutiful thoughts, their thoughts of loving and
giving and serving, and the abundance of beautiful thoughts that
overflow from their hearts. We tend to think that children are a little
bit morbid and unusually advanced when they ask questions about God and
imagine spiritual things, so we try to distract them and get them to
think about something else. What children need is to be guided into
thinking true, happy thoughts. Every day should bring them 'new
thoughts about God and new hopes about heaven.' They understand
spiritual things better than we do because they haven't had to conform
their ideas to conventional dogma, and thoughts about God seem to them
like a way to escape to the infinite realm, away from the limitations
that
make them anxious, and from their perception that some of their bitter
experiences
pg 141
can seem like prison bars. We must keep children in the habit of always
having God in their thoughts so that losing it, even for a little
while, will be like returning home to find that their mother has gone
out.
This is a very delicate part of a parent's work.
Reverent
Attitudes
We tend to overlook the importance of reverent attitudes these days.
We're extremely sincere and that makes us hesitant to insist on 'mere
formality.' We feel that it's best to leave children free to express
their own heartfelt emotions naturally. But we might be wrong about
this. It's as true that formality can inspire feelings as it is that
feelings can result in form. Children should be taught to take the time
to be reverent while saying grace before meals, during family prayers,
as they pray on their own, and in church when they're old enough to sit
through the service. Maybe some of us remember standing beside our
mother every day with an attitude of reverence while reciting the
Apostles' Creed, and the memory of that childhood reverence set the
tone for our attitude towards God all our lives. 'Because the angels
will see' should be a thought that keeps children from misbehaving.
We're wrong when we assume that forms of reverence are always boring to
children. They love little ceremonies. If they were taught to kneel
properly while saying their little prayers, it would help to instill a
feeling of reverence in their later lives. We can't expect reverent
feeling and formalities from children in church if we take them when
they're too young, or make them sit through services that are too long,
or expect them to pay attention for the whole time. If children are
taken to long services, they should be allowed to have a Sunday picture
book, and they should be told that the songs and
pg 142
memorized rituals, such as the Lord's Prayer, are parts of the service
that children can participate in.
Doing
Devotionals Regularly
It's important to develop the habit of regularity in devotional time. A
mother may not always be with her children, but I've seen children
who are more determined about doing their devotions on time when
they're away from their mother because they know that's what she would
want, than they are when she's with them. One four-year-old friend of
mine said, 'Mommy, I always worship idols.' 'You do, Megan? When?'
'When I say my prayers to the chair.' It's wonderful for all of us to
get into the habit of 'saying our prayers' at a specific time and in a
specific place. Wherever that may be, it will become like a holy place
for us. Whether it's a chair, the side of the bed, a little prayer
table, or, best of all, the mother's knee, that place will play a major
part in guiding the child's soul to develop a habit of devotion. While
I'm on the subject, it's worth mentioning that children's prayers, even
for school aged children, shouldn't be left until they're so tired that
they nod off before they're finished. After evening tea [or dessert?]
is a good regular time for prayers if it can be managed.
The
Habit of Bible Reading
The habit of reading the Bible should be established when the child is
young enough that his Bible readings need to be read aloud to him. This
presents a challenge because the Bible is actually an entire library,
and some of its books and passages aren't suitable for children. Many
parents get around this by using little compilations of devotional
Scriptures. But I'm not sure this is such a good idea. I think that a
pg 143
narrative teaching of the Scriptures is a lot more helpful for children
than the isolated texts chosen to stimulate morals and spiritual
devotion. The Bible Society publishes [at
least, they did in 1904 when
this was written] inexpensive copies of individual books of the
Bible. Those are a nice resource for parents. A child who's old enough
to enjoy reading for himself would probably love reading through the
whole book of the Gospel of Mark or another book of the Bible little by
little as part of the morning devotion, using a nice copy of the book.
Children
Naturally Love Formality
But, while emphasizing the importance of developing the habits of
prayer and devotional reading, we need to remember that children
are little formalists by nature. They shouldn't be encouraged to
read long passages or pray long prayers with the erroneous idea that
there's some inherent benefit in those things [i.e., praying longer prayers doesn't make
them a better person].
The
Habit of Praise
We probably don't place a high enough priority on the habit of praise
in our children's devotions. Praise and thankfulness flow freely from
the young hearts of children. It's natural and good to be glad, and
music is fun. Singing hymns at home and singing worship songs at church
should be something to enjoy. The habit of singing soft, reverent songs
and offering our very best when we praise should be deliberately
formed. The best hymns for children are probably the ones that tell a
story, such as 'A
Little Ship Was on the Sea,' 'I Think When I
Read That Sweet Story of Old,' and 'Hushed Was the
Evening Hymn.' Children should be trained to pay attention and have
an attitude of sincere devotion during short services, or during parts
of the service. Instructing children to find their places in the prayer
book and Bible during the service helps them to pay attention to what's
going on during the service, but it might be better to have children
even as old as 10 and 11 occupy themselves during
pg 144
the prayer or sermon by going over the hymns they
know silently in their minds.
The
Habit of Observing the Sabbath
The habit of keeping Sunday observances that are special and reverent
without being severe or dull is very important. Special Sunday stories,
Sunday songs, Sunday walks, Sunday conversations, Sunday painting,
Sunday knitting, even Sunday card games, should all be suitable for the
Sabbath--quiet, enjoyable, peaceful. The people who want to make Sunday
like any other day don't realize how healing the change of pace of a
weekly rest can bring to a weary soul. One of the most precious
inheritances we can hand down is the traditional English Sunday,
especially if we can hand it down without its strictness but still
retain its quiet joy and communion with Nature and God. But I can't
pursue this subject any further. The topic of religious habits
provides lots of subjects that will be beneficial to teach and reflect
on. For example, there's the habit of thinking about God as a family,
the habit of having reverent thoughts, attitudes, actions, and words,
the habit of praying about certain things at a certain time and in the
same way or the same place, the habit of praise and thanksgiving, the
habit of an attentive and devotional attitude during church services,
things that can help devotional habits, and the habit of devotional
reading.
Inspiring
Ideas of Religious Life
Now we come to the most important aspect of our subject--the inspiring
ideas we'd like to give children about the things in a life devoted to
God. We sometimes tend to leave this to chance. But when we consider
how vitalizing an idea can be, and how one single idea can change the
course of a whole life, we realize how important it is to carefully
consider which ideas of
pg 145
spiritual things are the most suitable for children, and how they can
best
be presented to seem inviting. It's sad that so many children's first
concept of God as toddlers is of a Being who's always watching for them
to be naughty so He can punish them. We may never know how much this
kind
of concept can alienate children's hearts. Another danger is that
spiritual things can be made too familiar and worn out until the name
of God is used without reverence. Or, children might get the notion
that God's blessed name exists to serve them and what they can get from
God, instead of them existing to serve God.
The
Fatherhood of God
Perhaps the best concept to introduce children to first is that God is
a kind Father and they live and move and exist within His divine loving
arms. If children are allowed to grow up with this joyful assurance,
then being unfaithful to this, the closest of all relationships, would
be as shameful to them as it was to the Church during the medieval era.
Christ
as King
The next concept, the kingship of Christ, will inspire them to do the
right thing and will rouse children's eager loyalty, since we all know
that children naturally bestow heroic devotion on anyone they find
who's heroic. Perhaps we don't take advantage of this human tendency of
hero-worship as much as we could in teaching religion. We tend to make
our religious goals subjective [focused
on what it will do for me] instead of
objective [focused on God].
We're tempted to think of Christianity as a 'plan of salvation'
designed and carried out for our individual benefit. But the very
essence of Christianity is passionate devotion to a Person who's worthy
of adoration.
pg 146
Our
Savior
Even when we recognize this, we can still fall into the trap of
adopting a rose-water kind of treatment with children. Unfortunately
for us, very few adults have as keen a sense of sin as a child of six
or seven who has done something wrong. Many naughty, angry, sulky and
hardened young offenders are that way simply because they don't have a
personal understanding that there's a Savior of this world who has
immediate forgiveness and ready love for them. But even in this
respect,
children's thoughts need to be focused outside of themselves, on Jesus
the Savior, rather than their own personal feelings about the Savior.
The
Indwelling of the Holy Spirit
I have space to mention one more obvious Christian truth. Most
Christian parents teach their children to recognize the indwelling of
the Holy Spirit, the Comforter. They elaborate on the concept expressed
in this poem:
'Enable with Your constant light
The dullness of our blinded sight.'
'Anoint and cheer our dirty face
With the abundance of Your grace.'
It would be good if we could prevent our children from having the
concept that there's some kind of a separation between sacred things
and so-called secular things. We should help them to recognize that all 'sound learning,' even if it
isn't designated as 'religious instruction,' comes under the
jurisdiction of God, the Holy Sprit, who is the supreme teacher of all
mankind.
Parents and teachers will be able to think of lots of other inspiring
ideas that are more valuable than any I could suggest--for instance,
teaching, reading and meditating on any of the sections of the Lord's
Prayer or the Apostles'
pg 147
Creed, or any of the Duties Towards God in the [Anglican] Catechism.
Anyone who accepts the Old and New Testaments should find that
worthwhile.
I haven't mentioned everything that's necessary to bring up children
'in the nurture and admonition of the Lord,' but I've discussed a few
of
the principles that seem essential to me, although I've done it very
inadequately.
pg 148
This chapter appears in a Parents'
Review article.
Chapter
14 A Master-Thought
A
Motto
Some of you already know the Parents' Union motto: 'Education is an
atmosphere, a discipline, a life,' because there's a neat diagram of it
on the covers of our library books. They say that a society is destined
to live by its motto. One respected educationalist wrote this to me
about public education: 'Now, more than ever, we need the kind of
educational perspective that's expressed in the memorable words of the
Parents' Review motto.' An inspiring motto always has power, but living
upon our motto's good
reputation, and living up to
it, and in it are two
different things. I believe that the Parents' Union has a lot of
continual thinking and challenging living ahead if it wants to
interpret and illustrate those 'memorable words' to the world.
Fortunately, we're a courageous bunch. We have some determined
intentions,
and we're passionate about them. Those who set a goal with the best
determination, and who expend effort for the best, will see the best as
a result.
How
the 1800's Implemented the Principle of 'Education is an Atmosphere'
Meanwhile, we sometimes make mistakes by taking one part and acting as
if
it were the whole, and sometimes even by focusing on a small part of a
part
pg 149
and mistaking that for the whole. Of the three phrases in the motto,
the first, 'education is an atmosphere,' tends to be our favorite
because it's the most inviting for the permissive non-intervening part
of our human nature. And we lose something by thinking that
'atmosphere' is the same as 'environment,' and thinking that the word
itself holds some kind of magic key. The word 'atmosphere' is symbolic,
but a symbol means more to us than the word that's used. When we think
of everything surrounding the child as 'atmosphere,' then our
considerations will expand even to the air a child breathes, to make
sure it's fresh, clean and invigorating, and that the child breathes it
in deeply and correctly. If we use the more literal word,
'environment,' our concept will be more limited.
Results
of Permissive Non-intervention
But when we think of an education as an atmosphere, we get a fresh,
dynamic concept in our minds. If we imagine that it means sunshine,
green fields, pleasant rooms, good pictures, gentle inspiration used to
get children to learn their lessons, eliminating everything that we
feel isn't needed, charming, smiling teachers mesmerizing the children
into complying to be like everyone else, then it's easy for us to sit
back, satisfied that everything is going great and all of education is
being accomplished. But it's not. Although it's true that we can't live
without air, it's just as true that we can't live on air alone.
Children raised on the concept of 'environment' soon start showing
signs of laziness. They have very little curiosity, if they have any at
all, no ability to focus their attention or their effort, and, worst of
all, they lose their spontaneity and
pg 150
initiative. They expect life to come and drop itself into them like
raindrops dripping into a tub, without any effort or intention on their
part.
Boredom
The notion that education is covered by environment, or maybe even by
atmosphere, has been popular for the past generation or two, and it
seems to have left its mark on our public and private lives. We're more
interested in having things done for us than in doing things for
others. We're not interested in directing our own lives one way or the
other, we'd rather have our lives managed for us. A schedule of
appointments and events dictates what to do now, and what to do next.
We crave exciting entertainment, like parades and thrilling movies.
Even Shakespeare plays have become such spectacular displays that
Shakespeare's dialogues are lost in the show. There's nothing
intrinsically wrong with these things, but our desire to escape from
boredom reflects our one-sided view of education--the view that
education is all about atmosphere.
The
Way the 1700's Implemented 'Education is a Life' Causes Intellectual
Weariness
An even more consuming fatigue set in at the end of the 1700's, and
that was also the result of focusing on a part instead of the whole of
education. 'Education is a life' was the formula then, although not
consciously. The result was an obsessive chasing after ideas. It's
pathetic to read about Madame de
Stael and her crowd, or the cultured group who met at the
fashionable court of Hotel Rambouillet, and stayed up late because they
couldn't sleep. They spent long nights making up character sketches of
each other, brain teasers, word puzzles, and other
pg 151
useless intellectual games. Then some of them would meet early for
breakfast to compose and sing little songs fashioned after specific
themes. That might bore us as much as it bored them. We might err by
focusing too much on one thing as they did, but at least we have less
stress because we aren't always restlessly pursuing interesting
notions. But their experience can be a lesson for us at the beginning
of the 1900's. Their mistake was that they didn't understand the
concept of proportion. We tend to focus on education as atmosphere;
they focused on education as ideas. But the truth includes both of these as well as a third
aspect of education.
The
Concept of Education as the Cultivation of Faculties Leads to Abnormal
Developments
The third part of the motto, 'Education is a discipline,' has always
had its supporters, and it still does. Everyone recognizes that
disciplined moral and intellectual habits make up an important third of
education. But we go too far if we imagine that certain qualities of
character and behavior can be produced like factory-spun thread
if we use some educational system, or math, or science or athletics. In
other words, it's excessive when the notion of developing supposed
'faculties' displaces the physical fact of how intellectual habits are
formed. The difference between the two may seem small, but two streams
that originate a foot apart from the same mountain can end up watering
two entirely different countries. Two educational concepts may seem similar, but in practice, they
often branch off in totally different directions. Plutarch's father
pg 152
made him study Homer to give him heroic ideas of life. If young
Plutarch had merely been forced to learn Homer as a part of the
classical grind for the purpose of 'developing faculties,' he would
have been turned into a stuffy scholar instead of a man who was in
touch with life in many different aspects who was able to analyze men's
affairs with his reasonable, charitable mind. I think that the attempt
to use discipline to develop the 'faculties' tends to produce one-sided
people--limited, as people always are who develop abnormally. An artist
told me recently that success as an artist requires total absorption
with art. A painter has to think pictures, paint pictures, nothing but
pictures. But when art was great, men weren't just artists. The Flemish
painter Quentin Matsys also worked with wrought iron and did other
things, too. Michelangelo wrote sonnets, designed buildings, and
painted. Marble sculpture wasn't his only way of expressing himself.
Leonardo Da Vinci wrote systematic discourses, designed canals, played
musical instruments, and did a hundred things, all excellently. But
then, the concept of isolating and training separate 'faculties' hadn't
occurred to these great men or their teachers.
Education
has Three Faces
Now that we're clear and sure that education doesn't have just one
face, we can move on and consider how 'education is a life' without
getting caught up in thinking that it's all there is to education.
One
of the Faces is Education is a Life
Jesus said, 'Man does not live by bread alone, but by every word that
proceeds from the mouth of God.' The importance of the occasion when He
spoke those words has tended to make us think that the words are limited
pg 153
to what we call the life of the soul. But actually, they include a
great educational principle that the Medieval Church understood better
than we do. I'd like to describe again a painting that so visibly
expresses our educational creed. You may be familiar with the frescoes
on the walls of the Spanish
Chapel in the Church of S. Maria Novella in Florence, Italy. Middle
Age philosophy dealt with theology as its subject matter. There's a lot
of religious culture of that time that we don't relate to on some of
the
walls, but on one specific part of the wall and roof, we have a
uniquely satisfying illustration of educational thought. At the top
of the picture, we see the Holy Spirit descending in the form of a
dove. Immediately below in the upper part are the disciples who first
received the Spirit's inspiration. Under them is a random crowd of
various nationalities who were brought indirectly under the influence
of that first outpouring of the Spirit, including a couple of dogs to
illustrate that even the animals benefited from this new grace. In the lower
part, we see the angelic figures who represent the cardinal
virtues, which we all agree are divinely inspired. They are floating
above the seated apostles and prophets, who Scripture says 'spoke as
they were moved by the Holy Spirit.' So far, this Medieval concept of
philosophy reveals nothing new to those of us familiar with the
elements of Christian truth. But below them are 28 people--those on
the right at the top are the captain figures, or idealized
pg 154
representations of the seven Liberal Arts. They are graceful and
beautiful and represent the familiar subjects of grammar, rhetoric,
logic, music, astronomy, geometry, and arithmetic, all under the
inspiration of the Holy Spirit. Medieval philosophy manifests itself as
even more liberal when we see that, directly at the feet of each of
these idealized figures is the person they considered to be the leader
and representative of that particular science: Priscian, Cicero,
Aristotle, Tubal Cain, Zoroaster, Euclid, and Pythagoras. Later, a
narrower view of religion would place these men outside the barrier of
Christianity, inferring that their teaching was outside of God's
spirit and thus secular. But in this picture, they're all shown
receiving the same divine outpouring as the disciples near the top.
A
Creed That Unifies Life
We naturally crave unity. Current thinking, as thinking has done for as
long as we can tell, seeks to establish some kind of principle that
will unify life. In this fresco we have a magnificent plan of unity. We
tend to think of spiritual holiness as one thing, and intellectual and
artistic yearnings as something totally separate, and moral virtues as
something we pick up from our environment and by inheritance. We don't
consider them as something related to our conscious religion. That's
why we often have so much discord in our lives, especially young,
devoted people who want to be pure and holy but who can't escape from
the overpowering draw of art, intellect and pure physical enjoyment.
But they've been taught that these things are worldly and alien to a
religious life and they need to choose one or other. So they make a
choice, and their choice isn't
pg 155
always what those who are nonscripturally and unphilosophically
narrow-minded would consider a godly choice. We should be thankful for
Taddeo Gaddi and Simone Memmi [for painting the fresco, although the
fresco is now attributed to Andrea da Firenze] because they gave
us a creed that shows that our devotion, virtue, intellect and even our
physical beauty come from the same source--God Himself. They're all
inspired by the same source--God's Holy Spirit. (Copies of the fresco could be purchased to
hang on our walls from 'La Discessa dello Spirot Santo' and Allegoria
filosofica della Religione Cattolica' in care of Mr. G. Cole, 1 Via
Torna Buoni, Forence; shilling size, numbers 4077 and 4093.) The
generations that were brought up in this creed were productive in all
kinds of areas. Venice's noble industry was more dignified and sobered
because of this concept that all ideas were inspired by God--trade,
justice, fair weights and measures, and practical use. Coleridge writes
that Columbus, informed by the divine idea, ventured out to discover a
new world. Coleridge adds that 'great inventions and ideas about nature
were given to men who were selected by a divine power even higher than
nature herself. These ideas suddenly unfold in a prophetic kind of
succession, these systematic views were destined to produce the most
important revolutions in the state of man.' When Columbus returned
after discovering a new world, the people and rulers assumed his
discovery was a
gift from God and sang praises to God.
The
Diet of Great Ideas
Michelangelo wrote to his friend Vittoria Colonna that 'good Christians
always create good, beautiful figures. In making a representation of
our adored Lord, it isn't enough for the artist to be a great skilled
master. I believe that he must also be a moral, righteous man, possibly
a saint, so that the Holy
pg 156
Spirit will give him inspiration.' The truth is, only one diet affords
what men and nations need to become great. And that diet is a diet of
great ideas passed on by a power even higher than Nature itself to
people who
have prepared themselves to receive them.
Science:
The Approved Teaching of Our Day
I think that the PNEU has the leaven that can leaven the whole lump of
dough. Let's determine to work with a purpose and passion. Let's
restore to the world that great scheme of unity in life that produced
such great men and great works in the past, and let's enrich that with
current knowledge. We don't need to be afraid that the kinds of ideas
that will help education will oppose science. Many of us feel, for good
reason, that science is the
new teaching that's being emphasized in our age. That makes some people
very happy. They see it as a sign that moral and religious struggles
are about to be eliminated from life, and then life, for better or
worse, will run along an easy inevitable path. Others are confused and
are desperately looking for a middle ground where science and religion
can be reconciled. Still others take refuge by rejecting the theory of
evolution and all that goes with it. They hope to cling to religion by
interpreting it more and more narrowly. Whichever group we fall into,
we probably err by not having enough faith.
