Controlling aims in the teaching of philosophy

All these subjects, therefore, have as one of their aims the training of the powers of thought (judgment and reasoning); and philosophical teaching should never lose sight of this. Thinking is a difficult business,—an art which is practiced, to be sure, in every field of study, but one for which the philosophical branches provide unusual opportunity and material. It has become a habit with many of recent years to decry the study of logic as an antiquated discipline, but it still remains, if properly taught, an excellent means of cultivating clear thinking; there is no reason why a consciousness of correct ways of thinking and of the methods employed in reaching reliable judgments should not prove useful to every one.

We should say, therefore, that the study of philosophy has a high cultural value: it encourages the student to reflect upon himself and his human and natural surroundings (society and nature) and to come to grips with reality; it frees him from the incubus of transmitted opinions and borrowed beliefs, and makes him earn his spiritual possessions in the sweat of his face,—mindful of Goethe's warning that "he alone deserves freedom and life who is compelled to battle for them day by day";—it helps him to see things in their right relations, to acquire the proper intellectual and volitional attitude toward his world through an understanding of its meaning and an appreciation of its values; in short, it strengthens him in his struggle to win his soul, to become a person. This is its ideal; and in seeking to realize it, philosophy cooperates with the other studies in the task of developing human beings, in preparing men for complete living, and is therefore practical in a noble sense of the term. It has a high disciplinary value in that it trains the powers of analysis and judgment, at least in the fields in which it operates. And the habit acquired there of examining judgments, hypotheses, and beliefs critically and impartially, of testing them in the light of experience and of reason, cannot fail to prove helpful wherever clear thinking is a requisite.

The teacher should keep all these aims in view in organizing his material and applying his methods. He should not forget that philosophy is above all things a reflection upon life; he should endeavor to train his pupils in the art of interpreting human experience, of grasping its meaning. His chief concern should be to make thinkers of them, not to fasten upon them a final philosophic creed,—not to give them a philosophy, but to teach them how to philosophize. If he succeeds in arousing in them a keen intellectual interest and a love of truth, and in developing in them the will and the power to think a problem through to the bitter end, he will have done more for them than would have been possible by furnishing them with ready-made formulas. There is nothing so hopelessly dead as a young man without the spirit of intellectual adventure, with his mind made up, with the master's ideas so deeply driven into his head that his intellectual career is finished. The Germans call such a person vernagelt, a term that fitly describes the case. What should be aimed at is the cultivation of the mind so that it will broaden with enlarging experience, that it will be hospitable to new ideas and yet not be overwhelmed by them, that it will preserve inviolate its intellectual integrity and keep fresh the spirit of inquiry. Such a mind may be safely left to work out its own salvation in the quest for a Weltanschauung.

"Young, all lay in dispute; I shall know, being old."

In emphasizing the need of such central aims in instruction we do not wish to be understood as not appreciating the utilitarian value of the philosophical branches and their importance as a preparation for professional activity. Like all knowledge, these subjects have their worth not merely as means of developing human personality but also as means of equipping the student with such knowledge of facts, methods, and theories as will prove useful to him in his other studies and in the daily affairs of life. The teacher, the physician, the lawyer, the clergyman, the artist, the engineer, the business man, will be benefited by an understanding of the workings of the human mind, of the laws of human thinking, and of the principles of human conduct. It is not absolutely necessary, however, in our opinion, that separate classes specially designed for the different professions be formed in the colleges; after all, it is the same human mind that operates in all the fields of human activity, and a knowledge of mental life in general will serve the purposes of every vocation. Doubtless, courses in psychology, logic, and ethics, for example, might be offered having in view the particular needs of prospective members of the various callings, but such courses would, in order to meet the situation, presuppose an acquaintance with the respective professional fields in question which only students well along in their professional studies could be expected to possess. Courses of this character might profitably be given for the benefit of professional students who have already taken the introductory subjects necessary to their proper understanding.

Introduction of philosophy in the college course

It is not easy to determine the most favorable period in a student's college career at which philosophical subjects should be taught. The more mature the student is, the more successful the instruction is apt to be; but this may be said of many other studies. There is no reason why an intelligent freshman may not begin the study of psychology and logic and perhaps of some other introductory philosophical branches; but as a rule better results may be obtained by admitting only such persons to these classes as have familiarized themselves with university methods.

Problems of philosophy and the development of thought to be emphasized, rather than the historical sequence

We should recommend that every student in the college devote at least three hours a week for four terms to the study of psychology, logic, ethics, and the history of philosophy. In case not all these fundamental courses can be taken, the student will most likely derive the greatest benefit by giving a year to the study of the history of philosophy, or one term to the introduction to philosophy, where he has only that much time at his disposal. It seems easier, however, to arouse a philosophical interest in the average student through a study of the basal philosophical questions from the standpoint of contemporaneous thinking than through the study of the history of philosophy. He is generally lacking in the historic sense, and is apt to be wearied and even confused by the endless procession of systems. This is particularly the case when the teacher fails to emphasize sufficiently the progressive nature of philosophical thinking in its history, when he regards this as a mere succession of ideas rather than as a more or less logical unfolding of problems and solutions—as a continuous effort on the part of the universal mind, so to speak, to understand itself and the world. A course in the introduction to philosophy acquainting the student with the aims of philosophy and its relation to other fields of study, and placing before him an account of the most important problems of metaphysics and epistemology as well as of the solutions which have been offered by the great thinkers, together with such criticisms and suggestions as may stimulate his thought, will awaken in him a proper appreciation of a deeper study of the great systems and lead him to seek light from the history of philosophy.

Methods of instruction

The place and relative worth of the various methods of instruction in the province of philosophy will, of course, depend, among other things, upon the character of the particular subject taught and the size and quality of the class. In nearly all the introductory philosophical branches in which the classes are large the lecture method will prove a valuable auxiliary. In no case, however, should this method be employed exclusively; and in formal logic, it should be used rather sparingly. Ample opportunity should always be given in smaller groups for raising questions and discussing important issues with a view to clearing up obscure points, overcoming difficulties, developing the student's powers of thought, and enabling him to exercise his powers of expression. It is also essential that the student be trained in the difficult art of reading philosophical works. It is wise as a rule to refer him to a good textbook, which should be carefully studied, to passages or chapters in other standard manuals, and in historical study to the writings of the great masters. And frequent opportunity to express himself in the written word must be afforded him; to this end written reports giving the thought of an author in the student's own language, occasional critical essays, and written examinations appealing not only to his memory but to his intelligence should be required during the term. Such exercises keep the student's interest alive, increase his stock of knowledge, develop maturity and independence of thought, and create a sense of growing intellectual power. The written tests encourage members of the class to review the work gone over and to discuss with one another important phases of it; in the effort to organize their knowledge they obtain a much better grasp of the subject than would have been possible without such an intensive re-appraisal of the material.

Logic to be related to the intellectual life of the student

In the course on formal logic a large part of the time should be spent in examining and criticizing examples of the processes of thought studied (definitions, arguments, methods employed in reaching knowledge) and in applying the principles of correct thinking in written discourses. It is a pity that we have no comprehensive work containing the illustrative material needed for the purpose. As it is, the teacher will do well to select his examples from scientific works, speeches, and the textbooks used in other classes. As every one knows, nothing is so likely to deaden the interest and to make the study of logic seem trivial as the use of the puerile examples found in many of the older treatises. With the proper material this subject can be made one of the most interesting and profitable courses in the curriculum,—in spite of what its modern detractors may say.

