inquire what steps with regard to informing the community are necessary
to the success of a new program of studies.
Whose duty is it to plan new courses—that of the board of education,
the superintendent, or the teacher who is a specialist in some subject?
BOBBITT, J. F. What the Schools Teach and Might Teach. Published by
the Survey Committee of the Cleveland Foundation. (Copies may be
secured from the Russell Sage Foundation.)
KOOS, L. V. The Administration of Secondary-School Units.
Supplementary Educational Monograph No. 3, Vol. I, of the _School
Review_ and the _Elementary School Journal_. The University of Chicago
Press. Contains a summary of the practices of the approved schools of
the North Central Association.
Minimum Essentials in Elementary-School Subjects. Fourteenth Yearbook
of the National Society for the Study of Education, Part I, 1915.
Public School Publishing Company, Bloomington, Illinois. This is an
effort to bring together a statement of the essential requirements for
the elementary curriculum.
Report of the Committee of Ten on Secondary Education. National
Education Association. American Book Company. The most important
report ever prepared in relation to the organization and courses of
study of the high school. Its appearance marked the beginnings of the
present era of high-school expansion.
FOOTNOTES:
[41] Edwin A. Kirkpatrick, The Use of Money, pp. 1-2. The Bobbs-Merrill
Company, 1915.
CHAPTER IX
SPECIALIZED EDUCATION VERSUS GENERAL EDUCATION
PRESENT-DAY WAVERING BETWEEN SPECIALIZED AND GENERAL TRAINING
Because there is an urgent social demand for the reorganization of
the curriculum and because the principles which should underlie a
sound curriculum are as yet not clear, there is much running back and
forth in the educational world and much controversy that at times
grows very bitter and even personal. Experiments are set up and lauded
or assailed. Optimists are hopeful that out of this experimentation
will come much good. Pessimists see in it the failure of a democratic
educational system.
The recent controversies have revived the ancient dispute between a
general education which makes the “all-round man” and specialized
education which serves some particular purpose. This controversy can
be illustrated by two kinds of examples. First, let us listen to those
who are interested in higher education for the classes of students who
are going to high school and college. Later we shall find that there is
another level at which the same kind of controversy is going forward.
The following statements and counter-statements illustrate the extent
to which the dispute is carried:
I suggest, that, in the first place, a man educated in the modern
sense, has mastered the fundamental tools of knowledge: he can read
and write; he can spell the words he is in the habit of using; he can
express himself clearly orally or in writing; he can figure correctly
and with moderate facility within the limits of practical need; he
knows something about the globe on which he lives. So far there is
no difference between a man educated in the modern sense and a man
educated in any other sense.
There is, however, a marked divergence at the next step. The education
which we are criticizing is overwhelmingly formal and traditional.
If objection is made to this or that study on the ground that it is
useless or unsuitable, the answer comes that it “trains the mind”
or has been valued for centuries. “Training the mind” in the sense
in which the claim is thus made for algebra or ancient languages
is an assumption none too well founded; traditional esteem is
an insufficient offset to present and future uselessness. A man
educated in the modern sense will forego the somewhat doubtful mental
discipline received from formal studies; he will be contentedly
ignorant of things for learning which no better reason than tradition
can be assigned. Instead, his education will be obtained from
studies that serve real purposes. Its content, spirit and aim will
be realistic and genuine, not formal or traditional. Thus, the man
educated in the modern sense will be trained to know, to care about
and to understand the world he lives in, both the physical world
and the social world. A firm grasp of the physical world means the
capacity to note and to interpret phenomena; a firm grasp of the
social world means a comprehension of and sympathy with current
industry, current science and current politics. The extent to which
the history and literature of the past are utilized depends, not
on what we call the historic value of this or that performance or
classic, but on its actual pertinency to genuine need, interest or
capacity. In any case, the object in view would be to give children
the knowledge they need, and to develop in them the power to handle
themselves in our own world. Neither historic nor what are called
purely cultural claims would alone be regarded as compelling.
Even the progressive curricula of the present time are far from
accepting the principle above formulated. For, though they include
things that serve purposes, their eliminations are altogether too
timid. They have occasionally dropped, occasionally curtailed, what
experience shows to be either unnecessary or hopelessly unsuitable.
But they retain the bulk of the traditional course of study, and
present it in traditional fashion, because an overwhelming case
has not—so it is judged—yet been made against it. If, however, the
standpoint which I have urged were adopted, the curriculum would
contain only what can be shown to serve a purpose. The burden of proof
would be on the subject, not on those who stand ready to eliminate it.
If the subject serves a purpose, it is eligible to the curriculum;
otherwise not. I need not stop at this juncture to show that “serving
a purpose,” “useful,” “genuine,” “realistic,” and other descriptive
terms are not synonymous with “utilitarian,” “materialistic,”
“commercial,” etc., for intellectual and spiritual purposes are
genuine and valid, precisely as are physical, physiological, and
industrial purposes.[42]
The answer in florid and perfervid terms offered by a champion of the
classics is as follows:
I have left myself only a few words to sum up and define the main
issue raised by the so-called modernist reform of education. It
is not the place of physical science in our civilization and in
our universities: that is secure. It is not the opportunity of
industrial or vocational training for the masses: we all welcome
that. It is not the conversion of the American high school into the
old Latin-verse-writing English public school: nobody ever proposed
that. It is not the prescription of a universal requirement of Greek
or the maintenance of a disproportionate predominance of Latin in our
high schools and colleges: there is not the slightest danger of that.
It is the survival or the total suppression, in the comparatively
small class of educated leaders who graduate from high schools and
colleges, of the very conception of linguistic, literary, and critical
discipline; of culture, taste, and standards; of the historic sense
itself; of some trained faculty of appreciation and enjoyment of
our rich heritage from the civilized past; of some counterbalancing
familiarity with the actual evolution of the human man, to soften
the rigidities of physical science, and to check and control by the
touchstones of humor and common sense the _a priori_ deductions of
pseudo-science from conjectural reconstructions of the evolution of
the physical and animal man.
It is in vain that they rejoin that they too care for these things,
and merely repudiate our exclusive definitions of them. That is,
in the main, only oratorical precaution and the tactics of debate,
as, if space permitted, I could show by hundreds of citations from
their books. The things which, for lack of better names, we try to
suggest by culture, discipline, taste, standards, criticism, and the
historic sense, they hate. Or, if you prefer, they are completely
insensitive to them and wish to impose their own insensibility upon
the coming generation. They are genuinely skeptical of intellectual
discriminations which they do not perceive, and æsthetic values which
they do not feel. They are fiercely resentful of what they deem the
supercilious arrogance of those who possess or strive for some far-off
touch or faint tincture of the culture and discipline which they
denounce as shibboleths, taboos, and the arbitrary conventions of
pedants.
From their own point of view it is natural that they should deprecate
with sullen jealousy the inoculation of the adolescent mind with
standards and tastes that would render it immune to what one of them
has commended in print as the “science” of Elsie Clews Parsons. The
purpose, or, at any rate, the tendency of their policies is to stamp
out and eradicate these things and inculcate exclusively their own
tastes and ideals by controlling American education with the political
efficiency of Prussian autocracy and in the fanatical intolerance of
the French anticlericalists. Greek and Latin have become mere symbols
and pretexts. They are as contemptuous of Dante, Shakespeare, Milton,
Racine, Burke, John Stuart Mill, Tennyson, Alexander Hamilton, or
Lowell, as of Homer, Sophocles, Virgil, or Horace. They will wipe the
slate clean of everything that antedates Darwin’s _Descent of Man_,
Mr. Wells’s _Research Magnificent_, and the familiar pathos of James
Whitcomb Riley’s vernacular verse.
These are the policies that mask as compassion for the child bored by
literature which, they say, it cannot be expected to appreciate and
understand, or behind the postulate that we should develop æsthetic
and literary sensibilities only by means of the literature that
expresses the spirit of modern science, not that which preserves in
amber the husks of the dead past.[43]
THE THEORY OF SEPARATE SCHOOLS FOR DIFFERENT CLASSES OF PEOPLE
Both writers above quoted are speaking of those learners who are to
have large opportunities of higher education. What is to happen to
the common masses, to whom the last writer grants the “opportunity
of industrial or vocational training,” is still in doubt. There are,
however, disputants who are trying to settle this question also. To
illustrate we may borrow from a pamphlet issued by a great commercial
organization in its campaign for legislation which should transform the
school system of the city of Chicago and the state of Illinois.
STATEMENT OF PRINCIPLES
Definition: Vocational education includes all forms of specialized
education, the controlling purposes of which are to fit for useful
occupations, whether in agriculture, commerce, industry or the
household arts.
1. State aid is necessary to stimulate and encourage communities to
carry on work in vocational education, but local communities should
be permitted to initiate and should partly maintain such courses or
schools.
2. The vocational schools should not compete or interfere with the
present public school system, but should supplement it by providing
practical instruction in vocational lines for youth between fourteen
and eighteen who have left the present schools. To guard against any
competition with the public schools as now organized, a special tax
should be levied for the support of vocational schools, which, with
the State grant for their support, should not be taken from the funds
now provided by law for the support of the public school system.
3. The proper expenditure of State moneys for vocational schools
should be fully safeguarded, while at the same time the initiative in
adapting measures to local conditions should be left with the local
authorities. To secure these ends the general management and approval
of these courses and schools should be left to a State commission,
while the local initiative and direct control should be exercised
by a local board composed of employers, skilled employees and local
superintendents of schools.
4. An efficient system of vocational education requires different
methods of administration, different courses of study, different
qualifications of teachers, different equipment, different ways of
meeting the needs of pupils and much greater flexibility in adapting
means to ends than is possible under the ordinary system of public
school administration. For these reasons these schools should be under
a separate board of control, whether carried on in a separate building
or under the same roof with a general school, so that they may be free
to realize their dominant purpose of fitting for useful employment.[44]
If the last two quotations are stripped of their decorations, they
reveal a demand for a distinct class system of education. Broad
education is for the few. Specialized education is another matter,—let
it be developed for the masses.
PUBLIC DEMAND FOR A NEW CURRICULUM
It is interesting to note that the masses, so far as they can express
themselves, are asking for a change in the traditional curriculum and
are likely to get it. The masses are expressing their demands through
the courses sought by their children.
Our problem will perhaps be clearer if we turn from the writings of
those who discuss these matters to the changes which are actually going
on in the schools of the country.
