NATURE OF INTEREST.
By interest we mean the natural bent or inclination of the mind to find
satisfaction in a subject when it is properly presented. It is the
natural attractiveness of the subject that draws and holds the
attention. Interest belongs to the feelings but differs from the other
feelings, such as desire or longing for an object, since it is
satisfied with the simple contemplation without asking for possession.
The degree of interest with which different kinds of knowledge are
received, varies greatly. Indeed, it is possible to acquire knowledge
in such a manner as to produce dislike and disgust. A proper interest
in a subject leads to a quiet, steady absorption of the mind with it,
but does not imply an impetuous, passionate, and one-sided devotion to
one thing. Interest keeps the mind active and alert without undue
excitement or partiality.
It would be well if every study and every lesson could be sustained by
such an interest as this. It would be in many cases like lubricating
oil poured upon dry and creaking axles. Knowledge might then have a
flavor to it and would be more than a consumption of certain facts and
formulas coldly turned over to the memory machine. The child's own
personality must become entangled in the facts and ideas acquired.
There should be a sort of affinity established between the child's soul
and the information he gains. At every step the sympathy and life
experiences from without the school should be intertwined with school
acquisitions. All would be woven together and permeated by _feeling_.
We forget that the feelings or sensibilities awakened by knowledge are
what give it personal significance to us.
The interest we have in mind is _intrinsic_, native to the subject, and
springs up naturally when the mind is brought face to face with
something attractive. The things of sense in nature and the people
whom we see and read about, have a perennial and inexhaustible
attraction for us all. It is among these objects that poets and
artists find their materials and their inspiration. For the same
reason the pictures drawn by the artist or poet have a charm which does
not pass away. They select something concrete and individual; they
clothe it with beauty and attractiveness; they give it some inherent
quality that appeals to our admiration and love. It must call forth
some esthetic or moral judgment by virtue of its natural quality. Like
luscious grapes the objects presented to the thought of the children
should have an unquestionable quality that is desirable.
We just spoke of interest, not as fluctuating and variable, but steady
and persistent. It contains also the elements of ease, pleasure, and
needed employment; that is, in learning something that has a proper
interest, there is greater ease and pleasure in the acquisition, and
occupation with the object satisfies an inner need. "When interest has
been fully developed, it must always combine pleasure, facility, and
the satisfaction of a need. We see again that in all exertions, power
and pleasure are secured to interest. It does not feel the burden of
difficulties but often seems to sport with them."--_Ziller_.
A natural interest is also awakened by what is strange, mysterious, and
even frightful, but these kinds of interest concern us from a
speculative rather than a pedagogical point of view. We are seeking
for those interests which contribute to a normal and permanent mental
action.
_Severe effort and exertion_ are a necessary part of instruction, but a
proper interest in the subject will lead children to exert themselves
with greater energy even when encountering disagreeable tasks. There
are places in every subject when work is felt as a burden rather than
as a pleasure, but the interest and energy aroused in the more
attractive parts will carry a child through the swamps and mires at a
speedier rate. It is not at all desirable to conceal difficulties
under the guise of amusement. But by means of a natural interest it is
possible to bring the mind into the most favorable state for action.
In opposition to a lively and humane treatment of subjects, a dry and
dull routine has often been praised as the proper discipline of the
mind and will. "It was a mistake," says Ziller, "to find in the simple
pressure of difficulties a source of culture, for it is the opposite of
culture. It was a mistake to call the pressure of effort, the feeling
of burden and pain, a source of proper training, simply because will
power and firmness of character are thus secured and preserved to
youth. Pedagogical efforts looking towards a lightening and enlivening
of instruction should not have been answered by an appeal to severe
methods, to strict, dry, and dull learning, that made no attempt to
adapt itself to the natural movement of the child's mind." (Ziller,
Lehre vom E. U., p. 355.) Not those studies which are driest, dullest,
and most disagreeable should be selected upon which to awaken the
mental forces of a child, but those which naturally arouse his interest
and prompt him to a lively exercise of his powers. For children of the
third and fourth grade to narrate the story of the Golden Fleece is a
more suitable exercise than to memorize the CXIXth Psalm, or a
catechism.
