TiUNSACTIONS OF SECTION L. 930 



2. Discussion on (a) A^ote-taking and Report'; on Work ; (6) Clear 

 /Speaking and Heading Aloud. 



3. Discussion on Types of Education and their relative Values. 



(i) Acquirement in Ediucation. By Dr. G. Archdall Reid. 



Some parts of our bodies — the muscles of our limbs, for example — do not grow- 

 after birth unless they are used. Other parts — hair, teeth, and ears, for example- 

 develop fully if ouly they receive sufficient nourishmeut. All that is developed 

 under the sole stimulus of nutriment is termed inborn by biologists ; all that is 

 added under the stimulus of use is termed acquired. In this sense most of 

 the bulk of the human body is due to acquirement. Mind offers an exact 

 parallel to body. Some mental parts, the instincts, for example, develop in us 

 without the aid of experience, which is the term we use when speaking of the 

 mind. But everything we learu is acquired. 



Tlie power or faculty by means of which we learn is termed memory. Memorj', 

 the faculty not its contents, is of two kinds, conscious and unconscious. The 

 conscious memory stores all experiences that can be recalled to mind, the things 

 we have seen, sounds we have heard, and so on. The function of the unconscious 

 memory is every whit as important. Thus ability to walk or read is due to 

 thousands of experiences stored and concentrated in our unconscious memories. 



Intelligence and reason are not innate faculties. We learn them just as surely 

 as we learn to walk or read. They are acquired dexterities in thinking. They 

 depend on memory. Intelligence is that faculty by means of which we consciously 

 adapt means to ends. But we cannot consciously adapt means to ends unless 

 we have learned to do so. The caterpillar is not intelligent when he builds 

 his cocoon ; for he appeals only to that blind impulse which we term instinct, 

 and which is the very antithesis of intelligence. The man who builds a house 

 is intelligent because he utilises experience. Unlike the adult man, the new- 

 born baby is not intelligent, for he has no experience to which he can appeal. 

 He has only great capacity to learn to become intelligent. Eeason is merely 

 glorified intelligence. We have reason, unlike the lower animals, only because 

 our memories are vaster, and because we can learn to be very dextrous in using 

 their contents. 



When we send a child to school, we design that he shall learn, not merely 

 knowledge more abstruse than that which he can pick up, like a savage, from the 

 ordinary experiences of life ; we intend, also, that he shall acquire right habits 

 of thought. These right habits are acquired mental dexterities. Just as some 

 children can acquire more knowledge and acquire it more quickly than others, 

 so some can learn greater dexterity iu thinking, and learn it more quickly than 

 others ; but one and all, the quick and the slow, the clever and the stupid, 

 must learn it by means of the memory. An idiot or imbecile is simply a person 

 with a defective memory. He cannot learn knowledge, or he cannot learn to use 

 it, or both. 



If we wish to create great skill in thinking, we must create it, as we create 

 great knowledge, by continuing to train our pupils to the latest stage of develop- 

 ment over which we have control. Formerly little children were taught nothing 

 but knowledge ; now we have invented the kindergarten and the object-lesson. 

 Even the mental training of older boys and girls is improved. But the training 

 of university and college students remains much as it was a hundred years ago. 

 They are still crammed with facts and little more than facts. 



The best educational subjects are those which at the same time supply useful 

 knowledge and exercise the thinking faculty. "What is useful knowledge ? 

 Obviously one condition of its usefulness is that it shall be remembered. The 

 things that we remember are either very impressive things or those which link 

 up with our subsequent experiences, so that we are frequently reminded of them 



