“He is a bad boy” may mean so many things. In the eyes of some
teachers a boy is “bad” if he talks repeatedly to his neighbor.
The boy who has a fight with another boy is “bad.” The boy who
does not study his lessons is “bad.” The boy who goes to a
moving-picture show is “bad.” The boy who throws ink across the
room is “bad.” The boy who “answers back” is “bad.” The boy who
rifles the teacher’s desk is “bad.” The boy who disobeys school
rules is “bad.” “Give a dog a bad name and hang him” should now
read, “Give a boy a bad name and ruin him.”
All school types of “badness” need classification. Many
of them under careful classification would no longer be
considered “bad.” A boy’s wrong acts are often due not so much
to deliberate choosing of wrong after he knows right, but to
the lack of any sense of right or wrong. Children’s so-called
“badness” is due to unmorality oftener than to immorality. Until
a boy’s moral nature has been roused and developed, it is absurd
to think that one can find the basis of appeal in theoretic
ethics or right for right’s sake. Who is to blame when blind,
unquestioning obedience to short-sighted, arbitrary school rules
is made the basis of a child’s conduct and reputation?
When children go through school learning nothing except what
can be given to hundreds simultaneously, in classes so large
that undue emphasis is laid upon order and quiet, who is to
blame if the majority leave school with morals that alarm those
interested? Go through the list of “bad boys” in your school or
your town. Classify their offenses. Is immorality or unmorality
responsible? If the latter, what share of the blame for this
condition belongs to the school? Why consider a boy hopeless or
degenerate because he commits a moral offense? Do we consider
him intellectually hopeless or defective because of his errors
in spelling or arithmetic?--JULIA RICHMAN, “Proceedings
of the National Education Association,” 1909.
(180)