when applied to the teaching of specific truths, seems a needlessly roundabout and wasteful method of reaching a definite point.

Example of modern Socratic method. - An example of a typical Socratic lesson is given by Adams and quoted below. In studying it the reader should consider whether a more direct method of handling the difficulty would not have been more economical and just as effective. Adams says:

To illustrate, take the case of that constant difficulty at the early stages of composition, the incomplete sentence. Pupils brought up in illiterate homes are very apt to make a relative clause stand by itself, with no other help than the original grammatical subject. In schools where the pupils come from homes in which grammatical English is habitually spoken, there is not so much danger of this particular form of error, but every teacher in a school for the poorer classes is unpleasantly familiar with such a sentence in a pupil's exercise book as "John who broke the window." The following is a verbatim reproduction of a lesson actually given to a class of about sixty-five rather dull boys whose ages average eleven and one-half years. The sentence had occurred in one of the class exercise books, and was placed on the blackboard, as it had been written, with the addition of a comma after the word John. Teacher. Now what did John do?

Pupil. (Confidently) Broke the window.

T. Then what did who do?

P. Broke the window.

T. Were there two windows, then?

P. No, sir.

T. Then who broke it?

P. John.

T. And what did who do?

P. (Doubtfully) It says "who broke the window."

T. Did it take two to break the window?

P. No, sir.

T. Then which of them did the breaking?

(Pupils puzzled. No answer.)

T. How many people were there altogether?

P. (Cautiously) John and who.

T. Now, which was bigger, John or who?
P. They're both the same.

T. Then there was only one person there?

P. Yes, sir.

T. And what was his name?

P. John.

T. And what did he do?

P. Broke the window.

T. Then would it not be enough to say, "John broke the window"?

P. Yes, sir.

T. Is that what it says on the blackboard?

P. No, sir; it says, "John who broke the window."

T. And John and who are the same person?

P. Yes, sir.

7. Then they both have the same right to the verb?

P. Yes, sir.

T. Which of them is nearer the verb ?

P. Who.

T. What mark is between John and the verb ?

P. A comma.

T. Now if only one of the two can claim the verb, which has the better right to it?

P. Who.

T. And every noun and pronoun that is a subject must have a verb?

P. Yes, sir.

T. Then if who gets broke, what verb is left for John?

P. None.

T. How many subjects are there here?

P. Two.

T. And how many verbs?

P. One.

T. And every subject must have a verb?

P. Yes, sir.

T. How many verbs do we need, then, besides broke?
P. One.

T. Give me one.

(No answer.)

T. John (who broke the window) did something, or was something. What would you do if you broke a window?

P. (Promptly) Run away, sir.

T. Finish it, then. John, who broke the window,

P. Ran away.

T. Which are the two verbs now?

P. Broke and ran.

T. Which belongs specially to who?

P. Broke.

T. And to John?

P. Ran. (1: 81-82)

Some teachers approve extreme wandering in discussions. Sometimes teachers who are using the conversational method do not keep any specific objective point in mind, being unlike Socrates, who always had a definite purpose, although the foil or person who was being questioned was generally unaware of it and did n't know whither he was being driven. These teachers sometimes say they do not care where the students arrive, so long as they are mentally active. The teachers take up with any issue that is raised in the class discussion and follow it anywhere it leads. Sometimes they sincerely believe that this is the best use to which the class period could be put. Sometimes they are lazy teachers who fail to prepare definite material for the period and find it an easy way to keep the class interested and to get through the hour. Sometimes they are easy teachers who do not require their students to study consistently and for whom the latter prepare by saying, "Let's see if we can't get up a discussion to-day, so we won't have to recite." Sometimes the teachers are incompetent thinkers, who cannot distinguish quickly between what is relevant and useful and what is not; hence they easily get led astray in the discussions by inappropriate suggestions of the students.

Much better to tell some things than to waste time.Such poor administration of the conversational, or questionand-answer, method is condemned by Bagley in the following words:

Among some educators there is a superstition that the questionand-answer method is the only true method of instruction. This exaggerated view finds expression in the unwillingness to impart information in any way save by Socratic questioning. Valuable time is spent in attempting to get children to discover unimportant truths under a vague and hazy notion that it does n't matter much what the truth is so long as the child discovers it for himself, and so anxious is the teacher to have him discover it for himself that he spends twenty or thirty minutes in a "pumping" process to get a result which could have been stated in as many seconds.

It is this tendency to beat about the bush that constitutes the most dangerous pitfall of the question-and-answer method. Some judgments are not worth developing; they may better be stated as clearly and tersely as possible. The danger of confusing the pupil with a mass of details is also a source of some inadequate results in the application of this method by unskilled teachers. If the teacher is himself incapable of keeping system and unity in his thinking, he will find that his pupils cannot do it for him. (2: 274)

Conversational method wastefully used in pedagogical discussions.- Some of the best examples of the enormous waste that sometimes characterizes the conversational method are found in the discussions in classes which are studying education. For example, I visited a class of graduate students which was discussing methods of teaching music. They became sidetracked on some point concerning the perception of tonal differences. Nobody in the class, including the teacher, really had any reliable knowledge about the matter. Yet they spent forty-five minutes debating it vigorously, although they were no nearer the truth at the end than at the beginning of the discussion. After the class was over, I went to the library, took down from the shelves a book on

the "Psychology of Tone Perception," looked up the topic in the index, turned to the appropriate page, and found in three minutes the experimentally determined answer to the question upon which thirty adults had each wasted forty-five minutes of debate a total of one thousand three hundred fifty minutes, or twenty-two and one-half hours, of human time.

Legitimate uses. Conversational solution of problems valuable if properly controlled. In spite of the obvious dangers which beset the use of the conversational method, it has certain very legitimate uses. As suggested above, its best place is in the reflective solution of problems which the teacher has thoroughly mastered and for which the children possess the necessary data in their past experience. In such cases the important things for the teacher to keep in mind are the following: (1) To avoid being sidetracked. (2) To avoid spending too much time in an endeavor to get the class to discover a point. In order to preserve the balance of relative values the teacher should give some points outright or after a brief endeavor of the class to discover them. (3) To adapt the pace to individual differences in capacities, not holding up the bright pupils too long or hurrying so fast that the slow have no chance to contribute.

Conversational assignments important aids to study. Another place where the conversational method is especially valuable is in assigning lessons to be studied. In the case of reflective thinking it serves to get the problem in mind, to get started upon its solution, to anticipate and eliminate some of the chief difficulties, and to arouse curiosity to pursue the matter farther. In the case of acquiring habits of enjoyment it serves to give the necessary emotional setting which will be conducive to responses of enjoyment. In the case of training in expression a preliminary conversation may be very effective in getting students aroused to the point of being desirous of expressing themselves. It also aids in getting topics defined and even in getting freshly in mind the more formal phases