VOL. I.

NUMBER 9.

Never in the history of education in America has there been such a universal movement towards change as now. Conscious that existing plans must be modified, all who are interested in education have a feeling of great unrest, and this feeling expresses itself at every educational conference. Discussions are endless, and often apparently fruitless, for opinions are as numerous as are the factors of the problem, and the mighty power of what has been over the frail form of what might be holds us with a death-like grip.

It is not probable that some great educational reformer will arise and lead us directly to the truth. In these days we are all searching for the truth so eagerly that it is not likely to come as a sudden revelation. It will probably come by a series of approximations, and it will not be recognized until it has been thoroughly tested; and when it is known and acknowledged no one can tell who has been responsible for it, for it will have been evolved gradually from all our former experience. There is no problem concerning which we can so ill afford to be dogmatic; and no one concerning one concerning which past experience may be so unsafe a guide, since what we have attained can not be compared with what we hope for and have a right to expect. There is no problem in which theorizing may lead so far astray, and no problem which has been so covered up with crude theorizing. We do not understand the structure we are seeking to modify and develop; we do not know what we want to do for it when we shall understand it; and we do not know how to accomplish when we

shall know what we want. Out of this mass of negations we are constructing our hypotheses, and even venture to hope that they may stand. That student of education has not advanced very far into his subject who has any great measure of confidence in his own opinions, or in those of any one else. The effect of all this should be, not a discouraged, but a receptive mind; not dogmatism, but liberality. There need be no expectation that the true education is just at hand, and those impatient souls who can not rest content until everything is settled must cultivate the scientific spirit, which has learned to labor and to wait. It is no less a fact, however, that the true education is nearer at hand than it was last year, and that its coming will be hastened in proportion to our dissatisfaction with the existing order of things, and our rejection of that mind-benumbing dogma that the past contains all that is best in education. Our educational growth should be like that of a vigorous tree, rooted and grounded in all the truth that the past has revealed, but stretching out its branches and ever renewed foliage to the air and the sunshine, and taking into its life the forces of to-day.

With such a preface it may seem rash to suggest anything, but all of us must keep suggesting, if it is only the suggestion of a doubt. The subject announced is broad enough for me to select what I choose from the mass of educational problems that are constantly presenting themselves. If any of those which I have selected, or even all of them, do not seem pertinent to your situation, you

must understand that for some reason they have forced themselves upon my attention.

The first problem I would suggest is: 1. The Act of Teaching. This is quite independent of the subject-matter and has no reference to the equipment of the school in material things. It concerns simply the contact of teacher and pupil in the act of teaching. Perhaps the most difficult work of the teacher is to appreciate the exact mental condition of the pupil in reference to any subject. Unless there is complete adaptation in this regard the contact is a failure, leading to mutual disgust and distrust. It has been my good fortune to witness a large amount of teaching in all grades, and the impression left upon me has been one of astonishing lack of simplicity and directness in the presentation of sujects, resulting in utter confusion. My own conclusion has been that this indicates either ignorance of the subject, or lack of teaching ability, or a wooden application of some pedagogical refinement which has been learned somewhere, and which is either not worth applying in any case, or is wofully misapplied. Hardly can there be imagined a worse combination than wooden teaching by one ignorant of the subject. In the great mass of teaching, instead of using clear expression and a direct presentation, the effort seems to be to use most unusual phrases, as far from an ordinary vocabulary as possible, and to approach the subject in such a devious way that its significance is in danger of being missed. The philosophy of teaching is well enough as a background, but philosophical teaching is usually out of place. To inject the abstractions and phrase-making of normal training into the schoolroom is to dismiss. clearness and all intellectual contact with pupils. This is no criticism of pedagogical training, for I would be the last to suggest that any profession should be attempted without professional training; but it is a criticism of those teachers who do not know how to apply their training, and follow what they regard to be rules, rather than principles. Probably the greatest factor in this result is the fact

that far too many teachers have learned the form of teaching merely, and have strangely neglected to gain some knowledge of the subject-matter to be taught. With them it is form without substance, and what else are they equipped to do but to go slavishly through the motions of teaching? There is no flexibility, no power of adaptation, no ability to depart from a fixed routine, and hence no adjustment to the very diverse mental conditions they must meet and are expected to stimulate. Necessary flexibility in methods is impossible without a broad grasp of the subject to be presented. It should be unnecessary soberly to state that methods of presentation amount to nothing without something to present, but the schools seem to need the statement. The amount of meaningless drudgery that this senseless formalism has forced upon pupils has long been recognized by parents, whose indignation occasionally breaks out in condemnation of the schools as places where method has run to seed. It is very fortunate that the human mind is so tough a structure that it will develop in spite of teachers, and all of our educational experiments have not succeeded in sensibly stunting it. I have about concluded that the great problem in the act of teaching is not how to impart instruction, but how to oppose the fewest obstacles to mental development. The human mind has a mighty way of overcoming obstacles, but, as teachers, we have no right to attempt to make them insurmountable. I have almost cried out in indignation when witnessing some pupil whose quick mind has discovered short cuts to results, ruthlessly forced upon the procrustean bed of method by some teacher who knows only one way. It is such things that bring the profession into deserved contempt, as one that has not yet emerged from blind empiricism.

The necessary combination of knowledge of the subject with knowledge of methods needs further emphasis and application. It is often supposed that the lower the grade or the more elementary the subject, the less the need of a knowledge of the subject on the part of the