COMMERCIAL COURSES IN HIGH SCHOOLS
High schools in all parts of the country are giving commercial courses
in increasing degree. The first type of industrial education to be
extensively cultivated in the United States was commercial education.
This consisted in training for clerical positions and was carried on
for the most part in private “business colleges.” The reason for the
early demand for this particular kind of training is to be sought in
the fact that America has for years been a country devoted on a vast
scale to exporting raw materials. Commercial training, which has to do
with the shipping of goods, was accordingly the first to grow here. The
extent of the demand for commercial training is vividly set forth in a
report of the City Club of Chicago published in 1912, which contains
the following chart:
ENROLLMENT IN PRIVATE VOCATIONAL SCHOOLS AND IN PUBLIC HIGH SCHOOLS OF
CHICAGO[45]
There are at least There are only
19,000 STUDENTS 17,781 STUDENTS
in in all
Private Commercial Schools Public High Schools
and 800 in
Private Industrial Schools in Chicago
in Chicago, and at least and only
$1,485,000 $1,114,526
is paid for is expended for
TUITION MAINTENANCE
[Illustration: FIG. 12]
The high schools of the country entered into competition with the
private commercial schools, and for some years the competition has been
running high. The private schools solicit and get a large patronage
on the ground that they do not teach anything that is useless. They
give short, compact courses fitted to pupils’ needs. The high schools
point out that the short courses leave the stenographer with a meager
vocabulary and the clerk with no outlook on life.
The public schools are gradually pulling ahead of their competitors
because they are employing a higher grade of teachers than formerly and
are doing the work in a fashion which is technically more complete. In
the meantime the commercial courses are becoming more “respectable”
and are being taken by a better grade of students. The effect of the
election of commercial courses by a better grade of students is such
as to modify the whole program of the school in the direction of more
attention to the needs and practices of business life.
AGRICULTURAL HIGH SCHOOLS
A second type of vocational course appears in the high schools of rural
communities where much attention is being devoted to agriculture.
Indeed, the increase in the number of high schools in the country
in recent years has been very largely due to the fact that rural
communities have taken an interest in carrying the training of pupils
beyond the rudimentary subjects of the elementary curriculum.
This movement relates itself to the development of a department of
agriculture in the Federal government and to the generous subsidy
through that department for agricultural experiments in centers of
education in all the states. Three years ago a large Federal subsidy
was set aside for the further promotion of agricultural demonstrations
and schools, and the recently enacted Federal legislation for
industrial education includes provision for more agriculture.
PART-TIME COURSES
A third movement which has recently attracted a great deal of attention
and favorable comment was started in the engineering school of the
University of Cincinnati and is known as the part-time plan. Classes
are organized in such a way that their members spend one week or one
month in the shop of some manufacturing plant and the next period in
school. A second group alternates in the reverse order, so that the
shop and the school are at all times engaged in regular work. Where
this plan is well organized, there is a special school officer, called
a correlator, who sees to it that there is some direct connection
between the shop work and the courses taken up in the schools.
The part-time plan aims to supply that mixture of practical opportunity
and training in science, mathematics, and the academic subjects which
will lead to both vocational efficiency and a general education.
VARIOUS TYPES OF TRADE SCHOOLS
Fourth, there are all kinds of schools for young people in the trades.
Some of these hold their sessions at night, when the working day is
over, and others are organized to take the young worker out of the shop
or store for a limited number of hours during the working day. In the
matter of instruction some give only special training intended to make
the worker more skillful; others give general courses in civics, or
history, or even in literary subjects.
Some of these schools for workers are organized by the corporations
which employ the workers. Thus, telephone companies and dry-goods
stores find that it is economical to train their employees. Some of the
schools are conducted by the school system and are provided with pupils
either through the voluntary demand on the part of learners or through
the operation of state laws or municipal ordinances compelling children
to attend such schools until they are of a certain age.
Fifth, trade training is provided not merely for those in the trades
but also for those who are preparing to enter them. Trade schools are
sometimes supported out of the public purse, sometimes by private
endowments. The method of instruction is that of requiring the learner
to go through a definite series of exercises which will give him skill
in the trade. The strictly technical training is usually supplemented
by some “general” training.
The following quotation gives a brief summary by one specialist in
vocational education of the writings of another specialist in the same
field:
THE MANHATTAN TRADE SCHOOL, NEW YORK CITY
This trade school for girls is now a part of the public-school
system of New York City. Its early history as a privately supported
institution is of absorbing interest, and has been tersely written by
Mrs. Mary Schenck Woolman, in her book entitled “The Making of a Trade
School.” In this volume she gives an interesting account of the first
experiment in the United States to deal in an adequate way with the
problem of furnishing vocational training and guidance to children
destined to enter industrial life, otherwise wholly unprepared, at the
earliest possible age.
The aim of the school is frankly stated to be the giving of help
to the youngest wage earners, but its ideals are of considerable
breadth. They are to demonstrate to the community what education is
needed for “the lowest rank of women workers” in order that a girl may
become self-supporting and adaptable, “understand her relation to her
employer, to her fellow workers, and to her product,” and value health
and moral and intellectual development.
The necessity for this effort was found in the unfortunate social and
economic conditions, and especially in the lack of opportunity for
progressive work. “After several years spent in the market” the girl
was found to be little better off than on her entrance into industrial
life.
After investigation, trades were selected in which are used the sewing
machine (foot and electric power), the paint brush, paste brush,
and needle. In organizing instruction all unnecessary waste was
eliminated; short, intensive courses were planned to give knowledge
and skill in the technical aspects of the selected trade, and to
develop mental alertness on the part of the worker. It has been
observed that “the academic dullness which is shown at entrance comes
frequently from lack of motive in former studies.” The fundamental
importance of health and the value of trade art as a help to progress
are given special emphasis.
The supreme value of the school’s trade-order business, as an
educational asset, is shown in the following quotation:
It provides the student with adequate experience on classes of
material used in the best workrooms; these girls could not purchase
such materials and the school could not afford to buy them for
practice. The ordinary conditions in both the wholesale and the custom
trade are thus made a fundamental part of instruction. Reality of
this kind helps the supervisor to judge the product from its trade
value, and the teaching from the kind of workers turned out. Through
the business relation the student quickly feels the necessity of
good finish, rapid work, and responsibility to deliver on time.
The businesslike appearance of the shop at work on the orders, and
the experience trade has had with the product, have increased the
confidence of employers of labor in the ability of the school to
train practical workers for the trades.... The business organization
and management required in the adequate conduct of a large order
department can itself be utilized for educational purposes.
A chapter devoted to representative problems makes an illuminating
analysis of the difficulties which must be met and solved by those
organizing schools for workers in the lower grades of industry. While
the instruction must be direct and specific, some preliminary general
training is needed, and work intended to awaken vocational interests
should also be provided. Mrs. Woolman believes that all this might and
should be given in the public elementary school. Other difficulties
are the keeping of the school organization flexible and sensitive to
ever-changing trade conditions, and in “close contact with industrial
and social organizations of workers in settlements, clubs, societies,
and unions, that all phases of the wage earner’s life—pleasures, aims,
and needs—may be appreciated.” There is the difficulty of securing
suitable teachers, and of working in harmony with the ideals of
organized labor.[46]
PRACTICAL APPLICATIONS AS PARTS OF ACADEMIC COURSES
The effect of these experiments in vocational education is clearly
discernible in the traditional courses. Reading books are beginning
to include extracts which deal with practical matters. Mathematics
textbooks are presenting more than ever before practical problems
drawn from commercial, trade, and agricultural life. Science, both in
elementary and advanced forms, is turning to practical applications.
In short, there is going on a kind of intellectual compromise which
will eventually make training in skill an accepted part of a general
training.
General training has until recently been so proud of itself that it has
not willingly accepted association with courses designed to cultivate
skill. The result is that the common man has gained the impression that
there is a wide gulf fixed between general education and practical
life. One hopeful symptom of the present situation is that discussions
of general education are becoming very much more democratic. To be
sure, there are examples of the proud exclusiveness of former days
still to be found in the writings of those who do not understand the
reach of modern reforms in the curriculum, but these cases are likely
to become fewer as the years pass. In the meantime the practical world
is making long strides in the direction of an appreciation of the
value of a general education. The shop mechanic should read. He should
be independent in his cultivation of contact with the most recent
movements in his trade. The teacher who teaches reading is coming to
recognize this as clearly as does the employer, and very shortly the
idea that reading is an artificial somewhat, cultivated exclusively for
purely intellectual reasons, will give way to the broader view that
even the artisan gains in efficiency by reading.
When that time comes there will be no room for the theory that there
should be a different school for the tradesman and the professional
class. There will be differentiation within the courses. There will be
an elective opportunity for each pupil which will adapt the curriculum
to his special needs, but there will be no industrial school on the
other side of the street, with a separate course, a different kind of
teacher, and a different governing board. Such a cleavage of social
interests would be disastrous to the academic subjects quite as much
as to the practical subjects. Academic life cannot bury itself in the
past; it must make its contribution to the activities of the present.
STUDIES OF SOCIAL ACTIVITIES
Nowhere is the future more clearly forecast than in the new lessons
which are being introduced into both the elementary schools and
the high schools for the purpose of teaching social organization.
Under the title “community civics” or “lessons in community and
national life” the social sciences are beginning to offer to the
lower schools an exposition of the life of the people who make up
society. These courses, like all new applicants for admission to the
crowded curriculum, are finding some difficulty in making their way
into the school. In spite of these handicaps the movement toward
the introduction of social studies into the general school is now
sufficiently under way to be described as one of the most hopeful
innovations in the curriculum.
EXERCISES AND READINGS
What would be the effect on a community of putting different social
classes of children into different schools? Is this done in any degree?
Is the principle involved in such a suggestion different in its
essentials from the elective system?
What classes of students elect commercial courses? If a school were set
up which taught exclusively commercial courses, would the attitude
of teachers and students toward their work be better than in a school
which gives general academic courses also?
Should agriculture be taught in city high schools? It is sometimes
argued that the country school should have a course of study different
from that given in the city school. Does the argument touch spelling?
arithmetic? drawing?
The part-time experiment has failed in a number of cases where the
correlator is not appointed. Can you see why?
At what age should trade training begin? Connect this discussion with
the earlier discussions of (_a_) compulsory education and (_b_) costs.
Is reading a practical subject? Is science a natural and desirable
part of a trade course? The Federal government has appropriated money
for trade training. Can any part of this money reasonably be spent in
teaching arithmetic? history? literature?