First of all, let's be convinced that, for a believer, science and
religion can't possibly be at odds. Once we're assured of this, we
might be able to see scientific evolution as a process of
pg 157
revelation that's brought about in every case as far as I know by a
process described by Coleridge: 'Ideas about nature were given to men
who were selected by a divine power even higher than nature herself.
These ideas suddenly unfold in a prophetic kind of succession, these
systematic views were destined to produce the most important
revolutions in the state of man.' Huxley says that biology is useful
because it 'helps to give the right ideas in this world. After all,
this world is absolutely governed by ideas--and very often, by the
wildest and most hypothetical ideas.' He goes on, 'people who refuse to
go beyond the fact rarely get as far as the fact. Anyone who knows the
history of science knows that almost every advance has been made by the
anticipation of nature--in other words, by the invention of
hypothesis.' Surely men of science will find the unifying principle
they seek that Coleridge spoke of. If they did, then they would be able
to distinguish themselves, not just as the proclaimers of truth that
they're ready to take a stand for, but as servants of God who prepared
themselves to receive revelation from God, who is the Truth.
Evolution
is the Master-thought of the Age
Few of us can forget the mental image that Carlyle described of the Tiers etat [French commonality; the French nobles
refused to treat their concerns seriously and this was a cause of the
French Revolution of 1789] waiting for organization. 'Wise as
serpents, harmless as doves. What a spectacle for France! Six hundred
inhuman people who are needed to bring it back to life and save it, sit
on their long benches, desperately wishing for life.' Coleridge wrote
just as accurately about botany, although not as vividly. He said that
botany, as it existed in his day, was waiting for a unifying
pg 158
idea that would organize it. He wrote, 'What is Botany right now? Not
much more than an enormous collection of names, a huge catalog,
meticulously arranged. Every year and every month, more names are
added in various categories, and each has its own filing method and
reference system. It's the innocent diversion, healthy hobby and
impressive collection of amateurs. Botany still doesn't have the kind
of energy and devotion that true philosophers would give it.' Our
generation has been given the key word to interpret life, both animal
and plant, but we don't know what to do with it.
For
Ages, People Have Looked for a Unifying Principle
The human mind finds a great deal of rest and satisfaction in the
concept of evolution. But we shouldn't forget that, for three thousand
years, thinkers have been busy trying to explain the world with a
single principle that would also explain Reason and the human soul.
Herakleitos and the men of his time thought that they had found the
answer when they said that 'the true Being is forever changing.' They
thought that 'the universal change and evolving of things' explained it
perfectly. Demokritos and the men of his age thought they had solved
the riddle when they said, 'nothing exists except atoms moving around
in space.' Many times since then, with each world-changing discovery,
science has declared, 'I've solved the mystery!' when it's found a
principle that seems to explain all things and eliminate the existence
of personality.
But
Personality Still Remains
A little familiarity with history and philosophy will make us stop and
think. We'll recognize that each new discovery that has given the world
a
clearer concept of how nature works is like a lake that appears to be
pg 159
at its end, but as soon as your boat gets close enough, it proves to be
deceptive--it's really just an opening to a part of the lake that goes
even farther on! And knowledge from God is something like that. It does
more than give us the broader perspective that we get from knowing
history. Knowing about history teaches us that there's a 'stream of
tendency,' as Wordsworth puts it. There's an impersonal stream of force
that can't be measured, and it's shaping people and events. But beyond
that, there's also the variable force of Individual Personality that
has the ability to turn the 'stream of tendency' for its own purposes,
although Personality is just as likely to be swept away in its current.
Parents'
and Teachers' Attitudes About Evolution
It may seem like I'm dwelling on a topic that has little to do with
raising and teaching children. But I think that a vital part of a
parent's preparation is his own attitude about the concept of evolution
and age-appropriate lessons to teach it. If parents brush off the
driving ideas that move the age they live in, then they can hardly
expect to maintain influence over their children's minds. If they're
afraid and suspicious of new scientific revelations, then they'll plant
a seed of distrust and conflict in their children. On the other hand,
if they rush in like a zealous novice and proclaim the newest
scientific revelation as the final answer that explains everything
about human nature and even makes God unnecessary, unknowable or
distant and negligent, then they risk lowering the level of their
children's lives to the mere struggle for existence that we hear so
much about these days. Such a life has no reason to hope, set goals,
set oneself apart for God, or make sacrifices. But parents need to
recognize that every great concept in nature is like a new page of
God's revelation to people who are ready for the information. They need
to realize that a newly discovered scientific concept, no matter how
far-reaching and comprehensive it seems, is not final or conclusive.
pg 160
New ideas shouldn't be assumed to be in opposition against the personal
knowledge of God, which is the greatest knowledge of all. If parents
have this mindset, then their children will grow up with an attitude of
respect for science, reverence for God, and an open mind that's
appropriate for people whose lives are so short and who never get to
the point where they've learned everything there is to know. That's
enough about the diet of ideas that are being served to the world at
this time of history.
Education
is a World Concern
Maybe we include poetry, or art, or philosophy, who knows what else,
but we need to make sure of two things. We need to make sure that we,
as well as our children, stay in touch with the great thoughts that
educated the world in the past, and we need to maintain the right
attitude in ourselves and our children about the great ideas of our own
age. It's tempting to focus education on our personal favorite topics
so that we lose sight of the fact that education is a world concern.
The important lessons of the ages have already been determined. Each
generation needs to be concerned about the ideas of its own age, as
well as the ideas from all of the generations before it. After all,
nobody feels like they've mastered a book when all they've read is the
last page. And this brings me to the point that I'm anxious to share
with you.
We don't recognize how important the need is for the principle of unity
in education. We don't have one major 'Captain' idea that can make it
clear which of the many educational ideas floating around will suit our
purposes. Since we don't have any guiding principle to give us some
focus, we feel like we can pick and choose whatever strikes our fancy.
One person thinks science should be all the education his son gets.
Another likes the classics. A third prefers an education in mechanics.
A fourth thinks that a specialized technical education is a good idea,
and a fifth who's obsessed with physical health chooses a school that
makes nutrition and exercise the bulk
pg 161
of its program. (I don't mean to imply that we should neglect health,
but as long as general conditions are healthful, then it's best for
children not to focus much attention on their personal health.)
Everyone thinks he's free to do whatever seems right in his own eyes
when it comes to his children's education.
I'd like to discourage this kind of educational faddism as
strongly as I can. It's wrong to accept a one-sided concept as an
educational guide instead of a universal idea. Instead, I'd like to
constantly present, in season and out of season, one of these universal
ideas: the idea that education is the science of relationships.
Our
'Captain' Idea: Education is the Science of Relationships
A child should be brought up to have enthusiastic relationships with
earth
and water. He should run, ride, swim, skate, lift and carry. He should
be familiar with different textures and know how to work with different
materials. He should know the names of everything on the earth around
him--the birds, animals, insects, plants and trees, and he should know
where to find them in their natural habitat. He should be familiar with
literature, art, and the
thoughts of the past and the present. I don't mean that he should know all of these things. But when he
reads a newspaper article about the discovery of ancient frescoes from
the palace of King Minos in Crete, he should feel the same thrill that
the Cretan peasants felt when they were digging their gardens and their
shovels uncovered the frescoes. He shouldn't be thrilled just because
of the proximity of Crete to England, but because he has a living,
active
relationship with the past. Blood may be thicker than water, but
thought makes a person more alive than blood. The child also needs to
have a
living relationship with his own current era, and have a sense of
where it's going in historical movement, science, art, social issues and
pg 162
ideals. He needs to have a broad perspective, intimate relationships
with things all around him, and he should display a strong sense of
virtue in
what he does, determines, sympathizes with, and relates to. This isn't
an impossible goal. In fact, it can be pretty much accomplished in
any intelligent child by age thirteen or fourteen because it
doesn't depend on how much is
learned, but on how things
are learned.
A
Wider Curriculum
Children should be given a wide range of subjects with the goal of
establishing at least one of the relationships I mentioned in each
subject.
They should learn from first-hand sources--really good books, the best
ones available in each subject they're studying. They should get at the
books for themselves. They shouldn't have to listen to a flood of
diluting talk from their teacher. The teacher's job is to point things
out, stimulate interest, give guidance and provide limits in order to
help the child as he acquires knowledge. But in no way is the teacher
supposed to be the wellspring and source of all knowledge herself. The
less parents and teachers interpret for the child and lecture from
their own personal supply of information and opinions, the better for
the child. Pre-digested food fed to a healthy person doesn't help to
strengthen the digestion. Children must be allowed to reflect for
themselves and sort things out in their own minds. If they need help,
they'll ask for it.
We
Shouldn't Choose or Reject Subjects
With this 'Captain' Idea of Establishing Relationships as our guide,
it's easy to see how unwise it is to choose one subject or reject that
subject because we deem it more beneficial or less necessary to a
child's future. For example, we might decide that eight-year-old Thomas
doesn't need to waste his time studying Latin
pg 163
Grammar. We plan to give him a marketable skill or scientific
background; what good will Latin be towards that? But we don't realize
that we're depriving Thomas of more than a Latin Grammar
textbook. Thomas has to translate something like, 'Pueri formosos equos vident.' ['The boys see a beautiful horse.']
Thomas, being human, is a reflective being. He's heard something about
the strong Romans whose language he's now learning about. Roman boys
catch his interest. And he wishes he had one of their horses! The Latin
Grammar isn't just dull words to Thomas. At any rate, Thomas knows
better than we do that 'dull' doesn't apply to words! I know that it's
only every now and then that a notion grasps the attention of young
boys, but when it happens, it works wonders and does more for his
education than years and years of the daily grind of textbooks and
lectures.
Let's try, however imperfectly, to make education a science of
relationships. In other words, in one or more subjects, let's try to
let children work with living ideas. When it comes to education, even
small efforts are honored with great rewards. We believe that the kind
of education we're giving exceeds everything we intended or imagined.
pg 164
This chapter appears in a Parents Review article.
Chapter
15 - School Books and How They Bring About Education
Line
Upon Line
'School books' isn't a new topic, and everything I'm going to say here
is what I've already written in other volumes. But we aren't like the
men of Athens who got together regularly because they wanted to hear or
share something exciting and new. I'm sure you won't mind hearing the
same thing again.
An
Incident in the Lives of School Girls
In Frederika Bremer's 1837 novel, The
Neighbors, she writes with some spirit about an incident that
happened to some school girls. It may be a bit autobiographical. This
segment taken from the book is long, but I think it will be
appreciated. It illustrates my point better than any simple arguments I
could make.
The heroine says, 'I was sixteen at the time. Fortunately, since I had
a restless character, my right
pg 165
shoulder started to stick out. Gymnastics were the popular way to treat
all kinds of physical defects, so my parents decided to let me try
gymnastics. I was clothed in pantaloons with colored trim, a green
Bonjour coat, and a little bonnet with a pink ribbon. When I first
showed up, there was a group of thirty to forty other girls wearing the
same outfit I had on. They were happily swarming all over a large
public room, over ropes, ladders and poles. It was a strange, new thing
for me to see. I stayed in the background the first day, and my
governess taught me how to do a backbend and some arm and leg
exercises. The second day, I made friends with some of the girls. The
third day, I matched them on the ropes and ladders, and by the second
week, I was the leader of the second class and was encouraging the
others to try all kinds of new tricks.
'At that time, I was studying Greek history in my school lessons. Even
during gymnastics, my imagination was filled with Greek heroes and
their heroic deeds. So I suggested to my group that we should take on
ancient Greek men's names and that we should refuse to answer to any
other name during gymnastics. We took on such names as Agamemnon and
Epaminondas. I chose the name Orestes, and I called my best friend in
the class Pylades. There was a tall, thin girl with a Finnish accent
that I didn't like, mostly because of her disrespect for me and my
ideas, and she didn't care who knew it . . . this resulted in some
quarrels.
'I loved Greek history, but I also loved Swedish history. I idolized
Charles XII, and I often entertained the other girls with stories about
his deeds until my own soul
pg 166
was glowing with enthusiasm. Like a bucket of cold water, Darius (the
tall girl whose real name was Britsa) came into the midst of us one day
and asserted that Czar Peter I was a much greater man than Charles XII.
I reacted to her challenge with blind zeal and concealed rage. She
stated her case, bringing forth various arguments with coolness and
skill
to support her opinion. When I refuted her arguments and thought I had
won the victory and proved my hero the better man, she kept throwing
Bender and Pultawa in my way. [Charles
XII of Sweden and Czar Peter were enemies in the Great Northern War of
the early 1700's. Charles lost a battle at Pultawa/Poltava, in the
Ukraine, and fled to Bender, in the Ottoman Empire. That loss marked
the end of the Swedish Empire, and the rise of Peter's Russia.]
Oh, Pultawa! Pultawa! Many tears have been shed over your bloody
battlefield, but none were more bitter than the ones I shed later in
secret because, just like Charles XII, it proved to be my defeat, too.
She kept adding fuel until I finally cried out, 'I demand
satisfaction!' Darius only laughed and said, 'Bravo! Bravo!' I
exclaimed, 'You have insulted me disgracefully. I request that you
apologize in front of the class and acknowledge that Charles XII is a
better man than Czar Peter I, or else I'll fight you, unless you're a
coward who has no honor!' Britsa Kaijsa blushed, but she said with
detestable coolness, 'Apologize? I think not. I wouldn't dream of it.
You want to fight? Fine, I have no objection. Where shall we fight, and
with what? With pins?' 'With swords, if you're not afraid, and right
here. We can meet here half an hour before everyone else gets here.
I'll bring the swords. Pylades will be my second, and you can choose
your own second.' . . . So, the next morning, I entered the large, open
room and found my enemy already there with her second. Darius and I
saluted one another proudly
pg 167
and coolly. I let her have first choice of the swords. She took one and
flourished it around with some skill, as if she was used to handling
one. I began to have visions of myself in my imagination with a sword
in my heart . . . Darius cried out, 'Czar Peter was a great man!' 'Down
with him! Long live Charles XII!' I cried, bursting into a furious
rage. I positioned myself in an attitude of defense, and so did Darius
. . . our swords clashed one against the other. The next moment, I was
disarmed and thrown on the ground. Darius stood over me, and I thought
my last hour had arrived. But I was surprised when my enemy threw down
her sword, grabbed my hand to help me up, and cheerfully said, 'Okay,
now you've had satisfaction. Let's be good friends again. You're one
brave person!' Just at that moment, a tremendous noise was heard at the
door, and the fencing instructor and three other teachers rushed in. At
that point, I passed out.'
I hope none of you are like naughty children who enjoy the thrill of
the
story but miss the moral. What follows is actually the moral of this
fascinating tale.
How
Did the Girls Get Their Enthusiasm?
What was it in their school lessons that so excited these Swedish
girls? There is no hint that their zeal came from anything but school
reading. It could only have come from their books. Oral lessons for
young children and class lectures for older students hadn't been
invented in the early 1700's. We use books in our school rooms,
too--but we never hear this kind of wild enthusiasm and uncontrolled
passion over events recorded in history books, or dry
pg 168
facts in science textbooks. Those Swedish girls must have used a
different kind of book, and it's in our best interest to find out what
kind. It would be hard to find records of them, so we'll have to look
for clues from the girls themselves. We can't go to them and ask
directly, but if we can figure out what they were, we'd be able to make
a pretty good guess at what fired their souls.
What
Kind of Book Sustains the Life of Thought?
All we can tell from the story is that they were intelligent girls who
were probably raised by intelligent parents. But that's enough for our
purposes. The next question is, What kind of book will work its way
into the mind of an intelligent child with enough force to change the
child's thinking? We don't need to ask what the child likes--girls
often like twaddly goody-goody stories, and boys tend to enjoy
thrilling tales of adventure. We're all capable of being drawn to
mental junk food of a poor quality because it's stimulating and
exciting. This kind of mental candy is fine when our brains need the
rest of an arm chair, but our spiritual minds need a more sustaining
diet, whether we're boys or girls or grown-ups. When I say spiritual, I
mean our souls as opposed to our physical bodies. We could just as
easily use a phrase like thought-life, or the part of us that feels, or
the life of the soul.
It's interesting how every question, no matter how superficial it
seems, leads us to foundational principles. Even the simple question,
What kind of school books should our children use? leads us right to
one of the two main principles that are foundational to educational
thought.
Publishers'
Text-Books
I think
pg 169
that spiritual life, in the sense I just mentioned, is only maintained
on one kind of diet--a diet of ideas. Ideas are the living fruit of
living minds. If we ask any publisher for a catalog of their school
books, we'll find that the general nature of school books is that
they're drained dry of any living thought. It may have some thinker's
name on it, but then it's usually an abridgment of an abridged edition.
All that's left for the unfortunate student is the bare dusty bones of
the subject with all the warm flesh, living color, breath of life and
movement sanitized away. Nothing is left except what Oliver Wendell
Holmes calls, 'the mere brute fact.'
It can't be said too often that information isn't the same as
education. A student might answer an exam question correctly about the
location of the Seychelles and the Comoto Islands without ever being
nourished by the fact that they lay in a specific longitude and
latitude--those are merely dry facts. But if he could follow whaler
Frank Bullen in The Cruise of the
Cachelot, then the mere names of the islands would excite the
little mental receptors, showing that real knowledge has taken place.
The
Reason for Oral Teaching
Intelligent teachers know how dry and dull text-books are, so they
resort to oral lessons that are designed not to be 'bookish.' But
living ideas can only come from living minds. Occasionally a vital
spark is flashed from the teacher to the student. But this only happens
when the subject is one that the teacher has personally given some
original thought to. In most cases, the oral lesson, or, with older
students, the more advanced lecture, consists of information that the
teacher picked up from various books, and that information is relayed
to the student in language that's a bit academic, or rather
pg 170
common, or dumbed down. Even a gifted teacher isn't likely to have a
living interest and, therefore, original thought, about a wide variety
of subjects.
Limitations
of Teachers
We want to place the children in front of open doors that lead to lots
of different fields of learning and delight, and every one should offer
the child some fresh, invigorating thoughts. We can't expect schools to
have a staff of a dozen master-minded geniuses. Even if they did, and
students were taught by all of them, it would be to their disadvantage.
What the student needs from his teachers is moral and mental
discipline, encouragement, and direction. All in all, it's better for
the student if his training is managed by one wise teacher instead of
being passed from one teacher to another for different subjects.
Our
Goal in Education is To Give a Full Life
Now we begin to realize what it is that we need. Children require so
much from us. We owe it to them to spark their interest in a lot of
different things. 'You have set me in a wide, spacious place' should be
the delighted expression of every intelligent soul. Life should be full
of
living. It shouldn't be spent merely passing time doing tedious
activities. I don't mean that life should be nothing but doing, or
nothing but feeling, or nothing but thinking. That would be too
intense. When I say that life should be full of living, I mean that
we should be in touch and able to relate with some genuine interest no
matter where we are, what we hear, or what we see. This kind of
interest isn't something we give to children. In fact, we'd prefer that
children never say that they've learned botany or chemistry or
conchology or geology or astronomy, or whatever. The question isn't how
much a student knows after he's completed his education, but how much
he cares, and how many categories
pg 171
of things he cares about. How wide and spacious is the place he's been
set in? And, so, how full is the life he has in his future? It's true
that you can bring a horse to water but you can't make him drink. The
problem is that we're not even bringing the 'horse' to water. We give
him pathetic little text-books that are nothing but outlines of dry
facts, and the student is supposed to memorize them and spit them back
out when it's exam time. Or else we give him assorted facts that have
been diluted in talks prepared by his teacher that might still have a
spark or two of living thought hiding somewhere in the mixture. And
yet, all this time, we have a treasure of books that are swarming with
ideas fresh from the minds of brilliant thinkers in every subject we'd
want to expose children to.
We
Don't Appreciate Children
The truth is, we don't appreciate children. We've heard the concept so
often lately that an infant is nothing but a huge oyster who gradually
develops into a wonderful, moral intellectual adult, that we've come to
think that the only food that's appropriate for children's 'little
minds' is intellectual spoon-feedings. It means nothing to us that
William Morris read his first Waverley
novel when he was only four years old, and he finished the entire
series by the time he was seven. It didn't do him any harm--in fact, he
lived and prospered, unlike John Evelyn's son Richard, who died three
days after his fifth birthday, which makes us wonder when we read that
he 'had a passion for Greek, could translate English into Latin and
Latin into English easily. He had a natural talent for mathematics and
knew different propositions of Euclid by heart.' I'm quoting young
pg 172
Richard (one could hardly call such an experienced child Little
Ritchie!) as a warning, not an example to aspire to, Macauley seems to
have started life as a great reader. There's a cute story about how
Hannah More paid a visit to his parents when he was four years old. He
came forward with the most charming hospitality and said, 'if you'll be
good enough to come in, I'll bring you a glass of spirits.' He
explained afterwards that 'Robinson Crusoe often had some!'
