athematics. Since the individual mind was presumably formed by building into it the products of the collective mind, methods of instruction were concerned wholly with how this was to be done. Herbart's interest lay in determining how knowledge could be presented so that it would be understood and therefore retained. He insisted that education must be based on psychological knowledge of the child so that he could be instructed effectively. The essence of his influence probably lay not so much in his carefully evolved five-step lesson plan but in the basic idea of a lesson plan. Such a plan suggested the possibility of evolving a systematic method of instruction that was the same for all pupils. Perhaps Herbart's emphasis on the importance of motivating pupils to learn whether through presentation of the material or, failing that, through rewards and punishments also influenced the new teaching methods of the 1880s and 1890s. The new methods, combined with the physical organization of the school, represented the direct opposite of Pestalozzi's belief that the child's innate powers should be allowed to develop naturally. Rather, the child must be lopped off or stretched to fit the procrustean curriculum. Subjects were graded according to difficulty, assigned to certain years, and taught by a rigid daily timetable. The amount of information that the child had absorbed through drill and memorization was determined by how much could be extracted from him by examinations. Reward or punishment came in the form of grades. At the end of the 19th century the methods of presenting information had thus been streamlined. The curriculum had been enlarged and brought closer to the concerns of everyday life. Book learning had been supplemented somewhat by direct observation. And psychological whipping in the form of grades had perhaps diminished any physical whipping. In one respect, however, the schools of the late 19th century were no different from t...
