Pestalozzi’s Method of Education

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Introduction
Modern education began when Johann Heinrich Pestalozzi established his experimental school at Neuhof in 1775. Comenius had shown the true path of teaching. Pestalozzi was the enthusiast who felt with burning passion the injustice done to the child in the schoolhouses of his day. He protested that the old education was all wrong and he proved this by his achievements, establishing a little school in his own home at Neuhof and then in 1800 a larger one at Burgdorf.

The Swiss Government adopted his ideas. Teachers were sent to learn of him. From Burgdorf is sprung the whole school system of to-day. As a practical school-teacher Pestalozzi was nevertheless a failure in the end, because he relied on no force but that of personal affection to control his pupils. This divinest of methods succeeded remarkably while his schools were so small as to bring him into close paternal contact with every child. But at the large institution at Yverdon, of which he was master in his later years, the method broke down badly. Hence there were not wanting in his own times critics who pronounced him a failure. They did not see that beside his insistence on love as the “way,” the reformer had an even more important message for the world. “The grand change advocated by Pestalozzi,” says Mr. Quick, “was a change of object. The main object of the school should not be to teach but to develop.” In this sentence we have the key to all modern education, though not every teacher even to-day has digested fully the idea that his duty is less that of stuffing a child full of facts than of developing its character and abilities, encouraging whatever of value exists within itself.

The full importance of Pestalozzi’s work was recognized by keener intellects even in his own lifetime. Queen Louise, the heroine of Prussia, wished she could fly to Switzerland to grasp Pestalozzi’s hand. His system was introduced throughout Northern Germany and did wonders for the development of the German people. To-day it is the system of the world.

This selection is by George Ripley.

Time: 1775
Place: Swiss Countryside

After completing the usual course of education, Pestalozzi continued his studies, with a view to engaging in the ministry of the gospel, to which the wishes of his friends, as well as his own deep religious feelings, had early destined him. This course, however, was soon abandoned. He appeared for the first and only time in the pulpit as a candidate and then, discouraged by the ill-success of the experiment, renounced all aspirations to the sacred office. Soon after, he applied himself to the law but with a strong predilection for political studies. At this time his inquiries seem to have taken the direction which ultimately led him to the discoveries that characterize his name. He saw clearly the great abuses in society which prevailed in his native country; and by dwelling on their enormity his active mind suggested means of relief which could be realized only by a more thorough and judicious education of the people at large. His first publication, issued while a student at law, contained his views on this subject. It was an essay on the bearing which education ought to have upon our respective callings.

It was not for a mind like Pestalozzi’s to behold the evils which had been brought to his notice without deep and painful emotion. This was experienced to such a degree that he was thrown into a state of morbid excitement; and, at length, a dangerous illness broke off his ardent researches. Still his mind was not quieted. His thoughts could not be prevented from dwelling on the painful subjects to which he had given his whole soul. Prostrate on the bed of sickness, he continued to indulge himself in dark musings; and his fancy represented the prospects of the future, both for society and for himself, in gloomy colors. The strength of his constitution, however, carried him through the disorder; and from the moment of his recovery he resolved to follow the leadings of Providence, and, setting aside all human considerations, to act up to the full extent of his conceptions and if possible to put his views to the test of experience.

He now abandoned all his former studies, committed his papers to the flames and believing that the evils into which society was plunged were mainly owing to a departure from the straight and simple path of nature, to the school of nature he resolved to go. Accordingly he quitted Zurich and went to Kirchberg, in the Canton of Bern, where he became an apprentice to a farmer of the name of Tschiffeli.

After qualifying himself under the direction of Tschiffeli for the charge of a farm, he purchased a tract of waste land in the neighborhood of Lensburg, in the Canton of Bern, on which he erected a dwelling-house, with suitable buildings and gave it the name of Neuhof. The work of his hands here was prospered. He soon brought himself into comfortable circumstances and saw his prospects as bright and happy as could be wished. At this time he formed a connection in marriage with Ann Schulthess, the daughter of one of the wealthiest merchants in Zurich, a young lady of a refined education and great dignity of character. This marriage, while it increased the happiness of his domestic circle, offered him a new sphere of useful exertion, by giving him an interest in a flourishing cotton manufactory.

After eight years of successful industry at Neuhof, Pestalozzi resolved to make a fair trial of the plan, which he had long had at heart, of giving the lower orders such an education as should raise them to a condition more consistent with the capacities of their nature and with the spirit of Christianity.

To avoid the interference of others as much as possible and to place the beneficial results of his system in a clearer light, he selected the objects of his experiment from the very dregs of the people. If he found a child who was left in destitute circumstances from the death of its parents or from their incompetency and vice, he immediately took him home, so that, in a short time, his house was converted into an asylum, in which fifty orphan or pauper children were fed, clothed and instructed in the different employments from which they might afterward be able to gain a livelihood and for the exercise of which his farm and the cotton manufactory, in which he was a partner, afforded an ample opportunity.

Continued.

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