Children
of the Previous Generation
We can dismiss these children as exceptionally gifted. But I mention
them to remind us that our grandparents recognized that children were
reasonable beings, people who had minds and consciences like they did,
but who needed their guidance and control since they didn't yet have
knowledge or experience. Look at the strange antique children's books
that have been passed down to us. They treated children, first and
foremost, as reasonable, intelligent and responsible people. This is
what distinguished family life in previous generations. As soon as the
baby was aware of his surroundings, he was expected to be morally and
intellectually responsible.
Children
as They Are
Children haven't changed. They're still the same as they were
then--more acutely intelligent, more keenly logical, more alert to
observe, quicker in moral sensitivity, more abounding in love and faith
and hope--in fact, they're just like us in every way, only more so. Yet they're totally
ignorant of the world and what's in it, and of us and the way we are,
and, most of all, how to manage and channel and express the limitless
possibilities that they're born with.
Our
Job is to Give Enlivening Ideas
We know that the brain is where habit originates, and that
pg 173
behavior and character are both the result of whatever habits we
develop. We also know that an inspiring idea sparks a new habit of
thought, and, therefore, a new habit of life. We recognize that
education's great work is to inspire children with enlivening ideas in
every area of life, every category of knowledge, every subject we think
about, and to deliberately help children to develop the habits of good
living that come from inspiring ideas. In attempting this important
task, we seek and have the promise of receiving the help of God's
Spirit. We recognize His Spirit in a sense that's new to our modern way
of thinking--we recognize Him as the Supreme Educator, teaching humans
things that men have labeled as secular, as much as He teaches them
things that are considered religious.
pg 174
Chapter
16 - How to Use School Books
Disciplinary
Subjects
Now that we've clarified our goal, we begin to ask
ourselves, 'Is there a productive idea behind each of the subjects that
our students are studying?' We no longer believe that 'developing the
faculties' is the most important part of education. If any subject
doesn't originate from some great thought in life, we perceive it as
unhealthy and unproductive, and we reject it. But we keep the subjects
that encourage habits of clear, orderly thinking. Math, grammar, logic,
etc. aren't purely disciplinary. They do help develop intellectual
'muscle.' We don't advocate getting rid of the traditional subjects of
education for school lessons, but we value them for different reasons.
We no longer believe that their worth is in developing specific
'faculties.' We appreciate them even more because we know that they
leave real physical impressions on the brain tissue.
'Open,
Sesame'
If we'd quit thinking of ourselves as assorted 'faculties' and instead
recognize that we're individuals whose job is to get in touch with all
kinds of other people in varying circumstances, from all countries,
climate and times, then we'd have a great educational revolution.
pg 175
History would seem fascinating. Literature would be like a magic mirror
helping us to discover other minds. Studying sociology would be a duty
that we'd delight in. We'd become responsive, wise, humble and
reverent, and we'd recognize the responsibilities and true joy that
make up a full human life. It's too ambitious to think we can achieve
that kind of curriculum, but we can keep it in view. Even that will
help since every human life is shaped after whatever the person
idealizes.
The
Bible is the Great Storehouse of Moral Impressions
Although summaries of its moral teachings can be valuable, it's the
Bible itself that we need, because it's the great storehouse of moral
examples. Here' a quote from De Quincey about this:
'Among all of the vast collection of books in our room when I was
little, there was a Bible, illustrated with lots of pictures. During
long, dark evenings, my three sisters and I would sit by the fire, and
this was the book we would request most often. It had a power to move
us that was as mysterious as music. We all loved our young governess.
Sometimes she would try to explain the parts that confused us, although
she was no expert. We children would be touched with a pensive
moodiness. The restless gloom and sudden radiance of the room caused by
the flickering fire perfectly matched our evening feelings. They also
suited the divine relations of God's power and mysterious beauty that
awed us so much. Most of all, the story of Jesus, the just man who was
man and yet not man, but more real than anything else, and yet more
shadowy and obscure than anything else, who suffered an intense death
in Palestine, brooded over our minds like a morning mist broods over a
pond. Our governess understood and explained the main differences in
the climate to the east. As it happens, all of the differences
pg 176
express themselves in varying relation to the great wonders and powers
of summer. The cloudless sunlights in Syria seemed to indicate that it
was summertime. The disciples picking corn must also have been in the
summer. The very name Palm Sunday, which is a festival in the English
Church, troubled me like an anthem.'
The
Effect Of Our Formal Liturgy on Children
I can't resist from quoting De Quincy again as he beautifully describes
the effect that our liturgy had on him when he was a child. 'On Sunday
mornings, I went to church with the rest of family. The church was
modelled after the ancient churches in England. It had aisles,
galleries, an organ, all old, sacred things, and everything had
majestic proportions. The congregation would kneel during the long
liturgical prayer. When we came to the passage where God is asked to
help on behalf of 'all sick people and young children,' which is just
one of many prayers that are loved for their beauty, I would weep
secretly. Then I would raise my tear-filled eyes and look at the upper
windows of the gallery. On sunny days, I'd see a beautiful sight that
was as inspiring as anything that the prophets ever saw. The sides of
the windows were ornamented with lots of stained glass. The sun would
shine through deep purples and reds so that the heavenly light from the
sun would be mingled with the gorgeous earthly colors of man-made glass
art, illuminating what's the best in mankind. The windows had pictures
of the apostles who had once walked on the earth, serving others
because of God's love for mankind. And there were martyrs who had stood
firm for truth even through flames, pain, and the disapproval of many
hostile, insulting enemies. There were saints who had withstood
temptations
pg 177
and glorified God by humbly submitting to His will.' 'God speaks to
children, too. Sometimes He speaks to them in dreams and in messages
that come in the darkness. But, most of all, He speaks in solitude,
when His voice can be heard because the heart is meditative enough to
hear Him in the truths and services of a public church. God holds
'undisturbed communication' with children. Solitude can be as silent as
light. But it is also as mighty as light because solitude is necessary
to people. Everyone comes into this world alone, and everyone leaves it
alone.'
Principles
on Which to Base Book Selection
The right books have the ability to inspire and stir the emotions. But
that makes us ask, which are
the right books? And I don't want to claim that I have the answer to
that question. Someone might compile a list of 'the hundred best books
for school,' but it won't be me. But I'd like to give one or two
principles about selecting books, and leave the more difficult task of
applying those principles to my readers. For one thing, I think it's
important for children to dig for knowledge for themselves from the
appropriate books in all their subjects. We owe them that. There are
two reasons for this. When a child works and finds something for
himself, it's his for life. But whatever comes too easily from hearing
it like a casual song in the air, tends to float out of the mind as
easily as it floated in. It rarely gets assimilated. I don't mean that
lectures and oral lessons are totally useless, but their role should be
to inspire and give direction to what's learned. They shouldn't be the
medium used to dispense knowledge, and they shouldn't replace the part
of education that comes from appropriate knowledge given in the
appropriate way.
Like I've already said, ideas need to come from the thinker's mind
directly, and it's mostly with the books they wrote that we make
contact with the best minds.
pg 178
Signs
of a Suitable Book
A couple of things can be said about the distinguishing marks of a good
school book. The right book isn't necessarily a big book. When John
Quincy Adams was nine years old, he wrote to his father to ask for the
fourth volume of Tobias Smollett to read in his free time, although he
admitted that he was more preoccupied thinking about birds eggs. Maybe
some of my readers remember reading systematically through the many
volumes of Alison's History of Europe,
privately priding ourselves on how much good we were doing for
ourselves by getting through such a big book. But these days, even
great men write short books, although these books should be used with
discretion because they're sometimes nothing more than abridgments, the
dry dull bones of the subject. But sometimes a short book is fresh and
living. Secondly, it isn't necessary to insist on using only books
written by original thinkers. In some cases, a mediocre mind is able to
assimilate the knowledge about a subject and reprocess it in a form
that's more suitable for students than what the original thinker wrote.
There's no hard and fast rule. A thick book, a short book, a first-hand
source or a second-hand one--either one might be the right book, as
long as we're able to tell when a book is living, able to quicken the
mind, and full of living ideas about its subject.
How
to Use the Right Books
So much for how to tell which are the right books. The right way to use
them is another matter. The children need to enjoy the book. Each of
the ideas in the book needs to make a sudden delightful impact on the
child's mind, causing an intellectual awakening that signifies that an
idea has been born. The teacher's role in this is to see and feel for
himself, and then to prompt his students with an appreciative look or
pg 179
comment. But he needs to be careful that he doesn't deaden the
impression of the idea with too much talking. Intellectual sympathy is
stimulating, but we've all been like the little girl who said, 'Mom, I
think I'd be able to understand it if you'd stop explaining so much.'
One teacher said this about a student--'I find it so hard to tell
whether she's really grasped the concept, or whether she just knows the
mechanics of getting the right answer.' Children are like little
monkeys. All they usually get from a flood of explantions is the trick
of coming up with the right answer.
Children
Need to Work
This process of getting ideas fom the text isn't the only thing we need
to do with books. 'In all work there's some profit.' At least, there's
profit in some work. A book
needs to make a child expend some effort in thinking. The child
needs to make generalizations, classify, infer, make judgments, be able
to visualize, discriminate, or use his capable mind to work in some
kind of way until the knowledge in the book is sorted so that some is
assimilated and some is rejected, according to his own decision. In the
end, he's the one who decides what he'll get out of a book, not his
teacher.
The
Value of Narration
The easiest way to deal with a paragraph or chapter is to have the
child narrate it after a single reading that he's paid close attention
to. Only one reading, no matter how slow, should be the requirement,
because we tend to make sure we'll have another opportunity to 'find
out what it's all about.' If we don't get a clear grasp of the daily
news, there's always a weekend edition. If we still haven't got it,
there's a monthly news magazine, or a quarterly review, or an annual
report. In fact, many of us are content to let present events, history
in the making, pass right by us, and it doesn't bother us. We have a
false sense of security in knowing that, in the end, we'll find out
what happened one way or another. This is a bad habit to get into. We
should make sure that our children don't get into that habit
pg 180
by not giving them a vague expectation that there will always be a
second and third and tenth opportunity to do what should have been done
the first time.
A
Single Careful Reading
There's a big difference between intelligent reading that a child does
in silence, and a mere cramming of information in order to repeat it
back like a parrot. It's a good educational exersize for the child to
be able to give the different points in a descrption, or put a series
of events in proper sequence, or reconstruct the line of an argument
point
by point--after reading the passage just once. This is a skill that
lawyers, publishers and scholars work to acquire. It's an ability that
children can acquire easily. And, once they have it, they'll have
crossed the bridge that divides readers from non-readers.
Other
Uses For Books
But that's only one way to use books. Some other things that can be
done are numbering the statements in a paragraph or chapter, analyzing
a chapter, dividing a chapter into paragraphs with suitable subtitles,
arranging and classifying series, tracing causes to results and tracing
results back to causes, analyzing the characters of people in a book
and considering how character and circumstances work together to
produce a certain outcome--getting life lessons and learning how to
act, which is the living knowledge that can make practical science out
of any book. All of this is possible for students. In fact, they
haven't truly begun their education until they start using books this
way.
The
Teacher's Role
First of all, the teacher's role is to see what needs to be done by
looking over the day's lessons beforehand to see what mental discipline
and vital knowledge can be gotten from various lessons, and then to
plan questions and tasks that will give his students a full scope
pg 181
of mental activity. Writing notes in the margins of books is fine if
it's done neatly and beautifully--books should be handled with respect.
Numbers, letters and underlining can be used to help spot points and to
save the needless work of writing out notes. Let the student write out
a half dozen questions about the passage studied. He doesn't even need
to write out the answers if he understands that the mind can only truly
know whatever it can rephrase as an answer to a question that it asks
itself.
Disciplined
Studies Must Not Come Between the Child and the Soul of the Book
These few suggestions aren't meant to thoroughly exhaust all the
disciplined uses of a good school book. But we do need to make sure
that our systematic exercises and other tools to help grasp and
categorize knowledge don't come between the child and the living
thought that comprises the soul of the book. Science is promising so
much these days, nature seems to be unfolding right before us, art is
revealing so much meaning to us, the world is becoming so abundantly
rich for us, that we're in a bit of danger of neglecting the art of
getting nourishment from books. Let's not impoverish our lives and our
children's lives. As the golden words of Milton say,
'Books aren't static dead things. They contain the potency of life
within them so that they can be as active as the mind who wrote them.
They preserve the purest power and expression of the living mind that
created them, as if it were in a bottle. Killing a good book is almost
like killing a man. Whoever kills a man kills a good, reasonable being
created in God's image, but whoever kills a good book kills reason
itself, and kills the image of God itself.'
pg 182
Chapter
17 - Education as the Science of Relationships:
We are Educated by Our
Intimacies as Illustrated by Wordworth's Prelude and Ruskin's Praeterita
'But who's going to divide up his intellect in some geometric pattern,
Splitting up his mind like a province of neatly shaped farmlands?
Who can know in which moment his first habits were sown, like seeds?
Who can point to different areas of his mind and say,
That part of the river of my mind came from that particular fountain
over there'?
[adapted from Wordsworth's 'Prelude']
I don't need to emphasize what kind of educational tools we should use.
We know that 'Education is an atmosphere, a discipline, a life.' By
that, we mean that parents and teachers should know how to make the
best use of a child's circumstances
(atmosphere) in order to advance a solid education; they should
cultivate his self-discipline by training him to have the kind of habits that will make his life run
smoothly (discipline), and they should nourish his mind with ideas, since that's the kind of
mental food that develops their personalities (life).
Only
Three Educational Tools
We believe that these are the only three tools that we can validly use
in raising children. Any shortcut we take by taking advantage of their
sensitivities,
pg 183
emotions, desires, or passions will bring grief to both us and our
children. The reason is simple: habits, ideas and circumstances are all
external and it's never wrong to help any person to improve in those
things, but it's wrong to directly interfere with someone else's
personality. It isn't right to play on his ego, his fears, his
affection, his ambition, or anything that's his by right and is a part
of what makes him the unique individual that he is.
Our
Limitations
Most conscientious people are sincerely concerned about the best way to
bring up children. But that can sometimes make us want to control more
than we're entitled to, and not recognize the boundaries that limit us
to only the outer manifestations of the child's personality. Adults and
children aren't much different. One gracious writer has helped us by
following Jesus's method of educating the twelve disciples.
He writes, 'Our Lord respected whatever the person had within himself
on his own, and He was very careful to encourage the natural
development of his individual personality . . . In His view, people
weren't merely clay in the hands of a potter to be molded into shape.
He saw them as organic, living beings, with their own individuality
growing from within, with a life of their own--a unique, personal life
that was enormously precious to Him and His Father. He encouraged this
development so that it would grow to its highest, most noble
potential.' (Pastor
Pastorum, by H. Latham, M.A., pg 6)
We
Manage Too Much of Children's Lives
I don't think we allow life and normal circumstances to just naturally
occur in children's lives. We control too much, as if we were shielding
little lambs from the wind. We shelter them from knowledge about pain,
sin,
need, suffering, disease, death
pg 184
and other hazards in ordinary life. I'm not saying we should expose
children's tender souls to distress with careless abandon, but we
should recognize that life has a calling for them, as much as it does
for us. Nature provides
them with a subtle protection, as subtle as the scent of a violet, that
screens them from traumatic shocks. Some parents won't even read their
children fairy tales because they're afraid that they'll expose the
children to the ugly facts of life too suddenly. It's worthwhile for us
to consider Wordsworth's experience. I don't think we make use of two
very useful treasures that we as parents and teachers could be using.
Those treasures are the autobiographies of two great
philosophers--William Wordsworth and John Ruskin.
Fairy
Tales Act as a Screen and Shelter
Wordsworth tells us that, shortly after he started school at Hawkshead,
the body of a suicide victim was found in Esthwaite Lake. It was
a ghastly incident, but we can take comfort when we see how children
are protected from shock. Wordsworth, the little boy, was there, and
saw it all:
'Yet, as young as I was, not even nine years old,
No depressing fear possessed me, because, in my mind,
I had seen such sights before among silvery streams
Of fairyland in the romantic forests.
The memory of my imaginings covered the real tragedy
With an ornament of perfect grace.
It gave the incident a dignity, a smoothness, like the works
Of Greek art, or the purest poetry.'
It's reassuring to hear a child who went through it say that such a
terrible scene was kept separate from him by an atmosphere of poetry,
and a veil woven from fairy tales by his own fanciful imagination.
That doesn't mean that we should take unnecessary risks. We should use
pg 185
a calm, matter-of-fact tone when we talk about fires, car wrecks or
other terrors. For some children, the thought of Joseph being in the
pit is scary, and even many of us adults can't handle a horrifying tale
in the news or literature. The only thing I'm suggesting is that we
treat children naturally and let them have their fair share in
experiencing life as it really is. We shouldn't allow too much caution,
or let our own panic dictate the way we deal with them.
Spontaneous
Living
As we know, the laws of habit are one of God's divine laws. Forming
good habits and inhibiting bad habits are some of a parent's most
important duties. But we need to remember that all habits, whether
they're helpful ones or hindering ones, only come into play
occasionally. Spontaneous living is going on all the time, and the only
thing we can do to help that is to drop in inspiring ideas when we have
the opportunity. All of this is old news, but I hope my readers will
indulge me in saying again that our educational tools don't change,
they stay the same. We can't leave out carefully and tactfully forming
good habits any more than we can leave out subtly suggesting productive
ideas and taking wise advantage of circumstances in our child's life.
What
Does Fullness of Life Depend On?
What exactly is education?
The answer lies in this phrase: Education
is the Science of Relationships.
As I said before, I don't mean it in the sense that Herbart did. He
meant that ideas are related to each other, so we need to take care and
be sure to pack the right ideas in the right order so that, once
they've gotten into the child's mind, each idea can attach itself to
its cousins and form a cliquish 'apperception mass.' What I mean is
that we personally have relationships with everything that exists right
now, everything
pg 186
that's ever existed in the past, and everything that will exist in the
future above us and all around us, and, for each of us, our fullness of
life, broadness of mind, expression and ability to be useful depends on
how much we grasp these relationships and how many of them we seize.
George Herbert expresses it well:
'Man is all symmetry,
Full of proportions, one limb connected to another,
And connected to the whole world
besides;
Each part of him can call on its farthest brother,
Because the head and the foot have a private bond,
And both have a connection with
moons and tides.' (Charlotte Mason added the italics.)
Every child is heir to a vast inheritance, inheriting all of the past
ages and
everything in the present. The question is, what procedures (speaking
educationally, not of legal papers) are necessary so that he can take
possession of what's already his? The point of view is changed. It's no
longer subjective, but objective regarding the child.
The
Child is a Person
Seen from this perspective, we no longer talk about how to develop his
faculties, or how to train his moral nature, or guide his religious
sentiments, or educate him towards his future career or social
standing. We don't need the joys of 'child-study.' Instead, we accept
the child as he is--a person with a lot of healthy affinities and
inborn attachments. Therefore, we perceive that our task is to give him
a chance to make the largest number of these attachments good [by
exposing him to as many things as possible.]
A
Baby's Self-Education
Infants are born into the world with hundreds of these inborn
pg 187
sensors, and they go right to work to establish them with surprising
energy:
'The baby,
Nursed in his mother's arms, sinks off to sleep
Rocked on his mother's breast. With his soul,
He drinks in the feelings of his Mother's eyes!
For him, there exists in one dear Person
A virtue that radiates and exalts
Things through the widest connections of sense.
He's no bewildered and depressed outcast.
All of his infant veins are interfused with
The appealing and obligatory bond
Of nature that connects him with the world.'
(adapted from The Prelude)
He attaches his being to Mother, Father, Sister, Brother, Grandma, the
man in the street that he calls 'dada,' the cat and dog, spider and
fly. Earth, air, fire and water are dangerously fascinating to
him. His eyes crave light and color, his ears crave sound, his limbs
crave movement. He's interested in everything, and from everything he
receives:
'That calm delight
Which, if I'm not mistaken, must surely belong
To those first inborn attractions that help connect
Our new existence to things that exist in the real world,
And, in our first days, make up
The bond that joins life with joy.'
(adapted from The Prelude)
And, when he's left to himself, he also gets real knowledge about each
thing, and that knowledge reinforces his relationship with that
particular thing.
Our
Role is to Remove Obstacles and to Pique Interest
Later on, we step in to educate him. It's only in the proportion to how
many living relationships we expose him to that he'll have wide,
meaningful interests that will give his life fullness. It's only in
proportion to how aware he's made
pg 188
of the laws that govern every relationship, that his life will be lived
in duty and service. As he learns that every relationship with both
people and things needs to be maintained with deliberate effort, he'll
recognize the laws of work, and the joy of labor. Our role is to remove
obstacles, pique interest and provide guidance to the child who's
trying to get in touch with the vast world of things and thoughts--the
vast world that's his rightful inheritance.