Students to be familiarized with sources and original writings of the leading philosophers

In the history of philosophy the lectures and textbook should be supplemented by the reading of the writings of the great philosophers. Wherever it is possible, the learner should be sent to the sources themselves. It will do him good to finger the books and to find the references; and by and by he may be tempted to read beyond the required assignment—a thing greatly to be encouraged, and out of the question so long as he limits himself to some one's selections from the writings of the philosophers.

In the advanced courses the research method may be introduced; special problems may be assigned to the student who has acquired a knowledge of the fundamentals, to be worked out under the guidance of the instructor.

Lecture method should arouse dynamic interest and a desire to master the problems of philosophy

In the lecture intended for beginners the teacher should seek to arouse in his hearers an interest in the subject and the desire to plunge more deeply into it. He should not bewilder the student with too many details and digressions but present the broad outlines of the field, placing before him the essentials and leaving him to fill in the minutiae by a study of the books of reference. Each lecture ought to constitute an organic whole, as it were, in which the different parts are held together by a central idea; and its connection with the subject matter of the preceding lectures should be kept before the hearer's mind. All this requires careful and conscientious preparation on the part of the teacher, who must understand the intellectual quality of his class and avoid "shooting over their heads" as well as going to the other extreme of aiming below the level of their mental capacities. Lecturing that is more than mere entertainment is an art which young instructors sometimes look upon as an easy acquisition and which older heads, after long years of experience, often despair of ever mastering. The lecture aims to do what books seldom accomplish—to infuse life and spirit into the subject; and this ideal a living personality may hope to realize where a dead book fails.

How to secure active participation by students through lecture method

In order, however, that the philosophical lecture may not fail of its purpose, the hearer must be more than a mere listener; he must bring with him an alert mind that grasps meanings and can follow thought-sequences. And he cannot keep his attention fixed upon the discourse and understand the relations of its parts unless other senses cooperate with the sense of hearing and unless the motor centers are called into play also. He should carefully cultivate the art of taking notes, an accomplishment in which the average student is sadly lacking and to acquire which he needs the assistance of the instructor, which he seldom receives. An examination of the student's notebook frequently reveals such a woeful lack of discrimination on the writer's part that one is led to doubt the wisdom of following this method at all; wholly unimportant things are set down in faithful detail and essential ones wholly ignored. The hour spent in the lecture room, however, can and should be made a fruitful means of instruction, one that will awaken processes of thought and leave its mark. But in order to get the best result, the student should be urged to study his notes and the books to which he has been referred while the matters discussed in the lecture are still fresh in his mind; he will be able to clear up points he did not fully grasp, see connections that have escaped him, understand the force of arguments which he missed; and he will assume a more independent and critical attitude toward what he has heard than was possible on the spur of the moment, when he was driven on and could not stop and reflect. At home, in the quiet of his study, he can organize the material, see the parts of the discourse in their relations to each other, and re-create the whole as it lived and moved in the mind of the teacher. In doing this work he is called on to exercise his thinking and takes an important step forward. It is for this reason that I am somewhat skeptical of the value of the syllabus prepared by the teacher for the use of classes in philosophy,—it does for the student what he should do for himself. Whatever value the syllabus may have in other fields of study, its use in the philosophical branches ought to be discouraged. The great weakness of the lecture method lies in its tendency to relieve the hearer of the necessity of doing his own thinking, to leave him passive, to feed him with predigested food; and this defect is augmented by providing him with "helps" which rob him of the benefit and pleasure of putting the pieces of the puzzle-picture together himself.

However, even at its best, the lecture method, unless supplemented in the ways already indicated, runs the danger of making the student an intellectual sponge, a mere absorber of knowledge, or a kind of receptacle for professors to shoot ideas into. As was said before, the student must cultivate the art of reading books and of expressing his thoughts by means of the spoken and written word. At the early stages and in some fields of philosophical study, however, the reading of many books may confuse the beginner and leave his mind in a state of bewilderment. It is indispensable that he acquire the working concepts and the terminology of the subject, and to this end it is generally wise to limit his reading until he has gained sufficient skill in handling his tools, as it were. In the elementary courses many members of the class will be unable to do more than follow the lectures and study the textbook; the more gifted ones, however, should be encouraged to extend the range of their reading under the guidance of the instructor.

Organization of undergraduate courses in philosophy

An answer to the question concerning the desired sequence of courses in philosophy will depend upon many considerations,—upon one's conception of philosophy and of the various subjects generally embraced under it, upon one's notion of the aims of philosophical instruction, upon one's estimate of the difficulties encountered by the student in the study of the different branches of it, and so on. There is wide divergence of opinion among thinkers on all these points. Philosophy is variously conceived as metaphysics, as theory of knowledge, as the science of mind (Geisteswissenschaft), as the science of values (Werttheorie), or as all of these together. Logic is conceived by some thinkers as dependent upon psychology, by others as the presupposition of all the sciences, including psychology. Ethics is regarded both as a branch of psychology, or as dependent upon psychology, and as an independent study having nothing whatever to do with psychology. Psychology itself is treated both as a natural science, its connection with philosophy being explained as a historical survival, and as the fundamental study upon which all the other subjects of the philosophical department must rest. Where there is such a lack of agreement, it will not be easy to map out a sequential course of study that will satisfy everybody. Even when philosophy is defined in the old historic sense as an attempt to reach a theory of the world and of life, men may differ as to the exact order in which the basal studies should be pursued. By many the history of philosophy is considered the best introduction to the entire field, while others would place it at the end of the series of fundamentals (psychology, logic, ethics), holding that a student who has studied these will be best equipped for a study that includes the history of their development. As a matter of fact, given students of mature mind and the necessary general preparation, either order may be justified. The average underclassman is, however, too immature to plunge at once into the study of the history of philosophy, and the present writer would recommend that it be preceded by courses in general psychology, logic and ethics. The average sophomore will have little difficulty in following courses in psychology and logic; and it is immaterial which of these he takes up first. The course in the theory of ethics should come in the junior or senior year and after the student has gained some knowledge of psychology (preferably from a book like Stout's Manual of Psychology). And it would be an advantage if the course in ethics could be preceded by a study of the development of moral ideas, of the kind, let us say, presented in Hobhouse's Morals in Evolution. For reasons already stated, the entire course in philosophy should be inaugurated by the Introduction to Philosophy. Advanced courses in metaphysics and the theory of knowledge should come at the end and follow the history of philosophy. The ideal sequence would, therefore, be in the view of the present writer: Introduction to Philosophy, Psychology or Logic, the Development of Moral Ideas, Theory of Ethics, History of Philosophy, Metaphysics, and Theory of Knowledge. It must be admitted, however, that a rigorous insistence upon this scheme in the American college, in which freedom of election is the rule, would impair the usefulness of the department of philosophy. Few students will be willing to take all these subjects, and there is no reason why an intelligent junior or senior should not be admitted to a course in ethics or the history of philosophy without having first studied the other branches. A person possessing sufficient maturity of mind to pursue these studies will be greatly benefited by them even when he comes to them without previous preparation; and it would be a pity to deprive him of the opportunity to become acquainted with a field in which some of the ablest thinkers have exercised their powers. At all events, he should not leave college without having had a course in the history of philosophy, which will open up a new world to him and may perhaps stimulate him to read the best books in the other branches later on.

It would not be possible, of course, to prescribe all the fundamental philosophical courses, even if it were desirable,—few faculties would go so far,—but it would be wise to require every candidate for the bachelor's degree to give at least six hours of his time (three hours a term, on the two-term basis) to one or two of the elementary courses, preferably in the sophomore year. Ethics and the history of philosophy could then be chosen as electives and be followed by the more advanced and specialized courses.

