Especially the
teachers and the physicians, later the lawyers as well, looked for
help from exact psychology. The science of education and instruction
had always had some contact with the science of the mind, as the
pedagogues could never forget that the mental development of the child
has to stand in the centre of educational thought. For a long while
pedagogy was still leaning on a philosophical psychology, after that
old-fashioned study of the soul had been given up in psychological
quarters. At last, in the days of progressive experimental psychology,
the time came when the teachers under the pressure of their new needs
began to inquire how far the modern laboratory could aid them in the
classroom. The pedagogical psychology of memory, of attention, of
will, and of intellect was systematically worked up by men with
practical school interests. We may notice in the movement a slow but
most important shifting. At first the results of theoretical
psychology were simply transplanted into the pedagogical field.
Experiments which were carried on in the interest of pure theoretical
science were made practical use of, but their application remained a
mere chance by-product. Only slowly did the pedagogical problems
themselves begin to determine the experimental investigation. The
methods of laboratory psychology were applied for the solving of those
problems which originated in the school experience, and only when this
point was reached could a truly experimental pedagogy be built on a
psychological foundation.
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