On the Theory of Primary Education

Abstract

The statement that educational science is lagging behind the demands of practice is all but a commonplace. One can generally agree that the principal shortcoming of the modern art and methods of teaching—the fulcrum of educational science—is the weakness of theory. However, it is useless merely to state this fact without exploring its true causes. What, in our view, is the cause of this underdevelopment of the principal theoretical questions in today's teaching methodology, and why is it that work on them goes so extraordinarily slowly?