Ontario Normal School Manuals: Science of Education

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=Interpreting Ideas Already Known.=--It is to be noticed at the outset
that all ideas selected to aid in the solution of the lesson problem
have their origin in certain past experiences which have a bearing on
the subject in hand. When presented with a strange object (guava), a
person fixes his attention upon it, and thereupon is able, through his
former sensation experiences, to interpret it as an unknown thing. He
then begins to select, out of his experiences of former objects, ideas
that bear upon the thing before him. By focusing thereon certain ideas
with which he is perfectly familiar, as rind, flesh, seed, etc., he
interprets the strange thing as a kind of fruit. In the same way, when
the student is first presented in school with an example of the
infinitive, he brings to bear upon the vague presentation various ideas
already contained within his experience through his previous study of
the noun and the verb. To the extent also to which he possesses and is
able to recall these necessary old ideas, will he be able to adjust
himself to the new and unfamiliar presented example (infinitive). It is
evident, therefore, that a new presentation can have a meaning for us
only as it is related to something in our past experience.

=Further Examples.=--The mind invariably tries to interpret new
presentations in terms of old ideas. A newspaper account of a railway
wreck will be intelligible to us only through the revival and
reconstruction of those past experiences that are similar to the
elements described in the account. The grief, disappointment, or
excitement of another will be appreciated only as we have experienced
similar feelings in the past. New ideas are interpreted by means of
related old ideas; new feelings and acts are dependent upon and made
possible by related old feelings and acts. Moreover, the meaning
assigned to common objects varies with different persons and even with
the same person under different circumstances. A forest would be
regarded by the savage as a place to hide from the attacks of his
enemies; by the hunter as a place to secure game; by the woodcutter as
affording firewood; by the lumberman as yielding logs for lumber; by the
naturalist as offering opportunity for observing insects and animals; by
the artist as a place presenting beautiful combinations of colours. This
ability of the mind to retain and use its former knowledge in meeting
and interpreting new experiences is known in psychology as
_apperception_. A more detailed study of apperception as a mental
process will be made in Chapter XXVI.

THE SELECTING PROCESS

=Learner's Mind Active.=--A further principle of method to be deduced
from the foregoing is, that the process of bringing ideas out of former
experiences to bear upon a presented problem must take place within the
mind of the learner himself. The new knowledge being an experience
organized from elements selected out of former experiences, it follows
that the learner will possess the new knowledge only in so far as he has
himself gone through the process of selecting the necessary interpreting
ideas out of his own former knowledge and finally organizing them into
new knowledge. This need for the pupil to direct mental effort, or
attention, upon the problem in order to bring upon it, out of his former
knowledge, the ideas relative to the solution of the question before
him, is one of the most important laws of method. From the standpoint of
the teacher, this law demands that he so direct the process of learning
that the pupil will clearly call up in consciousness the selected
interpreting ideas as portions of his old knowledge, and further feel a
connection between these and the new problem before him.

=Learner's Experience Analysed.=--The second stage of the learning
process is found to involve also a breaking up of former experience.
This appears in the fact that the various ideas which are necessary to
interpret the new problem are to be selected out of larger complexes of
past experience. For example, in a lesson whose problem is to account
for the lack of rainfall in the Sahara desert, the pupil may have a
complex of experiences regarding the position of the desert. Out of this
mass of experience he must, however, select the one feature--its
position in relation to the equator. In the same way, he may have a
whole body of experience regarding the winds of Africa. This body must,
however, be analysed, and the attention fixed upon the North-east
trade-wind. Again, he may know many things about these winds, but here
he selects out the single item of their coming from a land source.
Again, from the complex of old knowledge which he possesses regarding
the land area from which the wind blows, he must analyse out its
temperature, and compare it with that of the areas toward which the wind
is blowing. Thus it will be seen that, step by step, the special items
of old knowledge to be used in the apperceptive process are selected out
of larger masses of experience. For this reason this phase of the
learning process is frequently designated as a process of analysis.

