From the EDITOR'S INTRODUCTION The experimental investigation of educational problems had its origin, in large measure, among the workers in psychological laboratories. The subject matter of the problems is chiefly psychological in nature. Many of the methods which have been developed in the psychological laboratories are applicable to the study of the problems of education, and some of the problems in psychology, particularly those of learning and memory, have direct bearing upon education. During recent years ...
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From the EDITOR'S INTRODUCTION The experimental investigation of educational problems had its origin, in large measure, among the workers in psychological laboratories. The subject matter of the problems is chiefly psychological in nature. Many of the methods which have been developed in the psychological laboratories are applicable to the study of the problems of education, and some of the problems in psychology, particularly those of learning and memory, have direct bearing upon education. During recent years experimental education has experienced a very rapid growth, and there have been extensive developments in certain specialized directions. The fields in which this work has been largely done are the investigation of the learning process which characterizes progress in the subjects of study in school, the accurate measurement of attainment in these school subjects, and the determination of individual ability through tests of mental maturity, intelligence, and individual differences. These problems, while of the same general nature as those studied in the psychological laboratories, are in the main untouched in the work of these laboratories and in the manuals which have been prepared for the guidance of their work. Under these conditions the formulation of courses of experiments for students in education, which shall meet the special demands of this particular field of investigation, is highly desirable, since the organization of manuals to serve as guides in such courses has not kept pace with the research which has been carried on. This is the natural result of the newness of the field, of its lack of organization, and of the variable quality of the work which has been done in it. The present volume of this series of textbooks is an attempt, by a psychologist who has been engaged in much of this newer type of educational investigation, to make a workable organization of this new field in applied psychology, to sift the valuable phases of the work from those which are ephemeral, and to formulate a series of experiments which shall introduce the student to the more important problems of experimental education. As such it is hoped that it may prove of much use to students of such problems as are here included.
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