Digitized by the Internet Archive in 2007 with funding from Microsoft Corporation http://www.archive.org/details/addressesproce1891natiuoft CONTENTS. Constitution and Act of Incorporation, 5 Calendar of Meetings, 9 Officers for 1890-91, 10 Officers for 1891-92, 12 Life Directors, 14 Life Members, 15 Minutes, Official Reports, and Reports of Committees, . . . . 19 Report of Committee on Exhibits, . - 255 Addresses, Papers, and Discussions 55 General Sessions of Association, 57 Council, 275 Superintendence, 3?9 Kindergarten, ' 527 Elementary, 569 Secondary, 615 Higher, 689 Normal, 709 Industrial and Manual Training, 741 Art, 759 Music, 807 Round Table Conferences, 827 List of Annual Members, 837 CONSTITUTION National Educational Association PREAMBLE. To elevate the character and advance the interests of the profession of teaching, and to promote the cause of popular education in the United States, we, whose names are subjoined, agree to adopt the following CONSTITUTION. ARTICLE I.— NAME. This Association shall be styled the National Educational Association. ARTICLE II.— DEPARTMENTS. Section 1. It shall consist of nine departments : The first, of School Superin- tendence ; the second, of Normal Schools ; the third, of Elementary Schools ; the fourth, of Higher Instruction ; the fifth, of Industrial Education ; the sixth, of Art Education ; the seventh, of Kindergarten Instruction ; the eighth, of Music Educa- tion ; the ninth, of Secondary Education ; and a National Council of Education. Sec. 2. Other departments may be organized in the manner prescribed in this Constitution. ARTICLE III.— MEMBERSHIP. Section 1. Any person in any way connected with the work of education, or any educational association, shall be eligible to membership. Such person or associa- tion may become a member of this Association by paying two dollars and signing this Constitution, and may continue a member by the payment of an annual fee of two dollars. On neglect to pay such fee, the membership will cease. Sec 2. Each department may prescribe its own conditions of membership, pro- vided that no person be admitted to such membership who is not a member of the general Association. Sec. 3. Any person eligible to membership may become a life-member by paying at once twenty dollars. ARTICLE IV.— OFFICERS. Section 1. The officers of this Association shall be a President, twelve Vice-Pres- idents, a Secretary, a Treasurer, one Director for each State, District or Territory represented in the Association, and the presiding officers of the several departments THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION. and a Board of Trustees to be constituted as hereinafter provided. Any friend of education may become a life-director by the donation of one hundred dollars to the Association at one time, either by himself or on his behalf ; and any educational association may secure a perpetual directorship by a like donation of one hundred dollars, the director to be appointed annually or for life. Whenever a life-member desires to become a life -director, he shall be credited with the amount he has paid for his life-membership. Sec. 2. The President, Vice-Presidents, Secretary, Treasurer, Directors, Life Directors, President of the Council, and presiding officers of their respective de- partments shall constitute the Board of Directors, and, as such, shall have power to appoint such committees from their own number as they shall deem expedient. Sec. 3. The elective officers of the Association shall be chosen by ballot, unless otherwise ordered, on the second day of each annual session, a majority of the votes cast being necessary for a choice. They shall continue in office until the close of the annual session subsequent to their election, and until their successors are chosen, except as hereinafter provided. Sec. 4. Each department shall be administered by a President, Vice-President, Secretary, and such other officers as it shall deem necessary to conduct its affairs ; but no person shall be elected to any office of any department, or of the Association, who is not, at the time of the election, a member of the Association. Sec 5. The President shall preside at all meetings of the Association and of the Board of Directors, and shall perform the duties usually devolving upon a presiding officer. In his absence, the first Vice-President in order who is present shall preside ; and in the absence of all Vice-Presidents, a pro tempore chairman shall be appointed on nomination, the Secretary putting the question. Sec 6. The Secretary shall keep a full and accurate report of the proceedings of the general meetings of the Association and all meetings of the Board of Directors, and shall conduct such correspondence as the Directors may assign, and shall have his records present at all meetings of the Association and of the Board of Directors. The Secretary of each department shall, in addition to performing the duties usually 1 >( rtaining to his office, keep a list of the members of his department. Sec 7. The Treasurer shall receive and under the direction of the Board of Trus- tees hold in safe keeping all moneys paid to the Association ; shall expend the same only upon the order of said Board ; shall keep an exact account of his receipts and expenditures, with vouchers for the latter, which accounts, ending the first day of July each year, he shall render to the Board of Trustees, and, when approved by said Board, he shall report the same to the Board of Directors. The Treasurer shall give such bond for the faithful discharge of his duties as may be required by the Board of Trustees ; and he shall continue in office until the first meeting of the Board of Directors held prior to the annual meeting of the Association next suc- ceeding that for which he is elected. Sec 8. The Board of Directors shall have power to fill all vacancies in their own body; shall have in charge the general interests of the Association, excepting those herein intrusted to the Board of Trustees ; shall make all necessary arrangements for its meetings, and shall do all in its power to make it a useful and honorable institution. Upon the written application of twenty members of the Association for permission to establish a new department, they may grant such permission. Such new department shall in all respects be entitled to the same rights and privileges as the others. The formation of such department shall in effect be a sufficient amend- ment to this Constitution for the insertion of its name in Article II., and the Secre- tary shall make the necessary alterations. Sac. 9. The Board of Trustees shall consist of four members, elected by the CONSTITUTION. Board of Directors for a term of four years, and the President of the Association, who shall be a member ex officio during his term of office. At the election of the Trustees in 1886, one Trustee shall be elected for one year, one for two years, one for three years, and one for four years, and annually thereafter, at the first meeting of the Hoard of Directors held prior to the annual meeting of the Association, one Trustee shall be elected for the term of four years. All vacancies occurring in said Board of Trustees, whether by resignation or otherwise, shall be filled by the Board of Directors for the unexpired term ; and the absence of a Trustee from two con- secutive annual meetings of the Board shall forfeit his membership therein. The Board of Trustees thus elected and constituted shalJ be the executive financial officers of this Association, as a body corporate, as conferred by the certificate of incorpo- ration under the provisions of the Act of General Incorporation, Class Third, of the Revised Statutes of the District of Columbia, dated the twenty-fourth day of Feb- ruary, 1886, at Washington, D. C, and recorded in Liber No. 4, " Acts of Incorpora- tion for the District of Columbia." Sec. 10. It shall be the duty of the Board of Trustees to provide for safe keeping and investment of all funds which the Association may receive from life-director- ships, or from donations ; and the income of such invested funds shall be used exclusively in paying the cost of publishing the annual volume of Proceedings of the Association, excepting when donors shall specify otherwise. It shall also be the duty of the Board to issue orders on the Treasurer for the payment of all bills approved by the Board of Directors, or by the President and Secretary of the Associa- tion acting under the authority of the Board of Directors ; and,, when practicable, the Trustees shall invest all surplus funds exceeding one hundred dollars, that may remain in the hands of the Treasurer after paying the expenses of the Association for the previous year. ARTICLE V.— MEETINGS. Section 1. The Annual Meeting of the Association shall be held at such time and place as shall be determined by the Board of Directors. Sec 2. Special meetings may be called by the President at the request of five Directors. Sec. 3. Any department of the Association may hold a special meeting at such time and place as by its own regulations it shall appoint. Sec 4. The Board of Directors shall hold their regular meetings at the place, and not less than two hours before the assembling of the Association. Sec 5. Special meetings may be held at such other times and places as the Board or the President shall determine. Sec 6. Each new Board shall organize at the session of its election. At its first meeting a Committee on Publication shall be appointed, which shall consist of the President and the Secretary of the Association for the previous year, and one mem- ber from each department. ARTICLE VI.— BY-LAWS. By-laws, not inconsistent with this Constitution, may be adopted by a two-thirds vote of the Association. ARTICLE VII.— AMENDMENTS. This Constitution may be altered or amended at a regular meeting by the unani- mous vote of the members present, or by a two-thirds vote of the members present, provided that the alteration or amendment has been substantially proposed in writ- ing at a previous meeting. THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION BY-LAWS. 1. At each regular meeting of the Association there shall be appointed a Com- mittee on Nominations, one on Honorary Members, and one on Resolutions. 2. The President and Secretary shall certify to the Board of Trustees all bills approved by the Board of Directors. 3. Each paying member of the Association shall be entitled to a copy of its Proceedings. 4. No paper, lecture, or address shall be read before the Association or any of its departments in the absence of its author, nor shall any such paper, lecture, or address be published in the volume of Proceedings without the consent of the Asso- ciation, upon approval of the Executive Committee. It shall be the duty of the President, Secretary and Treasurer of the Associa- tion, to appoint annually some competent person to examine the securities of the permanent fund held by the Board of Trustees, and his certificate showing the condition of the said fund shall be attached to the report of the Board of Trustees. ACT OF INCORPORATION. At a meeting of the Board of Directors of the National Educational Association, held at Saratoga Springs, New York, July 14, 1885, the fol- lowing resolution was passed : Resolved, That a committee of three be appointed to secure articles of incorpo- ration for the National Educational Association, under United States or State laws, as speedily as may be. N. A. Calkins, of New York, Thomas W. Bicknell, of Massachusetts, and Eli T. Tappan, of Ohio, were appointed such committee. Under the authority of the resolution quoted above, and with the approval of the committee, and by competent legal advice, the chairman obtained a CERTIFICATE OF INCORPORATION. We, the undersigned, Norman A. Calkins, John Eaton, and Zalmon Richards, cit- izens of the United States, and two of them citizens of the District of Columbia, do hereby associate ourselves together, pursuant to the provisions of the Act of General Incorporation, Class Third, of the Revised Statutes of the District of Columbia, under the name of the National Educational Association, for the full period of twenty years, the purpose and objects of which are to elevate the character and advance the interests of the profession of teaching, and to promote the cause of popular educa- tion in the United States. . . -. To secure the full benefit of said act, we do here execute this our ( Certificate of Incorporation as said act provides. In witness whereof, we severally set our hands and seals, this 24th day of Febru- ary, 1886, at Washington, D. C. Norman A. Calkins, [l. s.] John Eaton. [l. s.] Zalmon Richards. [l. s.] Duly acknowledged before Michael P. Callan, notary public in and for the District of Columbia, and reco-ded in Liber No. 4, Acts of Incorporation for the District of Columbia. CALENDAR OF MEETINGS. NATIONAL TEACHERS* ASSOCIATION. 1857.— PHILADELPHIA, PA. (Organized.) Jamks L. Enos, Chairman. W. E. Sheldon, Secretary. 1858.— CINCINNATI, OHIO. Z. Richards, President. J. W. Bulkley, Secretary. A. J. Rickofp, Treasurer. 1859.— WASHINGTON, D. C. A. J. Rickoff, President. J. W. Bulkley, Secretary. C. S. Pennell, Treasurer. I860— BUFFALO, N. Y. J. W. Bulkley, President. Z. Richards, Secretary. O. C. Wight, Treasurer. 1861, 1862.— No session. 1863.— CHICAGO, ILL. John D. Philbrick, President. James Ckuikshank, Secretary. O. C. Wight, Treasurer. 1864.-OGDENSBURG, N. Y. W. H. Wells, President. David N. Camp, Secretary. Z. Richards, Treasurer. 1865.-HARRISBURG, PA. S. S. Greene, President. W. E. Sheldon, Secretary. Z. Richards, Treasurer. 1866.— INDIANAPOLIS, I M ). J. P. Wickersham. President. S. H. White, Secretary. S. P. Bates, Treasurer. 1867.— No session. 1868.— NASHVILLE, TENN. J. M. Gregory, President. L. Van Bokkelen, Secretary. James Cruikshank, Treasurer. 1869.— TRENTON, N. J. L. Van Bokkelen, President. W. E. Crosby, Secretary. A. L. Barber, Treasurer. 1870.-CLEVELAND, OHIO. Daniel B. Hagar, President. A. P. Marble, Secretary. W. E. Crosby, Treasurer. NAME CHANGED TO NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION. 1871.-ST. LOUIS, MO. J. L. Pickard, President. W. E. Crosby, Secretary. John Hancock, Treasurer. 1872.— BOSTON, MASS. E. E. White, President. S. H. White, Secretary. John Hancock, Treasurer. 1873.— ELMIRA, N. Y. B. G. Northrop, President. S. H. White, Secretary. John Hancock, Treasurer. 1874.— DETROIT, MICH. S. H. White, President. A. P. Marble, Secretary. John Hancock, Treasurer. 1875. -MINNEAPOLIS, MINN. W. T. Harris, President. W. R. Abbott, Secretary. A. P. Marble, Treasurer. 1876.— BALTIMORE, MD. W. F. Phelps, President. W. D. Henkle, Secretary. A. P. Marble, Treasurer. 1877.— LOUISVILLE, KY. M. A. Newell, President. W. D. Henkle, Secretary. J. Ormond Wilson, Treasurer. 1878.— No session. 1879.-PHILADELPHIA, PA. John Hancock, President. W. D. Henkle, Secretary. J. Ormond Wilson, Treasurer. 1880.— CHAUTAUQUA, N. Y. J. Ormond Wilson, President. W. D. Henkle, Secretary. E. T. Tappan, Treasurer. 1881. -ATLANTA, GA. James H. Smart, President. W. D. Henkle, Secretary. E. T. Tappan. Treasurer. 1882.— SARATOGA SPRINGS, N. Y. G. J. Orr, President. W. E. Sheldon, Secretary. H. S. Tarbell, Treasurer. 1&83.-SARATOGA SPRINGS, N. Y. E. T. Tappan, President. W. E. Sheldon, Secretary. N. A. Calkins, Treasurer. 1884. -MADISON, WIS. Thomas W. Bicknell, President. H. S. Tarbell, Secretary. N. A. Calkins, Treasurer. 1885. -SARATOGA SPRINGS, N. Y. F. Louis Soldan, President. W. E. Sheldon, Secretary. N. A. Calkins, Treasurer. 1886.— TOPEKA, KAS. N. A. Calkins, President. W. E. Sheldon, Secretary. E. C. Hewett, Treasurer. 1887.— CHICAGO, ILL. W. E. Sheldon, President. J. H. Canfield, Secretary. E. C. Hewett, Treasurer. 1888.— SAN FRANCISCO, CAL. Aaron Gove, President. J. H. Canfield, Secretary. E. C. Hewett, Treasurer. 1889.— NASHVILLE, TENN. Albert P. Marble, President. J. H. Canfield, Secretary. E. C. Hewett, Treasurer. 1890.— ST. PAUL, MINN. James H. Canfield. President. W. R. Garrett, Secretary. E. C. Hewett, Treasurer. 1891.— TORONTO, ONTARIO. W. R. Garrett, President. E. H. Cook, Secretary. J. M. Greenwood, Treasurer. (9) National Educational Association OF THE UNITED STATES. OFFICERS FOR 1890-91. GENERAL ASSOCIATION. W. R. GARRETT Nashville, Tennessee Pr&ddent. E. II. COOK Flushing, New York Secretary. J. M. GREENWOOD Kansas City, Missouri Treasurer. J. H. Canfield, Kansas. W. H. H. Beadle, South Dakota. Delia L. Williams, Ohio. J. II. Baker, Colorado. Vice-Presidents. T. A. Futrall, Arkansas. John T. Buchanan, Missouri. H. S. Jones, Nebraska. Mary E. Nicholson, Indiana. J. R. Preston, Mississippi. E. B. McElrov, Oregon. M. C. Fernald, Maine. Solomon Palmer, Alabama. Board of Trustees. N. A. Calkins Chairman 124 East Eightieth street. New York. Zalmon Richards Secretary 1301 Corcoran street, Washington, D. C. N. A. Calkins New York Term expires July, 1894. H. S. Tarbell Providence, R. I M " " 1893. Zalmon Richards Washington, D. C " " " 1892. John Eaton Marietta, Ohio " " " 1891 W. R. Garrett Nashville, Tenn Ex Officio. Board of Directors. Albee, Geo. S., Oshkosh, Wisconsin. Allensworth, Allen, Fort Bayard, New Mexico. Anderson, W. H., Wheeling, West Virginia. Baker, J. H., Denver, Colorado. Beadle, W. H. H., Madison, South Dakota. Bb rdshear, W. M., Ames, Iowa. Bell, VV. A., Indianapolis, Indiana. Bingham, Robert, Bingham P. O., North Carolina. Brown, Leroy D., Santa Monica, California. Buchanan, John T., Kansas City, Missouri. Campbell, A. H., Vermont. (an field, J. H., Lawrence, Kansas. Carter, Hannah Johnson, New York City. (handler, J. W., Jordan, New York. Clemmer, C. II., Grand Forks, North Dakota. Cook, E. H., Flushing, New York. Cox, Edwin B., Chillicothe, Ohio. Cordery, Deborah L., Philadelphia, Pa. Day, L. W., Cleveland, Ohio. Dick, F., Denver, Colorado. Dougherty, N. C., Peoria, Illinois. Downing. A. S., Newark, New Jersey. Drai-er, A. S., Albany, New York. Fairchild, G. T., Topeka, Kansas. Fernald, M. C, Orono, Maine. Futrall, T. A., Marianna, Arkansas. Garrett, W. R., Nashviile, Tennessee.