a royal road to learning, and the extravagant encomiums which have been passed upon the method of teaching by object lessons, may possibly, fifty years hence, excite as much amusement among the promoters of education of that time as Governor Clinton's eulogy on honest Joseph Lancaster's system does in our minds at the present day. Still, a notice is due to a system which so many eminent teachers unite in approving.

"Object teaching," though a novelty in its introduction into the primary schools, is by no means a new thing in the history of education. Something of the kind may be traced in Egyptian and Spartan education. In times comparatively modern, however, the system found a nearly complete development in the methods of two eminent teachers and writers on education of the seventeenth century-Wolfgang Ratich (1571-1635) and John Amos Comenius (1592-1671)—and both were indebted, partially at least, to Lord Bacon's "Instauratio Magna" for the first conception of the system. Ratich required the reading over of the lesson to the child by the teacher many times, accompanied each time by explanations and illustrations, in order to fix the phrases and the ideas together in his memory. In practice this proved so wearisome to both teacher and child that it was soon abandoned. Comenius was a man of far more practical character. He had early noticed the advantage of presenting to the mind of the child either the object concerning which he wished to instruct him or some representation of it, and the honor belongs to him of having been the first to prepare for the use of children a pictorial text book. This work (the "Orbis Sensualium Pictus," 1657) was not, like some of the illustrated school books at the present day, filled with pictures of battles or occurrences of history, but was a true cyclopædia of nature, fully illustrating, in a popular way, the natural science of the time, and his "Methodus Novissima," written as a guide to teachers in his new method of instruction, contains so much that

is analogous to the "Manuals of Object Teaching" that it is difficult to believe that it was written two centuries ago. The following are a few passages taken from Hoole's translation of the works of Comenius, published in

London in 1658:

The ground of this business is that sensual objects may be rightly presented to the senses, for fear they may not be received. I say, and say it again aloud, that this last is the foundation of all the rest. Now, there is nothing in the understanding which was not before in the sense; and, therefore, to exercise the senses well about perceiving the difference of things, will be to lay the grounds for all wisdom and all wise discourse; which, because it is commonly neglected in schools, and the things which are to be learned are of fered to scholars without being understood, or being rightly presented to the senses, it cometh to pass that the work of teaching and learning goeth heavily onward, and affordeth little benefit.

Descend to the very bottom of what is taught, and proceed as nature herself doth, in an orderly way, first to exercise the senses well, by representing their

objects to them, and then to fasten upon the intellect, by impressing the first notions of things upon it, and Missing this way, we do teach children as we do parlinking them one to another by a rational discourse. rots, to speak they know not what.

Since some things cannot be pictured out with ink, for this reason it were to be wished that things rare, and not easy to be met with withal at home might be showed also as often as any words are to be made kept ready in every great school, that they may be of them to the scholars. Thus, at least, this school would indeed become a school of things obvious to the senses, and an entrance to the school intellectual. of the whole world. Such a dress may entice way Pictures are the representations of all visible things children that they may not conceit (conceive it) to be a torment to be in the school. For it is apparent that children, even from their infancy almost, are delighted And it will be very well worth the with pictures. be taken away out of wisdom's gardens. pains to have brought to pass that scarecrows may

The good bishop goes on to explain the se and necessity of the blackboard, which he illustrates by a picture of that useful adjunct for illustration, explains the phonic method of teaching children to read, and inculcates the necessity of sympathy with the children, the necessity of evolving rules from illustrations and, above all, the entire dependence of the teacher upon God's blessing for success in teach ing. This "Orbis Sensualium Pictus," revised and modernized occasionally, was largely used close of the first third of the present century. In as a text book in the schools of Germany till the the next century, object teaching was again revived as a method of instruction, through the writings of Jean Jacques Rousseau, and the establishment of the " John Bernhard Basedow (1723-1790). BasePhilanthropinum" by dow's "Elementary Book of Human Know! edge" (Elementar Werk) was in four volumes, with 100 plates, and its plan comprised-1st, ele mentary instruction in words and things; 2d, a method of teaching children to read without weariness or loss of time (this was essentially a phonic method); 3d, natural knowledge; 4th, knowledge of morals, the mind and reasoning 5th, natural religion; 6th, a knowledge of social duties, commerce, &c. Basedow himself was a manners, and in the latter part of his life grossly man of small culture, violent temper, and coarse intemperate; but some of his assistants, among successfully on his system, and the school at whom were Wölke, Campe, and Salzman, taught Schnepfenthal, founded by Salzman in 1784, is

