A Study of the Theory of the Individual Education in about the thirtieth year of Meiji

Abstract

The education respecting individuarity is one of the greatest matters of concern to us in the present education. But the theory of the individual education already appeared in about the thirtieth year of Meiji in Japan. This theory was proposed by the normal school teachers, Otohiko Hasegawa, Tsunejiro Okamoto and others in Meiji era. The features of the theory were that they criticized the classroom teaching and approved the existence of various individuality. Hasegawa mainly studied the theory from the "Special Pedagogy" of the German pedagogical scholor, H. Kern and Okamoto chiefly studied from the practice of the one-class school teaching. The educational policies after the war between Japan and Shin affected this theory of the individual education. That is to say, Meiji government, which aimed at the aggression, negated the man of uniform and looked for the man of ambition and drive. In that sense, the proposal of the theory of the individual education agreed with the negation of the formal and uniform education, in the end. The theories of Hasegawa and Okamoto influenced the other theories of individual education in later age and the theories of individualization in teaching practice. The education respecting individuality grew to be one of the principles in the "New Education Movement" in the Taisho era.