FARRINGTON, F. E. Commercial Education in Germany. The Macmillan
Company. A book dealing with one phase of the matter.
ROMAN, F. W. The Industrial and Commercial Schools of the United
States and Germany. G. P. Putnam’s Sons. An interesting comparison
of the provisions made in Germany for trade education with various
American efforts in the same direction.
Eleventh Yearbook of the National Society for the Study of Education.
Part I, 1912, Industrial Education. Public School Publishing Company,
Bloomington, Illinois.
Eleventh Yearbook of the National Society for the Study of Education.
Part II, 1912, Agricultural Education in Secondary Schools. Public
School Publishing Company, Bloomington, Illinois.
Lessons in Community and National Life. Published in 24 numbers
(October, 1917, to May, 1918) by the United States Bureau of Education.
FOOTNOTES:
[42] Abraham Flexner, A Modern School, pp. 8-9. Published by the
General Education Board, New York City, 1916.
[43] Paul Shorey, “The Assault on Humanism,” _Atlantic Monthly_, July,
1917.
[44] Vocational Schools for Illinois, pp. 1-2. Published by the
Commercial Club of Chicago.
[45] A Report on Vocational Training in Chicago and in Other Cities, p.
38. Published by the City Club of Chicago, 1912.
[46] Frank M. Leavitt, Examples of Industrial Education, pp. 149-151.
Ginn and Company, 1912.
CHAPTER X
EXTENSION OF SCHOOL ACTIVITIES
A GENERAL SOCIAL MOVEMENT
It would be a mistake to treat the innovations in the course of study
which were discussed in the last chapter as concessions to a narrow
demand for mere gain through the better training of workmen. To be
sure, there are some who would be willing to curtail the educational
opportunity of the common people in order to insure that type of
contentment which is supposed to dwell in the mind untrained in higher
ideas. But these are fortunately not likely to succeed in their plans.
The movement for a better industrial training is part of a larger
movement for a broader social and economic life for all. The important
fact about the whole movement is that changes within the school
parallel a general effort to deal with all the problems of modern life
as problems of popular education.
No exhaustive study of educational extension can be undertaken in
the short compass of a single chapter. Indeed, there is hardly more
than space to enumerate the types of activity which enter into this
movement. Confining ourselves, then, to this very modest effort, the
following outline will serve as a rough classification of the major
phases of the school-extension movement.
First, there are activities of pupils which lie outside the school
but are systematized and promoted through the supervision of the
school. Second, there are organized efforts to supplement and enlarge
school work by adding to the opportunities offered to pupils out of
school hours or during vacations. Third, there are continuation
courses offered in the schools for adults who have been limited in
their educational opportunities. Fourth, there are various forms of
educational propaganda through which communities are to be brought
to a more satisfactory economic or social status. Fifth, there are
legitimate and refined forms of entertainment, some intellectual and
some purely social, which are provided at public expense either in
the school building or in other meeting places. Some of these social
activities are directed toward the cultivation of a direct interest in
the schools; some have no special relation to schools. Sixth, there
is at present a great movement for the spread of education through
correspondence schools.
Following this outline, concrete examples of each type of activity may
be briefly described.
CREDIT FOR HOME ACTIVITIES
First, the extension of school supervision is illustrated by the fact
that in a township high school the girls who are taking cooking are
required to do each day a certain amount of laboratory work in the
kitchen at home. This is reported by the parents, and the cooking
teacher visits the homes from time to time to inspect the work. Again,
in many agricultural schools home gardening is required as a part of
the course. Sometimes a school officer is employed to keep up the
supervision of this home work during the vacation period. Another
series of examples under this heading is to be found in those systems
where miscellaneous home activities are credited by the school on the
report of parents. The following quotation taken from Superintendent
Alderman’s book on home credits shows how far the matter has been
carried in some quarters:
Below is the Spokane County plan.
BULLETIN FOR TEACHERS: HOME CREDITS
The following are the rules and reward offered for home work. This
work is to be done during the school week. No one is compelled to
enter this contest, and the pupil may drop out at any time.
All work must be voluntary on the part of the pupil. Parents are
requested not to sign papers for pupils if the work is not voluntarily
and cheerfully done.
The rewards for this work are:
One half-holiday each month to the child who has earned one hundred
or more home credits, and has not been absent or tardy for the month;
also 5 per cent will be added to his final examination. The pupil who
earns one hundred or more credits each month but fails in perfect
attendance will have the 5 per cent added to his final examination.
In addition, the board of directors may offer a prize to the pupil
in each grade who shall have the greatest amount of home credits,
and shall be neither absent nor tardy during the term, or from the
adoption of these rules.
List of Home Credits
Personal cleanliness 2
Cleaning teeth 1
Cleaning finger nails 1
Practicing music lesson 2
Dressing baby 1
Washing dishes 1
Sweeping floor 1
Making bed 1
Preparing meal 2
Making a cake 1
Making biscuits 1
Churning 2
Scrubbing floor 2
Dusting 1
Blacking stove 1
Darning stockings 1
Delivering papers 2
Retiring before 9 o’clock 1
Feeding and watering chickens 1
Feeding and watering horses 1
Feeding and watering cows 1
Feeding and watering hogs 1
Gathering eggs 1
Cleaning chicken house 1
Going for mail 1
Picking apples 2
Picking potatoes 2
Bringing in wood for to-day 1
Splitting wood for to-day 1
Bringing in water for to-day 1
Grooming horse 1
Milking cow 1
Working in field 2
Going for milk 1
E. G. MCFARLAND,
County Superintendent of Schools.
The following statement is made by Superintendent McFarland as to the
effect home credits had on attendance in 1913-1914:
We attribute the increase in our attendance this year in the schools
of Spokane County, outside the city of Spokane, largely to the Home
Credit System and our certificates for perfect attendance. While the
enrollment was 108 less than last year, yet our attendance was 16,712
days more. At the present rate of 16 cents per day, the pupils earned
for the county, from the State appropriation, nearly $2700 more than
last year. With the same enrollment as last year the increase of
apportionment would have reached approximately $6000.
The credit slip for the school week provides for a daily record of
“chores or work done” from Monday to Friday inclusive. It does not
contain a stated list of duties; the blanks are to be filled in by the
child. The list of home credits is furnished each district, but the
teacher uses her judgment in allowing credit for any chore peculiar to
her locality.[47]
In Greeley, Colorado, the high school gives credits for courses taken
in the Sunday schools. The teachers, under this plan, must be approved
by the school authorities and the work must be graded. In many schools
credit is given for music taken at home. Sometimes the results of this
instruction are examined, sometimes not. In the latter cases teachers
are sometimes approved by the school and their work then accepted
without further question.
RELATION OF HOME WORK TO TRADITIONAL SCHOOL WORK
All these examples make it clear that the school organization is being
used to systematize activities which without school credits are carried
on very irregularly. The supervision of the school is undoubtedly of
advantage to the activities. Is the draft made on the supervisory
energy of the school legitimate? The answer to this question is, in
some cases, undoubtedly no. Thus, if the school is not supplied by
the public with supervisory energy beyond that commonly devoted to the
routine of ordinary school work, it is difficult to manage without
distraction some of these new kinds of credits. Again, if outside
activities are allowed to take the place of regular school courses, the
dangers become even more apparent. The advocates of the home credit
system assert that the drawbacks are slight and offer examples to show
that there is no conflict, but rather help for the school work.
A boy in one of the Portland, Oregon, schools had trouble with his
spelling, getting a mark of only 4½ on a scale of 10. Soon after home
credits were put into use by his teacher he came to her and anxiously
inquired if he could help out his spelling grade with a good home
record. The teacher graciously assured him that he could. The boy
brought in each week one of the very best home record slips, and in
some mysterious manner his spelling improved as his hours of work
increased. He does not need his home record to help out his spelling
grade now, for last month he received more than a passing mark, 7½, in
his weak subject. The knowledge that there was help at hand relieved
his nervousness, and gave him confidence.[48]
AFTER-SCHOOL CLASSES AND VACATION CLASSES
The second type of extension to be noted is that which adds to the
regular school work by giving supervised opportunity outside the
ordinary curriculum.
One example is that of a high school which tried the experiment of
requiring manual training. The students grumbled a good deal about the
course because it was so different from their other work. The course
was abandoned. In its place was opened a voluntary class after school
hours to which only students who secured a high grade in their regular
work were admitted. There was a larger demand for the course than the
shop could satisfy.
Vacation schools are often supported by groups of citizens interested
in providing for pupils who have to remain in the city during vacation
and have no suitable employment or recreation to keep them off the
streets. So valuable is this addition to school work that it is very
often taken over by the school system.
A great deal of school gardening is being encouraged by finding vacant
lots or providing land in unsettled districts. School supervision
sometimes cannot be extended to cover this work. This movement has
been evolved during the recent campaign for food cultivation and
conservation into a general social movement.
Athletics are sometimes organized under school supervision; sometimes
only advisory help is furnished by the schools. The playground is
opened to pupils after school hours or a special playground is
provided. The matter of supervised play is important enough to justify
a full discussion in a later chapter.
Some schools are providing moving-picture exhibitions out of hours
for the pupils. The experiment has been successfully carried out by
charging enough for such entertainments to pay their cost, the school
thus furnishing only the place and the organization.
All these examples show that there is an unused margin of time and
energy which pupils will use somewhere. Especially in cities it becomes
a serious problem to insure wholesome conditions for the use of this
surplus. If the pupils need further opportunities and the schools can
provide them, it is certainly legitimate to carry out such plans. To be
really educational all these activities need supervision. Supervision,
of course, means either more expenditure of money to secure additional
supervisors or an increased demand on the energies of present school
officers. The present provision for instruction and supervision is
seldom excessive. Expansion, therefore, ought to be faced as a new
demand.
CONTINUATION CLASSES FOR ADULTS
Continuation courses for adults are intended to carry on the schooling
of people who for some reason or other have found it necessary to stop
ordinary school work. In many cases continuation classes are conducted
at night in what is commonly known as night school. Here there are two
types of courses, one designed to give training in the conventional
academic subjects, the other to give greater efficiency in the
practical occupational life of the student. As an example of general
courses not connected with industries we may cite the special courses
for immigrants which have of late been matters of an especially urgent
campaign by the Bureau of Education, as indicated in the following
paragraphs from a paper by Mr. Wheaton, the specialist on immigration
in the bureau:
Education, however, is the most potent force toward inculcating
American ideals and impulses. The English language and a knowledge
of the civic forces of the country are indispensable to the alien
in adjusting himself to America. Through our common speech comes
understanding. Without it the pages of our newspapers are meaningless
and ordinary matters of business with Americans must be transacted
through the medium of an interpreter. Only by overcoming inability
to speak English, by eliminating illiteracy among aliens, and by
instilling the ideals, attitudes, and habits of thought of America,
can we hope to make real American citizens of the strangers within our
gates....