Moot questions: controversy between philosopher and psychologist

We have already touched upon some of the debatable questions in the sphere of philosophical education. The dispute concerning the place of psychology in the scheme of philosophical instruction has its cause in differences of view concerning the aims, nature, and methods of that subject. Philosophers ask for an introductory course in psychology which shall serve as a propaedeutic to the philosophical studies, while teachers of education wish to have it treated in a way to throw light upon educational methods and theory. "Some biologists treat mental phenomena as mere correlates of physiological processes.... Others, including a number of psychologists also, regard psychological phenomena as fully explicable in terms of behavior, and as constituting therefore a phase of biological science." The Committee of the American Psychological Association on the Academic Status of Psychology recommends "that the Association adopt the principle that the undergraduate psychological curriculum in every college or university, great or small, should be planned from the standpoint of psychology and in accordance with psychological ideals, rather than to fit the needs and meet the demands of some other branch of learning."[45] This declaration of principle might lead to peace between the philosophers and the psychologists if there were agreement concerning the "psychological ideals" in accordance with which the subject is to be studied. The desideratum of the philosophers is a psychology which will give the student an understanding of the various phases of mental life; but they do not believe that this can be reached by an exclusive use of the natural-scientific method. The objection of some psychologists, that the philosophers wish to inject metaphysics into the study of mental processes, is met by the rejoinder that the natural-scientific psychology is itself based upon an unconscious metaphysics, and a false one at that. What the philosophers desire is psychological courses which will do full justice to the facts of the mental life and not falsify them to meet the demands of a scientific theory or method—courses of the kind given in European universities by men whose reputation as psychologists is beyond suspicion.

Divergent views as to nature of introductory course in philosophy

We have likewise alluded, in this chapter, to the controversy over the need and nature of an introductory course in philosophy. Of those who favor such a philosophical propaedeutic some recommend the History of Philosophy, others an Introduction to Philosophy of the type described in the preceding pages. Some teachers regard as the ideal course a study of the evolving attitudes of the individual toward the world, after the manner of Hegel's Phenomenology of the Spirit; some the Philosophy of History; some Kulturgeschichte, that is, the study of "the evolution of science, morality, art, religion, and political life,—in short, the history of institutions"; some the study of the great literatures; and some would seek the approach to the subject through the religious interest.[46] It is plain that the History of Philosophy will receive help from all these sources; and a wise teacher will make frequent use of them. Nor can the course in the Introduction to Philosophy afford to ignore them; it will do well to lay particular stress upon the philosophical attitudes, the embryonic philosophies which are to be found in the great literatures, in the great religions, in science, and in the common sense of mankind. Wherever the human mind is at work, there philosophical conceptions,—world-views, crude or developed,—play their part; and they form the background of the lives of peoples as well as of individuals. In the systems of the great thinkers they are formulated and made more or less consistent; but everywhere they are the result of the mind's yearning to understand the meaning of life in its manifold expressions. When the student comes to see that philosophy is simply an attempt to do what mankind has always been doing and will always continue to do, in a rough way, that it is "only an unusually obstinate attempt to think clearly and consistently,"—to continue the process of thinking to the bitter end,—his attitude toward it will be one of intelligent interest and respect. But not one of these subjects taken by itself will serve the purpose of an introductory course.

The "case method" in the teaching of philosophy

Another moot question is concerned with the use of the "case method," employed in law instruction, in ethics. The case method seeks to know what the moral law is by studying the moral judgments of society; or, more definitely, to quote the words of Professor Coxe,[47] one of its champions: "to discover, if possible, a law running through the judgments which society has made through its duly appointed officials." "Historical cases, properly attested, alone give us the means of objective judgment." There can be no doubt that this method will prove serviceable, if judiciously applied; but its exclusive use either as a method of study or as a method of instruction,—even in an introductory course in ethics,—is not to be recommended.[48] The student will not gain an adequate conception of morality from a study of the varying and often contradictory "historical cases," much less from a study of the judgments which society has made "through its duly appointed officials." The legal "case" literature of our country does indeed furnish valuable and interesting material for ethical study, but it would require a riper mind than that of a beginner to discover and to evaluate the moral principles which lie embodied in it.

Testing the results of instruction

The problem of testing the effectiveness of one's teaching presents few difficulties in classes which are small and in which individual instruction is possible. Wherever teacher and student come in close personal contact and opportunity is afforded for full and frequent discussions as well as for written exercises, it is a comparatively easy matter to judge the mental caliber of the members of the class and to determine the extent of their progress. In the case of the large classes, however, which crowd into the lecture halls of the modern university, the task is not so simple. Here every effort should be made to divide such concourses of students into numerous sections, small enough to enable the instructor to become acquainted with those under his charge and to watch their development. The professor who gives the lectures should take one or more of these sections himself in order that he may understand the minds to which he is addressing himself, and govern himself accordingly. The tests should consist of discussions, essays, and written and oral examinations; by means of these it is not impossible to determine whether the aims of the subject have been realized in the instruction or not. But the tasks set should be of such a character as to test the student's power of thought, his ability to understand what he has read and heard with all its implications, his ability to assume a critical attitude toward what he has assimilated, and his ability to try his intellectual wings in independent flights. A person who devotes himself faithfully to his work during the entire term, who puts his mind upon it, takes an active part in the discussions, and is encouraged to express himself frequently by means of the written word, will surely give some indication of the progress he has made, even in a written examination—it being a fair assumption that one who knows will somehow succeed in revealing his knowledge. Care must be taken, of course, that the test is not a mere appeal to the memory; it is only when the examination makes demands upon the student's intelligence that it can be considered a fair measure of the value of philosophical instruction. It must not be forgotten, however, that the examination may reveal not only the weakness of the learner but the weakness of the teacher. It is possible for a student, even in philosophy, to make a fine showing in a written examination by repeating the words of the master which he does not understand, without having derived any real benefit from the course. The teacher may set an examination which will hide the deficiencies of the instruction, and the temptation to do this in large classes which he knows have not been properly taught is great.

FRANK THILLY Cornell University

BIBLIOGRAPHY

COXE, G. C. The Case Method in the Study and Teaching of Ethics. Journal of Philosophy, Psychology, and Scientific Methods, Vol. X, 13, page 337.

DAVIES, A. E. Education and Philosophy, Journal of Philosophy, Psychology, and Scientific Methods, Vol. VI, 14, page 365.

HINMAN, E. L. The Aims of an Introductory Course in Philosophy. Journal of Philosophy, Psychology, and Scientific Methods, Vol. VII, 21, page 561.

HOeFLER, A. Zur Propaedeutik-Frage.

HOeFLER, A. Zur Reform der philosophischen Propaedeutik. Zeitschrift fuer die Oesterreichischen Gymnasien, Vol. L, 3, page 255.

HUDSON, J. W. Hegel's Conception of an Introduction to Philosophy. Journal of Philosophy, Psychology, and Scientific Methods, Vol. VI, 13, page 337.

—— An Introduction to Philosophy through the Philosophy of History. Journal of Philosophy, Psychology, and Scientific Methods. Vol. VII, 21, page 569.

—— The Aims and Methods of Introduction Courses: A Questionnaire. Journal of Philosophy, Psychology, and Scientific Methods, Vol. IX, 2, page 29.

LEHMANN, R. Der deutsche Unterricht, pages 389-437.

LEUCHTENBERGER, G. Die philosophische Propaedeutik auf den hoeheren Schulen.

OVERSTREET, H. A. Professor Coxe's "Case Method" in Ethics. Journal of Philosophy, Psychology, and Scientific Methods, Vol. X, 17, page 464.

PAULSEN, F. German Universities and University Studies. English translation by Frank Thilly and W. W. Elwang, Book III and Book IV.