- Gault, F. B., Tacoma, Washington. Goodman, F., Nashville, Tennessee. Goodwin, A. C, Owensboro, Kentucky. Gove, Aaron, Denver, Colorado. Greenwood, J. M., Kansas City, Missouri. Galeae, II , Denver, Colorado. IIaii.mann, Eudora L., La Porte, Indiana. Hall, Caleb G., New Berlin, New York. Hatch, W. II., Moline, Illinois. Hinsdale, B. A., Ann Arbor. Michigan. Hoitt, Ira G., Sacramento. California. Hornberger, J. A., Norfolk, Nebraska. Hunt, Mary II., Hyde Park, Massachusetts. Hurd, George B., New Haven, Connecticut. Jewett, A. V., Abilene, Kansas. Jones, H. S., Lincoln, Nebraska. Kendall, C. N.. East Saginaw, Michigan. Kern, T. L., Lake City, Florida. Kratz, H. B., Vermillion, South Dakota. Larimer, II. G., Topeka, Kansas. McElroy, E. B., Salem, Oregon. Marshall, T. Maim ellus, Chamita, New Mexico. Mills, J. J., Richmond, Indiana. Newell, M. A., Baltimore, Maryland. Nicholson, Mary E., Indianapolis, Indiana. Palmer, S., Montgomerv, Alabama. Parker, Chas. L., South Chicago, Illinois. Parr, S. S., St. Cloud, Minnesota. Pkabody, S. II., Champaign. Illinois. Phillips, J. II., Birmingham, Alabama. Plummer, F. E., Des Moines. Iowa. Preston, J. R., Jackson, Mississippi. Ramsey, Geo. J., Clinton. Louisiana. Ric hards, Zalmon, Washington, D. C. Rhkoff. A. J , New York City. Rioler, F., Oregon City, Oregon. Rounds, C. C, Plymouth, New Hampshire. Russell, J. R., Butte, Montana. S< haeffer, N. C, Kutztown, Pennsylvania. Sheldon, W. E., Boston, Massachusetts. Smith, E. B., La Grange, Georgia. Stanford, Lei.and. San Francisco, California. Stratton. C. Cm Mills Seminary, California. Sutton, W. S., Houston, Texas. Taylor, A. R., EmpOria, Kansas. Thomas, A. M., Houlton, Maine. Thompson, W. E., Little Rock, Arkansas. Walker, Peleg R., Rockford, Illinois. Williams. Delia L., Delaware. Ohio. Wilson, W. E., Providence, Rhode leland. Wolfe, L. E., Moberly, Missouri. VVoofter, T. J., West Point, Mississippi. (10) OFFICERS OF THE ASSOCIATION. \\ NATIONAL COUNCIL OF EDUCATION. SELIM H. PEABODY President, Champaign. 111. ANDREW J. RICKOFP Vice-President New York, N. Y. D. L. K1EHLE Secretary St. Paul, Mhm. DEPARTMENT OFFICERS. Kindergarten. EUDORA L. HAILMANN President La Porte, Ind. LUCY J. WHEELOCK Vice-President Boston, Mas*. ELIZA BLAKER Secretary Indianapolis, Ind. Elementary. H. S. JONES President Lincoln, Neb. JULIA TUTWILER Vice-President Livingston, Ala. ELLEN F. WHEATON Secretary St. Paul, Minn. Secondary. F. E. PLUMMER President Des Moines, Iowa. S. W. LANDON Vice-President Burlington, Vt. W. T. WHITE Secretary Knoxvllle, Tenn. Higher. J. J. MILLS President Richmond, Ind. E. B. ANDREWS Vice-President Providence, R. I. C. A. BLANCHARD Secretary Wheaton, 111. Normal. B. A. HINSDALE President Ann Arbor, Mich. G. L. OSBORNE Vice-President Missouri. ISABELLA LAWRENCE Secretary Minnesota. Superintendence. A. S. DRAPER President Albany, N. Y. J. A. B. LOVETT First Vice-President Huntsville, Ala. E. B. McELROY Second Vice-President Salem, Oregon. L. W. DAY Secretary Cleveland, Ohio. Industrial Education and Manual Training. LEWIS McLOUTH President Brookings, S. D. WILLIAM SAYRE Vice-President Philadelphia, Pa. GEORGE S. MILLS Secretary Toledo, Ohio. Art. HANNAH JOHNSON CARTER President New York, N. Y. LILLIAN JAC'OBY Vice-President Rockford, 111. FRANK H. COLLINS Secretary Denver, Colo. Music. HERBERT GRIGGS President Denver, Colo. N. L. GLOVER Vice-President Akron. Ohio. F. E. MORSE Secretary Auburndale, Mass. National Educational Association OF THE UNITED STATES. OFFICERS FOR 1891-92. GENERAL ASSOCIATION. E. II. COOK Flushing. New York President. R. W. STEVENSON Wichita, Kansas Secretary. J. M. GREENWOOD Kansas City, Missouri Treasurer. W. R. Garrett, Tennessee. ('. II. Ci.emmer, North Dakota. T. A. Futrall, Arkansas. E. O. Lyte, Pennsylvania. Vice-Presidents. G. L. Osborne, Missouri. J. R. Preston, Mississippi. E. B. McElroy, Oregon. E. H. Bartholomew, Kentucky. Miss Nebraska Cbopsbt, Indiana. Wm. M. Beardshear, Iowa. Irwin Shepard, Minnesota. A. P. Marble, Massachusetts. Board of Trustees. 124 East Eightieth street, New York. 1301 Corcoran street, Washington, D. C. Terin expires July, 1895. N. A. Calkins Chairman Zalmon Richards Secretary E. C. Hewett Normal, Illinois N. A. Calkins New York City H. S. Tarbell Providence, Rhode Island " " " 1893 Zalmon Richards Washington, District of Columbia " " " 1892 E. II. Cook Flushing, New York Ex officio. " The Board of Trustees shall be the executive financial officers of this Association, as a body cor porate." — Art. IV., Sees. 9 and 10, of the Constitution. Board of Directors.* Jones, H. S., Lincoln, Nebraska. Kern, F. L., Lake City, Florida. Knapp, W. E., Denver, Colorado. Kruse, Edwin, Wilmington, Delaware. Leipziger, H. M., 148 Grand street, N. Y. City. Lyte, E. O., Millersville, Pennsylvania. Marble, A. P., Worcester, Massachusetts. Marshall, T. Marcellus, Chamita, New Mexico. McElroy. E. B., Salem, Oregon. McFadden, Miss Mary E., Portland, Oregon. McLouth, Lewis, Brookings, South Dakota. Miller, Tom B., Helena, Montana. Millspaugh, J. F., Salt Lake City, Utah. Nicholson, Miss Mary E., Indianapolis, Indiana. Norton, R. C, Cape Girardeau, Missouri. Ooden, John, Bismark, North Dakota. Osborne, G. L., Warrensburg. Missouri. Parker, Charles I., South Chicago, Illinois. Plummer, Frank E., Des Moines, Iowa. Powers, James K., Florence, Alabama. Preston, J. R., Jackson, Mississippi. Prince, J. T., Newtonville, Massachusetts. Ramsey, G. J., Clinton, Louisiana. RicHARDS, Zalmon. Washington, District Columbia. Richmond, Miss Sarah E., Baltimore, Maryland. Rickopp, Andrew J., New York City, N. Y. Rogers, C. P., Marshalltown, Iowa. Rounds, C. C, Plymouth, New Hampshire. Sarin, Hbiiby, Des Moines, Iowa. Sciiaeffer, N. C, Kutztown, Pennsylvania. Shepard, Irwin, Winona, Minnesota. Shinn, Josiah II., Little Rock, Arkansas. Sill, J. M. B., Ypsilanti, Michigan. Smith, Euler B., La Grange, Georgia. Smith, Miss Noka, San Francisco, California. Stanford, Leland, San Francisco, California. Stevenson, R. W., Wichita, Kansas. Sto( kwell, Thomas B., Providence, R. I. Stratton, C. C Mills Seminary, California. Taylor, A. R., Emporia, Kansas. Tutwiler, Miss Julia, Livingston, Alabama. Walker, Peleg R., Rockford, Illinois. Woofter, T. J., West Point, Mississippi. * " The President, Vice Presidents, Secretary, Treasurer, Directors, Life-Directors, President of the Council, and presiding officers of their respective departments shall constitute the Board of Direct- ors."- Art, /!*., 8ec.2, of the Constitution. (12) Adams, E. II., Ashville, North Carolina. Anderson, W. H., Wheeling, West Virginia. Atkinson, W. R., Columbia, South Carolina. Baker, James H., Denver, Colorado. Bakdeen, C. W., Syracuse, New York. Bartholomew. W. II., Louisville, Kentucky. Beardshear, Wm. M., Ames, Iowa. Bi.oss, J. M., Topeka, Kansas. Bkackett, S. H.. St. Johnsbury, Vermont. Bradley, John E., Minneapolis, Minnesota. Brown, Leroy D., Santa Monica. California. B- tler, N. M., Paterson, New Jersey. Ciirw mill, J. O., Cheyenne, Wyoming. Ci.emmer, C. II., Grand Forks, North Dakota. Collins, Frank E., Denver, Colorado. Cook, E. H., Flnshing, New York. Cox, E. B., Xenia, Ohio. Cbopsey, Miss Nebraska, Indianapolis, Indiana. Cross, w. O., Louisville, Kentucky. Curtis, Virgil G., New Haven, Connecticut. Day, L. W., Cleveland, Ohio. DeGarmo, Charles, Swarthmore, Pennsylvania. Dougherty, N. C. Peoria, Illinois. Faum mild, Geo. T., Manhattan, Kansas. Kernald, M. C, Orono, Maine. Futrall, T. A., Marianna, Arkansas. Garnett. James M., University of Virginia, Va. Garrett, W. R., Nashville, Tennessee. Gates, Merrill E., Amherst, Massachusetts. Gault, F. B., Tacoma, Washington. Gillan, S. Y., Milwaukee, Wisconsin. Glover, N. L., Akron, Ohio. Goodman, Frank, Nashville, Tennessee. GOVE, Aaron, Denver. Colorado. Greenwood, J. M., Kansas City, Missouri. IIadley, Hiram, Las Cruces, New Mexico. Hall, Caleb G., New Berlin, New York. Hamilton, Robert W., Muskogee, Ind. Territory. Harris, W. T., Washington, District of Columbia. Harris, T. G., Dallas, Texas. Hughes, Mrs. Jas. L., Toronto, Canada. Hunt, Mary H., Hyde Park, Massachusetts. Jewett, A. V., Abilene, Kansas. OFFICERS OF THE ASSOCIATION. 13 NATIONAL COUNCIL OF EDUCATION. JAMES H. BAKER President Denver, Colorado E. W. COY Vice-President ( 'mcinnati, Ohio. N. C. SCHAEFFER Secretary Kutztown, Penn. DEPARTMENT OFFICERS. Kindergarten. Mrs. J. L. HUGHES President Toronto, Ont. Miss NORA SMITH Vice-President San Francisco, Cal. Miss ANNA E. FREDERICKSON Secretary La Porte, Ind. Elementary. Miss JULIA TUTWILER President Livingston, Ala. FRANK B. GAULT Vice-President Tacoma, Wash. Miss LUCIA STICKNEY Secretary Cincinnati, Ohio. Secondary. FRANK E. PLUMMER President Des Moines, Iowa. J. A. HORNBERGER Vice-President Norfolk, Neb. W.T.WHITE Secretary Knoxville, Tenn. Higher. MERRILL E. GATES President Amherst, Mass. H. W. ROGERS Vice-President Evanston. 111. JOHN M. COULTER Secretary Bloomington, Ind. Normal. CHARLES DE GARMO President Swarthmore, Pa. LARKTN DUNTON Vice-President Boston, Mass. MARGARET E. CONKLING Secretary Milwaukee, Wis. Superintendence. HENRY SABIN President Des Moines, Iowa. VIRGIL G. CURTIS First Vice-President New Haven, Conn. OSCAR H. COOPER Second Vice-President Galveston, Texas. L. W. DAY Secretary Cleveland, Ohio. Industrial Education and Manual Training. II. M. LEIPZIGER President New York, N. Y. WM. M. BEARDSHE AR Vice-President Ames, Iowa. E. R. BOOTH Secretary Cincinnati, Ohio. Art. FRANK H. COLLINS President Denver, Colorado. LUELLA E. FAY Vice-President Springfield, Mass. HENRY W. 1'OOR Secretary Lawrence, Mass. Music. N. L. GLOVER President Akron, Ohio. FRANK A. FITZPATRICK Vice-President Leavenworth, Kan. CLARENCE BIRCHARD Secretary Chicago, 111. Note.— Information relating to the volumes of Proceedings of this Association for previous years may be obtained by addressing the Chairman or Secretary of the Board of Trustees. The Custodian, appointed by the Board of Trustees for the care of the several volumes of Proceedings of the Associa- tion, as well as of the Council of Education, is Zalmon Richards, 1301 Corcoran Street, Washington, D.C. MEMBERSHIP OF THE National Educational Association, The dates in the margin indicate the year when the several memberships began. The addresses given are the same as last year, except in cases where information of change of residence has been furnished. Where there is a reasonable doubt as to residence it is indicated by (?). PERPETUAL DIRECTORSHIP. 1879. Philadelphia Teachers' Institute. Wm. G. Caskey, 2019 Camac St., Philadel- phia, Pa., Representative for 1891. 1889. Board of Education of Nashville, Tenn. 1890. Illinois State Teachers' Association. Peleg R. Walker, Representative for 1890. LIFE DIRECTORS. CALIFORNIA. 1888. Stanford, Leland, San Francisco. 1888. Brown, LeRoy D. , Santa Monica. 1888. Stratton, C. C, Mills Seminary. COLORADO. 1888. Gove, Aaron, Denver. ILLINOIS. 1887. Dougherty, N. C, Peoria. 1887. Parker, Chas. I., South Chicago. KANSAS. 18*6. Fairchild, Geo. T.. Manhattan. 1886. Taylor, A. R., Emporia. 1886. Jewett, A. V., Abilene. MASSACHUSETTS. 1887. Hunt Mary H., Hyde Park. MISSOURI. 1886. Greenwood, J. M., Kansas City. NEW MEXICO. 1877. Marshall, T. Marcellus, Chamita. NEW YORK. 1885. Hall, Caleb G., New Berlin. 1881. Rickoff, Andrew J., New York. OHIO. 1888. Day, L. W., Cleveland. (H) LIFE-MEMBERSHIPS. 15 LIFE-MEMBERSHIPS. 1881. Woodward, G. A., Selma. 1884. 1886. 1864. 1884. 1884. 1876. 1880. 1889. 1890. 1881. 1870. 1884. 1880. 1884. 1864. 187H. 1870. 1880. 1876. 1870. 1880. 1886. 1886. 1886. 1886. 1886. 1886. 1886. 1886. 18S6. 1886. 1877. 1877. ALABAMA. CALIFORNIA. Eden, Philip, Glendora. 1889. Hobe, Augusta W.. San Francisco. English, R. F., San Francisco. 1888. O'Connor, Joseph, San Francisco. COLORADO. Brown, Mrs. A. J., Denver. 1884. Hayward, Emily A., Denver. CONNECTICUT. Barnard, Henry, Hartford. 1870. Stone, Mrs. M. A., New Milford. Northrop, Birdsey G., Clinton. DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA. Bell, Alex. Graham, Washington. Harris, Wm. T., Washington. Hiltz, John, Washington. Keane, John J., Washington. 1864. Richards, Zalmon. Washington. 1884. Rusk, J. M., Washington. 1880. Wilson, J. Ormond, Washington. GEORGIA. Baker, W. H., Savannah. Mallon, Mrs. Frances C, Atlanta. 1880. Setzefaud, A., Dalton. ( ?) ILLINOIS. Allen, Ira W., Chicago. 1876. Allyn, Robert, Carbondale. 1884. Brown, Geo. P., Bloomington. 1891. Cheney, Augustus J., Oak Park. 1884. Eberhardt, J. F., Chicago. 1876. INDIANA. 1866. 1877. 1876. Bell, W. A., Indianapolis. Hobbs, B. C, Bloomingdale. Irwin, J. 8., Ft. Wayne. Armstrong. Allen, Sioux City. Crosby, W. E., Des Moines. Gilchrist, J. C, Sioux City. IOWA. 1886. 1884. 1884. KANSAS. Campbell, A. G., Council Grove. 1886. Clark, Frank H., Minneapolis. 1886. Coover, N., Wilson. 1886. Fairchild, Edward S., Ellsworth. 1886. Harvey, G. I., Ottawa. 1886. Jay, Walter M., Salina. 1886. Klock, J. E., Emporia. 1886. Larimer, Henry G. , Topeka. 1880. Limerick, A. H., Winfield. 1886. MacDonald, John, Topeka. 1886. McVicar, Peter, Topeka. Forbes, Alex., Chicago. Hewett, Edwin C, Normal. Hull, John, Carbondale. Raab, Henry, Belleville. Schmitz, J. Adolph, Elgin. McRae, H. S., Marion. Smart, James H, La Fayette. Stevens, M. C, La Fayette. Pickard, J. L., Iowa City. Taylor, Henry J., Sioux City. Willis, William A., Iowa City. Meade, Richard C, Atchison. Miller, J. H., Topeka. Roop, C. Y., Salina. Rose, George E., Rosedale. Sawhill, Thos. A., Concordia. Schuyler, A., Salina. Stanley, Edmund, Lawrence. Stevenson, R. W., Wichita. Tillotson, D. C, Topeka. Williams, Philo Jesse, Lawrence. KENTUCKY. Bartholomew, W. H, Louisville. Kalfus, Anna F., Louisville. 1877. Monsarret, Mrs L. L., Louisville. 16 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION. MARYLAND. 1876. Newell, M. A., Baltimore. 1876. Richmond, Sarah E , Baltimore. MASSACHUSETTS. 1884. Bascom, John, Williamstown. 1880. 1882. Bicknell, Thos. W., Boston. 1886. 1864. Hagar, Daniel B., Salem. 1865. 1870. Jones, D. W., Roxbury, Boston. 1870. 1870. Manly, R. M., Wellesley. 1870. Marble, A. P., Worcester. Mowry, Wm. A., Boston. Sheldon, Wm. E., Boston. Tourgee, Eben, Boston. Wilcox, M. C, Boston. MICHIGAN. 1870. Hey wood, C. W., Scotts. 1886. Mayhew, Ira, Detroit. MINNESOTA. 1870. Phelps, Wm. F., St. Paul. MISSISISPPI. 1889. Wright, Edmund W., Vicksburg. MISSOURI. 1886. Evans. Chas. H., St. Louis. 1877. Soldan, F. Louis, St. Louis. 1864. Pennell, C. S., St. Louis. NEBRASKA. 1876. Beals, S. D., Omaha. 1884. Curry, Robert, Palmyra. 1880. Bibb-Sudborough, Grace O, 1884. James, Henry M., Omaha. Omaha. NEVADA. 1887. Young, Chas. S., Reno. 1876. Rounds, C. C. 1871. 1864. 1879. 1880. 1883. 1864 18(54. 1883. 1876. NEW HAMPSHIRE. Plymouth. NEW JERSEY. 1876. Thompson, L. S., Jersey City. NEW Brooklyn. Anderson, John J Bradley, P., Lyons. (?) Calkins, N. A., New York. Coe, E. M., New York. Corey, Lucien B., Hicksville. Cruikshank, James, Brooklyn Danforth, Edward, Elmira. Day, Mrs. Albert, New York. Dorna, G. Videlia, New York (?) YORK. 1882. Hodgdon, Josephine E., Brooklyn. 1879. Hoose, James H., Cortland. 1885. Hunter, Thomas, New York. 1879. Kraus, John. New York. 1882. Morris, Hattie N., Brooklyn 1880. Rickoff, Mrs. R. D., New York 1880. Spring, E. A., New York. 1882. Stern, M., New York. 1884. Van Aikin, Mrs. G., New York. NORTH CAROLINA. 1881. Bingham, Robert, Bingham P. O. ( ?) 1870. Arey, Oliver, Cleveland. 1884. Bennett, C. W., Piqua. 1880. Bennett, Hampton, Franklin 1880. Burns. .!..!.. Dayton.- 1870. Cole, W. H., Marysville. 1883. Coy, Eliab W., Cincinnati. ( "in-i-an, N. T., Sandusky. 1880. Davidson. C. C., Alliance 1881. De Wolf, David F.. Columbus ( 1880. Dutton, Bettie A., Cleveland 1876. *Hancock, John, Columbus Deceased, OHIO. 1865. 1883. 1870. 1879. 1880. 1880. 1880. 1882. ?) 1870. 1880. 1870. Hartshorn, 0. N., Mt. Union. Harvey, Thomas W. , Painesville. Holden, L. E., Cleveland. McMillan, Reuben, Youngstown McMillan, Mrs. S., Youngstown.' Miller, Lewis, Akron. Peaslee, John B. . Cincinnati. Robert, J. A., Dayton. White, Emerson E., Cincinnati. Widner, Esther, Dayton. Williams, Mrs. D. A. (Lathrop), Delaware. PERPETUAL MEMBERSHIPS. 17 PENNSYLVANIA. 1876. Brooks, Edward, Philadelphia. 1879. Paxon, Joseph A., Philadelphia. 1879. Foster, Rachel Gordon, Phila. (?) 1879. Shippen, Edward, Philadelphia. 1879. Gratz, Simon, Philadelphia. 1880. Singer, Edgar A., Philadelphia. 1865. Ingram, S. D., Harrisburg. 1884. Stewart, Sarah A., Philadelphia. 1880. Partridge, Lelia E., W. Phila. 1865. *Wickersham, James P., Lancaster. RHODE ISLAND. 1872. Stone, E. M., Providence. SOUTH CAROLINA. 1891. Scofield, Miss Martha, Aiken. TENNESSEE. 1887. Conway, Clara, Memphis. TEXAS. 1877. Franklin, M. B., Grapevine. (?) WISCONSIN. 1884. Albee, Geo. S., Oshkosh. 1870. Hoyt. J. W. 1884. Ayl ward, John Arthur, Black Earth. 1887. Hutton, A. J., Platteville. 1884. Beck, George, Platteville. 1884. Nye, Charles H., Platteville. 1884. Carpenter, J. H., Madison. 1884. Parker, Warren D., Madison. 1884. Chandler, W. H., Madison. 1884. Parkinson, John B., Madison. 1884. Charlton, E. A., Brodhead. 1884. Shaw, Samuel, Antigo. 1884. Clark, L. H., Tomah. 1884. Stark, Joshua, Milwaukee. 1884. Emery, J. L., Ft. Atkinson. 1884. Stewart, I. N., Appleton. 1884. Flavin, J. T., Watertown. 1884. Stearns, J. W., Madison. 1884. Graham, Robert, Madison. 1884. Thayer, J. B., Madison. 1884. Harvey, Lorenzo Dow, Oshkosh. 1884. Twining, N. C., Monroe, 1884. Howland, H. C, Eau Claire. 1884. Whitford, Wm. C, Milton. ONTARIO. 1891. Wylie, Mary J. B., Brantford. PERPETUAL MEMBERSHIPS. KANSAS. 1886. Abilene — President Board of Education. 1886. Dodge City— Dodge City Schools. 1886. Manhattan — Riley County Teachers' Association. 1886. Ottawa — Board of Education. 1886. Sedgwick— Sedgwick City Schools. 1886. Winfield — Cowley County Teachers' Association. MINNESOTA. 1890. Northfield— Independent School District No. 3. WISCONSIN. 1884. Beloit— Board of Education. 1884. Board of Regents of State Normal Schools. 1884. Janesville — Board of Education. 1884. Janesville — Public-School Teachers. * Deceased. 18 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION. 1884. La Crosse— Board of Education. 1884. Milwaukee — Alumni Association of City Normal School. 1884. Milwaukee — Board of Education. 