p T E

A
C II

' ELEVATION

SILENCE: ABSTRACTIONS MATERIALIZED

ONE of the differences between our method and those generally

used in the schools for the education of normal children bears
reference to the way of education.
Perhaps the' silence' may serve to illustrate the idea.
In the ordinary schools there is discussed a state of normal
order which is accepted although it has never been defined. It is
that state in which the behaviour of the class makes it possible for
the master to give a lesson.
As, however, the class is acting under compulsion the tendency
is to drift from that mediocre state of order into a disorder in which
movements of all kinds, unco-ordinated and purposeless, create
noise and restlessness which make the giving of a lesson difficult
?r impossib]e; that is, it disturbs the working order. There m~st
10
. such a case be an energetic call for 'silence,' indicating wi th
this very word the working order. ,
So t_he , medium order ' is not only something already attain--
ed, but is normal d d ffices to
b .
o ta1n 1t.
. an customary· '
a simple com.man su
 ELEVATION
:BY our method, the medium order ( . 225
r forl.11 which results from the indi .d which, however has a
otµe . v1 ual labo ' n-
. a point of departure, for climbing to a hi urs of the pupils)
is h d d gher level b
teP not yet reac e an unknown 8.1 Y means of
as . b . . 1 ence is th
·ctorY which must e gained through kno 1 d en a positive
"'l we ge and ·
I{nowledge, therefore, . is applied to . . experience.
cons1denng th li
.,, vements, to controlling actions in e
J.J-"
0 • • very detad. i e s dghtest
obtain the absolute 1m.mob1lity
" which leads t o silence-a
. ' n orstriki
er to
idea, new,• never · ·b e1ore evaluated. In the ord'inary schools th ng
call for . . silence 1s mtended to bring back aff:airs . mto
. . normale
their
condition.
. By contrast, the silence of immobility suspends th normal
life, suspends useful work, has no practical aim • All is ·t impor-
·
tance, all its f as~ina~ion,_ springs _from the fact that, by suspending
the communal hfe, 1t raises the individual to a higher level where
utility does not exist but where it is the conquest of self which
calls him.
When we find that little children of three or four ask ' to have
the silence ' or when, having been invited, they respond at once
with the keenest interest, we have plain proofs that children have
a tendency towards elevation and that they enjoy the higher
pleasures. Many people have been present on some one of these
astonishing occasions when, a mistress having begun to write on
the blackboard the word' silence' in order to obtain it, even before
she has completed the word they perceive that profound sil~nce
has invaded the place where, an instant before, forty or fifty little
ones had been intent on their occupations. · n instantaneously.
b t
The motor life was suspended, Y con agio ,
Some child had read the first letters and had . hisunderstood that the
own movements,
d
order for silence was coming; by suspen f hingothers at once guesse d
O
he started the performance which each t_ e lled for silence,
at, and joined in with him. And so· silence ca
.h k d f it by speech.
Wit out. .a single voice having as be or de with. respect to all the •I

