Principles of Teaching Part 20

QUESTIONS AND SUGGESTIONS--CHAPTER XVII

1. What is an aim?

2. Why is it particularly essential to good religious teaching?

3. What are the objections to "eleventh-hour" preparation?

4. To what extent is a teacher handicapped in deciding upon an aim for another teacher to follow?

5. Turn to the following references and determine what possible aims might be developed under each. Is any aim adequate for the whole reference? In each case which do you consider your best aim? Why? How much of the reference would you include in a single lesson?

John, Chapter I; Isaiah, Chapter II; III Nephi, Chapter X; Doctrine & Covenants, Section 87.

HELPFUL REFERENCES

Colgrove, _The Teacher and the School_; Betts, _How to Teach Religion_; Driggs, _The Art of Teaching_; Strayer and Norsworthy, _How to Teach_.

CHAPTER XVIII

APPLICATION

OUTLINE--CHAPTER XVIII

The question of application.--The matter a complex one.--Various conceptions of the term as it affects the intellect, the emotions, or the will.--Application may be immediate or delayed.--How to make the application.--Ill.u.s.trations.--Making the application and moralizing.--Utah moral codes as objectives behind our teaching.

Application is one of the most important subjects in the whole range of religious education. It is also one concerning which there are greater varieties of opinions than concerning almost any other subject.

What is application?

How is it made?

Is it inherent in the lesson, or is it added as a sort of supplement to the lesson?

When is it best made?

Does it always involve action?

These questions are only typical of the uncertainty that exists relative to this term.

Application really goes to the very heart of all teaching. Colloquially expressed, it raises the question in teaching, "What's the use?" Why should certain subject matter be presented to a cla.s.s? How are cla.s.s members better for having considered particular facts? In short, application involves the question, "What is the _carry-over_ value of the lesson?"

It is impossible to dispose adequately of the matter of application in a single statement. It fairly epitomizes the whole process of teaching and therefore is so comprehensive that it calls for a.n.a.lysis. The ultimate purpose behind teaching, of course, as behind all life, is salvation.

But salvation is not had in a day. It is not the result of a single act, nor does it grow out of particular thoughts and aspirations. Salvation is achieved as a sum total of all that we think, say, do, and _are_. Any lesson, therefore, that makes pupils better in thought, word, deed, or being, has had to that extent its application.

Application of a lesson involves, then, the making sure, on the part of the teacher, that the truths taught carry over into the life of the pupil and modify it for good. Someone has said that the application has been made when a pupil

"Knows more, Feels better, Acts more n.o.bly,"

as a result of the teaching done. There is a prevalent conception that application has been made in a recitation only when pupils go out from a recitation and translate the principle studied into immediate action.

There are lessons where such applications can be made and, of course, they are to be commended. Particularly are they valuable in the case of young children. But surely there are other justifiable interpretations to the term application.

We need to remind ourselves that there are three distinct types of subject matter that const.i.tute the body of our teaching material. These are, first of all, those lessons which are almost wholly intellectual.

Debates are conducted by the hundreds on subjects that lead not to action but to clearer judgment. Cla.s.ses study subjects by the month for the purpose of satisfying intellectual hunger. Such questions, for instance, as "Succession in the Presidency," or the "Nature of the G.o.dhead"--questions gone into by thoroughly converted Latter-day Saints, not to bring themselves into the Church, nor to lead themselves into any other kind of action except the satisfying of their own souls as to the truth. In other words, it appears clear that there may be application on a purely intellectual level. Application upon application is made until a person builds up a structure of faith that stands upon the rock in the face of all difficulties.

A second type of lessons appeals to the emotions. They aim to make pupils _feel_ better. They may or may not lead to immediate action.

Ideally, of course, every worthy emotion aroused should find, if possible, suitable channels for expression. Pent up emotions may become positively harmful. The younger the pupils the more especially is this true. Practically every educator recognizes this fact and gives expression to it in language similar to the following quotation from Professor S.H. Clark:

"Never awaken an emotion unless, at the same time, you strive to open a channel through which the emotion may pa.s.s into the realm of elevated action. If we are studying the ideals of literature, religion, etc., with our cla.s.s, we have failed in the highest duty of teaching if we have not given them the ideal, if we have not given them, by means of some suggestion, the opportunity for realizing the ideal. If there is an emotion excited in our pupils through a talk on ethics or sociology, it matters not, we fail in our duty, if we do not take an occasion at once to guide that emotion so that it may express itself in elevated action."

And yet there is a question whether this insistence upon action may not be exaggerated. Abraham Lincoln witnessed an auction sale of slaves in his younger days. He did not go out immediately and issue an emanc.i.p.ation proclamation, and yet there are few who can doubt that that auction sale registered an application in an ideal that persisted in the mind of Lincoln through all those years preceding our great civil war.

Many a man has been saved in the hour of temptation, in his later life, by the vividness of the recollection of sacred truths taught at his mother's knee. There may be just a little danger of cheapening the process of application if it is insisted that for every ideal impressed upon the minds of pupils there must be a corresponding immediate response in daily actions of the pupils taught. May not a wonderful impression become the more wonderful as it is hallowed by the pondering of the mind through the maturing years of childhood and young manhood?

