Page:American Journal of Sociology Volume 8.djvu/161

 THE ELEMENTARY-SCHOOL CURRICULUM 149

tools. For the development of these tools anthropology had to await the development of geology, biology, psychology, sociology, and other kindred sciences. But the organic charac- ter of society is illustrated here as elsewhere, and anthropology is now ready to render service to the sciences to which it owes its rise. An examination of its relation to the various sciences and arts would well repay the labor involved in a careful inves- tigation of the subject. But that is too large a subject for this occasion. Attention is invited at this time to but one phase of the larger subject the relation of anthropology to the curricu- lum of the elementary school.

The curriculum represents the social factor in the educational process. It corresponds to the stimulus, the individual factor being represented by the response. Since stimulus and response are but two phases of one activity, it is evident that the com- plexity of the stimulus bears a direct relation to the complexity of the response. That which constitutes the stimulus in a given case is not the external object itself, but the object functioning with reference to the individual. Whether an object functions as a stimulus in a given situation depends upon its relation to the attitudes of the child. These attitudes, which are largely the product of remote racial activities, and hence social products in a measure from the first, determine, within fairly definite limits, the nature and complexity of social stimuli. Manifestly it is the part of education to discover these attitudes, in order that materials may be presented that are best adapted to pro- mote the normal growth of the child. It is likewise important to guard against the use of materials that are liable to occasion experiences not conducive to such growth.

Anthropology has made important contributions to the study of the child's attitudes, and, as the science develops, it will undoubtedly yield still greater results. Assuming that the reader is familiar with these results and with the literature of mental development, let us pass directly to the consideration of the relation of anthropology to the elementary curriculum.

Because the child's attitudes are yet comparatively simple, because they have not yet been overlaid by complex social