S1nular comparisons roaY e ma t[

I

activities of the two different types of schools. I

I

15
 226 THE DISCOVERY OF THE CHILD

A certam . medium level represents ' goodhi' in the ordin ~ary

schools-a goo, d , which is not defined, but
. . . w ch as a matte r of
custom res tnc . t s the scholastic level which 1s aimed
. ' at.
In our Schools we set out from . . .a medium .good,' Which 1s.
that attained spontaneously by 1nd1v1dual wo:k, in order to rise
to.a higher condition, towards a goal of ~er~ection. .
It is evident that if there does not exist 1n the chlld as a matter
.of necessity a tendency which renders this elevation possible it Will
never be reached in practice.
If it does exist, and if it shows itself in undoubted success,
we ought, as educators, to feel that a new duty illumines our
mission.
The education of the senses may serve to illustrate this idea.
It is known that many educationists have considered education of
the senses to be a mistake. That is because, by taking the
' medium ' life as the end, the education of the senses causes a
deviation from the natural way of learning.
Objects are regarded in their entirety, as a combination of
qualities, as possessing many characters. The rose will have its
colours and its odours; the marble vase its form and its weight,
and so on. The lesson on actual objects just as they are is then
the correct thing. This is the reasoning which regards as finality -
the medium order of things.
If, however, we consider the medium order not as a fixed end,
but as a point of departure we may find out by intuition that little
children notice spontaneously much more than the object lessons
~ream of explaining, because, naturally, they are left free to observe
, in accordance with their own instinct; they are not hindered by
organic inhibition, that is, by the fear of acting by themselves.
1
say "intuition" because even if we have not stndied
th
me odically spontaneous child reactions we can understand such
th
a _tru empirically. The child possesses a vital tendency to explore
: surroundings, however great, as he also tends to listen to
st
t 0 guage; he mu get to know the external world he muSt Jearnf
speak d · . ' · do
' nven by a pressing instinct. It is, we say, a peno
 ELEVATION 227
the senses in his . life. which makes him observ·e 1n • this way the
things around him, hke the sounds of the human .vOlCe. ·
The~e. is, no need . .
to illustrate
. .
objects for him·, the onIy need
is to refrain from stifling the instinct of observation which nature
has given him.
If we want to help him we must place ourselves on a higher
level. We must give him more than he could obtain by his
unaided efforts.
May l be permitted to make a strong assertion-that we ought
to give him the philosophy of things?
Let us begin with abstraction. Abstract ideas are synthetic
,conceptions of the mind, which, detached from actual objects,
abstract from them some qualities held in common, which do not
exist of themselves but exist in the actual things. For example,
weight is an abstraction; it does not exist by itself-only heavy
objects exist. ,
In the same way one considers form and colour. These words
stand for abstractions which are synthetic in themselves because
they mass together in one single idea, in an abstract manner, a
quality scattered in various ·ways over an infinite number of real
things. The children who love to stroke things materially rather
than just to look at them appear to have minds which are less
open to abstract ideas. But here there comes in a fine distinction.
Is it the absence of the object which makes the abstractions
inaccessible to the child, or is it real mental incapacity for grasp-
ing that synthesis of many things which is an abstract idea of
quality?
If we succeed in materialising the idea, presenting it in a form
.adapted to the child, that of tangible objects, will his mind be
.capable of grasping it, of interesting himself deeply in it?
The sense material may certainly be considered from this
point of view as materialised abstraction. It presents colour,
-dimension, form, odour, sound, in a tangible and distinct manner
and arranged in grades which permit of the classification and
analysis of qualities.
I I
I

THE DISCOVERY OF THE CHILD

·228 .
. h'ld finds himself In front of the material h
When the c 1 d a- e app1:
. 'th a serious, concentrate euort Which l.le&
him self to it WI . . 11 seellls
b t there is Ill him. It actua y appears that h' to
.draw out the es h h . . c ildre
ng conquests greater t an t err minds are 11
are found maki h . . 11· capab1
t ·al opens up. to t err mte 1gence ways oth . e
.
,maccess1 'ble i·n the age of childhood.
. . .
. b way of this matenal that concentration 1s attained
ItIB Y . ,~
it includes things fitted to absorb the mtense attention of the child.

