The Parents' Review

A Monthly Magazine of Home-Training and Culture

The Psychology of Childhood.

I was once asked by an amiable hostess, who rashly assumed me to be something better than a bachelor, how many children I had? I replied that I did not know exactly, but it was somewhere about 40,000. You probably have smaller families, consequently your experience of children will be of a different character to mine. Yours must be a narrow knowledge, because it is based on a few examples; but it is very intimate and thorough as far as it goes. The professional educator's experience is much shallower, but on the other hand much broader, and affords therefore a safer basis for generalization. The science of education needs both sorts of experience. There is much that we can learn from you, provided you study your children with sympathetic and intelligent observation, but without undue prepossessions; but there is also something which you may learn from us. All are of necessity educators. We may delegate their duties in part to paid substitutes; but, even were it desirable, it is not possible for them to place their responsibilities wholly on other shoulders. In the first place, there is one whole department of life in which the parent's influence must be infinitely stronger than that of the school master: I mean the training of character; and, in the second place, the child is not in the hands of the specialist from beginning to end. There are at least the years before the child is old enough to go to school, and there are the holidays. Even if no formal lessons are given in the pre-school period, the child nevertheless learns more in the first five years of its life than in the next fifty. It learns to walk, to talk, to use its various senses and to interpret their multitudinous evidence. Here alone is an immense field for the parent to cultivate. As to the training of character, the home influence must always be dominate for several reasons: first, because it is exercised at a period when the child's mind most plastic; secondly, because, although personal affection should, and often does, exist between the schoolmaster and his charge it can never have the strength which is derived from natural instinct and early association; thirdly, because the parent has far better opportunities, as well as a far stronger interest to study the special idiosyncrasies of each individual child.

The parent, therefore, cannot escape being an educator; but, if he relies solely on personal experience he is a mere journeyman working by rule of thumb, and helpless when confronted with any strange set of circumstances. One of the chief objects of your Association, I take it, is to assist its members to become something more than mere empiricists in their delicate task. You do not want a minute code of rules, designed to meet every conceivable case. No one can give you that. What you want is to get hold of some general principles, which you can apply as the need arises. I have, therefore, thought that I might be of most service to you if I endeavored to give you some idea of the fundamental principles which underlie the Art of Education. And, in attempting to do so, I shall bear chiefly in mind the two points to which I have already referred as of special interest to parents, viz., the earlier years of childhood, and the formation of character.

We cannot profitably set about any practical undertaking unless we know the nature of the materials on which we have to work, for so only can we obtain a clear conception of the process in which we are engaged, and of the methods which we should employ. So in the subject which concerns us today, we cannot understand what education means, unless we have more or less definite ideas of human nature in its various stages. "What a piece of work is man! How noble in reason! How infinite in faculties! In form and moving how express and admirable! In action how like an angel! In apprehension how like a god! The beauty of the world! The paragon of animals!" Yes, but what is a new born babe? If I may trust my reading, little better than a vociferous oyster! A stomach and a pair of lungs. What a gulf separates this helpless creature from the being described by Hamlet! To bridge this gulf is the work of nature and of nurture, in other words, education.

Let us first get a preliminary and general idea of the nature of this process. Fröbel sums it up in a poetical metaphor -- the one word Kindergarten. The family or school is likened to a garden, in which the children are the plants and the educator the gardener. The implication is that the faculties of the child unfold themselves gradually, "first the blade, then the ear, then the full corn in the ear." Herbert Spencer's view, though differently expressed, is much the same essentially so far as regards the individual, but it goes deeper. He regards education as the evolution of the individual. The education of society at large we call civilization; the civilization of the individual we call education. "We are learning," says Dr. Sully to whose work, entitled "The Teacher's Handbook of Psychology," I owe much of the matter that follows -- "We are learning to connect the individual life with that of the race, and this again with the collective life of all sentient creatures. The doctrine of evolution bids us view the unfolding of a human intelligence today, as conditioned and prepared by long ages of human experience, and still longer cycles of animal experience. The civilized individual is thus a momento, a kind of a shorthand record of nature's far receding work of organizing, or building up, living, conscious structures. And according to this view the successive stages of the mental life of the individual roughly answer to the periods of this extensive process of organization -- vegetal, animal, human, civilized life."