Our
Mistake
The tragic mistake that we make is that we assume that we're the tour
guide who's going to show him the world. Not only that, but we act like
there's no connection between the child and the universe unless we
decide to set one up for him. We imagine that we have all the control,
and if we decide that a low-income child only needs to be educated in
the 3R's, what right does he have to want anything more? If his idea of
life is Saturday nights spent
partying at the local bar, it's not our fault! If our own children
graduate from high school and college and don't have any meaningful
interests or connections to worthwhile things, we're convinced that
that's not our fault, either. We resent it when they're called 'dull
slouches' because we know that they're really decent people. And so
they are. They're splendid material that never quite completed in
development.
Business
and Desire
Hamlet said,
'Every man has business and desire.'
That was undoubtedly true in the boundless days of the great Queen
Elizabeth. But what about us? Yes, we have business, but do we have
desire? Are there lots of enthusiastic interests calling to us after
we're done with the work we have to do? Maybe not, otherwise we
wouldn't be enslaved by the uninspired 'joys' of Ping-Pong, Solitaire,
Bridge and other trivial games. The
pg 189
thing is, real interests aren't things that can be picked up on a whim
at the spur of the moment. They spring up from affinities that we find
and hold onto. As one old writer said, 'When it comes to worldly and
material things, whatever is used is spent and gone. But when it comes
to intellectual and spiritual things, whatever isn't used is lost.'
Once we recognize that it's up to us to provide more for our children
than financial security, the question is, how do we go about it?
Setting
Up Dynamic Relationships
A child should have what we call dynamic
relationships with the earth and water. He needs to run, jump,
dance, ride and swim. Here's an example of how not to do it from Praeterita:
'And so on to Lianberis and up Snowdon . . . if only my parents had
recognized my real strengths and weaknesses. If only they would have
given me a shaggy old Welsh pony and let me spend time with a good
Welsh guide and
his wife! If I'd tried to get any coddling, they would made a man of me
. . . If only! But they could never have done that, it would have been
as unlikely as throwing my cousin Charles into the Croydon Canal. My
father took some time off from his work once or twice a week and took
me to an enclosed square sky-lit riding school in Moorfields with
sawdust on the floor. It was more like a prison. Even the smell of it
as we turned into the gate to enter it was a terror and a horror and
abomination to me. There, they put me on big horses that jumped and
reared up, and circled, and sidled. I fell off every time the horse did
any of these things. I was a shame to my family, and felt disgraced and
miserable. Finally I sprained the forefinger on my right hand (it's
never been the same since) and riding school was abandoned. They bought
me a well-broken Shetland pony and the two of us were led around the
roads of Norwood with a rope by a riding teacher.
pg 190
'I would do pretty well as long as we were going straight, but then my
mind would wander and I'd fall off when we turned a corner. I might
have gotten the hang of it if they hadn't made a fuss about it and
continued to ask how much I'd stayed on and how many times I fell off,
but as soon as I'd get home, my mother would give me the third degree
about my day's disgraces, and I just got more stressed and nervous with
each fall. Finally, riding lessons were given up altogether. My parents
consoled themselves as best they could by concluding that my inability
to ride horseback must signify that I had great genius in some other
area.'
Ruskin's
Accusations About the Limitations of His Situation
Ruskin suffered for his condition. His parents were suburban middle
class people who tend who think too much about bringing up children,
but
not very wisely. They tend to choke out a good part of living with too
much over-protectiveness and coddling, and they're apt to be convinced
that their children don't need any other outlets than the ones
they themselves think to provide. Suburban life is a necessity in our
culture, but it's a misfortune, too. Well-to-do people in a suburb are
around their own kind too much. They're cut off from the lowly, from
the great, from honest work, from adventure, and from needs. I think
that all parents who live in the suburbs should read Praeterita. Even though John Ruskin
shows chivalrous loyalty to his parents, his book gives an accusation,
not of his parents, but of the limitations of his situation. One can
almost hear the child crying out on every page, like Laurence Sterne's
caged starling--'I can't get out, I can't get out!'
One might say that, whatever the faults of his education were, a great
man like John Ruskin was the result. But who can say how much better an
influence Ruskin might have been
pg 191
if he'd been allowed his right to a free life when he was little? And
it's also safe to admit that not every child born and living a
sheltered life in a mansion will be another Ruskin! We can't follow the
setting up of Ruskin's further connections with the dynamic
relationships that were suitable for him, because his parents didn't
allow it, so nothing happened. He says that his mother 'never allowed
me to go near the edge of a pond, or be in a field that a pony was in.'
But he comments 'with thankfulness the benefit I got from a ditch in
Croxted Lane that had tadpoles.' He says that Camberwell Green had a
pond, and 'one of the most treasured joys of my childhood was when my
nurse would let me stare at this contemplative pond with awe from the
other side of the way.'
Wordsworth's
Recognition of His Opportunities
Wordsworth's childhood was a lot more rough and tumble! When he was
nine, he was sent to the school in the little village of Hawkshead, and
he lived with Mrs. Tyson in the cottage [perhaps in a dorm setting??]. Most
things at home and school
pleased him. He didn't get lessons in horse riding, skating, hockey or
tennis, but the local boys probably made it clear that he'd have to do
what they did if he wanted to fit in. But by the time he went to
school, he was already a healthy, strong little boy because his mother
had allowed him to really live.
'How many times as a five year old
In a small creek cut off from the stream
I spent the whole day playing in the water,
Basking in the sun, playing, and basking some more.'
Here's what he says about his childhood:
'My soul had good time to take root, and I grew up
Nourished by both beauty and fear.'
pg 192
Before he turned ten, he moved to his 'beloved Vale.' He says about it,
'There, we were let loose
To enjoy an even greater variety of amusements.'
Those Hawkshead boys did all kinds of things! He writes about times,
'When I hung
Higher than the raven's nest, by clumps of grass
And half-inch fissures in the slippery rock
Hanging precariously and almost (it seemed)
Held up only by the gusty wind
That blew against the crag.'
Those boys went skating:
'Wearing steel blades,
We'd skim along the polished ice playing organized games
That imitated the chase,
And the sports of the woods--blowing horns,
The dogs barking, and the hunted rabbit.'
They played:
'Week after week, and month after month, we lived
A life of activity. Every day our games
Lasted in summer until it got dark.'
They went boating:
'When summer came,
On bright days when we had half the day free,
We would sail along the plain of Windermere
Racing with our oars . . .
This kind of race,
Never ended in disappointment,
There were no sore losers, no frustration, no jealousy.
We rested in the shade, everyone satisfied,
Both the winners and the losers.'
Young Wordsworth also had his share of horseback experiences when he
and his schoolmates would return to school
pg 193
with plenty of things to talk about after their long vacation. They
would hire some horses from a 'courteous innkeeper' and ride off,
'proud to curb, and eager to spur on the galloping horse.' And then
they'd come home:
'Through the walls we flew,
And down the valley, making a circle
In a carefree way. Through rough and smooth paths,
We scampered towards home.'
pg 194
Chapter
18 - We are Educated by Our Intimacies Part II: More Affinities
An
Affinity for Material Resources as Illustrated by John Ruskin's
Opportunities
Wordsworth doesn't say much about affinity for material
resources and the joy of handling and making things. But Ruskin seemed
to be possibly interested in that, which is first evident with 'two
boxes of smoothly cut wooden blocks,' and possibly resulted in his
road-making days while he was at Oxford. He writes:
'Afterwards, I was given a small two-arched bridge that
had impressive wedge-shaped stones and headstones, and level layers of
masonry with beveled edges that dovetailed the same way that the
Waterloo Bridge does. The centrings were well made and there were
inlaid
steps leading down to the water so that this bridge model was accurate
and instructive. I never got tired of constructing it, dismantling it
(it was too strong to be knocked down, so it had to be deconstructed
piece
by piece) and building it again.'
We know that he kept himself busy building a small dam and a reservoir
when he lived at Herne Hill and Denmark Hill. When he was still a
little boy, he scrubbed the steps of a hotel in the Alps with a broom
and a pail of water because they bothered his mother. I think this
shows that his nature was crying out for more opportunities.
Intimacy
with Natural Objects
We don't
pg 195
read that either boy had much intimacy with natural objects, like birds and
flowers. Here again, it seems like Ruskin just never had the chance
because he was deprived of opportunities. All of the flowers that he
knew
were cultivated garden varieties. Is there anything more pathetic than
this? 'My main prayer to the kindness of heaven during the season when
flowers bloom was that the frost wouldn't touch the almond blossoms.'
(Those who have read Love's Meinie
and Proserpine will know
that, later in Ruskin's life, he had compensations that made up for his
childhood disadvantages.)
Wordsworth seems not to have had any special intimacy with flowers
until he acquired it from his sister Dorothy. He writes, 'She gave me
eyes, she gave me ears.' We've already seen that his knowledge of birds
came from the horrid sport of robbing birds' nests. Yet, one day when
he and his wild friends rode to Furness Abbey, he wrote,
'That simple wren sang so sweetly
In the center of the old church
That I could have moved in and stayed there forever
Just to hear such beautiful music.'
Ruskin's
Flower Studies
Ruskin might not have had exposure to a wide variety of wildflowers,
but perhaps he made up for that by giving enormous attention to the few
that did come his way. In the same way that blocks and his model bridge
gave him his first exposure to the principles of architecture, maybe
his early flower studies were what gave him his ability to see and
express detail. He writes about flowers, 'I passed all of my time
staring at them, or staring into them. I pulled every flower to pieces,
not in morbid curiosity, but admiring wonder and fascination until I
knew everything that could be seen with a child's eyes. I used to hoard
pg 196
little treasures of seeds as if they were pearls and beads. I never had
any intention of planting them.' Yet he complains that books on Botany
were more difficult than his Latin Grammar.
Ruskin's
Pebble Studies
Ruskin writes, 'If there'd been somebody to teach me anything about
plants or pebbles, it would have been so good for me.' He loved the
pebbles of the Tay River, and followed up his acquaintance with these
by studying the pebbles at Matlock bath (from the River Derwent). 'I
was ecstatically happy to pursue my studies of minerals by looking at
fluor, calcite, and lead ore that were in the glittering white broken
rocks, speckled with blue-gray lead sulfite that made the walkways by
the hotel garden sparkle, and were also in the hills of the pretty
village and paths along its cliffs. I can't describe the joy I felt
when I was allowed to go into a cave.'
A
Life-Shaping Intimacy
Later, he went up Mount Snowdon in Wales. 'I remember, during the climb
up, that the most exciting part was finding a 'real' mineral for myself
for the first time, a piece of copper pyrite!' This eagerly
sought-after knowledge of pebbles resulted in his life-changing
intimacy with minerals, which led to him writing The Ethics of the Dust.
Ruskin's
Insatiable Delight in Books
As far as Books, we read that
John Ruskin grew up on the Waverley
novels, Pope's translation of The
Iliad, many of Shakespeare's plays, and a lot of other
delightful books. But he doesn't indicate that he ever had the
kind of experience we're looking for--a sudden, passionate, insatiable
delight
in a book that indicates a real connection. We don't see that until
he's
introduced to Lord Byron. He says he first read Byron 'about the
beginning of the teen years':
'Very certainly, by the end of 1834, I was pretty familiar with all of
Byron's works, all except Cain, Werner, the
pg 197
Deformed Transformation, and Vision of Judgment. I didn't understand
them, and my parents didn't think it would be a good idea for me to. I
rejoiced in the sarcasm of Don Juan that I could understand. As soon as
I got into the later cantos of it, I made a firm decision that Byron
would be my master of verse, in the same way that Turner was my master
in painting. I made that decision in the fledgling period of existence
without being conscious of the deeper instincts that prompted it. I
only recognized two things. First, his was the most exact truth of
observation. And, second, the way he chose to express himself was the
most concentrated that I had ever yet found in literature. But the
totally new and precious thing that I found in Byron was his measured
and living truth. His truth
was measured as compared to Homer, and living as compared to everybody
else. He taught me the meaning of Chillon and of Meillerie, and
encouraged me to seek first in Venice--the ruins of the homes of
Foscari and Falieri that Byron wrote about and made alive for me so
that I came to perceive them as real people whose very feet had worn
out the marble I walked on.'
Wordsworth's
Insatiable Delight in Books
Here's how Wordsworth took to his books:
'I had possessed a treasure for a long time--
A little yellow book covered in canvas,
A slender summary of the Arabian tales.
From friends I met when I lived in a new place,
I found out that this beloved book of mine
Was just the tip of the iceberg--
That the Arabian Nights had four whole volumes,
Full of similar content. Truly,
It was divinely promising!
And, from then on, when I returned home
During school vacations, I'd find
The glorious collection of books I'd left
And I'd be in heaven! Often
I've laid
Down beside the murmuring stream of the Derwent River
On the hot stones in the glaring sun,
Reading, devouring as I read,
Wasting the day's glory, I was so desperate!'
pg 198
'They
Must Have Their Nourishment' of Adventure
I can't leave out the advice that comes next:
'A gracious spirit presides over this earth,
And over the heart of man. It comes
Invisibly to works of unreproved delight,
And with a kind intent, it directs those
Who don't care, don't know, and don't think about what they do.
The tales that add charm to sleepless nights
In the Arabian Nights, legends written
For comfort by the dim light of monk's lamps;
Fiction for the ladies they loved were made up
By young squires; endless adventures told
By decrepit warriors in old age,
Out of the memories of the very plans
They had as young men.
These spread like daylight. And they will live
In some form until mankind ceases to exist.
We have unspoken yearnings and hidden desires,
And they must have their nourishment. Our childhood,
In all its simplicity, sits on a throne
Than has more power than all of the elements.'
Children
Need to Roam Freely Among Books
And here's more advice:
'Every once in a while, with reluctance, I would stoop
To reading concise themes. yet I rejoice,
And, humbled by these thoughts, I pour out
Thanks with uplifted heart that I was raised
Safe from an evil that current times have put
Upon today's children. This pest
Might have dried me up, body and soul
Right where I was
If, instead of living in an environment of free choice
Where I was allowed to wander through libraries
Rich with mind food, like an open field
Of lush, happy pastures wherever I wanted,
I had been followed, watched constantly, and chained
To the depressing way chosen for me.'
pg 199
Words
Are 'A Passion and a Power'
Later we read about the first time he was captivated by poetry:
'I was ten
Or younger the first time my mind
Consciously enjoyed the charm
Of words in rhyming sequence, and found them to be sweet
For their own sakes, having a passion and a power.
And I enjoyed phrases chosen for their pleasure,
Or impressiveness, or love. Often, on public roads
That were nearly empty because the sun
Was just rising over the hills, I would go out
With a close friend, and for almost
Two delightful hours, we would stroll along
By the still banks of the misty lake
Repeating our favorite verses together as if we had one voice
Or talking together as happy as the birds
That were chirping around us.'
Ruskin's
Sense of Local History
Ruskin's awakening historic sense
seems to be a continual thing, and we can learn a lesson from that
about the importance of places. In his case, historic interest and the
delight of beauty seemed to be the same thing. We've already seen that
in his quote about how Byron's poetry affected him. And here, he writes
about the, 'three centers of thought in my own mind: Rouen, Geneva, and
Pisa. They taught me all I know, and were mistresses of everything I
did from the first moment I entered through their gates.' Before them,
there was Abbeville, which 'ushered me into immediate healthy work and
joy . . . Of course, my most intense periods of joy were when I was in
the mountains. But it was also a happy, unmatched pleasure that I never
got tired of to see Abbeville on a bright summer afternoon, when I'd
jump out into the courtyard of the Hotel de l'Europe and rush down the
street to see the Church
of St. Wulfran while the
pg 200
sun was still shining on its towers. These are reasons why we should
cherish the past--until the end.'
Being
In Touch With the Past is Necessary
But Ruskin's lack of living touch with the past, except when that kind
of touch came through some newly discovered history of a place he
happened to be in, is evident in his account of his first impressions
of Rome:
'The whole of my Latin learning that I had to help me begin my studies
of Rome, consisted of the first two books of Livy, which I hadn't
learned very well, and the names of places that I'd remembered but
never looked up on a map; a page or two of Tacitus, and the part in
Virgil's book about the burning of Troy, the story of Dido, the episode
about Euryalus, and the last battle. Of course, I had read the Aeneid
half-heartedly, but I considered most of it nonsense. As far as later
history, I had read some English summaries about the vices of their
rulers, and I thought that malaria in the Campagna was a consequence of
the Pope. I had never heard of a good Roman Emperor or a good Pope. I
wasn't sure whether Trajan had lived before or after Jesus. I would
have been satisfied and relieved if anybody had told me that Marcus
Antonius was a Roman philosopher who lived at the same time as Socrates
. . . Of course, we drove around Rome and the saw the Forum, Coliseum
and so on. I had no distinct idea what the Forum was, or what it had
ever been, or what the three pillars or the seven had to do with it, or
the Arch of Severus. Whatever the Forum might have been, I didn't care
in the least. As far as I could tell, the pillars on the Forum were too
small and their capitals weren't carved very well, and the houses above
them weren't nearly as interesting as the side of any alley in the old
part of Edinburgh.'
Wordsworth
and Ruskin were Aloof From the Past
Wordsworth was also aloof. He was vaguely aware of
'Old, unhappy, far-off things
And battles long ago,'
but the past histories of nations didn't interest him. According to
what he wrote
pg 201
in the Prelude, even the
anguish of the French Revolution hardly made an impression on him,
although he took a walking tour in Europe and experienced a moment
where,
'The nations hailed their great expectancy
As if they were awakened from sleep.'
But in his case,
'I looked upon all of these things
As if I were seeing them from a distance. I heard and saw and felt,
And I was impressed, but I had no real concern.'
The
Kind of Knowledge That's Learned in Schools
When it comes to the knowledge
that's learned in schools, Ruskin gives some pretty dry details
of his experience in learning Euclid, Latin grammar, and other
subjects. But neither Ruskin nor Wordsworth seems to have been 'pricked
with the rapture of a sudden inspiration' during any of his lessons,
unless Hawkshead Grammar School wants to claim this:
'We have so many joys
In youth! But life is so wonderful
When every hour brings tangible access
To learning--when learning is delightful,
And completely lacking any sorrow!'
But the praise of nature's unfolding season comes after this, and I'm
afraid
it's their lessons that the poet had in mind.
Friendship
Everyone's been interested in the illuminating will of the late Cecil
Rhodes, and I imagine that most mothers and teachers have thought about
the four
qualifications for scholarships [this
was the birth of the Rhodes Scholar.]
The third criteria is 'fellowship,' and the fourth is 'leadership
instincts and an interest and concern for his classmates.' It's good
that a talent for friendship
as an essential element is brought before us in such a prominent way.
That's the rock
pg 202
that Ruskin's education was split on, as he was sadly aware. He never
knew the joys of friendship. The main blessings of his childhood were,
'peace, obedience, and faith--these three were the main good, and,
after
these, the habit of focusing attention with both the mind and the
eyes.' He goes on to list the 'equally dominant disasters':
'First of all, I had nothing to love. My parents were rather like
visible forces of nature to me, no more loved than the sun or the moon,
although I would have been annoyed and bewildered if either of them had
disappeared (and more so now that both of them are gone!) I loved God
even
less. It's not that I had any quarrel with Him, or dread of Him. I
simply thought that what people told me about serving Him sounded
unpleasant, and what I heard about His book didn't sound very
entertaining. I had no friends to quarrel with, either--nobody I could
help, and nobody to thank. Servants were never allowed to do any more
for me than was part of their required duty. And why should I have been
grateful to the cook for cooking, or to the gardener for gardening? My
present conclusion about my general education of those days is that it
was both too formal and too luxurious. At the most crucial time of my
character development, it left me excessively cramped, yet
undisciplined, and that it only protected my innocence, without helping
me to practice doing the right thing.'
As we've seen, Wordsworth, by comparison, lived the life of his
schoolmates with entire abandon.
He was always either with a crowd of playmates, or he was with one
friend. He was only alone during those moments of deeper intimacy that
we'll discuss later. The simple life of his 'beloved Vale' took such
passionate hold of his strong northern nature that neither Cambridge
nor
London nor revolutionary Europe (as we just read) could displace his
earliest images, or give direction to his most profound thoughts. Sir
Walter Scott claimed to be 'intimate with all classes of my countrymen,
from Scottish noblemen to Scottish
pg 203
farmers.' And the result was the Waverly Novels. Wordsworth was happy
to be familiar with the good-natured peasants of his own valleys, and
poetic souls like his own. Maybe such limitations were what went into
making the poet of plain living and high thinking, but limitations are
dangerous [and shouldn't be deliberate].
pg 204
Chapter
19 - We Are Educated by Our Intimacies
Part III - Vocation
I could trace how various other affinities came about in the
lives of Ruskin and Wordsworth, but I don't have the space. All I can
do is to show the joy of pursuing each new interest after being
introduced to it, and then the resulting occupation in intense intimacy
that never ends
for the heart and soul. In these two geniuses, that
intense intimacy became their vocation, or career.
