Ontario Normal School Manuals: Science of Education | Page 8

however, be considered
in Chapter XXII.
CHAPTER III
THE PROCESS OF EDUCATION
CONSCIOUS ADJUSTMENT
From the example of conscious adjustment previously considered, it
would appear that the full process of such an adjustment presents the
following characteristics:
1. The Problem.--The individual conceives the existence within his
environment of a difficulty which demands adjustment, or which serves
as a problem calling for solution.
2. A Selecting Process.--With this problem as a motive, there takes
place within the experience of the individual a selecting of ideas felt to
be of value for solving the problem which calls for adjustment.
3. A Relating Process.--These relevant ideas are associated in
consciousness and form a new experience believed to overcome the
difficulty involved in the problem. This new experience is accepted,
therefore, mentally, as a satisfactory plan for meeting the situation, or,
in other words, it adjusts the individual to the problem in hand.
4. Expression.--This new experience is expressed in such form as is
requisite to answer fully the need felt in the original problem.
EDUCATION AS ADJUSTMENT
=Example from Writing.=--An examination of any ordinary educative
process taken from school-room experience will show that it involves

in some degree the factors mentioned above.
As a very simple example, may be taken the case of a young child
learning to form capital letters with short sticks. Assuming that he has
already copied letters involving straight lines, such as A, H, etc., the
child, on meeting such a letter as C or D, finds himself face to face with
a new problem. At first he may perhaps attempt to form the curves by
bending the short thin sticks. Hereupon, either through his own failure
or through some suggestion of his teacher, he comes to see a short,
straight line as part of a large curve. Thereupon he forms the idea of a
curve composed of a number of short, straight lines, and on this
principle is able to express himself in such forms as are shown here.
[Illustration]
[Illustration]
In this simple process of adjustment there are clearly involved the four
stages referred to above, as follows:
1. The Problem.--The forming of a curved letter by means of straight
sticks.
2. A Selecting Process.--Selecting of the ideas straight and curved and
the fixing of attention upon them.
3. A Relating Process.--An organization of the selected ideas into a new
experience in which the curve is viewed as made up of a number of
short, straight lines.
4. Expression.--Working out the physical expression of the new
experience in the actual forming of capitals involving curved lines.
=Example from Arithmetic.=--An analysis of the process by which a
child learns that there are four twos in eight, shows also the following
factors:
1. The Problem.--To find out how many twos are contained in the

vaguely known eight.
2. A Selecting Process.--To meet this problem the pupil is led from his
present knowledge of the number two, to proceed to divide eight
objects into groups of two; and, from his previous knowledge of the
number four, to measure the number of these groups of two.
3. A Relating Process.--Next the three ideas two, four, and eight are
translated into a new experience, constituting a mental solution of the
present problem.
4. Expression.--This new experience expresses itself in various ways in
the child's dealings with the number problems connected with his
environment.
=Example from Geometry.=--Taking as another example the process
by which a student may learn that the exterior angle of a triangle is
equal to the two interior and opposite angles, there appear also the same
stages, thus:
1. The Problem.--The conception of a difficulty or problem in the
geometrical environment which calls for solution, or adjustment--the
relation of the angle a to the angles b and c in Figure 1.
[Illustration: Fig. 1]
[Illustration: Fig. 2]
[Illustration: Fig. 3]
2. A Selecting Process.--With this problem as a motive there follows, as
suggested by Figure 2, the selecting of a series of ideas from the
previous experiences of the pupil which seem relative to, or are
considered valuable for solving the problem in hand.
3. A Relating Process.--These relative ideas pass into the formation of a
new experience, as illustrated in Figure 3, constituting the solution of
the problem.

4. Expression.--A further applying of this experience may be made in
adjusting the pupil to other problems connected with his geometric
environment; as, for example, to discover the sum of the interior angles
of a triangle.
EDUCATION AS CONTROL OF ADJUSTMENT
The examples of adjustment taken from school-room practice, are
found, however, to differ in one important respect from the previous
example taken from practical life. This difference consists in the fact
that in the recovery of the coin the modification of experience took
place wholly without control or direction other than that furnished