—— Ueber Vergangenheit und Zukunft der Philosophie im gelehrten Unterricht, Central-Organ fuer die Interessen des Realschulwesens, Vol. XIV, 1, page 4.

—— Geschichte des gelehrten Unterrichts, Conclusion.

Report of the Committee on the Academic Status of Psychology, published by the American Psychological Association, December, 1914.

TUFTS, J. H. Garman as a Teacher. Journal of Philosophy, Psychology, and Scientific Methods, Vol. IV, 10, page 263.

WEISSENFELS, O. Die Philosophie auf dem Gymnasium. Zeitschrift fuer das Gymnasialwesen, Vol. LIII, 1, page 1.

WENDT, G. Didaktik und Methodik des deutschen Unterrichts, Handbuch der Erziehungs- und Unterrichtslehre fuer hoehere Schulen.

Footnotes:

[45] The sentences quoted are taken from the Report of this committee, which was published in December, 1914.

[46] See the articles of J. W. Hudson and others in the Bibliography.

[47] See Bibliography.

[48] See Professor Overstreet's Discussion mentioned in the Bibliography.



XV

THE TEACHING OF ETHICS

Interest in the study of ethics determined by the aim of instruction

Nowhere does academic tediousness work a more dire mischief than in the teaching of ethics. It is bad to have students forever shun the best books because of poor instruction in literature; the damage is worse when it is the subject of moral obligation which they associate with only the duller hours of their college life. Not that the aim of a course in ethics is to afford a number of entertaining periods. The object rather is to help our students realize that here is a subject which seeks to interpret for them the most important problems of their own lives present and to come. Where this end is kept in view, the question of interesting them is settled. A sincere interpretation of life always takes the interest when once it is grasped that this is what is really being interpreted.

Viewpoint in the past

The procedure in the past (and still quite common) was to introduce the subject by way of its history. A book like Sidgwick's History of Ethics was studied, with supplements in the shape of the students' own reading of the classics, or lectures, with quotations, by the teacher. That this method was frequently of much service is undeniable. Teachers there are with rare gifts of inspiration who can put freshness into any course which ordinary teachers leave hopelessly arid. But this should not blind us to the fact that certain modes of procedure are in general more likely to be fruitful than others.

The business of right living the aim of ethics teaching

These methods depend upon the aim; and the aim, we venture to hold, should be eminently practical. The content of ethics is not primarily a matter of whether Kant's judgments are sounder than Mill's or Spencer's. Its subject is human life and the business of right living: how should people—real people, that is, not textbook illustrations—live with one another? This is the essential concern of our subject matter, and in it our student is intimately and practically involved. Charged with the fact, he may deny the impeachment. He refuses to worry over the merits of hedonism versus rigorism, the distinction between hypothetical and categorical imperatives, or the claim of ethics to be called a science. Ethics, that is, as an intellectual discipline through the survey of historic disputations is indeed remote from the concerns that touch his life. But all the time there is no subject of greater interest when approached from the side of its bearing on practical problems. Consider the earnestness with which the student will discuss with his friends such questions as these: What sense is there in a labor strike? Is a conscientious objector justified in refusing military service? Why should any one oppose easy divorce laws? May a lawyer defend a rogue whom he knows to be guilty? Can one change the nature with which he was born? Is violence justified in the name of social reform? If what is right in one age or place is wrong in another, is it fair to object when moral laws are broken? If a practice like prostitution is common, what makes it wrong?

These do not sound like the questions likely to receive a welcome hearing in the classroom; but it is precisely upon the interest in such topics as these that the course in ethics should build; for its subject is right living, a matter in which the student may indeed be assumed to feel a genuine concern. If the questions that he wants answered are not all as broad in their significance as the foregoing, there are others of a more immediate personal kind which arise in his life as a student, as a friend, as a son and brother, problems in which standards of fair play and "decency" are involved, and upon which it may be taken for granted that he has done some thinking, howsoever crude. These interests are invaluable. Out of them the finer product is to be created in the shape of better standards, higher ideals, and habits of moral thoughtfulness, leading in turn to still better standards and still worthier conduct. The course in ethics should be practical in the sense that both its starting point and its final object are found in the student's management of his life.

Illustrations of the problems of right living

Consider, for example, how his interest in problems of friendship may be used as the point of departure for an extremely important survey over general questions of right relationship. Just because friendship is so vital a concern of adolescent years, he can be led to read what Aristotle, Kant, Emerson, have to say upon this subject and be introduced as well to that larger life of ideal relationships from which these writers regard the dealings of friends. The topic of right attitudes toward a friend broadens out readily into such considerations as treating persons aright for their own sake or regarding them as ends per se, a dead abstraction when approached as it is by Kant, but a living reality when the students get Aristotle's point about magnanimous treatment of friends. They can then proceed by way of contrast to note, for example, how this magnanimity was limited to friends in the upper levels of Athenian society, and went hand in hand with approval of slave labor and other exploitations which a modern conscience forbids. To give sharper edge to the conception of man as deserving right treatment for his own sake, the class might go on to examine other notable violations of personality in past and present; e.g., slavery (read for instance Sparr's History of the African Slave Trade) or the more recent cruelties toward the natives in the rubber regions of the Congo and the Amazon. Reference may also be made (without undue emphasis) to the white-slave traffic of today and the fact be noted that a right sense of chivalry will keep a man from partnership in the degradation which creates both the demand for white slavery and ultimately its supply. We mention this to show how a common practical interest can be employed to introduce the students to so fundamental an ethical conception as the idea of inviolable human worth. It may, no doubt, be highly unconventional for them to begin with a discussion of friendship and after a few periods find themselves absorbed in these other questions; but if care is exercised to sum up and to emphasize the big conceptions underlying the topic, we may be sure that their grasp of the subject will be no less firm than under the older method. Their acquaintance with a study requiring hard, abstract thinking will surely not be hurt, to say the least, by an introduction which is concrete and practical.

Or take another matter of real concern to the student at this period of his life. He is certain to be giving some thought to the matter of his future vocation; and here again is a topic which, properly handled, broadens out into the most far-reaching inquiries. It is to be regretted that as yet the vocational-guidance movement has been occupied in the main with external features—comparing jobs, making objective tests of efficiency, and so on. The central ethical conceptions are usually slighted. That one's vocation is a prime influence in the shaping of personality in oneself, in one's fellow workers, in the public served (or disserved) by one's work, in the world of nations in so far as war and peace are connected with commerce and other interchange of vocational products—all this is matter for the teacher who wishes the ethics course to work over into better living.[49] Nor again, as will be noted later in the chapter, need the claims of the subject as a scholarly discipline suffer from such treatment. Questions of the nature of moral standards, of the distinction between expedient and right, etc., can be taken up more profitably when, instead of dealing with the academic questions forming the stock in trade of most textbooks, the course examines a few vocations, let us say, business, teaching, art, law, medicine,—in the light of such standards as these: A history of the calling; e.g., what has it contributed to the elevation of mankind, to the development of the arts and sciences, and to specific kinds of human betterment? What is the best service it can accomplish today? What traits does it require in those who pursue it? What traits is it likely to encourage in them for better and for worse? Report on great leaders in the calling, with special reference to what their work made of them. What are the darker sides of the picture? What efforts are being made today to raise the moral code in this vocation? Sum up the ideal rewards.

We do not mean, of course, that the only problems are those which center around the demands of today for a more just economic and social order. On the contrary, we believe that the movement for social justice is greatly in need of precisely that appreciation of the claims of moral personality which it is the main business of ethical study to promote. But we shall never get our students to profit from their work in social ethics, or in ethical theory, or in any branch of the subject whatever, unless we keep fresh and close the contact with their own experiences and ambitions.