still in existence.

The advocates of the method of object teaching now in vogue, profess to regard Pestalozzi (1746-1827) as the originator of the system. It seems, however, that most of the principles of their system had been set forth and developed by Comenius, and that Pestalozzi, in so far as he advocated what is to-day known as "object teaching," was but reiterating the system of Comenius. Pestalozzi, though a humane and generous man, had little originality, a meagre and desultory education, and no tact. For a few years past there has been attributed to him the origination of theories and systems of edu cation which he would have been the last to

claim as his own inventions. In the Elementar Werk of Basedow, and the Orbis Pictus of Comenius, he had at his hand systems of instruction which he did little more than to adapt, and not always with success, to the circumstances of the children of his time. He was possessed of a kindly and affectionate nature, and in his intercourse with children came down to their capacities with great readiness. His principles of education were developed in his "Leonard and Gertrude." "How Gertrude teaches her children," and his "Book for Mothers," though no man ever departed more frequently from his own principles than he. The following statement, prepared by the late William C. Woodbridge, who had made himself most thoroughly master of Pestalozzi's system, will show what were the characteristics of that system:

"He laid down these principles: that education should proceed according to the laws of nature; that it was the duty of the teacher to assist this by exciting the child to self-activity, and rendering him only a limited degree of assistance; that progress should be slow and gradual, but uninterrupted, never passing to a second topic till the first is understood; that the memory and the understanding should not be unduly cultivated, but all the faculties developed in harmony; that the peculiarities of every child and of each sex should be carefully studied, in order to adapt instruction to them; that the elements of all knowledge were Form, Number, and Language, and that these elements should be taught with simplicity and thoroughness; that the art of observing should be acquired, and the perceptive faculties well developed; that every topic of instruction should become an exercise for the reflective powers; that mental arithmetic, geometry, and the arts of drawing and modeling objects of beauty, were all-important exercises for training, strengthening, and disciplining the mind; that the laws of language should be developed from within, and the exercises in it made not only to cultivate the intellect, but to improve the affections; that vocal music should be taught in schools, not by rote, but by a careful study of the elementary principles of music; that the Socratic method, as used by Basedow and others, is objectionable, and that in the early stages of instruction, dictation by the teacher and repetition by the scholar is preferable, and at a more advanced stage, the giving out of problems by the teacher, to be solved by the pupil without assistance; that religious instruction should begin with the mother, that the filial feelings of the child should be first cultivated, and directed toward God, and that formal religious instruction should be reserved to a later period, when the child can understand it; that despotic and cruel government in schools was improper, but that mutual affection between teacher and pupil was a better incitement to intellectual activity than prizes or other stimulants to emulation; and, finally,

that the exercise of the senses and the thorough cultivation of the physical powers were of very great importance to the complete development of the child."

Many of these principles were excellent, though not more than two or three of them (that in relation to despotic and cruel government in school being one) were new. There were, however, some practical defects in their application. The intellect was quickened, but very little positive knowledge was imparted, while the child almost inevitably gained the impression that he had made wonderful attainments; too high a place was given to language; mathematical and intuitive studies were given more than their proper share of attention, while other equally important studies were neglected; the process of simplification was carried too far and continued too long; repetitions were continued till they became wearisome; historic truth, and testimony as a source of knowledge, received but little attention, especially in religious matters, and religious knowledge was regarded as innate, rather than revealed.