=Problem as Object of Analysis.=--Although the second step of the
learning process has been described as a selecting of elements from past
experience, it might be supposed that the various elements which the
mind has been said to select from its former experiences to interpret
the new problem, come in a sense from the presentation itself. Thus it
is often said, in describing the present step in the learning process,
that the presentation embodies a certain aggregate of experience, which
the learner can master by analysing it into its component parts and
recombining the analysed parts into a better known whole.

=Analysis Depends upon Selection.=--It is not in the above sense,
however, that the term analysis is to be applied in the learning
process. It is not true, for instance, when a person is presented with a
strange object, say an _ornithorhynchus_, and realizes it in only a
vague way, that any mere analysis of the object will discover for him
the various characteristics which are to synthesize into a knowledge of
the animal. This would imply that in analysis the mind merely breaks up
a vaguely known whole in order to make of it a definitely known whole.
But the learner could not discover the characteristics of such an object
unless the mind attended to it with certain elements of its former
experiences. Unless, for instance, the person already knew certain
characteristics of both birds and animals, he could not interpret the
ornithorhynchus as a bird-beaked animal. In the case of the child and
the mud-turtle, also, there could have been no analysis of the problem
in the way referred to, had the child not had the ideas, bug and basket,
as elements of former experience. These characteristics, therefore,
which enter into a definite knowledge of the object, do not come out of
the object by a mere mechanical process of analysis, but are rather read
into the object by the apperceptive process. That is, the learner does
not get his new experience directly out of the presented materials, but
builds up his new experience out of elements of his former knowledge. In
other words, the learner sees in the new object, or problem, only such
characteristics as his former knowledge and interest enable him to see.
Thus while the learner may be said from one standpoint to analyse the
new problem, this is possible only because he is able to break up, or
analyse, his former experience and read certain of its elements into the
new presentation. To say that the mind analyses the unknown object, or
topic, in any other sense, would be to confound mental interpretation
with physical analysis.

=A Further Example.=--The following example will further show that the
learner can analyse a presented problem only to the extent that he is
able to put characteristics into it by this process of analysing or
selecting from his past experience. Consider how a young child gains his
knowledge of a triangle. At first his control of certain sensations
enables him to read into it two ideas, three-sidedness and
three-angledness, and only these factors, therefore, organize themselves
into his experience triangle. Nor would any amount of mere attention
enable him at this stage to discover another important quality in the
thing triangle. Later, however, through the growth of his geometric
experience, he may be able to read another quality into a triangle,
namely two-right-angledness. This new quality will then, and only then,
be organized with his former knowledge into a more complete knowledge of
a triangle. Here again it is seen that analysis as a learning process is
really reading into a new presentation something which the mind already
possesses as an element of former experience, and not gaining something
at first hand out of the presented problem.

=Problem Directs Selection.=--It will be well to note here also that the
selecting of the interpreting ideas is usually controlled by the problem
with which the mind is engaged. This is indicated from the various ways
in which the same object may be interpreted as the mind is confronted
with different problems. The round stone, for instance, when one wishes
to crack the filbert, is viewed as a hammer; when he wishes to place his
paper on the ground, it becomes a weight; when he is threatened by the
strange dog, it becomes a weapon of defence. In like manner the sign _x_
suggests an unknown quantity in relation to the algebraic problem; in
relation to phonics it is a double sound; in relation to numeration, the
number ten. It is evident that in all these cases, what determines the
meaning given to the presented object is the _need_, or _problem_, that
is at the moment predominant. In the same way, any lesson problem, in so
far as it is felt to be of value, forms a starting-point for calling up
other ideas, and therefore starts in the learner's mind a flow of ideas
which is likely to furnish the solution. Moreover, the mind has the
power to measure the suitability of various ideas and select or reject
them as they are felt to stand related to the problem in hand. For
example, when a pupil is engaged in a study of the grammatical value of
the word _driving_ in the sentence, "The boy driving the horse is very
noisy," it is quite possible that he may think of the horse at his own
home, or the shouting of his father's hired man, or even perhaps the
form of the word _driving_, if he has just been viewing it in a writing
lesson. The mind is able, however, to reject these irrelevant ideas, and
select only those that seem to adjust themselves to the problem in hand.
The cause of this lies in the fact that the problem is at the outset at
least partly understood by the learner, which fact enables him to
determine whether the ideas coming forward in consciousness are related
in any way to this partially known topic. Thus in the example cited,
the learner knows the problem sufficiently to realize that it is a
question of grammatical function, and is able, therefore, to feel the
value, or suitability, of any knowledge which may be applied to it, even
before he is fully aware of its ultimate relation thereto.