Indeed, we venture to assert that unless this connection is kept unbroken, the subject is not ethics at all but an abstraction which ought to take some other name. Ethics deals with human volitions; but the latter term is meaningless to the student save as he interprets it by his own experiences in the preference of better ways to lower. He knows the difficulties that arise in his own group-associations,—his home or his class or his club, for example,—the conflicts of ambitions, the readiness to shirk one's share of common responsibility, the discordant prides and appetites of one sort and another which lead to overt injustices. All these should be used to throw light upon the living moral problems of group-life in the vocations, in the civic world, in the international order.

Temperamentally, to be sure, the teacher may be inclined to handle his subject in what he prefers to regard as academic detachment. But where the subject is ethics and not dead print, complete aloofness is out of the question. There would be no textbooks in ethics if the men whose convictions are there recorded had not grappled earnestly with problems of vital moment to their day and generation. The crucial questions raised by a changing Athenian democracy were no matters of air-born speculation to Socrates and Plato and Aristotle. Nor is it an accident that the philosopher who so sought to vindicate the worth of man as an end per se should have sent from his apparently isolated study in Koenigsberg his glad acclaim of the French Revolution. The abounding interest of the English Utilitarians in the economics, the politics, the social reform, of the nineteenth century needs no comment. There are texts for study today because the men who wrote them were keenly concerned about a nobler mode of life for mankind. To invite the student to share their reflections without expecting worthier conduct is to ignore the essential purpose by which those reflections were prompted.

Governing aim in ethics teaching

Hence our first recommendation—that the content of the ethics courses be determined by the principal aim of so interpreting the experiences and interests of the student as to stimulate worthier behavior through a better understanding of the general problem of right human relationships.

Our second recommendation as to aims is suggested by certain extremes in the practice of today. Reference to problems of immediate concern does not mean that ultimate considerations are to be shelved. Indeed, it must rather be stressed that such discussions miss their best object, if they fail to lead to searching reflection upon ultimate standards. The temptation to forego such inquiry today is strong. In their desire to be practical and up-to-date, many teachers are altogether too ready to rest the case for moral obligation upon a kind of easy-going hedonism, the fallacy of provisionalism, as Professor Felix Adler calls it. Tangible "goods" like happiness or "social values" are held up as standards, as if these values were ends in themselves and the problem of an ultimate human worth were irrelevant.

It may very well be a modest attitude to say that we can no longer busy ourselves with the nature of ultimate ends and that we can best employ our energies in trying to define the various goods which contribute now and here to human betterment. Let the effort be made, by all means. But when the last of empirical goods have been examined and appraised (assuming for the moment that we can indeed appraise without possessing ultimate norms) the cardinal question still waits for answer: To what are all these goods instrumental? What kind of life is best? What is it that permits man, with all his faults, his sordid appetites, his meannesses and gross dishonors, to hold his head erect as one yet worthy of the tribute implied in the fact that we have duties toward him?

An answer satisfying to all may never be reached; but to evade these questions is to abdicate the teacher's function. Many young people are led by the biologic teachings of the day to regard man as the utterly helpless product of his environment. Or they are so impressed with the obvious and immediate needs of whole masses for better food, better homes, greater opportunities for culture, that they do not stop to ask whether these goods are worth while in themselves, or if not, what is the deeper purpose to which they should minister. A conception of personality is needed, sufficiently exalted to permit the various immediate utilities to find their due place as tributes to the ideal excellence latent in man; and on the other hand there is need for a view of the spiritual life free from the misuse to which that term is put by the various cults evoked by reaction against modern mechanism. Painstaking inquiry into the grounds upon which the assurance of human dignity can justify itself, has never been more urgently required.[50]

Ideals and tendencies in ethics teaching

Let us beware of surrendering to the common but often pernicious demand of our swift-moving America that in order to receive consideration a new idea should prove itself capable of yielding immediate dividends. There seems to be a certain hesitancy today among some in our educated classes about speaking of "ideals." Ideals connote a long look ahead. They imply a sense that there is something perfect even though the steps toward embodying or approximating it will be many and arduous, perhaps discouragingly hard. They betoken the likelihood of appearing before men as the victims of ultimately unworkable dreams. In refreshing contrast is the seeming practicability of encouraging present tendencies. Your tendency is no far-off projection of mere thought; it is something solid and "real," here and now, respected at the bank, in the newspaper office, and other meeting places of those whose heads are hard. Tendencies turn elections; ideals carry no such palpable witness of their power. "Hence let us study tendencies."

This characterization is perhaps extreme, but the danger to which it refers is all too frequent. A strike, for instance, sets most of us to discussing ways by which this particular disturbance can be ended quickly. It is only the few who are willing to hold in mind both terms of the problem, namely the procedure for tomorrow morning and the positive ideal toward which all our vocational life should set its face even if the distant tomorrow is still so far ahead. So of our conceptions of political life. A given election may indeed involve an immediate moral issue; but even the issue of next month can be faced properly only when it is related to an ideal of public life which may have to wait long years for appreciation by the majority. Nothing is more necessary in a democracy than a leadership trained in the long forward look, trained in distinguishing morally right and morally wrong from expedient, and best from merely better, trained in the courage to champion a distant ideal in the face of clamor to accept some inferior but belligerently present substitute.

In short, the student should be offered every encouragement to thinking out the ultimate obligations of his own life and of his various groups and to reaching the conviction that there is such a reality as a permanent human worth, a fundamentally right way for men and women to seek, a rightness whose authority is undiminished by the blunders of the human mind in trying to define it. An ever more earnest attempt to find that way, and to find it by practice illumined by all the knowledge that can be brought to bear, should be the leading object. Not a series of definitions and quotations, nor yet a little information about the social movements of our time, but a truer understanding of life as the result of interpreting it in terms of the obligation to create right human adjustments—such an aim saves college ethics alike from dryness and from superficial attempts to sprinkle interest over a subject of inherent and intense practical importance.

It is not essential that an introductory course in ethics should enter into the philosophy of religion. This may be left to other agencies, like the church, or to later courses, with every confidence that the outcome will be sound if mind and soul and will (to use the old formula) are first enlisted in behalf of noble conduct. Whatever thinking the student may do along these lines will be the better if its nurture is drawn first from moral thinking and moral practice.[51]

Course in ethics prescribed, and early in college course

From the foregoing it follows that the ethics course should be taken by all the students. The earlier it can be given the better, inasmuch as its demands upon their conduct apply to all the years of their life, and because the whole career at college is more likely to benefit from beginning early such reflections as this study particularly invites.

Sequence determined by development of the student

The sequence of courses will perhaps be best determined by remembering the need of following the natural growth of the student. Experiences come first and then the interpretations. Hence the insistence upon the practical content of the introductory courses. Theory and history should follow, not precede. Nobody is interested in the history or the theory of a thing unless he is interested in the thing itself. Furthermore, we must bear in mind the needs of those students who are not likely to care enough for the more theoretical aspects to continue the subject. If the introductory course is to be all that they take, obviously the more practical we can make it the better.

In teaching ethics follow the maxim from the concrete to the abstract

As to method, a variety of profitable ways abounds if only the contact with life is kept close and the principles studied are tested by their outcome in the life which the student knows best. In general, the best procedure is to work back from concrete instances to the principles underlying the problem, formulate the principles and test them in other fields. Our illustrative strike, for instance, can be used to throw light upon the actual and the ideal principles involved in human relationship in some such manner as the following:

Method of procedure illustrated

What do the employers want? What do they mean by liberty? What were the circumstances under which Mill formulated his principle of "liberty within the limits of non-infringement?" What have been the consequences in America of reliance upon this formula? Why does it break down in practice? Compare it with the theory of the balance of power in international relations. What is likely to be the effect of the possession of power upon the possessor himself?