Thus in each individual there exists an hereditary and an acquired element. Each child comes into the world with certain potentialities, but also with certain limitations. It is vain, therefore, to expect that education can make perfect beings of all. It can, and should develop the existing capacities in the right direction, and to the utmost extent.

What are these capacities? They are partly physical and partly mental, "To live well," says Herbert Spencer, "it is necessary to be a good animal," that is, the bodily organs must be duly developed. Physical training is therefore a most important part of the educator's function, but time compels me to pass over this without further remark.

Turning to the mind;-- its operations present themselves to us as states of consciousness. These states of consciousness present characteristics sufficiently distinct to enable us to classify them under three heads. We think, we feel, and we will. We say, therefore, that we have three primary groups of Faculties. Intelligence, whose end is Truth, Emotion, whose end is pleasure, and Will, whose end is Duty. The Educator's task is therefore threefold, to train the Intelligence, the Emotions and the Will. This division is theoretically convenient, but we must not regard the mind as consisting of three distinct and separate parts. It is one organic whole, the various manifestations of which are closely interdependent; and I want you to notice in what follows how these three strands become inextricably twisted together into the strong cable of the adult character. I propose to trace these three Faculties to their roots, and to give some idea of the stages they pass through and the laws which govern their development.

The Intelligence

The highest function of the human Intelligence is admittedly the power of Reasoning. Let us take an example of deductive reasoning like the following:--

       fruits have seeds:
       The orange is a fruit;
       Therefore the orange has seeds.

The two propositions on which the conclusion depends, viz: "All fruits have seeds," and "The orange is a fruit," are two judgments. In inductive reasoning the conclusion is likewise based on judgments, not two only, but many. All reasoning therefore pre-supposes the faculty of Judgment. We must learn to judge before we can reason. Now examine one of these judgments, "The orange is a fruit." Here we find two general terms, "orange" and "fruit," names that is to say of classes of things. Such a general notion is called a concept, and the faculty which enables us to form such general notions is called Conception. This power must consequently be anterior to Judgment.

How are these general notions formed? The class of things called "orange" is formed in virtue of certain similarities found to exist among a number of individual things. The individual things must therefore be known before general notions are possible; that is to say, we cannot classify things until we are able to apprehend similarities and differences. Mental science expresses this by saying that we must possess the faculties of Assimilation and Discrimination. What then enables us to attain to the knowledge of individual things? The faculty which does this is called Perception. In virtue of it we recognize an orange as a whole when we see it. The mental product of this operation is called a percept. But how are percepts formed? Why, by combining the evidence of the several senses, such as sight, touch, taste, &c. Thus our knowledge of an orange is a bundle of sensations such as those of roundness, yellowness, sweetness, &c. The senses therefore are the gates of knowledge.

But if the impressions produced by objects through the senses passed away immediately the exciting cause were removed, all lasting knowledge would be impossible. As a matter of fact these impressions leave a more or less permanent trace on the brain, and can be recalled. Look at an orange, and you get a percept. Remove the orange, you can reproduce or re-present to the mind a copy of that percept in the form of a mental image. This faculty is therefore called Representative Imagination, Memory or Retentiveness. This is a faculty of the highest importance, not merely because, as we have seen, no higher intellectual operation than that of Perception would be possible without it, but because it is also an essential element in the development of the Emotions and the Will. Here let me just touch on that higher form of Imagination which corresponds to what is popularly understood by the term. When the mental image is not an exact reproduction of antecedent percepts, but a new product worked up out of the materials supplied by previous impressions, we are exercising what is called Constructive Imagination. This power first shows itself in the capricious workings of childish fancy. Later it is capable of being regulated by Will. It is thus that under the guidance of a skillful teacher, a child may obtain a faithful image of the Island of Teneriffe or the character of Julius Caesar.

