A School Chemistry

Abstract

MANY text-books of physics and chemistry are now constructed upon the interrogatory plan. Judiciously used, the method has real educational advantages, for it makes the student think for himself instead of merely using his brain as an absorbing medium for what he reads or is told. But the Socratic principle is often overdone. The questions which a teacher asks—either in book or verbally—in connection with experiments in progress, are frequently not those which present themselves to the mind of the student. True, by suggesting questions the pupil can be led to see the main points to be brought out, and to have an interest in finding answers to them; but the ideal plan is to let his own mind do the questioning instead of the mind of the teacher. While, therefore, we agree that the interrogative method largely employed by Dr. Waddell is often stimulating, and certainly much better than the plan of former text-books for schools, we do not believe it is altogether satisfactory.

A School Chemistry.

By Dr. John Waddell. Pp. xiii + 278. (New York: The Macmillan Co., 1900.)