Turner's
Call to Ruskin
Ruskin's career began when,
'On my thirteenth birthday, February 8th, 1832, my father's partner,
Henry Telford, gave me Samuel Roger's book Italy, a Poem, and that determined
the direction that my life took . . . as soon as I saw Turner's
pictures, I
decided that they would be my only masters, and I worked to imitate
them
as best I could with careful pen shading. . . .
'Finally my father gave me a copy of the Turner painting, 'Richmond
Bridge, Surrey,' [possibly 'Richmond
Hill and Bridge', or this
one; Richmond Hill is in Surrey] not intending to start a collection,
but just so I'd have one, assuming that one would be all I'd ever need
or want to have.'
And here he talks about how he bought Turner's 'Harlech:'
'Any seeds of nobility that existed within me were all centered on
my love for Turner. It wasn't just a piece of paper I bought for
seventy pounds, It was a Welsh castle and village, and Mt. Snowdon in
blue cloud.'
pg 205
Sincere
Work
It wasn't until he was 22 that he produced what he considered his first
sincere drawing:
'One day, on my way to Norwood, I noticed a little bit of ivy winding
around a thorny stem. Even to my critical judgment, it seemed to be a
decent composition, so I decided to make a light/shade sketch in pencil
in my gray pocket notebook. I worked carefully as if it was a piece of
sculpture, and I liked it more and more as I drew. When it was done, I
realized that I had been wasting my time ever since I was twelve years
old, because nobody had ever told me to just draw what was really
there!'
Initiation
Later we hear the story of his real initiation:
'I took out my notebook and carefully began to draw a little aspen tree
that was across the road. Casually, but not lazily, I started drawing,
and as I drew, my casual air passed away. The beautiful lines of the
tree insisted on being recorded diligently. They became more and more
beautiful as each line rose among the others and took its place. With
increasing wonder every instant, I saw that they were composing
themselves using finer laws than any that men knew about. Finally the
tree was there on my paper, and everything I thought I had known about
trees before seemed to be nothing. From that point on, 'He has made
everything beautiful in His time' became my interpretation of the bond
between the human mind and the things it can see.'
A
Passion for Nature
Let's intrude on the bringing about of one more intimate interest.
We've seen how already young Ruskin has been exposed to mountains. Now
he's going to have his first view of the Alps. He, his parents and his
cousin Mary went for a walk on the first Sunday evening after they
arrived at the garden terrace of Schaffhausen.
'Suddenly--look! Over there! None of us had for a moment thought
that they would be clouds. They were as clear as crystal, sharp against
the pure horizon of sky, and already rose-tinted with the setting sun.
It was infinitely beyond everything we'd ever
pf 206
thought or even dreamed. The walls of Eden, if we could have seen them,
couldn't have been any more beautiful to us. Nothing could have been
more powerful, like gazing around heaven, or at the sacred walls of
death. For a child with my temperament, this was the most blessed
entrance into life.'
What about Wordsworth? How shall we trace that pure, gracious,
absorbing intimacy with Nature that was the master-light of all of
Wordsworth's seeing? He reveals--
'The simple ways of my childhood
Are mostly what first caused me to love
Rivers, woods and fields. The passion was
Still in its infancy, sustained by chance
With nourishment that came
Even though I wasn't deliberately looking
for it.'
We can't trace every step of Wordworth's growing delicate passion. We
can only look at a phase here and there. As a boy, he and some of his
friends from school were boating on Lake Windermere late one evening.
They decided that one of them, the 'Minstrel of the Troop,' would stay
behind on a small island:
'We rowed away gently, while he played his flute
Alone upon the rock. And then the calm
Still water effected my mind
With a weight of pleasure. The sky
Had never been so beautiful, the sight came into my heart
And captivated me like a dream.
In this way, my sympathies were broadened and
The daily common things I saw
Grew dear to me. I began to love the sun
Although not as much as I did later. Then I loved him as a pledge
And guarantee of this earthly life. It's a light
That we see and makes us feel alive.
It's not so much for the light and warmth that he shines on the world,
But because his rays
Made the morning hills so beautiful
And touched the western mountains with his glorious sunset.'
pg 207
The
Calling of a Poet
We can take one more look at this amazing child who, after he grew up,
believed that every child is born a poet in the same way that he was.
'I was seventeen.
At this time
Blessings seemed to surround me like an ocean.
The days flew by, the years passed.
I had received so much
From Nature and her generous soul
That all my thoughts overflowed with emotion
I could only be content when, with incomparable joy,
I felt the emotions of God spread over all these things:
Over everything that moves and everything that's still;
Over everything that, even though it may be beyond the reach of thought
And human knowledge, and can't be seen
By the human eye, yet, to the heart, it still lives;
Over everything that leaps and runs and shouts and sings
Or beats the joyful air; over everything that glides
Under the waves, and even the wave itself
And the powerful deep waters.
. . . If I ever fail to speak of you
With a grateful voice, you mountains and lakes
And waterfalls, you mists and winds
That live among the hills where I was born.
If I have been pure in heart during my youth,
If, even though I spend time in the world, I'm content
With my own simple pleasures, if I've lived
And communicated with God and nature, separated
From little upsets and unworthy desires,
It's you I have to thank for that gift.'
How
Little Snobs Are Educated
Before we leave the Prelude,
I'd like to draw your attention to Wordsworth's description of the
'child-studied' little snob of his days. Those were days when there was
a lot of soul searching and lots of theories about education.
'In order that common sense
Might test this system by judging its results,
Allow me to let common sense analyze this
pg 208
Example given faithfully.
Here is a child who never
Gets involved in quarrels because it would be
Beneath his dignity. His generosity, like a fountain,
Overflows with gifts. He doesn't have
A selfish bone in his body. None of the little
Flitting pleasures tempt him to do wrong.
Wandering beggars praise his name,
Animals recognize what a gentle person he is,
And fear, whether of real things
Or vague supernatural fears,
Don't bother him except when he dreams about them.
To make you even more amazed, look at how skilled he is
At spotting, how polished he is at noticing the ridiculous.
He knows what's inside the earth, and the names of the stars,
And he knows the policies of foreign countries.
He can spout off names of districts, cities, towns
All over the world, backwards and forwards.
He can sift and weigh information.
He questions everything.
He feels that he needs to grow wiser every day
Or else his life is wasted.
He takes note of every drop of knowledge
As it drips into the rippling pool in his heart.
He's like a tree growing unnaturally. Blame his gardener,
And pity the poor child.
Meanwhile, Mother Earth is sad
To find all the fun things she designed for him
Because she loved him
Ignored. In the woods, the flowers
Cry, and the riverbanks are depressed.
If only we had Fortunatus's Wishing Cap
Or the invisible coat
Of Jack the Giant Killer, or Robin Hood,
Or Sabra in the forest with St. George!
The child, whose love is here,
Could have one tremendous benefit:
He might be able to forget himself.'
Children
Have Affinities and They Should Have Relationships
I can't take the time to stop and collect any more
pg 209
of the lessons and insight from these two wonderfully educational
books, The Prelude and Praeterita. For now, it's enough if
we've seen how children attach themselves to the affinities they're
born with if they have the opportunity and proper freedom. Our role is
to make sure plenty of opportunities are freely provided at home and at
school. Children should have relationships with earth and water. They
should run, jump, ride, swim, and establish the relationship that a
maker has with material resources, and thy should do this with as many
kinds of material resources as possible. They should have treasured
intimate relationships with people, through face to face talking,
through reading stories or poems, seeing pictures or sculpture, through
finding flinthead arrows and being around cars. They should be familiar
with animals, birds, plants and trees. Foreign people and their
languages shouldn't be something unknown to them. And, most important
of all, they should discover that the most intimate and highest of all
relationships--the relationship to God--fulfills their entire being.
This kind of a plan isn't overwhelming because, in all of these things
and even more, children have natural affinities. As human beings find
their place in the universe, they put out feelers, trying to connect in
every direction that's suitable for them. We need to get rid of the
notion that the only way a child will ever know the 3 R's or Latin
grammar is to focus his education on these and nothing else. The truth
is, that for us as well as for our children, the broader our range
of interests is, the more intelligently we'll understand each one of
them.
Education
Isn't Aimless
But I'm not preaching to lazy people and claiming that education is
casual and aimless. Many great authors have written at least one book
about education. Sir Walter Scott's contribution seems to be Waverley.
pg 210
We're told that Edward Waverley 'was pretty much allowed to learn
whatever he wanted, when he wanted, if he wanted.' He seemed to want to
learn, and he was able to grasp things unusually quickly, so this kind
of approach to education seems justified. But he was allowed to grow up
wavering, so he remained like his name: Waverley. His life was marked
with instability and ineffectiveness. The way he was educated and the
results of that educated are described:
'Edward would throw himself eagerly into the books of whatever classic
author his tutor suggested. He would master the style enough to
understand the story. If he liked it or found it interesting, he'd
finish the volume of that author's books. But it was useless to try to
get him to focus on serious literary study, differences in idioms, the
beauty of well-chosen phrases, or artificial grammatical combinations.
'I can read and understand Latin authors,' young Edward protested, with
the self-confident and impulsive reasoning of a fifteen year old. 'Even
Scaliger or Bentley couldn't do much better than that.' Unfortunately,
while he was allowed to read only for entertainment, he didn't realize
that he was losing the opportunity forever to form good habits of
determination, hard work, control, self-direction, and the ability to
make himself focus his attention. And that's an art that's even more
essential than being intimately familiar with the classics, which are
the main object of studying.'
Waverley illustrates what
Ruskin says plainly: no matter what we do with our youth, it stays with
us
forever:
'The laws of prescription are so stubborn and so unchangeable that now,
looking back over my life from now at 1886, to my youth by the side of
a brook in 1837, viewing my entire youth, I discover that nothing about
me has really changed. Some parts of me have died away, and some of me
is stronger. I've learned some new things, and forgotten lots of
things. But I'm still the same me,
disappointed and rheumatic.'
pg 211
Strenuous
Effort and Respect
We've seen that both Ruskin and Wordsworth had the ability to work hard
at focusing their attention, which is necessary in order for a person
to be
receptive. It made each of them productive in his own area. Anyone who
wants to do a thing, whether it's baseball or portrait painting, has to
learn the rules diligently and gain skill with practice and effort.
It's true that work we love will override pain, but it's also true that
we won't be able to enjoy any of the affinities that are waiting for us
without strenuous effort and respect. You might think that a
bird-watcher has chosen an easy hobby. But that's not true. A true bird
lover is outside by 4 am to assist with the birds' uprising, or even
out at Hyde Park at 2:30 am to try and catch a glimpse of a kingfisher!
He lies in wait, hiding in secret places to watch the birds in their
natural habitat. He travels to far locations to see new birds in other
places in the world. He gives his attention, labor, love and reverence
to the study of birds. He gains joy in this, so maybe his effort is
unconscious, but the effort is still there.
Having
Buddies Has Its Responsibilities
Here's another example of an affinity: sociability. Most of us have
serious thoughts about what it means to be a true friend. But we tend
to take the social comraderie of our buddies too casually. We think
it's maintained sufficiently if we meet at parties, games, picnics,
etc. Boarding school boys usually know better. They've learned that
having buddies takes some good-natured give and take, teasing, help,
honest criticism, serious correcting when it's needed, loyalty,
confident and trustworthy leadership, reliable following, speaking the
truth, the ability to let others be first with no hard feelings, and
the ability to be first without being conceited. This
pg 212
calls for attention, effort, love and respect. But the effort is
overshadowed by the enjoyment of the relationship.
The
Angel Stirs The Still Pool
I'd like to make one more point. We remain faithful to whatever
affinities captivate us until death, or even longer. I'd like to say a
word about the 'advantages' of special
instructors and classes that a big city like London offers. [Too many activities aren't a good idea.]
I suspect
that it's most often the still pool
that the angel comes down to stir. A steady, unruffled routine of work
without privileged extras lends itself best to the angel's
'stirring'--which takes the form of what Coleridge calls a 'Captain
Idea,' striking our mind, and initiating contact with an affinity.
The
Highest Relationship
Neither The Prelude nor Praeterita has much to say about the study of
the highest relationship of all--the most profound intimacy that man's
soul can have. I think the best way I can close is with a quote from a
little book called The
Practice of the Presence of God which tells about the spiritual
life of Brother Lawrence, a barefooted Carmelite lay Brother in 1600's
Paris.
'The first time I saw Brother Lawrence was on Aug. 3, 1666. He told me
that God had done him a personal favor when he was converted at age
eighteen. It was winter, and he saw a tree that didn't have any leaves.
He reflected on the thought that, in just a little while, the tree
would have leaves, and then it would have flowers and fruit. This gave
him a higher perspective of God's power and providence, and that
impression never left him. This thought set him free from the world and
kindled such a love for God inside him, that he couldn't even tell
whether his love for God had grown in the forty years that he'd been a
Christian. He said that he had been a footman working for the treasurer
M. Fieubert, but that he was clumsy and kept breaking things. He wanted
to be
pg 213
allowed to go into a monastery because he thought that, there, he would
be punished for his clumsiness and other faults. In that way, he'd be
able to sacrifice his life and all its pleasures to God. But God
disappointed him. He had been perfectly content in that situation . . .
He said that, for him, scheduled times of prayer were no different from
other times. He retired to a secluded place to pray as his superior
dictated, but he didn't really need to do that because even his most
important duties didn't take his mind off God . . . He said that the
greatest pains and the greatest pleasures that this world has are
nothing compared with what he'd experienced of spiritual pain and
pleasure, so he didn't worry about anything and he feared nothing. The
only thing he wanted of God was to not offend him . . . He said that
he had experienced God's help so often on various occasions that, any
time he had business to do, he never thought about it beforehand. When
it was time to do it, he found all that he needed to do in God, just
like in a clear mirror. Lately he had acted like this, not worrying
about his affaiirs, but before, he had often been anxious in his
duties. When some outward business
distracted him a bit from thinking of God, a fresh remembrance from God
would come into his soul, and he'd be so inspired and transported that
it would be difficult for him to contain himself. He was more united
with God in his outward business than he was when he separated himself
for devotion in a retired place.'
'I want, I'm made for, I must have a God
Before I can be anything, do anything. It isn't just a Name
That I need, but the True Thing, with what proves that it's true.
In other words, I need a connection from that Thing to myself.
I need it to touch me from head to toe. When I feel this touch,
Then I'll take the rest with it, this Life of Ours!'
[adapted from Browning]
pg 214
An Educational Manifesto
'Lessons
should be enjoyable; they should enhance the individual and give him
the ability he needs for life.'
Every child has a right to be exposed to several fields
of knowledge.
Every normal child has a natural appetite for this kind of knowledge.
This appetite, or natural desire, is all a child needs to motivate him
to do his lessons, if the knowledge is presented properly.
The desire to learn is destroyed in four ways:
(1) Too much talking at the child, offering
diluted knowledge without giving the child time and space to reflect
and digest that knowledge.
(2) Lectures that are assembled, arranged and
illustrated from different sources by the teacher. These usually offer
knowledge that's so condensed and well-prepared that the child doesn't
need to think about it, and doesn't assimilate it.
(3) Textbooks that are compressed and filtered
and recompressed until they bear little of the original living
ideas from the mind they started with.
(4) The use of competition and desire for
achievement as motives to do lessons, instead of the natural hunger and
love for knowledge that are all a child needs to learn.
Children learn best from real, tangible things, and
books. Tangible things include:
a. Natural structures for physical activity
like climbing, swimming, walking, etc.
b. Resources for working and building with,
such as wood, leather or clay.
c. Natural objects in their native habitat,
like birds, plants, creeks, and stones.
d. Works of art.
e. Scientific instruments.
Most people acknowledge the need for tangible things in
learning, as in hands-on education, but fewer people recognize that
intellectual education has to come from books.
Every student six years old and up should enjoy studying their own books from each of their
subjects, and their books should represent a pretty wide curriculum.
Children between the ages of six to eight will need to have most of
their books read aloud to them.
This approach has been used with successful results for the past twelve
years in many home schoolrooms and some other schools.
By freely using books, the mechanical difficulties of education -
reading, spelling, composition, etc. - disappear, and lessons become
'enjoyable; able to enhance the individual and give him the ability he
needs for life.'
We believe that these principles can work in all schools, both
elementary and high school, and they can make education more
simplified, cheaper, and more disciplined.
pg 215
Chapter 20 - Suggestions Regarding
Curriculum (For children under 14)
Part 1
Summary
of Earlier Chapters
The practical subject of this book is curriculum considerations, yet
I've left that subject until these last few chapters because a
curriculum isn't an isolated, independent thing, it's linked to many
other things with chains of cause and effect. We had to consider the
foundational principles of authority and submission first because
they're so fundamental. But, because they are so fundamental, they should be
there, yet not be visible--just like the foundation of a house supports
a house, but isn't visible. Yet authority and submission need to take
into account the respect for the child's individual personality. In
order to give children space to develop freely according to their own
particular 'bent,' parents and teachers need to adopt an attitude of
'masterly inactivity.'
I discussed the relationship between teachers and students, and then
the relationship between education and current philosophy. Education
should go along with current thinking, it shouldn't be isolated in a
sealed compartment away from modern trends. Some current trends that
should help us as we work towards an educational ideal are
pg 216
a sense of the brotherhood of man, and a deep awareness of the process
of evolution.
As far as the training of children falling under four convenient
divisions--physical, mental, moral and religious--that seems to be
common knowledge and generally accepted, so I didn't think it was
necessary to give any suggestions about that. Instead, I've focused on
aspects of training that fall under headings that are likely to be
overlooked. Under the phrase 'Education is a life,' I tried to show
that intellectual life needs ideas to stay alive. Therefore,
school-books should be a place to glean ideas, not mere collections of
dry facts. 'Education is the science of relationships' means that
normal children have a natural, inborn desire for all knowledge, and
they have a right to be exposed to it.
These considerations set the stage for us to begin considering
curriculum, and that's what the rest of this book will cover. This is
just a summary of what we've already covered. I hope you'll be patient
as I repeat what seems to me to be necessary in making my point.
Some
Preliminary Considerations
The following suggestions have come about in the administering of the
Parents' National Educational Union, so it might be helpful to say
again that the first priority for the PNEU during its first ten
years was impressing the definition of Education on its members, as
expressed in our motto, 'Education is
an Atmosphere, a Discipline, a Life.' What we mean by this is
that parents and teachers
pg 217
should understand how to make the most practical use of a child's
circumstances (atmosphere),
they should help him develop the kinds of habits that will make his
life better (discipline), and
they should feed his mind with the food of intellectual life--ideas. We believe that these
three are the only tools that are authorized in raising children. It
might be easier to play on their sensitivities, emotions, desires and
passions, but the result will be disastrous. Since habits, ideas and
circumstances are external, it's okay to help each other make the most
of them that we can. But it's forbidden to directly meddle with the
personality of anyone else. It's wrong to play on a child's vanity,
fears, affection, ambition, or anything else that helps make him who he
is. Most people are sincere about raising children, but we tend to take
control of more than we're entitled to by not recognizing that we're
limited to working only with the outward covering of personality.
A
Definite Goal
The Parents' Union devoted ten years to learning how to use the three
tools of education (circumstances, habits and ideas). Then, a few years
ago, we took a slight departure from that and asked ourselves what end
goal we should have in mind as a result of wisely using these tools.
What is education? The answer we accept is that Education is the Science of Relations.
We don't mean like Herbart did, that things and thoughts are related to
each other and that, therefore, teachers have to be careful to pack the
right corresponding things in the right order into the child's mind so
that, once these things and thoughts get into the child's mind, each
thing or thought finds others of its kind so that they can attach
themselves together to form a strong, cliquish 'apperception mass.'
What concerns us personally is that we all
pg 218
have relationships with things in the present world, and what's been in
the past, what's in the skies above us, and what's around us. A full
life and our ability to be useful depends on how many of these
relationships we realize and take hold of. Every child is heir to an
enormous inheritance. Our concern is, what are the practical things we
need to do to help him gain possession of what's already his?
Education
is Objective, not Subjective
This changes our perspective. It's no longer subjective regarding the child [what do we feel like teaching him?]
It's objective [what knowledge does he have a right to?]
So we no longer focus on developing the child's faculties, or training
his moral nature, or guiding his religious feelings, or grooming him to
function in a particular social circle, or for a specific career.
Instead, we accept the child as he is--a person with lots of healthy
affinities and budding connections. We try to help him solidify as many
of these connections as we can.
A newborn comes into the world with a thousand feelers, and he sets
right to work eagerly to connect to the world. From
everything around him, he gets,
'That calm joy that, if I'm not mistaken, surely must be part of
Those first-born affinities that connect
Our new existence to things that exist in the world.