The education of children of immigrants in the day schools has always
been considered a primary and essential function of the school
system. But the training of adults in English and civics has not
been generally so considered. Evening schools, through which only
can adults be reached effectively, have usually been regarded merely
as adjuncts to the day-school system, and hence are maintained when
funds can be spared or eked out. Adequate facilities for the adult are
rarely organized and maintained as an organic part of the educational
system with a specific appropriation and unified supervision.
In fact, education of immigrants has been left too largely to
the well-intentioned but sporadic interest and effort of private
organizations and individuals. The provision of public facilities
may, therefore, be treated at present and for some time to come as a
legitimate extension activity for educational systems.
It is with this latter conception in mind that the United States
Bureau of Education has for a considerable period been actively
engaged in promoting the extension of facilities for the education of
immigrants over the compulsory attendance age. Authority to undertake
this extensive program is derived from the organic act creating the
bureau in 1867 and from various acts of Congress making appropriations
for the purpose of promoting industrial and vocational training, the
elimination of illiteracy, and the cause of education generally.[49]
The industrial phase of continuation education was noted in the
discussions of the last chapter. It remains only to add that the
industrial courses for adults have done much to make available for
mature workers the kind of training which the school is now beginning
to give to children.
Continuation classes are often provided by organizations outside of the
schools, such as the Christian associations for young men and women,
and labor unions, and through private endowment.
DEMONSTRATIONS AS MEANS OF ECONOMIC AND SOCIAL IMPROVEMENT
The fourth type of educational activity may be described as educational
propaganda. The Federal government, especially through its Department
of Agriculture, has promoted scientific farming where there was no
initial impulse on the part of farmers to go to school. This work was
supported, especially in the Southern States, by the General Education
Board. It sometimes took the form of an appeal to the boys and girls as
well as to adults. A typical case is set forth in the first report of
the General Education Board.
A club consists essentially of a group of boys varying in number from
twenty-five to one hundred, and ranging in age from ten to eighteen.
Corn and cotton are both cultivated, but corn is preferred: first,
because the South needs more corn; secondly, because corn lends itself
better to study and selection. As a rule, each member works a plot
of one acre. The county superintendent of education is usually in
charge....
Driving through Macon County, Alabama, not long ago, two strangers
observed, in a large field of ordinary corn, a patch standing out like
a miniature skyscraper. They dismounted to interview the owner. A
Negro boy approached.
“Is this your corn?”
“Yes, sir.”
“How did you come to grow it?”
“One of Dr. Knapp’s men showed me, sir.”
“Why did you plant it so far apart in the rows?”
“Because, sir, most all that grows comes from the sunshine and the
air.”
“When did you plow?”
“Last fall, sir.”
“Why?”
“To make plant food during the winter.”
“Where did you get your fertilizer?”
“From the bottom, sir.”
“How many times did you cultivate?”
“Six times, sir.”
“Why?”
“Because there’s water down next to the clay, and when I don’t plow
the sun draws it all away.”
“When did you put in the cowpeas?”
“After the last plowing, sir.”
“What did you do that for?”
“Because the cowpeas get out of the air nitrogen, and put back in the
ground about as much as the corn takes out.”
How many valuable lessons had this remote Negro lad learned from doing
one job right! But this is not the end of the story. His double crop
was worth $52. From his pocket he pulled a dirty little pass-book,
the entries in which showed what the crop had cost. Reckoning his own
time at ten cents an hour and his father’s mule at a dollar a day, he
netted a profit of $30 to the acre. His younger sister, it appeared,
had had an equally profitable quarter of an acre in cotton. Three
years later both were students at Tuskegee, paying for their education
with the money earned as club workers.[50]
Equally impressive examples could be supplied of transformations in
homes brought about by demonstrations in cooking, house decoration, and
costume design given by teachers of domestic science and household art.
ENTERTAINMENT AS PART OF THE EDUCATIONAL PROGRAM
The problem of providing proper entertainment for people in the city
and proper places for the coming together of social groups in country
and city communities is one of the serious problems of modern life.
The church serves less than it used to the purposes of a meeting place
for the community. The schools have been called on to help solve this
problem. The extent to which the demand exists is illustrated by the
following quotation from the Cleveland survey[51]:
According to the custodians’ reports the total after-class lettings
of school accommodations during 1914-15 numbered 3,469. Of these,
462 were for mothers’ club meetings, class dances, pupil society
meetings, pay entertainments, bazaars, or some other kind of purely
school function and 3,007 were lettings to outside organizations. A
large part of the latter consisted of clubs or Sunday-school classes
connected with some 27 different churches which, along with two dozen
or more specifically named athletic societies, sought the use of
school gymnasiums and showers for basketball and similar indoor games.
The varied character of the bodies which hired the auditoriums, club
and classrooms can best be discovered from a perusal of the following
partial but representative list.
GROUPS USING SCHOOL ACCOMMODATIONS
Twentieth Ward Improvement Association
East End Chamber of Commerce
East End Neighborhood Club
Women’s Suffrage Political League
Municipal School League
Spanish War Veterans
Ladies’ Relief Corps
Knights of Pythias Lodge
Public School Association
Garment Workers’ Union
Warner Civic Association
Social Center Club
Teachers’ and Mothers’ Club
Western Reserve Dental Club
Thespian Dramatic Club
South End Choral Society
Mendelssohn Choir
Boys’ Glee Club
D. A. R. Clubs
G. A. R. Post
Normal Alumni
Alumni Club
Sanitation Club
Civic League
Boy Scouts
Boy Cadets
Camp Fire Girls
Y. W. C. A.
Mothers’ Club
Anti-Fly Campaign
Boys’ Chef Club
Patrons’ Club
Social Club
German Club
Latin Club
Syrian Club
These names show concretely what a wide range of Cleveland’s social
elements are nowadays seeking the kind of facilities which a modern
school edifice possesses. In the majority of cases these groups were
obliged to pay custodians’ fees ranging from 30 cents to $5.00 an
evening depending on the size of the quarters used. That fact attests
the genuineness of this demand and its vigor is further evidenced by
the rapid growth in volume which, as shown in the following table, has
practically doubled during the past two years.
GROWTH OF AFTER-SCHOOL USE OF SCHOOL FACILITIES BY NEIGHBORHOOD
ORGANIZATIONS
=======================================================================
| | |PER CENT
|1913-1914 |1914-1915 |INCREASE
————————————————————————————————————————+—————————-+—————————-+———————-
Organizations using buildings | 298 | 596 | 100
Total lettings | 1,932 | 3,007 | 56
Fees paid to custodians by organizations|$1,729.91 |$2,813.55 | 62
Aggregate attendance | 120,511 | 276,253 | 129
=======================================================================
ASSOCIATIONS AIMED DIRECTLY AT THE IMPROVEMENT OF SCHOOLS
A social organization which is of special importance to the schools
is the parent-teachers’ association, which is coming to be a common
adjunct of every school. Such an association often helps the school
to secure equipment which it needs, and furnishes a useful avenue for
the dissemination of ideas with regard to school policies. Sometimes
the school officer finds that the proper relation of the association
to school administration needs definition. He then falls back with
satisfaction on the words of a recent writer in the _Atlantic_:
Running a school or a class is a technical or expert job. It cannot
as a rule be done by an untrained person; and untrained people,
seeking to break in, are likely to do more harm than good. The school
situation, indeed, resembles the situation in medicine fifty years
ago. The practice of medicine at that time was atrocious; but it had
to be improved, and it was improved by doctors, not by laymen. I shall
not spare the schools; but schools must be improved by schoolmen—and
they will be.
We have then reached this point. Intelligent parents wish to have a
say in the education of their children. But schools must be conducted
by trained persons. The training of these persons is, however, largely
antiquated. Are we not deadlocked?
I think not. Parents cannot tell teachers what to do or how to do
it. But what they can do is to ask questions. They can, like the
man from Missouri, require “to be shown.” At first blush, this may
not look like very much. But if my readers will bear with me for a
moment, perhaps they will see that the right and the duty of asking
“to be shown,” of asking persistently and continuously “Why?” “Why?”
gives parents all the leverage they need or can use in making over the
education of their children.
Our schools could not be perfect. I won’t even stop to argue that
they can all at a bound make themselves much better than they are.
Parents cannot possibly make many practicable suggestions by way of
improving them. But just because we all know so little, just because
schoolmasters are so hampered by tradition and organization, just
because parents are so helpless in making practicable suggestions, for
these very reasons the complacent following of traditions is the most
inexcusable of attitudes. The schools which are now too conventional,
too complacent, too free from deep-seated and unhappy doubts, should
be tentative, inquiring, investigating, skeptical in their point
of view. They will be assisted in becoming tentative, inquiring,
skeptical, and experimental if parents will, year after year, make
them tell _why_, make them show _why_. For when people are called on
to show why, they begin to look into what they are doing, and out
of this critical scrutiny will come doubt, invention, and finally
something living in place of something long since dead.[52]
CORRESPONDENCE SCHOOLS
This discussion has not included, as perhaps it should, university
extension, libraries, rural-community organization, and other agencies.
It must, however, make reference to one popular movement which has
grown in recent years to proportions that are literally vast. The
correspondence schools of this country do an enormous amount of more or
less valuable teaching. The qualifying phrase “more or less valuable”
is justified by the fact that many of the correspondence schools are
purely commercial enterprises and provide a very low grade of courses.
The number of such schools, however, shows the demand for education,
the evidence in this case being the stronger when we recognize that in
many cases the quality of instruction is not such as to encourage the
student.
PRINCIPLES REQUIRED TO SYSTEMATIZE EDUCATIONAL ACTIVITIES
The list of activities which carry education far beyond the limits of
the traditional curriculum could be extended. A complete list would
include newspapers and magazines with their lessons on health, on food
and economic problems. It would include the churches and many social
organizations. The purposes of the present exposition have, however,
been adequately served if the reader has been impressed by the popular
demand for a broad educational program.
EXERCISES AND READINGS
Complications sometimes arise in the matter of credits, not from the
fact that they are given within a certain institution but rather from
the fact that a second institution to which students go cannot deal
with the credits. Suppose that a certain high school gives credit for
gardening. Should the college accept the credit toward admission? Is it
legitimate to substitute Sunday-school courses for senior English?
