Educational Review (Volume 2) (Paperback)

Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: volition, that an excitation was diffused throughout the brain, from the cortex to the base. [Fig. 16.] To secure such massive cerebro-mental action is the fundamental reason for trying to excite feelings, and to suggest voluntary acts to a child, whenever we attempt to generate in his mind a new idea. I have now drawn this line of thought to a close, and Fie. 16. will sum up the three or four propositions I have tried to elucidate. I have only touched upon one or two of the most general psychological aspects of education, and have passed by many that might seem especially to call for discussion. Thus I have left entirely untouched the great fact that the child's mind is an organism in course of evolution; that on this account its processes often differ radically from those of an adult mind; and may often be most fruitfully studied along the lines explored by Romanes, who traces the evolution of mind from the lower animals up. Again, I have hardlyalluded to the recent experiments in psycho-physics, which some writers seem inclined toconsiderthe most practical and fruitful part of modern psychology. These experiments investigate, in fractions of a second, the time relations of many cerebro- mental phenomena, especially acts of perception as modified by the attention of the subject, or the complexity of the recognition required. Other experiments investigate thequantum relations between stimuli and sensations; and these again as modified by the attention, or experience?that is, by the previous life of the subject. Themes like these are equally large and special, and it has seemed better to dwell upon a few more fundamental considerations, which may determine the most general attitude -of the teacher toward his charge. I will sum up these considerations as follows: ...