And in our first days, they become
A bond that unites life and joy.'
[adapted from The Prelude, by
Wordsworth]
When he's left to himself, he also gains the kind of real knowledge
about each thing he comes across, and that knowledge helps to cement a
relationship between him and that thing. Then later, we step in to
educate him. The number of wide, essential interests he'll have, and
how full his life will be, depends on the range of different living
relationships we've exposed him to. He'll be a person of duty and
pg 219
usefulness if we make him aware of the laws that govern all
relationships to the world. When he recognizes that relationships with
people and things take effort to maintain, he'll learn the laws of work
and the joy of expending effort.
Our role is to remove obstacles, to stimulate interest, and provide
guidance to the child as he tries to get in touch with the universe of
things and thoughts around him. Our mistake is that we assume the role
of showman to the universe and think that there's no connection between
the child and his world unless we decide to set one up.
Interests
Do we have lots of captivating interests outside of our obligatory
work? If we do, then we won't be enslaved by trivial amusements.
Real interests aren't something we take up on the spur of the moment.
They emerge from whatever affinities we've found and connected with.
And, the way I see it, the goal of education is to help children get as
much use out of the world as possible.
When we're influenced by these kinds of considerations, the phrase
'Education is the science of relationships' will help us to form a
definite goal in our efforts.
Educational
Unrest
We've all become familiar with the term 'educational unrest,' and we
all sense how appropriate the phrase is. There have never been more
capable and dedicated teachers and educational staff in schools of all
social classes. Money, labor and research are all spent generously on
education. Theories are studied, and great pains are taken to find out
what's going in education in other places. Yet something's wrong, and
it's more than a 'divine discontent' that leads us to work harder. We
know that a major change is needed in how we approach the problem, and
we're ready as long as the change is something more substantial than
pg 220
just an experiment. I think that school principals are the most ready
to support a sensible reform. But, since they're more experienced and
intellectually trained, they're too wise to jump on the bandwagon of
change unless it has a reasonable philosophical foundation, as well as
practical, utilitarian results.
A
Unifying Principle
Up until now, the Parents' Union has emphasized our home-training views
to the public rather than our ideas about school teaching. But that's
only because we're not willing to disturb the system that's already in
place.
But, for the last twelve years, we've successfully worked out a unifying principle and the way to
implement it in our training college and school. We exist
because we have a definite goal and because our existence is needed to
meet that goal. I don't think I need to speak right now about the few
principles that should guide us as we raise children [that's in Volumes
1 and 2], but the principle that's supposed to guide us in
teaching knowledge
(education) might indicate why so much of education is a failure, and
show us how to improve.
Education
Should Give Knowledge That's Touched with Emotion
We can take a phrase that Matthew Arnold wrote about religion and adapt
it for education: 'education's goal should be to give knowledge that's touched with emotion.' I already
quoted the cute story from Frederika
Bremer's book Neighbors,
about the two school girls who fought a duel on behalf of their heroes,
Charles XII. and Peter the Great. Parents should be glad that girls
don't duel these days! School girls don't care about heroes anymore.
Now all they care about are their grades. They don't feel like
knowledge is 'touched with emotion' except in cases of their own
personal curiosity and ambition. Students have the potential to be
generous and eager. If they
pg 221
graduate from school without any real interests except preparing for
their next exam, or the mind-numbing entertainment of pointless games,
then it's the fault of the schools. Maybe the public's anxiety about
secondary education at home and overseas is due to the fact that
graduates coming out of schools that have excellent reputations, have
listless minds. They haven't been given 'long drinks of intellectual
enlightenment' to quench the thirst they had when they entered school.
H. C. Benson of Eton College wrote in 'The Schoolmaster,' which
appeared in the December 1902 issue of Nineteenth Century, 'I truly
believe that boarding school teachers have two strong ambitions: to
make their students good and to make them healthy. They don't seem to
care about making them intellectual. Intellectual life is left to fend
for itself. I believe that too many teachers look at the students' work
as a duty. In other words, they view it from a moral perspective rather
than an intellectual perspective. No one can deny that the academic
standard at English boarding schools is kept pretty low. Even more
serious, I don't see any signs that it's on its way to getting any
higher.'
Professor [Michael Ernest?]
Sadler, who may have a broader outlook, says almost the same thing. He
says that our secondary schools have some good qualities, but they're
behind intellectually, even as compared to schools in some European
countries. Mr. Benson undoubtedly speaks from personal experience, but
might it be true that such an intellectual group of teachers would
deliberately neglect academic excellence in their schools? Or perhaps
the problem is that exams force them to rely on the false intellect
pg 222
of cramming? Cramming deadens the intellect, and that's why some of us
consider teaching certification a backwards trend. Hundreds of mediocre
young women work to cram for a set of exams, often a long set, so they
can get their certificate. Head teachers are already feeling the
decline of this system and have started actively seeking assistants who
are different than the usual candidates. This causes the young woman to
be too conscientious and try too hard, and the stress of years of moral
effort to prepare for one exam after another often leaves them without
any clear understanding of the material studied. There are some
brilliant exceptions, but most young women who have gone through this
process don't have much initiative, don't catch on to things very
quickly, don't adapt easily, and can't think on their feet. They seem
to lack spirit. I call their effort 'moral effort' because the
preparing for exams and enduring a steady grind for a prolonged period
of time doesn't require intellectual effort, it's mostly moral. Young
men don't seem to have this problem--they're often less strenuous and
less absorbed, and, therefore, more receptive to the ideas they come
across while studying.
Education
is the Science of Relationships
The idea that gives life to the teaching in the Parents' Union is the
idea that 'Education is the Science of Relationships.' That phrase
means that children come into the world with a 'natural appetite,' to
use Coleridge's mental image, and with a natural attraction to
knowledge of all kinds and in all forms. They have a natural interest
in the heroic past and in the age of myths. They want to know about
everything that moves and lives, and strange places and strange people.
They want to handle materials and make things. They have a desire to
run and ride and row and do whatever gravity
pg 223
will allow them to do. That's why we think it's wrong to select certain
subjects and exclude others when a child is young. For instance, it's
not right to decide that a child shouldn't learn Latin, or doesn't need
science. Instead, we strive to make sure that he'll establish
enjoyable, intimate relationships with as many appropriate interests as
possible. He won't just get a slight, incomplete smattering of this or
that subject, either--we'll let him plunge right into vital knowledge,
and introduce him to a great field of knowledge before him that will
take more than his lifetime to explore. Having this concept in mind, we
try to get that 'touch of emotion' that indicates that living knowledge
is being taken in. We probably only feel
when we enter our proper vital relationships.
Is
There Such a Thing as a 'Child-Mind'?
We gain courage to challenge such a wide program just by applying a few
working ideas or principles. One concept we challenge is the notion
that there's such a thing as a 'child mind.' We don't believe that
children are a different species than us. Yes, their ignorance is
unlimited, but, on the other hand, their intelligence can run circles
around our slower wits. In practical use, we discover that knowing this
fact has great power. Teachers no longer talk down to children, and
they don't strain to explain every word they use, or poke and pry to
make sure that children understand every detail. When I was about
twelve years old, I browsed quite a bit through William Cowper's poems
and, for some reason, took an interest in Mrs. Montague's Feather Hangings.
It was only the other day that the ball that would fit that socket came
to me--it arrived in the form of an article in The Quarterly called 'The Queen of
the Bluestockings.' And, right there in that article, I recognized Mrs.
Montague and her feather hangings! The pleasure of seeing her again
after all those years was wonderful. Knowledge is at its most enriching
when it
pg 224
leaves behind a dormant appetite for more of the same kind of
knowledge. Arthur Evans's discovery of the palace of Knossos in Crete
can only be appreciated by those who remember how Ulysses told Penelope
about Crete's ninety cities, and Knossos, and King Minos. It isn't what
we've already learned that makes knowledge so fascinating, but what
we're still waiting to know. Knowledge shouldn't be predigested or
watered down. It should be offered to students with some substance and
vitality still in it. We've discovered that children can cover a large
and varied amount of knowledge intelligently, and enjoy it, in the same
amount of time that it usually takes to cover the 3 R's, object
lessons, and other overly-diluted material where there's more teaching
being offered than knowledge.
Knowledge
vs. Information
I think the difference between knowledge and information is
fundamental. Information is the record of facts, experiences,
appearances, etc. that's compiled in books or in the verbal memory of
an individual. But knowledge implies that there's been a pleasurable
voluntary activity of the mind acting on the material presented to it.
Great minds like Darwin and Plato are able to deal with appearances and
experiences first-hand. But more ordinary minds only get a little of
their knowledge this directly. For the most part, ordinary minds are
set into action by the energizing knowledge of other people, which
stimulates and provides a point of departure at the same time.
Information acquired during a course of formal education is only by
chance, and only of practical value in certain circumstances. But
knowledge, on the other hand, is the result of the active working of
the mind on material presented to it--and this kind of knowledge is
power. It implies that the intellectual mind has grown in many
different directions, and provides an ever new point of departure.
pg 225
Perhaps the most important task for a teacher is to be able to tell the
difference between their students gaining information, and knowledge.
Since knowledge is power, the student who has gotten knowledge will be
able to demonstrate power in dealing with it. He'll be able to remodel,
condense, illustrate or narrate it vividly and with freedom in his
wording. But the child who has only gained information will only
be able to parrot the stereotypical phrases in his textbook, or mangle
his teacher's lectures in his notes.
Children
Naturally Crave Knowledge
It's easier for us to deal directly with knowledge this way because we
don't feel the pressure to develop 'faculties' first. For our practical
purposes, the so-called 'faculties' can be collectively defined as 'the
mind.' And we've found that the normal mind already has everything it
needs to handle knowledge in the same way that the digestive process
already has everything it needs to handle food. What we need to be
concerned about is providing the kind of knowledge that will open up as
large a share of the world the child lives in as possible for his use
and enjoyment. There are certain gymnastic exercises for the body, and,
for the mind, there are also certain disciplinary subjects that we can
make use of. When the body digests food, it works invisibly and without
our conscious awareness. In the same way, judgment, imagination and all
the other mental abilities deal with the mental food of knowledge. It
incorporates it and makes it part of the mind, which isn't the same as
memorizing. Another analogy is that the digestive process is motivated
by appetite. In the same way, children come into the world with a few
inborn desires that motivate them to get what they need. These
appetites are ambition, praise, wealth, the desire to excel,
companionship, and curiosity--the
craving for knowledge.
pg 226
It seems to me that any education that appeals to the desire for wealth
(grades, prizes, scholarships), or the desire to excel (being top in
the class), or any other desire other
than the craving for knowledge will upset the natural balance of
character. Even more fatal, wrongly motivated educational efforts will
kill any desire and love for the knowledge that's supposed to enrich
and delight us for our entire lives. Dr. Johnson says, 'The desire to
know is natural to mankind. Every human being whose mind hasn't been
destroyed will be willing to sacrifice everything he has to get
knowledge.' Could it be that a hunger for good grades is really the
sign of a debased, ruined mind? A pure, healthy mind will eagerly take
in knowledge. Our students have found their lessons so interesting that
they don't need any other motivation to learn.
Children
Must Be Educated With Books
Related to the principle that Education is the Science of
Relationships, is that no education is worth its name if it doesn't
make children feel at home in the world of books. Education should
connect children mind to mind with thinkers who have dealt with
knowledge. We reject things like abridged synopses and condensed
compilations. Instead, we provide children with books that, whether
they're long or short, are definitely living.
The teacher's main job is to help children deal with their books.
Lectures and oral lessons are just a small part of the teacher's job,
and are only used to summarize, expand or illustrate the book [--never in place of it!]
It's a tendency to put too much faith in lectures and oral lessons.
Carlyle said, 'To have material poured into you as if you were a bucket
isn't exhilarating to anyone.' And it's not very exhilarating to have
every difficult concept
pg 227
explained to the point of tediousness, or to be coaxed to explain with
annoying questions. Dr. Johnson said, 'I refuse to be put to the
question. Don't you think, sir, that this questioning is a rude way for
a gentleman to behave? I refused to be baited with what? and why? What is this? What is that?
Why is a cow's tail long? Why is a fox's tail bushy?' Children think
the same thing, although they don't say so. Oral lessons are
occasionally useful, and when they're used correctly, it's the child
who will be curious enough to ask questions. It isn't as healthy or
totally honest as has been supposed for a teacher to pose as the source
of all knowledge who gives such nice lessons. Such lessons might seem
interesting at the moment, but they deprive the child of having to
exert any mental effort, and the result is the same as when an older
person reads a magazine. But, on the other hand, when children work
through a substantial book, even if takes two or three years to master,
they stay interested to the end. They develop an intelligent curiosity
about cause and effect. In fact, what they're doing is educating themselves.
pg 228
Chapter
21 - Suggestions Toward a Curriculum (For
Children under Twelve)
Part
II.--School Books
Books
that Supply the Nourishment of Ideas
H. G. Wells hit the nail on the head when he said that selecting the
right schoolbooks is a teacher's great task. I'm not sure that this
would
necessarily be the way to do it, though--or if even a whole team of
experts with a generous budget could really provide the kind of
schoolbooks that children connect with. Children are unpredictable.
They might dutifully plod through the volumes of dull texts that
qualify as 'schoolbooks' or 'educational,' but they don't allow those
books to reach their inner spirits and have access to their minds. A
book might be long, short, old, contemporary, easy, difficult, written
by a great man, or written by a lesser man, and still be the kind of living book that find its way into
the mind of a young reader. An educational expert isn't the best person
to choose because, in this case, it's the children themselves who are
the experts. Even reading a single page will be enough for the child to
make up his mind. Unfortunately, once he decides, he opens or
closes his mind. Many impressive and admirable textbooks
pg 229
that teachers dearly love are filed in the wastebasket of the
schoolchild's
mind, and that's why he doesn't absorb any of it, and can't produce
results from it. The teacher needs to have an understanding of the
difference between twaddle and simple clarity, and between excitement
and vital life. Beyond that,
he'll just have to test each book or see what kind of results other
teachers have had with different books. But one thing he can be sure of
is that a book only educates to the extent that it's vital and
essential. But I've already discussed this subject in another chapter.
Books
and Oral Lessons
Once the right book has been found, the teacher needs to let the book
take the lead, and be content to stay in the background. The book takes precedence over any lecture.
The teacher's role is to get the students in the right attitude about
the book with a word or two expressing his own interest in what's in
the book, or his enjoyment of the author's style. The students only get
knowledge when they dig for it themselves. Work paves the way for
assimilation, which is the active mental process of converting
information into real knowledge. The effort of working through the
author's sequence of thought is more valuable to a student than any
amount of oral lectures.
Do teachers understand the paralyzing, dulling effect that a deluge of
talking has on the mind? Yes, an inspired speaker can waken a response
so that his hearers listen with captivated attention, but not many of
us can claim to be inspired, and we're sometimes aware of how difficult
it is to hold our students' attention. We blame ourselves, but the real
fault is isn't with us, it's with the method we're using. It's the
diluted
oral lesson or lecture used in place of a living, compelling book
that's to blame. Oral lessons are sometimes needed to introduce,
illustrate,
pg 230
amplify or sum up a book. But they should be few and far between.
Children
will have to walk through life on their own, finding their intellectual
nourishment for themselves. We shouldn't start them off getting used to
crutches.
Using
Supplemental Resources
For the same reason, so we don't paralyze the mental ability of
children, we should be cautious about using supplemental appliances
(except for things like microscopes, telescopes, slide projectors that
enhance the child's own observations). I once heard a teacher who
taught in a town where ships were built say that he demanded and got
from the school committee a scale cut-away model of a warship. He said
that this model would be useful to his students when they went to work
in the shipyard. But, during their school years, I believe that this
would stifle their minds because the mind isn't able to conceive for
itself when it has an elaborate model as its basis. I recently visited
M. Bloch's impressive 'Peace and War' show at Lucerne. There were full
models and cut-away diagrams of torpedoes, but I still didn't
understand them. I asked the person I had dinner with to explain the
principle. He used his eyeglass case to illustrate, and, after a few
sentences, I understood what made a torpedo a torpedo. As it turned
out, the man had worked in the War Office and been involved with
torpedoes. The teacher's ability to illustrate his point with a coffee
mug or ruler or whatever he has at hand, and the blackboard,
seems to me to be more useful than even the most elaborate models and
diagrams that dull the senses and switch off the active mind as soon as
they're presented.
Coordinating
Subjects [The Unit Study Model]
Another point I'd like to make is that
pg 231
coordinating subjects shouldn't be based on the notion that they need
to be planned to prevent ideas from clashing and to assist their
formation
into clumps of 'apperception masses.' They should be coordinated solely
in reference to the natural and inevitable relationships to each
other. When reading about the period of history of the Armada, we
shouldn't devote math time to calculating how much food was necessary
to sustain the Spanish fleet. That would be an arbitrary, forced
connection, not a natural, inherent one. But it's natural to read
whatever history, travel books, and literature will make the Spanish
Armada come to life in the students' minds.
Our
Goal in Education
Our goal in education is to give children significant interests in as
many different subjects as possible--to 'set their feet in a large
room.' [Psa 31:8] The tragic
evil of our day, as I see it, is intellectual apathy.
If we truly believe that a child is in the world to get all he can of
the things that endure, and that his full, happy life and expansion,
expression, resourcefulness, ability to serve--in
other words, his character--depends on how much he recognizes the
relationships that are proper for him and grasps them, then we should
be gravely uneasy if a student graduates and has prejudices and only
cares
about sporting events instead of having essential interests and
pursuits. We
believe that our best students have principles that are credited as
much to their school as their home. Our failure in educational seems to
be more intellectual than moral.
Education
By Things
Students should be educated by Things
and by Books. Ten years ago,
utilizing Things in education
wasn't thought much of, except in games at
pg 232
boarding schools. But a great reform has taken place, and, today, the
value of Things is widely
recognize everywhere. Disciplinary exercises and artistic handicrafts
are valued as much in education as geography and Latin. Nature study
has been only a recent addition, but it's become accepted
enthusiastically. If that Sikh that Cornelia Sorabji quoted in Spectator, 2nd August 1902 visits
us again ten years from now, I hope that he wouldn't still say about
us, 'The very thoughts of the people are about merchandise. They
haven't learned the common language of Nature.' The teaching of Science
is getting a lot of attention, so I don't need to stress how important
it is in this book. Here and there, children are exposed to works of
art, and that will become a more widely used tool of education in the
future.
I don't need to repeat what everyone already knows. So much general
attention is being given to Things,
and it seems to be being implemented correctly so far, so I have
nothing more to add on the subject.
Education
by Books
The educational failure that we still have to deal with regards Books. We recognize that all the
knowledge and thought of the world is stored in Books, but we're overwhelmed by the
amount of knowledge and number of books. So we think we can take
selections here and there from this or that book, using fragments and
facts
of knowledge and distributing them in booklets to be studied for exams,
or oral lessons and lectures.
Sir Philip Magnus [an educationalist]
recently spoke about Headwork and Handicrafts in Elementary Schools,
and he said some things worth considering. Maybe he puts too much of a
priority on workshops in his ideal schools of the future, but he
certainly is accurate in singling out the weak point in
pg 233
elementary and secondary school work: the problem is that
students are 'memorizing scraps of knowledge, fragments of so-called
science.' And we agree with him when he emphasizes reading and writing. Through
reading and writing,
even school lessons will become something 'to delight in.' Of course,
learning to write comes from reading. Nobody can write well who doesn't
read much. In the April 16, 1903 issue of Education, Sir Philip Magnus says
this about schools of the future: 'We'll no longer require students to
learn scraps of history, geography and grammar by rote memory. We won't
teach them mere fragments of so-called science. Instead, the daily
hours set aside for these subjects will be applied to creating mental
aptitudes, and used to show students how to get knowledge for
themselves . . . In the future, education's main function will be to
train the hands, senses and intellectual capabilities so that students
will have an advantage in seeking knowledge . . . The extent of the
lessons will be broadened. Children will be taught to read in order
that they'll want to read. They'll be taught to write in order that
they'll want to write. The teacher's goal will be to create in his
students a desire for knowledge, and, as a result, a love for reading.
And, with proper selection of lessons, teachers will cultivate in their
students the enjoyment that reading can bring. The main component of
reading lessons will be to show the students how to use books, how
books can be consulted to find out what other people have said or done,
and how books can be read for the pleasure they provide. Storing facts
in the memory has no place in elementary school . . . It isn't enough
pg 234
for a child to know the mechanics of writing. He needs to know what to write. He needs to learn to
describe what he's seen or heard clearly, and to transfer his
sense-impressions to written language, and to express his own thoughts
concisely.'
