ciated as learners.

The art of class-teaching has yet other and closer
conditions or restrictions. In consequence, it requires
finer skill and larger scholarship to be a teacher of a
class of forty or sixty or perhaps a hundred than to be
a tutor of an individual learner or of a small group. In
the large class, there is a variety of persons, who differ
in temperament in wide extremes and often consider-
ably in age. Usually, both sexes are represented; and
in public schools, of whatever grade, all social classes
and conditions. In cities, the public school attendance
includes many different nationalities and races, religions
and languages. In an extreme instance, a class of forty-
five pupils has been known to include fourteen different
nationahties, three different races, five different rehgions,
and nine different languages. In all instances approxi-

27



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT

mating such extremes as this, the only safety of the
teacher in instruction and in management consists in
faithfully observing the general principles of the teach-
ing process; special variations to suit the few Hun-
garians or the several Itahans or the Russian Jews
confuse all the others.

The teacher who would intelligently and successfully
adapt his or her teaching methods to the class needs
first of all to understand the characteristics of pupils of
the ages represented in the class. According as the
pupils are younger, the element of trying to help the
learner for his own sake is more important; as they
are older, the element of meaning to keep knowledge
alive in the world is more important. In a general way,
in elementary schools, the first purpose predominates;
in secondary schools, the purposes are nearer at even
balance; in the higher education of college and uni-
versity, the main purpose is to continue science, art, and
philosophy in the world.

Some of the errors of teachers proceed from failure
to observe this clear and simple principle. To illus-
trate : — In a colored school in Southern Alabama, for an
hour the teacher struggled mth her primary class in an
effort to teach them the names of the first five books
of the Bible. It is well worth while to know the names,
of course; but smaU children are not the proper field
for sowing this kind of seed. Again, a faculty of a
university reversed its policy, and thereafter it granted
no higher professional degrees in one of its graduate
schools to industrious but mediocre students, however
meritorious in character or in effort. It gave as its
reason the principle that it was considering the welfare
of the pubUe and the continuance of expert knowledge

28



THE TEACHING PROCESSES

in the high favor of the pubHc rather than the special
"good" of its students. In short, it raised its standard
and reduced the number of its degree-holders, thereby,
of course, discouraging many ambitious men and wom-
en, but protecting the public from the deficiencies of
the relatively incompetent.

The course of study of a primary school is made as it
is mainly to help the children forward, to educate them.
The hundreds of electives of the university are offered
in order that each of these hundreds of bodies of knowl-
edge may endure in the minds of at least a few men.
AU the subjects of the primary school are offered in
order to help the boys and girls to succeed in life. Very
few of the subjects of the university have the personal
success of the students in view. Personal ambition
characterizes the younger minds, and the smaller minds ;
social service, art, science, order, patriotism, humanity
characterize the older and the larger minds.

The teacher who knows the characteristics of pupils
of the ages represented in his or her class knows to
what motives to make his or her appeal. And the first
principle of the general teaching process is to awaken
effort, to stimulate motivation in one of its two forms,
intellectual curiosity (or "interest") in the case of a
study and bodily activity in the case of an exercise.
Arousing the pupil's own endeavor is the beginning of
teaching a lesson. Until such endeavor stirs in the
soul of the learner, the learning process does not be-
gin.

In most children under twelve or fourteen years, the
one generally present motive is to know or to be able
to do something commonly considered important in the
over-world of adults. This motive is not always present.

29



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT

Obviously, in the motor temperaments, it takes the
mode of intending to do what the adult can do; in the
vital sedentary temperament, it takes the mode of in-
tending to enjoy the affairs of life about as the adult
enjoys them; in the speculative sedentary tempera-
ment, it takes the form of intending to know what the
adult knows.

In these children under twelve or fourteen, in respect
to their immediate education, sex is relatively unim-
portant; and yet, even in childhood, the boy usually
cares most for the things that interest men, and th(>
girl for the things of domestic life. Such interests, how-
ever, are by no means as marked as they become after
these ages. To the small children, the ways of adults,
their actions and concerns seem so great and remote
and compelling that distinctions between men and
women are without interest.

At adolescence, however, especially with girls, the
forces of sex-heredity set in with vigor; and thereafter
in the normal instances, to know what men know and
to do what they can do is a powerful motive with boys;
and to know and do what women know and do, with girls.
In the secondary adolescence of young manhood and
young womanhood, — when they broaden out and grow
heavier, — this motive takes on specific forms or follows
specific modes according to the individual heroes or
heroines or other ideal persons admired by the young
man or by the young woman. The young man wishes
to be a chemist like So-and-so or a surgeon Hke Some-
one-else; the young woman has plans to be a social
leader like So-and-so or an author hke her favorite
Some-one-else. The best of them go about with heads
full of admiration for statesmen, milhonaires, lawyers,

30



THE TEACHING PROCESSES

inventors; or for matrons, actresses^ artists ; usually liv-
ing persons of present great reputation.