What would you want to know about a music teacher before crediting her
pupils with a high-school credit in music? How would you find out how
much work the music pupil had done? If you think an examination a good
method, would you give credit for typewriting to a boy who learned to
write outside of school and could pass an examination?
The distinction between an education and school credits is sometimes
painfully evident. Describe cases in which the effort to get credits
interferes with school work.
When a community is very enthusiastic about social centers, it often
asks the board of education to open the schools at night. Should the
board charge a fee or give the use of the building without charge? In
case the board does not have money enough to furnish the children with
playground apparatus, should it give the use of buildings free?
PERRY, C. A. Wider Use of the School Plant. Russell Sage Foundation.
This book treats in a comprehensive way of all the different types of
outside activity carried on in schools.
The Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science,
September, 1916, Vol. 67, No. 156. Concord, New Hampshire. The number
is given over to a symposium in which a number of authors give an
account of the outside activities which have in recent years been
attached to the school.
FOOTNOTES:
[47] L. R. Alderman, School Credit for Home Work, pp. 89-91. Houghton
Mifflin Company, 1915.
[48] L. R. Alderman, School Credit for Home Work, pp. 32-33. Houghton
Mifflin Company, 1915.
[49] H. H. Wheaton, “The United States Bureau of Education and the
Immigrant.” _The Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social
Science_, Vol. LXVII, No. 156 (September, 1916), pp. 273-274.
[50] The General Education Board: An Account of its Activities,
1902-1914, pp. 58, 61-62. New York City, 1915.
[51] Clarence Arthur Perry, Educational Extension, pp. 82-85. Cleveland
Education Survey. Published by the Survey Committee of the Cleveland
Foundation, 1916.
[52] Abraham Flexner, “Parents and Schools.” _The Atlantic Monthly_
(July, 1916), pp. 26-27.
CHAPTER XI
PRINCIPLES INFLUENCING THE ORGANIZATION OF THE CURRICULUM
NECESSITY OF PRACTICAL DECISIONS IN SPITE OF CONFUSION
With the expansions in education that have been reviewed in foregoing
chapters, there has come a certain confusion and uncertainty of
practice which sometimes tends to lower the standards of work in the
school.
Consider a concrete case. A small city can afford to offer only a
limited number of courses in its high school. Shall the choice fall on
Latin or typewriting? Among the sciences shall botany or chemistry be
provided? Botany would relate itself well to agriculture, and chemistry
would be a basis for domestic science. Sometimes in the effort to meet
both demands, weak courses are tolerated, and teachers are either
overloaded because they are called on to carry heavy programs or are
inadequately compensated in the effort to provide a sufficient number
to do all the work demanded.
Nor is it the school alone which is confronted with the necessity of
choosing; the individual student must elect. There is a high school
in a small city in Illinois, as shown by the last report of the North
Central Association of Colleges and Secondary Schools, which enrolled
in 1915 four hundred and sixty-one students. This school offered
twenty-three units in academic subjects and twelve units in vocational
subjects. If each pupil took five units a year, which would be a very
heavy program, he would be able to complete in four years only twenty
units, or fifteen less than the school offers. Another high school
in the same state with an enrollment of five hundred and thirty-two
students offers an aggregate of forty-four units.
Finally, there are choices to be made within these choices, because
after the decision has been reached that botany is to be taught, the
teacher must select from the abundant material within this science that
which seems most productive. The student, also, gives more attention to
one subject than to the others which he is pursuing, thus exhibiting
another kind of selection.
Choices have to be made, and every choice has back of it some prejudice
or some clearly thought-out principle or some experience collected by
the teacher or pupil through contact with earlier educational problems.
Our business in this course is, first, to become aware of the chief
reasons for the choices actually made in schools, and, second, to
take up some of the evidences which justify one or the other of these
reasons. The present chapter will be devoted to a brief statement of
the principles most commonly urged as the basis of choice.
THE DOCTRINE OF DISCIPLINE
The historical reason for training children which has come down to us
from the religious traditions of the Middle Ages, and more directly
from the austere beliefs and practices of the Puritans, is the supposed
demand for a curbing of the naturally perverse tendencies of children,
for a disciplining of nature into a higher form of morality. This
reason has in more recent times been phrased in new terms. The mind, it
is said, must be made strong through struggle with difficulties as the
athlete becomes skillful and muscular through training. If the training
seems for the time being monotonous and overvigorous, well and good;
the end justifies the effort. This is the doctrine of discipline.
THE DOCTRINE OF NATURAL EDUCATION IN THE FORM OF THE DOCTRINE OF FREEDOM
Against the notion of discipline there has been matched, especially
in the last century, the opposing notion that all good qualities
are natural and will express themselves freely if the artificial
restraints of life are removed. Rousseau, in his famous attack on
social conventions, pointed out the truth that the child is naturally
an eager learner. Biology reinforced Rousseau’s teachings with the
doctrines of natural selection and the survival of the fittest, meaning
by the fittest those able to take on complete adaptation to the present
environment. The belief that nature is a safe guide has led to the
doctrine of freedom for the child in all matters of intellectual
development.
CONCENTRATION AND INTEREST
The antithesis between discipline and freedom, between training which
aims to transform the child’s nature and training which gives the
child’s nature opportunity to express itself without restraint, can be
illustrated as follows. On the one side it is said that children have
no power of concentration of attention. They are flighty and erratic.
They must be made to think steadily in order to train their minds for
hard mental work. On the other side it is asserted that when a child’s
interest is aroused through an appeal to his natural tastes he will
exert his mind to the limit of its powers, and this is all that can
advantageously be required.
POPULAR ATTITUDE TOWARD DISCIPLINE
When the antithesis between discipline and natural interests is
presented to the present-day world, it must be said that there is
a widespread disposition to set aside discipline as arbitrary and
puritanical. Our generation is in favor of natural development.
Perhaps it would be truer to use the past tense in the last statement
because the social attitude toward discipline has been profoundly
affected by the war. Never in the history of this country has the
lesson been clearer than it is at the present that social coöperation
means the training of the individual to make some sacrifices. The
American school has carried the elective system and its concessions to
individuals to an extreme which is likely to be limited somewhat in the
future by a recognition of social obligations.
EXAMPLES OF DISCIPLINE AND FREEDOM
It may be well to illustrate this abstract discussion of discipline and
freedom with concrete examples. One of the most emphatic pronouncements
in favor of the doctrine of freedom is that of Madam Montessori, an
Italian physician whose system of education has been much heralded in
this country as a substitute for the kindergarten. According to this
writer’s views the pupil should have perfect freedom. The contrast with
the kindergarten is described as follows by one of the observers of the
two institutions:
A contrast between the Montessori school and the kindergarten of the
more formal and traditional type may serve to give a clearer picture
of the Montessori procedure, and consequently of the Montessori
conception of liberty as it appears in practice. The most evident
difference is seen in the function of the teacher. The kindergartner
is clearly the center and arbiter of the activity in the room. The
Montessori directress seems, on the contrary, to be at one side. The
kindergartner contemplates at each moment the whole of her group; the
directress is talking usually to one alone—possibly to two or three.
The kindergarten children are engaged in some sort of directed group
activity; each Montessori child is an isolated worker, though one or
more comrades may look on and suggest. The arrangement of the room
shows the same contrast. The kindergarten has a circle about which all
may gather, and tables for group activity. The Montessori room is
fitted, preferably, with individual tables, arranged as the children
will. (In the writer’s observation, there has been little deviation,
however, from arrangement in formal rows.) Montessori provides long
periods, say of two or more hours, while the kindergarten period
rarely goes beyond a half-hour. During the period assigned for that
purpose practically all of the Montessori apparatus is available for
any child (except for the very youngest or the newest comers), and the
child makes his choice freely. The kindergartner, on the other hand,
decides very nicely what specific apparatus shall be used during any
one period. The Montessori child abides by his choice as long as he
wishes, and changes as often as he likes; he may even do nothing if
he prefers. The child in the traditional kindergarten uses the same
apparatus throughout the period, and is frequently led or directed
by the teacher as to what he shall do. At other times he may be at
liberty to build or represent at will whatever may be suggested by
the “gift” set for the period. The Montessori child, each at his own
chosen task, works, as stated, in relative isolation, his nearest
neighbors possibly looking on.[53]
At the other end of the educational system we find the example of
“stiff” courses in college designed to “weed out” the slothful and
incompetent. The “stiff” course is required mathematics, or a foreign
language, or a course in English composition. Opposition to stiff
courses expresses itself in the demand for an undiluted elective system
in which the student may take whatever serves his purposes.
NATURAL EDUCATION AND RECOGNITION OF INDIVIDUAL DIFFERENCES
The advocacy of a natural education takes a different turn when it
drops the word “freedom” and emphasizes the fact that individuals
differ radically in their native capacities. Some pupils have an
aptitude for one kind of work, others for other types. The school is
to-day committed to a recognition of these differences and to a study
of their meaning. There is a movement known as the vocational-guidance
movement which is making progress in the direction of the discovery
of methods for finding out what studies can properly be undertaken by
students in view of their varying natural endowments. The individual’s
natural bent being discovered, his educational training can be directed
to the highest possible cultivation of his powers. Nature is thus
recognized but is not made the dominant fact. The vocational end is
the controlling factor in the situation. The attainment of this end
may require the most rigid disciplining of one’s powers. The direction
of this disciplining is dictated by nature, but not the particular
steps of education. As a result of such a discussion it begins to
appear that there is no fundamental reason for the abandonment of the
idea of discipline even if there is a complete recognition of natural
individual differences.
In concrete cases the opposition to the doctrine of discipline may,
however, be acute. The pupil may say that he has absolutely no natural
capacity for algebra or spelling. The teacher may answer that these
are universal requirements and that there is no escape from these
necessary studies because of individual differences. In such a dispute,
tradition, on the one hand, and the wider opportunities of the modern
curriculum, on the other hand, are likely to be arrayed against each
other. Algebra as the conservative subject is likely to defend the view
that discipline is necessary, whereas manual training and domestic
science are likely to emphasize the natural attractiveness of the
practical training which they offer. Thus it has come to pass that
certain subjects, especially the older subjects in the curriculum, have
come to be regarded as the defenders of the doctrine of discipline,
while the newer subjects have often been regarded as opposed by their
very character to the doctrine.