LAW OF PREPARATION

=Control of Old Knowledge Necessary.=--But notwithstanding the direction
given the apperceptive process through the aim, or problem, it is
evident that if the pupil is to select from his former experiences the
particular elements which bear upon the problem in hand, he must have a
ready and intelligent control over such former knowledge. It is too
evident, however, that pupils frequently do not possess sufficient
control over the old knowledge which will bear upon a presented problem.
In endeavouring, for example, to grasp the relation of the exterior
angle to the two interior and opposite angles, the pupil may fail
because he has not a clear knowledge of the equality of angles in
connection with parallel lines. For this reason teachers will often find
it necessary (before bringing old knowledge to bear upon a new problem)
to review the old knowledge, or experience, to be used during the
apperceptive process. Thus a lesson on the participle may begin with a
review of the pupils' knowledge of verbs and adjectives, a lesson on the
making of the colours orange and green for painting a pumpkin with its
green stem may begin with a recognition of the standard colours, red,
yellow, and blue, and the writing of a capital letter with a review of
certain movements.

=Preparation Recalls Interpreting Ideas.=--It must be noted that this
review of former knowledge always implies, either that the pupil is
likely to have forgotten at least partially this former knowledge, or
that without such review he is not likely to recall and apply it readily
when the new problem is placed before him. For this reason the teacher
is usually warned that his lesson should always begin with a review of
such of the pupil's old knowledge as is to be used in mastering the new
experiences.

VALUE OF PREPARATION

=A. Aids the Understanding.=--The main advantage of this preparatory
work is that it brings into clear consciousness that group of ideas and
feelings best suited to give meaning to the new presentation. Without
it, the pupil may not understand, or only partially understand, or
entirely misunderstand the lesson. (1) He may not understand the new
matter at all because he does not bring any related facts from his past
experience to bear upon it. Multiplication of decimals would in all
probability be a merely mechanical process if the significance of
decimals and the operation of multiplying fractions were not brought to
bear upon it, the pupil not understanding it at all as a rational
process. (2) He may only partially understand the new matter because he
does not see clearly the relation between his old ideas and the new
facts, or because he does not bring to the new facts a sufficient
equipment of old ideas to make them meaningful. The adverbial objective
would be imperfectly understood if it were not shown that its functions
are exactly parallel with those of the adverb. The pupil would have only
a partial understanding of it. (3) He may entirely misunderstand the new
facts because he uses wrong old experiences to give them meaning. Such
was evidently the difficulty in the case of the young pupil who, after a
lesson on the equator, described it as a menagerie lion running around
the earth. Many of the absurd answers that a pupil gives are due to his
failure to use the correct old ideas to interpret the new facts. He has
misunderstood because his mind was not prepared by making the proper
apperceiving ideas explicit.

=B. Saves Time.=--There is the further advantage of economy of time,
when an adequate preparation of the mind has been made. When the
appropriate ideas are definitely in the forefront of consciousness, they
seize upon kindred impressions as soon as these are presented and give
them meaning. On the other hand, when sufficient preparation has not
been made, time must be taken during the presentation of the new problem
to go back in search of those experiences necessary to make it
meaningful. Frequent interruptions and consequent waste of time will be
inevitable. Time will be saved by having the apperceiving ideas ready
and active.