A proper interest aims, finally, at the highest form of _quiet,
sustained will exertion_. The succession of steps leading up to will
energy, is interest, desire, and will. Before attempting to realize
the higher forms of will effort, we must look to the fountains and
sources out of which it springs. If a young man has laid up abundant
and interesting stores of knowledge of architecture, he only needs an
opportunity, and there is likely to be great will-energy in the work of
planning and constructing buildings. But without this interest and
knowledge there will be no effort along this line. In like manner
children cannot be expected to show their best effort unless the
subject is made strongly interesting from the start, or unless
interest-awakening knowledge has already been stored in the mind. To
make great demands upon the will power in early school years, is like
asking for ripe fruits before they have had time to mature. Knowledge,
feelings, and will-incentives of every sort must be first planted in
the mind, before a proper will-energy can be expected. In teaching, we
should aim to develop will power, not to take it for granted as a ready
product. As the will should ultimately control all the mental powers,
its proper maturity is a later outcome of education. Even supposing
that the will has considerable original native power, it is a power
that is likely to lie dormant or be used in some ill-direction, unless
proper incentives are brought to bear upon it. The will is so
constituted that it is open to appeal, and in all the affairs of school
and life, incentives of all sorts are constantly brought to bear upon
it. Why not make an effort to bring to bear the incentives that spring
out of interest, that steady force, which is able to give abiding
tendency and direction to the efforts? Why not cultivate those nobler
incentives that spring out of culture-bringing-knowledge? There are,
therefore, important preliminaries to full will energy, which are
secured by the cultivation of knowledge, the sensibilities, and desires.
There is a common belief that any subject can be made interesting if
only the teacher knows the secret of the how; if only he has proper
_skill_. But it is hard even for a skillful workman "to make bricks
without straw," to awaken mental effort where interest in the subject
is entirely lacking. It is often claimed that if there is dullness and
disgust with a study it is the fault of the teacher. As Mr. Quick
says, "I would go so far as to lay it down as a rule, that whenever
children are inattentive and apparently take no interest in a lesson,
the teacher should always look first to himself for the reason. There
are perhaps no circumstances in which a lack of interest does not
originate in the mode of instruction adopted by the teacher." This
statement assumes that all knowledge is about equally interesting to
pupils, and everything depends upon the _manner_ in which the teacher
deals with it. But different kinds of knowledge differ widely in their
power to awaken interest in children. The true idea of interest
demands that the subject matter be _in itself_ interesting, adapted to
appeal to a child, and to secure his participation. If the interest
awakened by bringing the mind in contact with the subject is not
spontaneous, it is not genuine and helpful in the best sense. One of
the first and greatest evils of all school courses has been a failure
to select those subjects, which in themselves are adapted to excite the
interest of children at each age of progress. If we could assume that
lessons had been so arranged, we might then with Mr. Quick justly
demand of a teacher a manner of teaching that must make the subjects
interesting, or in other words a manner of treatment that would be
appropriate to an interesting subject.
There are two kinds of interest that need to be clearly distinguished:
_direct_ interest, which is felt for the thing itself, for its own
sake, and _indirect_ interest which points to something else as the
real source. A miser loves gold coins for their own sake, but most
people love them only because of the things for which they may be
exchanged. The poet loves the beauty and fragrance of flowers, the
florist adds to this a mercenary interest. A snow-shovel may have no
interest for us ordinarily, but just when it is needed, on a winter
morning, it is an object of considerable interest. It is simply a
means to an end. The kind of interest which we think is so valuable
for instruction is direct and intrinsic. The life of Benjamin Franklin
calls out a strong direct interest in the man and his fortunes. A
humming bird attracts and appeals to us for its own sake. Indirect
interest, so called, has more of the character of _desire_. A desire
to restore one's health will produce great interest in a certain health
resort, like the Hot Springs, or in some method of treatment, as the
use of Koch's lymph. The desire for wealth and business success will
lead a merchant in the fur trade to take interest in seals and
seal-fishing, and in beavers, trapping, etc. The wish to gain a prize
will cause a child to take deep interest in a lesson. But in all these
cases desire _precedes_ interest. Interest, indeed, in the thing
itself for its own sake, is frequently not present. It is true in many
cases that indirect interest is not interest at all. It is a dangerous
thing in education to substitute _indirect_ for _direct_ or true
interest. The former often means the cultivation, primarily, of
certain inordinate desires or feelings, such as rivalry, pride,
jealousy, ambition, reputation, love of self. By appealing to the
selfish pride of children in getting lessons, hateful moral qualities
are sometimes started into active growth in the very effort to secure
the highest intellectual results and discipline. Giving a prize for
superiority often produces jealousy, unkindness, and deep-seated
ill-will where the cultivation of a proper natural interest would lead
to more kindly and sympathetic relations between the children. The
cultivation of direct interest in all valuable kinds of knowledge, on
the other hand, leads also to the cultivation of desires, but the
desires thus generated are pure and generous, the desire for further
knowledge of botany or history, the desire to imitate what is admirable
in human actions and to shun what is mean. The desires which spring
out of direct interest are elevating, while the desires which are
associated with indirect interest are in many cases egotistic and
selfish.