Some of Pestalozzi's pupils and assistants, especially Neiderer, Schmid, Krüsi, Zeller, and Fellenberg, subsequently established schools in which they improved upon his theories. The Pestalozzian system, as it was called (though but a small portion of it was truly Pestalozzi's), was adopted extensively in the early part of this century in Prussia and the smaller German states, and in a modified form was introduced into France, Great Britain, and the United States. The improved Pestalozzianism introduced into this country mainly by the efforts of William C. Woodbridge, Thomas H. Gallaudet, William Russell, James G. Carter, Lowell Mason, and others, nearly thirty-five years ago, was divested of some of the absurdities of Pestalozzi's own theories, and was in many respects superior to any system of education previously attempted. The experience of Messrs. Gallaudet and Woodbridge in the instruction of deaf mutes had led them to see and avoid the fallacies of Pestalozzi's theory in regard to language, which he had formulated thus:-"Observation is the absolute basis of all knowledge; the first object then in education must be to lead a child to observe with accuracy; the second, to express with correctness the result of his observations." This second conclusion, every logician must see, does not follow from the premises. Pestalozzi subsequently says, that "out of the observation of an object the first thing that arises is the necessity of naming it." This necessity, a closer observation shows does not exist at all. A correct idea of an object can be, and is acquired, daily, where the object has no name, or its name is unknown to the observer; we might instance the position and relations of an unnamed planet, or the habits, locality, &c., of an undescribed plant or animal. The conception of an object by a deaf mute is none the less clear and perfect from the fact that he may not know the name by which it is called.

This zeal for loading the mind of the child with names for every object and for all the attributes of every object which falls under his observation, was deprecated by many of Pestalozzi's assistants and followers; and Fellenberg, Zeller, and Van Raumer, the ablest of them, entirely repudiated it.

In Germany, however, the evil results flowing from this predominance given to language, are, owing to the structure of the German language, far less injurious than they would be elsewhere. From the native roots, compounds and derivatives are formed by accretion of root words in common use, and early understood by the child, so that the attributes or qualities of objects are described in language which suggests its own meaning to the child. Thus where we should speak of the transparency of glass, for instance, the German word would be (literally translated) "through-seenness:" what we should call a hexagon, the German would describe as six corners," a carnivorous animal in their vernacular would be "flesh-eating." Thus the mind of the child was not taxed, as it would be in English, with names of "learned length and thundering sound" derived from foreign tongues, and forming no part of the language of every day life.

SO

In 1818, Dr. Mayo, of London, visited Pestalozzi's institution at Yverdun, and was favorably impressed with his system that he resolved to introduce it into Great Britain. Dr. Biber and Mr. Greaves, who had also been at Yverdun, cooperated with him in the effort to accomplish his purpose. They introduced some modifications in order the better to adapt it to the English habits and modes of thought, but unfortunately the theory of language was adopted with all its faults, and with the additional objection, that owing to the idea apparently that the homely and expressive Saxon descriptive words, which would at least have had the merit of being constantly used within the child's hearing were vulgar, the more refined and classical words of Latin or Greek derivation were adopted; thus, if a peppercorn were the subject of the lesson, the child, instead of being told that its taste was biting or stinging, was taught that it was acrid or pungent; birdlime, instead of being sticky, was adhesive; an object without life was inanimate; a sourish apple was acidulous, and so on ad infinitum. In 1836, the "Home and Colonial School Society" was organized for the promotion of schools on this system, and a few years later established model and training schools from which about 3,000 teachers, a majority of them females, have been sent out. The apparent results from this method of teaching have been such as to attract attention, and to lead to its extensive introduction in Great Britain. In Toronto, Canada, it has been introduced into the normal and model schools. Dr. Mayo first, and subsequently his daughter, Miss Elizabeth Mayo, have prepared books of introduction for the teachers of the Home and Colonial Training