Though age is indeed a decisive factor, it is by no
means determined by mere count of years. Persons of
the vital, corpulent temperament are always younger
for their years than the muscular motor; the muscular
motor than the ideo-motor; and these than the reflective-
sedentary.^ In fact, age is largely a matter of foresight
and of anxiety, of care and of thoughtfulness. There
are manly boys and childish men, — and temperament has
much to do with both kinds. The manly boy has indeed
something fine about him; though perhaps he loses
cliildhood and youth by it. The childish man is saved
thereby much trouble. But neither type is normal or
average, though each is doubtless useful, if not for
example always, at least for warning.

The competent teacher who has been reading in the
book of himaan nature looks for age at physique and ex-
pression and conduct rather than at the birth certificate;
and does not try to anticipate the future of the boy or
girl but to take each as he or she is.

With endeavor aroused in the learner, the next stage
in the teaching process is to set forth new facts or prin-
ciples, not too many or too much, nor yet too few or too
little, in accordance with the average or a little more
than the average of the needs, the powers, and the in-
terests of the learners. To put the principle otherwise,
in presenting the need it is better to err on the side of
giving too much than of giving too little. To give too
little thwarts the best elements in the class, — the bright,
the strong, the able. It is, of course, a sign of poor
judgment in a teacher to aim at interesting only the

iSeepages220, 221.
31



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT

uppermost third or fourth or tenth in the class. But
when in a general way, he or she thinks of the class as
in four ranks of almost equal nmnbers and aims to in-
terest and hold the second rank, the teacher has done
well. In so ranking a class, marks are of but little
value; for the reason that they include the quantity of
achievement through a period of time, whereas in giving
the daily instruction in a subject, the teacher should
think mainly of the actual working power of the pupils
before him.^ Another way of properly adjusting the
instruction is to think of a normal boy or girl of just
slightly better than the median quality in the class, and
then setting out to teach all the class in such a way as
to meet his needs, and varying only so much as one
must in order not entirely to miss any considerable
number of the others.

In shaping the instruction at this point to fit the
learners, free questions and answers between the teacher
and the pupils are usually helpful. These, however,
must not proceed to the extent of interrupting the
orderly presentation of the facts or principles that are
to be taught.

The next stage in the general teaching process is to
find out, in the way appropriate to the study or exercise
and to the especial matter in hand, whether or not the
learner remembers what has just been taught. There
are many devices for doing this,— asking for a direct and
complete statement in topical form in the case, for
example, of an informational lesson, and requiring, in
the case of an exercise, that the learner should proceed
through it alone.

Here upon the occasion of defective answers by a

*See page 211, following^
32



THE TEACHING PROCESSES

considerable niiniber of the class, the teacher has a fine
opportunity to get the echo of his or her own work and
thereby to check the teaching. It is evidence that the
new material was badly presented or perhaps was im-
properly chosen when many learners failed to under-
stand the lesson, or when some entirely misunderstand
it, or when, as sometimes happens, they do not remem-
ber it at all.

In such cases, it is sometimes well to abandon, for the
present, that ''lead" and to proceed in some other di-
rection. We do not build a railroad directly in a bee
line through a mountain chain, but we sent it gradually
up through tunnels, by bridges across chasms, by spirals
along the mountain sides, circuitously and subterrane-
ously, knowing that "the longest way around is often
the shortest way home." Direct telling is usually poor
teaching, as the test at this stage often shows in the
case of young or incompetent teachers. Sometimes,
at this stage, all that is necessary is a little more ex-
planation or the presentation of another illustration,
and then the lesson clears up.

Beyond this period of the general teaching process is
the reviewing, the testing, the drilling, and the examin-
ing, from day to day, later until the matter taught has
taken its place as a part of the assured mental equip-
ment of the learner, adding either to his skill or to his
power to interpret or perhaps to both. What shall be
done in the way of repeating, or reviewing in larger
relations, of testing to see whether the matter is
well and firmly placed and related, and of drilling for
final security depends mainly upon the special topic
itself. When the affair is a multiplication table, this
series of repetitions is prolonged through years. Some-

33



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT

times, it is a concern of but a week or a fortnight. Tliere
is not much in an elementary school course that de-
serves being taught at all that does not require at least
a week's consideration.

But the discussion of what shall be done in respect
to these later stages of the general teaching process
brings the investigator clearly to the point of inquiring
as to the special teaching processes suitable to the va-
rious kinds of studies. Tliis is the other element in the
purpose of teacliing that must be regarded even in
the case of elementary school work and that controls in
the case of higher education.

