The schools devote about the usual amount of time to training for the
correct use of the mother tongue. Most of the time in intermediate
and grammar grades is devoted to English grammar. Composition receives
only minor attention.
TABLE 6.--TIME GIVEN TO LANGUAGE, COMPOSITION, AND GRAMMAR
========================================================
| Hours per year | Per cent of grade time
|-----------------------|------------------------
Grade | Cleveland | 50 cities | Cleveland | 50 cities
--------------------------------------------------------
1 | 79 | 75 | 10.9 | 8.6
2 | 95 | 79 | 10.8 | 8.7
3 | 79 | 94 | 9.0 | 10.3
4 | 104 | 106 | 11.8 | 10.9
5 | 120 | 116 | 13.6 | 12.0
6 | 120 | 118 | 13.6 | 12.2
7 | 125 | 134 | 14.3 | 13.7
8 | 125 | 142 | 14.3 | 14.1
========================================================
Total | 847 | 864 | 12.3 | 11.4
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In the teaching of grammar too much stress is placed on forms and
relations. Of course it is expected that this knowledge will be of
service to the pupils in their everyday expression. But such practical
application of the knowledge is not the thing toward which the work
actually looks. The end really achieved is rather the ability to
recite well on textbook grammar, and to pass good examinations in the
subject. In classes visited the thing attempted was being done in a
relatively effective way. And when judged in the light of the kind
of education considered best 20 years ago, the work is of a superior
character.
As a matter of fact, facility in oral and written expression is, like
everything else, mainly developed through much practice. The form and
style of expression are perfected mainly through the conscious and
unconscious imitation of good models. Technical grammar plays, or
should play, the relatively minor role of assisting students to
eliminate and to avoid certain types of error. Since grammar has this
perfectly practical function to perform, probably only those things
needed should be taught; but more important still, everything taught
should be constantly put to use by the pupils in their oversight of
their own speech and writing. Only as knowledge is put to work, is it
really learned or assimilated. The schools should require much oral
and written expression of the pupils, and should enforce constant
watchfulness of their own speech on the part of the pupils. It is
possible to require pupils to go over all of their written work and to
examine it, before handing it in, in the light of all the grammatical
rules they have learned. It is also possible for pupils to guard
consciously against known types of error which they are accustomed to
make in their oral recitations. Every recitation in whatever subject
provides opportunity for such training in habits of watchfulness. Only
as the pupil is brought to do it himself, without prompting on the
part of the teacher, is his education accomplished.
A limited amount of systematic grammatical teaching is a necessary
preliminary step. The purpose is an introductory acquaintance with
certain basic forms, terminology, relationships, and grammatical
perspective. This should be accomplished rapidly. Like the preliminary
survey in any field, this stage of the work will be relatively
superficial. Fullness and depth of understanding will come with
application. This preliminary understanding can not be learned
"incidentally." Such a plan fails on the side of perspective and
relationship, which are precisely the things in which the preparatory
teaching of the subject should be strong.
This preliminary training in technical grammar need not be either
so extensive or so intensive as it is at present. An altogether
disproportionate amount of time is now given to it. The time saved
ought to go to oral and written expression,--composition, we might
call it, except that the word has been spoiled because of the
artificiality of the exercises.
The composition or expression most to be recommended consists of
reports on the supplementary reading in connection with history,
geography, industrial studies, civics, sanitation, etc.; and reports
of observations on related matters in the community. Topics of
interest and of value are practically numberless. Such reports will
usually be oral; but often they will be written. Expression occurs
naturally and normally only where there is something to be discussed.
The present manual suggests compositions based upon "changes in trees,
dissemination of seeds, migration of birds, snow, ice, clouds, trees,
leaves, and flowers." This type of composition program under present
conditions cannot be a vital one. Elementary science is not taught in
the schools of Cleveland; and so the subject matter of these topics is
not developed. Further, it is the world of human action, revealed
in history, geography, travels, accounts of industry, commerce,
manufacture, transportation, etc., that possesses the greater value
for the purposes of education, as well as far greater interest for the
student.
Probably little time should be set apart on the program for
composition. The expression side of all the school work, both in the
elementary school and in the high school, should be used to give the
necessary practice. The technical matters needed can be taught in
occasional periods set aside for that specific purpose.
The isolation of the composition work continues through the academic
high schools and in considerable degree through the technical high
schools also. In the high schools the expression work probably needs
to be developed chiefly in the classes in science, history, industrial
studies, commercial and industrial geography, physics, etc., where the
students have an abundance of things to discuss. Probably four-fifths
of all of the training in English expression in the high schools
should be accomplished in connection with the oral and written work of
the other subjects.