1884. Milwaukee — County Teachers' Association. 1884. Milwaukee — Intermediate and Upper Sections, Milwaukee Teachers' Corps. 1884. Milwaukee—Primary Section, Milwaukee Teachers' Corps. 1884. Milwaukee — Principals' Association. 1884. Milwaukee — Spencerian Business College. 1884. Oshkosh— Board of Education. 1884. Platte ville -Athenaeum Literary Society, State Normal School. 1884. Platteville — Philadelphian Society, State Normal School. 1884. Platteville— State Normal School. 1884. Watertown— Board of Education. 1884. Wisconsin County Superintendents' Association. 1884. Wisconsin Principals' Association. 1884. Wisconsin Teachers' Association. MINUTES, OFFICIAL REPORTS, AND REPORTS OF COMMITTEES. The National Educational Association FIRST DAY'S PROCEEDINGS. THE WELCOME. The Association met at 2:30 p. m., July 14, 1891, in the Mutual Street Rink, in the city of Toronto, Ontario, Canada. The meeting was called to order by Inspector James L. Hughes, Chair- man of the Local Executive Committee. The session was opened with prayer by Rev. Dr. Potts, of Toronto. Mr. Hughes then said : I will ask this vast audience to stand while we sing together the national hymns of the United States and Canada. Fortunately they are sung to the same tune, and we will sing the first verse of " God Save the Queen " and u America." (Applause). Mr. Harold Jarvis, of Toronto, sang " Marguerite/' Addresses of welcome were delivered by Inspector James L. Hughes, on behalf of the Toronto Local Executive Committee ; by the Reverend Principal Grant, of Queen's University, on behalf of Canada ; by Hon. G. W. Ross, Minister of Education for the Province of Ontario, on behalf of the people of Ontario ; by Rev. Dr. Allison, Superintendent of Instruc- tion for the Province of Nova Scotia, on behalf of Nova Scotia ; by the Rev. Elson I. Rexford, on behalf of the Province of Quebec ; and by E. F. Clarke, Esq., Mayor of Toronto, on behalf of the city of Toronto. A letter of welcome from the Ontario Teachers' Association was also read by Wm. Mackintosh. Responses were made by the President, the Secretary, the Treasurer, and the Chairman of the Board of Trustees, on behalf of the Association ; by Hon. W. T. Harris, United States Commissioner of Education, on behalf of the Union ; by Prof. L. H. Jones, of Indiana, for the North Central States ; by William M. Beardshear, of Iowa, for the Northwestern States ; by Supt. F. B. Gault, of Tacoma, Wash., on behalf of the Pacific Coast ; by Prof. T. Marcellus Marshall, of New Mexico, for the Southwest ; by Prof. W. H. Bartholomew, of Kentucky, for the South Central States ; by Hon. Josiah H. Shinn, President of the Southern Educational Association, for the South ; and by State Super- intendent John E. Massey, of Virginia, for the Southeast. After announcements by the Secretary, the Association adjourned. (21) 22 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION. EVENING SESSION.— July 14. The meeting was called to order at 8:15 p. m. at the Mutual Street Kink by President Garrett. Music by Henry Blight, of Toronto. Usual announcements by the Secretary. Francis W. Parker, Chicago, 111., read a paper on "The School of the Future." Discussion followed, participated in by Supt. A. P. Marble, Worcester, Mass. ; James L. Hughes, Toronto, Canada ; G. Stanley Hall, Worcester, Mass.; Miss Schofield, of South Carolina; Nicholas Murray Butler, New York City ; and Mr. S. Jones. The discussion was closed by Colonel Parker, SECOND DAY'S PROCEEDINGS. MORNING SESSION.— July 15. The meeting was called to order at 9 a. m. at the Pavilion, in the Horticultural Gardens, by President Garrett. Invocation by the Rev. Mr. Milligan, of Toronto. The President announced the following Committees : On Nominations— A. P. Marble, of Massachusetts, Chairman ; J. H. Phillips, of Alabama ; T. A. Futrall, of Arkansas ; Miss Nora Smith, of California ; R. H. Beggs, of Colorado ; V. G. Curtis, of Connecticut ; David W. Harlan, of Delaware ; Z. Rich- ards, of District of Columbia ; J. L. Williford, of Georgia ; E. C. Hewett, of Illinois ; W. A. Bell, of Indiana ; H. H. Freer, of Iowa ; R. W. Stevenson, of Kansas ; W. 0. Cross, of Kentucky ; H. E. Chambers, of Louisiana ; M. C. Fernald, of Maine ; M. A. Newell, of Maryland ; B. A. Hinsdale, of Michigan ; D. L. Kiehle, of Minnesota ; T. J. Woofter, of Mississippi ; L. E. Wolfe, of Missouri ; R. G. Young, of Montana ; H. S. Jones, of Nebraska ; C. C. Rounds, of New Hampshire ; William N. Barringer, of New Jersey ; T. Marcellus Marshall, of New Mexico ; James M. Milne, of New York ; John Ogden, of North Dakota ; L. W. Day, of Ohio ; Mary E. McFadden, of Oregon ; E. O. Lyte, of Pennsylvania ; H. S. Tarbell, of Rhode Island ; W. R. Atkinson, of South Caro- lina ; Louis McLouth, of South Dakota ; Frank Goodman, of Tennessee ; Joseph Bald- win, of Texas ; John E. Massey, of Virginia ; R. B. Bryan, of Washington ; John G. Giddings, of West Virginia; 0. E. Wells, of Wisconsin ; W. G. Smith, of Wyoming. On Necrology — Z. Richards, of District of Columbia, Chairman ; N. A. Calkins, of New York ; George P. Brown, of Illinois ; Solomon Palmer, of Alabama ; W. E. Shel- don, of Massachusetts. On Honorary Members— John E. Massey, of Virginia, Chairman ; T. B. Stockwell, of Rhode Island ; N. C. Dougherty, of Illinois ; Mrs. E. G. Buford, of Tennessee ; Lucia Stickney, of Ohio. JOURNAL OF PR00EJED1N0S. 23 On Exhibits — John T. Bradley, of Minnesota, Chairman ; Mrs. T. E. Ryley, of Mis- souri ; Walter S. Goodnough, of New York ; J. H. Baker, of Colorado ; W. C. Schaffer, of Pennsylvania ; Miss Fay, of Springfield, Mass. On Resolutions— A. S. Draper, of New York, Chairman ; Frank A. Fitzpatrick, of Missouri ; F. B. Gault, of Washington ; Josiah H. Shinn, of Arkansas ; H. M. Parker, of Ohio. Prof. Henry Sabin, of Iowa, presented the following resolution, which was passed by unanimous consent without reference to the Committee on Resolutions : Resolved, That Hon. A. S. Draper, of New York ; Hon. J. W. Dickinson, of Massa- chusetts ; Hon. D. L. Kiehle, of Minnesota — he appointed a Committee from this Association to draw up a memorial and forward the same to the Classification Com- mittee of the Columbian Exposition, expressing the strong conviction of the National Educational Association that the educational interests of the nation should have a separate department, and setting forth our reasons why we deem such a division abso- lutely necessary to the success of the educational exhibit. Dr. Harris announced the formation of the Henry Barnard Publishing Company, and that subscriptions to its capital stock would be received. The usual announcements by the Secretary followed. The Secretary also read a letter of greeting from the Ontario "Woman's Christian Tem- perance Union. On motion of Mr. Marshall, of New Mexico, the officers of the Association were requested to make a suitable reply. A communication was read by the Secretary, concerning the compilation and publication of a memorial volume by the friends of the late Dr. John Hancock. J. R. Preston, of Jackson, Miss., read a paper on : Teaching Patriotism. Discussion followed, participated in by A. H. McKay, of Halifax, Nova Scotia ; Mr. Williams, of Missouri ; Charles A. Blanchard, of Illinois ; Francis W. Parker, of Chicago ; W. D. Atkinson, of South Carolina ; and W. A. Douglass, of Toronto. J. R. Preston closed the discussion. Zalmon Richards, of Washington, D. C, read a paper on : History of the National Educational Association. H. S. Jones, of Nebraska, moved that the thanks of the Association be tendered to ex-President Richards, for his valuable and painstaking paper. Carried unanimously. Discussion by E. C. Hewett, of Illinois, followed. The Association then adjourned. EVENING SESSION.— July 15. The meeting was called to order in the Mutual Street Rink at 8 p. m. by President Garrett. Music by Mr. Fred Warrington, of Toronto. 24 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION. Usual announcements by the Secretary. Hon. W. T. Harris, United States Commissioner of Education, read a paper on : Education in the United States. Hon. George W. Koss, Minister of Education for the Province of On- tario, addressed the Association on The Uducatiotial System of Ontario. Adjourned. THIRD DAY'S PROCEEDINGS. MORNING SESSION.— July 16. The meeting was called to order at the Pavilion at 9:30 A. m. by Presi- dent Garrett. Invocation by the Rev. E. Rexford, of Quebec. Usual announcements by the Secretary. H. W. Brewster, Chairman of the Committee on Spelling Reform, sub- mitted his report. T. R. Vickroy, another member of the Committee, further discussed the subject. T. Marcellus Marshall, of New Mexico, moved that the report be adopted. Mr. H. H. Lincoln, of Boston, seconded the motion. Discussion followed, participated in by H. H. Lincoln, of Massachu- setts ; William Houston, of Toronto ; and Z. Richards, of Washington. Mr. Stevenson, of Kansas, moved that the matter of printing the report be referred to the Board of Directors. Seconded and carried. Music by Miss Lillie Kleiser. A. P. Marble, Chairman of the Committee on Nominations, submitted the following report : Your Nominating Committee beg leave to submit the following report : President— E. H. Cook, N. Y. Vice-Presidents — W. R. Garrett, Tennessee ; C. H. Clemner, North Dakota ; T. A. Futrall, Arkansas ; E. 0. Lyte, Pennsylvania ; G. L. Osborne, Missouri ; J. R. Pres- ton, Mississippi ; E. B. McElroy, Oregon ; W. fl. Bartholomew, Kentucky ; Miss Nebraska Cropsey, Indiana ; Win. Beardshear, Iowa ; Irwin Shepard, Minnesota ; A. P. Marble, Massachusetts. Secretary — R. W. Stevenson, -Kansas. Treasurer — J. M. Greenwood, Missouri. Directors — W. T. Harris. United States ; James K. Powers, Alabama ; J. H. Shinn, Arkansas ; Miss Nora Smith. California ; Virgil G. Curtis, Connecticut ; W. E. Knapp, Colorado ; Z. Richards, District of Columbia ; F. L. Kern, Florida ; Euler B. Smith, Georgia ; Miss Mary E. Nicholson, Indiana ; P. R. Walker, Illinois ; C. P. Rogers, Iowa ; J. H. Bloss, Kansas : W. 0. Cross ; Kentucky ; G. J. Ramsay, Louisiana ; M. C. Fernald. Maine ; Miss Sarah E. Richmond, Maryland ; J. T. Prince, Massachusetts ; J. M. B. Sill. Michigan ; T. J. Woofter, Mississippi ; R. C. Norton, Missouri ; John E Bradley, Minnesota ; Thomas B. Miller, Montana ; II. S. Jones. Nebraska ; C. C. Rounds, New Hampshire ; Hiram Hadley, New Mexico ; C. W. Bardeen, New York ; JOURNAL OF PROCEEDINGS. 25 Robert Bingbam, North Carolina ; John Ogden, North Dakota ; N. M. Butler, New Jersey ; E. B. Cox, Ohio ; Miss Mary E. McFadden, Oregon ; N. C. Shafer, Penn- sylvania ; Thomas B. Stockwell, Rhode Island ; W. R. Atkinson, South Carolina; Louis Mc Louth, South Dakota ; Prank Goodman, Tennessee ; T. G. Harris. Texas ; James M. Garnett, Virginia ; F. B. Gault, Washington ; S. Y. Gillan, Wisconsin ; W. H. Anderson, West Virginia ; J. 0. Churchill, Wyoming. On motion of Mr. Huling, of Massachusetts, the Secretary of the Asso- ciation was instructed to cast the ballot of the Association for the persons named in the foregoing report, and the President declared them elected unanimously. Miss Julia Tutwiler, of Alabama, read a paper on : A German Model School for Girls. Charles De Garmo, of Illinois, Chairman of the Committee on Peda- gogical Inquiry, submitted the report of that Committee. On motion of Mr. Richards, duly seconded, the report was declared adopted and ordered published in the proceedings. Discussion by P. M. McMurray, of Illinois, followed. Adjourned. EVENING SESSION.— July 16. The meeting was called to order by the President in the Mutual Street Rink at 8 p.m. Music by Mr. Douglass Bird, of Toronto. Hon. A. S. Draper, of New York, Chairman of the Committee on Reso- lutions, submitted the report of the Committee. The report was adopted. President M. E. Gates, of Amherst College, Mass., addressed the Asso- ciation upon : The Profession of Teaching, for Light and Power. Prof. fm. Clark, of Toronto, addressed the Association on : The Growth of National Education in England. Prof. Goldwin Smith addressed the Association. Adjourned. FOURTH DAY'S PROCEEDINGS. MORNING SESSION. -July 17. The meeting was called to order in the Pavilion at 9 a.m. by President Garrett. Pn vocation by the Rev. Septimus Jones. Music by Miss Eva H. Roblin. Mr. Z. Richards presented the report of the Committee on Necrology. In accordance with this report, Mr. E. 0. Lyte, of Pennsylvania, pre- sented a sketch of the life of Mr. J. P. Wickersham. Announcements by the Secretary. 20 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION. A telegram containing the greetings of the Southern Educational Asso- ciation was read. Mr. Massey, of Virginia, submitted the following report of the Com- mittee on Honorary Membership. Your Committee to whom consideration of the subject of Honorary Membership was committed beg leave to report that, while care and caution should be used in electing Honorary Members, it is highly proper to confer this honor upon those who have dis- tinguished themselves by eminent services in educational work. We therefore present the names of Hon. G. W. Ross, Minister of Education for the Province of Ontario, Inspector J. L. Hughes, of Toronto, H. A. E. Kent, ex-Chairman of Public School Board, Goldwin Smith, M. A., Toronto, Rev. Principal Grant, Queen's University, Kingston, Thomas Kirkland, M. A., Principal Normal School, Toronto, and Rev. E. Rexford, M. A., Secretary Board of Education, Quebec, as those of gentlemen fully worthy of this honor, and recommend their election to Honorary Membership of the National Educational Association. Respectfully submitted, John E. Massey, Chairman. On motion of Secretary Cook the name of Mr. William Clarke was added to the list contained in the report. The report was then adopted unanimously by rising vote. D. J. Goggin, of Manitoba, read a paper on : TJie Professional Train- ing of Teachers. A. J. Rickoff, of New York, read a paper on : Educational Propa- ganda. John A. MacDonald, of Kansas, read a paper on : The Independent District System. The Secretary read the Annual Report of the President of the Council of Education, and the same was approved and ordered printed in the Proceedings. Capt. Allen Allensworth, of New Mexico, read a paper upon : Military Education in the United States. Dr. Oronhyatekha, of Toronto, then addressed the Association. Adjourned. EVENING SESSION.— July 17. The meeting was called tx> order in the Mutual Street Rink at 8 p. m. by President Garrett. Music by Mr. C. G. Bagulay. Usual announcements by the Secretary. Prince Momolu Massaquoi addressed the Association upon the subject of : In Search of an Education. Miss Mary Eastman, of Massachusetts, read a paper on : The Co-Edu- cation of the Sexes. JOURNAL OF PROCEEDINGS. 27 Prin. Grant, of Kingston University, was introduced and addressed the Association upon : The Influence of the Public Schools, Nationally and Internationally. President Garrett then in a few words introduced President-Elect E. H. Cook, who made a short response. The audience then rose and sang the doxology, after which the bene- diction was pronounced by the Rev. Prin. Grant. The Association then adjourned sine die. E. H. Cook. Secretary. 28 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION. MINUTES OF THE BOARD OF DIRKCTORS. Toronto, Ontario, Canada, July 14, 1891. The Board of Directors of the National Educational Association met in the Mutual Street Rink at 5:55 p. m., President W. R. Garrett in the chair. The following were present: Messrs. Allensworth, Beardshear, Bell, Buchanan, Calkins, Clemmer, Cook, Cox, Futrall, Garrett, Gault, Jones, Marshal], Parker, Rickoff, Sheldon, Walker, Wolfe, and Woofter. The President announced no quorum present. Secretary Cook moved that the Board adjourn until the following day at 3:30 p. M., in the rooms of the Board of Trade of Toronto. Carried. The Board then adjourned. E. H. Cook, {Secretary. ADJOURNED MEETING. July 15, 1891. — Pursuant to adjournment, the Board of Directors met in the Council Chamber of the Toronto Board of Trade, President Garrett in the chair. On call of the roll by the Secretary, the following Directors responded to their names : Messrs. Allensworth, Baker, Beardshear, Bell, Calkins, Chandler, Clemmer, Cook, Day, Dougherty, Draper, Fairchild, Futrall, Garrett, Gault, Jones, Larimer, Marshall, Parker, Peabody, Phillips, Ramsey, Richards, Rickoff, Smith, Wilson, and Woofter. The minutes of the meeting of July 14 were read and approved. On motion of Mr. Calkins, the incoming President of the Department of Superintendence was invited to sit with the Board of Directors. President Garrett gave it as the opinion of the Chair that all officers of the departments and other officers of the Association should fill out the work of the preceding year. " On motion of Mr. Baker, duly seconded, the view of the Chair was sus- tained as the sentiment of the Board of Directors. On motion, duly seconded, Henry Sabin, of Iowa, was requested to sit with the Board of Directors. Treasurer E. C. Hewett, of Illinois, presented his annual report. On motion of Mr. Richards, duly seconded, the report as read was accepted and ordered published in the volume of Proceedings. MINUTES OF BOARD OB1 DIRECTORS. Mr. Calkins, of New York, as Chairman of the Board of Trustees, pre- sented the fifth annual report of that body. On motion of Mr. Fairchild, of Kansas, the report as read was accepted and approved and ordered published with the Proceedings. On motion of Mr. Draper, of New York, Mr. Calkins, as Chairman of the Board of Trustees, was tendered a rising vote of thanks for the effi- cient and careful manner in which the funds of the Association had been handled, the high rate of interest obtained, and the security with which the funds were invested. On motion of Mr. Rickoff, duly seconded, Mr. E. C. Hewett, of Il- linois, was unanimously elected as a member of the Board of Trustees, to fill the vacancy caused by the expiration of the term of service of General John Eaton, of Ohio. Mr. Rickoff, of New York, presented the following resolution : Resolved, That the Board of Trustees be and are hereby authorized and directed