The intellectual faculties develop therefore in this order. 1. Sensation. 2. Perception. 3. Imagination, Reproductive, and later, Constructive. 4. Conception. 5. Judgment. 6. Reasoning. You will notice how the development of the intellectual faculties bears out the doctrine of evolution, those which may be described as animal faculties coming first, those most distinctively human last. And you will be able to hazard a pretty good conjecture as to the direction which nursery education should take in this department, and you will know why it should take this special direction. Clearly, your chief task is to train the senses and the imagination. Here toys play an important part. They develop the sense of colour, form, size, distance, weight: they accustom the hand and eye to work together and they stimulate observation and attention. From solid objects the child should pass to pictures. Both the senses and the imagination are aided in their development by stories, by songs, by repeating nursery rhymes, above all by language. Be very particular to train your children to speak distinctly, and in your talks with them encourage them to answer in whole sentences.

The Will

Will is the faculty of voluntary action, whether bodily or mental. Its foundation is to be sought in bodily movements. The earliest of these are hereditary and unlearnt. First come movements which are merely reflex, as when the infant's hand automatically closes round any small object placed in it, much the same way as the sundew closes on the insect that settles on its petals. These are followed by instinctive movements associated with some element of feeling, as for instance, the act of sucking or a little later that of crooning when pleased or frowning when annoyed. A third class consists of spontaneous movements, such as throwing the limbs about, not with any definite purpose, but from excess of nervous force, especially after sleep. None of these actions is strictly voluntary. An action is not voluntary unless it is performed as a means to the attainment of a definite end. Every voluntary action is therefore prompted by some desire. The sight of a bright red ball excites a child's pleasure, and this feeling prompts movements. One of these movements may bring the hand into contact with the ball. This will give rise to the feeling of pleasure. This particular action thus becomes associated with the pleasure of possession, and will be brought into play when the desire of possession is felt. This action has then become voluntary. For voluntary movements, therefore, experience is needed, and, of course, practice to perfect them.

As the power of performing bodily movements grows, the enjoyment of bodily activity increases, and the sight of another's actions prompts the child to imitate them, at first unconsciously and from mere contagious suggestion, but later consciously and voluntarily from a desire to do what others do, or it may be in obedience to the parent's command. A higher stage is reached when a movement is initiated, not as hitherto by some external stimulus, but by an internal mental cause, as when a child thinks of its toys and goes to the cupboard to fetch them.

We see then that the growth of the Will begins with the command of the organs of movement. The young child should therefore have plenty of scope for the free exercise of its active organs, and should be liberally provided with objects calculated to stimulate him to manual and bodily movements, But a child should not be given several toys at once, for this destroys the concentration of mind which is as necessary for furthering muscular progress as it is for any form of mental development. Companionship is desirable not only because of the stimulus it affords through the child's readiness to imitate, but also because of the feelings of sympathy and co-operation which it evokes. The parent should avoid being too ready to show children how to do things. Let the child find out for itself as much as possible. Constant help breeds indolent shirking of effort and so weakens Will and undermines self-reliance. A perfect bodily action is one which is well done from habit, and habits can only be acquired by repeated acts done at first under conditions of concentrated attention. The more complete this attention is the sooner will the movement become habitual and the sooner therefore will the mind be enabled to hand over the mechanical bodily action to its handmaid, Habit, and be free to devote itself to higher functions than those of bodily control. A child writing a letter has half its attention taken up with the complicated movements of penmanship, which to the adult have become merely mechanical through habit, leaving the mind free to occupy itself with the thoughts and their expression.

