The fundamental causes of this widespread influence were the educational unrest which filled the United States forty years ago, and the fact that through Mr. Sheldon's efforts the Oswego school offered a means of satisfying it. This unrest made a good soil for the new educational ideas; these new ideas were discussed by school men before New York State had a normal school; and the school at Albany was founded and began the teaching of educational theories before the Oswego school was even thought of. What Mr. Sheldon did was to focus all these floating ideas on actual practice, and work out a systematic and rational expression of these theories for the daily work of the schoolroom—to do what other men were dreaming about. Doubtless Mr. Sheldon had unusual genius for organizing and teaching, but these exercised under purely selfish motives would not have led to such results. School work as a business, pursued for salary alone, attains no more than it seeks. E. A. Sheldon with his ragged Oswego boys and girls in 18J:8, and Heinrich Pestalozzi with his destitute orphans at Stanz in 1799, teach the same lesson. Love, hope, and faith are the most potent forces in education as well as in religion. Through these forces the Oswego movement began; through these, its founder became and has remained a seeker for educational righteousness, ready to try all things and to hold fast the better; through these, he became receptive of good influences from all sources, and eagerly sought to impart them to others. An incident occurring in 1861 shows how Oswego's gospel was at first spread. An invitation was issued to leading educators of different States to come to Oswego to observe the methods. This invitation was cordially accepted, and after careful examination these observers made a favorable report, stating that "the system of object teaching is admirably adapted to cultivate the perceptive faculty of the child, to furnish him with clear conceptions and the power of expression, and thus to prepare him for the prosecution of the sciences or the pursuits of active life." They also expressed the opinion that this system "demands of the teacher varied knowledge and thorough culture; and that attempts to introduce it by those who do not clearly comprehend its principles, and who are not trained in its methods, can result only in failure," thus indorsing the necessity of training schools.
The system introduced at Oswego is commonly called Pestalozzian, because it was inspired so directly from that source, for the Home and Colonial was founded by disciples of Pestalozzi. The essentials of Pestalozzianism may be summed up as a new point of view; and, as resultants of this, a new conception of education, and methods appropriate for realizing it.[1] The old education takes
- ↑ See Krüsi's Life and Work of Pestalozzi.
