Wordsworth as an Educationist

Abstract

During the closing of eighteenth and the opening years of nineteenth centuries a revolution in educational theory was taking place. Instead of mechanical method of education emphasis was laid on method of The educationists of the time aimed to bring out responses of the child. Rousseau was one of the fore-runners of natural education. He suggested that the child should be raised in the country away from the complexity of civilization and to learn, not through the use of books, but by experience. To him, children should not be confined inside closed places and memorize abstract information; instead they should be set free to experience things themselves and learn accordingly. These ideas of Rousseau correspond with Wordsworth's child rearing. He thought that nature helps in the development of inherent capacities of a child. He believes that child's imagination is fostered by nature. In The Prelude he says: ………. bright blue river passed Along the margin of our terrace walk; A tempting playmate whom we dearly loved. Oh, many a time have I, a five years' child, In a small mill-race severed from his stream, Made one long bathing of a summer's day; Basked in the sun, and plunged and basked again Alternate, all a summer's day, or scoured The sandy fields, leaping through flowery groves Of yellow ragwort; or, when rock and hill, The woods, and distant Skiddaw's lofty height, Were bronzed with deepest radiance, stood alone Beneath the sky, as if I had been born On Indian plains, and from my mother's hut Had run abroad in wantonness, to sport A naked savage, in the thunder shower. Fair seed time had my soul and I grew up Fostered alike by beauty and by fear: This research article will trace Rousseaus influence on Wordsworth with especial reference to his poem The Prelude.