=C. Provides for Review.=--One of the most important values of the
preparatory step is the opportunity given for the review of old ideas.
These have to be revived, worked over, and reconstructed, and in
consequence they become the permanent possessions of the mind. The
pupil's knowledge of the functions of the adverb is reviewed when he
learns the adverb phrase and adverb clause, and is still further
illuminated when he comes to study the adverbial objective. Further, the
apperceiving ideas become more interesting to the pupil, when he finds
that he can use them in the conquest of new fields. He has a
consciousness of power, which in itself is a source of satisfaction and
pleasure.

PRECAUTIONS REGARDING PREPARATION

=Must not be too Long.=--Two precautions seem advisable in the
preparatory step. The first is that too long a time should not be spent
over it. There is sometimes a tendency to go back too far and drag
forward ideas that are only remotely connected with the new ideas to be
presented. Under such conditions much irrelevant material is likely to
be introduced, and often a train of associations out of harmony with the
meaning and spirit of the lesson is started. This is especially
dangerous in lessons in literature and history. Only those experiences
should be revived which are necessary to a clear apprehension of the
ideas or a full appreciation of the emotions to be presented in the new
lesson.

=Must Recall Vital Ideas.=--The most active, vivid, and powerful ideas
in the pupil's mind are those which are closely connected with his life.
This suggests the second precaution, namely, the use wherever possible
of the ideas associated with his surroundings, his games, his
occupations. When this is done, not only will the new knowledge have a
much greater interest attached to it but it will also be much more
vividly apprehended. This will be referred to further in connection with
the use of illustrations in teaching.

NECESSITY OF PREPARATION

Teachers, however, are not always agreed as to the amount of time or
emphasis to be given to this preparatory step. If the teacher can assure
himself that a lesson is following in easy sequence upon something with
which the children are undoubtedly familiar, he may, many argue, safely
omit such preparatory work. Indeed it is evident that after leaving
school the child will have no personal monitor to call up beforehand the
ideas that he must apply in solving the problems continually presenting
themselves in practical life. On the other hand, however, it is to be
remembered that the young child is, at the best, feeling his way in the
process of adjusting himself to new experiences. For this reason, the
first work for the teacher in any lesson is to ascertain whether the
pupils are in a proper attitude for the new knowledge, and, so far as is
necessary, prepare their minds through the recall of such knowledge as
is related to the new experiences to be presented. Although, therefore,
the step of preparation is not an essential part of the learning
process, since it constitutes for the pupil merely a review of knowledge
acquired through previous learning processes, it may be accepted as a
step in the teacher's method of controlling the learning process.

EXAMPLES OF PREPARATION

The following additional examples as to the mode and form of the step of
preparation may be considered by the student-teacher:

In a lesson in phonic reading in a primary class, the preparation should
consist of a review of those sounds and those words which the pupil
already knows that are to be used in the new lesson. In a nature study
lesson on "The Rabbit," in a Form II class, the preparation should
include a recall of any observations the pupils may have made regarding
the wild rabbit. They may have observed its timidity, its manner of
running, what it feeds upon, where it makes its home, its colour during
the winter and during the summer, the kind of tracks it makes in the
snow, etc. All these facts will be useful in interpreting the new
observations and in assisting the pupils to make new inferences. In a
lesson in a Form III class on "Ottawa as a Commercial Centre," the
preparation consists of a recall of the pupil's knowledge regarding the
position of the city; the adjacent rivers, the Ottawa, Gatineau,
Rideau, Lievre, Madawaska; the waterfalls of the Rideau and Chaudiere;
the forests to the north and west, with their immense supplies of pine,
spruce, and hemlock; and the fact that it is the Dominion capital. All
these facts are necessary in inferring the causes of the importance of
Ottawa. In a literature lesson in a Form III class on _The Charge of the
Light Brigade_, the preparation would involve a recall of some deed of
personal heroism with which the pupils are familiar, such as that of
John Maynard, Grace Darling, or any similar one nearer home. Recall how
such a deed is admired and praised, and the memory of the doer is
cherished and revered. Then the teacher should tell the story of
Balaklava with all the dramatic intensity he is master of, in order that
the pupils may be in a proper mood to approach the study of the poem. In
a grammar lesson on "The Adverbial Objective" the preparation should
consist of a review of the functions of the adverb as modifying a verb,
an adjective, and sometimes another adverb. Upon this knowledge alone
can a rational idea of the adverbial objective be built. In an
arithmetic lesson on "Multiplication of Decimals," in a Form IV class,
the preparation should involve a review of the meaning of decimals, of
the interconversion of decimals and fractions (for example, .05 = 5
hundredths; 27 ten-thousandths = .0027, etc.); and of the multiplication
of fractions. Unless the pupil can do these operations, it is obviously
impossible to make his knowledge of multiplication of decimals anything
more than a merely mechanical process.