Schools, giving, with great minuteness detail, the processes of instruction in all branches taught on the Pestalozzian system. The first of these works, published in 1833, was in five 8vo. volumes. A "Manual of Ele mentary Instruction," in two volumes, prepared by Miss Mayo, was published in 1861. In 1860, attention was called to this system of instruction in the United States by the publicstion, by Henry Barnard, in his "American Journal of Education," of a sketch of the Home and Colonial School Society's operations, and specimens of their mode of teaching. Several emi nent teachers and friends of education, in visiting Toronto, had spent some time in the Torosto model schools, and witnessed the exercises of the primary classes trained under this sys tem. Among them were E. A. Sheldon, superintendent of the city schools of Oswego, N. Y., and N. A. Calkins, of New York city. Mr. Sheldon procured the volume of instruction of the Home and Colonial Society, and very soon commenced training the teachers of his pri mary schools in the method of object teach ing, and, deeming it desirable to have the teachers of the primary schools thoroughly trained by experienced instructors, sent to the Home and Colonial Society for a teacher. Miss M. E. M. Jones, an experienced instructor, was sent by the society, and has conducted for the past year a training school at Oswego. Mr. Calkins, having devoted much attention to the methods of the society, has, for a year and a half past given instruction in object teaching at Teachers' Institutes, &c., on the subject. The system has been introduced into the model schools of the State Normal Schools of New York, New Jersey, and Michigan, and into a portion of the primary schools of Syracuse, N. Y., Paterson, N. J., Chicago, Ill., Toledo and Cincinnati, Ohio, Rochester, N. Y., San Francisco, Cal., and several smaller places. Mr. Sheldon and Mr. Calkins have both published treatises on the subject; Mr. Sheldon's being entitled "A Manual of Elementary Instruction for the Use of Public and Private Schools and Normal Classes, Containing a Graduated Course of Object Lessons, for Training the Senses and Developing the Faculties of Children," New York, 1862; and Mr. Calkins's, "Primary Ob ject Lessons for a Graduated Course of Devel opment: a Manual for Teachers and Parents," New York, 1862. The following works on the subject have also been published: "Object Teaching and Other Methods of Primary Instruction in Great Britain," by Henry Barnard, LL.D., Hartford, 1861; "A Manual of Infor mation and Suggestions for Object Lessons," by Marcius Willson, author of several popular school books, New York, 1862; "Object Les sons Prepared for Teachers of Primary Schools and Primary Classes," by A. S. Welch, Principal of Michigan State Normal School, New York, 1862. "Report of the Committee on the Primary Schools in the City of Oswego, N. Y., 1862." Several school books professedly

based on this system have also appeared in New York and Philadelphia.

Only a limited description of the processes adopted in the new method can be given in these pages, but a brief analysis of them may not be inappropriate, since the system is so actively propagated. The work of Mr. Sheldon must be the guide, as being more complete than any other, and being condensed from the manual of the Home and Colonial Training Schools, and with the assistance of two of the former teachers of those schools (Miss Jones and Professor H. Krüsi, a son of Pestalozzi's associate), is invested with a degree of authority which does not appertain to the other treatises. The system of object teaching is by these writers and in practice applied to children between the ages of 4 or 5 and 12 years. The subjects on which lessons with objects are given are color, form, number, size, weight, sound, language, reading, dictation, geography, lessons on the human body, lessons on animals, lessons on plants, moral instruction, and drawing. Under form is included the elementary principles of geometry and writing, under number the simpler rules of arithmetic, under language the principles of grammar, and under lessons on the human body, animals, and plants, elementary physiology, zoology, and botany. The range of topics is thus sufficiently extensive to comprise the studies of public schools generally. The rules for the teacher in giving instruction by this method require that the matter which is the subject should be stated, and the properties, nature, qualities and uses of it brought out by examination, the terms given and explained, the ideas developed from it, and illustrations and anecdotes respecting it narrated, and the whole impressed upon the memory by numerous simultaneous repetitions, and by writing and drawing upon the blackboard. Of course, in the different topics there must be considerable variations of detail, and much must necessarily be left to the skill and tact of the teacher, but the general order here indicated must be followed.

