tened and made more
meaningful the other. In the same way the story and dramatization were
intimately related to the reading and the language, but there were
formal lessons in reading and formal lessons in language. The geography
illustrated nature study and employed language and arithmetic and
drawing in its exercises. And so the whole structure was organized and
coherent and unified, and what was taught in one class was utilized in
another. There was no needless duplication, no needless or meaningless
repetition. But repetition there was, over and over again, but always it
was effective in still more firmly fixing the habits.

One would be an ingrate, indeed, if one failed to recognize the great
good that an extreme reform movement may do. Some very precious
increments of progress have resulted even from the most extreme and
ridiculous reactions against the drill and formalism of the older
schools. Let me briefly summarize these really substantial gains as I
conceive them.

In the first place, we have come to recognize distinctly the importance
of enlisting in the service of habit building the native instincts of
the child. Up to a certain point nature provides for the fixing of
useful responses, and we should be unwise not to make use of these
tendencies. In the spontaneous activities of play, certain fundamental
reactions are continually repeated until they reach the plane of
absolute mechanism. In imitating the actions of others, adjustments are
learned and made into habits without effort; in fact, the process of
imitation, so far as it is instinctive, is a source of pure delight to
the young child. Finally, closely related to these two instincts, is the
native tendency to repetition,--nature's primary provision for drill.
You have often heard little children repeat their new words over and
over again. Frequently they have no conception of the meanings of these
words. Nature seems to be untroubled by a question that has bothered
teachers; namely, Should a child ever be asked to drill on something the
purpose of which he does not understand? Nature sees to it that certain
essential responses become automatic long before the child is conscious
of their meaning. Just because nature does this is, of course, no
reason why we should imitate her. But the fact is an interesting
commentary upon the extreme to which we sometimes carry our principle of
rationalizing everything before permitting it to be mastered.

I repeat