712 PROCEEDINGS OF SECTION J. 



3.— EDUCATIONAL METHOD. WITH SPECIAL REFERENCE 

 TO THE TEACHING OF MATHEMATICS AND PHYSICAL 



SCTFNf'F 



By W. R. JAMIESON, B.Sr. 



[Abridged.] 



Educational method scarcely yet justifies its inclusion among the 

 departments of science. The term education is here used in the more 

 restricted sense of mental training and regarded as an application of 

 psychological science, a branch of knowledge which has only recently 

 been brought within the sphere of experimental research. When in 

 the future more exact knowledge is available as to the processes of the 

 mind, and especially as to its development, the right method to follow 

 in the training of the young will be more clearly evident. In the 

 meantime we must make the most of the knowledge acquired by 

 experience, and it is by virtue of such experience in the course of which 

 I have been led to changes in method that I venture to deliver the 

 following remarks. My experience has been acquired in the region of 

 science, and its results are appropriately made known before an 

 association whose avowed function is the advancement of science. 

 Whatever may be the immediate origin of new acquisitions to science, 

 its general advancement is largely dependent upon the earlier stages 

 of scientific training. It is with this phase of the subject that I pro- 

 pose particularly to deal. There has been a marked awakening in 

 England during recent years in regard to the urgent necessity for 

 improvements in the teaching of science through all its stages. 



No more searching criticism may be applied to present-day 

 methods than a comparison with those advocated by Huxley, who first 

 gave an impetus to the movement which has since been steadily gain- 

 ing momentum, of sound training in scientific method. 



The distinctive feature of scientific method should be that the 

 learner deals with things and not with mere words. The greatest 

 difficulty to encounter in securing the efficiency of scientific training 

 is the thraldom of symbols, whether of words, the vehicle of ordinary 

 description, or of the special symbols of mathematics and science. 

 How often do we find that a scholar has no real knowledge of things 

 apart from their symbolic representation. This difficulty can only 

 be met by supplying and ever keeping prominent a concrete basis 

 of actuality. Only to the extent that the learner .is able to draw 

 correct conclusions from that which he is aware of by his own percep- 

 tion can we claim to have rightly cultivated the scientific faculty. By 

 scientific method we mean, in brief, the acquisition of knowledge by 

 inferences drawn from the observations of experience and experiment. 

 The learner is in direct contact with reality and is not relying on words 

 uttered or read, of whose meaning he may form totally inaccurate 

 mental pictures. Now, in order to draw right inferences from phe- 

 nomena, it is necessary in the first place that he should observe correctly 

 and fully. The cultivation of the powers of observation is the first 



