Pedagogics as a System Part 14

-- 12. The nature of education, its form, its limits, are now to be investigated. (---- 13-50.)

-- 13. The nature of education determined by the nature of Mind or Spirit, whose activity is always devoted to realizing for itself what it is potentially--to becoming conscious of its possibilities, and to getting them under the control of its will. Mind is potentially free.

Education is the means by which man seeks to realize in man his possibilities (to develop the possibilities of the race in each individual). Hence, education has freedom for its object.

-- 14. Man is the only being capable of education, in the sense above defined, because the only conscious being. He must know himself ideally, and then realize his ideal self, in order to become actually free. The animals not the plants may be _trained_, or _cultivated_, but, as devoid of self-consciousness (even the highest animals not getting above impressions, not reaching ideas, not seizing general or abstract thoughts), they are not realized for _themselves_, but only for us.

(That is, they do not know their ideal as we do.)

-- 15. Education, taken in its widest compa.s.s, is the education of the human race by Divine Providence.

-- 16. In a narrower sense, education is applied to the shaping of the individual, so that his caprice and arbitrariness shall give place to rational habits and views, in harmony with nature and ethical customs.

He must not abuse nature, nor slight the ethical code of his people, nor despise the gifts of Providence (whether for weal or woe), unless he is willing to be crushed in the collision with these more substantial elements.

-- 17. In the narrowest, but most usual application of the term, we understand by "education" the influence of the individual upon the individual, exerted with the object of developing his powers in a conscious and methodical manner, either generally or in special directions, the educator being relatively mature, and exercising authority over the relatively immature pupil. Without authority on the one hand and obedience on the other, education would lack its ethical basis--a neglect of the will-training could not be compensated for by any amount of knowledge or smartness.

-- 18. The general province of education includes the development of the individual into the theoretical and practical reason immanent in him.

The definition which limits education to the development of the individual into ethical customs (obedience to morality, social conventionalities, and the laws of the state--Hegel's definition is here referred to: "The object of education is to make men ethical") is not comprehensive enough, because it ignores the side of the _intellect_, and takes note only of the _will_. The individual should not only be man in general (as he is through the adoption of moral and ethical forms--which are _general_ forms, customs, or laws, and thus the forms imposed by the _will_ of the _race_), but he should also be a self-conscious subject, a particular individual (man, through his intellect, exists for himself as an individual, while through his general habits and customs he loses his individuality and spontaneity).

-- 19. Education has a definite object in view and it proceeds by grades of progress toward it. The systematic tendency is essential to all education, properly so called.

-- 20. Division of labor has become requisite in the higher spheres of teaching. The growing multiplicity of branches of knowledge creates the necessity for the specialist as teacher. With this tendency to specialties it becomes more and more difficult to preserve what is so essential to the pupil--his rounded human culture and symmetry of development. The citizen of modern civilization sometimes appears to be an artificial product by the side of the versatility of the savage man.

-- 21. From this necessity of the division of labor in modern times there arises the demand for two kinds of educational inst.i.tutions--those devoted to general education (common schools, colleges, etc.), and special schools (for agriculture, medicine, mechanic arts, etc).

-- 22. The infinite possibility of culture for the individual leaves, of course, his actual accomplishment a mere approximation to a complete education. Born idiots are excluded from the possibility of education, because the lack of universal ideas in their consciousness precludes to that cla.s.s of unfortunates anything beyond a mere mechanical training.

-- 23. Spirit, or mind, makes its own nature; it _is_ what it produces--a self-result. From this follows the _form_ of education. It commences with (1) undeveloped mind--that of the infant--wherein nearly all is potential, and but little is actualized; (2) its first stage of development is self-estrangement--it is absorbed in the observation of objects around it; (3) but it discovers laws and principles (universality) in external nature, and finally identifies them with reason--it comes to recognize itself in nature--to recognize conscious mind as the creator and preserver of the external world--and thus becomes at home in nature. Education does not create, but it emanc.i.p.ates.

-- 24. This process of self-estrangement and its removal belongs to all culture. The mind must fix its attention upon what is foreign to it, and penetrate its disguise. It will discover its own substance under the seeming alien being. Wonder is the accompaniment of this stage of estrangement. The love of travel and adventure arises from this basis.

-- 25. Labor is distinguished from play: The former concentrates its energies on some object, with the purpose of making it conform to its will and purpose; play occupies itself with its object according to its caprice and arbitrariness, and has no care for the results or products of its activity; work is prescribed by authority, while play is necessarily spontaneous.

