Part 16 (1/2)
There exists a _sensory culture_, which is not generally taken into consideration, but which is a factor in esthesiometry.
For example, in the mental _tests_ which are used in France, or in a series of tests which De Sanctis has established for the _diagnosis_ of the intellectual status, I have often seen used _cubes of different sizes placed at varying distances_. The child was to select the _smallest_ and the _largest_, while the chronometer measured the time of reaction between the command and the execution of the act. Account was also taken of the errors. I repeat that in such experiments the factor of _culture_ is forgotten and by this I mean _sensory culture_.
Our children have, for example, among the didactic material for the education of the senses, a series of ten cubes. The first has a base of ten centimetres, and the others decrease, successively, one centimetre as to base, the smallest cube having a base of one centimetre. The exercise consists in throwing the blocks, which are pink in colour, down upon a green carpet, and then building them up into a little tower, placing the largest cube as the base, and then placing the others in order of size until the little cube of one centimetre is placed at the top.
The little one must each time select, from the blocks scattered upon the green carpet, ”the largest” block. This game is most entertaining to the little ones of two years and a half, who, as soon as they have constructed the little tower, tumble it down with little blows of the hand, admiring the pink cubes as they lie scattered upon the green carpet. Then, they begin again the construction, building and destroying a definite number of times.
If we were to place before these tests one of my children from three to four years, and one of the children from the first elementary (six or seven years old), my pupil would undoubtedly manifest a shorter period of reaction, and would not commit errors. The same may be said for the tests of the chromatic sense, etc.
This educational method should therefore prove interesting to students of experimental psychology as well as to teachers.
In conclusion, let me summarize briefly: Our didactic material renders auto-education possible, permits a methodical education of the senses.
Not upon the ability of the teacher does such education rest, but upon the didactic system. This presents objects which, first, attract the spontaneous attention of the child, and, second, contain a rational gradation of stimuli.
We must not confuse the _education_ of the senses, with the concrete ideas which may be gathered from our environment by means of the senses.
Nor must this education of the senses be identical in our minds with the language through which is given the nomenclature corresponding to the concrete idea, nor with the acquisition of the abstract idea of the exercises.
Let us consider what the music master does in giving instruction in piano playing. He teaches the pupil the correct position of the body, gives him the idea of the notes, shows him the correspondence between the written notes and the touch and the position of the fingers, and then he leaves the child to perform the exercise by himself. If a pianist is to be made of this child, there must, between the ideas given by the teacher and the musical exercises, intervene long and patient application to those exercises which serve to give agility to the articulation of the fingers and of the tendons, in order that the co-ordination of special muscular movements shall become automatic, and that the muscles of the hand shall become strong through their repeated use.
The pianist must, therefore, _act for himself_, and the more his natural tendencies lead him to _persist_ in these exercises the greater will be his success. However, without the direction of the master the exercise will not suffice to develop the scholar into a true pianist.
The directress of the ”Children's House” must have a clear idea of the two factors which enter into her work--the guidance of the child, and the individual exercise.
Only after she has this concept clearly fixed in her mind, may she proceed to the application of a _method_ to _guide_ the spontaneous education of the child and to impart necessary notions to him.
In the opportune quality and in the manner of this intervention lies the _personal art_ of the _educator_.
For example, in the ”Children's House” in the Prati di Castello, where the pupils belong to the middle-cla.s.s, I found, a month after the opening of the school, a child of five years who already knew how to compose any word, as he knew the alphabet perfectly--he had learned it in two weeks. He knew how to write on the blackboard, and in the exercises in free design he showed himself not only to be an observer, but to have some intuitive idea of perspective, drawing a house and chair very cleverly. As for the exercises of the chromatic sense, he could mix together the eight gradations of the eight colours which we use, and from this ma.s.s of sixty-four tablets, each wound with silk of a different colour or shade, he could rapidly separate the eight groups.
Having done this, he would proceed with ease to arrange each colour series in perfect gradation. In this game the child would almost cover one of the little tables with a carpet of finely-shaded colours. I made the experiment, taking him to the window and showing him in full daylight one of the coloured tablets, telling him to look at it well, so that he might be able to remember it. I then sent him to the table on which all the gradations were spread out, and asked him to find the tablet like the one at which he had looked. He committed only very slight errors, often choosing the exact shade but more often the one next it, rarely a tint two grades removed from the right one. This boy had then a power of discrimination and a colour memory which were almost prodigious. Like all the other children, he was exceedingly fond of the colour exercises. But when I asked the name of the white colour spool, he hesitated for a long time before replying uncertainly ”white.” Now a child of such intelligence should have been able, even without the special intervention of the teacher, to learn the name of each colour.
The directress told me that having noticed that the child had great difficulty in retaining the nomenclature of the colours, she had up until that time left him to exercise himself freely with the games for the colour sense. At the same time he had developed rapidly a power over written language, which in my method as presented through a series of problems to be solved. These problems are presented as sense exercises. This child was, therefore, most intelligent. In him the discriminative sensory perceptions kept pace with great intellectual activities--attention and judgment. But his _memory for names_ was inferior.
The directress had thought best not to interfere, as yet, in the teaching of the child. Certainly, the education of the child was a little disordered, and the directress had left the spontaneous explanation of his mental activities excessively free. However desirable it may be to furnish a sense education as a basis for intellectual ideas, it is nevertheless advisable at the same time to a.s.sociate the _language_ with these _perceptions_.
In this connection I have found excellent for use with normal children _the three periods_ of which the lesson according to Seguin consists:
_First Period._ The a.s.sociation of the sensory perception with the name.
For example, we present to the child, two colours, red and blue.
Presenting the red, we say simply, ”This is red,” and presenting the blue, ”This is blue.” Then, we lay the spools upon the table under the eyes of the child.
_Second Period._ Recognition of the object corresponding to the name. We Say to the child, ”Give me the red,” and then, ”Give me the blue.”
_Third Period._ The remembering of the name corresponding to the object.
We ask the child, showing him the object, ”What is this?” and he should respond, ”Red.”
Seguin insists strongly upon these three periods, and urges that the colours be left for several instants under the eyes of the child. He also advises us never to present the colour singly, but always two at a time, since the contrast helps the chromatic memory. Indeed, I have proved that there cannot be a better method for teaching colour to the deficients, who, with this method were able to learn the colours much more perfectly than normal children in the ordinary schools who have had a haphazard sense education. For normal children however there exists a _period preceding_ the Three Periods of Seguin--a period which contains the real _sense education_. This is the acquisition of a fineness of differential perception, which can be obtained _only_ through auto-education.
This, then, is an example of the great superiority of the normal child, and of the greater effect of education which such pedagogical methods may exercise upon the mental development of normal as compared with deficient children.