to appropriate a sum of money not to exceed $2,500, from the funds of the National Edu- cational Association, for the aid of such measures as they may decide to be most effect- ive and judicious for the relief of Henry Barnard from the financial embarrassments to which he has subjected himself, by his life-long services to the cause of Education, in the publication of the American Journal of Education and other works of National importance, and for the completion of such sets of the Journal as may be found in- complete. On motion of Secretary Cook, the words " authorized and directed " were stricken out, and the word " requested " inserted in the place thereof. On motion of Mr. Marshall, of New Mexico, the resolution as amended was referred to a Committee of Three, to be appointed by the Chair, which Committee were directed to report at an adjourned session of the Board. The Chair appointed on the Committee A. S. Draper, of New York, S. H. Peabody, of Illinois, and Mr. Bell, of Indiana. Selim H. Peabody, President of the Council, submitted the annual report of that body. On motion, duly seconded, the Chair appointed the following Commit- tee, to whom the report of the President of the Council was referred: Messrs. Dougherty, Smith, Gault, Bell, and Marshall. This Committee was requested to report before the close of the session of the Board. Mr. Dougherty, Chairman of the Committee, to whom the report of the Council was referred, reported as follows : Your Committee would recommend that the following be chosen as members of the National Council: W. T. Harris, Washington, D. C, to succeed himself; D. Bemiss, Spokane Falls, Washington, to succeed S. S. Parr, of Minnesota; J. E. Bradley, of Minnesota, to succeed himself ; George T. Fairchild, of 30 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION. Kansas, to succeed himself ; and E. J. James, of Philadelphia, Pa., to succeed Robert Allyn, of Illinois. The report was accepted as read. Mr. Calkins, of New York, presented a bill for $211.50 for the printing of the proceedings of the Department of Superintendence at the meeting held in February, 1891. On motion of Mr. Draper, the action of the Board of Trustees, in con- nection with the disbursement of this sum in connection with the proceed- ings of the Department of Superintendence, was unanimously approved. On motion of Mr. Draper, the Board of Trustees were authorized to pursue the same course hereafter as to the publication of the proceedings of the Department of Superintendence. On motion, duly seconded, the Board of Directors adjourned to meet at the close of the general session, in the Pavilion, on Thursday morning, July 16. E. H. Cook, Secretary. ADJOURNED MEETING. July 16. — Pursuant to adjournment, the Board of Directors met at the close of the morning session of the General Association, in the Pavilion in the Horticultural Gardens. The meeting was called to order by Presi- dent Garrett, at 12:15 p.m. The minutes of the previous meeting were read and approved. The roll call showed twenty directors present. S. H. Peabody, Chairman of the committee to whom the resolution concerning the subject of aid to the publications of Henry Barnard, sub- mitted the report of that Committtee, which was approved as read and ordered published in the Proceedings. N. A. Calkins, of New York, moved that the President, Secretary, Chairman of Board of Trustees, and E. C. Hewett, the former Treasurer, be appointed an Auditing Committee to examine and approve the various bills brought against the Association for the past year. Seconded and carried. Secretary Cook moved that the Executive Committee be empowered to allow each State Manager who should apply to them before any expense had been incurred, to expend not more than twenty dollars upon neces- sary expenses connected with the working up of the attendance from his State. Seconded. Carried. Mr. Hornberger moved that the Auditing Committee be authorized to approve such bills of the State Managers for the past year as they should deem right. Seconded. Carried. MINUTES OB1 BOARD OF DIRECTORS. 31 W. T. Harris, of Washington, D. C, moved that reports of the Round T:ible Conferences to the extent of not more than two thousand words be printed in the Proceedings. Seconded. Carried. Mr. Rickoff, of New York, moved that the sum of five hundred dollars ($500) be appropriated for the incidental expenses connected with the editing and issuing of the volume of Proceedings. Seconded. Carried. The Board then adjourned. E. H. Cook, Secretary. NEW BOARD OF DIRECTORS. A meeting of the New Board of Directors of the N. E. A. was held in the Council Chamber of the Toronto Board of Trade at 4:30 p.m., July 16, 1891. President-elect Cook in the chair. On a call of the roll by the Secretary thirty-nine directors responded. On motion of W. R. Garrett, of Tennessee, J. F. Millspaugh, of Utah, was elected to membership in the Board. On motion of Mr. Calkins, the President and Secretary were authorized to fill any vacancies in the Board for any of the States and Territories represented at the Toronto meeting, by delegates, unknown to the Board of Directors. On motion of Mr. Marble, the President, Secretary, Treasurer, First Vice-President, and Chairman of the Board of Trustees were appointed as the Executive Committee of the Association for the ensuing year. A resolution from the General Session of the Association held at the Pavilion on the morning of July 15, 1891, referring the report of the Committee on Spelling Reform to the Board of Directors, was laid on the table. Mr. Baker, of Denver, invited the Association to hold its convention at Denver, Colorado, any time after 1892. On motion the Executive Committee was authorized to have the pro- ceedings of the meeting of the Department of Superintendence, immedi- ately after their annual meeting, prepared in such form that it can be inserted in the annual report. The Board of Directors received representatives from different places, inviting the Association to hold its next annual meeting in the localities mentioned. The Chairman of the Board of Directors read the conditions under which invitations were to be received and considered. On motion the time allowed for the presentation of the claims of each place was limited to ten minutes. 32 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION Superintendent Young, of Helena, Montana, tendered an invitation to the Association to hold its next annual meeting in that city. Superintendent Massey, of Virginia, extended an invitation in behalf of Seattle, Washington. Superintendent P. B. Gault, of Tacoma, Washington, endorsed the remarks of Mr. Massey, in inviting the Association to Seattle Mr Bardeen, of New York, invited the Association to hold its next annual meeting at Saratoga, New York, stating that all the requirements of the Association as read by the Chairman would be fully met Miss Susie Jennings presented an invitation to the Association to hold its next annual meeting at "Glen Echo on the Potomac " BoIr7nfneilV° furthe'invitati<™ to be considered, on motion the Boa d of Directors proceeded to ballot for the selection of a place for hold! i ng the next annual meeting of the Association «28fSX~£rwid that the ExecHtive Committeebe * JmirngrL? TreaSUrer' * * *"**• *- * ^ -— The following was the result of the ballot : Helena Firstb*U<* Second ballot. T,lird balIot Pourth ballot Seattle,' \\ %■ » tf Saratoga, 9 12 ' 2 Washington, 5 \ \ 15 On motion of Mr. Beardshear the whole matter as to fh„ a 1 v * tiaras r=™~s :; of the Executive Committee. ' * t0 the dlsc«t''on Mr. Butler, of New York, offered the following resolution : o^cntC^^ m 1893 as to how some portion of the ann„anneome "f 1°" A T"* and "P™4 emp.oyed to foster the work of P-^^^tS" ^ "est he The resolution was adopted. The Chair appointed as the Committee Tlr w w rr • sioner of Education of the United CTw I- - T" Harrl8> Commis- Butler, of New York, Inl Mr J *?£* Washington, D. C, D, N. M. Council, as the committee. ^ °f Denver> President of the In accordance with the request nf n, n • L, authorized to select their own ch^nnl " committe« "ere nto ove. to the trustees to be taken care of MINUTES OF BOARD OF DIRECTORS. 33 by them until such time as the Association shall have a building of its own. This beautiful silver card from Helena is entitled to the best of care. Seconded. Carried. Mr. Stockwell : I move that a Committee of Three be appointed by the Chair to consider the question of such changes as may be deemed neces- sary to secure the establishment of a permanent membership and the col- lection of annual dues from such members. Carried. The Chair asked for suggestions in regard to the make-up of that com- mittee in order that it might be made representative. The Chair appointed as the committee C. C. Rounds, of New Hamp- shire, E. E. White, of Ohio, and George F. Osborne, of Missouri. On motion the Board of Directors adjourned subject to call. E. H. Cook, Secretary. 34 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION. SUMMARY OF TREASURER'S REPORT FOR 1891. Edwin C. Hewett, in Account with the National Educational Association. Dr. July 1 to Balance from account of 1889-90 $31 71 111. State Teachers' Association for Perpetual Directorship 100 00 Two Life Memberships : W. H. Baker, Savannah, Ga., , $20 ( 40 m Ind. Sch. Dist., Northfield, ( w w Minn., $20 ' Annual Membership Fees : Paid to Officers of As- sociation (net) $1,377 35 Collected by RR. Offi- cials 10,323 00 Total 11,700 35 Interest on Investments of the Permanent Fund 1,660 27 Sales of Volumes of Proceedings.. 168 65 -$13,700 98 SUMMARY OF YEAR'S FINANCES. Total receipts for the year 1890 $13,669 27 Total disbursements for the year 6,231 40 Net proceeds $7,437 87 Toronto, Ontario, July 14, 1891. This report of the Treasurer for the year ending July 1, 1891, has been examined, and approved. I RichIrds! SeCc^' \ B°ard °f TrUSt^ *'**- 1890-91. Cr. By Expenses in preparing Volume of Proceedings for publication and for proof-reading, Vol. 1890, $150 ; printing and binding 4,000 volumes of proceedings, Vol. 1890, $3,537.78 $3,687 78 Distributing Vol. 1890 to mem- bers: Express, $849.35; mail, $30.77 880 12 Stenographer's report of St. Paul Meeting 111 50 Expenses of President in making arrangements for St. Paul meet- ing : Stenographer, typewriters, and clerks, $94 ; postage and telegrams, $117.79 ; travelling expenses, $76.31 ; messengers and express, $17.71 305 81 Expenses of Treasurer on account of St. Paul meeting : Assistants and clerks, $128 ; expense of meetings for preliminary ar- rangements, $34.24; postage and express, $18.72 ; exchange on drafts, $11.89 192 85 Expenses of Secretary on account of St. Paul meeting Ill 30 Expenses for general Association : Printing circulars, etc., $129.80 ; printing abstracts of papers, $82.50 ; printing card signs, etc., $7.35 ; printing extra member- ship certificates, 1890, $37.50; printing extra membership cer- tificates, 1891, $55; freight of vols, of proceedings, $54.54 ; rent of depository one year, $30; services of custodian, $50 ; postage, express, etc., by cus- todian, $15.46 ; premium on new investment of permanent fund, $68.60 ; rent to Safe De- posit Co., $15 ; postage, tele- grams, etc., by Board of Trus- tees, $11.93 557 68 Expenses of the Departments : Superintendence, $173 05; High- er Education, $50.11 ; Second- ary Education, $12 ; Elementary Education, $15.85 ; Musical Ed- ucation, $11.75 ; Art Education, $14.60 ; Manual Training, $11.45. 288 81 Expense of State Manager for Ohio 35 55 Railroad coupons for membership redeemed for life members 60 00 Total disbursements $6,231 40 Transfer to permanent funds: One Life Directorship, $100 ; from receipts St. Paul meeting, $7,300. 7,400 00 Balance transferred to account of 1890-91 69 58 $13,700 98 ANNUAL REPORT OF THE BOARD OF TRUSTEES. 35 FIFTH ANNUAL REPORT OF THE BOARD OF TRUSTEES. To the Board of Directors of the National Educational Association : The Board of Trustees present as their fifth annual report of the financial condition of the permanent fund of the National Educational Association, for the year ending July 1, 1891, the following : At the close of the fiscal year ending June 30, 1890, the amount of -the permanent fund was twenty-nine thousand dollars. During the past year there has been added to this fund, by one life directorship, the sum of one hundred dollars, and by transfers from the receipts of the meeting at St. Paul in 1890, as per Art. IV., Sec. 10 of the Constitution, the sum of seven thousand three hundred dollars, thus making the total amount of said fund thirty-six thousand four hundred dollars ($36,400). Investments. — At the date of our fourth annual report, the amount of the permanent fund invested was twenty-six thousand five hundred and eighty-eight dollars. During the past year a part of these investments matured, amounting to the sum of nine hundred and fifty dollars, all of which was paid and re-invested in six per cent, school bonds. Additional investments have been made since the last report to the amount of seven thousand five hundred and fifty dollars, thus making the total amount of investments of the permanent fund thirty-four thou- sand one hundred and thirty-eight dollars, as stated in the certificate hereunto attached. The remaining sum in the permanent fund of two thousand two hundred and sixty-two dollars, just transferred to the fund, will be duly invested at an early favorable opportunity. Income from Interest, etc. — During the past year, the amount of inter- est received from the permanent fund was one thousand six hundred and sixty dollars and twenty-seven cents ; and the sum received from the sale of volumes, for libraries, was one hundred and sixty-eight dollars and sixty-five cents, all of which is included in the report of receipts by the Treasurer for this period. Of the investments made, the sum of $22,638 pays six per cent, inter- est ; the sum of $7,000 pays seven per cent, interest ; the sum of $1,000 pays five and one-half per cent, interest — all semi-annually. The invest- ment of $3,500 in city warrants draws eight per cent, interest. Respectfully submitted, N. A. Calkins, ) Z. Richards, > Trustees. H. S. Takbell, ) 36 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION CERTIFICATE. This is to certify that I have examined the several bonds and securities of the "permanent fund" belonging to the National Educational Asso- ciation, now held by the Board of Trustees, and that I found said securi- ties to consist of a first mortgage for three thousand dollars ($3,000) on real estate in the city of Providence, Rhode Island, with a policy of fire insurance for $3,000 ; of bonds of several school districts in the State of Kansas, to the amount of twenty-one thousand six hundred and thirty- eight dollars ($21,638), with proper coupons attached ; of funding bonds of the counties of Grant, Lane, and Seward, and of the city of Marion, Marion County, Kansas, to the amount of six thousand dollars ($6,000) ; also of City Warrants of Spokane, Washington, to the amount of three thousand five hundred dollars ($3,500) ; all of which are kept in the safe- deposit vault of the Nassau Bank of the city of New York. Andrew J. Rickoff, Examiner. New York City, July 6, 1891. REPORT OF COMMITTEE ON RESOLUTIONS. 37 REPORT OF COMMITTEE ON RESOLUTIONS. To the National Educational Association : The Committee on Resolutions, guided by the sentiments which appear to prevail in the Association, as manifested in the papers and addresses or brought out in discussions or in general conversation, respectfully sub- mits the following for the consideration of the Association, and as the basis of its public declarations to the country. 1. The last year seems to have excelled all preceding ones in healthful educational growth and development. All the instrumentalities which go to promote the intelligence, increase the knowledge, and cultivate the morals of the people have been characterized by unexampled energy of action. 2. Individual gifts to the higher educational institutions, to libraries and other agencies for extending learning, have not only exceeded in num- ber and in amount what has been given in preceding years, but indicate what may confidently be anticipated as to the future. Speaking for the educators of the United States, we express their appreciative thanks to the generous donors who may be living, and exalt and honor the memory of those who are dead. 3. The growth of popular interest in general education has been con- spicuously illustrated during the year through the movement toward an organized system of home-study and class lectures and examination com- monly denominated the " University and School Extension " movement. In the judgment of the Association, it is a movement capable of large beneficial results, but encompassed with some dangers. It would be idle to suppose that any irregular and independent educational work can compare in value with that of the regular institutions, but irregular work may be made of no inconsiderable value to seekers after knowledge who are unable to attend upon the schools. If this fact is clearly understood, and if in the organization of the movement the element of home study rather than the public lecture is made prominent, if the public lecture is made of educational value and not a mere entertainment, if the course of studies is arranged and systematized with discriminating care, the move- ment will bear fruits and scatter blessings along its pathway. 4. The enlargement of the field of operations of the National Council of Education, as determined upon at the present session, by means of round-table conferences and the original investigation of educational topics of timely interest, through the introduction of experts or special- 38 TEE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION ists, seems calculated to promote worthy educational movements more rapidly and to repress and dispose of unsubstantial ones more quickly, and therefore promises to be an instrumentality of much consequence to the educational interests of the country. 