The eight secrets looked like this:
1) In place of skills training, rote memory drills.
2) In place of exercise to develop independent judgment, habit and attitude training.
3) Strict limits on student questioning.
4) Strict limits on student-to-student association.
5) Silent testing of material previously assigned for memorization, followed by publicly announced rankings of student test results. This done regularly.
6) Denial of student rights to initiate curriculum based on personal interests.
7) Long-term confinement in conditions of near-immobility and enforced silence, extended over a term of years.
8) Removal of students from familiar surroundings, routines, and people; placement under direction of strangers who discourage attempts to build personal student-teacher relationships.
This recipe was written down by a British military chaplain, Alexander Bell, who published a version of it in London in 1797 as the methodology in use by Hindu elites to manage their huge population. He thought such a discipline might prove useful to Britain’s own class-driven social order. Seldom has a single short essay had such lasting influence on world history. In a short time, Bell’s words were being read in governing circles across the world.
1) In place of skills training, rote memory drills.
2) In place of exercise to develop independent judgment, habit and attitude training.
3) Strict limits on student questioning.
4) Strict limits on student-to-student association.
5) Silent testing of material previously assigned for memorization, followed by publicly announced rankings of student test results. This done regularly.
6) Denial of student rights to initiate curriculum based on personal interests.
7) Long-term confinement in conditions of near-immobility and enforced silence, extended over a term of years.
8) Removal of students from familiar surroundings, routines, and people; placement under direction of strangers who discourage attempts to build personal student-teacher relationships.
This recipe was written down by a British military chaplain, Alexander Bell, who published a version of it in London in 1797 as the methodology in use by Hindu elites to manage their huge population. He thought such a discipline might prove useful to Britain’s own class-driven social order. Seldom has a single short essay had such lasting influence on world history. In a short time, Bell’s words were being read in governing circles across the world.