PREPARATION MERELY AIDS SELECTION

Before closing our consideration of preparation as a stage of method, it
will be well again to call attention to the fact that this is not one
of the four recognized stages of the learning process, but rather a
subsidiary feature of the second, or apperceptive stage. In other words,
actual advance is made by the pupil toward the control of a new
experience, not through a review of former experience, but by an active
relating of elements selected from past experience to the interpretation
of the new problem.

CHAPTER XI

LEARNING AS A RELATING ACTIVITY

OR

PROCESS OF SYNTHESIS

=Learning a Unifying Process.=--It has been seen that the learner, in
gaining control of new knowledge, must organize into the new experience
elements selected from former experiences. For instance, when a person
gains a knowledge of a new fruit (guava), he not only brings forward in
consciousness from his former knowledge the ideas--rind, flesh, seed,
etc.,--to interpret the strange object, but also associates these into a
single experience, a new fruit. So long also as the person referred to
in an earlier chapter retained in his consciousness as distinct factors
three experiences--seeing a boy at the fence, seeing the vineyard, and
finally, seeing the boy eating grapes--these would not, as three such
distinct experiences, constitute a knowledge of grape-stealing. On the
other hand, as soon as these are combined, or associated by a relating
act of thought, the different factors are organized into a new idea
symbolized by the expression, _grape-stealing_.

=Examples From School-room Procedure.=--A similar relating process is
involved when the learner faces a definite school problem. When, for
instance, the pupil gains a knowledge of the sign /, he must not only
bring forward in consciousness from his former knowledge distinct ideas
of a line, of two dots, and of a certain mathematical process, but must
also associate these into a new idea, division-sign. So also a person
may know that air takes up more moisture as it becomes warmer, that the
north-east trade-winds blow over the Sahara from land areas, and that
the Sahara is situated just north of the equator. But the mind must
unify these into a single experience in order to gain a knowledge of the
condition of the rainfall in that quarter.

NATURE OF SYNTHESIS

=Deals with Former Experiences.=--This mental organizing, or unifying,
of the elements of past experiences to secure control of the new
experience, is usually spoken of as a process of synthesis. The term
synthesis, however, must be used with the same care as was noted in
regard to the term analysis. Synthesis does not mean that totally _new_
elements are being unified, but merely that whatever selected elements
of old knowledge the mind is able to read into a presented problem, are
built, or organized, into a new system; and constitute, for the time
being, one's knowledge and control of that problem. This is well
exemplified by noting the growth of a person's knowledge of any object
or topic. Thus, so long as the child is able to apperceive only the
three sides and three angles of a triangle, his idea of triangle
includes a synthesis of these. When later, through the building up of
his geometric knowledge, he is able to apperceive that the interior
angles equal two right angles, his knowledge of a triangle expands
through the synthesis of this with the former knowledge.

=All Knowledge a Synthesis.=--The fact that all knowledge is an
organization from earlier experiences becomes evident by looking at the
process from the other direction. The adult who has complete knowledge
of an orange has it as a single experience. This experience is found,
however, to represent a co-ordination of other experiences, as touch,
taste, colour, etc. Moreover, each of these separate characteristics is
an association of simpler experiences. Experiencing the touch of the
orange, for instance, is itself a complex made up of certain muscular,
touch, and temperature sensations. From this it is evident that the
knowledge of an orange, although a unity of experience in adult life, is
really a complex, or synthesis, made up of a large number of different
elements.

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