-- 26. Work and Play: the distinction between them. In play the child feels that he has entire control over the object with which he is dealing, both in respect to its existence and the object for which it exists. His arbitrary will may change both with perfect impunity, since all depends upon his caprice; he exercises his powers in play according to his natural proclivities, and therein finds scope to develope his own individuality. In work, on the contrary, he must have respect for the object with which he deals. It must be held sacred against his caprice, must not be destroyed nor injured in any way, and its object must likewise be respected. His own personal inclinations must be entirely subordinated, and the business that he is at work upon must be carried forward in accordance with its own ends and aims, and without reference to his own feelings in the matter.

Thus work teaches the pupil the lesson of self-sacrifice (the right of superiority which the general interest possesses over the particular), while play develops his personal idiosyncrasy.

-- 27. Without play, the child would become more and more a machine, and lose all freshness and spontaneity--all originality. Without work, he would develop into a monster of caprice and arbitrariness.

From the fact that man must learn to combine with man, in order that the individual may avail himself of the experience and labors of his fellow-men, self-sacrifice for the sake of combination is the great lesson of life. But as this should be _voluntary_ self-sacrifice, education must train the child equally in the two directions of spontaneity and obedience. The educated man finds recreation in change of work.

-- 28. Education seeks to a.s.similate its object--to make what was alien and strange to the pupil into something familiar and habitual to him.

[The pupil is to attack, one after the other, the foreign realms in the world of nature and man, and conquer them for his own, so that he can be "at home" in them. It is the necessary condition of all growth, all culture, that one widens his own individuality by this conquest of new provinces alien to him. By this the individual transcends the narrow limits of particularity and becomes generic--the individual becomes the species. A good definition of education is this: it is the process by which the individual man elevates himself to the species.]

-- 29. (1) Therefore, the first requirement in education is that the pupil shall acquire the habit of subordinating his likes and dislikes to the attainment of a rational object.

It is necessary that he shall acquire this indifference to his own pleasure, even by employing his powers on that which does not appeal to his interest in the remotest degree.

-- 30. Habit soon makes us familiar with those subjects which seemed so remote from our personal interest, and they become agreeable to us. The objects, too, a.s.sume a new interest upon nearer approach, as being useful or injurious to us. That is useful which serves us as a means for the realization of a rational purpose; injurious, if it hinders such realization. It happens that objects are useful in one sense and injurious in another, and _vice versa_. Education must make the pupil capable of deciding on the usefulness of an object, by reference to its effect on his permanent vocation in life.

-- 31. But _good and evil_ are the ethical distinctions which furnish the absolute standard to which to refer the question of the usefulness of objects and actions.

-- 32. (2) Habit is (a) _pa.s.sive_, or (b) _active_. The pa.s.sive habit is that which gives us the power to retain our equipoise of mind in the midst of a world of changes (pleasure and pain, grief and joy, etc). The active habit gives us skill, presence of mind, tact in emergencies, etc.

-- 33. (3) Education deals altogether with the formation of habits. For it aims to make some condition or form of activity into a second nature for the pupil. But this involves, also, the breaking up of previous habits. This power to break up habits, as well as to form them, is necessary to the freedom of the individual.

-- 34. Education deals with these complementary relations (ant.i.theses): (a) authority and obedience; (b) rationality (_general_ forms) and individuality; (c) work and play; (d) habit (general custom) and spontaneity. The development and reconciliation of these opposite sides in the pupil's character, so that they become his second nature, removes the phase of constraint which at first accompanies the formal inculcation of rules, and the performance of prescribed tasks. The freedom of the pupil is the ultimate object to be kept in view, but a too early use of freedom may work injury to the pupil. To remove a pupil from all temptation would be to remove possibilities of growth in strength to resist it; on the other hand, to expose him needlessly to temptation is fiendish.

-- 35. Deformities of character in the pupil should be carefully traced back to their origin, so that they may be explained by their history.

Only by comprehending the historic growth of an organic defect are we able to prescribe the best remedies.

-- 36. If the negative behavior of the pupil (his bad behavior) results from ignorance due to his own neglect, or to his wilfulness, it should be met directly by an act of authority on the part of the teacher (and without an appeal to reason). An appeal should be made to the understanding of the pupil only when he is somewhat mature, or shows by his repet.i.tion of the offence that his proclivity is deep-seated, and requires an array of all good influences to reinforce his feeble resolutions to amend.

-- 37. Reproof, accompanied by threats of punishment, is apt to degenerate into scolding.