Children of the ages above specified are divided into four classes or steps according to age and intellectual capacity. With the youngest, the object of the teacher must be to exercise the perceptive faculties; with the second, a more minute perception is developed and the conceptive faculty called into action; with the third, the reasoning faculties are exercised, especially in the matter of distinctions, differences, and comparisons; while the perceptive faculty is still kept in activity, in the fourth, the imagination and the powers of analogy and generalization are developed.

The Phonic method of teaching reading, as prescribed in the "Object System," is peculiar, and many advantages are claimed for it. The letters are taught by means of cards and the blackboard, in the following order, a, t, m, c, b, r, h, v, ƒ, 8, d, l, p, g, n, j, w, e, i, o, x, u, y, 1, 2, and the combinations, ow, oy, and th. The

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small letters are taught first, and only the short sounds of the vowels; the capitals are next taught, C, K, O, P, S, U, V, N, X, and Z, from their analogy to the small letters, and the remainder divided into three classes, I, L, T, F, E, H, A, N, and M, straight-lined letters; Q and G, curved line letters, and D, B, R, and J, straight and curved line letters. These letters are to be rudely imitated by the children with laths, and drawn on the blackboard. Meantime the child is taught to recognize by sight the words the, is, his, this, to aid in forming sentences, and combinations of the letters into words of one syllable, having the short sound of the vowels, are made. The children are exercised next, first on the long, double, and short vowel sounds, secondly on the consonant sounds, and third on rhyming sounds. In the second step, the children are introduced to words containing the long sounds of the vowels, and an additional list of words to be learned at sight, containing different sounds of the vowels; to words containing silent letters, and also to the sound of K, previously omitted, and the two sounds of C and S. They are also taught words having more than one initial or terminal consonant, and for the first time learn the names of the letters. Reading is commenced in a simple reading book, prepared by the Home and Colonial Society, and from this the teacher reads first word by word, the children repeating, and then the children read in the same way and the teacher repeats, and this several times; the same process is followed with each clause and finally with each sentence. Words having any peculiarity of spelling are selected and written upon the blackboard, sounds distinguished, and silent letters noticed. Next a single child is called upon to read the sentence or sentences in the same way, and the children are questioned on the meaning of the words, and the idea of the sentence. In the third step, the remaining consonants g, th, ph, gh, ch, z, and x are considered and their sounds taught by examples and analogies; diphthongs and other anomalous sounds are also distinguished, and the children exercised in reading as before, though in lessons of longer and more difficult words. It is impossible to concur in the commendations bestowed on this method of teaching to read. It seems faulty in instructing the child vowels before consonants, letters before words, and compound sounds before simple ones.

Those who desire more full descriptions of the system will find them in the treatises above named. It is not surprising that so many prominent teachers should have eagerly seized upon this system. The teaching of very young children, always a matter of difficulty, had never been managed with much method, and with but a moderate degree of success; and routine, fatal here as everywhere else, had deprived the best of the plans in use of much of their vitality. The Kinder-garten system, though in many respects admirable, was encumbered with too many and too expensive arrangements

of building grounds and apparatus, and required too long and thorough training of the teachers, to come into general use. Here was a system, requiring, indeed, the possession of considerable talent, tact, education, and imagination on the part of the teacher, but rendering routine impossible, and promising showy and brilliant results.