A COMPARISON BETWEEN THE EDUCATION OF

NORMAL CIDLDREN AND THAT OF THOSE MENTALLY DEFICIENT

Knowing that this educational method for normal children

has its origin in the method which Itard and Seguin elaborated for
children mentally deficient, many have objected that it is impossible
to apply one and the same treatment to the two classes of children.
More and more at the present time is it the tendency to distinguish
mental levels with increasing accuracy, recognising and treating
differently those who from the point of view of intelligence are
differently endowed, e.g., the supernormal.
I think it well, therefore, to point out the difference which our
method recognises so clearly between children rich in vital spirit
and those who are poor in it. The same means used in both cases
provoke different reactions, and serve to establish an extremely
illustrative comparison.
The first and fundamental difference between a child mentally
inferior and a normal child, when placed in front of the same
~aterial, is that the defective child does not show spontaneous
int:rest. It is necessary to ask for his attention continually and
actively, inviting him to observe to compare exhorting him to do
something. · ' '
Let us supp th b" t a piece of
th . . ose at we are using as our first o ~ec . the
e sohd insets Th . . · takillg
cyliud . e exercise, as we know, consists in _..;iin!
ers out of th · 1 t ble JJ..L".
them u eir P aces, putting them on the a ' ·
nd th
P, a en replacing them, each in its own place.
 ELEVATION 229
For the child who is apathetic and mentally weak, it would
be necessary, however, to begin with exercises in which the stimuli
Are more strongly contrasting and would be reached in this exercise
.after many others had been taken.
For normal children this is the first object which may be
presented, and from among all the sense material this is the object
preferred by little children of two and a half to three and a half
years of age.
For defectives, when they reached this object, it was necessary
to attract their attention continually and firmly, inviting observation
and comparison; the child, having gathered all the cylinders once
into their places, stopped, and the game was finished. When the
defective made mistakes, he had to be corrected, or urged to correct
himself, and even when he managed to recognise a mistake it
generally left him indifferent.
It is different with the normal child who of his own free will
takes the liveliest interest in the game, corrects himself, while the
correction itself leads to an intensification of his attention on the
differences in dimensions and in making comparisons among them.
When the normal child is absorbed in his work he refuses
interference from those who want to step in and help him; he
wants to be left a]one with his problem. The result is a voluntary
activity which has a much higher value than simply clearing up
the differences between things. Used in this way the material
reveals itself as a key which puts the child in communication with
himself, and opens his mind to expression and activity.
Concentration on a voluntary exercise repeated a great many
times is the index to the superiority of the normal child.
Another difference is found in the distinction which the normal
child is capable of making between essential things and secondary
things which often serve to throw the others into relief.
It has been said that there enters into the education of
the senses the isolation of the sense which is to be exercised .
Thus, when establishing tactile differences it is a good plan to
isolate the child from visual impressions, either by making the
 DISCOVERY OF THE CHILD
230 THE ,
. d k or by covering up his eyes with a bandag
surroundmgs ar . . d e.
In other cases, silence is what is reqmre . . .
s are instrumental 1n helping the norn-.
All these method . ...i~ia1
one isolated stimulus; they strengthen h.
child to concentrate On 1s.
interest in it. . • ·1 d"
On the contrary, the defective child IS east Y 1st~ac~ed by these
very methods; he is led away _by the~ from the pnnc1pal subject
which ought to be claiming his attention. In darkness, he easily
falls asleep, or he becomes unruly. It is the ban~age which attracts
his attention instead of the sense stimulus on which he was expected
to fix his mind; thus the exercise degenerates into a useless game
or an outburst of meaningless joy.
Finally, there is another fact specialiy worthy of notice; it is.
that both for defectives and for normal children, excellent results
are produced by Seguin's 'lesson in three stages,' which so simply
and so clearly links up the word with the idea acquired.
That ought to make us reflect that the difference between the
higher and the lower mentality diminishes and becomes less notice-
able when the child is in the condition to receive, like a passive
creature, lessons based on the activity of the teacher who acts
over him.
The simple and psychologically perfect lesson of Seguin suc-
ceeds in its aim in both cases.
This is clear and eloquent proof that individual differences are
revealed and intensified only through spontaneous work · and in
expression which has not been incited-that is in the direct
manifestations of the inner impulses. '
The association of the name with the sense perception in
S . ' 1
~gum s esson succeeds not only in fixing that association in the
mm<l ~f the defective child, but also partly in increasing his·
perceptive power Th d fi • .
. · e e ect1ve 1s helped by that lesson to observe
the obJect better- 't
' I seems now to be doubly attached to hiro-bY
appearance and by name.
The normal child h -a·
observat· . as no need for this help in observing. .otS
ion Is at a st . -a
. • :I · age preceding the need for the lesson. .oe
 'I