We often say that it is necessary to make a subject interesting so that
it may be more _palatable_, more easily learned. This is the commonly
accepted idea. It is a means of helping us to swallow a distasteful
medicine. If the main purpose were to get knowledge into the mind, and
interest only a means to this end, the cultivation of such indirect
interests would be all right. But interest is one of the qualities
which we wish to see permanently associated with knowledge even after
it is safely stored in the mind. If interest is there, future energy
and activity will spring spontaneously out of the acquirements.
Indirect interest indeed is often necessary and may be a sign of tact
in teaching. But it is negative and weak in after results. So far as
it produces motives at all they may be dangerous. It cannot build up
and strengthen character but threatens to undermine it by cultivating
wrong motives. There is no assurance that knowledge thus acquired can
affect the will and bear fruit in action, even though it be the right
kind of knowledge, because it is not the knowledge in this case that
furnishes the incentives. The interest that is awakened in a subject
because of its innate attractiveness, leaves incentives which may ripen
sooner or later into action. The higher kind of interest is direct,
intrinsic, not simply receptive, but active and progressive. In the
knowledge acquired it finds only incentives to further acquisition. It
is life giving and is prompted by the objects themselves, just as the
interest of boys is awakened by deeds of adventure and daring or by a
journey into the woods. The interest in an object that springs from
some other source than the thing itself, is indirect, as the desire to
master a lesson so as to excel others, or gain a prize, or make a money
profit out of it. In speaking of interest in school studies, teachers
quite commonly have only the indirect in mind; _i.e._, the kind that
leads children to take hold of and master their lessons more readily.
Interest is thus chiefly a means of overcoming distasteful tasks. It
is the merit of a direct or genuine interest that it aids in mastering
difficulties and in addition to this gives a permanent pleasure in
studies. One of the high aims of instruction is to implant a strong
permanent interest in studies that will last through school days and
after they are over.
A live interest springs most easily out of _knowledge subjects_ like
history and natural science. Formal studies like grammar and
arithmetic awaken it less easily. Herbart has classified the chief
kinds and sources of interest as follows: Interest in nature apart from
man, and interest in man, society, etc. In _nature_ and natural
objects as illustrated in the natural sciences there are three chief
kinds of interest. _Empirical_, which is stirred by the variety and
novelty of things seen. There is an attractiveness in the many faces
and moods of nature. Between the years of childhood and old age there
is scarcely a person who does not enjoy a walk or a ride in the open
air, where the variety of plant, bird, animal, and landscape makes a
pleasing panorama. _Speculative_ interest goes deeper and inquires
into the relations and causal connections of phenomena. It traces out
similarities and sequences, and detects law and unity in nature. It is
not satisfied with the simple play of variety, but seeks for the cause
and genesis of things. Even a child is anxious to know how a squirrel
climbs a tree or cracks a nut; where it stores its winter food, its
nest and manner of life in winter. Why is it that a mole can burrow
and live under ground? How is it possible for a fish to breathe in
water? _Esthetic_ interest is awakened by what is beautiful, grand,
and harmonious in nature or art. The first glance at great overhanging
masses of rock, oppresses us with a feeling of awe. The wings of an
insect, with their delicate tracery and bright hues, are attractive,
and stir us with pleasure. The graceful ferns beside the brooks and
moss-stained rocks suggest fairy-land.
But stronger even than these interests which attach us to the things of
nature, are the interests of _humanity_. The concern felt for others
in joy or sorrow is based upon our interest in them individually, and
is _sympathetic_. In this lies the charm of biography and the novel.
Take away the personal interest we have in Ivanhoe, Quenten Durward,
etc., and Scott's glory would quickly depart. What empty and
spiritless annals would the life of Frederic the Great and Patrick
Henry furnish! _Social_ interest is the regard for the good or evil
fortune of societies and nations. Upon this depends our concern for
the progress of liberty and the struggle for free institutions in
England and other countries. On a smaller scale clubs, fraternities,
and local societies of all kinds are based on the social interest.
