The child's mind : its growth and training being a short study of some processes of learning and teaching / by W.E. Urwick.

  • Urwick, W. E. (William Eddowes)
Date:
1907
Catalogue details

Licence: In copyright

Credit: The child's mind : its growth and training being a short study of some processes of learning and teaching / by W.E. Urwick. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    injudicious forcing of spelling, grammar, and ex- planation of words ; for art owing to the freehand drawing ; and for music owing to scales. In all these subjects it is easy to overload first beginnings with such doses of dull routine as to stifle apprecia- tion. It is often pleaded that appreciation in art, music, and literature is a late product in educa- tion, not to be expected before the close of adoles- cence. Only the exceptional pupil, it is said, is really capable of it, and hence it would be waste of time to endeavour to cultivate it in all pupils. Such a plea contains something that is true amid a great deal that is more than doubtful. If for a moment we leave literature on one side, it might with equal, if not greater, justice be urged in respect to art and music, that not one pupil in a hundred will be either an artist or a musician, and that it is, therefore, not worth while to waste time over the acquisition of technique. Enough is not known of the changes which adoles- cence brings with it to say, with any certainty, what effect it has upon those parts of our emotional nature to which aesthetic values appeal. It appears, indeed, probable that the creative impulse in all the arts is in some obscure way connected with it, but further than this it is not possible to go. On the other hand, it is an established fact that the majority of young children between five and seven years old show already that liking for pictures, for music, and for literature, out of which appreciation may subsequently grow, provided