Your Committee is agreed that the time devoted to the elementary school
work should not be reduced from eight years, but they have recommended,
as hereinbefore stated, that in the seventh and eighth years a modified
form of algebra be introduced in place of advanced arithmetic, and
that in the eighth year English grammar yield place to Latin. This
makes, in their opinion, a proper transition to the studies of the
secondary school and is calculated to assist the pupil materially in
his preparation for that work. Hitherto, the change from the work of
the elementary school has been too abrupt, the pupil beginning three
formal studies at once, namely, algebra, physical geography, and Latin.
Your Committee has found it necessary to discuss the question of
methods of teaching in numerous instances, while considering the
question of educational values and programmes, because the value and
time of beginning of the several branches depend so largely on the
method of teaching.
The following recommendations, however, remain for this part of their
report:--
They would recommend that the specialization of teachers’ work should
not be attempted before the seventh or eighth year of the elementary
school and in not more than one or two studies then. In the secondary
school it is expected that a teacher will teach one, or at most, two
branches. In the elementary school, for at least six years, it is
better, on the whole, to have each teacher instruct his pupils in all
the branches that they study, for the reason that only in this way can
he hold an even pressure on the requirements of work, correlating it in
such a manner that no one study absorbs undue attention. In this way
the pupils prepare all their lessons under the direct supervision of
the same teacher and by their recitations show what defects of methods
of study there have been in the preparation.
The ethical training is much more successful under this plan, because
the personal influence of a teacher is much greater when he or she
knows minutely the entire scope of the school work. In the case of the
special teacher the responsibility is divided and the opportunities of
special acquaintance with character and habits diminished.
With one teacher, who supervises the study and hears all the
recitations, that there is a much better opportunity to cultivate
the two kinds of attention. The teacher divides his pupils into two
classes and hears one recite while the other class prepares for the
next lesson. The pupils reciting are required to pay strict attention
to the one of their number who is explaining the point assigned him
by the teacher--they are to be on the alert to notice any mistakes of
statement or omissions of important data, they are at the same time
to pay close attention to the remarks of the teacher. This is one kind
of attention, which may be called associated critical attention. The
pupils engaged in the preparation of the next lesson are busy, each
one by himself, studying the book and mastering its facts and ideas,
and comparing them one with another, and making the effort to become
oblivious of their fellow-pupils, the recitation going on, and the
teacher. This is another kind of attention, which is not associated,
but an individual effort to master for one’s self without aid a
prescribed task and to resist all distracting influences. These two
disciplines in attention are the best formal training that the school
affords.
Your Committee has already mentioned a species of faulty correlation
wherein the attempt is made to study all branches in each, misapplying
Jacotot’s maxim, “all is in all” (_tout est dans tout_).
A frequent error of this kind is the practice of making every
recitation a language lesson, and interrupting the arithmetic,
geography, history, literature, or whatever it may be, by calling the
pupil’s attention abruptly to something in his forms of expression,
his pronunciation, or to some faulty use of English; thus turning
the entire system of school work into a series of grammar exercises
and weakening the power of continuous thought on the objective
contents of the several branches, by creating a pernicious habit of
self-consciousness in the matter of verbal expression. While your
Committee would not venture to say that there should not be some degree
of attention to the verbal expression in all lessons, it is of the
opinion that it should be limited to criticism of the recitation for
its want of technical accuracy. The technical words in each branch
should be discussed until the pupil is familiar with their full force.
The faulty English should be criticised as showing confusion of
thought or memory, and should be corrected in this sense. But solecisms
of speech should be silently noted by the teacher for discussion in the
regular language lesson.
The question of promotion of pupils has occupied from time to time
very much attention. Your Committee believes that in many systems
of elementary schools there is injury done by too much formality in
ascertaining whether the pupils of a given class have completed the
work up to a given arbitrarily fixed point, and are ready to take up
the next apportionment of the work. In the early days of city school
systems, when the office of superintendent was first created, it was
thought necessary to divide up the graded course of study into years
of work, and to hold stated annual examinations to ascertain how many
pupils could be promoted to the next grade or year’s work. All that
failed at this examination were set back at the beginning of the year’s
work to spend another year in reviewing it. This was to meet the
convenience of the superintendent, who, it was said, could not hold
examinations to suit the wants of individuals or particular classes.
From this arrangement there naturally resulted a great deal of what is
called “marking time.” Pupils who had nearly completed the work of the
year were placed with pupils who had been till now a year’s interval
below them. Discouragement and demoralization at the thought of taking
up again a course of lessons learned once before caused many pupils to
leave school prematurely.
This evil has been remedied in nearly one-half of the cities by
promoting pupils whenever they have completed the work of a grade. The
constant tendency of classification to become imperfect by reason of
the difference in rates of advancement of the several pupils owing to
disparity in ages, degree of maturity, temperament, and health, makes
frequenter classification necessary. This is easily accomplished by
promoting the few pupils who distance the majority of their classmates
into the next class above, separated as it is, or ought to be, by an
interval of less than half a year. The bright pupils thus promoted have
to struggle to make up the ground covered in the interval between the
two classes, but they are nearly always able to accomplish this, and
generally will in two years’ time need another promotion from class to
class.
The procrustean character of the old city systems has been removed by
this device.
There remain for mention some other evils besides bad systems of
promotion due to defects of organization. The school buildings are
often with superstitious care kept apart exclusively for particular
grades of pupils. The central building erected for high school
purposes, though only half filled, is not made to relieve the
neighboring grammar school, crowded to such a degree that it cannot
receive the classes which ought to be promoted from the primary
schools. It has happened in such cases that this superstition prevailed
so far that the pupils in the primary school building were kept at work
on studies already finished, because they could not be transferred to
the grammar school.
In all good school systems the pupils take up new work when they have
completed the old, and the bright pupils are transferred to higher
classes when they have so far distanced their fellows that the amount
of work fixed for the average ability of the class does not give them
enough to do.
In conclusion, your Committee would state, by way of explanation, that
it has been led into many digressions, in illustrating the details of
its recommendations in this report, through its desire to make clear
the grounds on which it has based its conclusions and through the hope
that such details will call out a still more thorough-going discussion
of the educational values of branches proposed for elementary schools,
and of the methods by which those branches may be successfully taught.
With a view to increase the interest in this subject, your Committee
recommends the publication of selected passages from the papers sent
in by invited auxiliary committees and by volunteers, many of these
containing valuable suggestions not mentioned in this report.
Organization for City School Systems.