NATURAL EDUCATION AS TRAINING FOR LIFE
Still another turn is given to the discussion by an emphasis on the
social demands of later life. As society is constituted, individual
differences are sure to play a large part in determining success
or failure. Furthermore, society as constituted in its commercial
organizations accepts without hesitation the principle of division of
labor. Why should not the school be like society? Why should not the
school be a miniature world with all the different types of life that
will later become real to the pupils? Practical needs thus come into
the foreground.
TRAINING IN THE METHODS OF KNOWLEDGE AND GENERAL TRAINING
Two views are sometimes offered in opposition to the doctrine of a
strictly practical training. First, it is said that the pupil in order
to prepare for later life must pass through certain forms of training
which are preliminary, intended to set up his mental machinery before
it begins to produce anything. Otherwise expressed, it is said that the
pupil must get the tools of knowledge before he tries to take part in
real life.
Second, it is said that there is no possibility in the complex society
of the modern world of foreseeing just what will be the practical needs
of pupils when they grow to adult life. It will therefore be better, it
is argued, to aim at a broad flexible training which can in due time be
turned into any channel that circumstances may dictate.
EXAMPLES OF VIEWS ON FORMAL TRAINING
The dispute which is introduced by these opposing statements is one
of the bitterest in modern educational writings. Let us borrow two
quotations which will present the case in detail. Frank M. McMurry has
given in his report on the schools of New York City a striking example
of the advocacy of direct and constant attention to social needs.
In giving the quotation from this author it is possible to include
incidentally his description of an earlier view of the curriculum which
emphasizes general training or methods of thought rather than special
content.
PROMINENCE OF CURRICULUM IN DETERMINING QUALITY OF INSTRUCTION
Thirty years ago the belief was often expressed that it made little
difference _what_ one studied, but all the difference in the world
_with whom_ one studied. That belief made almost any curriculum
acceptable, and directed attention to the personality of the teacher
and to _method_ as the principal factors determining the effectiveness
of instruction.
That belief, however, has been greatly modified. While no one will
deny the importance of the teacher’s personality, most persons will
admit that the proper expression of personality and skill in method
are both greatly dependent upon the subject matter of the curriculum.
Carefully selected subject matter is prerequisite to skill in method
of presentation. Without a good curriculum there is bound to be great
waste.
BASES FOR JUDGING CURRICULUM AND SYLLABI
1. BY RELATION OF SUBJECT MATTER TO CHILDREN’S PURPOSES
In harmony with the previous discussion of standards for judging the
quality of instruction, as a whole, the quality of the curriculum in
particular is to be determined partly by its tendency to influence
the tastes, purposes, and hopes of children. Any curriculum for the
elementary school should have its content selected from among those
experiences of mankind that have seemed most valuable. That is to be
presupposed. But this selection can be indifferent to the tendencies,
interests, and capacities of children in general, and of certain ages
in particular, and aim only at present storage of facts and ideas
that may count in a dim future, i.e., in adult life. Or it may be
made with constant reference to the abilities, tastes, and needs of
children at the present time. In the former case, motive on the part
of children is overlooked; in the latter case, the extent of provision
for it is accepted as one of the standards by which the curriculum is
to be judged. We represent the latter point of view.[54]
The group of thinkers to whom McMurry refers with disfavor as absorbed
in methods rather than content has never been more ably represented
than by President Hadley, extracts from whose statement are as follows:
Greek is an intellectual game where the umpires know the rules better
than they know the rules in the game of French, for instance, or
history, or botany. A man’s rating in an examination on any one of
these last three subjects is largely the result of accident unless
the examiner is quite unusually skillful. A man’s rating in Greek,
on the other hand, means something. There never were intellectual
competitions keener than the classical competitions at Oxford in the
days when the best men in England wanted their sons to learn that
particular game.
Unfortunately, a large number of the strongest men, both in England
and in the United States, have decided that this game takes more time
than it is worth. Personally, I believe that this change of mind is
in many respects a misfortune; that in trying to get more practical
results in the way of knowledge or culture a great many American
college boys have lost the training which the Greek would have given
them and gained nothing of equal value in its place....
It was a mistake for the advocates of the old curriculum to think
that all the students required the same treatment. It is, I believe,
an equal mistake for the advocates of the elective system to think
that each student requires a different treatment. For while there is
a very large number of subjects of interest to study, and an almost
infinite variety of occupations which the students are going to follow
afterwards, there is a comparatively small number of types of mind
with which we have to deal. If we can have four or five honor courses,
something like those of the English universities, where the studies
are grouped and the examinations arranged to meet the needs of these
different types, we can, I think, realize the chief advantages of the
elective system or the group system without subjecting ourselves to
their evils. I am confident that we can secure a degree of collective
intellectual interest which is now absent from most of our colleges,
and can establish competitions which will be recognized not only in
college but in the world as places where the best men can show what is
in them.
It may be objected that any such arrangement would render it difficult
for a boy to study the particular things that he was going to use in
after life. I regard this as its cardinal advantage. The ideal college
education seems to me to be one where a student learns things that he
is not going to use in after life, by methods that he is going to use.
The former element gives the breadth, the latter element gives the
training.[55]
FORMAL DISCIPLINE AND TRANSFER OF TRAINING
The controversy here illustrated has led to the development of a number
of technical phrases. The doctrine that emphasizes form or method as
opposed to content is known as the doctrine of formal discipline. The
advocates of this doctrine defend the view that training gained in one
field will transfer to other fields of activity. Stated in these terms
the doctrine is referred to as that of the transfer of training.
The doctrine of transfer of training is capable of experimental and
statistical verification or refutation. A vast body of evidence has
been collected in recent years. The conclusions to be drawn from
this evidence are clear. There are certain general habits, such as
concentration of attention and power of arranging and expressing ideas,
which carry over from one field of experience to another. The transfer
of training is facilitated if the original training is given in such
a form that it lends itself readily to application in new spheres of
thought. So important is the development of general habits that it
is entirely legitimate to proceed at every stage of education slowly
enough to give to each subject its relations through a variety of
possible applications. It is recognized as impossible to give in the
schools direct special training for all possible lines of activity
upon which the pupil is to enter. Some effort must be expended in
cultivating what may properly be called the applying attitude of mind.
Once the applying attitude is aroused in any individual, the transfer
of training will be likely to go on through individual recognition of
the advantages of application.
RELATION OF SUBJECTS TO MATURITY OF PUPILS
The quotation from McMurry given some pages back suggests another
aspect of this whole matter which has been a subject of much dispute.
When should certain kinds of training be introduced into the
curriculum? A quotation will help to make the problem clear.
So far as high-school instruction is concerned, the most important
practical question raised in the present discussion is whether the
ability to learn a foreign vocabulary varies with age. It is almost
universally claimed that a student must begin a language when young
in order to learn it effectively and economically. In opposition to
this theory, we shall maintain, as in the case of motor skill, that a
foreign vocabulary can be learned just as economically at the later
end of the period from six to eighteen years of age as at any other
part of it. As the basis for this contention we have some very closely
related evidence from experimental psychology, in the work done upon
facility in memorizing at different ages.[56]
If the statement here quoted is accepted, it still remains an open
question whether the pronunciation of a foreign language is worth
acquiring and whether pronunciation is to be sought as an important
element of the study, for if it is, there is little doubt that young
children acquire it more easily and more accurately than do older
persons.
The example is introduced not for the purpose of attempting a
settlement of the question but for the purpose of showing that
the organization of the curriculum raises questions which are now
answered for the most part on the basis of mere prejudice, but should
be answered in the light of a body of broad, scientific evidence.
Certainly the problem of the distribution of a pupil’s studies through
the various periods of his mental development is one of the most
important of these problems.
SUMMARY
The doctrine of discipline holds that it is desirable by training to
transform in some measure the natural tendencies of the child’s mind.
The general doctrine of natural education emphasizes the importance
of following the lines of natural development in education. Often
this doctrine is so formulated as to be opposed to the doctrine of
discipline.
When dealing with the intellectual side of the pupil’s nature the
doctrine of discipline takes the form of a demand for cultivation of
concentration. Natural education asserts the right of the child to
his personal interests and is liberal in making concessions to these
interests.
The form of the doctrine of natural education most directly opposed to
the doctrine of discipline is the doctrine of freedom. According to
this view the pupil should be left to follow his natural impulses.
Another form of the doctrine of natural education recognizes the
differences between individuals as important considerations in
governing their training.
Training for practical life is a very common basis for the organization
of the curriculum and has been amply illustrated in earlier chapters.
Training in the methods or tools of knowledge is in some measure
opposed to the demand for practical training.
Training of general intelligence is advocated because it gives the
student greater freedom in adjusting his career to the circumstances of
later life.
Training in the forms of knowledge, or formal training, sometimes
called formal discipline, is practically synonymous with training of
general intelligence.
The doctrine of transfer of training is one formulation of the doctrine
of formal discipline. Evidence is abundant that transfer takes place.
Its degree and the methods of securing it are subjects of vigorous
investigation.
The adaptation of training to the maturity of pupils is one of the most
important requirements in arranging a curriculum. In a later chapter
this will be discussed under the title “Periodicity in the Pupil’s
Development.”
EXERCISES AND READINGS
The arguments for and against disciplinary subjects should be followed
in detail. Thus, why so much arithmetic in the lower school? Is it
necessary to have as much as we do in the upper grades, even admitting
its value in the lower grades? Are students of higher mathematics
practical men?
A child brought up in an indulgent home is sometimes pointed out as a
horrible example of a child brought up with unlimited freedom. Is the
example just? What are the different meanings which may attach to the
term “freedom”?
What does maturity on the part of a pupil mean? What are the marks of
increasing maturity? Can maturity be produced by deliberately adopted
school methods?
What elements of one’s own education can be traced to the demand on the
part of some teacher or parent for discipline? Was the demand when put
into actual operation in the school successful in producing general
improvement in one’s ability?
Classify subjects in the curriculum as designed to satisfy different
aims. How many different aims can be distinguished as appealing to
men of ordinary experience in their efforts to secure an education?
Booker Washington used to say that he found many people desiring an
education in order that they might escape from hard work. Is this a
common desire? Is it legitimate? Is it harder to earn one’s living by
composing music or by keeping books? Why do men want an education?
HECK, W. H. Mental Discipline and Educational Values. John Lane
Company. A summary of the arguments for and against formal discipline
with a very strong bias against.
JUDD, C. H. Psychology of High-School Subjects. Ginn and Company.
Especially the chapter which deals with formal discipline, with an
affirmative statement of what such discipline means.