I'd like to add one more thing to Sir Philip Magnus's vision. I'd like
to emphasize the habit of
reading as something that's important for students to acquire from
school. After all, it's only those who have read who do read.
The
Question of a Curriculum
Regarding curriculum, I'd like to emphasize what I said in an earlier
chapter. Perhaps the main part of a child's education should be
concerned with the great human relationships--history, literature, art,
ancient and modern languages, travel. All of these are the records or
expressions of people. Science is, too, when it's the history of
discoveries or an account of someone's observations that can be read in
books. But, for the most part, science is under the category of
Education by Things. Science
is actually too broad a subject to deal with here. But what's more
important than all of these is Religion, which includes our
relationships of love, loyalty, love and service to God. Maybe next
in importance is the intimate, individual relationship with ourselves
that's implied
when we talk about things like self-knowledge and self-control. We owe
children these kinds of knowledge because it seems to be the case that
the limit of human intelligence directly corresponds to how limited a
person's interests are. In other words, a normal person with deficient,
narrow intelligence is that way because he was never exposed to the
interests that were proper for him. A curriculum that provides what
children have a right to can be divided into six to eight groups:
religion, perhaps philosophy, history, languages, math, science, art,
physical exercise, and handicrafts.
pg 235
Religion
In teaching Religion, the
Bible is without question what we need to rely on because it's the
great storehouse of spiritual truth and moral impressions. In fact, a
child could receive a pretty generous education from reading nothing
but the Bible because the Bible contains such great literature within
itself.
At one time, the 'National Schools' educated their students on the
Bible, which is one of the three great collections of ancient classical
literature. Ever since miscellaneous 'Readers' have replaced the Bible,
there's been some decline in both character and intelligence in our
nation. It's not possible or even desirable to revert back to what they
used to do, but we should make sure that children get as much
intellectual, moral and religious nourishment from their books as they
did when their lessons were constructed entirely from the story of
Joseph in Genesis to the letters of St. Paul.
History
In history, students aged twelve to fourteen should have a pretty
thorough knowledge of British history, contemporary French history, and
Greek and Roman history. They should get their Greek and Roman history
from biographies. Perhaps nothing else besides the Bible is as
educational as Plutarch's Lives.
The wasteful mistake that's made so often in teaching English history
is in having children from about nine to fourteen read through several
short abridgments beginning with Little
Arthur's History of England [by
Maria Callcott]. But their intelligence at those ages is
sufficient to steadily work through a single more substantial book.
Language
By age twelve, children should have a good understanding of English
grammar, and they should have read some literature. They should have
some ability to speak and understand French, and they should
pg 236
be able to read an easy French book. They should have similar abilities
with German, but with considerably less progress. In Latin, they should
at
least be reading 'Fables,' if not 'Caesar' and possibly 'Virgil.'
Math
I don't need to discuss mathematics. It already receives enough
attention, and is quickly becoming a subject that's taught with living
methods.
'Practical
Instruction'
As far as practical instruction in subjects like Science, Drawing,
Manual and Physical Training, etc., I can't do any more than repeat our
convictions again. The PNEU believes that children in all social
classes have a right to be educated in all of these four subjects. For
students under twelve, the same general curriculum should be fine for
all of the children. I don't have anything to add to the way these
subjects are taught, which is pretty widely accepted by everyone.
Science
In Science, or, actually,
nature study, we place a high priority on recognition. We believe that the
ability to recognize and know the name of a plant or rock or
constellation requires some classifying, and includes a good bit of
knowledge. To know a plant by the way it grows, where it lives, when
and how it flowers and bears seeds, or to know a bird by the way it
flies, its song, and when it arrives and leaves, to know when you might
find a robin or a thrush, takes a lot of focused observation and the
kind of knowledge that helps understand science. Students keep a dated
record of what they see in their nature notebooks. They're allowed to
manage these notebooks however they want; the books aren't graded or
corrected. They take pride and pleasure in these notebooks and freely
illustrate them with dry-brush work paintings of twigs, flowers,
insects, etc. The knowledge
pg 237
it takes to make these nature records isn't taught from formal school
lessons. One
afternoon a week, the students in our 'Practicing School' [taught by the student teachers at
Charlotte Mason's teacher's college] go for a 'nature walk' with
their teacher. They notice things by themselves, and the teacher tells
them the name or gives other information only if they ask for it. It's
surprising how much knowledge about different things a child can gain
by the time he's nine or ten years old. The teachers are careful not to
turn these nature walks into an opportunity to give science lessons,
because they want the children's attention to be focused on their own
observations. They're allowed to notice things with very little
direction from the teacher. By doing this, children accumulate a good
collection of 'common knowledge.' Huxley thought that this kind of
general knowledge should come before formal science teaching. Even more
important, students learn to know and take pleasure in objects from
nature like they do in the familiar faces of friends. The nature walk
shouldn't be used as a chance to dispense miscellaneous tidbits of
scientific facts. The study of science should be taught in an ordered
sequence, and that's not possible or even desirable during a nature
walk. I think that an essential aspect of any living education should
be for all students of all ages to spend a half day every week
throughout the entire year, outside in nature. In almost every town,
there's some place where children can have the opportunity to observe
the changing seasons from week to week.
Geography, geology, the sun's course through the sky, the way clouds
behave, signs of the weather, everything that the open air has to
offer, are utilized on these walks, but it's all casual and incidental,
things are simply noticed as they happen to come up. In most areas
there are probably naturalists who would be willing to help with these
nature walks in one of the local schools.
This direct nature walk is supplemented with
pg 238
occasional object lessons, such as the different kinds of hairs on
plants, or the diversity of wings, and all the things discussed in
Professor [Bernard?] Miall's
wonderful books. But we rely on books
only as a subordinate supplement to outside observation. We use books
by authors such as Mrs. Fisher, Mrs. Brightwen, Professor Lloyd Morgan,
Professor Geikie, and, for students over fourteen, Professor Geddes and
Thomson. With these books and others like them, the student is put in
the position of being an original observer of biology or some other
phenomena. They learn what to look for, and they make observations for
themselves that are original, at least for them. They get into the
right frame of mind to observe and make deductions, and their alert
interest is awakened. We're extremely careful not to burden children's
verbal memory with scientific names. They learn about pollen, antennae,
and whatever, casually as these things appear to them and they need to
know its name. Only those children who are curious about it should have
the opportunity to see tiny structural wonders that come up in their
reading or walks under a microscope. A good microscope lens is a great
investment and almost indispensable in nature observation. I think
there can be too much of a priority given to education by Things. Although that is
tremendously valuable, a certain lack of atmosphere tends to result, as
well as a tragic lack of any standard with which to make comparisons,
and the principle of reverence for nature. The distinction of an
education that relies only on Things
and leaves out Books seems to
be the kind of attitude that 'We're the only people who ever mattered!'
Drawing
In pictures, we avoid mechanical aids like grids and directional lines.
We don't use
pg 239
black lead pencils because they tend to encourage the copying of lines
instead of the free rendering of objects. Children tend to always work
in the round, whether they're using charcoal or drybrush. They also
illustrate stories and poems, which aren't usually impressive as far as
drawing skill goes, and don't lend themselves to art instruction.
Still, they're useful exercises.
Picture
Talks
We believe that our picture talks have a lot of value. A reproduction
of an appropriate picture, perhaps by Millet, is put into the
children's hands, and they study it by themselves. Then, children from
ages six to nine describe the picture, giving all the details and
showing with a few lines on the blackboard where a certain tree or
house is, seeing if they can guess what time of day the picture
depicts, and discovering the story of the picture if there is one.
Older children can also study some of the lines of the composition,
light and shade, the particular style of the artist, and draw certain
details from memory. The purpose of these lessons is to help students
appreciate art, not to create it themselves.
I don't have enough space to go into more detail about a curriculum;
you can see curriculum more fully illustrated in the appendix.
pg 240
Chapter
22 - Suggestions Regarding Curriculum
(For
Children under Twelve)
Part
III.--The Love of Knowledge
Using
Books Makes for a Short School Day
Since a half dozen entire groups of subjects with their own sets of
subjects are included under the heading of 'Education by Books,' any
practical teacher might be tempted to laugh because it seems to be some
kind of educational Utopia. But, in practice, it turns out that using
books does make the school day shorter. In our Parents' Review School, all
book-work, writing, preparation or reporting is done between the hours
of 9:00 to 11:30 for the lowest class, and 9:00 to 1:00 for the
highest, with a half hour break for exercise/drill, etc.
Then one or two hours, depending on the age and class, are spent in the
afternoons with handicrafts, nature observation (field work), drawing,
etc. The evenings are absolutely free so that the students have time
for hobbies, reading with their families, and other leisure
activities. Since children taught this way get into the habit of
focusing close attention, and are carried along in their schoolwork
because it's so interesting, we're able to get through a greater number
of subjects, and do a more thorough job covering each subject,
and in a shorter amount of time than is usually allowed.
'Utilitarian'
Education
I'm inclined to say the same thing about utilitarian education that Mr.
Lecky [probably William Edward
Hartpole Lecky] says about utilitarian morals,
pg 241
that 'the Utilitarian theory is extremely immoral.' Deliberately
educating children for a specific purpose, such as qualifying them for
commercial work or manufacturing, is making general ignorance a
priority in order to favor special skills. 'The greater includes the
less, but the less doesn't include the greater.' A person who's been
educated to have good character and general intelligence can do any
kind of work excellently, and we teachers can't do anything more noble
for the nation than preparing these kinds of people to serve the
country. Anyone who has intelligent relationships with life will
produce good work.
Relationships
and Interest
Throughout this book, I've talked about relationships, and not interests. Interests can be casual,
unworthy and fleeting. Everyone, even the most ignorant person, has
interests of one kind or another. But creating a valid relationship
implies that some knowledge has begun in that area. The problem
with the way we think about education is that we don't realize that
knowledge is vital. Therefore both adults and children suffer from
malnourished minds. Our intellectual void is undoubtedly partly due to
the fact that educational theorists use organized methods that
undervalue real knowledge. I think that these kinds of theorists tend
to place more importance on the physical workings on the brain than to
what comes from the brain. In other words, they think that it's more
important for a child to think
than it is for him to know.
But I say that a child can't know
without having thought, and
that he can't think if he doesn't have a regular, abundant supply of
various materials of knowledge. All of us know how reading a passage
can stimulate us to think, wonder, and make inferences, which all
result in getting us some additional knowledge.
pg 242
The undervaluing of knowledge isn't a deliberate conspiracy, it isn't
even realized. But the more education is perceived as a series of
psychological problems, the greater the tendency will be to treat,
modify, and practically eliminate
knowledge. Yet that knowledge is the very air, food, exercise, and
whole life of man's mind. When we provide 'education' without including
abundant knowledge, we're like people striving for physical development
by giving lots of exercise, but almost no food. The purpose of a
child's education is supposed to be getting knowledge and delighting in
knowledge. One of our prophets [Thomas
Carlyle] was right when he said, 'If even one man dies ignorant
when he could have had knowledge, that's tragic.'
To summarize, I believe that our efforts to provide an intellectual
education fail for six reasons:
Reasons
for Failure
(a) The oral lesson, which, at worst, is poor twaddle, and at best is
still far inferior to an organized learning of the same material by
reading the right book written by an original thinker. (The right books
exist in countless numbers, both old and new ones, but it takes great
care to make the right selections, as well as a lot of experience
understanding the rather whimsical tastes and dislikes of children.)
(b) Lectures, which are usually gathered from different books that the
teacher took quick notes from, and then delivers in hasty notes that
the students take notes on, and then cram for an exam. Lectures are
often careful, thorough and well-illustrated--but they still aren't as
educational as direct contact with the mind of an original thinker who
wrote a book on the subject. We know that Arnold, Thring, and Bowen
lectured very effectively, but each of them
pg 243
only lectured on a few subjects, and each of their lectures was like a
spring bubbling out of their well of knowledge that they had slowly
gathered over time. Alas, not all of us are Arnolds or even Bowens.
(c) Text books that are condensed and compressed from one or even many
bigger books. These text books fall into two categories--the dry and
boring kind that only give dull data and factual details, or the easy
and
attractive kind that seek to entertain. I think we can safely say that
neither kind of text-book has any
educational value.
(d) Lazy minds that are the result of stimulating the wrong desires to
motivate students to do work that they would naturally do if they were
allowed to enjoy knowledge for its own sake.
(e) In elementary school, depending on graphics and illustrative
objects that paralyze the mind.
(f) Also in elementary schools, using 'Readers' that, no matter how
carefully they're selected, can never be as valuable as reading actual
literature.
Education
by Books
For the last twelve years, we've tried our plan of educating children
with Books and Things, and, on the whole, the
results are very encouraging. Even average
children are happy to do their lessons. That doesn't mean they'll
remember everything they learn, but, in the words of Jane Austen,
they'll have had their 'imaginations warmed' in lots of different areas
of knowledge.
Blind
Alleys
I'd like to take a moment to warn against following blind alleys in our
educational thoughts or educational methods. When it comes to
education, we don't find hidden treasure by casually digging in the
freeways. If evolution is true, then ideas must also have their own
species and descendants, and they must follow their own laws of
reproducing. An educated and thoughtful Chinese man will sometimes
remove himself from the outer world
pg 244
and separate himself from the ideas of other people. Then, when he
feels that he's arrived at a proper state of emptiness, he'll get out
his paint brushes and create from his inner consciousness. The result
will be something that he's never seen or heard or even imagined--some
hieroglyphic set of curves that will be attractive and impressive if
he's an artist. Then he labels his disconnected creation with some
arbitrary Chinese symbol, his peers accept this without question, and
this art is duly hung in his Hall of Tablets. (See 'Through a Hidden
Shensi,' by F. Nichols) Some of us probably know the symbol for
'happiness' in the flowing Chinese characters.
This is all very interesting, and our Western mind is ready enough to
fall for this charming fancy. But I think that it gives us a key to
the baffling problem of China. Here we have a vast population with some
high moral qualities, sharp and sometimes profound intelligence, yet
their civilization seems to have been stagnant for thousands of years.
Might the reason be their tendency to chase after intellectual
rabbit trails and futile blind alleys in all different directions? They
don't realize that a method implies that you're working towards a
specific goal, and traveling a path to get there, making progress step
by step. And they don't realize that a notion only becomes a fruitful
idea when it's influenced by something from outside. Their air of
Divine superiority means that no one will question their casual finds,
but they won't progress. They'll remain the same in everything, just as
they've always been.
And this is the danger that we can fall into regarding education. We
seize on the notion that children should be able to use both hands, or
to draw figures on compasses without any intention, or we apply the
theory of 'child study' to the mind, or latch onto the image of
coagulating clumps that
pg 245
we call 'apperception masses,' or any of a hundred useless intellectual
rabbit trails in a hundred different directions that we hope will give
us the key to education. We can see how futile these notions are if we
apply the test of progress to them. Are they the way to anything? If
so, to what? Out of respect for the children, let's be conservative.
Let's not stake their interests on the hope that this new way or that
novel idea might lead to great results if people are bold enough to try
it. Yes, it's exciting to be a pioneer, but, for the children's sake,
it might be safer to restrain ourselves and only take the paths that we
know people have successfully taken before, or only those newer
paths that offer evident, assured means of making progress towards a goal we desire.
Educationalists shouldn't have their own agendas, and they shouldn't be
allowed
to adopt fads.
An
Educated Child
Knowledge is undoubtedly a relative term, and what a young child knows
about a subject would be considered ignorance if that's all an older
student knew. All the same, there is such a thing that we can define
objectively as
an educated child. Such a child has a solid, wide knowledge of lots of
different subjects, and they all interest him. This is a child who
enjoys his school lessons.
Children
Enjoy School, but Not Because They Love Knowledge
In all fairness, it's true that most children like school. They love
the stimulation of school life and the social experience of friends.
They're competitive and eager for reward and praise. They enjoy the
hundreds of legitimate interests of school life, including the
appealing personality of a particular teacher. But it's doubtful
whether the love of knowledge for its own sake is much of a motivator
with the young students. This is important
pg 246
because, of all the wonderful motives of school life, the love of
knowledge is the only one that lasts. It's the only motive that
determines the level on which the student will live the rest of his
life. To repeat what I've already said, my point is that all children
naturally have an inborn capacity and love for knowledge. Knowledge
about people and governments is best gotten from books, and children
should get that knowledge for themselves out of their books.
There are hundreds of biographies that give us glimpses of
children who grew up on books. And there are still probably lots of
schools whose main work is studying books. It's probably this fact that
keeps our great boarding schools going--to the extent that they still
continue to exist, they exist on books. The best boarding school
graduates are fine, decent young adults, and even the worst of them
have probably benefited by having their minds touched by living ideas.
Yet we all recognize that boarding schools often fail because they
graduate average or slow students and place them in the world still
ignorant, because the curriculum was too narrow to be of any interest
to them. Remember that if a student leaves school at age 17 or 18 and
hasn't become a diligent reader by then, it's pretty certain that he'll
never become a reader. But
it's possible that the most essential step in reforming schools is
proper preparation upon a
broad curriculum, handled intelligently, while the student is between
the ages of six and twelve.
An
Educational Revolution
I've added appendices to demonstrate (a) how a wide, varied curriculum
and the use of lots of books work in the Parents' Review School; (b) the
kind of progress that a student should have made by age twelve
pg 247
using this method; and (c) how we use oral lessons. I hope my readers
will be convinced that the students have knowledge in
several fields of study, that they manifest a distinct appetite for
such knowledge, and that thought and mental ability develop as we read
books in a way that doesn't happen with lectures. If my readers are
indeed convinced of the truth of what I've proposed, I think they'll
see more than a minor reform here and there. I think that this is
nothing less than an EDUCATIONAL
REVOLUTION--and each of us can have a
hand it.
The
Children's Magna Carta
I think I've justified my suggestions with experience. My plea is for
lots of doors to be opened to children until they're at least twelve or
fourteen--and all doors to good houses, in the sense that [Hippolyte?] Taine wrote that
'Education is merely a written invitation to privileged and noble
homes.' And children should never be introduced to any subjects via
concise summaries, outlines or selections. they should learn what
history is, and what literature is, and what life is, from living books
written by those who know. I
know it's possible because it's being done right now on an impressive
scale.
If we're convicted, then the Magna Carta of children's intellectual
freedom is at hand. We need it now,
and the way to do it is clear. At the very least, we should guarantee
that children up to the age of twelve should be educated using a
curriculum similar to what I've been talking about, instilling a habit of Books that I've discussed. (It's
very encouraging that the Board of Education's new regulations for
primary and secondary schools go along with the suggestions in this
book.)
pg 248
Appendix
Questions
for the Use of Readers
Chapter 1 - Submission And Authority
In The Home And The School
1. In what ways are relationships between children and their parents
better than they were a generation or two ago?
2. Describe the elder generation of parents.
3. What about 'ill guided' homes?
4. Give an example of absolute authority. Name some notable men who
grew up under such rule.
5. Compare the arbitrary parent now with the arbitrary parent of the
past.
6. Was arbitrary rule always a failure?
7. What thought should encourage us in our own efforts?
8. Explain how arbitrary rule was needed because of limitations.
9. Explain how it is one cause of the secretive nature of children.
10. In what way has the evolution of philosophic thinking changed the
relationship between parents and children?
11. What effect has the concept of Infallible Reason had on
authority?
12. Explain how English thought elevates the concept of Reason.
pg 249
13. What is the final justification for authority?
14. Why is the enthronement of human reason the dethronement of the
highest authority?
15. Explain how the spreading of an idea is as 'quick as thought.'
16. Why has the notion of the finality of human reason become
intolerable?
17. On what grounds are authority and docility fundamental principles?
18. Explain why self-interest does not adequately explain the response
of submission to authority.
19. Explain why the work of the rationalistic philosophers was
inevitable.
20. Explain how they support the concept of human freedom.
21. Describe the method in which the education of the world seems to be
carried on.
22. Show the danger of the notion that authority is vested in persons.
23. Explain how a person in authority is under authority.
Chapter 2 - Docility And Authority In
The Home And The School Part II - How Authority Behaves
1. Show, by example, that it's easy to make a mistake on principle.
2. Explain the difference between authority and absolute rule.
3. How does absolute rule behave?
4. Explain how it is absolute rule that assigns duties and grants
favors.
5. How does authority behave?
6. Give half-a-dozen ways in which we can distinguish the rule of
authority.
7. What are the qualities that a ruler should have?
pg 250
8. What's the difference between mechanical and reasonable obedience?
9. When is mechanical obedience useful?
10. Show how actions of mechanical obedience can help a child to have
masterly
use of his body.
11. How is the person who can make himself do what he wills, trained?
12. Why is the effort of decision the greatest effort of life?
13. Show how habit spares us a lot of this stressful effort.
14. Show how the habit of obedience eases the lives of children.
15. How does authority avoid any cause of offence?
16. Explain how alert authority in the home acts as a preventive force.
17. Show how important the changing of the thoughts, or diversion, is
in helping to form habits.