_Religious_ interest finally reveals our consciousness of man's
littleness and weakness, and of God's providence. As Pestalozzi says,
"God is the nearest resource of humanity." As individuals or nations
pass away their fate lies in His hand.
The _sources_ of interest therefore are varied and productive. Any one
of the six is unlimited in extent and variety. Together they
constitute a boundless field for a proper cultivation of the emotional
as well as intellectual nature of man. A study of these sources of
genuine interest and a partial view of their breadth and depth, reveals
to teachers what our present school courses tend strongly to make them
forget, namely, that the right kind of knowledge contains in itself the
stimulus and the germs to great mental exertion. The dull drill upon
grammar, arithmetic, reading, spelling, and writing, which are regarded
as so important as to exclude almost everything else, has convinced
many a child that school is veritably a dull place. And many a teacher
is just as strongly convinced that keeping school is a dull and sleepy
business. And yet the sources of interest are abundant to overflowing
for him who has eyes to see. That these sources and materials of
knowledge, arousing deep and lasting interests, are above other things
adapted to children and to the school room, is a truth worthy of all
emphasis.
Interest is a good test of the _adaptability_ of knowledge. When any
subject is brought to the attention at the right age and in the proper
manner, it awakens in children a natural and lively feeling. It is
evident that certain kinds of knowledge are not adapted to a boy at the
age of ten. He cares nothing about political science, or medicine, or
statesmanship, or the history of literature. These things may be
profoundly interesting to a person two or three times as old, but not
to him. Other things, however, the story of Ulysses, travel, animals,
geography, and history, even arithmetic, may be very attractive to a
boy of ten. It becomes a matter of importance to select those studies
and parts of studies for children at their changing periods of growth,
which are adapted to awaken and stimulate their minds. We shall be
saved then from doing what the best of educators have so frequently
condemned, namely, when the child asks for bread give him a stone, or
when he asks for fish give him a serpent.
The neglect to take proper cognizance of this principle of _interest_
in laying out courses of study and in the manner of presenting subjects
is certainly one of the gravest charges that ever can be brought
against the schools. It is a sure sign that teachers do not know what
it means "to put yourself in his place," to sympathize with children
and feel their needs. The educational reformers who have had deepest
insight into child-life, have given us clear and profound warnings.
Rousseau says: "Study children, for be sure you do not understand them.
Let childhood ripen in children. The wisest apply themselves to what
it is important to _men_ to know, without considering what _children_
are in a condition to learn. They are always seeking the man in the
child, without reflecting what he is before he can be a man." It is
well for us to take these words home and act upon them.
It is worth the trouble to inquire whether it is possible to select
subjects for school study which will prove essentially attractive and
interesting from the age of six on. _Are_ there materials for school
study which are adapted fully to interest first grade children? We
know that fairy stories appeal directly to them, and they love to
reproduce them. Reading and spelling in connection with these tales
are also stirring studies. Reading a familiar story is certainly a
much more interesting employment than working at the almost meaningless
sentences of a chart or first reader. Number work when based upon
objects can be made to hold the attention of little ones, at least in
the last half of the first grade. They love also to see and describe
flowers, rocks, plants, and pictures. It probably requires more
skillful teaching to awaken and hold the interest in the first grade
than in the second or any higher grade, unless older children have been
dulled by bad instruction. On what principle is it possible to select
both interesting and valuable materials for the successive grades? We
will venture to answer this difficult question.
The main interest of children must be attracted by what we may call
_real knowledge_ subjects; that is, those treating of people (history
stories, etc.,) and those treating of plants, animals, and other
natural objects (natural science topics). Grammar, arithmetic, and
spelling are chiefly form studies and have less native attraction for
children. Secondly, it may be laid down as a fact of experience that
children will be more touched and stimulated by _particular_ persons
and objects in nature than by any _general_ propositions, or laws, or
classifications. They prefer seeing a particular palm tree to hearing
a general description of palms. A narrative of some special deed of
kindness moves them more than a discourse on kindness. They feel a
natural drawing toward real, definite persons and things, and an
indifference or repulsion toward generalities. They prefer the story
to the moral. Children are little materialists. They dwell in the
sense-world, or in the world of imagination with very clear and
definite pictures.
