Again, as marked as this is in its early stages, the continuance of it
leads to results which are nothing short of deplorable. When such a
student has gone through a preparatory school without overcoming this
tendency to "fluid attention" and comes to college, the instructors in
the higher institutions are practically helpless before him. We say of
him that "he has never learned to study," that he does not know "how
to apply himself," that he has no "power of assimilation." All of
which simply means that his channels of reaction are so formed already
that no instruction can get sufficient lodgment in him to bring about
any modification of his "apperceptive systems." The embarrassment is
the more marked because such a youth, all through his education
period, is willing, ready, evidently receptive, prompt, and punctual
in all his tasks.
Now what shall be done with such a student in his early school years?
This is a question for the secondary teacher especially, apart from
the more primary measures recommended above. It is in the years
between eight and fifteen that this type of mind has its rapid
development; before that the treatment is mainly preventive, and
consists largely in suggestions which aim to make the muscular
discharges more deliberate and the general tone less explosive. But
when the boy or girl comes to school with the dawning capacity for
independent self-direction and personal application, then it is that
the problem of the motor scholar becomes critical. The "let-alone"
method puts a premium upon the development of his tendencies and the
eventual playing out of his mental possibilities in mere motion.
Certain positive ways of giving some indirect discipline to the mind
of this type may be suggested.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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