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Problem, a Motive.—The foregoing description and examples of the educative process have shown that new knowledge necessarily results whenever the mind faces a difficulty, or need, and adjusts itself thereto. In other words, knowledge is found to possess a practical value and to arise as man faces the difficulties, or problems, with which he is confronted. The basis of conscious activity in any direction is, therefore, a feeling of need. If one analyses any of his conscious acts, he will find that the motive is the satisfaction of some desire which he more or less consciously feels. The workman exerts himself at his labour because he feels the need of satisfying his artistic sense or of supplying the necessities of those who are dependent upon him; the teacher prepares the lessons he has to present and puts forth effort to teach them successfully, because he feels the need of educating the pupils committed to his care; the physician observes symptoms closely and consults authorities carefully, because he feels the need of curing his patients; the lawyer masters every detail of the case he is pleading, because he feels the need of protecting the interests of his client. What is true of adults is equally true of children in school. The pupil puts forth effort in school work because he feels that this work is meeting some of his needs.
Nature of Problem.—It is not to be assumed, however, that the only problem which will prompt the individual to put forth conscious effort must be a purely physical need, such as hunger, thirst, or a distinct desire for the attainment of a definite object, as to avoid danger or to secure financial gain or personal pleasure. Nor is it to be understood that the learner always clearly formulates the problem in his own mind. Indeed, as will be seen more fully later, one very important motive for mastering a presented problem is the instinct of curiosity. As an example of such may be noted a case which came under the observation of the writer, where the curiosity of a small child was aroused through the sight of a mud-turtle crawling along a walk. After a few moments of intense investigation, he cried to those standing by, "Come and see the bug in the basket." Here, evidently, the child's curiosity gave the strange appearance sufficient value to cause him to make it an object of study. Impelled by this feeling, he must have selected ideas from his former experience (bug—crawling thing; basket—incasing thing), which seemed of value in interpreting the unknown presentation. Finally by focusing these upon this strange object, he formed an idea, or mental picture, which gave him a reasonable control over the new vague presentation. Such a motive as curiosity may not imply to the same degree as some others a personal need, nor does it mean that the child consciously says to himself that this new material or activity is satisfying a specific need, but in some vague way he knows that it appeals to him because of its attractiveness in itself or because of its relation to some other attractive object. In brief, it interests him, and thus creates a tendency on the part of an individual to give it his attention. In such situations, therefore, the learner evidently feels to a greater or less degree a necessity, or a practical need, for solving the problem before him.
NEED OF PROBLEM
Knowledge Gained Accidentally.—It is evident, however, that at times knowledge might be gained in the absence of any set problem upon which the learner reacts. For example, a certain person while walking along a road intent upon his own personal matters observed a boy standing near a high fence. On passing further along the street, he glanced through an opening and observed a vineyard within the inclosure. On returning along the street a few minutes later, he saw the same boy standing at a near by corner eating grapes. Hereupon these three ideas at once co-ordinated themselves into a new form of knowledge, signifying stealing-of-fruit. In such a case, the experience has evidently been gained without the presence of a problem to guide the selecting and relating of the ideas entering into the new knowledge. In like manner, a child whose only motive is to fill paper with various coloured crayon may accidentally discover, while engaged on this problem, that red and yellow will combine to make orange, or that yellow and blue will combine to make green. Here also the child gains valuable experience quite spontaneously, that is, without its constituting a motive, or problem, calling for adjustment.
Learning without Motive.—In the light of the above, a question suggests itself in relation to the lesson problem, or motive. Granting that a regular school recitation must contain some valuable problem for which the learning process is to furnish a solution, and granting that the teacher must be fully conscious both of the problem and of its mode of solution, the question might yet be asked whether a problem is to be realized by the child as a felt need at the beginning of the lesson. For example, if the teacher wishes his pupils to learn how to compose the secondary colour purple, might he have them blend in a purely arbitrary way, red and blue, and finally ask them to note the result? Or again, if he wishes the pupils to learn the construction of a paper-box or fire-place, would he not be justified in directing them to make certain folds, to do certain cutting, and to join together the various sections in a certain way, and then asking them to note the result? If such a course is permissible, it would seem that, so far at least as the learner is concerned, he may gain control of valuable experience, or knowledge, without the presence of a problem, or motive, to give the learning process value and direction.
Problem Aids Control.—It is true that in cases like the above, the child may gain the required knowledge. The cause for this is, no doubt, that the physical activity demanded of the pupil constitutes indirectly a motive for attending sufficiently to gain the knowledge. But in many cases no such conditions might exist. It is important, therefore, to have the pupil as far as possible realize at the outset a definite motive for each lesson. The advantage consists in the fact that the motive gives a value to the ideas which enter into the new knowledge, even before they are fully incorporated into a new experience. For example, if in a lesson in geometrical drawing, the teacher, instead of having the child set out with the problem of drawing a pair of parallel lines, merely orders him to follow certain directions, and then requests him to measure the shortest distance between the lines at different points, the child is not likely to grasp the connections of the various steps involved in the construction of the whole problem. This means, however, that the learner has not secured an equal control over the new experience.
Pupils Feel Its Lack.—A further objection to conducting a lesson in such a way that the child may find no motive for the process until the close of the lesson, is the fact that he is himself aware of its lack. In school the child soon discovers that in a lesson he selects and gives attention to various ideas solely in order to gain control over some problem which he may more or less definitely conceive in advance. For this reason, if the teacher attempts, as in the above examples, to fix the child's attention on certain facts without any conception of purpose, the pupil nevertheless usually asks himself the question: "What does the teacher intend me to do with these facts?" Indeed, without at least that motive to hold such disconnected ideas in his mind, it is doubtful whether the pupil would attend to them sufficiently to organize them into a new item of knowledge. When, therefore, the teacher proposes at the outset an attractive problem to solve, he has gone a long way toward stimulating the intellectual activity of the pupil. The setting of problems, the supplying of motives, the giving of aims, the awakening of needs—this constitutes a large part of the business of the teacher.
PUPIL'S MOTIVE
Pupil's Problem versus Teacher's.—But it is important that the problem before the pupil at the beginning of the lesson should really be the pupil's and not the teacher's merely. The teacher should be careful not to impose the problem on the pupils in an arbitrary way, but should try to connect the lesson with an interest that is already active. The teacher's motive in teaching the lesson and the pupil's motive in attending to it are usually quite different. The