Restate the ideal of liberty in terms of duty, not of privilege. What are the obstacles to the fulfillment of such an ideal in industry? In homes? What are the personal obstacles to clear understanding of the meaning of right?

What do the workers want? Examine each of their demands—shorter hours, more pay, recognition of the union, etc. What should the granting of these demands contribute to their lives? Give instances to show whether "better off" means better persons or not.

Compare the working man's use of the word "liberty" with that of the employer. Why do workers often become oppressors when they themselves become employers? What is the difference between demanding a redress of your grievance and making a moral demand? What makes the cry of fraternity as uttered by the workers repugnant to those who otherwise would accept fraternity as an ideal?

How would you formulate the ideal for the vocational life of the factory worker? Apply it to other vocations—journalism, law, teaching. Sum up the ideal rewards of work.

Make tentative definitions of liberty, rights, duty, justice.

* * * * *

Each of the questions mentioned above—and many more will occur in the course of the discussion—furnishes occasion for extended considerations that call upon the student for scholarly gathering of facts, for close thinking, and—not least—for reflection upon his own experiences and volitions. Other problems will suggest themselves. It is obvious how the interest of the student in prison reform, for example, can be employed in like manner as a motive to searching reflection upon questions of moral responsibility. The principle that punishment should be a means of awaking in the offender the consciousness of a self which can and should hold itself to account despite the magnitude of its temptations is of special usefulness, in the years when a broadening altruism (and we might add, a tendency to self-pity) is likely to lead to loose notions of personal obligation.

Place of the textbook in ethics teaching

The use of a textbook is a minor matter. To prevent the courses from running off into mere talk—and even ethics classes are not averse to "spontaneous" recitation on their own part or to monologues by the teacher—a textbook may be required, with, let us say, monthly reports or examinations. So much depends, however, upon the enthusiasm of the instructor that here particularly recommendations can be only of the most general kind. Some of the most effective work in this subject is being done by teachers who forget the textbook for weeks at a time in order to push home a valuable inquiry suggested by an unforeseen problem raised in the course of the discussion. Others use no textbooks at all. Some outline the year's work in a series of cases or problems with questions to be answered in writing after consulting selected passages in the classics or in current literature or in both.[52] This method has the advantage of laying out the whole year's work beforehand and of guaranteeing that the student comes to the classroom with something more than a facility in unpremeditated utterance. It is generally found to be of greater interest because it follows the lines of his own ordinary thinking—first the problem and then the attempt to find the principles that will help to solve it.

Moral concepts deepened by participation in social or philanthropic endeavors

More important than any of these details of technique is the need of helping the student to clarify his thinking by engaging in some practical moral endeavor. The broadening and deepening of the altruistic interests is a familiar feature of adolescent life. The instructor in ethics, in the very interest of his own subject, is the one who should take the lead in encouraging these expressions, not only because of the general obligation of the college to make the most of aptitudes which, neglected in youth, may never again be so vigorous, but also because of the truth in Aristotle's dictum that insight is shaped by conduct. Hence the work in ethics should be linked up wherever possible with student self-government and other participation in the management of the college, and with philanthropics like work in settlements or in social reform groups or cosmopolitan societies. For the students of finer grain it is eminently worth the trouble to form clubs to intensify the spirit of the members by activities more pointedly directed to the refining of human relationships. They might engage in activities in which the task of elevating the personality is specially marked, that is, in problems which have to do with mutual interpretation—e.g., black folk and white, foreign and native stocks in America, delinquents and the community, immigrant parents and unsympathetic children. They might organize clubs for one or more of these purposes, for discussing intimately the problems of personal life, for public meetings on the ethics of the vocations and on the more distinctly ethical phases of political and international progress. Such organizations can be made to do vastly more good for their members then the average debating society, with its usual premium on mere forensic skill, or the fraternity, with its encouragement of snobbishness. The wholesome thing about the spirit of fraternity should be set to work upon some such creative activities as we have mentioned. Not only does the comradeship strengthen faith in right doing, but these practical endeavors offer a notable help to the deepening, extending, and clarifying of that interest in moral progress without which there can be none of the intelligent leadership for which our democracy looks to its colleges.

Peculiar difficulty of applying usual test to courses in ethics

To test how far the subject has been of value to the student is unusually difficult. His interest in the discussions is by no means an unfailing index. There are those who may be both eager and skilled in the intellectual combat incidental to the course but whose lives remain untouched for the better. The worthier outcome is hard to trace. It is quite possible for the teacher to take credit for the instilling of an ideal whose generation was due to some agency wholly unknown, perhaps even to the student himself. On the other hand, the best results may take years for overt appearance. In the nature of the case, their more intimate expressions can never be recorded.

Moreover, students vary in the force of character which they bring with them to the study. A lad whose home training has been deficient may take more time than the best teacher can give in order to reach the degree of excellence to which others among his classmates ascend more quickly. Or a lad whom the course has moved with a desire to take up some philanthropic endeavor may hesitate to pursue it through lack of the necessary gift or failure in self-confidence. The forces which enter into the making of character are so complex, including as they do not only acquisitions of new moral standards, but temperamental qualities, early training, potent example, physical stamina, dozens of accidental circumstances, that it is unfair to use the tests applicable, let us say, to a course in engineering.

Hence we must be beware of testing the value of the work by immediate results. Something may be gathered by having the students write confidentially what they think the course has done for them and where it could be improved. This they can do both at the end of the course and years later when time has brought perspective. But tests are of minor importance. The ethical shortcomings of our time, the constant need of our students for ever finer standards, convey challenge enough. Even though the obvious results fall short of our hopes, we can make the most of our resources with every assurance that they are amply needed. Are young men more likely to be the better for setting time aside to obtain with the help of an earnest student of life a clearer insight into the principles of the best living? If they are the courses are justified, even though some who take them can show little immediate profit.

HENRY NEUMANN, Ph.D. Ethical Culture School, New York

Footnotes:

[49] See Adler: The Present World-Crisis and Its Meaning, chapter on "An Ethical Program of Social Reform": also An Ethical Philosophy of Life, Chapters 3, 4, 5, 6, 7.

[50] From this point of view the ethical justification for the war on the slum becomes: (a) to make possible for the slum-dweller the better performance of his various duties as parent, worker, citizen; (b) to drive home to all concerned the meaning of interdependence; (c) to clarify for all of us the ideals to which better living conditions should minister. There is every need today to further the conviction that the highest service we can perform for another is not to make him happier, but to help him make himself a better person through the better performance of his duties.

[51] Note the emphasis placed by modern philosophy upon ethical value as the point of approach to the problem of Godhead.

[52] Professor Sharp of Wisconsin has found this method so serviceable that he has interested many teachers in his state and elsewhere in using it with high school students for purposes of moral instruction. See "A Course in Moral Instruction for High Schools," by F. C. Sharp; Bulletin, University of Wisconsin.



XVI

THE TEACHING OF PSYCHOLOGY

Place of psychology in the curriculum

Historically, as an offshoot, and rather a recent offshoot, from philosophy, psychology has been under the care of the department of philosophy in colleges and universities, foreign as well as American, and has been taught by professors concerned in part with the courses in philosophy. Though this state of affairs still obtains to a considerable extent, the tendency is undoubtedly towards allowing psychology an independent position in the organization and curriculum of the college. In recent appointments, indeed, the affiliation of psychology with education has frequently been emphasized instead of its affiliation with philosophy, for the professional applications of psychology lie more in the field of education than elsewhere. As a required study, our science is more likely to find a place in the college for teachers than in the college of arts. But, on the other hand, the applications to medicine, business, and industry are increasing so rapidly in importance as to make it logical to maintain an independent position for the science. Only in an independent position can the psychologist be free to cultivate the central body of his subject, the "pure" as distinguished from the applied science; and, with the multiplication of practical applications, it is more than ever important to center psychological teaching in the person of some one who is simply and distinctively a psychologist.