So far we have dealt with that early type of action which is represented by bodily movements aiming at some immediate result. The growth of Intelligence and of Feeling leads to a higher development of Will. As its intelligence expands, the child begins to see the more remote consequences of its actions, and therefore aims at things which are not so much desirable in themselves as the means of obtaining what is desirable. Thus he comes in time to value obedience, self-restraint, study, to desire knowledge and to love duty. The motives which influence him become much more varied and complex. Several desires may now co-operate to move him in one direction, or various impulses may draw him some one way and some another. In the latter case an alternative is presented to his mind and he is compelled to reflect and to choose. This deliberation implies an effort of Will to check the impulse to immediate action, and the exercise of moral judgment to decide which course is the more desirable. This power is therefore a late product. Young children are too keen to act and have too little experience of the consequences of their action to be capable of this restraint. It is only when their intellectual horizon has expanded and their range of desires has widened out that they are able to prefer a more remote but more worthy end to an immediate gratification of a lower type. When they have reached this stage they have attained the power which we know as Self-control. At first the arrest of action and the pause for reflection will cost a painful effort, which however will be lessened by each success until the process becomes easy and natural and passes into a moral habit.

The Feelings

Feeling is the name given to mental states which are pleasurable or painful, and since it is our pleasures and pains that determine our happiness or misery, the study of Feeling is important for itself; but it is also important because Feeling is bound up with Intellect and with Will. Violent feeling hinders intellectual operations, but moderate feeling stimulates it. Conversely, the higher feelings, such as the sense of beauty, depend largely upon the development of the Intellect. Again, Feeling is connected with Will since it supplies motives of action.

The Emotions obey the same laws of development as the intellectual faculties. The earliest are the simplest, requiring little representative power, the latest the most complex. The earliest to show themselves are the Egoist Feelings, especially those connected with animal life and the lower forms of sensations. Bodily pleasures and pains, such as those of appetite, are the chief sources of feelings. Such emotions as fear, anger, love of power, necessarily come early because they make for self-preservation. An infant's fractiousness, as well as an adult's ill temper, is frequently due to physical discomfort, if not actual disorder of the vital functions. Next come the pleasures and pains arising from the exercise of special organs and muscles, such as the pleasures of sights, sounds, and movements. The moderate exercise of our sense and motor organs causes pleasure, but if the stimulus is too prolonged, or too intense, we experience pain. Light is pleasant, a glare painful; it is pleasant to walk a few miles, painful to tramp all day. Suitable occupation is therefore necessary for children, and equally necessary is variety. Conversely the absence of means of exercising the faculties causes the painful feelings of ennui and restlessness. But just as a stimulus, which at first gives pleasure, becomes painful if excessive in duration, so one which begins by being painful may become indifferent or even pleasurable from the same cause. For example, a child's sense of shame may be easily deadened if it be exposed to constant humiliation, and the taste for tobacco, distinctly disagreeable at first, becomes positively enjoyable.

The character of young children's feelings is affected by their intellectual condition. While their imaginative power is low, their feelings are aroused only by impressions actually present. They may be frightened at the sight of a dog, but not by the thought of a dog. Still less is it possible for them to restrain their present anger at being thwarted, by recalling to mind the past indulgences they have received. Hence children's feelings are violent and intense, all-absorbing for the time on account of the absence of reflecting power and the weakness of Will power. On the other hand, their feelings are transitory because they are dependent on present external circumstances. This also explains why their moods are so changeable.

But though young children's passions are transitory, they do not pass without permanent effect. Every emotion experienced leaves its trace, the brain centers being modified in some way. Therefore each fit of anger indulged, each instance of gratitude experienced, makes it easier for that feeling to recur, and, on the renewal of the feeling, traces of the previous experience mingle with it and thus strengthen it. Owing to this persistence a child is enabled later on, when his representative power is sufficiently developed, to recall an imagined feeling not actually present at the moment. Here we have the germ of Sympathy, which is at the root of all Social Feeling and therefore of all Moral Education.