ELECTRICITY. In connection with the progress of electrical discoveries and theory, the feature of most absorbing interest at the present time, is that of the several propositions and attempts toward establishing certain fixed units of measurement for various electrical quantities, and particularly-1, for the electromotive force of a galvanic couple or battery, i. e., the total force of current the couple or battery could generate if the resistance opposed to the passage of such current through the conducting wires or circuit be nothing or inappreciably small; 2, for the resistance opposed to the current by the necessarily imperfect conducting power of the wires or material of the circuit; 3, for the actual intensity of the current produced, as a result of the given electro-motive force diminished by the given resistance. The determining of such units, as leading in time to the ability to estimate accurately and compare the electrical quantities of batteries and circuits of all sorts whatever, and those requisite to the various effects which currents are expected to produce, is at once seen to be a problem the solution of which promises results of the highest practical value. In the applications of electricity during the past year, although perhaps no great or striking achievement has been made, some points of interest nevertheless present themselves. (See also AURORAS, METEOROLOGY, and TELEGRAPHY.)

I. SCIENTIFIC PROGRESS.—Measures of Electric Resistance. To determine comparatively the resistances of different circuits, Mr. Siemens had proposed that the standard or unit should be a filament or minute column of mercury of given length within a tube, and from the two ends of which connections with the two poles of a galvanic element or battery should be made: a needle or other galvanometer introduced in the course of the same circuit would show the intensity of current when the mercury filament is, and when it is not, made part of the circuit, and would thus give the resistance of the given length and diameter of that metal as a conductor. An objection to this plan is, that after a time alloy of the mercury from the ends of the solid metal conductors must occur, thus changing the actual conducting power of the filament, and again, that the contact of the solid wires with the metallic mercury is uncertain or of variable degree. To obviate these difficulties, as well as certain imperfections in Wheatstone's electro-motive balance, Prof. W. Thomson has devised a new electro-motive balance for determining resistances of short bars or wires, and by use of which he considers that no uncertainty in the

connections can exist, even though these are not made with extraordinary care. He concludes, however, that in order to arrive at the most accurate possible system of electrical measures, the standards that may be adopted must first have been exchanged between and compared by different experimenters. For the details of the paper, which is long and mainly theoretical, the scientific reader is referred to the proceedings of the Royal Society, or to the "Philos. Magaz.," Aug. 1862.

Matthiessen's Unit of Resistance—is that opposed to perfect conduction of an electric current by a wire composed of 2 parts by weight of gold and 1 of silver, length 1 metre (39.37 in.), diameter 1 millimetre (.03937 in). The author's experiments lead him to conclude that this alloy conducts electricity with nearly the same facility at all temperatures between 32° and 212° F.; that impurities in small quantity do not sensibly affect its conducting power; and that the annealing of the metal also makes no sensible difference. The wire should be varnished to protect it from action of mercury. (Pogg. Annalen, cxii, p. 353). Prof. W. Gibbs suggests that the specific conducting power of such a wire may, as is known to be the case with copper, undergo change from continued or repeated use.

space

time.

Weber's Proposed Absolute Standard.-The student of mechanics well knows that having the measures of space and time, no specific fundamental measure of velocity is required; since we find or express velocity by the simple ratio, Weber calls attention to the fact that, in like manner, if there are measures for electromotive force and actual intensity of current, no specific fundamental measure of electric resistance is necessary; the resistance that exists in a closed current in which the unit of electromotive force produces the unit of intensity, being taken as the unit of resistance. Now, in Gauss's treatise on the "Intensity of the Earth's Magnetic Force" (Gottingen, 1835), absolute measures for terrestrial magnetism and for bar magnetism are given. Weber shows that from these an absolute unit of measure of electro-motive force and a like unit of intensity of current can be obtained-these being expressed and known in the three simple elements of space, time, and mass (of the conductor). In some experimental applications of his principle, employing a copper wire 3,946,000 millimetres in length, and of a mass equal to 152,890,000 milligrammes (about 338 lbs. avoird.), Weber calculated the absolute measure of resistance at 190,000,000 units, and the specific resistance of the material at 1,865,600 units. (“Philos, Magaz.," Sept. and Oct., 1861.)

Electro-motive Force of Voltaic Piles.-M. Marie Davy believes that, however carefully the units of resistance and of current may be defined, since these are arbitrarily chosen, it still cannot be hoped that from them we can BO estimate the electro-motive force of batteries as directly to furnish the calorific value, or