11111

ELEVATION 231
·ves the lesson with great joy when he has already fixed the
recel
nse distinctions. The lesson on the name then clarifies and
~:ropletes his own voluntary work. The idea is known, it lives
through his own work; and now comes the baptism, the name, the
consecration. It is interesting to watch the child's intense joy
when he has associated a name with something about which he
has learned something through his senses.
I remember having taught one day to a small girl who was
not yet three the names of three colours.
I got the children to place one of their little tables in front of
the window, and, having seated myse]f in one of their chairs, I
made the child sit down in a similar one, on my right hand. I had
on the table six pieces of colour, in pairs of the same colour-red,
blue and yellow. As a first exercise I put before the child one of
the tablets, and asked her to find its match, and this I repeated for
all three colours, getting the similar pairs arranged in a column.
Then I passed on to Seguin's three stages. The little one learnt
to recognise the respective names of the three colours.
She was so delighted that she looked at me for a long time
and then began to dance about. As I watched her dancing in
front of me, I said to her laughing-" Do you know the colours? ''
And she always replied as she danced on-" Yes ". This joy of
hers had no end; she continued to dance round that she might
hear the same question repeated, and answer it with her enthusiastic
"Yes'\
The defective child, on the contrary, is helped by the lesson
to understand the materials ; his attention is directed insistently on
the contrasting differences, and in the end he gets interested in.
them and begins. to work; the object in itself did not possess a
stimulus strong enough to rouse his energy.
A COMPARISON BETWEEN OUR TEACHING AND
EXPERIMENTAL PSYCHOLOGY

There is generally neglected a very interesting comparison

between the research of ltard on the education of children who
 232 THE DISCOVERY OF THE CHILD
are deaf-mutes and defectives, and that attempt Which Was lllad
much later through the work of the Germans Fechner and Web e
(and then Wundt) to subject psychology to experimental resear:~
made by means of instruments and measurements.
Itard, who lived about the time of the French Revolution
was led by his scientific studies on diseases of the ear to experj'.
ment the education on a positive basis, looking for reactions Which
by exciting the senses systematically, would stimulate attention and
awaken intelligence and motor activity. The objects which he had
in mind had therefore the real meaning of stimu]i.
Later, Fechner, Weber, and Wundt tried to found a psycho-
logy on experimental bases, beginning by testing the sensitivity
which existed in normal individuals in respect of minimum stimuli·
aiming at determining with mathematical exactitude what times of'
reaction to the stimuli were displayed by the various subjects which
were acted on. Importance was given to the objects by the
possibility of their being more or less directly a means of measure-
ment. They formed the instrumentarium of estesiometry, the
measurement of sensibility.
The two lines of research, bom independently, were carried
on independently, the first creating as it expanded schools for
deaf-mutes and mental defectives, the second founding institutes
of estesiometry, which had for their purpose experimental research
directed to building up a new science.
All these research workers, however, seeing that they based
the construction of their instruments on the sensitive reactions of
the man, arrived at a determination of objects for the most part
analogous and similar to one another, although they would con·
stitute in the one case material for the education of the senses and
in the other a kind of arsenal for psycho-sensational measure-
ments.

The aim of the two lines of research, so much alike in tbe

matter of their constructive bases is therefore quite opposite.
'
s . A s a matter of fact, estesiometry is seeking for the sm ·td
tunuli I>erceptible to a man already fully developed or to a chi
..,
ELEVATION 233
developed to a standard corresponding to his age, by pure and
simple _demonstration.
The importance of such demonstrations was to show that
mental facts are susceptible to mathematical measurement. And
it included the idea, which was considered almost as an axiom,
that the manner of feeling, or rather of perceiving (that is, recog-
nising) stimuli was an absolutely natural quality, not dependent
on knowledge, or on the methodical working of the mind, or on
intellectual education; that is, it is not dependent on those artificial
mental differences which result from education.
Seeing if one thing is larger or smaller than another, feeling
if a minute object has come into contact with our skin, etc., are
experiences common to all, and individual differences are characters
derived from nature, which normally creates its own variations,
and which therefore makes men more or less sensitive just as it
makes them more or less intelligent, more or less markedly dark
or fair. Its judgments therefore were considered as judgments
on the man in his natural mental development. In fact psycho-
logy is intended later to determine the characters corresponding
to the various mental levels associated with each age, and asso-
ciated with individual variations (of normal, sub-normal people
etc.).
In place of this method, ltard proposed to set up maximum
stimuli which were in strong contrast in order to attract to them
the sense faculty of children shut out from their environment and
incapable of obtaining in the ordinary way precise knowledge of it;
he meant to lead them on, by repeated exercises, to perceive, step
by step, contrasts less abrupt and differences more minute in the
separate qualities presented to them. In this case, it is not a
simple test which is being carried out on the subject in order to
demonstrate his mental condition but a modifying action which is
directed towards the intelligence in order to awaken it, to kindle
contact with the external world, to estimate its characters with
precision, and to bring into a harmony of interests the intellect and
the outer realities.
 "
234 THE DISCOVERY OF THE CHILD

