THE VILLAGE STREET
Playing store is a game of universal interest. Making a play store is a
fascinating occupation. These are factors which cannot be overlooked in
any scheme of education which seeks to make use of the natural activities
of children.
The downtown store stands to the children as the source of all good things
which are to be bought with pennies. It is usually the first place outside
the home with which they become familiar, and its processes are sure to be
imitated in their play. In their play they not only repeat the processes
of buying and selling, but try to reproduce in miniature what they regard
as the essential features of the real store.
If they are allowed to play this fascinating game in school, it may, by
the teacher's help, become at once more interesting and more worth while.
Curiosity may be aroused through questions concerning what is in the
store, where it came from, how it got there, what was done to make it
usable, how it is measured, and what it is worth. In seeking answers to
these questions, the fields of geography, history, and arithmetic may be
explored as extensively as circumstances warrant and a whole curriculum
is built up in a natural way. After such study, stores cease to be the
_source_ of the good things they offer for sale. The various kinds of
merchandise take on a new interest when the purchaser knows something of
their history, and a new value when he knows something of the labor which
has gone into their manufacture.
[Illustration: FIG. 31.--Box house and stores. Grades one, three, and two.
Columbia, Missouri.]
Being a subject of universal interest, it may be adapted to the conditions
of the various grades. It being also impossible to exhaust the
possibilities of the subject in any single presentation, it may profitably
be repeated with a change of emphasis to suit the development of the
class. For example, in the second grade, the study of the street is
chiefly a classification of the various commodities which are essential to
our daily life, and a few of the main facts of interest concerning their
origin. Those a little older are interested in the processes of
manufacture and the geography of their sources. In playing store, weights
and measures, the changing of money, and the making of bills take on an
interest impossible in the old-fashioned method of presenting these phases
of arithmetic. Discussions and narratives supply oral language work, and
descriptions, letters, and notes provide material for written exercises.
The class may be divided into groups, each group contributing one store to
the street, or the attention of the whole class may be centered on one
store at a time, as the immediate conditions suggest. If the former method
is used, as each store is finished it may be used as subject matter for
the entire class, while the important facts concerning it are considered.
The first permits a broader scope; the second a more exhaustive study. In
either case visits to the real stores studied are important supplements
to the work.
[Illustration: FIG. 32.--A village street. Third grade. Columbia,
Missouri.]
=General Directions.=--Discuss the stores on a village street. Which are
most important? Why? Decide how many stores the class can build, and
choose those most necessary to a community.
If self-organized groups[2] are allowed to choose the part they are to
work out, both interest and harmony are promoted and leadership
stimulated.
Use a box for each store. Each group is usually able to provide its own
box. Paper inside of box with clean paper, or put on a coat of fresh
paint. Make appropriate shelving and counters of thin wood.
Stock the store with samples of appropriate merchandise as far as
possible. Supplement with the best representations the children can make.
They should be left to work out the problem for themselves to a large
extent, the teacher giving a suggestion only when they show a lack of
ideas.
=Suggestions for Details of Representation.=--_Clay Modeling._--Clay may
be used to model fruits and vegetables, bottles and jugs for the grocery;
bread, cake, and pies for the bakery; different cuts of meat for the
butcher shop; horses for the blacksmith shop and for delivery wagons. Clay
representations may be made very realistic by coloring with crayon.
_Canned Goods._--Paper cylinders on which labels are drawn before pasting
serve well for canned goods. Cylindrical blocks may be cut from broom
sticks or dowel rods and wrapped in appropriately labeled covers.
_Cloth._--Rolls of various kinds of cloth should be collected for the dry
goods store. Figures may be cut from fashion plates and mounted for the
"Ready to Wear" department.
_Hats._--Hats may be made for the millinery store from any of the
materials commonly used. This is a good way for girls to develop their
ingenuity and resourcefulness.
_The Store Front._--The front of each store may be made of either wood or
cardboard, the spaces for doors and windows being left open that the
merchandise may be conveniently handled. Brick or stone fronts,
second-story windows, offices, etc., may all be indicated as artistically
as the capacity of the class permits by the use of colored crayons. The
sign is an important feature and should stimulate an interest in well-made
lettering.
=Additional Projects.=--In addition to representations of retail shops,
various industries, such as the carpenter shop, blacksmith shop, flour
mill, ice plant, and other familiar industries, may be represented.
Cooperative institutions, such as the post office and fire department,
should be included in the study.
[Illustration: FIG. 33.--A grocery. Fourth grade.]
