SCIENCE. 



[N. S. Vol. XI. No. 279. 



is quite as easy to abuse the laboratory as 

 the didactic method of instruction and that 

 in all schemes of education a good teacher 

 with a bad method is more effective than a 

 bad teacher with a good method. As Pro- 

 fessor Howell * has well remarked, " courses 

 of lectures, that, if analyzed would be found 

 to be top-heavy and lopsided, and otherwise 

 possessed of an instability that should have 

 insured failure, have been saved and made 

 instruments of great value by the mere 

 earnestness of the teacher." 



DISTKIBUTION OF WORK. 



The next question which I shall ask you 

 to consider is that of the proper distribution 

 of the work of a medical student. Thirty 

 years ago no such question seems to have 

 presented itself to the minds of instructors 

 in medicine. The medical faculties of that 

 time contented themselves with providing, 

 each year, courses of lectures covering all 

 the departments of medicine, as they were 

 then understood, and every student was ex- 

 pected to attend as many of the lectures as 

 he saw iit. Between 1870 and 1880 the fact 

 that there is a natural sequence in medical 

 studies became generally recognized and 

 graded courses of instruction were estab- 

 lished in the principal medical schools of the 

 country. The grading, was not, however, 

 carried sufficiently far. Thus instruction 

 in both anatomy and physiology was gen- 

 erally given simultaneously through the 

 whole of the first year, though the knowl- 

 edge of structure should logically precede 

 a study of function. 



The time seems now to have come for 

 taking another step in grading medical in- 

 struction and, during the academic year 

 now drawing to a close, instruction in the 

 Harvard Medical School has been given in 

 accordance with a plan of which the guid- 

 ing principles are concentration of work 

 and sequence of subjects. Thus in the first 



*1. c, p. 144. 



half of the first year the students devote 

 themselves exclusively to the study of anat- 

 omy including histology and embryology. 

 In the second half year they are occupied 

 with physiology, including physiological 

 chemistry, while in the first half of the 

 second year pathology, including bacteriol- 

 ogy, engages their attention. It is perhaps 

 too early to pass a final judgment upon the 

 value of the method but thus far both 

 teachers and students seem to regard it as 

 a success. The result seems to have justi- 

 fied the opinion of its advocates that the 

 work of the student would be made ' easier 

 by concentrating his thoughts upon one 

 subject instead of dissipating his attention 

 upon many subjects.'* Nor have its oppo- 

 nents found any justification for their fears 

 that the average brain would become fa- 

 tigued and unreceptive by too close appli- 

 cation to one subject for the sciences of 

 anatomy, physiology and pathology ' are 

 not narrow hedged in areas but rather 

 broad and diversified domains composed of 

 many contiguous fields, 'f in passing from 

 one to another of which the student may 

 rest his mind without interrupting the con- 

 tinuity of effort essential to effective work. 

 An obvious objection to this method 

 of concentrating instruction is the large 

 amount of work which it imposes upon the 

 instructors. There is no doubt that the 

 labor of teaching every day in the week 

 may task the powers of even the most en- 

 thusiastic instructor, but it has been found 

 that the laboratory work which has occu- 

 pied from two to three hours every forenoon 

 has been conducted with much less fatigue 

 than was anticipated. In fact students, 

 when supplied with printed directions for 

 work and with the necessary apparatus, 

 need remarkably little supervision. In 

 the physiological laboratory it was found 

 that one instructor could readily supervise 



*Miiiot, 1. c, Keprint, p. 22. 

 t Porter, 1. c, Reprint, p. 12. 