MCMURRY, C. A. Conflicting Principles in Teaching. Houghton Mifflin
Company. An interesting and balanced summary of the general principles
discussed in this chapter and other principles of like type.
FOOTNOTES:
[53] William Heard Kilpatrick, The Montessori System Examined, pp.
14-15. Riverside Educational Monograph. Houghton Mifflin Company, 1914.
[54] Frank M. McMurry, Report on Educational Aspects of the Public
School System of the City of New York, 1911-1912, Part II, p. 265.
[55] Report of the President of Yale University, 1908-1909. Published
by the University, New Haven, 1909.
[56] Samuel Chester Parker, Methods of Teaching in High Schools, pp.
318-319. Ginn and Company, 1915.
CHAPTER XII
INDIVIDUAL DIFFERENCES
ADAPTATION OF CURRICULUM TO INDIVIDUAL PUPILS
A number of times in the last few chapters the discussion has been
brought to the point of recognizing the importance of individual
differences. The teacher cannot determine merely from a knowledge
of history what history is suitable for a given type of pupils. In
the elective system of the high school and of the college there is a
liberal recognition of the principle that instruction must be adapted
to individuals, both in content and method. The present chapter will be
given over to a treatment of some of the individual differences among
pupils which are of dominant significance in formulating the curriculum.
LOW GRADES OF INTELLIGENCE
The most striking example of individual deviation from the average
grade of intelligence is to be found in the cases of those
unfortunates who continue throughout life to be deficient because
they have underdeveloped nervous systems. As a result of heredity or
pathological conditions in early childhood a certain number of persons,
conservatively estimated as two in every thousand, are permanently
subnormal. These cases vary in degree. The lowest grade defectives,
known as idiots, are defined in the Report of the British Royal
Commission on the Feeble-minded as persons “so deeply defective in mind
from birth or from early age that they are unable to guard themselves
against common physical dangers.” The less defective are classed as
imbeciles, feeble-minded, and morons, each class representing a
further approach toward normality.
The lower grades of defectives are so dependent on the care of others
that they do not reach the school at all, but the higher grades either
escape detection until they try to learn reading and arithmetic or
through the persistence of parents are brought to school in the
hope that their defectiveness may be temporary. Some of the highest
grades succeed in learning enough so that they pass out of the first
grade. They do not master reading, but they learn to repeat the words
sufficiently to deceive the teacher with the appearance of having
recognized the printed symbols.
DIFFERENTIATED COURSES
As soon as a defective child is discovered, it is advantageous for him
and for the other pupils in the school that he be given some form of
special training. In most cases it is more than useless to try to give
him the ordinary school courses. He cannot learn to read well enough to
enable him to get information from books. He can, on the other hand,
acquire some of the simple arts of self-support. It would be better for
all concerned to give up the effort to teach such a child reading.
The major objection to a program of this type is that it is sometimes
extremely difficult and, in the early years, often quite impossible
to decide whether the child is really defective or is merely slow
in development. Some children come to their normal powers slowly,
but ultimately reach a level of intellectual and physical efficiency
so high that they are not to be classed with the defectives. One
hesitates, therefore, to give up the teaching of reading in the case of
a particular child until all possibility of his development is past. It
is better to err on the side of too great training than to despair at
too early a date.
TESTS OF GENERAL INTELLIGENCE
In the effort to discover defectives various systems of tests have been
devised. The general assumption back of all these systems is that a
defective child is one whose mental development has prematurely ceased.
For example, a twelve-year-old child may be behind in his development
to such an extent that he has a mind like a four-year-old. If, now,
it can be determined what mental powers are possessed by an ordinary
four-year-old and if the defective can be shown to possess the same
powers, and no more, it is possible to adapt instruction to his real
intellectual needs. Technical students of the problem have accordingly
drawn the distinction between physiological age and mental age. In the
example cited above the physiological age is twelve; the mental age,
four.
A system of tests of this kind has another use. If a child is put
through the tests at intervals of a year, it can be ascertained
whether he is improving or standing still. In this way some of the
uncertainties as to the permanence or temporary character of his
deficiencies can be removed.
Tests of the type under discussion are called tests of general
intelligence. An example taken from one of the most widely used
systems, namely, the Binet-Simon series, will serve to show what the
tests are and how they are used. The special form of the test here
quoted is that worked out by Professor Terman. His exposition of one of
the fifth-year tests is as follows:
_Materials._ It is necessary to have two weights, identical in shape,
size, and appearance, weighing respectively 3 and 15 grams. If
manufactured weights are not at hand, it is easy to make satisfactory
substitutes by taking stiff cardboard pill-boxes, about 1¼ inches in
diameter, and filling them with cotton and shot to the desired weight.
The shot must be embedded in the center of the cotton so as to prevent
rattling. After the box has been loaded to the exact weight, the lid
should be glued on firmly. If one does not have access to laboratory
scales, it is always possible to secure the help of a druggist in
the rather delicate task of weighing the boxes accurately. A set of
pill-box weights will last through hundreds of tests, if handled
carefully, but they will not stand rough usage. The manufactured
blocks are more durable, and so more satisfactory in the long run. If
the weights are not at hand, the alternative test may be substituted.
_Procedure._ Place the 3-and 15-gram weights on the table before the
child some two or three inches apart. Say: “_You see these blocks.
They look just alike, but one of them is heavy and one is light.
Try them and tell me which one is heavier._” If the child does not
respond, repeat the instructions, saying this time, “_Tell me which
one is the heaviest._” (Many American children have heard only the
superlative form of the adjective used in the comparison of two
objects.)
Sometimes the child merely points to one of the boxes or picks up
one at random and hands it to the examiner, thinking he is asked to
_guess_ which is heaviest. We then say: “_No, that is not the way.
You must take the boxes in your hands and try them, like this_”
(illustrating by lifting with one hand, first one box and then the
other, a few inches from the table). Most children of 5 years are
then able to make the comparison correctly. Very young subjects,
however, or older ones who are retarded, sometimes adopt the rather
questionable method of lifting both weights in the same hand at once.
This is always an unfavorable sign, especially if one of the blocks is
placed in the hand on top of the other block.
After the first trial the weights are shuffled and again presented for
comparison as before, _this time with the positions reversed_. The
third trial follows with the blocks in the same position as in the
first trial. Some children have a tendency to stereotyped behavior,
which in this test shows itself by choosing always the block on a
certain side. Hence the necessity of alternating the positions.
Reserve commendation until all three trials have been given.
_Scoring._ The test is passed if _two of the three_ comparisons are
correct. If there is reason to suspect that the successful responses
were due to lucky guesses, the test should be entirely repeated.
_Remarks._ This test is decidedly more difficult than that of
comparing lines. It is doubtful, however, if we can regard the
difference as one due primarily to the relative difficulty of visual
discrimination and muscular discrimination. In fact, the test with
weights hardly taxes sensory discrimination at all when used with
children of 5-year intelligence. Success depends, in the first place,
on the ability to understand the instructions; and in the second
place, on the power to hold the instructions in mind long enough to
guide the process of making the comparison. The test presupposes,
in elementary form, a power which is operative in all the higher
independent processes of thought, the power to neglect the manifold
distractions of irrelevant sensations and ideas and to drive direct
toward a goal. Here the goal is furnished by the instruction, “Try
them and see which is heavier.” This must be held firmly enough in
mind to control the steps necessary for making the comparison. Ideas
of piling the blocks on top of one another, throwing them, etc., must
be inhibited. Sometimes the low-grade imbecile starts off in a very
promising way, then apparently forgets the instructions (loses sight
of the goal), and begins to play with the boxes in a random way. His
mental processes are not consecutive, stable, or controlled. He is
blown about at the mercy of every gust of momentary interest.
There is very general agreement in the assignment of this test to year
V.[57]
EXCEPTIONALLY BRIGHT PUPILS
Thus far the discussion has been of inferior individuals. There are
likewise individuals who are superior to the average. Schools have
ordinarily taken little account of these. They do not constitute urgent
problems in the same sense as defectives. The supernormal child can get
his lessons, if he will, so that the teacher will never have to bother
with him. A moment’s thought on the matter, however, will convince
anyone that society has more to gain from a proper system of training
supernormal children than from special provisions for the subnormal.
Since defense is of the most vital importance, we may say that society
had at the outset to defend itself against the harm that might be done
by subnormals. But defense having been provided in adequate degree,
attention should turn to the possibilities of great benefit which may
be expected from special training of the unusually bright.
Various devices have been suggested for the treatment of the
supernormal. In general, the principles underlying these suggestions
are the same as the principles for the treatment of subnormals.
Separate the unusually bright and give them a type of training which
will best develop their personal powers.
In a school system which has only a few special cases of the one type
or the other it is extremely difficult to follow the suggestion of
special training for special levels of ability. The matter must be
left in such cases to the ingenuity of the teacher. The bright pupil
should be given extra work and, so far as possible, special attention.
The dull child should be allowed to do some useful handwork. Where the
system is larger, special rapid classes—express classes, as they have
sometimes been called—should be organized for the bright pupils, while
slowly moving classes are provided for the backward pupils.
SEX DIFFERENCES
Leaving the degrees of intelligence, we turn to a distinction which is
of an entirely different type—the difference between boys and girls.
It is difficult to disentangle this problem from a mass of social
considerations which attach to it. Women and girls have grown up under
a social system that has assumed on their part fundamentally different
tastes and interests from those of men and boys. The social system has
sometimes expressed itself in terms which imply inferiority of women
as compared with men. It is natural, therefore, that at a period when
women and girls are taking a new place in the social scheme, there
should be at first a good deal of attention given to the demonstration
that women are not inferior to men. The simplest demonstration can, of
course, be given by putting girls into the same classes with boys and
requiring of them the same intellectual tasks. For some years past the
experiment has been under way. Girls have shown themselves not only
quite as competent intellectually as boys but in some respects superior.
During the period of experimentation, however, there has persisted
a difference in tastes and interests; and the demand for a special
training for girls was never louder than to-day when the proof that
girls are quite as competent as boys seems to be incontrovertible.
The reasons for this demand are connected in part with the later
practical uses to which girls expect to put their training and in part
with the fact that girls give attention to certain groups of facts
which boys neglect, while boys, on the other hand, have their special
spheres of interest.
For example, boys are always brought up to interest themselves in
mechanical appliances. When a boy comes to study natural science,
therefore, it is easily possible to introduce the subject by examples
of a mechanical type. Parents do not give girls mechanical toys,
society assumes that girls will not engage in occupations which call
for a knowledge of machinery, consequently they do not readily take up
courses in physics which begin with mechanics.