But while dealing with _things of sense_ and with particulars, it is
necessary in teaching children to keep an eye directed toward general
classes and toward those laws and principles that will be fully
appreciated later. In geography, arithmetic, language lessons, and
natural science, we must collect more materials in the lower grades;
more simple, concrete illustrations. They are the basis upon which we
can soon begin to generalize and classify. The more attractive the
illustrative materials we select, the stronger the appeal to the
child's own liking, the more effective will be the instruction. A way
has been discovered to make the study of the concrete and individual
lead up with certainty to the grasp of general notions and even of
scientific laws as fast as the children are ready for them. If the
concrete object or individual is carefully selected it will be a
_type_, that is, it illustrates a whole class of similar objects. Such
a typical concrete object really combines the particular and the
general. It has all the advantage of object-teaching, the powerful
attraction of real things, but its comparison with other objects will
also show that it illustrates a general law or principle of
wide-reaching scientific importance. In both these steps natural
interest is provided for in the best way. A full and itemized
examination of some attractive object produces as strong an interest as
a child is capable of. Then to find out that this object is a sort of
key to the right interpretation of other objects, more or less familiar
to him, has all the charm of discovery. The _sunflower_, for example,
is a large and attractive object for itemized study. It the
examination leads a step further to a comparison with other composite
flowers, there will be an interesting discovery of kinship with
dandelions, asters, thistles, etc. This principle of the type, as
illustrating both the particular and general, is true also of
geographical topics that lead a child far from home and call for the
construction of mental pictures. The study of _Pike's Peak_ and
vicinity is very interesting and instructive for fourth grade children.
The valleys, springs at Manitou, Garden of the Gods, Cheyenne Canon and
Falls, the Cave of the Winds, the ascent of the peak by trail or by
railroad, the views of distant mountains, the summit house on the
barren and rugged top, the snow fields even in summer, the drifting
mists that shut off the view, the stories of hardship and early
history--these things take a firm hold on a child's interest and desire
for knowledge. When this whole picture is reasonably complete a brief
comparison of Pike's Peak with Mt. Washington, Mt. Marcy, Mt. Shasta,
and Mt. Rainier, will bring forth points of contrast and similarity
that will surprise and instruct a child. In every branch of study
there are certain underlying principles and forms of thought whose
thorough mastery in the lower grades is necessary to successful
progress. They are the important and central ideas of the subject. It
was a marked quality of Pestalozzi to sift out these simple
fundamentals and to master them. It is for us to make these simple
elements intelligible and interesting by the use of concrete _types_
and illustrations drawn from nature and from human life. If we speak
of history and nature as the two chief subjects of study, the simple,
fundamental relations of persons to each other in society, and the
simple, typical objects, forces, and laws of nature constitute the
basis of all knowledge. These elements we desire to master. But to
make them attractive to children, they should not be presented in bald
and sterile outlines, but in typical forms. All actions and human
relations must appear in attractive _personification_.
Persons speak and act and virtues shine forth in them. We do not study
nature's laws at first, but the beautiful, _typical life forms_ in
nature, the lily, the oak, Cinderella, and William Tell. For children,
then, the underlying ideas and principles of every study, in order to
start the interest, must be revealed in the most beautiful illustrative
forms which can be furnished by nature, poetry, and art. The story of
William Tell, although it comes all the way from the Alps and from the
distant traditional history of the Swiss, is one of the best things
with which to illustrate and impress manliness and patriotism. The
fairy stories for still younger children, are the best means for
teaching kindness or unselfishness, because they are so chaste, and
beautiful, and graceful, even to the child's thought. The most
attractive type-forms and life-personifications of fundamental ideas in
history and nature are the really interesting objects of study for
children. To put it in a simple, practical form--objects and human
actions, if well selected, are the best means in the world to excite
curiosity and the strong spirit of inquiry. While dwelling upon this
thought of the attractiveness of type-forms as personified in things or
persons, we catch a glimpse of a far-reaching truth in education.