5. Regarding, as it does, the free public elementary school system as infinitely more consequential than any other of our educational instru- mentalities, the Association observes with great satisfaction the improve- ments which are continually taking place therein. It is not too much to say that school architecture and sanitation, the preparation of the teacher, the course of study, the classification and promotion of pupils, the man- ner of discipline and the methods of instruction, the general and local supervision of the whole, and all of the numerous details which go to systematize the work, adapt it to existing conditions, and render it effect- ive, have never received so much or so intelligent attention as during the year just closing. 6. We view with pleasure the spread of Kindergarten principles and methods, and trust that they may be generally introduced into the public schools. To this end we recommend that the different States secure the necessary legislation that will enable communities to support and maintain free Kindergartens at the public expense. We desire, however, to express our admiration for many of the essentials contained in the organization of the present primary schools — elements which are not contained in the Kindergarten — and we therefore desire to be understood as holding fast to the old, while grafting on the present organization the excellencies of the new. 7. The importance of a more closely related system commencing with the Kindergarten and ending with the University, to the end that the waste of time, effort, and money shall be minimized, and that each grade of the work may aid and support each other, is claiming the attention of all thoughtful friends of education. Some progress has been made in this direction. Much more is desirable. It is a problem encompassed with many perplexities, and can be completely solved only by mutuality of effort. Yet it must be solved before educators hold out to the people a perfe(?t national educational system, entitled to the first rank among those of the world. Americans can be satisfied with nothing less, and we con- fidently look for substantial advances along this line during the coming year. 8. The advance in public sentiment touching the necessity for the special and professional preparation of the teacher has been so marked as to justify us in characterizing it as a revolution. Many of the colleges, even some of the most conservative of them, now recognize the fact that teaching has a scientific basis by providing for instruction in the science of pedagogy. State Normal Schools are flourishing and multiplying, while they are gradually confining their work more and more closely to REPORT OF COMMITTEE ON RESOLUTIONS. 39 pedagogical science. Cities which are to be regarded as in the van of educational progress are drawing their supply of teachers almost exclu- sively from local normal schools or classes. Professional training classes are being pushed out into the smaller villages for the benefit of the out- lying districts. The time is not in the future, it has arrived, when the intelligent sentiment of the country sees the fact that knowledge of the history and philosophy of education, and of the developing processes of the human mind, is essential to the equipment of a good teacher. The time is not far distant when the intelligent sentiment of the country will submit its children to the care and instruction of no persons who are not so equipped. 9. We have observed during the last year a most striking advance of sentiment in several of the large cities, in regard to the selection of none but a professional expert as superintendent of instruction. So strongly has this sentiment been asserted in two or three conspicuous instances as to prove an object lesson for all the cities of the country. Large results must flow from' this, and still more gratifying results will follow if a sen- timent can be aroused which will insist upon the extension of the same principle to all county or district supervising officers, and to that end we solicit the co-operation of all friends of popular education throughout the country. 10. The Association observes with great pleasure the manifest enlarge- ment of educational activity in the Southern States of the Union. There is generally apparent in that section of the country an energy of educa- tional effort which must inevitably go far, which has already gone far, to solve some of the social and industrial problems with which those States have been encompassed. With peculiar satisfaction we observe and record the fact, and congratulate our friends of the fair and sunny South upon its development. 11. We commend the action of the Government of the United States upon the efforts now in progress for extending improved educational facilities upon the Indian Reservations, and to the enlisted men and chil- dren of officers of the regular army. We are confident that if this policy shall be pursued, the "Indian Problem" will be not only less formidable, but the morale of the army will be greatly improved in consequence of it, and we respectfully urge upon Congress the enactment of any legislation which may be deemed necessary to the full attainment of that end. 12. Finally, we urge upon all the friends of education throughout the United States the importance of preparing such an exhibit of the educa- tional work of the country for the Columbian Exposition, to be held at Chicago in the year 1893, as will be a fair and creditable representation of that work, and will reveal to the nations of the world the mighty processes which are in operation for promoting the physical, intellectual, and moral well-being of this great people. 40 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION. Your Committee also submits the following memorandum, touching those who have conspicuously promoted the success of this meeting. I. The courtesies extended to the Association by the transportation companies and hotels merit and receive our most grateful acknowledg- ments. II. The zeal and good judgment with which the retiring President of the Association, Hon. W. R. Garrett, has discharged the delicate and responsible duties of his position, abundantly justify the wisdom of the choice made at the last annual meeting, and gain for him our lasting regard. The alacrity and efficiency with which the other executive officers have filled their stations have our highest admiration, and entitle them to our most sincere thanks. III. The National Educational Association, assembled for the first time beyond the limits of the United States, and among a people who bear allegiance to another flag, hereby expresses in permanent and enduring form its appreciation of the cordial and sumptuous hospitality with which it has been entertained. The official action of the government of the Province of Ontario, as well as of the other provinces of the Dominion, and particularly of the city of Toronto, must have been conceived in a high-minded spirit of gen- erosity and magnanimity. The complete and felicitous manner in which the high civil and educational officers of the provinces and the city have given expression to such official action, supplemented by a multitude of courteous attentions, which cannot be enumerated, but which will never be forgotten, show that they not only assumed their responsibilities with alacrity, or more likely that they imposed them upon themselves, but also that they have discharged them as a li labor of love." But even this is not all. At every point of contact with the body of the people of this " Queen City of the Dominion," conspicuous for its beauty, its thrift, and its quiet and well-ordered life, in our temporary homes, in the public thoroughfares, in the churches, in the magnificent educational institutions, which are her glory and pride, in the public assemblages of the Association, we have been impressed with every con- ceivable manifestation of popular pleasure at our presence. Such popular demonstrations can spring only from hearts attuned to the music of the humanities, and minds enriched by the culture of the schools and the refined social intercourse of a liberty-loving, God-fearing people. These things have not only rendered this annual session of the Associa- tion a highly enjoyable and profitable one, but one whose conspicuous success will make it memorable in the educational history of our country, of the Western continent, and of the world. We gratefully acknowledge our obligations, and express our apprecia- tive thanks to all who, in will or deed, have contributed to our pleasure and the success of this meeting. We would say more. We wish for all REPORT OF COMMITTEE ON RESOLUTIONS. 41 our Canadian friends Heaven's richest blessings. May virtue and domes- tic felicity here abide in every home. May social order and tranquillity here abound. May intelligent and healthful industry fill the cup of their prosperity to the brim. Even more. May great results flow from this meeting. May our intermingling be of some permanent avail. Here, under the folds of two flags, one of which we each love, and both of which we all honor, for the many thousands assembled, and that still greater multitude whom we represent, in fraternal regard and mutual respect, let us pledge the faith of the Educators of the Republic and the Dominion that upon this American Continent, without reference to polit- ical divisions, there shall be the fullest fruitage of that spirit of liberty, the fullest growth of that respect for law, the most widespread diffusion, and the most complete development of that intelligence and culture which has been ensured by the blood of the fathers, and which the flags of the two great English-speaking nations illustrate and enforce around the world. 42 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION THE REPORT OF THE PRESIDENT OF THE COUNCIL. To the President of the Board of Directors of the National Educational Association : Sir — I have the honor to inform you that the terms of office of the fol- lowing-named persons as members of the National Council of Education have expired, and that their successors should be chosen by the Board of Directors of the Association : W. T. Harris, Washington, D. C; S. S. Parr, St. Cloud, Minn.; J. E. Bradley, Minneapolis, Minn.; George T. Fairchild, Manhattan, Kansas ; Robert Allyn, Carbondale, 111. Respectfully, Selim H. Pea body, President of Council. REPORT OF COMMITTEE ON HENRY BARNARD FUND. To the Board of Directors of the National Educational Association, Gentlemen : Your Committee to whom was referred the subject of aid to the publi- Ci'Jon of Barnard's Journal of Education has carefully considered the same, and begs leave to report the following preamble and resolution : Whereas, The completed publication of Henry Barnard's American Journal of Edu- cation is a matter of peculiar importance to the interests of education, and therefore, in accordance with the objects of the National Educational Association, therefore Resolved, That the Board of Trustees of said Association be, and it is hereby, author- ized to expend in aid of said publication a sum not to exceed one thousand dollars ($1,000), to be taken from the funds accruing at the meeting now in progress, and to be used in such manner as the said Board of Trustees may determine. Respectfully submitted, A. S. Draper, S. H. Peabody, J- Committee. W. A. Bell, REPORT OF COMMITTEE ON NECROLOGY. 43 REPORT OF COMMITTEE ON NECROLOGY. Your Committee would now make a Report of Progress, and ask leave to complete it, and have it printed with our Annual Proceedings. We would simply say that during the past year we have heard of the deaths of only two of our members, viz. : ex-President J. P. Wickersham, of Pennsylvania, a memoir of whom has been prepared by Dr. E. 0. Lyte, of Pennsylvania, whom I have asked to make a short memorial statement. We regret to say also that ex-President John Hancock, Commissioner of Schools in Ohio, has been suddenly stricken with death in the midst of his labors. Both of these efficient co-laborers have been taken away from us since the last meeting of the Department of Superintendents, at Phila- delphia, in February last. A memorial of Dr. Hancock, prepared by Dr. E. E. White, of Ohio, will also be published with the Annual Proceedings. In behalf of the Committee, Z. Richards, Chairman. J. P. WICKERSHAM. Mr. Chairman, I would say that in compliance with request of Mr. Richards, Chairman of the Committee on Necrology, I have prepared a brief sketch of the life and services of the eminent educator, J. P. Wick- ersham. As county superintendent of schools, as principal of the great normal school, as State Superintendent of Public Instruction of Pennsyl- vania, he was indeed a leader in educational thought. He was essentially a pioneer and worker and a man of great instructive power, and as such he will be known. Dr. Wickersham was both a great executive officer and a philosopher. His philosophy is shown in the works he has written ; works on School Economy are known throughout the world, and have been translated into several foreign languages. His " History of Education in Pennsylvania " is a pre-eminent work on that subject. While a philosopher, he was at the same time a great executive officer. He has made a permanent im- pression upon the public-school system of Pennsylvania ; and it is to me a satisfaction that I can rise before this body this morning and testify as one of his pupils, one associated with him for a quarter of a century in the work of education, that I can testify to the great and valuable work that he has done in Pennsylvania. 44 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION. JOHN HANCOCK, Ph.D. A Tribute to His Memory. John Hancock was born on one of the hill farms back of Point Pleas- ant, Clermont County, Ohio — the birth-place of General Grant — on the 18th day of February, 1825, and he died on the 1st day of June, 1891, in the sixty-seventh year of his age. He was the eldest of five children. His father, David Hancock, was born in Western Pennsylvania, and his grandfather, Henry Hancock, was a native of New Jersey. His mother died at the age of thirty-five. Dr. Hancock spent his childhood and youth on the farm, receiving his early education in the district school. In his later years he often referred with gratitude to one of his early teachers, who awoke in him a desire for reading and a taste for good books. At the age of nineteen Mr. Hancock taught his first school, and during the four succeeding years he taught school in the winter, and in the intervening months supplemented farm work by study, under the private tuition of Mr. James K. Parker, princi- pal of the Clermont Academy. In 1850 Dr. Joseph Ray, of Cincinnati, met Mr. Hancock at a teachers' gathering in Clermont County, and on Dr. Ray's recommendation he was elected first assistant in what was then known as the Upper Race Street School, Cincinnati, Mr. Andrew J. Rickoff being the principal. Here Dr. Hancock began his real life work. He used with alacrity the oppor- tunities for self-improvement which the city afforded. He continued his studies, joined scientific and literary clubs, and otherwise widened his scholastic and literary attainments. The habit of reading thus formed followed him through life. It is but a few months since the writer heard him say playfully that he was then reading " two miles of Shakespeare daily " — in the street car, on his way to and from his office. In 1856 the honorary degree of Master of Arts was conferred on him by Kenyon Col- lege, and in 1876 the honorary degree of Doctor of Philosophy by the University of Wooster. On Mr. Rickoff's election as superintendent of schools in 1853, Mr. Hancock became principal of the Race Street school, and a year later he became principal of the new First Intermediate School, a position which he filled for ten years. Mr. Hancock's work as assistant and principal did much to shape early instruction in the Cincinnati schools, and in these years he won a high reputation as a teacher and manager. In 1864 he resigned the principalship of the First Intermediate School to accept a position in Nelson's Business College. He was attracted to the position not only by the increased salary, but chiefly by the coveted opportunity for literary work as editor of The News and Educator, a new REPORT OF COMMITTEE ON NECROLOGY. 