The de\dces for presenting knowledge to learners, and
of bringing learners into the presence of the opportuni-
ties to learn knowledge are many, and their appropriate-
ness in respect to the various kinds of knowledge, and to
the various stages of the acquirement of the knowledge
depends upon some, at times, not easily harmonized
elements. In a general way, we may say that teaching
is effected successfully in the recitation class-room, in
the lecture-hall, in the library through the consultation
of books, in the laboratory, and upon excursions out-
doors or by visits to museums, only when four elements
are properly associated, — the teacher, the learners, the
subject, and the device. To illustrate by the negative : —
An old experienced teacher with a body of young chil-
dren is not likely to make much of a success with a
science lesson in a laboratory. Again: — A young inex-
perienced teacher is not likely to make much of a success
with a body of mature graduate students in a political
science lecture in a university lecture-hall. Again: —
Even a skilful teacher, forced to teach physics by the
recitation method in a class-room, cannot make much of

34



THE TEACHING PROCESSES

a success. There are some subjects that few women
can teach well to older students, — for example, history,
physics, higher mathematics, art. There are many sub-
jects that few men can teach well to young learners;
indeed, there are but few subjects that they can teach
well in the lower schools.

The four places of lesson-giving, — the library with its
seminar, the laboratory with its experiment tables, the
class-room with its recitations, and the lecture-hall, —
afford opportunities for some six chfferent kinds of de-
\aces for imparting knowledge. The method that is to
be followed controls the devices that are to be used in
accordance with it. A ''device" is a division of the
highway or method, a section of its road. It is, however,
important enough to merit some consideration by itself.

A traveller plans a journey from New York to St.
Louis; a ticket for the journey by train is one of his
devices for getting there. He gives to his family, or
employer, or friends some reason for going, — that
reason or excuse is a device for getting away and being
absent for the period of the journey. An artist conceives
a great picture: — the canvas, the paints, the brushes, the
studio, the preliminary sketches, the consultations with
critical friends, the placing of the canvas now in one
light, now in another, the potboilers painted or drawn
to get money for living expenses, while the great picture
is on the easel, are all devices for getting the picture done
well.

These words, "method" and "device," should be used
with care. A recitation is only a device for teaching
sometliing; and yet the recitation itself has its own true
method and its own devices for carrying its method out.
A book is only a device for telling something that the

4 35

V â– 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT

author regarded as important enough to write out, and
the pubHsher to issue; but the book has some method
in it, good or bad, and the chapters and paragraphs, in
form and in content, are the devices for carrying out the
method of the book.

When, therefore, one speaks of the ''recitation meth-
od," one has in mind so^jething entirely distinct from
the method of a subject, such as grammar. But when
one speaks of "method" in itself, the reference is to the
general theory of method and not specifically to any one
subject or to recitations or to study or to lessons or to
anything else.

Between method and process, the distinction is this, —
''method" means "highroad," and "process" means
"going forward." The former refers primarily to the
track, the latter to the movement along the track.
Each unplies the other.

Of the teaching processes, for a period of several
decades in Europe and America, the recitation has at-
tracted the most attention and has been given the most
consideration. The reason therefor is that the recita-
tion is active and dynamic. Directed study is as much
a teaching process as is the recitation, and the directed
exercise is likewise. We lost interest in the latter as
we converted our school into sedentarj, bookish enter-
prises in the conviction perhaps that to understand life
is more important than to act in it, and in the knowledge
certainly that it costs less to maintain schools for the
study of books than for the acquirement of the manual
arts and of the technical sciences. The tradition grew
up that the teacher is a talker rather than an exemplar
and guide. At any rate, in every science and art, the
critic, the novice, the narrator and talker about it is

36



THE TEACHING PROCESSES

much cheaper to employ than the skilled performer. It
has been absolutely necessary to the development of
schools, — especially of public schools upon tax-support,
because taxes as such are always hateful, — to keep the
costs low. Let us hope that this period of failure to
understand the investment-values of the public school
will everywhere at some time pass away. It has already
passed away in some sections of the country. But let
us not expect that the investment-value of education
will soon be understood and admitted as true every-
where.

The oral recitation in large classes, following oral in-
struction, is the cheapest known way of imparting
knowledge. It saves even the cost of books.

Of the oral recitation, there is one standard method
often applied to every kind of subject. It has what are
known as the ''five formal steps." These formal steps
constitute what is known as ''the method of the recita-
tion."

The reason for the vogue of this system is that this
kind of recitation is indeed admirably calculated for
imparting knowledge in a certain kind of subject.
Though by no means universally valid and helpful, it is
necessary in tliis kind of subject. The whole situation
by which "the method of the recitation," thus formu-
lated, has come to be applied to every kind of subject,
with unfortunate and often absurd results, is but one
more illustration of the fatuity with which mankind,
finding a thing "good for something," has assimied that
it is good for everything. Medicine has constantly to
fight this tendency. Wlien a remedy has been found
specific for one disease, it is always in danger of being

heralded by the many and used by the unscientific for

37



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT

a time as a panacea for all diseases. This tendency is
indeed the life of the patent medicine trade. Almost
any medicine whether simple or compounded will cure
some disease in some person. W ''^ '' \ ', .