The idea of _culture epochs_, as typical of the steps of progress in
the race, and also of the periods of growth in the child, offers a deep
perspective into educational problems. In the progress of mankind from
a primitive state of barbarism to the present state of culture in
Europe and in the United States, there has been a succession of not
very clearly defined stages. In point of government, for example,
there has been the savage, nomad, patriarch, kingdom, constitutional
monarchy, democracy, republic, federal republic. There have been great
epochs of political convulsion in the conflicts with external powers
and in civil struggles and revolutions. In the growth of handicrafts,
arts, manufactures, and inventions, there has been a series of advances
from the time when men first began to cultivate the ground, to reduce
the metals, and to bring the forces of nature into service. In the
development of human society, therefore, and in the progress of arts
and human knowledge, there are certain typical stages whose proper use
may help us to solve some of the difficult problems in educating the
young. All nations have passed through some of these important epochs.
The United States, for example, since the first settlements upon the
east coast, have gone rapidly through many of the characteristic epochs
of the world's history, in politics, commerce, and industry; in social
life, education, and religion.
The importance of the culture epochs for schools lies in the theory,
accepted by many great writers, that children in their growth from
infancy to maturity, pass through a series of steps which correspond
broadly to the historical epochs of mankind. A child's life up to the
age of twenty, is a sort of epitome of the world's history. Our
present state of culture is a result of growth, and if a child is to
appreciate society as it now is, he must grow into it out of the past,
by having traveled through the same stages it has traced. But this is
only a very superficial way of viewing the relation between child and
world history. The periods of child life are so similar to the epochs
of history, that a child finds its _proper mental food_ in the study of
the materials furnished by these epochs. Let us test this. A child
eight years old cares nothing about reciprocity or free silver, or
university extension. Robinson Crusoe, however, who typifies mankind's
early struggle with the forces of nature, claims his undivided
attention. A boy of ten will take more delight in the story of King
Alfred or William Tell than in twenty Gladstones or Bismarcks. Not
that Gladstone's work is less important or interesting to the right
person, but the boy does not live and have his being in the Gladstonian
age. Not all parts of history, indeed, are adapted to please and
instruct some period of youth. Whole ages have been destitute of such
materials, barren as deserts for educational purposes. But those
epochs which have been typical of great experiences, landmarks of
progress, have also found poets and historians to describe them. The
great works of poets and historians contain also the great _object
lessons_ upon which to cultivate the minds of children. Some of the
leading characters of fiction and history are the best personifications
of the steps of progress in the history of the race; Crusoe, Abraham,
Ulysses, Alfred, Tell, David, Charlemagne, Moses, Columbus, Washington.
These men, cast in a large and heroic mold, represent great human
strivings and are adapted to teach the chief lessons of history, if
properly selected and arranged. These typical individual characters
illustrate the fundamental ideas that will give insight and
appreciation for later social forms. They contain, hidden as it were,
the essential part of great historical and social truths of
far-reaching importance. The culture epochs will be seen later to be
important in solving the problem of the _concentration of instruction_
along certain lines, but in the present discussion their value is
chiefly seen in their adaptability to arouse the interest of children,
by supplying peculiarly congenial materials of instruction in the
changing phases of child progress.
The interest most worth awakening in pupils is not only direct but
_permanent_. Hawthorne's Golden Touch embodies a simple classic truth
in such transparent form that its reperusal is always a pleasure. In
the same way, to observe the autumn woods and flowers, the birds and
insects, with sympathy and delight, leaves a lasting pleasure in the
memory. The best kind of knowledge is that which lays a permanent hold
upon the affections. The best method of learning is that which opens
up any field of study with a growing interest. To awaken a child's
permanent interest in any branch of knowledge is to accomplish much for
his character and usefulness. An enduring interest in American
history, for example, is valuable in the best sense, no matter what the
method of instruction. Any companion or book that teaches us to
observe the birds with growing interest and pleasure has done what a
teacher could scarcely do better. This kind of knowledge becomes a
living, generative culture influence. Knowledge which contains no
springs of interest is like faith divorced from works. Information and
discipline may be gained in education without any lasting interest, but
the one who uses such knowledge and discipline is only a machine. A
Cambridge student who had taken the best prizes and scholarships said
at the end of his university career: "I am at a loss to know what to
do. I have already gained the best distinctions, and I can see but
little to work for in the future." The child of four years, who opens
his eyes with unfeigned interest and surprised inquiry into the big
world around him, has a better spirit than such a dead product of
university training. But happily this is not the spirit of our
universities now. The remarkable and characteristic idea in university
life today is the spirit of investigation and scientific inquiry which
it constantly awakens. We happen to live in a time when university
teachers are trying to enlarge the bounds of human knowledge in every
direction, to solve problems that have not been solved before. No
matter what the subject, the real student soon becomes an explorer, an
investigator in fields of absorbing interest. The common school can
scarcely do better than to receive this generous impulse into its work.
