JOHN AMOS COMENIUS
(28 March 1592 – 4 November 1670)
JOHN AMOS COMENIUS (Jan Amos Komensky) was born in 1592 in Nivnice, Moravia, in the area that is now the Czech Republic. Known today as the 'Father of Modern Education,' he pioneered modern educational methods. A contemporary of Galileo, Descartes, Rembrandt, and Milton, Comenius contributed greatly to the Enlightenment. John Amos Comenius was a Czech teacher, educator, and writer.
Life sketch
John Comenius was the youngest child and only son of Martin Comenius and his wife Anna. His parents and two of his four sisters died in 1604, and young John went to live with his aunt. Due to his impoverished circumstances, he was unable to begin his formal education until late. He was 16 when he entered the Latin school. In 1618 he became pastor and rector at Fulnek, one of its most flourishing churches. Throughout his life, this pastoral activity was his most immediate concern. He served as the last bishop of Unity of the Brethren, and became a religious refugee and one of the earliest champions of universal education, a concept eventually set forth in his book Didactica Magna. He lived and worked in many different countries in Europe, including Sweden, the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, Transylvania, the Holy Roman Empire, England, the Netherlands, and Royal Hungary. Comenius died in Amsterdam in 1670. Comenius is buried in Naarden, Holland.
The level of teaching should be suited to the child’s understanding.
Effective learning is done through the use of vernacular language.
Education should be in accordance with the child’s natural interest.
Older children should stay longer in school, while younger ones stay in school only for a short of period time.
Subject mastery: All subjects should be thoroughly mastered. All classes of the same level should have the same textbooks, teachers, and tests or examination.
Morning hours should be devoted for intellectual subjects, while the afternoon hours should be spent on subjects that promote physical and aesthetic development. He was the first to use pictures in textbooks (The Visible World In Pictures, 1658).Comenius is best known for his innovations in pedagogy, his religious and metaphysical convictions. Comenius characterized human life–from the mother's womb to grave–as a series of educational stages in which objects from nature would serve as the basis of learning. He believed in a holistic concept of education.
He taught that education must begin in the earliest days of childhood, and continued throughout life. He emphasised on early childhood education. He advocated the formal education of women, an idea which was unheard of in his day. Comenius formulated the general theory of education. He was the first to formulate that idea of “education according to nature”. The most permanent influence exerted by Comenius was in practical educational work. He first applied or attempted to apply in a systematic manner the principles of thought and of investigation to the organization of education in all its aspects. The summary of this attempt is given in the Didactica Magna.
He disapproved of the scholastic tradition of studying grammar and memorizing texts. He lamented the haphazard and severe teaching methods in European schools, which tended to diminish student interest in learning. Comenius felt that all children–whether male or female, rich or poor, gifted or mentally challenged–were entitled to a full education, and he regretted that only a privileged few received formal schooling.
AIM OF EDUCATION ACCORDING TO COMENIUS
The aim of education is to alleviate human suffering. Education aims at uniting all people and religions through a common appreciation of God. The aim of education is to create a good man and ultimately a good society. The ultimate purpose of human life is to become united with God and to obtain eternal bliss in life after death, with life here on earth being the preparation for life after death. Education helps man to attain this goal.
METHOD OF TEACHING SUGGESTED BY COMENIUS
He was a strong advocate of sensory learning who believed that the child should experience the actual object of study before reading about it. Comenius argued that the acquisition of new material began through the senses. Comenius desired to make learning enjoyable and more meaningful through the use of dramatic productions and other innovative methods. He showed aversion to corporal punishment. He was the first to use pictures and illustrations in text books. Lessons should proceed from easy to complex at a slow and deliberate pace.
ROLE OF TEACHER ACCORDING TO COMENIUS
Comenius argued that teachers could ensure that they produced knowledgeable and virtuous students who would continue to learn throughout their lives. He viewed teaching as a technical skill; if performed correctly, one could guarantee the results. Comenius delineated a universal teaching method or standard set of pedagogical postulates that would facilitate an effective communication of knowledge between the teacher and student. He said that teachers needed to identify their students' stages of development and match the level of instruction accordingly. Comenius also advocated that teachers begin with simple lessons for students to master before proceeding to more complex exercises. He recommended that teachers employ the students' native language as a necessary frame of reference for unfamiliar words to become meaningful.
PHILOSOPHY OF PANSOPHY BY COMENIUS
His philosophy of Pansophism (meaning 'all knowledge') attempted to incorporate theology, philosophy, and education into one. He searched for a method to alleviate human suffering while uniting all people and religions through a common appreciation of God. He believed that universal education and pedagogy, pansophy would eliminate human prejudice and lead to human perfection. He believed that learning, spiritual, and emotional growth was all woven togethe. Comenius believed that a pansophic college- "college of light" would be located in a prominent and accessible locale and utilize a common language in order to facilitate the inclusion of all European scholars of prominence. He reasoned that a good man (a rational being who understood God through nature), and ultimately a good society, could only be created if all people acquired encyclopedic knowledge.
Major works of Comenius
During his lifetime, Comenius published 154 books, mostly dealing with educational philosophy and theology. His educational influence on the subject matter and method of education, were exerted through a series of textbooks of an entirely new nature.
v The first-published of these was the Janua Linguarum Reserata (The Gate of Languages Unlocked), issued in 1631. This book brought him widespread prominence and fame.
v This was followed later by a more elementary text, the Vestibulum, and a more advanced one, the Atrium, and other texts.
v In 1657 was published the Orbis Sensualium Pictus probably the most renowned and most widely circulated of school textbooks. It was also the first successful application of illustrations to the work of teaching, though not, as often stated, the first illustrated book for children.
v In his Didactica Magna (Great Didactic), he outlined a system of schools that is the exact counterpart of the existing American system of kindergarten, elementary school, secondary school, college, and university.
v The World in Pictures a pivotal text in pedagogical innovation that opened the way for modern-day teaching instruments such as audiovisual aids and electronic media.
v In 1639, Comenius published his Pansophiæ Prodromus,
v Comenius also attempted to design a language in which false statements were inexpressible
His texts were all based on the same fundamental ideas:
learning foreign languages through the vernacular; obtaining ideas through objects rather than words; starting with objects most familiar to the child to introduce him to both the new language and the more remote world of objects; giving the child a comprehensive knowledge of his environment, physical and social, as well as instruction in religious, moral, and classical subjects; making this acquisition of a compendium of knowledge a pleasure rather than a task;making instruction universal.
While the formulation of many of these ideas is open to criticism from more recent points of view, the importance of the Comenian influence in education has now been recognized for half a century. The educational writings of Comenius comprise more than forty titles. Comencius’ contributions to the educational scene are immeasurable in many ways. He pioneered modern educational methods. He wrote several textbooks on education. These were so original that they won him the name “Father of Modern Education”.
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