charity-school attitude of New York City. The Massachusetts district system was instituted, local taxation required, state aid distributed on the basis of school census, and the first State Superintendent of Schools provided for. 1814 1814 Teachers to be examined. By 1820 New York schools probably the best of any State in the Union. 263. Jefferson's Plan for Education in Virginia (Jefferson, Thomas, Notes of the State of Virginia, pp. 243-49) In 1779 Jefferson, then a member of the Virginia Legislature, submitted to that body a comprehensive bill "For the more general diffusion of knowledge" in the State, through the organization of a complete state system of schools. The plan1 was not approved, but in the following statement Jefferson gives the more important provisions of his bill. FIG. 64. THOMAS JEFFERSON (1743-1826) This bill proposes to lay off every county into small districts of five or six miles square, called hundreds, and in each of them to establish a school for teaching reading, writing, and arithmetic. The tutor to be supported by the hundred, and every person in it entitled to send their children three years gratis, and as much longer as they please, paying for it. These schools to be under a visitor, who is annually to chuse the boy, of best genius in the school, of those whose parents are too poor to give them further education, and to send him forward to one of the grammar schools, of which twenty are proposed to be erected in different parts of the country, for teaching Greek, Latin, geography, and the higher branches of numerical arithmetic. Of the boys thus sent in any one year, trial is to be made at the grammar schools one or two years, and the best genius of the whole selected, and continued six years, and the residue dismissed. By this means twenty of the best geniuses will be raked from the rubbish annually, and be instructed, at the public expence, so far as the grammar schools go. At the end of six years' instruction, one half are to be discontinued (from among whom the grammar schools will probably be supplied with future masters); and the other half, who are to be chosen for the superiority of their parts and 1 This plan, commonly known as Jefferson's First Plan, may be found in full in the Biennial Report of the Superintendent of Public Instruction of Virginia, 1900-01, pp. Lxx-lxxv. ... disposition, are to be sent and continued three years in the study of such sciences as they shall chuse, at William and Mary college, the plan of which is proposed to be enlarged, . . . and extended to all the useful sciences. The ultimate result of the whole scheme of education would be the teaching of all the children of the state reading, writing, and common arithmetic: turning out ten annually of superior genius, well taught in Greek, Latin, geography, and the higher branches of arithmetic: turning out ten others annually, of still superior parts, who, to those branches of learning, shall have added such of the sciences as their genius shall have led them to: the furnishing to the wealthier part of the people convenient schools, at which their children may be educated, at their own expense. . . . Of all the view of this law none is more important, none more legitimate, than that of rendering the people safe, as they are the ultimate guardians of their own liberty. For this purpose the reading in the first stage, where they will receive their whole education, is proposed, as has been said, to be chiefly historical. History by apprising them of the past will enable them to judge of the future. CHAPTER XXI NEW THEORY AND SUBJECT-MATTER FOR THE ELEMENTARY SCHOOL THE Readings of this chapter deal with the work of Rousseau, Basedow, Pestalozzi, and Fellenberg, and the influence of their work in redirecting and reshaping the elementary vernacular school. Largely out of their labors, coming at a time when the democratic theory of education was fast superseding the religious, the elementary school of the nineteenth century was given form and direction. The first selection (264) gives a series of illustrative extracts from the Émile of Rousseau, extracts which are characteristic of Rousseau's thought and form of treatment. The second and third selections deal with the work of the German educational reformer, Basedow. The second (265) outlines the course of instruction given to each class in the institution he established at Dessau, and the third (266) being a page from his famous Elementarwerk. The remainder of the Readings deal with the work of the more celebrated German-Swiss reformer, Pestalozzi. The first of these (267) is an explanation from Pestalozzi's own pen, made to a Society supporting his work, in which he tells them the objects he had in mind in his work. The three selections which follow are appreciative estimates of Pestalozzi's labors. The first (268) is by Professor John Griscom, of New York; the second (269) by the New England educator, Woodbridge; and the third, (270) by the English Dr. Mayo. The Reading following these (271) is a careful comparison of the work of Basedow and Pestalozzi, pointing out the comparative merits of the work of each. The final selection of the chapter (272) is a description and estimate of the agricultural and mechanical and literary Institute of Emmanuel Fellenberg, at Hofwyl, the prototype of all such institutions in the nineteenth century. 