THE NEW TEACHING.* Tins is a book written by experts
for experts—and others. What- ever the experts may think of it, to the " others " it will certainly prove exceedingly interesting. The writers, sixteen in number, deal with the subject of " teaching" in contradistinction to that of education. It goes without saying that the two things overlap, but the editor tells us in his able and comprehensive Preface that he and his colleagues are concerned for the moment with methods of communicating knowledge rather than with its educational effect. It may be claimed for the "new way " that it is something of a "royal road" (though Dr. John Adams deprecates any such suggestion), for by removing out of the pupil's path a vast number of removable obstacles it enables him to travel faster, and conse- quently to get further in the time at his disposal. Take, for instance, the question of foreign languages. It is declared by men of wide scholastic experience that between the ages of ten and nineteen four languages can be mastered by any boy of ordinary ability. Nursery French is of little good, so we are here told. All the same, French, not Latin, should be the first language taught. Twelve, we read, is young enough to begin Latin ; fourteen is the best age to begin Greek ; and between the ages of sixteen and nineteen proficiency in a fourth tongue can be ensured. All this, however, cannot be accomplished except upon new methods. It is largely a matter of" intensive culture." Periods of days must not intervene between the lessons. The French master, for instance, must be allowed to claim the attention of every pupil from half-an- hour to an hour daily. During the whole lesson he will pursue
• -• the direct method" ; that is, he will teach the boy to think in French, not to translate English. The phrase, not the word, will be the unit ; the pupil will learn how to describe such-and-such an action in French, not how to translate an English description of it. The obstacle of an intermediate language will be swept out of • his way, and experience would appear to prove that the rate of his progress will be doubled. Obviously the method in its early stages is chiefly oral, though in the matter of pronunciation the best results seem to be attained, not by trusting wholly to the ear, but, as it were mechanically, "by deliberately placing the vocal organs in certain positions so as to produce certain sounds." The "direct method" is likewise to be pursued in the teaching of the classics, which are to be regarded as a key to literature, and not as a series of mental gymnastics. No attempt is made to teach grammar until such an interest in the classics as vehicles of literature has been ensured as to render the drudgery tolerable.
It is of course much less easy to lay down rules for the teaching of science than it is for the teaching of languages. The "new scientific teaching," however, as it is here elucidated, is inspired by the same principles. The first efforts of the master are directed to" exploit the pupil's spontaneity," and to" guide his development with a looser rein" than has hitherto been thought practicable. " Habits of exact thought and interest in scientific theory must be regarded as goals marking the end of the course, not entrance gates into it." In fact, these new teachers regard an interest in the subject they are teaching, and a pleasure in its pursuit, as the only really solid foundation for future proficiency. Geography, history, English, and English literature obviously make a wider appeal than science and mathematics. It would surely be difficult for any master, pursuing the new method as it is here set forth, to make them dull. When we hear that a small library Faust be "the laboratory in which the class works," that books
• The New 1'eaehin4). Edited by John Adams, 11.A., B.Sc., LL.D. London : Hodder and btoughton. Ma. Gd. net.] about books must be set aside, that matter, not manner, is the test of an essay, and that geography should be made delightful to the very young by means of the stereoscope and the lantern, we are tempted to wish that our schooldays could " return. The present writer remembers to have been as a child very much confused about the relation of a map to reality. This apparently is a common difficulty in the minds of young children, and seriously retards their progress. Under the new system of teaching this trouble is got over almost before they begin to learn geography at all. They are taught to make maps of their classrooms, and of the immediate neighbourhood of the school, and thus they soon learn the meaning of these at first meaningless symbols.
The view here taken of history teaching is a very bold one, and will, we feel, provoke a good deal of opposition. "The aim of history teaching is in the present and at home," says Mr. Keatinge (Reader in Education at the University of Oxford). "We give the story of past events that a pupil may understand the social system in which he lives through learning its origins." The danger of bias is obvious. Mr. Keatinge acknowledges the danger, but thinks that in the old system there were other dangers, and worse. So lately as the present summer holidays an instance of the amazing ignorance of history which may exist in the pupils of well-known schools came before the present writer. A boy of thirteen, who had been at an excellent preparatory school in which his naturally very good intelligence has been reasonably well developed, asked him in the course of conversation whether it was "Charles I. or Charles II. who was beheaded at Marble Arch" ! He apologized for his ignorance, saying that he knew something about the Heptarchy, but nothing beyond the Norman Conquest, as "when we got to there we had a new master and went back."
It is impossible to mention all the papers in this well-edited and excellently written book. Some are much longer than others, but all are alike lucid. The last deals with Commercial Education, and it is one of the best. Mr. Charles (Head of the Commercial Department, City of London College) deprecates the notion that the word" commercial" is a synonym for" grasping," and that the phrase " a commercial education" means a little typewriting, less shorthand, and no education. He would like to see a real "commercial education" offered to boys "whose future is secure, who are destined by birth and connexions to occupy controlling positions in the commercial world of the future." Such a school is in contemplation. In it boys would not only learn how to write a foreign letter, but they would study "the life, habits, manners, thoughts, wants, and products of the people" in the country to which such a letter might be addressed. They would learn something of foreign currencies, foreign banking facilities, all things, in fact, which affect the commercial life of other nations. Such matters "touch the very life of the people, not of the few, but of the many ; not of the administrators only, but of the workers also. They deal with the everyday life of the nation, not with its great occasions, but with its daily drudgery. . • . They deal with live men and their doings in a world of changes ; they are 'humanities.'" This paper contains several really new suggestions, not for educational reform—with which all the other papers deal— but for educational revolution. We once more congratulate the editor. He has shown his good sense. Fifteen parts reform and one part revolution are about the right proportions for an exhaustive book about teaching.
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