A modifying action which increases the power of discri:rn.ina...

tion is a true and proper educational action. .
Education of the senses leads to a perfectmg of the differential
perception of stimuli, by means of repeated ~xercise~.
There exists, therefore, a sense education which generally is.
given no consideration in researches made in mental development,
but which is a factor which has to be considered.
For example, I have often seen used as · mental tests cubes.
varying in size and placed at different distances. From among
these the child had to recognise the smallest, and the largest,
whilst the chronometer was measuring the time of reaction which
elapsed between the command and the response, and error was
noted.
I used to repeat that in such an experiment the factor of
education was forgotten, and by that I meant sense education~
Our children have, among the teaching material used for the
education of the senses, a series of ten cubes graduated in their
dimensions. The exercise consists in placing on the ground on a
dark-coloured rug all the cubes, which are coloured pale pink,
and .then building up the 'tower/ placing at the base the largest
cube and then the others in succession up to the smallest. The
child must choose from the carpet, every time, the largest cube.
This game is found to be most amusing even by children of two
and a half years old, who, directly they have built up the tower,
knock it down with little blows, admire the pink shapes as they
lie on the dark background, and begin the construction all over
again, for an indefinite number of times.
If there were exposed to these tests one of my children between
three and four years of age, and one of the children from the :firSt
cl~ss in the elementary school between six and seven years of age,
nune Would undoubtedly show a shorter reaction period, and
would be much readier to choose the largest cube and the smalleSt ·
from the heap, and they would make no mistakes.
The s b · ·1
sense, etc. ame may e said about tests in colour sense, tactt e
.
ELEVATION 235
This fact, in a fundamental manner, strikes at intentions of
psychometry (and, in general, of all experimental psychology based
00 tests), because it displays in age the mental levels which it
considered absolute as a natural variation in individuals.
This educational method may also be taken into consideration
by the advocates of experimental psychology who hope to estimate
by means of instantaneous reactions the level of mental develop-
ment, almost making an absolute measure of the whole through
one detail, as one would do if one were to calculate the growth
of the body at various ages by measuring the height. Systematic
exercise of the senses would upset these proportions, showing
that they have not demonstrated an absolute feature in mental
growth.
If it is desired to obtain from experimental psychology a
practical application, wherever it may be attempted, to the reform
of educational methods in schools, then the mistake in principle
becomes all the clearer.
If scientific pedagogy is to be established it will have to take
as the starting point active and modifying stimuli, and not
measuring stimuli.
This standard constituted the very beginning of my researches.
It succeeded in practice in establishing an experimental pedagogy
for normal children, and, at the same time, in revealing mental
qualities which had not previously been known in children.
The psychology of the study, with its reactions and its tests,
introduced into elementary schools to reform them, has not suc-
ceeded in influencing the practical work in the school itself or
changing its methods of education.
The logical consequence has merely been to catch a glimpse
of the possiblity of modifying examinations, that is, tests of the
scholar and for a time English-speaking America seemed very
keen 0 ~ considering seriously the substitution of the scientific
examination of individual attitudes for the old examination, that
is, for the testing of what had been learnt. There was thus plac~d
at the end of the studies the same examination as that adopted 1n
 236 THE DISCOVERY OF THE CHILD

institutes of a professional character for the admission of lllen

to work.
On the other hand, Itard's studies had immediate practical
results in the heart itself of education, and resulted in the curin
of partly deaf children, who regained their hearing by the strength:
ening of their auditory faculty by means of exercise; and at the
same time they regained speech. From this beginning there arose
the education of the real deaf-mutes, and then of the defectives.
The schools established throughout Switzerland, Germany,
France and America spread this work of redemption of unhappy
children, and raised the mental and social level of all the children
who were affected by them.
And directly the same methods were introduced into the
schools for normal children, a profound change in the school was
the result, an elevation of the personality of the child which has
spread through the whole world the social conception of indepen-
dence and the liberation of the child.