The present situation, then, is something like this: girls are proved
to be equal to boys in school ability, but continue with the full
sanction of society to have tastes and interests different from those
of boys.
DIFFERENCES IN INDUSTRIAL OPPORTUNITY FOR THE SEXES AND CORRESPONDING
DEMANDS FOR TRAINING
The contrast in industrial demands which the school must meet in
dealing with boys and girls who are preparing for clerical positions is
shown in the following summary of conclusions reached by the Cleveland
survey:
Training for boys and girls should be different in content and in
emphasis.
The usual course of study in commercial schools is suitable for girls
and unsuitable for boys.
A girl needs, chiefly, specific training in some one line of work. She
has a choice among stenography, bookkeeping and machine operating.
A boy needs, chiefly, general education, putting emphasis on writing,
figuring, and spelling; general information; and the development of
certain qualities and standards.
* * * * *
Boys’ training looks forward to both clerical work and business
administration; but as clerical work is a preparation for business
and is likely to occupy the first few years of wage-earning, training
should aim especially to meet the needs of clerical positions.
Clerical positions for boys cover a variety of work which cannot be
definitely anticipated and cannot therefore be specifically trained
for. But certain fundamental needs are common to all.
Most of the specialized training for boys should be given in night
continuation classes.
Girl stenographers need a full high school course for its educational
value and for maturity. Girls going into other clerical positions can
qualify with a year or two less of education; but immaturity in any
case puts them at a disadvantage.
Boys’ training, for those who cannot remain in school, should be
compressed into fewer than four years. Immaturity in the case of boys
is not a great disadvantage.[58]
To many readers not prepared by a full consideration of the facts the
above conclusions may seem untenable. A brief section of the argument
will therefore be important in carrying conviction. This argument is
presented in the following quotation:
If we wish to generalize broadly about the work of boys and girls we
can say with truth that the majority of boys begin as messengers or
office boys and subsequently become clerks or do bookkeeping work. As
men they remain in these latter positions or, in at least an equal
number of cases, pass on into the productive or administrative end of
business. The majority of girls, first and last, are stenographers or
to a less extent, assistants in bookkeeping or clerical work. There
are of course boy stenographers and girl clerks, and there are women
in general administrative work; but that these are a minority this
report has several ways of showing.
Boys’ work may be expected to take on the characteristics of the
business that employs them; girls’ work remains in essentials
unchanged even in totally changed surroundings. For example, a boy who
is clerk in a wholesale house will have work very unlike that of the
boy who is clerk in a bank; but girl stenographers in both businesses
will have an experience that is practically the same.
Boys’ work, within limits, is progressive; girls’ work in its general
type—with individual exceptions—is static. Boys as a rule cannot stay
at the same kind of work and advance; girls as a rule stay at the
same kind of work whether or not they advance. Boys in any position
are expected to be qualifying themselves for the “job ahead,” but for
girls that is not the case. Boys may expect to make a readjustment
with every step in advancement. Each new position brings them to a
new situation and into a new relation to the business. Girls receive
salary advancement for increasingly responsible work, but any change
in work is likely to be so gradual as to be almost imperceptible if
they remain in the same place of employment. If they change to another
place those who are stenographers have a slight readjustment to make
in getting accustomed to new terms and to the peculiarities of the new
persons who dictate to them. Bookkeeping assistants may encounter
different systems, but their part of the work will be so directed and
planned that it cannot be said to necessitate difficult adaptation on
their part. The work of clerical assistants is so simple and so nearly
mechanical that the question of adjustment does not enter. These
girl workers do not find that change of position or firm brings them
necessarily into a new relation to the business.
Even moderate success is denied to a boy if he has not adaptability
and the capacity to grasp business ideas and methods; but a
comparatively high degree of success could be attained by a girl who
possessed neither of these qualifications. A boy, however, who has no
specific training which he can apply directly and definitely in work
would be far more likely to obtain a good opening and promotion than a
girl without it would be.
The range of a boy’s possible future in commercial occupations is
as wide as the field of business. He cannot at first be trained
specifically as a girl can be because he does not know what business
will do with him or what he wants to do with business. The girl’s
choice is limited by custom. She can prepare herself definitely for
stenography, bookkeeping, or machine operating and be sure that she
is preparing for just the opportunity—and the whole opportunity—that
business offers to her. Her very limitation of opportunity makes
preliminary choice and training definitely possible things.[59]
HOUSEHOLD ARTS AS EXTRAS
There is another respect in which the present-day training of girls
differs from that of boys. Girls are being trained in the science
of home-making. Where a girl intends to take up some vocation in
the business world, her desire for courses in the household arts
complicates the situation very seriously. The boy who is going into
business wants a general education plus some business training. The
girl wants all that the boy has plus household arts.
DEMAND FOR NEW COURSES FOR GIRLS
The demand for the complete education of girls gives rise to many
unsolved problems. For example, shall physics as at present taught be
required as an introduction to cooking, or shall the cooking course
be made to carry all the physics that the girl needs? The course in
physics, be it remembered, contains many an example that is drawn from
the boy’s sphere of interests in mechanics and does not appeal at all
to the girl’s interests.
Or one may ask a similar question about economics. Shall the girl be
given a special course in marketing in which examples are drawn from
the daily activities of home life, or shall she wait until she can take
the conventional course in political economy where the problems are
often those of international trade and banking?
It would be impossible to secure anything like unanimity for any answer
to these questions. The uncertainty in regard to the correct answer
calls attention to the opportunity which is offered to the intelligent
women of the teaching profession to solve a problem which is new and
complicated, but all the more important because there are no guideposts
to mark the way.
INDIVIDUAL DIFFERENCES WHICH APPEAR DURING TRAINING
The individual differences discussed up to this point may be described
as native differences. In addition, there are differences which appear
in the course of training. These, in turn, divide into two classes.
There are differences which seem to result from varying degrees of
mastery of the subjects taken in school, and there are differences in
taste and outlook which arise as the pupils mature to the point where
they begin to exhibit personal ambitions.
Recent studies of attainments of pupils in school subjects show how
striking are the differences among individuals. For example, it is
shown in the Cleveland survey that in the fifth grade of one and the
same school there are pupils who read orally only 7, 8, or 9 lines in a
minute, while others read orally 19 or 20 lines. In silent reading the
variations are even greater, covering rates from as low as 4 lines a
minute to as high as 40 lines.[60] What is true of reading is true in
equal degree of all the other subjects. The facts are graphically shown
in Fig. 13.
[Illustration: FIG. 13. Individual differences in the number of lines
read in a minute by pupils in the fifth grades of two schools
Each small square with a number represents an individual; the number
indicates the lines which he was able to read in a selected passage in
one minute
14 16
11 14 16 School A. Oral
11 12 13 14 16
11 12 13 14 16
11 12 13 14 15 16 17 20
5 6 8 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21
24
24
24 School A. Silent
17 24 25
17 20 24 25
13 16 17 20 21 24 25 30
8 9 11 12 13 15 16 17 18 20 21 24 25 26 27 28 30 33 40
15 17
15 17
15 17 18
14 15 16 17 18 19 School B. Oral
12 14 15 16 17 18 19 20
7 8 9 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20
24 School B. Silent
24
12 17 21 23 24
9 12 16 17 21 23 24 28 31 34
4 9 11 12 16 17 20 21 22 23 24 27 28 29 31 34 40]
The type of individual difference which develops when pupils begin
to look forward to their places in the practical world is of great
significance in organizing school work. School experience in this
matter is clearly reflected in the following resolution adopted in
1915 by the Department of Superintendence of the National Education
Association:
Resolved, That we note with approval the increasing tendency to
establish, beginning with the seventh grade, differentiated courses
of study aimed more effectively to prepare the child for his probable
future activities. We believe that as a result of these modifications
a more satisfactory type of instruction will be developed and that a
genuine economy of time will result.[61]
The differentiation of the curriculum here demanded is required in
order to keep in school those pupils who have reached the point where
any simple uniform curriculum would fail to furnish the variety which
they require to meet their developing tastes and their demands for
special training.
DEMOCRATIC RECOGNITION OF INDIVIDUAL DIFFERENCES
The differentiation of the courses for individual pupils was at one
time thought to be contrary to the democratic principle that all pupils
must be treated alike. We are coming to see that a democracy has need
of many kinds of people and that the truest expression of the principle
of equal treatment is through liberal provision for individual
differences.
EXERCISES AND READINGS
Evidently low grades of intelligence are most likely to be found in the
lower grades. Is the elimination of low-grade children from the regular
classes advantageous to them? It is sometimes argued that they gain
from association with the bright children.
With regard to the bright children, it is pointed out that they may be
pushed along too rapidly. How can this danger be avoided?
Are the elections of courses made by students in high school indicative
of sex differences? What tendencies in economic life can be noted as
bringing men and women to the same levels of occupation? Are these
tendencies likely to change the conclusions reached in this chapter?
What types of school work are adjusted, even in the present school
program, to the individual characteristics of pupils? How is the
discussion to be related to the chapter dealing with the grouping
of pupils? Is the argument of this chapter in favor of individual
tutoring? How far should it be insisted that all the members of a class
be kept together for a year in their attainments in arithmetic? in
Latin? in English literature? in typewriting? in laboratory physics?
How far down in the elementary school can individual election of
courses be organized with profit to the pupils? Could a medical school
or an engineering course be organized on the elective plan?
GALTON, FRANCIS. Inquiries into Human Faculty and its Development.
E. P. Dutton and Company. One of the earliest studies of individual
differences in mental characteristics, with special emphasis on
differences in mental imagery.
THORNDIKE, E. L. Educational Psychology (especially Vol. III).
Teachers College.
THORNDIKE, E. L. Measurements of Twins. Science Press. A study of the
degree to which individuals are alike.
FOOTNOTES:
[57] Lewis M. Terman, The Measurement of Intelligence, pp. 161-163.
Houghton Mifflin Company, 1916.
[58] Bertha M. Stevens, Boys and Girls in Commercial Work, pp. 179-180.
Cleveland Education Survey. Published by the Survey Committee of the
Cleveland Foundation, Cleveland, Ohio, 1916.
[59] Bertha M. Stevens, Boys and Girls in Commercial Work, pp. 14-16.
Cleveland Education Survey. Published by the Survey Committee of the
Cleveland Foundation, Cleveland, Ohio, 1916.