=Excursions.=--Wherever possible, the plant should be visited by the class.
Before making the visit, the class should discuss what they expect to see,
and go prepared to find out definite things. Each child should have at
least one question which he is to ask, or one item of information for
which he is to be responsible to the class on the return. Often the visit
is more worth while to the class after they have tried to make a
representation from what they already know and from what they can read on
the subject. They are then more conscious of their needs and more alive to
the important elements than when they are merely seeing a new thing which
is to a great extent foreign to their experience. If they make the visit
first, they are apt to feel the need of another when they attempt to work
out their representation. If they make a representation first, they are
quite sure to be dissatisfied with it and want to make another after they
have made the visit. In either case their consciousness of need is a
measure of growth.
=Correlation.=--While the building of a store is in progress the study of
the sources and processes of manufacture of the various articles of
merchandise will supply valuable subject matter in several fields.
_English._--Books containing information on the subject will be read with
a definite purpose and more than ordinary interest. Especially if the
group method is used, will the members of a group be proud to bring to the
class interesting items concerning their particular part of the work.
These narratives and descriptions may be made excellent practice in either
oral or written English and will be of the sort Dewey characterizes as
"having something to say rather than having to say something."
_Geography._--This study may also enter as deeply into the field of
geography as the development of the class warrants. It will be geography
of a vital sort. How these things are brought to us touches the field of
transportation, creating an interest in ships and railroad trains, pack
mules and express wagons.
_History._--The study of the process of manufacture opens up the field of
industrial history, and in this, as in the geography, the study is limited
only by the capacity of the class.
_Number._--In the field of number the possibilities are also unlimited, in
studying the weights and measures used for different commodities, the
actual prices paid for these things, and the usual quantities purchased.
Playing store will involve the making of bills, the changing of money, and
the measuring of merchandise. Different pupils may take turns acting as
salesmen or cashier. The common practices of business life should be
followed as closely as possible, only in this case each purchaser should
make out his own bills. Actual purchase slips may be brought from home and
used in number lessons.
An inventory of the stock may be taken and will supply excellent practice
in addition and multiplication. After the example of _real_ stores, a
stock-taking sale at reduced rates may be advertised. The writer answered
such an advertisement by a third grade and asked how much could be
purchased for one dollar. Pencils were busy at once, and a variety of
combinations suggested. One pupil was quickly called to account by his
mates for offering only ninety-five cents' worth of merchandise for the
dollar. By these and numerous other exercises which will suggest
themselves to lively children and wide-awake teachers a vast amount of
vital subject matter may be dealt with in a natural way, quite on the
level of the child's experience and interest.
[Illustration: FIG. 34.--A grocery. Third grade. Columbia, Missouri.]
_Art._--The art side also may receive due attention in the general
proportioning and arrangement of the stores, in the modeling of certain
features from clay, as enumerated above, in the making of labels for boxes
and cans, in the writing of signs and advertisements, and in the color
combinations. These features are to a great extent incidental to other
problems just as the use of good taste is incidental to all the affairs
of life and should receive corresponding emphasis.
ILLUSTRATIONS
Figure 32 shows about half the stores built by one third-grade class. Some
of the subject matter drawn from the various stories was as follows: in
connection with the grocery, a study of the source of various articles of
food with oral and written descriptions of processes of manufacture; the
common measures used in the grocery, and ordinary amounts purchased.
In connection with the meat market, the names of various kinds of meat,
the animals from which they are obtained, and the part of the animal which
furnishes certain cuts; as, for example, ham, bacon, chops. The current
prices and approximate quantity needed for a meal made practical number
work.
The bakery called for an investigation of the processes of bread making
and a study of the material used. In all of the processes the teacher had
opportunity to stress the necessity for proper sanitation.
In connection with the dry goods store, the distinguishing characteristics
of cotton, wool, linen, and silk were emphasized and illustrated by the
samples collected for the store and by the clothing worn by the children.
Common problems in measuring cloth enlivened the number lessons.
The millinery store disclosed considerable ingenuity in the field of hat
manufacture, and a lively business in doll hats was carried on for some
time.
In connection with the post office, registered letters, dead letters,
money orders, rural free delivery, etc., were discussed, and the
advantages of cooperation touched upon.
[Illustration: FIG. 35.--A dry goods store. Third grade.]
The other stores of the village street offer further opportunity for
becoming better acquainted with the common things which lie close at hand
and touch our daily lives.
[Illustration: FIG. 36.--Home in a hot country.]
[Illustration: FIG. 37.--Home in a cold country.]