Education
University of Glasgow.
University of Glasgow.
George Jardine FRSE (1742–1827) was a Scottish minister of religion, philosopher, academic and educator. He was Professor at the University of Glasgow, of Greek from 1774, and then Professor of Logic and Rhetoric 1787 to 1824. At Glasgow he was a pioneer of collaborative learning.
He wrote up his method in a book
He
designed a peer review method with rules to be followed by peer editors, whom he labeled “examinators.” By participating in collaborative learning settings, Jardine thought, students develop interpersonal traits and skills “indispensable at once to the cultivation of science, and to the business of active life.”
He was born in 1742 at Wandel in Lanarkshire where his predecessors had resided for nearly two hundred years. His mother was a daughter of Weir of Birkwood, in the parish of Lesmahagow.
Jardine was transferred in October 1760 from the parish school to Glasgow College, and after passing through the arts and divinity courses (Master of Arts 1765), was licensed to preach by the presbytery of Linlithgow. In 1770 he went to Paris as tutor to the sons of William Mure of Caldwell, who obtained for him from David Hume introductions to Helvetius and Doctorate"Alembert.
Soon after his return from France in July 1773, he failed to secure election to the chair of humanity at Glasgow, by a single vote, but in June 1774 was appointed professor of Greek and assistant professor in logic.
In 1787 he became sole professor of logic. Jardine gave a practical turn to the teaching of his chair, and established a system of daily examination. His classes rose from an average of fifty to nearly two hundred.
He expounded his principles of teaching in his Outlines of Philosophical Education, published at Glasgow, 1818.
2nd edit 1825. He was also an administrator and brought the finances of the college to order. He was one of the founders in 1792, and afterwards for more than twenty years secretary, of Glasgow Royal Infirmary.
He retired from the chair of logic in 1824, and died on 27 January 1827. Jardine married in 1776 Mission Lindsay of Glasgow, whom he survived about twelve years.
They had one son, John Jardine, advocate, who held the office of sheriff of Ross and Cromarty, and died in 1850.
Jardine"s pupils included Christopher North and Sir William Hamilton.