Can our common studies be approached in this inquisitive spirit? Can
growth in knowledge be made a progressive investigation? A true
interest takes pleasure in acquired knowledge, and standing upon this
vantage looks with inquiring purpose into new worlds. Children in our
schools are sometimes made so dyspeptic that no knowledge has any
relish. But the soul should grow strong, and healthy, and elastic,
upon the food it takes. If the teaching is such that the appetite
becomes stronger, the mental digestion better, and if the spirit of
interest and inquiry grows into a steady force, the best results may be
expected.
The cultivation of a _many-sided interest_ is desirable in order to
_avoid_ narrowness, and to open up the various sources of mental
activity, _i.e._, to stimulate mental vigor along many lines. We
believe that most children are capable of taking interest in many kinds
of study. The preference which some children show for certain branches
and the dislike for others may be due to peculiar early surroundings,
and is often the result of good or poor teaching as much as to natural
gifts. As every child has sympathies for companions and people, so
every child may take a real interest in story, biography, and history,
if these subjects are rightly approached. So also the indifference to
plant and animal life shown by many persons is due to lack of culture
and suitable suggestion at the impressionable age. Unquestionably the
lives of most people run in too narrow a channel. They fail to
appreciate and enjoy many of the common things about them, to which
their eyes have not been properly opened. The particular trade or
business so engrosses most people's time that their sympathies are
narrowed and their appreciation of the duties and responsibilities of
life is stunted. The common school, more than all other institutions,
should lay broad foundations and awaken many-sided sympathies. The
trade school and the university can afford to specialize, to prepare
for a vocation. The common school, on the contrary, is preparing all
children for general citizenship. The narrowing idea of a trade or
calling should be kept away from the public school, and as far as
possible varied interests in knowledge should be awakened in every
child.
But this variety of interests may lead to scattering and _superficial
knowledge_. And in its results many-sided interest would seem to point
naturally to many-sided activity; that is, to multiplicity of
employments, to that character which in Yankee phrase is designated as
"Jack of all trades and master of none." If instead of being allowed
to spread out so much, the educational stream is confined between
narrow banks, it will show a deep and full current. If allowed to
spread over the marshes and plains, it becomes sluggish and brackish.
Our course of study for the common schools in recent years, has been
largely added to and has been extended over the whole field of
knowledge. History, geography, natural science lessons and drawing
have been added to the old reading, writing, arithmetic, and grammar.
There may appear to be more variety, but less strength. When in
addition to this greater variety of studies, enthusiastic teachers
desire to increase the _quantity_ of knowledge in each branch and to
present as many interesting facts as possible, at every point, we have
the _over-loading_ of the school course. This effect will be noticed
in a later chapter in its bearing upon concentration. Children have
too much to learn. They become pack-horses, instead of free spirits
walking in the fields of knowledge. _Mental vigor_, after all, is
worth more than a mind grown corpulent and lazy with an excess of
pabulum, overfed. The cultivation therefore of a many-sided interest
ceases to be a blessing as soon as encyclopedic knowledge becomes its
aim. In fact the desire on the part of teachers to make the knowledge
of any subject complete and encyclopedic destroys all true interest.
The solution of this great problem does not consist in identifying
many-sided interest with encyclopedic knowledge, but in such a detailed
study of _typical_ forms in each case as will give insight into that
branch without any pretension to exhaustive knowledge. Certainly a
true interest in plants does not require that we become acquainted with
all the species of all the genera. But a proper study of a few typical
forms in a few of the families and genera might produce a much deeper
interest in nature and in her laws.
The culture of a many-sided interest is essential to a full development
and _perfection_ of the mental activities. It is easy to see that
interest in any subject gives all thought upon it a greater vigor and
intensify. Mental action in all directions is strengthened and
vivified by a direct interest. On the other hand mental life
diminishes with the loss of interest, and even in fields of knowledge
in which a man has displayed unusual mastery, a loss of interest is
followed by a loss of energy. Excluding interest is like cutting off
the circulation from a limb. Perfect vigor of thought which we aim at
in education, is marked by strength along three lines, the vigor of the
individual ideas, the extent and variety of ideas under control, and
the connection and harmony of ideas. It is the highest general aim of
intellectual education to strengthen mental vigor in these three
directions. Many-sided interest is conducive to all three. Every
thought that finds lodgment in the mind is toned up and strengthened by
interest. It is also easier to retain and reproduce some idea that has
once been grasped with full feeling of interest. An interest that has
been developed along all leading lines of study has a proper breadth
and comprehensiveness and cannot be hampered and clogged by narrow
restraints and prejudice. We admire a person not simply because he has
a few clear ideas, but also for the extent and variety of this sort of
information. Our admiration ceases when he shows ignorance or
prejudice or lack of sympathy with important branches of study.
