recognition is there of varying values of facts in such teaching?

_The effect of such teaching on method of study_

Not all of such instruction is avoidable or even undesirable; but it
is so common that it has a very important effect on method of study.

So long as facts are treated as approximately equal in worth, the
learner is bound to picture the field of knowledge as a comparatively
level plain composed of a vast aggregation of independent bits. In
spelling, writing, and beginning reading it is so many hundreds or
thousands of words; in beginning arithmetic it is the various
combinations in the four fundamental operations; in geography it is a
long list of statements; in history it is an endless lot of facts as
they happen to come on the page; in literature it is sentence after
sentence.

One can get possession of this field, not by taking the strategic
positions,--for under the assumption of equality there are none,--but
rather by advancing over it slowly, mastering one bit at a time. Thus
the words in beginning reading, writing, and spelling are learned and
reproduced in all orders, proving them to be independent little
entities. In geography and history, when the facts are not wormed out
of the pupil by questions, he sees the page before him by his mind's
eye,--a fact frequently revealed by the movement of his eyes while
reciting,--and attempts to recall each paragraph or statement in its
order. In literature he masters his difficulties sentence by sentence,
a method most clearly shown in the case of our greatest classic, the
Bible, which is almost universally studied and quoted by verses.