Reviews

Review and Herald Publishing Association · Takoma Park Station, Washington, D.C. · Jul 2, 1908

In the prosecution of study by any class of students, frequent reviews are necessary. This is so, because the memory is very much aided by repetition and by association. But, further, the understanding is often much improved by a review. Many of the sciences can not be presented in independent parts, nor can all the terms employed be fully appreciated till these parts are again viewed as a whole. Many things which were but dimly seen the first time they were passed over, become perfectly clear to the mind when viewed afterward in connection with what follows them.

In conducting reviews, regard must be had to the age and character of the pupils, and to the branch pursued. In arithmetic, and indeed in mathematics generally, where so much depends upon every link in the great chain, very frequent reviews are necessary. Indeed, almost daily it is profitable to call up some principle gone over before. In several branches, where the parts have a less intimate connection, as in geography, natural philosophy, and some others, the reviews may be at greater intervals. It would be well, I think, in every common school, to have a review-day once a week. This, besides the advantage already indicated, will lead the children to study for something beyond recitation.

Nor is it enough, at the review, that

the questions of the text-book be again proposed to the children. If this be all, they will exercise only their memories. As far as possible the subject should be called up, and the application of principles to practical life should be dwelt upon. If this course is expected by the learners, they will think during the week, in order to anticipate the examination of the teacher; and this thinking is more profitable to them than the knowledge itself.

It is always well, besides the periodical reviews, to have a general review at the close of any particular study. This enables the teacher to detect any false conceptions which the pupil has entertained during the first course. He can now present the subject as a whole, and view one part by the light of another. In natural philosophy, how much better the law of reflected motion can be appreciated after the subject of optics has been studied, in which the doctrine of reflection in general has been fully discussed and illustrated! In physiology, what light is thrown upon the process of growth in the system, by the subsequent chapters on absorption and secretion! How much clearer is the economy of respiration understood when viewed in connection with the circulation of the blood! A general review, then, is an enlightening process, and it is always profitable, with, perhaps, one exception. When it is instituted with reference to a public examination, it is very doubtful whether the evil is not greater than the good. It then degenerates into an effort to appear well at a particular time; it is again studying in order to recite; and I look upon it as no small evil that the mind should have any object in view which comes in between it and the grand desire to know,—to master the subject for its own sake, and not simply for the purpose of being able to talk about it on one great occasion.—Selected.