Finally, the unity and harmony of the varied kinds of knowledge are a
great source of interest. The tracing of connections between different
studies and the insight that comes from proper associations, are among
the highest delights of learning. The connection and harmony of ideas
will be discussed under concentration.
The six interests above mentioned are to be developed along parallel
lines. They are to be kept in proper _equipoise_. It is not designed
that anyone shall be developed to the overshadowing of the others.
They are like six pillars upon which the structure of a liberal
education is rested. A cultivation of any one, exclusively, may be in
place when the work of general education is complete and a profession
or life labor has been chosen.
It is also true that a proper interest is a _protection_ against the
desires, disorderly impulses, and passions. One of the chief ends of
education is to bring the inclinations and importunate desires under
mastery, to establish a counterpoise to them by the steady and
persistent forces of education. A many-sided interest cultivated along
the chief paths of knowledge, implies such mental vigor and such
preoccupation with worthy subjects as naturally to discourage unworthy
desires.
Locke says, self-restraint, the mastery over one's inclinations, is the
foundation of virtue. "He that has found a way how to keep a child's
spirit easy, active, and free, and yet at the same time to restrain him
from many things he has a mind to, and to draw him to things that are
uneasy to him; he, I say, that knows how to reconcile these seeming
contradictions, has, in my opinion, got the true secret of education."
But it is a secret still; the central question remains unanswered. How
is the teacher to approach and influence the will of the child? Is it
by supposing that the child has a will already developed and strong
enough to be relied upon on all occasions? On the contrary, must not
the teacher put incentives in the path of the pupil, ideas and feelings
that prompt him to self-denial?
Interest as a source of _will-stimulus_ has peculiar advantages. It is
not desired that the inclinations and feelings shall get the mastery of
the mind, certainly not the disorderly and momentary desires. Higher
desires, indeed, should properly influence the will, as the desire of
the approval of conscience, the desire to attain excellence, to gain
strength and mastery, to serve others, etc. But the importance of
awakening interest as a basis of will cultivation is found in the
favorable mental state induced by interest as a preliminary to will
action along the best lines. Interest is not an impetuous force like
the desires, prompting to instant action, but a quiet, permanent
undertone, which brings everything into readiness for action, clears
the deck, and begins the attack. It would be a vast help to many boys
and girls if the irksomeness of study in arithmetic or grammar, which
is so fatal to will energy, could give way to the spur of interest, and
when the wheels are once set in motion, progress would not only begin
but be sustained by interest.
It is pretty generally agreed to by thoughtful educators, that in
giving a child the broad foundations of education, we should aim not so
much at knowledge as at capacity and _appreciation_ for it. A
universal receptivity, such as Rousseau requires of Emile, is a
desideratum. Scarcely a better dowry can be bestowed upon a child by
education, than a desire for knowledge and an intelligent interest in
all important branches of study. Herbart's many-sided interest is to
strengthen and branch out from year to year during school life, and
become a permanent tendency or force in later years. No school can
give even an approach to full and encyclopedic knowledge, but no school
is so humble that it may not throw open the doors and present many a
pleasing prospect into the fields of learning.
With Herbart, therefore, a many-sided, harmonious interest promotes
_will-energy_ through all the efforts of learning from childhood up,
and when the work of general education has been completed, the youth is
ready to launch out into the world with a strong, healthy appetite for
information in many directions. The best fruitage of such a course
will follow in the years that succeed school life. Interest is a very
practical thing. It is that which gives force and momentum to ideas.
It is not knowledge itself, but, like the invisible principle of life,
it converts dead matter into living energy. In our schools thus far we
have had too much faith in the mechanics of education. Too much virtue
has been imputed to facts, to knowledge, to sharp tools. We have now
to learn that _incentive_ is a more important thing in education; that
is, a direct, permanent, many-sided interest.