45 and bright magazine which Mr. Nelson was then publishing. Mr. Han- cock's work as editor showed those literary resources which his later life so fully disclosed. He filled this position nearly two years, and then accepted the duties of assistant in the editor's department of the publish- ing house of Sargent, Wilson & Hinkle, Cincinnati. A year later he turned away from literary work to accept the superin- tendency of the Cincinnati schools — a position for which his previous training had been an excellent preparation. He filled this responsible position for seven years, to the high satisfaction of all interested in public education. He introduced few marked changes in school organization or instruction, but he strengthened the best features, increased the attention given to literary culture, quickened the professional spirit of the teachers, and gave emphasis to all those elements of discipline and instruction that make true and manly pupils. In the seventh year of his efficient admin- istration party politics, for the first time in the history of the schools, entered into the election of superintendent, and Dr. Hancock was retired. He next accepted the superintendency of the public schools of Dayton, Ohio, filling the office with great fidelity and efficiency for a period of ten years. It was here that Superintendent Hancock seemed to recognize more fully than before the fact that all true instruction emanates from the individual teacher, and while he called for good results he gave the teachers larger freedom in their work, and as a result there was less of mechanism and more of individual influence and power in the schools. He stepped down from this place of great usefulness at the demand of party politics, while all who knew aught of his work in the schools bore enthusiastic testimony to his efficiency as a superintendent and his high character as a man. In 1886 Dr. Hancock took charge, by State appointment, of the Ohio education exhibit in the World's Fair at New Orleans, and on his return he accepted the superintendency of the public schools of Chillicothe, to which he had been unanimously chosen. He filled the position with high satisfaction until November, 1888, when, in response to the wishes of the leading educators of Ohio, he was appointed by the governor State Com- missioner of Common Schools, to fill the vacancy caused by the death of Dr. Eli T. Tappan. He accepted the position, though it involved con- siderable pecuniary sacrifice, and entered with zeal upon what proved to be his final work. He filled the unexpired term, and in July, 1890, en- tered upon a full term, having been elected by a popular vote that happily attested the people's recognition of his high qualifications and efficiency. In his first term he successfully inaugurated the new compulsory system, and in his second he secured amendments to the compulsory law which greatly increased its efficiency. On Monday morning, June 1, 1891, he entered his office, and greeting his assistants in his usual cheerful manner, took his seat at his desk to 46 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION. attend to correspondence. He had written only a few letters when he was stricken with paralysis, and, without a word or sign, passed from his earthly service to a heavenly reward. He left a devoted wife and five worthy children, a daughter and four sons. Dr. Hancock devoted more than forty years to public education in his native State, and, during most of these years, he took a prominent part in all important efforts to improve its educational policy. He was an early and earnest advocate of normal training, county supervision, the township system, and other measures of school progress. He served as a member of the State Board of Examiners, as a trustee of the McNeely Normal School — an institution founded by the late Cyrus McNeely, and by him entrusted to the direction of the State Teachers' Association — and also of the Ohio University at Athens, taking an active part in the establishment of the Normal Department therein. He was early in the institute work in the State and long served as an instructor, few men receiving a more appreciative hearing. As early as 1852 he became a member of the Ohio Teachers" Association, in 1859 its president, and earlier or later filled nearly every position of responsibility in its gift. Nor were Dr. Hancock's interest and efforts in behalf of education con- fined to his native State. He became a member of the National Educa- tional Association, then called the National Teachers' Association, at the first regular meeting, held in Cincinnati in 1858. He was present at all the subsequent meetings, possibly with one, at most two, exceptions, and always took an active part in the proceedings. He presided with great acceptance at the eighteenth annual meeting, held in Philadelphia in 1879, and before and since filled other important official positions in the Association with marked fidelity. He never sought honor or preferment in the Association, but he filled every position to which he was assigned by his fellow-members with honor and success. But it is not Dr. Hancock's official service in the Association that should be most gratefully remembered, but his earnest devotion to its interests as a member. In the times that tried men's pockets, so distinctly remembered, he loyally sustained the Association, not only by his presence and service, but by his means. He enjoyed the meetings, and was always an attentive and discriminating listener. In all the history of the Associ- ation, Dr. Hancock has been one of its leading and most influential members. He specially enjoyed the meeting of old friends at their annual gatherings, and his good cheer, genial wit, generous sympathy, and warm friendship always secured for him a hearty welcome. Dr. Hancock was present at the preliminary meeting for the organi- zation of the Council held in Chautauqua in 1880, and his name is in the roll of its first members. He was elected a member of the first Executive Committee, and he subsequently served the Council on several other important committees. He was present at every meeting of the Council REPORT OF COMMITTEE ON NECROLOGY, 47 held, certainly since 1881,* and was in his place at nearly every day's session. It need not be added in this presence that no other member has shown greater personal interest in the welfare of the Council, and that few, if any, have more frequently or intelligently participated in its discussions. The annual volumes of proceedings contain several reports and papers prepared by him — the last and probably the best (on " Co- education ") being presented at the last annual meeting in St. Paul. At the Nashville meeting in 1889, he read an admirable tribute to the memory of the lamented Dr. Tappan. At this meeting of the Council we all sadly miss the familiar form and voice of our departed associate. We find ourselves waiting unconsciously for his entrance, as of old, but he comes not, and will not come again ; but his memory will long be green here. As the members of this body shall in the future gather at its annual council-fires, memory will lovingly recall the genial humor, the earnest words, and the noble spirit of our lamented brother. It is difficult to present in a few sentences a just estimate of Dr. Hancock's ability and character. He was endowed with an acute and versatile mind and also with an earnest desire for knowledge, and these qualities made a broad self-education possible. He not only read widely and thoughtfully, but he improved every opportunity to widen his attain- ments. He was an earnest student of education, but was more interested in its practical than in its speculative phases. He was an alert and dis- criminating reader and listener, quickly seizing the more salient points of a writer or speaker and seeing their practical import and bearing. This quality and habit made him ready as a speaker, especially in con- versation or discussion. But John Hancock's noblest characteristic was his high moral pur- pose and life. His personal habits were not only above criticism, but he was the soul of purity and honor and rectitude. Neither his character nor his word needed an endorser. He not only hated self-seeking, trickery, and double-dealing in others, but was himself incapable of indirection and subterfuge. He admired professional courtesy and honor, was true to his friends, and just and generous to those with whom he differed ; and no educator in Ohio had more friends and fewer enemies than he. Dr. Hancock was in the best sense a manly man, and his influence and sympathies were always with the right, as he saw the right. He had a deep reverence for sacred things and a deepening religious faith. A few years before his death he made a public profession of religion, uniting with the Broad Street Presbyterian Church of Columbus. As he wrote of the noble Tappan, John Hancock was " not only upright, but he was uprightness itself." * The Secretary's minutes do not include his name in the list of members present at the first regular meeting in Atlanta in 1881. 48 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION In the past few years death has been busy among the Ohio members of this Council. Four of the original members from the State have been called to a higher service — W. D. Henkle, I. W. Andrews, Eli T. Tappan, and John Hancock, all men of blessed memory — men who were an honor to the noble Commonwealth which they served ; men who represented its ripest scholarship, its highest character, and its best service in the cause of education. Emerson E. White. July 10, 1891. KINDERGARTEN EXHIBITS. 49 REPORT OF THE COMMITTEE ON EXHIBITS. KINDERGARTEN EXHIBITS. The Kindergarten Exhibits at the International Convention of the N. E. A., at Toronto, Ontario, mark an epoch in the history of all exhibits, both in quality and in numbers. Fully one- third of the educational exhibits were along the line of Kinder- garten work, and far surpassed any previous attempts. When viewed together from all parts of the world, the realization of the far-reaching proportions of this educational reform comes to us in a forcible manner. The United States, Japan, and the Dominion of Canada contributed to this department, and the consensus of opinion was to the effect that none was more extensive or as interesting. The Chicago Free Kindergarten exhibit was illustrative of a very inter- esting plan of work based upon the study of nature. The growth of the plant from seed to fruit in its various stages of development, and preserved in alcohol, is watched by the children and recorded with pencil, needle, and paint-brush. Color, Number, and Form are also developed in flower-painting, first in primary and secondary colors, followed by combinations of these, and finally tints and shades of the same color. In number, groups from one to six are represented according to the number of petals of the flowers ; and in form are the different flowers that may be enclosed by the circle, triangle, square, pentagon, and hex- agon. The clay work also represents the different stages of development from seed to flower, suggesting the work done by the children in the classifica- tion of flowers according to number of petals. There are different illustrations of one song in pasting, painting, sticks, and rings, suggesting limitless possibilities in conventionalizing such natural forms as grass, flowers, birds, and butterflies. The dandelion series showed the work of the sunlight in a most impressive and interest- ing way with the blue-print photographs of ragweed. On two cards were representations of work showing in a limited degree what knowledge of the need and effect of water upon plant life was gained by the pupils through many experiments. Seeds were also classified in bottles in designs for flower-beds. Bird life is also studied in a variety of bird homes, and the analogy drawn between bird life and child life. Pictures of the family * The remaining reports on exhibits have not reached the Secretary, but will be found at the end of volume if received. 50 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION life of the birds were pasted on cards, showing the bird as a mason or a carpenter, followed by the child's work in the same direction illustrated by the foot-rule and carpenters' tools. One can see at a glance the scien- tific and educational value of such work, and shows that the child's creativity and growing powers have been developed, rather than the pos- sibilities of the material. The San Francisco Kindergartens displayed a very large exhibit of all the occupations in their work, such as mat-weaving, paper-folding, per- forating outlines and raised work with sewing in silk and wool, cutting and pasting of colored papers in forms of life and symmetrical construc- tion, showing and painting of flowers, fruits, and animals, and a credit- able collection of work in clay, all of which bespoke the hand of very young children well trained. The Toronto Kindergarten exhibit held a foremost place in the building as well as in its claim to the processes actually employed in the pursuit of the "new education," and no division of Kindergarten work attracted more attention or proved of more general interest to the many visitors that thronged the courts of the Granite Eink. The display of drawing, sewing, slat-work, paper-cutting, weaving, clay-modelling, pea-work, and coloring, were examples of creditable and elaborate work executed by the children in the schools and by the teachers in the training classes. The first efforts of the child with baby fingers were shown, up to the more advanced work of the older children, which was conspicuous in intricate designs of practical value and utility, such as Christmas and birthday presents for their older admirers. Among these were noticed beautiful calendars, picture-frames, blotters, pen-wipers, etc., made up and decorated in Kindergarten work and materials. This department was full of interest and instruction, and displayed admirable tastes in its arrangement. The teachers' work was a marvel of accuracy and origin- ality, bringing out all the possibilities of the different materials in most beautiful forms and coloring. Their work with peas and sticks was particularly noticeable, and the use of different colored sticks in the different designs was most effective. The Hamilton (Ont.) Kindergartens displayed their work in the court adjoining, and no other. word than "beautiful" will describe it. The whole interior of the court was decorated with mounts of work in the ascending order of the school grades, and gave evidence that it was not a selection of work specially prepared for exhibition purposes, but the plain every-day work of the pupils and teachers in the training class. Viewed as such it shows a high state of efficiency in execution and gradation. The children's free inventions in all divisions of work impress one with the true development of creative activity, stamped upon all the different materials in use. Paper-folding, cutting and weaving, outline and school WDERGARTEF EXHIBITS. 51 sewing, clay- modelling, drawing and coloring, all vie with each other in completeness of execution and design. A special feature of this exhibit was the color work. Six large mounts of color pencil work in leaves, flowers, fruits, animals ; and geometric designs in borders and symmetrical forms, presented a most comprehen- sive study in the sciences of botany, natural history, and geometry. These specimens were submitted by the students of the Hamilton Kindergarten training class, and show careful study and execution. Six other mounts the same size displayed the work of the children with the color pencils in connection with the natural science lessons in the Kindergarten and their songs and games. Besides these elaborate mounts there were as many charts of the same size illustrative of all the trades, the feathered tribe, classified ; and forms classed under different types. Surmounting the whole display were photographs, handsomely framed in hard wood, of all the school buildings in Hamilton, completing one of the most elaborate and unique exhibits in the building. Brantford (Ontario) had a very fine display of Kindergarten work, both from the Public Schools and from the Institution for the Blind. The work from the fingers of these unfortunate children, made deft and supple by the Kindergarten training, is another proof of the adequacy of this system of learning by doing. No material difference could be distinguished between their work and that of the children who had their eyesight. A large photograph of the interior of this Asylum Kindergarten room was suspended over the work and showed these little ones busily engaged at the tables with their attractive work before them. Strathroy (Ontario) had a very unique manner of exhibiting some very tastefully arranged and carefully executed work from their Kindergarten. It consisted of sewing, weaving, folding anything, and pea-work mounted on cards suspended on a large fire screen, which stood about six feet high and was handsomely framed in oak. The Tokio (Japan) Kindergarten work was exhibited by the Secretary of the Kindergarten Association in the Indiana division, and astonished its numerous admirers by the skill of workmanship and the characteristic individuality of its workers — "Japanese" was stamped on all the decora- tive work, and the customs and manners of the people seemed to speak to the public through the crude efforts of its little workers to express them- selves in materials. They will not be behind their fellow- workers long, if they progress as rapidly in the next five years as in the last in this line of educative play. Their work in wires and cork was particularly fine, and the weaving executed with slats, paper, and even strings was a noticeable feature of the display. On the other side of this Court was a perfect "poem in Color" work 52 TEE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION. from the La Porte (Indiana) Schools, extending from the Kindergarten through the elementary grades ; and showing groups of work evincing the prescribed as well as spontaneous work of children in each grade. The La Porte (Indiana) Color work as far as exhibited is strictly elemen- tary in its character. Its purpose is not to transmit to the child certain established rules and deductions of established conventional art, but rather to stimulate in the children the aesthetic sense with reference to color and to lift it gradually into a condition that may enable them to receive art training intelligently. Its criteria are to be found, therefore, not in the rules of established conventional art, but in the growth and development of aesthetic activity evinced in the spontaneous productions of, or creations of, the children. The work exhibited extended over a period of six school years. It was arranged in two groups, which, however, in their development in the school room, run .parallel. The first of these groups contains analytic work. The children play with cardboard tablets covered with the pure color paper prepared by the Milton Bradley Company. These tablets are of various shapes adapted to the ready formation of geometric designs. "With their help the children study analytically and successively under the teacher's direction, the relations of colors in various contrasts and har- monies and the various devices for softening and harmonizing contrasts. Every discovery made by them is at once applied by them in pleasing combination of their own invention, the children working individually or in social groups of four. The educative value of this social work, which Superintendent Hailman considers indispensable, was well shown in the evidence of rapid gain in discovery indicated. The gradual but sure growth of the children out of the half-savage pleasure in glowing contrasts into the deeper enjoyment of softer blendings was clearly shown, and in the development the social work was evidently the chief factor. The second group of the exhibit consisted of a series of cards on which were mounted the results of the synthetic work of the children. For the purposes of this work the children use blank white painting paper, ruled faintly in squares of one-half inch, and water-colors, prepared for school use by the Nicholas Company of Rochester, N. Y. The designs of the children are based at first upon geometric forms, but later on spontane- ously found plant forms. In these designs dictation enters to a limited extent, but always in such a way as to stimulate spontaneous invention. No dictation ever ends with itself, but is always used merely as a starting point for spontaneous work on the children's part. Indeed, in most cases these spontaneous additions are sufficiently elaborate to conceal the dictation to the eyes of the superficial observer. The evidence of care and patient labor in this part of the exhibit give proof of deep spontaneous interest on the KINDERGARTEN EXHIBITS. 