264. The Émile of Jean-Jacques Rousseau (Rousseau, Jean-Jacques, Émile. Paris, 1762. Trans. in Barnard's American Journal of Education, vol. v) In 1762 there appeared in Paris, from the pen of a man who had declared war on organized society, two of the most influential books of the eighteenth century. One was the Contrat social (R. 249), and the other the Emile. The first dealt with the conditions under which organized government should continue, and the second with the education of an imaginary boy and his future wife. The Émile was divided into five books, as follows: Book I. Infancy, or education to the age of five. The volume was written in charming literary style, but presented no workable plan for education. Instead it set forth Rousseau's criticisms of the education of his time and his ideas, largely drawn from the Thoughts of John Locke (Rs. 216, 217, 228, 229), as to needed reforms in educational procedure. He popularized the best ideas of Locke and scattered them over Europe, thus awakening an interest in the education of children before unknown. The following extracts from the Emile give some idea as to Rousseau's style, method of treatment, and ideas. (a) The Preface. The book was originally written for a thoughtful mother. Even if the thoughts contained in it are of no value in themselves, they ought to serve to awaken valuable thoughts in others. Every body writes and cries out against the usual methods of instruction, but no one suggests a better one. The knowledge of our century serves much more for destroying than for building up. Childhood is not understood. The most judicious, in their teaching, confine themselves to that which it is necessary for a man to know; without considering what children are fit to learn. They are always seeking for a man in the child, without ever thinking what the child is before it becomes a man. My system is nature's course of development. This term will be mistaken by many of my readers. They will take my book to be, not a work upon education, but the dreams of a visionary. I do not see as others do; but can I give myself others' eyes? I can not change my views; I can only suspect them. It has been often said to me, Propose only what can be accomplished. This means, propose something which is done now; or, at least, something good, of such a kind that it will come into agreement with prevalent evils. Such a collocation would destroy the good without healing the bad. I would rather adhere entirely to what is already received than to try any half measures. (b) The Three Teachers of Men. We come weak into the world, and need strength; bare of every thing, and need assistance. All which we have not at our birth, and have when we grow up, we acquire by education. This education we receive either from nature, from man, or from things. The inner development of our powers and organs is the education of nature; the use which we are taught to make of this development, is education by man; and what we learn by our own experience of the circumstances which have an influence over us, the education by things. The natural man is complete within himself; his is the numerical unity; an absolute whole; which has relations only with itself, or with its like. The man of society is only a fraction, which depends on its denominator, and whose value is determined by its relations to the whole; to the social body. Those modes of education are best for society, which are most efficient in perverting man from nature; in robbing him of his absolute existence, in giving him the relative one, such that after it he will feel and act only as a member of society. This opposition between education for a citizen and for a man, corresponds with the opposition between public education together, and private education in the family. The former existed in Sparta; but exists no longer, for there is no longer any fatherland, or any citizens. Thus, there remains for us only private education, or that of nature. But what would the man educated only for himself become afterward, among others? To know this, it is necessary to know the completely educated man; and also the natural man. This book is intended to assist in gaining such knowledge. What now is necessary to be done to educate the natural man? Much, no doubt; chiefly in order to hinder any thing from being done. The child should be educated for the common human vocation, not for any special situation; he must merely live, in good or evil, as life should bring them; and should learn more by experience than by teaching. Considering the instability of human affairs, and the restless, rebellious spirit of the present century, which is overturning every thing, no more unnatural method of education could be devised than that which deals with a child as if he were never to leave home, or the companionship of his own friends. As soon as the unhappy pupil has gone a step away, he is lost. (c) Handling Children properly. Ever since children have been instructed, no other means have been invented of managing them, but emulation, energy, jealousy, covetous |