The formal recitation is good for all informational
studies in the first presentation of new topics. We may
classify the subject of the whole educational curriculum
from kindergarten through the professional school into
studies and exercises, and the studies may again be di-
vided into logical and informational. An informational
study is one not yet organized in accordance with an
inner logic that so controls the material as to make its
presentation in a certain order of topics necessary. An
informational study is one, then, that has so far no essen-
tial method, no special and characteristic process. It
may be a subject in the course of discovering such an
inner logic with a typical method for its exposition. In
fact, its very presence in the school curriculum usually
implies that it is seeking scientific, or artistic, or philo-
sophical forai; but the informational study is the one
that has not yet found such form. Nature-study,
geography, history, spelling, and literature are, in this
sense, among the informational studies. Many of the
school and college subjects, however, are in one sense
studies and in another sense exercises, — as for example,
spelling, reading, English and other languages. Or to
put the principle in another way, — in some respects,
the lessons to be given in some studies should conform
to the principles applicable to informational studies, in
other respects to the principles applicable to exercises.
To illustrate: — We should not teach in the same way
lx)th an oral lesson in elocutionary reading and an oral
lesson in the development of the content of that reading.

38



THE TEACHING PROCESSES

The first step in the method of the informational
recitation is commonly called "the preparation"; the
second step, "the presentation"; the third step, "the
association"; the fourth step, "the generalization,"
and the fifth step "the application."

In the first step, the teacher suggests matters that
the pupils already know, arouses in some way of appeal
or reference to fundamental concerns their active in-
terest and attention, reviews a recent theme, or other-
wise tries to get the children or youth into the atmos-
phere of the subject. Tliis "preparation" may be a
brief or a long matter, easy and quiet or hard and noisy.
It is quite useless to try to teach the class until they are
all in the mood of active attention. Their curiosity
must be stimulated else they will not try to learn. The
question as to how brief or how energetic this prepara-
tion is to be depends partly upon the kind of class that
the teacher has. Good classes are usually attentive.
In some poor classes, the effort to get the active atten-
tion of all is certain to fail: to the extent of its failure,
this step in the lesson is a failure.

This step is so important that two thousand years
ago, Cicero, the Roman orator, dwelt upon it at length
as a test of the skill of the man before the forum in
addressing his audience. Indeed, our recitation theory
is little more than an expansion of his plan for the
oration.*

It is the step in which the known is brought before
the consciousness of the learner to help liim hook upon
it the new unknown that is to come.

Illustration: — ^Topic for the proposed lesson. The

^On the Orator, § xxii, "before we enter upon the main subject,
the minds of the audience should be conciliated by an exordium."

39



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT

Battle of Gettysburg. Preparation: Some other battle
that the children already have studied. Eai'lier move-
ments of the armies upon each side that the pupils
already know. Hills and low mountains that they
have seen or at least have read about hitherto.
Great crowds or other assemblages such as the learners
have either seen in reality or in pictures. Gunpowder
explosions. Noise. Bravery and heroism. — Not all
tliese points are necessary. It is sufficient to say enough,
or to ask the learners to tell enough, to make them
anxious to know more.

Sometimes to this step is added a so-called "sub-
step" known as ''the aim." Here the teacher tells
briefly what the aim or purpose of the lesson is.

The second step is the presentation of the new ma-
terial. At this point often arises the error of the teacher
who assigns the lesson in the text-book to be studied
before giving an oral lesson or holding a recitation upon
it. To expect a class whose members have already read
all the text-book account to listen to a presentation of
the same material upon the plea that it is new and
therefore answers their curiosity is common enough, but
it is in direct opposition to the very theory of this kind
of recitation.

The reason why this error is so frequently made by
teachers trained in normal schools is because their train-
ing is usually designed to fit them for the lower grades
where few books are used and they are not warned that
the very use of books to study a new body of material
makes this kind of recitation inappropriate. In ele-
mentary grades, books are for study-reviews.

But assuming that the material is really new, the
business of the teacher is to tell it with a due emphasis

40



THE TEACHING PROCESSES

of the salient points and with such questions at times to
members of the class as assure him that most of them
are actually following the narrative or exposition. This
may commonly be made the longest single section of
the entire recitation or lesson.

Presentation: — Numbers of men on each side, with
names of some of the leaders and heroes. The topo-
graphical facts. The first day's combat. The second
day's. The third day's. Pickett's charge. The defeat.
The results on the battle-field. The results in national
history. The disappointment of the Confederates. The
elation of the Federals.

Gettysburg, though not the greatest, one of the critical