53 children's part. Throughout, too, there is manifest healthy growth toward correct and refined color intentions. The analytic work of the first group runs through the first four years of school life ; the synthetic work of the second group runs through the first six years. At the close of the period the children are supposed to be ready for instruction and practice in conventional decorative art. The results of the third course Mr. Hailman hopes to place before the teachers in Chicago in 1893. The Exhibit of the Prang Course of Study was comprehensive and thoroughly sequential, showing work from the first primary year to the^ close of the high school. Through the first eight years parallel lines of work in Form Study and Drawing, in making patterns of geometric solids, and hollow geometric solids, in making articles based on these type forms, and in color, were carried on side by side. The exhibit of the first primary year contained work to be based upon type forms, the sphere, cube, cylinder, hemisphere, and the square and right-angled triangular prisms. These were to be studied as wholes and then modeled in clay ; objects like them are also to be modeled, as a ball, a box, a rolling pin, a cup, a trunk, a trough. Examples of this modeling made an attractive part of the exhibit. The details of these objects are then to be studied and the shapes of their faces were shown in tablets and also in paper-cutting. The shapes thus obtained were used in various ways, to be folded in paper, to be cut in paper to represent the objects and also to be used in arrangements for borders, etc. Articles like these type forms were also shown in bright worsted balls, pocket pin- cushions, boxes, etc. Some of these articles were decorated also like the arrangements that had been made with tablets. All these things are such as would appeal to the child, so that while he was learning his form he was evidently acquiring it through means most pleasing to him. The models, the clay, and the bright paper, all appeal to him and enlist his interest. Work in clay was exhibited for the first two years only. After that the same line of work was carried on through what is called paper modeling. Patterns of the various solids are cut and folded to make hollow type forms. These patterns and the model forms were exhibited side by side. The regular work in drawing after the first two years is divided into the three subjects, Construction, Representation, and Decoration, and it was arranged by years so that it could be easily read and understood. The drawing in Construction led up to the making of working drawings by the pupils from which the objects made were exhibited. The drawing in Representation led to the drawing of groups in good pictorial composition, and the drawing in Decoration led to fine drawing of good examples of Historic Ornament as well as good design. In addition to this, applica- tions were shown of drawing to other subjects, as arithmetic, geography, 54 TEE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION. history, etc., showing that drawing is not to be carried out merely for its own sake, but as a means of expression in all school work. For the ninth year some really artistic work in pen and ink was shown, and the higher work was supplemented witli suggestions for a high school course, and included fine drawings of detail in machinery and building- Construction, showing the plans and elevation of a fine house, in Represen- tation of out-door and in-door sketches in pen and ink, and of charcoal drawings from casts and from objects, and fine water color work of well- composed groups. In Decoration there was work in Historic Ornament, .in pen and ink and color, and many fine examples of applied designs in wall paper, carpets, book covers, stained glass, etc. The whole exhibit was consistent and progressive from beginning to end, showing what might be expected as the outcome of a course in Form Study and Drawing that was based on the study of the child as well as of fine technical knowledge. Mrs. L. T. Newcombe. ADDRESSES, PAPERS AND DISCUSSIONS, GENERAL ASSOCIATION". GENERAL SESSIONS OF THE ASSOCIATION. ADDRESSES OF WELCOME. inspector james l. hughes, of toronto. Mr. President, Ladies and Gentlemen, Members of the National Educational Association of the United States : On behalf of the Local Executive Committee of Toronto, I have the honor to bid you wel- come to-day to our city. It gives us a great deal of pleasure to welcome you here. We receive you as strangers, but we hope to make you friends before you leave us. We welcome you to-day as citizens of a great and friendly nation with which we always hope to live at peace. We believe that your coming here and our going to your land as teachers, fellow- workers in the same great cause, will tend to perpetuate all that which is for the best interests of the two countries, and to establish common education on a broad, sound, and solid basis which can never be disturbed. We welcome you as teachers and fellow- workers, coming here to take part in the discussion of some of the most important questions relating to your work and ours, and we trust that your coming and that your discussion of those matters which we may listen to may do much to give us a better, grander, truer idea of our work and of yours. We are glad that this National Associa- tion has in a certain sense become international, and we are not without some faint hope that your constitution may be so modified that you may be able to receive us as members of your Association in fact, and that some day you may he broad enough to take in at least the whole conti- nent of North America. It will be my pleasure to introduce to you to-day several gentlemen who will speak to you on behalf of various parts of our Dominion, and rep- resenting various interests in our Dominion. It is not my duty to speak, but simply to introduce them. I had expected the pleasure of introducing to you one who is not with us to-day ; one whom we laid to rest a few weeks ago ; one whom, when last February we asked to be present to-day, said heartily to us, who had the privilege of meeting him then, that he would be glad to welcome these ladies and gentlemen from the United States to our country. But Sir John Macdonald is not here to-day. And to those of you from the States who may not know it, I may say that is a greater sorrow to us as Canadians than perhaps you can understand, because we looked to him, in (57) 58 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION. many senses, as the father of our country, who would have been glad indeed to welcome you, and we would have been pleased to have had our country's father greet you. However, the Honorable Mr. Foster, Minister of Finance for the Do- minion, was invited to come, after the death of Sir John Macdonald, and he very courteously replied that he would come, and he would have been glad to show you to-day on this platform a gentleman who now occupies one of the important folios in our Dominion Cabinet, and tell you that he at oue time was a public-school teacher, a professor in one of our colleges in New Brunswick. Unfortunately, the budget is under discussion to-day in Ottawa, and it was impossible for him to be here. In his stead, how- ever, and in place of Vice-Chancellor Miller, who was to have spoken, but who is also detained by public duties at Ottawa, I have the pleasure of introducing to you one whom we will be glad to have you take as a repre- sentative Canadian, the Reverend Principal Grant, of Queen's University, Kingston. reverend principal grant. Comrades in the Teaching Profession of the United States : Standing here to speak for Canada and regarding you as the representa- tives of the United States, the solemnity of the occasion should, I suppose, oppress me ; but, to be frank with you, my feelings are rather those that belong to good-fellowship than to solemnity. You are here for a holiday as much as for anything else, and when cousins meet — for are we not cousins ? yes, more than cousins — "We are a' John Lamson's bairns" — when cousins meet to have a picnic together, they are supposed to be in the mood for laughter and not for long faces. It is my duty, however, to tell you that Canada is a very big country. The people of Toronto would doubtless like you to believe that their city is the whole or the larger half of Canada ; for Toronto has a fair share of that healthy localism that distinguishes almost every place of any size on this continent. I have never been in a city in America where I was not shown something which hospitable friends assured me was the finest thing of the kind in the world, and so they put their city first after the manner in which Mr. Slick proved to the Judge the supreme greatness of the Slick family. You must make allowances for this pardonable pride, for .even the Apostle Paul had it ; and remember that you have not seen Canada till you have visited other great cities of which you have heard as little as you heard previously to this con- vention of Toronto, such as Peultanginsheul and Petecodial and Mages and ISTearamictin and Guassies, not to speak of our Gardens of Eden, Paradises, Golden Shores, cities, and other well known centres. But big as Canada is you must not expect too much, for we are only a baby nation after all. People tell us, too, that we are not a nation at all, ADDRESSES OF WELCOME. 59 but only a dominion. However, we are practical persons, and for these the one word means pretty much the same thing as the other. We have the rights and privileges of a nation, except the privilege of paying a share of imperial expenses ; and when these mean an expensive army or a still more expensive pension fund, some of us are not half as sorry as we should be that we have no share in paying the bill. You have been accustomed to think of yourselves as a young nation, but compared to baby Canada, think how old you are. Judging by the looks of a good many, I should say that you must be at least " sweet six- teen." Our birthday was the 1st of July, 1887 ; yours the 4th of July, 1776. When you were born as a nation 115 years ago, during a little un- pleasantness with your mother, you were thirteen sturdy Colonies ; you numbered in all 3,000,000 of the best British stock ; you had been nur- tured too, by more than a century's conflict with savage wildernesses, still more savage Indians, and disciplined regiments from France. What was the condition of Canada then ? With the exception of a handful here and there on the coast of Nova Scotia, there was not an English-speaking community in any one of the seven Provinces and five Territories that now constitute the Dominion. This great Province of Ontario was covered with unbroken forest. Even the city of Toronto was not. Our popula- tion consisted of 60,000 or 70,000 inhabitants along the St. Lawrence. No wonder that French-speaking Canadians are still an important element with us ; especially in the Department of Public Works or railways and canals, those departments of the country that are known as the " money- spending" to distinguish them from others that are merely money-making. You are more than a century older than Canada, you see, and you must therefore make allowances, and not show more contempt for us than a lad of sixteen usually does for a boy of six — or for his grandmother. I think that you will take to us, for we are wonderfully like you in some things. For instance, nothing pleases us so much as washing our dirty linen, both municipal and federal, in public. When a particularly dirty bit is dragged to light it is greeted with yells of exultation. Read our papers, and you will see that even this great convention does not get anything like the same number of columns that a Parliamentary scandal gets ; and the relative amount of space gives a faint conception of the com- parative interest taken in each by the Canadian public. Since I have referred to this point of likeness between us, you will excuse me if I add that our virtue is conspicuous, not only in Sabbath-keeping but in expos- ing corruption. I understand that you leave it to Democrats to tell on the Republicans, and to Republicans to expose the Democrats, whereas in our Dominion investigation, our men are of the same political stripe. You will give us credit, then, for having the innocence as well as the immatur- ity of youth. If we do not pay you the compliment of a vast amount of newspaper 60 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION space, you must not think that our welcome is cold. You have received in advance the greatest compliment that one country could pay to another. Should the teachers of Canada visit the States in July, I doubt if Congress would pay them the compliment of adjourning on Canada's National day, and making up for it by listening to tedious speeches and doing what they called " business" on the Fourth of July. But that is what our Parlia- ment did this year ; in your honor, no doubt, for if that was not the reason, nobody knows what was. When you go home again, give this as a proof that we are the most courteous people under the sun. That is one of the advantages we get from having so many French in Canada ; for Frenchmen are always polite. I am told that to-day I represent not only the Dominion, but specially the Universities, and so the managers of this meeting have paid you the compliment of soliciting a schoolmaster to represent Canada. That, I may mention, is my business as well as yours, for, as Carlyle points out, what is a university but a school. In the common school pupils learn to read in their own language. In the university they learn to read in all languages, to appreciate all literatures, to read the human mind, to read the inspired volumes of nature and almost undecipherable tomes of uni- versal history. As a comrade I bid you a hearty welcome. I say, " Magnify your office." Twenty years before the Revolutionary War broke out, John Adams taught school in Worcester, and long before that Benjamin Franklin began those researches into electricity that made him famous. Greater names there are not among your statesmen and men of science. Well, when John Adams was an old man, he testified that he acquired more knowledge of human nature by keeping school than by his work " at the head, in the world of politics, or at the courts of Europe." He advised every young man to " keep school," for it was " the best method of acquiring patience, self-command, and a knowledge of character." There are men like Adams, Jay, Franklin, Washington, now teaching school in Canada and the States. Remember that your welcome is not merely Canadian. We represent the world-wide commonwealth of Britain. I am no more a mere Canuck than you are mere Northerners or Southerners, Yankees or Western men. You have given the most splendid proof of devotion to your Union and to the flag that represents the Union. We desire to imitate you ; to say in your own classic words, "We follow no flag, we march with no party, that does not keep step with the Union." We twine your flag with ours. Next to our own we love it best, for you are of our roll, and the blows you have struck for freedom were for us as well as for yourselves. How much more should you love and honor the red cross flag ! for your inher- itance in it is larger than in your own, did you but reflect for a moment. " We, too, are heirs of Runny mede," ADDRESSES OF WELCOME. 