On Popular Education Page #3

"On Popular Education" is a thought-provoking essay by Leo Tolstoy in which the renowned Russian author explores the role of education in shaping individuals and society. Written in 1862, Tolstoy critiques the existing educational systems of his time, advocating for a more accessible, practical, and moral approach to learning. He emphasizes the importance of fostering critical thinking and moral values over rote memorization, urging educators to nurture the innate curiosity of learners. Tolstoy's reflections serve as a powerful call for a more humane and equitable educational framework that empowers individuals to contribute meaningfully to society.

• Essay

								

(or copy-books). Make on them a line of this size.' (The teacher draws
on the blackboard a line two or four inches in length, or shows on the
ruler that length.) 'Rub it off. How many lines are left?'--'Not
one.'--'Draw several such lines.' It would be unnatural to invent any
other exercises in order to acquaint the children with number one. It
suffices to rouse in them that conception of unity which they, no doubt,
had previous to their school instruction."

Then Mr. Bunákov speaks of exercises on the board, and so on, and Mr.
Evtushévski of the number four with its decomposition. Before examining
the theory itself of the transmission of ideas, the question
involuntarily arises whether that theory is not mistaken in its very
problem. Has the condition of the pedagogical material with which it has
to do been correctly defined? The first thing that startles us is the
strange relation to some imaginary children, to such as I, at least,
have never seen in the Russian Empire. The conversations, and the
information which they impart, refer to children of less than two years
of age, because two-year-old children know all that is contained in
them, but as to the questions which have to be asked, they have
reference to parrots. Any pupil of six, seven, eight, or nine years will
not understand a thing in these questions, because he knows all about
that, and cannot make out what it all means. The demands for such
conversations evince either complete ignorance, or a desire to ignore
that degree of development on which the pupils stand.

Maybe the children of Hottentots and negroes, or some German children,
do not know what is imparted to them in such conversations, but Russian
children, except demented ones, all those who come to a school, not only
know what is up and what down, what is a bench and what a table, what is
two and what one, and so forth, but, in my experience, the peasant
children who are sent to school by their parents can every one of them
express their thoughts well and correctly, can understand another
person's thought (if it is expressed in Russian), and can count to
twenty and more; playing with knuckle-bones they count in pairs and
sixes, and they know how many points and pairs there are in a six.
Frequently the pupils who came to my school brought with them the
problem with the geese, and explained it to me. But even if we admit
that children possess no such conceptions as those the pedagogues want
to impart to them by means of conversations, I do not find the method
chosen by them to be correct.

Thus, for example, Mr. Bunákov has written a reader. This book is to be
used in conjunction with the conversations to teach the children
language. I have run through the book and have found it to be a series
of bad language blunders, wherever extracts from other books are not
quoted. The same complete ignorance of language I have found in Mr.
Evtushévski's problems. Mr. Evtushévski wants to give ideas by means of
problems. First of all he ought to have seen to it that the tool for the
transmission of ideas, that is, the language, was correct.

What has been mentioned here refers to the form in which the development
is imparted. Let us look at the contents themselves. Mr. Bunákov
proposes the following questions to be put to the children: "Where can
you see cats? where a magpie? where sand? where a wasp and a suslik?
what are a suslik and a magpie and a cat covered with, and what are the
parts of their bodies?" (The suslik is a favourite animal of pedagogy,
no doubt because not one peasant child in the centre of Russia knows
that word.)

"Naturally the teacher does not always put these questions straight to
the children, as forming the predetermined programme of the lesson; more
frequently the small and undeveloped children have to be led up to the
solution of the question of the programme by a series of suggestive
questions, by directing their attention to the side of the subject which
is more correct at the given moment, or by inciting them to recall
something from their previous observations. Thus the teacher need not
put the question directly: 'Where can a wasp be seen?' but, turning to
this or that pupil, he may ask him whether he has seen a wasp, where he
has seen it, and then only, combining the replies of several pupils,
compose an answer to the first question of his programme. In answering
the teacher's questions, the children will often connect several remarks
that have no direct relation to the matter; for example, when the
question is about what the parts of a magpie are, one may say
irrelevantly that a magpie jumps, another that it chatters funnily, a
third that it steals things,--let them add and give utterance to
everything that arises in their memory or imagination,--it is the
teacher's business to concentrate their attention in accordance with the
programme, and these remarks and additions of the children he should
take notice of for the purpose of elaborating the other parts of the
programme. In viewing a new subject, the children at every convenient
opportunity return to the subjects which have already been under
consideration. Since they have observed that a magpie is covered with
feathers, the teacher asks: 'Is the suslik also covered with feathers?
What is it covered with? And what is a chicken covered with? and a
horse? and a lizard?' When they have observed that a magpie has two
legs, the teacher asks: 'How many legs has a dog? and a fox? and a
chicken? and a wasp? What other animals do you know with two legs? with
four? with six?'"

Involuntarily the question arises: Do the children know, or do they not
know, what is so well explained to them in these conversations? If the
pupils know it all, then, upon occasion, in the street or at home, where
they do not need to raise their left hands, they will certainly be able
to tell it in more beautiful and more correct Russian than they are
ordered to do. They will certainly not say that a horse is "covered"
with wool; if so, why are they compelled to repeat these questions just
as the teacher has put them? But if they do not know them (which is not
to be admitted except as regards the suslik), the question arises: by
what will the teacher be guided in what is with so much unction called
the programme of questions,--by the science of zoology, or by logic? or
by the science of eloquence? But if by none of the sciences, and merely
by the desire to talk about what is visible in the objects, there are so
many visible things in objects, and they are so diversified, that a
guiding thread is needed to show what to talk upon, whereas in objective
instruction there is no such thread, and there can be none.

All human knowledge is subdivided for the purpose that it may more
conveniently be gathered, united, and transmitted, and these
subdivisions are called sciences. But outside their scientific

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