18. Explain how children, also, exercise authority.
19. What question should parents ask themselves daily to help them
maintain authority?
Chapter 3 - 'Masterly Inactivity'
1. Contrast our sense of responsibility with that held in the 1850's
and 1860's.
2. Explain how the change in our point of view is a sign moral progress.
3. What kind of responsibility currently presses heavily upon
thoughtful people?
4. Explain how anxiety marks every transition stage.
5. How does a sense of responsibility produce a fussy and restless
habit?
6. Why is it a good idea to adopt the concept of 'masterly
inactivity' in education?
pg 251
7. What four or five ideas are included in the concept of 'masterly
inactivity'?
8. What is Wordsworth's phrase?
9. What is the first element of this attitude of mind?
10. Explain how good-naturedness is the second element.
11 Explain how self-confidence is also necessary.
12. What can mothers learn from the casual, easy attitude of some
fathers?
13. Explain how confidence in children is also an element of 'masterly
inactivity.'
14. Why do parents and teachers need to be omniscient?
15. Show why 'masterly inactivity' is necessary in bringing up a
child whose life is conditioned by 'fate' and 'free-will.'
16. What delicate balance between fate and free-will should be aimed at
for the child?
17. Show why it's important for the parent to have a sound mind within
a healthy body.
18. What can we learn from the quality that all the early painters
have bestowed upon the ideal Mother?
19. Give one or two practical suggestions for tired, over-stimulated
mothers.
20. Why is leisure necessary to a children's well-being?
21. What is the foundation of the 'masterly inactivity' we have in mind?
Chapter 4 - Some Of The Rights Of
Children As Persons
1. Why should children be free in their play?
2. In what respect are organised sports not really play?
3. Why should we be careful of interfering with children's work?
4. Explain how children must succeed or fall by their own efforts.
5. Show the danger of a system of prodding.
pg 252
6. How far can we count on the dutiful nature of children?
7. How far should children be free to choose their friends?
8. How far should children be free to spend their pocket-money?
9. How far should children be free to form their opinions?
10. Explain how spontaneity isn't like a native wildflower.
Chapter 5 - Psychology as it Relates
to Current Thinking
1. Describe the educational thought of the 1700's.
2. Explain how we, too, have had a period when we were certain and
excited about education.
3. Explain the general dissatisfaction we have now.
4. What conditions can we use to test a working psychology for our own
age?
5. Show how the sacredness of the person is one of the
living concepts of the age that we're being brought up on.
6. Why do we feel justified in expecting an education to make the most
of a person?
7. How is 'the solidarity of the race' to be dealt with in education?
8. Explain how the best thought of any age is common thought.
9. Discuss Locke's States of Consciousness.
10. Explain how this theory does not provide for the personal growth of
individuals.
11. How does modern physiological psychology compare with Locke's
theory?
12. How does Professor James define physiological psychology?
13. Explain how this definition makes the production of thought, etc.,
purely chemical.
14. Why is this assumption 'unjustifiable materialism'?
pg 253
15. What is Professor James' conclusion about what is called the
'new psychology'?
16. Explain why a psychology that eliminates personality
is depressing and devitalising.
17. How can we tell when the 'new psychology'
has become part of our faith?
18. Explain how this 'new psychology' is inadequate, unnecessary, and
out of harmony.
19. At what point does it impede the personal growth of the individual?
Chapter 6 - Examining Some Educational
Theories
1. What do we owe to the theories of Pestalozzi and Froebel?
2. What is the source of weakness in their theories?
3. Compare 'make children happy and they will be good' with 'be good
and you will be happy.'
4. Show the fundamental error of regarding man as merely part of the
Cosmos.
5. Explain how the struggle for existence is a part of life, even for a
child.
6. Explain how any sort of transition violates the principles of unity
and
continuity.
7. Why is the Herbartian theory so tempting?
8. Explain how this theory treats the person as an effect, and not a
cause.
9. Explain how the role of education is overrated by this theory.
10. Explain how this system of psychology is not in harmony with
current
thought in three specific ways.
11. Explain how educational truth is a common possession, owned by
everyone.
12. What are the characteristics of a child who is being effectively
educated?
pg 254
13. What, roughly speaking, is meant by the word 'person'?
14. Show how a person is like Wordsworth's 'cloud.'
15. Describe an adequate doctrine of education.
16. Show how an adequate doctrine of education is in touch with the
three great ideas which are currently in people's minds.
17. What would you say about personal influence in education?
18. What is implied by, Education is the Science of Relationships?
19. Why must teaching not be pushy?
20. What attitude on the teacher's part results from accepting the
child as a person?
Chapter 7 - An Adequate Educational
Theory
1. Give a basic definition of a human being.
2. What are man's capacities?
3. What are his limitations?
4. What are the two functions of a human being related to his education?
5. What physical process does education depend on?
6. What do we know, or can we guess, about the behavior of ideas?
7. What appears to be the origin of ideas?
8. Why do different ideas appeal to different minds? Give an
illustration.
9. Do we have any reason to believe that an idea is able to make a
physical
impression on the brain?
10. Mention some of the reflex actions we have when an idea strikes us.
11. How does spirit correspond with spirit, whether it's human or
divine?
12. Is a child born equipped with ideas?
13. What is the field that's open to the educationalist?
14. What can we learn from the story of the
'Child of Nuremberg'?
pg 255
15. What does nature, unassisted, do for a child?
16. Explain how the normal child has every ability he'll ever need.
17. How much does fulness of living depend on establishing
relationships?
18. Explain how our common way of teaching subjects like science
damages a natural affinity.
19. Why should a child be taught to recognise the natural things around
him?
20. How can we help him to appreciate beauty?
21. Why should he start with a first-hand knowledge of science?
22. Explain how appreciation and exact knowledge each has its
appropriate season.
Chapter 8 - Certain Relationships That
Are Proper for Children
1. How long would you give a child to initiate the range of
relationships that are appropriate for him?
2. What dynamic relationships should he have?
3. What power over material resources should he have?
4. Explain how he should have intimacy with animals.
5. What range of subjects belong to the great human relationships?
6. Give an example of the awakening idea and its outcome.
7. Explain how intelligence is limited to human interests.
8. What would happen if we fully accepted children as persons?
9. What effect has current psychology had on the sense of
duty?
10. Explain how children used to get a pretty thorough ethics education.
11. What is the case now?
pg 256
12. Explain how 'my duty towards my neighbor' is the only sound basis
for moral relationships.
13. Does the sense of what is due from us come instinctively?
14. Why should a child learn something about self-management?
15. Why should children have intimacy with people from all walks of
life?
16. How can their capability as citizens be helped?
17. What are the three groups of relationships that a child needs to
establish?
18. Which is the most important of these?
19. Explain how emotional religious sentiments don't fulfill our 'duty
towards God.'
20. What's the difference between sentiment and duty?
Chapter 9 - A Review of A Great
Educationalist
1. Show how Herbartian theory has more influence than
any other in Europe.
2. Explain how we, like Herbart, discard the concept of 'faculties.'
3. What does Herbart say about the persuasiveness of dominant ideas?
4. In what ways do we, too, recognise the influence of the Zeitgeist?
5. How does Herbart define the child's schoolmasters?
6. Explain how we agree with him in realizing the place of the family.
7. What does Herbart say about the child in the family?
8. Explain how we agree that all education springs from and rests
upon our relationship to God.
9. Why should we not divide education into religious and secular?
pg 257
10. What doctrine of the medieval Church do we hold regarding
'secular subjects'?
11. On what, according to Herbart, does the welfare, civilization,
and culture of a people depend?
12. Discuss the uncertainty that exists about the purpose of
education.
13. Should we follow Rousseau, Basedow, Locke, Pestalozzi, Froebel, in
our attempts to fix the purpose of education?
14. Show, according to Dr Rein, why not, in each case.
15. Explain how Herbart's theory is ethical, like ours is.
16. What did Herbart say about the obscurity of psychology?
17. But we have two shining principles. What are they?
18. What is probably the root problem with Herbart's educational
philosophy?
Chapter 10 - Some Aspects of Physical
Training That We Don't Usually Consider
1. Why doesn't our physical training tend to create heroes?
2. What is the goal of physical training?
3. Explain how this implies the idea of vocation.
4. What principle should temper excess, whether in work or pleasure?
5. Should parents bring up their children with unnecessary hardships?
Why not?
6. Write a short essay about each of the points brought up for
consideration.
7. Show how large a role habit plays in physical training.
8. Prove that self-restraint is a habit.
9. Show the danger of the excessive exercises that lead to indulgence.
10. How can self-control in a crisis become a trained habit?
pg 258
11. What can you say about the physical signs of mental states?
12. Explain how discipline needs to become self-discipline.
13. What is the role of parents during school vacations regarding
school
discipline?
14. How do 'local habits' demonstrate the necessity for self-discipline
in
even a young child?
15. Show how alertness needs to be trained as a physical habit.
16. Show how quick perception is not so much a gift, as a habit.
17. Write short essays on each of the habits discussed here.
18. Show the value of inspiring ideas in initiating habits.
19. How could you use the idea of 'fortitude' in education?
20. How could you use the idea of 'service'?
21. How could you use the idea of 'courage'?
22. How could you use the idea of 'caution' as related to the duty of
health?
23. What is the highest inspirational impulse towards purity that we
can have?
24 Write short essays on the virtues mentioned.
Chapter 11 - Some Aspects of
Intellectual Training That We Don't Usually Consider
1. Explain how we are somewhat law-abiding in physical and moral
matters.
2. Explain how we are not so law-abiding in intellectual matters.
3. What are the three ultimate facts that are not open to question?
4. Explain how one or other of the three is always a matter of debate.
5. What three attitudes/thoughts do we gain when we realise that
God is, self is, and the world is?
6. Why is it necessary to recognize the limitations of our reason?
pg 259
7. Describe the involuntary action of reason.
8. Show, using examples, (a) what the function of reason is, and (b) what
the function of reason is not.
9. Show, using examples, that wars, persecutions, and family feuds are
due
to the notion that whatever reason 'proves' is right and true.
10. Why should a child recognize the limitations of his own reason?
11. What mistake is commonly made regarding intellect and knowledge?
12. Explain how the world is educated by knowledge given 'in meals.'
13. How would you characterize our own era regarding the knowledge
given to us?
14. How did the medieval Church recognize the divine origin of
knowledge?
15. Why is nothing as practical as a great idea?
16. Show the importance of forming intellectual habits.
17. Explain how we put blind trust in disciplined subjects to
form intellectual habits.
18. Name and describe half a dozen intellectual habits that a child
should be trained in.
19. Explain how progress in the intellectual life, as in the Christian
life,
depends upon meditation.
20. Explain how a child must have the daily sustenance of living ideas.
How
do we err in this respect?
21. Comment on the literature that's appropriate for children.
22. Show how the intellectual development of children
is independent.
23. By what law do children assimilate nourishing ideas?
24. What, then, is the role of parents and teachers?
25. What mistake do parents make that is often fatal to growth?
26. Write a few comments on each of the subjects suggested regarding
the intellectual life of children.
pg 260
27. What was Plato's educational aim?
Chapter 12 - Some Aspects of Moral
Training That We Don't Usually Consider
1. What the three principles underlie the educational thought of the
PNEU?
2. Which principle is universally acknowledged as the foundation of
moral
teaching?
3. How does authority work?
4. 'Every man is his own final authority about what's right
and wrong.' Discuss this fallacy.
5. What are the limitations of authority?
6. What is the consequence of arbitrary action?
7. What idea that's been disputed for two thousand years is now
influencing the way teachers teach morals?
8. Explain how Socrates had to contend with the same concept, only
expressed differently.
9. What is the inevitable result of this teaching?
10. How should children be taught that duty can exist only as what
we owe to God?
11. Explain how morals do not come naturally.
12. Explain how a certain makeshift morality does come by heredity and
environment.
13. How do we get an educated conscience?
14. Explain how children aren't born moral nor immoral.
15. Show the danger of erratic, impulsive efforts to teach morals.
16. Where should we look for the foundation of our moral teaching?
17. What do the poets say to help us regarding moral teaching?
18. How did the medieval Church provide object lessons to teach ethics?
19. How do we fail in this respect?
pg 261
20. Why should children have the inspiration of high ideals?
21. Show the value of biographies in the inspiration of high ideals.
22. Name any virtues that the poets inspire us with.
23. Make a suggestion regaring the collection of mottoes.
24. How can parents and teachers help children develop the habit of
thinking pleasant
thoughts?
25. Name and discuss some of the virtues that children should be
trained to have.
26. Distinguish the difference between 'being good' and loving God.
Chapter 13 - Some Aspects of Religious
Training That We Don't Usually Consider
1. Show how the principle of authority influences religious teaching.
2. What ideas do the children of our day especially need to be
brought up in?
3. How do certain questions on people's minds diminsh the sense of
authority?
4. In what ways does authority work like a fair, good
government?
5. Discuss authority in connection with punishment.
6. Discuss each of the various habits connected with the
subject of authority in the religious life.
7. Explain how lines of habit are as important for the religious as
they are for
the physical, moral, and intellectual life.
8. How would you try to keep a child in the habit of the thinking about
God?
9. Discuss the subject of reverent attitudes.
10. How would you use, 'because the angels
will see' to help develop reverent attitudes?
11. Show the importance of regular times and places in children's
prayers.
pg 262
12. Why shouldn't evening prayers be left till bedtime?
13. What is to be said about little compilations of devotional
Scriptures?
14. Show the danger of neglecting the narrative teaching of the
Scriptures.
15. Why shouldn't children be encouraged to read long passages or pray
long prayers?
16. How should the habit of praise be fostered?
17. Show the value of the habit of observing the Sabbath, and describe
how a child's Sunday might be kept.
18. Write your reflections on each of the themes suggested related to
the habits of the religious life.
19. Show the importance of being selective about the inspiring ideas we
aspire to
give children in the things of the Divine life.
20. What other point demands our consideration?
21. What vitalizing idea is the most important to teach
children?
22. How should we teach children that the essence of Christianity is
devotion to a Person?
23. Why do children need to learn that there is a Savior of
the world?
24. What teaching would you give children about the work of the Holy
Spirit?
Chapter 14 - A Master-Thought
1. What is the motto of the Parents' Union?
2. Explain how this motto is a master-thought.
3. Why is 'education is an atmosphere' the part of the motto that
naturally appeals to us the most?
4. What happens if this part is taken for the whole?
5. What defect in education leads to boredom and the desire for passive
entertainment?
6. What was the unconscious formula of the 1700's?
pg 263
7. What was the result of this one-sided perspective of education?
8. Explain how the concept of developing faculties also rests on a
one-sided notion.
9. What is the tendency of an education whose foundation is the
development
of faculties?
10. Should it be our goal to produce specialists? Why not?
11. Show what kind of education develops a sound, well-balanced
mind.
12. Explain how the medieval Church understood that
'education is a life' better than we do.
13. Describe the educational philosophy illustrated on the
walls of the 'Spanish Chapel' of S. Maria Novella.
14. Explain how this educational creed unifies life.
15. What does Coleridge say about the origin of great ideas about
nature?
16. What did Michelangelo write to his friend about the need for a diet
of great ideas?
17. What is the special teaching approved for us today?
18. What views do people tend to take regarding to this subject?
19. What does Huxley say about ideas in science?
20. How does the teaching illustrated on the
walls of the 'Spanish Chapel' of S. Maria Novella, and Coleridge's
teaching relieve us from
anxiety and clear up our confusion?
21. How does Coleridge describe the science of Botany in his
day?
22. What has evolution, the key-word of our age, done for this and
other confusions?
23. But what have philosophers been seeking for
three thousand years?
24 How did Herakleitos attempt to solve the problem?
25. How did Demokritos attempt to solve the problem?
pg 264
26. Explain how some familiarity with history and philosophy should
make us stop and think regarding the key that evolution claims to
provide.
27. Explain how personality remains, and is not resolved by this key.
28. Why is it necessary for parents and teachers to consider their
attitude towards evolution?
29. What are the four attitudes that people take up?
30. What benefits will the children gain if their teachers adopt the
last of these attitudes?
31. What two things depend on us regarding the great
ideas that are influencing what the world is being taught?
32. Show the danger of making education too much of a personal matter.
33. If education is a world concern, explain how we need to have a
guiding
idea about it.
34. What ideas should regulate the curriculum of a student under
fourteen?
35. Show the importance of really good books, and lots of them, for
children to use.
36. Why shouldn't we arbitrarily choose or reject certain subjects?
Chapter 15 - School Books and How They
Bring About Education
1. What ideas do we get from the incident quoted from Frederika
Bremer's 1837 novel, The Neighbors?
2. What kind of books sustains the life of thought?
3. What can you say about publishers' textbooks?
4. Why do intelligent teachers rely on oral lessons?
5. What are some of the disadvantages of oral lessons?
6. What questions should we ask about a student who has completed his
education?
pg 265
7. Where does the error of our educational system lie?
8. Explain how we don't appreciate children, and therefore educate them
incorrectly.
9. What was notable about home-life in the previous generation?
10. How would you describe children as they are?
11. Explain how our job is to give them enlivening ideas.
Chapter 16 - How To Use School Books
1. What question do we need to ask about any school subject?
2. What are disciplinary subjects?
3. What danger is connected to blindly using these?
4. What idea should provide an 'open sesame' to many vitalizing
subjects?
5. Show how the Bible is the great source of moral
impressions.
6. What impressions did De Quincey get from his early Bible
readings?
7. In what ways did the formal liturgy appeal to him?
8. Why should a child dig for his own knowledge?
9. What are the uses of oral lessons and lectures?
10. Why should children use living books for themselves?
11. What is the sign of a suitable book?
12. How will we know if children enjoy a book?
13. What is the the teacher's role regarding teaching with books?
14. In what ways can children work from their books?
15. What is the simplest way of dealing with a paragraph or chapter?
16. Why should the lesson consist of a single careful reading?
17. Mention some other ways of using books.
pg 266
18. What disciplined devices can children use in their studies?
19. What does the teacher do to prepare a lesson?
20. What is the danger of too many disciplinary devices?
21. Why are we at risk of neglecting books?
Chapter 17 - Education as the Science
of Relationships: We are Educated by Our Intimacies as Illustrated by
Wordworth's Prelude and Ruskin's Praeterita
1. What are our three educational tools, and why are we limited
to these?
2. Why may we not violate the personality of children?
3. In what ways do we manage life too much for children?
4. What example of fairy tales serving as a screen and shelter does
Wordsworth give us in The Prelude?
5. What can you say about the spontaneous living of children?
6. What does fullness of life depend on?
7. Distinguish between the relationship of ideas to ideas, and the
relationship
of people to the ideas suitable for them.
8. Explain how the goal of education isn't to make something out of the
child, but to put the child in touch with everything that concerns him.
9. Describe the self-education of an infant. What does Wordsworth tell
us about this?
10. What is our role in the infant's education?
11. What is our common mistake, and what are the results?
12. What's the difference between business and desire?
13. What attempts were made to teach Ruskin horseback riding, and what
does he
think about those attempts?
pg 267
14. What accusation does he bring against the limitations of his
situation?
15. Why should parents, especially those who live in the suburbs, learn
a lesson from Præterita?
16. List Wordsworth's opportunities to form dynamic relationships.
17. Explain how these came about naturally in the course of things.
Chapter 18 - We are Educated by Our
Intimacies Part II: More Affinities
1. What chances did Ruskin have to learn to handle material resources?
2. What do we hear about the intimacy of either boy regarding natural
objects?
3. Describe Ruskin's flower studies.
4. Describe Ruskin's pebble studies.
5. Explain how these became a life-shaping intimacy.
6. What books did Ruskin grow up on?
7. What is the first mention we get of his insatiable delight in a book?
8. What qualities in Byron delighted him?
9. Describe Wordsworth's delight in the Arabian Nights.
10. What is Wordsworth's plea for 'adventure' in education?
11. What does he say about the freedom to roam freely among books?
12. Describe Wordsworth's first enthralment with poetry.
13. Explain how Ruskin's historic sense always seems to be connected
with places.
14 How does he demonstrate some lack of living touch with the past?
15. Explain how Wordsworth, too, was aloof.
pg 268
16. Explain how the knowledge 'learned in schools' didn't lay much hold
on
either boy.
17. Compare the experiences of the two boys regarding friendship
opportunities.
Chapter 19 - We Are Educated by Our
Intimacies Part III - Vocation
1. Describe Turner's 'call' to Ruskin.
2. What does Ruskin consider his first sincere drawing?
3. What does he say about his real initiation?
4. What is the first hint we get of nature as a passion?
5. How does Wordsworth trace the beginnings of his passion with nature?
6. Describe Wordsworth's 'calling.' <