17. Scherer, H. Geographie; also Geographieunterricht. (Wunderlich, Leipzig.) Two volumes of a very valuable series. The series contains a volume on the development of the science of each subject —-geography, mathematics, etc.; also a companion volume on the development of the teaching of each subject.

Concerning arithmetic. — 18. Colburn, WarreN. First Lessons in Arithmetic on the Plan of Pestalozzi. (Houghton Mifflin Company, 1821.) Edition of 1863 practically same as original except the title. Revised and enlarged edition of 1884 contains, in an appendix, the original preface and a memoir of Colburn.

19. UNGER, F. Die Methodik der praktischen Arithmetik. (Teubner, Leipzig, 1889.) The best history of the teaching of arithmetic. Pp. 175-198 discusses Pestalozzi and German followers.

Other books referred to in the chapter. — 20. PARKER, F. W. Talks on Teaching. (Kellogg, 1891.)

21. Teachers College Record, 1891. Vol. XII.

22. BARNARD, H. American Journal of Education, 1858. Vol. V, p. 55. Contains a memoir of Woodbridge.

CHAPTER XVI

PESTALOZZIAN FORMALISM; DEGENERATE OBJECT TEACHING; SIMPLE TO COMPLEX

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Main points of the chapter. -1. Certain formalized Pestalozzian methods have exerted a pernicious influence on elementary-school practice. 2. Hence Herbert Spencer accepted Pestalozzi's general principles but rejected his formal methods and specific devices.

3. Pestalozzian object teaching often degenerated into memorizing a list of adjectives. Dickens satirized such methods.

4. Pestalozzi and Spencer assumed that the natural process of learning consisted in building up complex wholes from unanalyzable elements, that is, proceeding from the simple to the complex.

5. Consequently Pestalozzi advocated the organization of an alphabet or graduated series of exercises for each subject, which was to be learned as the first step in studying the subject.

6. This principle was the basis of (1) the synthetic, alphabet-syllablespelling method in teaching reading; (2) of the straight-line, curved-line, etc., method of beginning drawing; and (3) of the Grube method of teaching arithmetic.

7. Recently psychologists have maintained that the natural method of learning is not as stated in 4 above, but that the child's experience begins as a "big, blooming, buzzing confusion," and that he learns by analyzing complex wholes as far as may be necessary for practical purposes, and then reconstructing more or less organized wholes.

Pernicious elements in Pestalozzianism.—The Pestalozzian methods described in the preceding chapters were a reaction against the formalism of words, which dominated the elementary schools at the beginning of the nineteenth century. This reaction was, for the most part, of permanent benefit to the elementary schools. But there were tendencies to formalism,

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1 Special supplementary reading: Herbert Spencer, "Education," chap. ii. See above, p. xxiii, for further directions.

even in the work of Pestalozzi and his followers, which exerted almost as great an influence on elementary-school practice as did his beneficial reforms. It is the purpose of this chapter to describe these tendencies.

Three types of formalism. - The term "formalism" is used here to designate roughly three tendencies: (1) to teach mere words or symbols without giving the learner an appreciation of the real meanings they are intended to represent; (2) to exalt particular devices or exercises which may have been used to carry out a certain educational principle, but to fail to appreciate the real spirit of the principle; (3) to establish an inflexible routine in the teaching of lessons which teachers administer in a mechanical way. The first kind of formalism might be called verbal formalism and was prominent in some phases of Pestalozzianism. The second kind, the formalism of particular devices, was, and is, especially characteristic of the work of many of the followers of Froebel in the kindergarten. The third kind, the formalism of routine in the teaching of lessons, is prominent in the use of the five formal steps of instruction by the Herbartians. Froebelian and Herbartian formalism will be discussed in later chapters. They are referred to here in order to show how general is the tendency, in connection with educational reforms, to degenerate into some kind of formalism.

Pestalozzi realized the danger of formalism. - Pestalozzi realized clearly the danger of degeneration into formalism and said:

I know too well how it will be; this poor husk, which is but the mere outward form of my method, will appear to be its real substance to a great number of men, who will endeavor to introduce this form into the narrow circle of their own ideas, and will judge of the value of the method according to the effects it produces in this strange association. I cannot prevent the forms of my method from having the same fate as all other forms, which inevitably perish in the hands of men who are neither desirous nor capable of grasping their spirit. (6: 246.)

Herbert Spencer described Pestalozzian formalism in England. One of the best accounts of Pestalozzian formalism versus the Pestalozzian spirit is found in the second chapter of the work by Herbert Spencer (1820-1903) on "Education," published in 1861. Spencer's chapter contains an exposition of English Pestalozzianism, which, as we noticed in an earlier article, tended toward this formal type. Spencer rejected the particular forms while approving strongly of the fundamental principles. He said :

While, therefore, we would defend in its entire extent the general doctrine which Pestalozzi inaugurated, we think great evil likely to result from an uncritical reception of his specific devices. That tendency which mankind constantly exhibit to canonize the forms and practices along with which any great truth has been bequeathed to them - their liability to prostrate their intellects before the prophet and swear by his every word- their proneness to mistake the clothing of the idea for the idea itself, renders it needful to insist strongly upon the distinction between the fundamental principles of the Pestalozzian system, and the set of expedients derived for its practice.

This Pestalozzian formalism can be discussed to advantage under two main heads: (1) degenerate object teaching, and (2) extreme and false applications of the theory of proceeding from the simple to the complex.

Degenerate object teaching. Pestalozzi recommended memorizing words. - Strange as it may seem, Pestalozzi recommended and carried out in his school the practice of having children memorize lists of words. Herbart, von Raumer, and other visitors to Pestalozzi's schools commented on this anomaly. Lists of nouns and adjectives were made up from the dictionary by the teacher and memorized by the children. Pestalozzi said:

These lists of words are placed in the hands of the child, merely as exercises in learning to read, immediately after he has gone through his spelling-book; and experience has shown me that it is possible to make the children so thoroughly acquainted with these lists of words that they shall be able to repeat them from memory, merely in the time that

is required to perfect them in reading; the gain of what at this age is so complete a knowledge of lists of names, so various and comprehensive, is immeasurable in facilitating the subsequent instruction of children. (2: 78.)

This memorized material included such phrases as "slippery, wormshaped, thick-skinned eel," "crawling, amphibious animals," "long-tailed monkeys," etc. In geography the children memorized long alphabetical lists of the names of German towns before studying their locations on the map. Many other examples of such absurd practices could be cited, which were utterly inconsistent with the theory of basing all instruction on sense perception, that Pestalozzi emphasized.

English books of object lessons became manuals for memorizing. It was in England that Pestalozzian verbal formalism was most influential in actual practice, resulting in what Spencer called "the well-conceived but ill-conducted system of object lessons." In an earlier chapter it was pointed out that one reason why Pestalozzian methods took such a strong hold on English schools was because of the early preparation of a textbook, "Lessons on Objects," by Elizabeth Mayo (17931865) and her brother. This textbook was published in 1830 and was very successful. By 1855 it had reached the fourteenth edition, a copy of which I have examined. It was a veritable little encyclopedia of the arts and sciences. The lessons were arranged in five series. The first series contained simple lists of qualities; for example, in the case of leather it was stated that it was flexible, odorous, waterproof, tough, smooth, durable, opaque. The second series gave parts of complicated objects as well as qualities. The third series. included nonsensory qualities such as "valuable," and such classifications as "artificial" and "natural." The fourth series continued the classifications and proceeded to discover analogies between physical and moral or spiritual qualities. The fifth series provided exercises for composition, containing lessons on various chemical substances, on solubility, on the