A champion of the transformation of pedagogy into a psycho-physiological
science is to be found in Sweden in the person of Prof. Hjalmar Oehrwal
who has discussed in his essays native and foreign discoveries in
the field of psychology. One of his conclusions is that the so-called
technical exercises, gymnastics, manual training, sloyd, and the like,
are not, as they are erroneously called, a relaxation from mental
overstrain by change in work, but simply a new form of brain fatigue.
All work, he finds, done under conditions of fatigue is uneconomic
whether one regards the quantity produced or its value as an exercise.
Rest should be nothing more than rest,--freedom to do only what one
wants to, or to do nothing at all. As to fear, he proves, following
Binet's investigation in this subject, how corporal discipline, threats,
and ridicule lead to cowardice; how all of these methods are to be
rejected because they are depressing and tend to a diminution of
energy. He shows, moreover, how fear can be overcome progressively,
by strengthening the nervous system and in that way strengthening
the character. This result comes about partly when all unnecessary
terrorising is avoided, partly when children are accustomed to bear
calmly and quietly the inevitable unpleasantnesses of danger.
Prof. Axel Key's investigations on school children have won
international recognition. In Sweden they have supplied the most
significant material up to the present time for determining the
influence of studies on physical development and the results of
intellectual overstrain.
It is to be hoped that when through empirical investigation we begin to
get acquainted with the real nature of children, the school and the home
will be freed from absurd notions about the character and needs of the
child, those absurd notions which now cause painful cases of physical
and psychical maltreatment, still called by conscientious and thinking
human beings in schools and in homes, education.
By Helen Key
The Century of the Child
Cr. 8vo. With Frontispiece. Net, $1.50
CONTENTS: The Right of the Child to Choose His Parents, The Unborn Race
and Woman's Work, Education, Homelessness, Soul Murder in the Schools,
The School of the Future, Religious Instruction, Child Labor and the
Crimes of Children. This book has gone through more than twenty German
Editions and has been published in several European countries. "A
powerful book."--N. Y. Times.
The Education of the Child
Reprinted from the Authorized American Edition of "The Century of the
Child," With Introductory Note by EDWARD BOK.
Cr. 8vo. Net 75 cents
"Nothing finer on the wise education of the child has ever been brought
into print. To me this chapter is a perfect classic; it points the way
straight for every parent, and it should find a place in every home in
America where there is a child."--EDWARD BOK, Editor of the Ladies' Home
Journal.
Love and Marriage Cr. 8vo
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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