The Teaching of Elementary Mathematics

Abstract

IN many training colleges for primary school teachers there are elaborate courses of study on psychology and ethics. Surely a knowledge of morals and of the mental machinery of boys and girls would be more certainly and more easily acquired incidentally during other studies, such as the natural sciences; but at these colleges there is seldom any attempt to educate through the natural sciences. We have, though not to the same degree, the same feeling about courses of instruction in mathematics. There is a cold-blooded formality about the mere name which tells all children truly that they are being offered stones for educational bread. But if there must, unfortunately, be separate courses of instruction in mathematics, we should, if we were children, dearly love to be taught by Mr. Smith. He is well read in his subject, and teachers who are also well read will take pleasure in seeing the best views so clearly put forward; teachers who are not learned in the subject will benefit greatly by reading this book. Short sketches of the histories of arithmetic, algebra and geometry are woven into the text in such a pleasant fashion that one reads and understands without much effort. The merits and demerits of various systems of teaching mathematics to very young children are clearly stated, but we cannot help thinking that too much is made of the philosophy of the numerous German exponents of pedagogy. There is no system which will give good results in the hands of a fool; there are many systems which will work fairly well in the hands of the average teacher; a thoughtful man who is in sympathy with his pupils will succeed with any method that he is likely to adopt. The Teaching of Elementary Mathematics. By David Eugene Smith, Principal of the State Normal School at Brockport, New York. Teachers Professional Library. P. xv + 312. (New York: The Macmillan Company. London: Macmillan and Co., Ltd., 1900.)