Finally there is the lesson which, though it involves both the intellect and the emotions, appeals primarily to the will and calls for action.

There can be no question but that this is the type of lesson of greatest significance in religious education. We meet our pupils so infrequently, at best, that at most we can do but a fraction of what we should like to do to modify their lives. Our concern is to change for the better their att.i.tude and conduct, and therefore we must address ourselves to the problems they face in the every-day life which they are to live between recitations. As Betts in his _How to Teach Religion_ so well says:

"In the last a.n.a.lysis the child does not come to us that he may learn this or that set of facts, nor that he may develop such and such a group of feelings, but that through these he may live better. The final test of our teaching, therefore, is just like this: Because of our instruction, does the child live differently here and now, as a child, in all his multiform relations in the home, the school, the church, the community, and in his own personal life? Are the lessons we teach translated continuously into better conduct, finer acts, and stronger character, as shown in the daily run of the learner's experience?

"It is true that the full fruits of our teaching and of the child's learning must wait for time and experience to bring the individual to fuller development. But it is also true that it is impossible for the child to lay up a store of unused knowledge and have it remain against a later time of need in a distant future. The only knowledge that forms a vital part of our equipment is knowledge that is in active service, guiding our thoughts and decisions from day to day.

Unused knowledge quickly vanishes away, leaving little more permanent impression on the life than that left on the wave when we plunge our hand into the water and take it out again. In similar way the interests, ideals, and emotions which are aroused, without at the same time affording a natural outlet for expression in deeds and conduct, soon fade away without having fulfilled the purpose for which they exist. The great thing in religious education is to find immediate and natural outlet in expression, a way for the child to use what he learns; to get the child to do those things pointed out by the lessons we teach him."

As the teacher faces this "carry-over" problem he is impressed that he must touch the lives of his pupils not only as individuals but as members of a social group. It becomes his obligation not only to direct them in matters pertaining to their own welfare, physically, intellectually, and morally, but he has a responsibility in helping to establish the standards of society to which individuals naturally subscribe more or less unconsciously.

The strong teacher's influence can be made to affect the ideals of the athletic field, of the amus.e.m.e.nt hall, of the church, of the business center, and of the home. These agencies offer such a variety of possibilities that every lesson offers easily some avenue of application. By way of ill.u.s.tration let us turn to a few subjects and point out some possibilities in the matter of application. May it be said here, in pa.s.sing, that the secret of making application lies in not getting lost in the past so that we may walk along with our heads turned back over the shoulder of time pondering merely the things of the past.

All too often the teacher hurries over into the Holy Land of some four thousand years ago, leaving a cla.s.s of twentieth century boys and girls here at home to wonder what all that ancient material has to do with the problems that confront them here and now. Not that we should ignore the past. Successful application lies in reaching back into the past for a solution of today's difficulties. But the _solution_ is our great concern. "We look back that we may the better go forward."

To ill.u.s.trate:

A lesson on Cain and Abel may find its application in a solution of the problems of the jealousy and selfishness that exist today. This story ought not to be merely a recounting of murder. There is a little Cain--a little Abel--in all of us. Consider the case of the boy who smashed up his brother's new sled as well as his own, because he couldn't keep up in coasting. The nature of the cla.s.s will determine the particular application. Or consider the story of Samson and Delilah: at first thought, a story with but little to contribute to a solution of today's problems. Yet out of that story application can be made beautifully, through either of these two truths:

He who plays with sin will eventually be conquered by it; or,

Marrying outside one's church is attended by grave dangers.

A lesson on helpfulness was once beautifully and rather dramatically given through the story of a rescue of a train. A lad was out at play on a railroad track when he discovered that a recent storm had washed out part of the road bed. He remembered that the through pa.s.senger train was due in a few minutes, and so rushed along the track and by frantically waving his hat succeeded in stopping the train just in time to prevent a terrible catastrophe. A few well-directed questions called for the pupils' own idea of application. They, too, would flag a train if such an occasion should arise. They could help people generally to guard against danger. They even carried the idea over into rendering any kind of service, about the home, at school, and elsewhere, as long as it was helpful.

And so ill.u.s.trations could be multiplied. The important thing is that, having decided upon a central truth for a lesson, the teacher then conceives avenues whereby the truth may be carried over through action into the lives of pupils. And, of course, he must see that they are directed in setting about the action.

The question often arises, "Isn't there danger of moralizing in making an application?" or "What is the difference between an application and moralizing?" Genuine and natural application ought to be inherent in the material presented. A good story ought to drive home its message without further comment. Moralizing consists of "tacking on" some generalized exhortation relative to conduct. Moralizing is either an unnecessary and unwelcome injunction to be or to do good, or it is an apology for a lesson that in and of itself drives home no message. The school boy's definition of moralizing is helpful and suggestive:

"_Moralizing is rubbing goodness in unnecessarily._"

In making application of truths presented, teachers naturally face the question as to what const.i.tutes the fundamentals in character development that are to be achieved. As a sort of guide, the two Utah codes of morals, one for children and one for youths, are rich in suggestion, both for pupil and teacher. They are submitted herewith as helpful in setting up the objectives toward which we are working: