Wholes to Parts, to Wholes. - The vague whole [namely, the story of Little Bo Peep or of Jack Horner] is acquired by the children through listening to the story told by the teacher, and through the exercise of their own self-activity in dramatization. The story is first analyzed into thought groups. The thought groups are then built up synthetically by the teacher, sentence by sentence, at the blackboard. Word groups and sight words are taken from the sentences. Selected words are separated into phonograms. Phonograms are blended to form words. The final step is the reading of the whole story from the book.

Similarly, in handwriting, the children write whole words or phrases before they are drilled in making meaningless straight lines and curved lines. Perhaps the most striking change is in drawing, in which the child in the primary grades may draw such pictures as those shown on page 152 and may never draw mere curved lines and straight lines as such. Equally striking are the changes in gymnastics and in kindergarten activities. In place of simple-to-complex calisthenics, children play games, which, as large unanalyzed wholes, give them excellent exercise and at the same time give training in recreation and certain social virtues. As to the kindergarten, the geometrical playthings and forms of beauty are being forgotten, and such large projects used as were described above, on page 126; namely, playhouses, grocery stores, dry-goods stores, and other community buildings.

Courage to permit crudeness of childhood replaces perfect models. In all of the processes involving handwork by little children, such as handwriting, drawing, and construction, progressive teachers are willing to accept rather crude products. This contrasts strongly with the desire for perfectly clean, clear-cut, copper-plate, model products for exhibition purposes which commonly prevails where alphabet methods are followed. It is recognized that if the pupils are to do their own analyzing, selecting, rejecting, and expressing, their products at first will be quite rough and

Illustrations by second-grade children of an original Arab story composed by them. Evidently something is happening in this picture. What do you suppose it is? See page 151. From Sargent's "How Children Learn to Draw." (Ginn and Company)

incomplete as compared with the finished product of the adult expert. But in their willingness to accept such crude products of little children, teachers are carrying out Rousseau's program for psychologizing teaching by studying childhood. Instead of merely "being attached to what is important for men to know," teachers now consider what children are able to apprehend"; instead of "always looking for the man in the child," teachers now are "thinking about what he was before he became a man," and organizing their subject matter in terms of his capacities and interests as a child.

Thus

Summary concerning psychological organization. we see that the psychological method of organizing subject matter is a large factor in improving teaching to-day. In introducing the discussion of the psychological organization we used the subject of history in order to contrast the older method of organizing subject matter merely in terms of the subject, which in the case of history produces the chronological order. We then presented Rousseau's epoch-making appeal to organize subject matter in terms of childhood, and told how far astray Pestalozzi and Froebel went in their efforts to carry out Rousseau's ideas. We pointed out that in organizing simple-to-complex alphabets in each subject they were not basing their organization on the capacities, interests, and learning processes of children but merely on an analysis of each subject. The mistakes of these wellintentioned educators were due to the fact that they were comparatively crude and amateur psychologists. When we turned to the discussions of learning presented by William James, the greatest American psychologist, we found him emphasizing the fact that analysis of complex wholes by the learner is a large factor in learning by children and adults. This fact parallels, in a way, the conclusion which we reached in the first half of this chapter, where the emphasis in organizing history, geography, and kindergarten activities was

placed on the organization around certain large topics or projects. The combination of the project method and the psychological methods of organization is resulting in the centering of instruction in units of subject matter that correspond to real situations in social life and at the same time are full of meaning to children and adapted to their capacities for learning and their interests at each age.

WASHING THE KINDERGARTEN DOLLS' CLOTHES

A meaningful social activity substituted for the comparatively meaningless, simplexto-complex, geometrical constructions pictured on page 147. Notice the improvised tubs, toy ironing-board, and toy iron. From a Chicago public-school kindergarten

Transition to Part II on learning processes; summary of Part I on fundamental points of view. - The statements made above concerning analysis by pupils when they are learning give only one inkling concerning the way children learn. The complete story of their methods of learning was roughly outlined in Rousseau's "Emile" in 1762, but has been greatly elaborated by later writers. This story is so long that we shall devote all of Part II of this book to relating it. Before doing this, it is desirable to get our bearings by reviewing briefly Part I, which has presented certain fundamental points of view that will guide us in our later thinking.

These fundamental points of view may be summarized as follows:

I. In our interdependent democratic American society the aim of public education is to increase the sum total of happiness for the multitudes.

2. To this end, the schools train for health, enjoyment of leisure, good will, and social service by developing in children appropriate information, habits, ideals, and abiding, many-sided interests.

3. The effective organization of such training involves reproducing in schools a prominent feature of our complex social life; namely, effective business management for economy in routine affairs.

4. The selection of the subject matter that is to be used to attain the broad social aims of the school should be made from the social viewpoint. The material should be clearly adapted to real present-day needs and conditions, and the relative values of the topics should be scientifically determined.

5. Such scientific determination requires investigations that are mathematically precise, objective, verifiable, expert, and impartial.

6. Where such scientific investigations have not been made we must rely on the opinions of great specialists, thinkers and writers such as Spencer and Dewey, who have devoted much thought to education. These opinions are not always valid.

7. Progressive textbooks and teachers organize the selected subject matter around large central topics or projects, and begin with units that are meaningful to pupils and adapted to their capacities, interests, and processes of learning at each age.

8. The study of these learning processes of pupils is such a complex and important undertaking that Part II of the text will be devoted to it.