| Summary: | "These studies are an outgrowth of work begun in a seminar in "Mental Development" conducted by Professor Dewey in 1901-2. Their aim is to present a consistent and intelligible outline of the mental development of the child from the standpoint of mental function. They do not pretend to try to cover, even in a general way, all the aspects of child-psychology, but rather to outline a point of view from which it is believed a good deal of the chaotic material of child-study will assume a new significance. Child-study has fallen into disrepute, not because it is of slight importance to the educator, but because it has been pursued partly in an unscientific fashion and partly with the presuppositions of an out-of-date psychology, which dealt with "powers" rather than the life as a whole. These pages emphasize the point that the attempt to study isolated elements of the child's life is radically unscientific; that we must have as nearly as possible the complete setting of an act before we are entitled to say what it is or what it means"--Preface. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2013 APA, all rights reserved).
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