-- 38. After the failure of other means, punishment should be resorted to. Inasmuch as the punishment should be for the purpose of making the pupil realize that it is the consequence of his deed returning on himself, it should always be administered for some particular act of his, and this should be specified. The "overt act" is the only thing which a man can be held accountable for in a court of justice; although it is true that the harboring of evil thoughts or intentions is a sin, yet it is not a crime until realized in an overt act.

-- 40. Punishment should be regulated, not by abstract rules, but in view of the particular case and its attending circ.u.mstances.

-- 41. s.e.x and age of pupil should be regarded in prescribing the mode and degree of punishment. Corporal punishment is best for pupils who are very immature in mind; when they are more developed they may be punished by any imposed restraint upon their free wills which will isolate them from the ordinary routine followed by their fellow-pupils. (Deprivation of the right to do as others do is a wholesome species of punishment for those old or mature enough to feel its effects, for it tends to secure respect for the regular tasks by elevating them to the rank of rights and privileges.) For young men and women, the punishment should be of a kind that is based on a sense of honor.

-- 42. (1) Corporal punishment should be properly administered by means of the rod, subduing wilful defiance by the application of force.

-- 48. (2) Isolation makes the pupil realize a sense of his dependence upon human society, and upon the expression of this dependence by cooperation in the common tasks. Pupils should not be shut up in a dark room, nor removed from the personal supervision of the teacher. (To shut up two or more in a room without supervision is not isolation, but a.s.sociation; only it is a.s.sociation for mischief, and not for study.)

-- 44. (3) Punishment based on the sense of honor may or may not be based on isolation. It implies a state of maturity on the part of the pupil.

Through his offence the pupil has destroyed his equality with his fellows, and has in reality, in his inmost nature, isolated himself from them. Corporal punishment is external, but it may be accompanied with a keen sense of dishonor. Isolation, also, may, to a pupil, who is sensitive to honor, be a severe blow to self-respect. But a punishment founded entirely on the sense of honor would be wholly internal, and have no external discomfort attached to it.

-- 45. The necessity of carefully adapting the punishment to the age and maturity of the pupil, renders it the most difficult part of the teacher's duties. It is essential that the air and manner of the teacher who punishes should be that of one who acts from a sense of painful duty, and not from any delight in being the cause of suffering. Not personal likes and dislikes, but the rational necessity which is over teacher and pupil alike, causes the infliction of pain on the pupil.

-- 46. Punishment is the final topic to be considered under the head of "Form of Education."

In the act of punishment the teacher abandons the legitimate province of education, which seeks to make the pupil rational or obedient to what is reasonable, as a habit, and from his own free will. The pupil is punished in order that he may be _made_ to conform to the rational, by the application of constraint. Another will is subst.i.tuted for the pupil's, and good behavior is produced, but not by the pupil's free act.

While education finds a negative limit in punishment, it finds a positive limit in the accomplishment of its legitimate object, which is the emanc.i.p.ation of the pupil from the state of imbecility, as regards mental and moral self-control, into the ability to direct himself rationally. When the pupil has acquired the discipline which enables him to direct his studies properly, and to control his inclinations in such a manner as to pursue his work regularly, the teacher is no longer needed for him--he becomes his own teacher.

There may be two extreme views on this subject--the one tending towards the negative extreme of requiring the teacher to do everything for the pupil, subst.i.tuting his will for that of the pupil, and the other view tending to the positive extreme, and leaving everything to the pupil, even before his will is trained into habits of self-control, or his mind provided with the necessary elementary branches requisite for the prosecution of further study.

-- 47. (1) The subjective limit of education (on the negative side) is to be found in the individuality of the pupil--the limit to his natural capacity.

-- 48. (2) The objective limit to education lies in the amount of time that the person may devote to his training. It, therefore, depends largely upon wealth, or other fortunate circ.u.mstances.

-- 49. (3) The absolute limit of education is the positive limit (see -- 46), beyond which the youth pa.s.ses into freedom from the school, as a necessary instrumentality for further culture.

-- 50. The pre-arranged pattern-making work of the school is now done, but self-education may and should go on indefinitely, and will go on if the education of the school has really arrived at its "absolute"

limit--_i.e._, has fitted the pupil for self-education. Emanc.i.p.ation from the school does not emanc.i.p.ate one from learning through his fellow-men. Man's spiritual life is one depending upon cooperation with his fellow-men. Each must avail himself of the experience of his fellow-men, and in turn communicate his own experience to the common fund of the race. Thus each lives the life of the whole, and all live for each. School-education gives the pupil the instrumentalities with which to enable him to partic.i.p.ate in this fund of experience--this common life of the race. After school-education comes the still more valuable education, which, however, without the school, would be in a great measure impossible.

ERRATA.