The grammar book and the abc book of the outstanding philologist and teacher Meletius Smotrytsky

Abstract

The development of Ukrainian education and upbringing, the implementation of the ideas of national education depends on the study of the cultural and pedagogical heritage of Ukraine, analysis and evaluation of the activities of prominent figures of the past. Meletii Smotrytskyi was such an outstanding figure in the formation of Ukrainian education. In 2019, it was 400 years since the publication of his famous “Slavic Grammar Correct Syntagma”. In addition, it is the anniversary of the Hornbook, which was published in 1618 and 1621. Identifying the contribution of M. Smotrytskyi to the development of Ukrainian education and evaluation of his pedagogical work is relevant.
The article considers the pedagogical activity of the Ukrainian linguist, teacher Meletii Smotrytskyi. The work of an outstanding thinker and polemicist in the positions of a private teacher, professor, rector, author of the famous “Slavic Grammar Correct Syntagma”, the Hornbook and the term “hornbook” was clarified. M. Smotrytskyi’s advice on how and why to teach children, expressed in the ddress “To school teachers” in “Grammar”, where we actually have a sample method of language teaching, which shows that learning a language is impossible without learning grammar, which will give students skills not only to read and understand what is read, but also to write according to the rules, to express one’s thoughts, to know the order of words in a sentence, the rules that must be followed to keep the language clean, which is the stylistic guidelines of the author of “Grammar”. The article draws attention to the rules that are preserved in the main features in our time, the terms, punctuation, proposed by M. Smotrytsky, his authorship of a new spelling at the time.
The proposed article is an attempt to gather in a single source the achievements of scientific literature on the educational activities of a prominent thinker, to outline and promote the pedagogical views of Meletii Smotritskyi, to identify his contribution to the pedagogical heritage of Ukraine, to convey to the reader the importance of pedagogical activities.
The materials of the research can be used by teachers in writing lectures, students, graduate students in studying the history of the Ukrainian language and the history of pedagogy.