Froebel as a pioneer in modern psychologyMurray, E. R. (Elsie Riach)
Science
Froebel as a pioneer in modern psychology
Murray, E. R. (Elsie Riach)
Fröbel, Friedrich, 1782-1852; Psychology
It is surprising to find that Froebel, writing so early, has nothing
at all resembling any special “moral faculty.” His references to
“Conscience” are decidedly interesting, though given in quaint connection
with games and rhymes for mere babes. He asks why the “Where’s Baby?”
game gives such delight, and shows his psychological insight in the
answer he finds, viz. that it is the feeling or recognition of self, of
personality, which gives such joy.
“Why, now, is my child so happy over the hiding game? It is the
feeling of Personality which already so delights the child, it
is the feeling of recognition of his own self.”[35]
The game which follows this repeats the hiding experience, but this time
with the cry of “cuckoo,” from some one unseen, and this is likened to
the conscience call, which is described as “consciousness of union in
separation and of separateness, that is personality, in union.”--_M., p.
98._
“In ‘Where’s Baby Been?’ parting and union seem more separate,
as though in order that each may become more and more clearly
conscious of itself; in ‘Cuckoo,’ parting and union are, as
it were, joined. It is parting in union and union in parting
that makes ‘Cuckoo’ such a peculiar game and so delightful
to a child. But consciousness of union in separation, and
of separateness--that is personality--in union, is also the
essence, the deep foundation of conscience.”--_M., p. 197._
Mr. Kirkpatrick’s second Regulative instinct or tendency is that of
Religion, but Froebel again, like Mr. McDougall, finds that Religion has
its roots in an instinct “not specifically religious,”[36] viz. in the
Social Instinct. He says this in “The Education of Man” in the plainest
of terms.
“This feeling of Community first uniting the child with
father, mother, brothers and sisters, and resting on a higher
spiritual unity, to which later on is added the discovery that
father, mother, brothers and sisters, human beings in general,
feel and know themselves to be in community and unity with a
higher principle--with humanity, with God--this is the very
first germ, the very first beginning of all true religious
spirit, of all genuine yearning for unhindered unification with
the Eternal, with God.”--_E., p. 25._
It seems quite in accordance with this that Froebel should write that he
likes better the German word _Gott-einigkeit_--union with God--than the
foreign word religion; and also that he should speak of “developing the
sense of kinship with man in every child, and the sense of kinship with
God in every man.” So, in his “Mother Songs,” he tells the mother to give
her child duties to perform, that so he may “feel his kinship” with her:
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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