SCIENTIFIC STUDY OF THE CHILD. 



763 



is absolutely natural. And is not the discovery of natural processes 

 the end of all our inquiries as educationists? I do not mean to 

 suggest that the incidental principle is to be pushed to an extreme. 

 There are times, later on, when the direct application of the learner's 

 mind to acquiring knowledge, the learning of which is, perhaps, dis- 

 tasteful, is good discipline, as well as necessary acquisition. But 

 would it not be an immense advantage if at least the eaiiier pi'ocesses 

 of education gave pleasure instead of arousing dislike? Would it not 

 be better to recognise right out that the methods common in schools 

 are unpleasant to many children, and to many a tiring effort, and 

 kindle in some a positive hatred of school and all that belongs to it? 

 And ai*e not the minds thus affected sometimes the most valuable, 

 because most individual and most perceptive? 



One application of the incidental principle in the case of adults I 

 met also. The method had flashed upon the teacher, a very able man, 

 after many weary efforts and failures. He had come across that 

 stumbling block known so well in night technical classes, even in 

 America, the mechanic who has left school at the minimum school 

 age, and after two or three years wakes up and wants to learn about 

 his trade. The particular mechanics in question were engineers, like 

 any others, shy, diffident, anxious, easily frightened off, and lost. 

 How in heaven's name to get these men to learn mathematics and 

 applied mechanics, and to go on learning them, and how to get — the 

 city was Chicago — more than a dozen to attend ? Here was the stroke 

 of genius? He dropped the hie, hac, hoc, adhoc; mathematics disap- 

 peared — from view — and he taught engine. He had up a model on 

 the platfonn. He let the men alone, and talked to the engine. He 

 took it to pieces, he made his drawings, his plans, his calculations on 

 the black board, discussing with himself and the engine as he went. 

 After forty minutes he would say, " Now, men, you'll find a man in 

 the next room who will tell you how that's done.' They had another 

 forty minutes there. In six months the men had learnt all the 

 mathematics and mechanics they needed, and did not know they were 

 learning one or the other. In two years the college had not rooms 

 large enough to hold the hundreds of men — men, not boys — who 

 wanted to know about engines. That instructor — no, not instructor, 

 master-teacher — is now head of all the night work of the great Lewis 

 Institute of Chicago, and I left him firmly convinced that the method 

 could be applied all round. This is incidental education. It is 

 applicable at least to early education, and later in beginning a new 

 study. I have tried to express the principle as I have gathered it 

 among those American enthusiasts, in the belief that there is value 

 in it, and in the hope that this expression of it may arouse some 

 thought or trial among co-educationists m Australasia. 



7.— THE SCIENTIFIC STUDY OF THE CHILD. 



Jiij A. W. HVDD, M.A., PriaciiJal, Ctanfield Colleye, i>V/«6anc. 



A Child Study Association has recently been formed in Brisbane, 

 and the committee of that association are desirous that some attempt 

 should be made to show what bearing the scientific study of the child 

 has upon the subjects which are likely to be dealt with in this Section. 