The training of feelings divides itself into two heads: first, the repression of violent feelings, and secondly, the development of the gentler emotions. Under the first head not very much can be done beyond keeping children free as far as possible, from causes of excitement. The chief remedy must be found in intellectual growth and development of Will, and the chief preventative in a good example. Good example will also be found the most efficacious means of developing the gentler feelings, for children are quick to imitate, and emotional imitation is a strong engine of moral culture. Secondly, you may avail yourselves of the principle of association. Feelings, having become attached to impressions or objects, recur when the impression or object recurs, or even anything which suggests that impression or object. The more readily such associations are formed, the quicker is the growth of emotion, and "the more numerous and varied the experiences which combine in these associations, the greater the volume of the resulting feeling." In such an emotion, for instance, as love of home, there are involved many simple feelings welded together by the force of association into one conglomerate mass which has become a habit.

Sympathy being the key of the situation, much may be done for moral education by interesting the children in animals. It is good for them to have pets, and to be trained in habits of kindness to them. Later their sympathies may be extended by stories of less familiar animals. Next they may pass to tales of noble men and women, deeds of bravery and self-sacrifice. Last, but not least, comes the inculcation of good manners. The importance of good manners is not merely to be measured by the charm they add to social life. They are a discipline in themselves, for it is a well established fact that the repression of the outward signs of an emotion helps to keep in check the emotion itself. But let not the manners you cultivate in your children be the insolent "politesse" of the Frenchman, which has its root in a scarcely veiled contempt for others, nor the punctilio of a duellist to his adversary, nor the servile affectations of the dancing master, but the easy grace of courtesy which characterises the Bavarian and the Austrian, and which wells up naturally from a heart full of kindly sympathy and consideration.

In each of the three great departments of mental life which we have been considering, you will have observed the same law of development. Alike in Intellect, in Will and in Emotion, the lower functions are developed before the higher, and the progress is from the vague to the distinct from the simple to the complex, from external sense to internal thought, from the concrete to the abstract. In moral education, in which all three branches of our mental activities are concerned, the same law of development of course holds good. "The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom." The fear of the parent is the beginning of the moral sense in the child, - the beginning, not the end. The moral sense begins with obedience. Obedience begins with fear, but must not end there. "Physical coercion," to quote Dr. Sully, "is not, strictly speaking, a moral force at all. True obedience to authority rests on an acknowledgment of the moral as well as the physical superiority of the governor." As the egoistic feelings become gradually curbed, and the social feelings begin to gather strength affection should gradually supplant fear. But this step cannot easily be taken unless the child has perfect confidence in both the wisdom and justice of its parent. It cannot trust in either if the parent is hasty or capricious, permitting one day what he forbids on another, giving a command and neglecting to enforce it, or excusing in one member of the family what he condemns in another. The parent's manner must be temperate, his will resolute, his rules as few as possible, but framed with deliberation, intelligibly expressed and uniformly enforced. Only so can he hope to form obedience into a habit. The habit of obeying good rules produces habits of good conduct. But habits of good conduct are similarly produced in a dog. For morality in its true sense something more is needed.

The development of intelligence and reflection enables the child to see in its parent, not an arbitrary master, but an embodiment of moral law. But mere passive obedience, whether to a person or to a law, is not enough. A child is not only an active agent whose acts affect others; he is also a passive being acted upon by others, and experiencing pleasure or pain according to their conduct towards him. He soon learns therefore to attach the terms "good" and "bad" to the actions of others on himself, and a little later, by the aid of sympathy, to their actions on those he loves. As his range of sympathies expands it embraces an ever widening circle of his fellows. From passing moral judgement on their acts as they affect third parties, he comes to pass moral judgment on his own acts. With the growth of imaginative power, he is enabled to derive pleasure from the pleasure he gives to others and to share in the pain his actions may cost them. When his unselfish emotions have reached this stage, wrong-doing will be accompanied by the pain of remorse and right conduct with the sense of obligation. This is Conscience, the highest product of the moral faculty.

Typed by Veronica M, Jan. 2025