The introductory course to be general, not vocationally applied psychology

For a similar reason, psychologists are wont to insist that the introductory course in their subject, no matter for what class of students, with general or with professional aims, should be definitely a course in psychology as distinguished from educational or medical or business psychology. Illustrative material may very well be chosen with an eye to the special interests of a class of students, but the general principles should be the same for all classes, and should not be too superficially treated in the rush for practical applications. Some years ago, a Committee of the American Psychological Association was appointed to make a survey of the teaching of psychology in universities, colleges, and normal schools, and the Report of this Committee (1), still the most important contribution to the pedagogy of the subject, emphasizes the concurrent view of psychologists to the effect just stated, that the study of psychology should begin with a course in the central body of doctrine. The psychological point of view must be acquired before intelligent application can be made, whether to practical pursuits or to other branches of study such as philosophy and the social sciences, to which psychology stands in the relation of an ancillary science.

During the war, the applications of psychology in the testing and selection of men and training them for specified military and naval work, in rating officers, in morale and intelligence work, and in several other lines, became so important that it was decided to give psychology a place as an "allied subject" in the curriculum of the Students' Army Training Corps; and the report of the committee of psychologists that prepared the outline of a course for this purpose deserves attention as a contribution to the pedagogy of the subject. They proposed a course on "Human Action," to be free from questions of a speculative or theoretical nature and concentrated on matters relevant to military practice and the military uses of psychology. The aim was to enlist the student's practical concern at the very outset, and to give him the psychological point of view as applied to his problems as a member of the Army and a prospective officer. In method, the course was to depend little on lectures, or even on extensive readings, and much on the student's own solution of practical psychological problems. Evidently the psychologists who prepared this plan were driven by the emergency to abandon "academic" prepossessions in favor of a course in pure psychology as the necessary prerequisite to any study of applications; and it is quite possible that courses in psychology for different groups of students could be prepared that should follow this general plan and be intensely practical from the start. It would still remain true that the thorough psychologist should be the one to plan and conduct such courses.

The psychological point of view must be emphasized in the introductory course

The psychological point of view means attentiveness to certain matters that are neglected in the usual objective attitude toward things. It is identified by many with introspection, but there is at present considerable dissent from this doctrine, the dissenters holding that an objective type of observation of human behavior is distinctively psychological and probably more significant and fruitful than the introspective attitude. However this may be, both introspection and behavior study require attention to matters that are commonly disregarded. Every one is of course interested in what people do, or at least in the outcome of their activities; but psychology is interested in the activities themselves, in how the outcome is reached rather than in the outcome itself. Ordinarily, we are interested in the fact that an inventor has solved a problem, but regard it as rather irrelevant if he proceeds to tell us the mental process by which he reached the solution. We are interested in the fact that a child has learned to speak, but devote little thought to the question as to how he has learned. It is to bring such psychological questions to light and arouse intelligent interest in them, with some knowledge of the answers that have been found, that the psychologist is chiefly concerned when initiating beginners into his science. This primary aim is accomplished in the case of those students who testify, as some do, that the course in psychology has "opened their eyes" and made them see life in a different light than hitherto.

Values of the study of psychology—cultural rather than disciplinary

Whether this primary value of psychology is to be counted among the disciplinary or among the cultural values may be a matter of doubt. Psychologists themselves have seldom made special claims in behalf of their science as a means of formal discipline, many of them, in fact, taking a very negative position with regard to the whole conception of such discipline. What psychology can give of general value is a point of view, and a habit of attentiveness to the mental factor. The need of some systematic attention to these matters often comes to light in the queer efforts at a psychology made by intelligent but uninstructed persons in the presence of practical problems involving the mental factor.

The practical value

Besides this "cultural" value, and besides the special uses of psychology as a preparation for teaching and certain other professions, there is a very real and practical value to be expected from an understanding of the mental mechanism. Since every one works with this mechanism, every one can make practical use of the science of it. Most persons get on passably well, perhaps, without any expert knowledge of the machinery which they are running; yet the machine is not entirely "fool proof," by any means, but sometimes comes to grief from what is in essence a lack of psychological wisdom either in the person himself or in his close companions. Mental hygiene, in short, depends on psychology. The college student, looking forward to a life of mental activity, is specially in a position to utilize information regarding the most economical working of the mental machine; and, as a matter of experience, some students are considerably helped in their methods of mental work by what they learn in the psychology class. Among the results of recent investigation are many bearing on economy and efficiency of mental work. This value of psychology, it will be seen, is practical without being professional—except in so far as all educated men can be said to adopt the profession of mental engineer. Much more emphasis than has been customary might well be laid on this side of the subject in elementary courses.

Content of the introductory course in psychology

The content of the first course in psychology is just now undergoing a certain amount of revision. Traditionally the aim has been, not so much, as in most other subjects, to initiate the student into a range of facts lying outside his previous experience, as to bring definitely to his attention facts lying within the experience of all, and to cause him to classify these so as to refer any given mental process to the class or classes where it belongs. This calls for definition, the making of distinctions, the analysis of complex facts, the use of a technical vocabulary, and in general for much more precision of statement than the student has been used to employ in speaking of such matters. Some laws of mental action, verifiable within ordinary experience, are also brought to light in such a course, and some account of the neural mechanisms of mental life is usually included; but its chief accomplishment is in leading the student to attend to mental processes and gain a point of view that may remain his future possession.

With the great expansion of psychological knowledge in recent decades, due to research by experimental and other empirical methods, it has become possible to give a course more informational in character and going quite beyond the range of the student's previous experience; and this new material is finding its way into elementary texts and courses. Many of the results of research are not at all beyond the comprehension of the beginner; indeed, they are often more tangible than the distinctions and analyses that give the stamp to the traditional course. These empirical results also have the advantage, in many cases, of throwing light on the practical problems of mental health and efficiency; and some inclusion of such material is desirable if only to fit the needs of the considerable number of students who cannot become interested in a course of the traditional sort. Practice in this matter is at present quite variable, some teachers basing the introductory course as far as possible on the results of experiment, and others adhering closely to the older plan.

Methods of teaching psychology—Practical exercises

There is certainly some advantage in keeping the first course untechnical. The student can then be set to observing for himself, instead of depending on books. Many of the facts of psychology are so accessible, at least in a rough form, as to make the subject a good one for appealing to the spirit of independence in the student. Some teachers are, in fact, accustomed to introduce each part of the subject by exercises, introspective or other, designed to bring the salient facts home to the student in a direct way, before he has become inoculated with the doctrine of the authorities. "The essential point is that the student be led to observe his own experience, to record his observation accurately—in a word, to psychologize; and to make the observation before, not after, discovering from book or from lecture what answers are expected to these questions. Individual experiments should so far as possible be performed in like manner before the class discussion of typical results. In all cases the results of these introspections should be recorded in writing; representative records should be read and commented on in class; and the discussion based on them should form the starting point for textbook study and for lecture." The plan thus highly recommended by Professor Calkins[53] she found not to be widely used at the time of her inquiry; a commoner practice was the assignment of reading for the student's first introduction to a given topic. This alternative plan is a line of less resistance; and it is also true that exercises in original observation by beginners in psychology are likely to be instructive mostly as evidence of the ineptness of the beginner in psychological observation. Moreover, when the content of the course is informational and based on the results of research, preliminary exercises by the student are of rather limited value, though they still could serve a useful purpose in bringing forcibly to his attention the problems to be studied.

