Civil Government in the United States Considered with - Some Reference to Its Origins by John Fiske
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page 11 of 467 (02%)
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thing as committing the text to memory. The tendency to rote-learning
is very strong. I had to contend with it in teaching history to seniors at Harvard twenty years ago, but much has since been done to check it through the development of the modern German seminary methods. (For an explanation of these methods, see Dr. Herbert Adams on "Seminary Libraries and University Extension," _J.H.U. Studies_, V., xi.) With younger students the tendency is of course stronger. It is only through much exercise that the mind learns how to let itself--as Matthew Arnold used to say--"play freely about the facts." [Footnote 3: "This," says Mr. Hill, "will please those who prefer the topical method, while it does not forbid the easy transformation of topics to questions, which others may demand." In the table of contents I have made a pretty full topical analysis of the book, which may prove useful for comparison with Mr. Hill's.] In order to supply the pupil with some wholesome exercise of this sort, Mr. Hill has added, at the end of each _chapter_, a set of "Suggestive Questions and Directions." Here he has thoroughly divined the purpose of the book and done much to further it. Problems or cases are suggested for the student to consider, and questions are asked which cannot be disposed of by a direct appeal to the text. Sometimes the questions go quite outside of the text, and relate to topics concerning which it provides no information whatever. This has been done with a purpose. The pupil should learn how to go outside of the book and gather from scattered sources information concerning questions that the book suggests. In other words, he should begin to learn _how to make researches_, for that is coming to be |
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