Kindergarten employments are calculated to give
information regarding cubes, spheres, etc., and to form certain
habits of manipulation of material (for everything must always be
done "just so"), the absence of more vital purposes being
supposedly compensated for by the alleged symbolism of the
material used. Manual training is reduced to a series of ordered
assignments calculated to secure the mastery of one tool after
another and technical ability in the various elements of
construction -- like the different joints. It is argued that
pupils must know how to use tools before they attack actual
making, -- assuming that pupils cannot learn how in the process
of making. Pestalozzi's just insistence upon the active use of
the senses, as a substitute for memorizing words, left behind it
in practice schemes for "object lessons" intended to acquaint
pupils with all the qualities of selected objects. The error is
the same: in all these cases it is assumed that before objects
can be intelligently used, their properties must be known. In
fact, the senses are normally used in the course of intelligent
(that is, purposeful) use of things, since the qualities
perceived are factors to be reckoned with in accomplishment.
Witness the different attitude of a boy in making, say, a kite,
with respect to the grain and other properties of wood, the
matter of size, angles, and proportion of parts, to the attitude
of a pupil who has an object-lesson on a piece of wood, where the
sole function of wood and its properties is to serve as subject
matter for the lesson.
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