The use of "exercises," somewhat analogous to the examples of algebra or the "originals" of geometry, is quite widespread in introductory courses in psychology, and several much-used textbooks offer sets of exercises with each chapter. Several types are in vogue: (1) some call for introspections, as, for example, "Think of your breakfast table as you sat down to it this morning—do you see it clearly as a scene before your mind's eye?" (2) some call for a review and generalization of facts presumably already known, as "Find instances of the dependence of character upon habit;" (3) many consist of simple experiments demanding no special apparatus and serving to give a direct acquaintance with matters treated in the text, such as after-images or fluctuations of attention; and (4) many call for the application of the principles announced in the text to special cases, the object being to "give the student some very definite thing to do" (Thorndike), in doing which he will secure a firm hold of the principles involved. In general, teachers of psychology aim to "keep the student doing things, instead of merely listening, reading, or seeing them done" (Seashore, 1, page 83). In a few colleges, laboratory work of a simple character forms part of the introductory course, and in one or two the laboratory part is developed to a degree comparable with what is common in chemistry or biology. As a rule, however, considerations of time and equipment have prevented the introduction of real laboratory work into the first course in psychology.

Classroom methods—The lecture

Of classroom methods, perhaps all that are employed in other subjects find application also in psychology, some teachers preferring one and some another. The lecture method is employed with great success by some of the leaders, who devote much attention to the preparation of discourse and demonstrations. One professor (anonymous) is quoted[54] as follows:

"I must here interject my ideas on the lecture system. The lecture has a twofold advantage over the recitation. (1) It is economical, since one man handles a large number of students; the method of recitation is extravagant. This fact alone will mean the retention of the lecture system, wherever it can possibly be employed with success. (2) It is educationally the better method, for the average student and the average teacher. For the reconstruction of a lecture from notes means an essay in original work, in original thinking; while the recitation lapses all too readily into textbook rote and verbal repetition.

"It is, nevertheless, true that sophomore students are on the whole inadequate to a lecture course. They cannot take notes; they cannot tear the heart out of a lecture. (They are also, I may add, inadequate to the reading of textbooks or general literature, in much the same way.) Hence one has to supplement the lecture by syllabi, by lists of questions (indexes, so to speak, to the lectures), and by personal interviews....

"The sum and substance of my recommendations is that you provide a competently trained instructor, and let him teach psychology as he best can. What the student needs is the effect of an individuality, a personality; and the lecture system provides admirably for such effect."

The recitation

Though the lecture system is used with great success by a number of professors, the general practice inclines more to the plan of oral recitations on assigned readings in one or more texts, and large classes are often handled in several divisions in order to make the recitation method successful. Not infrequently a combination of lectures by the professor and recitations conducted by his assistants is the plan adopted, the lecturer to add impressiveness to the course, and the recitations to hold the student up to his work. Written exercises, such as those already mentioned, are often combined with the oral recitation; and in some cases themes are to be written by the students. Probably the seminar method, in which the subject is chiefly presented in themes prepared by the students, is never attempted in the introductory course.

Class discussion

On the other hand, a number of successful teachers reject both the lecture and the recitation methods, and rely for the most part upon class discussions, with outside readings in the textbooks, and frequent written recitations as a check on the student's work. A champion of the discussion method writes as follows:[55]

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

Class experiments

Brief mention should be made of a form of class exercise peculiar to psychology, the "class experiment." This is in some respects like a demonstration, but differs from that in calling for a more active participation on the part of the student. Any psychological experiment is performed on a human (or animal) subject, and many experiments can be performed on a group of subjects together, each of them being called on to perform a certain task or to make a certain observation. Each of the class having made his individual record, the instructor may gather them together into an average or summary statement, and the individual variations as well as the general tendency may thus be brought to light. Very satisfactory and even scientific experiments can thus be performed, with genuine results instructive to the class.

Checking the work of the students

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

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

Place of psychology in the college course

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

Length of the introductory course

When the introductory course in psychology forms part of a course in philosophy, it is usually restricted to one semester, with three hours of class work per week. When psychology is an independent subject in the curriculum, a two-semester course is usually provided, since it is the feeling of psychologists that this amount of time is needed in order to make the student really at home in the subject, and to realize for him the values that are looked for from psychology. Often there is a break between the two semesters of such a course, the second being devoted to advanced or social or applied psychology. Sometimes, on the other hand, the two-semester course is treated as a unit, the various topics being distributed over the year; this latter procedure is probably the one that finds most favor with psychologists. Still, good results can be obtained with the semester course supplemented by other courses.

Content of advanced courses in psychology

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

ROBERT S. WOODWORTH Columbia University

BIBLIOGRAPHY

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

1. Report of the Committee of the American Psychological Association on the Teaching of Psychology. Psychological Monographs, No. 51, 1910.

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

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

4. Courses in Psychology for the Students' Army Training Corps. Psychological Bulletin, 1918, 15, 129-136. See also the Outlines of parts of the course in the same journal, pages 137-167, 177-206; and a note on the success of the courses by Edgar S. Brightman, in the Bulletin for 1919, pages 24-26.

Footnotes:

[53] In Report, pages 50-51.

[54] By Sanford, 1, page 66.

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



XVII

THE TEACHING OF EDUCATION

A. TEACHING THE HISTORY OF EDUCATION IN COLLEGE

Kinds of educational values

There are three main kinds of educational value; viz., practical, cultural, and disciplinary. These three types of educational value probably originated in the order in which they are here mentioned. In early educational periods, all values are practical, or utilitarian. With the growth of social classes, some values become cultural; viz., those pursued by the upper classes. The disciplinary values are recognized when studies cease to have the practical and cultural values.

Meaning of educational values

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

Value of the history of education

Now, what is the value of the history of education? There are no experimental studies as yet, nor scientific measurements, upon which to base an answer. The poor best we can do is to express an opinion. This opinion is based on the views of others and on the writer's experience in teaching the history of education ten years in a liberal college (Dartmouth) and ten years in a professional graduate school (New York University). On this basis I should say that the aim of the history of education, at least as recorded in existing texts, is first cultural, then practical, and last disciplinary. Texts yet to be written for the use of teachers in training may shift the places of the cultural and the practical. This new type of text will give the history, not of educational epochs in chronological succession, but of modern educational problems in their origin and development.[56]

Its cultural value

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

Its practical value

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

Its disciplinary value

As disciplinary, the history of education shows the value of all historical study. The appeal is mainly to the memory and the judgment. The teaching is inadequate, if the appeal is only to the memory. The judgment must also be requisitioned in comparing, estimating, generalizing, and applying. Memory is indispensable in retaining the knowledge of the historical facts, and judgment is utilized in seeing the meaning of these facts. With all studies in general, history shares in training perceptive, associative, and effortful activities. Training in history is commonly supposed also to make one conservative, in contrast with training in science, which is supposed to make one progressive. But this result is not necessary, being dependent upon one's attitude toward the past. If past events are viewed as a lapse from an ideal, the study of history makes one conservative and skeptical about progress. If, on the other hand, the past is viewed as progress toward an ideal, the study of history makes one progressive, and expectant of the best that is yet to be. But, even so, familiarity with the past breeds criticism of quick expedients whereby humanity is at last to arrive. On the whole, the disciplinary value of the history of education is attained as an incident of its cultural and practical values. We are no longer trying to discipline the mind by memorizing lists of names and dates, though they be such euphonious names as those of the native American Indian tribes, but we are striving to understand man's past and present efforts at conscious self-improvement.