61 says Whittier, and he is right. We admit the claim ; I would have you take your full share. Yes, you are heirs of Runnymede, and of Naseby fight, and the plains of Abraham as well ; you are heirs of Shakespeare and Milton, of Hampden, Russell, and Sydney, even as we are heirs of Washington and Lincoln. Think what that flag represents to us ! Not only national existence, but the cause of humanity all over the world ; not only freedom — personal, political, intellectual, commercial, civil, religious — but also the most pregnant spiritual ideas that ever descended from heaven to earth. It is the cross of St. George, the cross of St. Andrew, and the cross of St. Patrick, the three in one ; and as the cross means light and life, so where the flag waves there is justice for all, peace by land and sea, and the proclamation of good news to every son of Adam. 0 kinsmen ! blend the two flags together, and count those men enemies of the race who seek to erect or seek to maintain barriers between the British Commonwealth and the United States, or who teach that it is a good thing for neighbors to have no intercourse with each other. Join hands and never forget that we at least are children of the light. HON. GEO. W. BOSS, ONTARIO MINISTER OF EDUCATION. Ladies and Gentlemen : The Reverend Principal Grant was commis- sioned to extend to our American visitors the hospitality of Canada, and particularly the welcome of our higher educational interests. I regret exceedingly that the Honorable Lieutenant-Governor has been unable to present the welcome of the people of Ontario. It is my pleasure as a member of the Executive Government to represent, in a somewhat feeble way perhaps, our Government, not so aptly as the Lieutenant-Governor would have done, and to tell you how glad we of the Province of Ontario are to receive and welcome so many American citizens. I do so with pleas- ure, because, representing as I do the Educational Department, I know that I represent the feelings and disposition of over 8,000 teachers of this Province alone. And when I say, " Welcome, our fellow teachers from the United States," we welcome them as scholars, coadjutors in the great work of building up higher citizenship by the diffusion of intelli- gence and sympathy one with the other. There was a time, Mr. Chair- man, when about as many American citizens as are here in this city to- day paid Toronto a visit uninvited — not as you have done. In the early days of this century, I think it was, if I have not forgotten my school history, they came ; not then, however, to impart to us the pedagogical art of which you are the masters; but they came then not to teach the young Canadian idea how to shoot — it was rather a piratical art in which they were engaged then, of shooting young Canadians. They stayed a little while ; we did not invite them to our homes ; we were afraid we could not take care of them if we did. We were uneasy while we were 62 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION out of doors. Their reception was warm ; their departure was not re- gretted. But happily those times have gone. They are the shadows of the past ; they were the misunderstandings and the vicissitudes of diplo- matic mistake and superbuoyant aggressiveness of early youth. We have swept all that away, and in its stead has come a witter civilization and mutual respect one for the other. And to-day the representatives of the two nations stand upon a common platform together with an invocation to their Heavenly Father to protect them, illustrating how good, how pleasant, a thing it is for brethren to dwell together in unity. Sir, it is very pleasant to me to extend to our American friends a word of welcome on this occasion. The Dominion undoubtedly owes a great deal to the "United States educationally. Fifty years ago when the founder of our school system, the late Dr. Ryerson, was organizing that system he inquired into other systems on the other side of the water, and after a thorough examination it was found that the school system of the United States, particularly of the New England States, and of these especially Massachusetts, was, in his opinion, the best adapted to the wants of the people of Ontario, the best suited to the spirit of our institutions, and so that system was copied, in many of its main features. And so from that day until now the two peoples, with the same aspirations towards a democ- racy which recognizes the superiority of the people, differentiated their systems, although on the same general principle. We have free schools in Canada. I do not say we got them from the United States ; we have them here ; they are there also. We have also admired the splendid commercial resources of the United States. We appreciate the vast contributions of our American friends to literature, to science, and to art. We appreciate your statesmanship which guided the great Republic through the early difficulties of national organ- ization, and on through even the greater perils of reorganization. Allow me to say, sir, there is nothing in the history of the great people that I, as a Canadian, appreciate as much to-day, that from one nation to the other, from the Gulf on the south to the great lakes on the north, have laid down as a cardinal principle of American institution, that the ballot-box must be free in order that the people may be guided by the intelligence of its citizens. That principle we admire and that condition we appreciate. And we are glad to know that there, as here, the humblest citizen in the remotest hamlet in that mighty land, as well as he who comes from the palace of the millionaire, has the same right to a common English educa- tion ; has the same birthright of that intelligence, without which there can be no national prosperity. Because of your splendid contribution to the civilization of the age, we welcome you, our American friends, as the pioneers in some respects, as the exponents in all respects, of that higher civilization that is repre- sented by free public schools, by free high schools, and, equally impor- ADDRESSES OF WELCOME. tant to all nationalities, by practically a free university. We welcome you to-day not for what you have done, though you have done well, but we welcome you for what you are. We welcome you as teachers, as the architects of a nation's prosperity, the supreme factors in the civilization of all constitutional government, the teachers of the public schools, of the high schools, and in the universities of the country. We welcome you as the architects of the nation's fortunes — a nation the greatest on this con- tinent. The poet has said : " Let me make the songs of the people, and I care not who makes the laws/' I say, let me make the teachers, and we can defy despotism. We welcome you, then, as nation-builders. We welcome you as those who guard the foundations of a nation's liberty. Let the teachers be pure, high-minded, progressive, and you will see a civilization such as the poet never dreamed of, such as statesmanship never foresaw. We welcome you as pioneers of a higher civilization, and we trust, Mr. Chairman, that every hour spent under our Canadian flag, every moment spent in conversation with her citizens, will be one of pleasure and profit to you all. And when the time comes that we have to part with you, we hope yon will carry to your American homes, to that land to which we claim kinship, and in whose prosperity we re- joice, we hope you will carry away those influences which will bind the two peoples more closely in brotherly love, and bring in greater harmony the two nations on opposite sides of this imaginary line, so that you on one side will be working out a republican form of freedom for yourselves, and we on the other will illustrate the great truth that while there is a differentiating in national aspirations, yet at the same time there is a higher civilization attainable by each, on different lines. EEV. DR. ALLISON, SUPERINTENDENT OF INSTRUCTION, NOVA SCOTIA. Mr. President, Ladies and Gentlemen : There are two considera- tions that impress themselves upon my mind at this present time very strongly. The one is that it is a very great honor to be the medium through which the ancient province of Nova Scotia extends to this vast body of American teachers its heartiest welcome to Canada. The other impres- sion is, Mr. Chairman and friends, that the duty devolving upon me at the present time cannot be discharged in the general interest of this gathering too briefly and too concisely. I will not offend the intelligence, or question the geographical or historical knowledge of these teachers and educators, by assuming that you are not all familiar, or at least sort of familiar, with the name of Nova Scotia ; and that the history of Nova Scotia and the position which Nova Scotia occupies in the Canadian Dominion is understood by you. I only regret, ladies and gentlemen, that it did not fall to the lot of Nova Scotia on this present occasion to be represented by a single 64 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION. Nova Scotian rather than by two. I would have you know that my friend, who has just addressed this audience with such effect, is, brawn and bone, through and through, a Nova Scotian. We had simply made a temporary loan of him to this great •Province of Ontario, to take charge of one of its most important educational institutions, and when it becomes necessary that we should require his genius, experience, and skill as an educator, I am sure he will not fail to respond to the call of his native and beloved Province of Nova Scotia. Nova Scotia, ladies and gentlemen, is but a small country. She is not as large as Texas ; she is not as populous as New York. We have to content ourselves with the fact that she is just a little larger than Rhode Island, and, if I have not already forgotten my statistics, she is a little more populous than Nevada ; and it is separated by a beautiful sheet of water from the main country. There is no province of the Canadian Dominion that I think sees the advantages of intercourse with the United States in educational matters as much as the Province of Nova Scotia ; but I must say while they admire the greatness of the American people, as great as they are, I must tell the whole truth and say that there are not half a million of people anywhere in the Dominion of Canada, who estimate it a greater privilege to live under the British flag, or to be known as an integral part of the great British Empire, than the people of Nova Scotia. I will just say a word or two more. I happen to be a graduate of one of your New England universities. I am glad to see on this platform my old schoolmates, and I am glad to welcome so many whose acquaintance- ship in one way or another I have made in connection with the working out of educational ideas and problems between the two countries. I feel it tt great honor, looking back to my own old college days, to greet you people here to-day. The very air of the United States during those years was charged with electrical influences. We could feel, those of us who did not belong to that country, in our very inmost being that there was some- thing coming, some great, fearful overturning, some development on new lines ; and the workers in those days strove in a mighty cause, and the result is a grander, greater, better country than it was in my college days. And I say from the bottom of my heart that I believe that the United States of America is a far better country now than it was thirty years ago, and I believe it will be a better country thirty years hence than she is now. I see here a great many schoolmasters. Mr. Chairman, the des- tinies of these great countries, and the development of their future, is largely, I may say entirely, in the hands of the schoolmasters and school- mistresses of the respective countries. It has been my privilege to hear many of the great orators of that country. I have listened to the majestic power and eloquence of Edward Everett until I did not know whether I was in the body or out of the body. I have heard the oratory of our grand old Englishman, Mr. Gladstone, in one of his most majestic efforts. ADDRESSES OF WELCOME. I have heard great advocates ; some of them, many of them, utter the most eloquent words to which I ever listened in my life ; but the words which thrilled me the most, and which in their substance at least I remember best, was that sweet eulogy which I heard the great Mr. Beecher in his own Plymouth pulpit pronounce on the school uia'am, to whom he attributed all that was great and noble and influential in his life. He told how a poor, pale, consumptive girl impressed him, and he said with emphasis : "I can never forget her" ; all that he was, all that he had done for Plymouth, all that he had done for the slave, all that he had done for the general cause of human liberty, he owed, under the Almighty God and as God's providence, to "that tall, consumptive, attenuated skeleton of a schoolma'am." All of the young men and women before me have far greater advantages than that teacher. They are not attenuated, they are not consumptive ; not by any meaus. The bloom of youth is on their cheeks. They are here before us laden with smiles. Everything about them indicates a wealth of health and capacity for the great work they are engaged in. I bring these rambling remarks to a close, and trust that this conven- tion of this Association will bring prosperity and inspiration to all those who have the cause of education at heart. THE REV. ELSON I. REXFORD, SECRETARY OF THE DEPARTMENT OF INSTRUCTION, QUEBEC. La.dies and Gentlemen : I think you have been thoroughly welcomed already to this Dominion of ours. I had arranged for you what I thought would be somewhat of a treat for the teachers of this Association. When the invitation reached Quebec it was arranged that the Superintendent of Public Instruction should give you a specimen of the language used by a great majority of the people in the Province of Quebec. Superintendent Ouimet had fully intended to be present to-day to speak to you in his native tongue, so rich and well fitted for occasions of this kind. In his absence he has deputed me to convey to you his welcome, and express his deep regret that he is not here in person to-day to welcome you to the Dominion. Let me make one personal reference. It would be interest- ing to m.any of you listening to Superintendent Ouimet speak to you in his language, to know that he is the twenty-sixth child of the family to which he belongs. I do not think I am exceeding the bounds of propri- ety when I tell you a little story in connection with his birth. You know the curate is entitled to the twenty-sixth bushel of grain, and when the father of the present Superintendent received the present of his twenty- sixth child, he said, " This belongs to the curate," and he started with the baby in his arms and presented the child to the curate, who adopted him, and the result is a Prime Minister for the Province of Quebec and a 66 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION. Superintendent of Public Instruction, who has done much to build up an educational system in our province. I consider it a high honor to repre- sent the Superintendent for the Province of Quebec. I do not think there could possibly have been brought to your attention more decisive proof of the perfect harmony that prevails between the two nationalities in Quebec, than the fact that that province should be represented at this great international gathering by one who is neither French nor Roman Catholic. I desire to extend to you, then, on behalf of the Province of Quebec, a hearty welcome. I would like to say, with the Minister of Education of Ontario, who first conceived the thought of inviting this Association to meet here in Toronto, and ask the Superintendent of In- struction of Quebec to co-operate with him in extending the Dominion's welcome, that Superintendent Ouimet promptly responded that he would do all in his power to make this welcome a true welcome. I am here to-day to join with Ontario in extending you a welcome to the Dominion from the Atlantic to the Pacific, in order that you may in future recog- nize the advisability of calling this an International Association. I stand here as the representative of the Frenchmen, in a Province almost wholly French, which has manifested a marvellous power of the people to stick together, surrounded as they are wholly by English influences, cut off from their native land, ruled and governed by the English people. They have preserved their language and their institutions, and Principal Grant would be the first to admit that under the greatest difficulties and disad- vantages they have built up in that Province a literature which stands first in the Dominion to-day, easily. The literature of the Province of Quebec is far ahead of the literature of other parts of the Dominion. Not only so, Mr. Chairman, but they have developed in the Province of Quebec, under peculiar circumstances, institutions that command our admiration. I stand here to-day not only to represent the Province of Quebec, but as a. teacher and President of one of the largest associations of teachers in the Province. I would like to emphasize the idea of one of the previous speakers, who says that the teacher's work is that of an architect of nations, and I am convinced that great good will come from this vast meeting of teachers, brought from all parts of the two nations. And I trust that the teachers of the' United States and Canada will make it one of the first principles of their teaching, that peace and harmony between the two nations is of the greatest importance. E. F. CLARKE, ESQ., MAYOR OF THE CITY OF TORONTO. Mr. President, Ladies and Gentlemen : I consider it a high honor to most heartily and sincerely welcome you to our Queen City of Toronto. The great compliment which has been paid to the city and people of Toronto, and not only to them but to our whole Dominion, by you, is ap- ADDRESSES OF WELCOME. 67 predated. We appreciate the great compliment the members of this Association have paid the people of Toronto and Canada in going beyond the borders of the United States and selecting a Canadian city in which to hold their annual convention. We look upon this visit as the evidence of a kindly feeling entertained by you for our country and its people. We sincerely hope that many of you will have the most pleasant recollec- tion and reminiscences of your stay with us. Mr. Chairman, the trait I admire most in our American cousins is their intense patriotism, their intense love of country. I often wish Cana- dians were more strongly developed on this side of the line in that particular. The people of the United States have great reasons to be patriotic, have great reasons to be proud of their grand country and the magnificent record it has made. But, as a previous speaker has said, I think the American people have greater reasons to pride themselves on their magnificent educational associations which afford facilities for citizens to prepare themselves for the discharge of the high and important and responsible duties to the best advantage of the State. We feel especially honored that you, the National Association, have paid our city a visit, and we know that our people will be greatly bene- fitted by your visit. On behalf of the city of Toronto, the Queen City, as we are proud to call her, I extend to you, ladies and gentlemen, a most cordial, sincere welcome. You will have an opportunity to see 'the city of Toronto, and in closing I will say that we are perfectly delighted to see so many of our American cousins with us. ONTARIO TEACHERS' ASSOCIATION. To the Hon. W. R. Garrett, President National Educational Association of the U. S. A.: Sir — The Ontario Teachers' Association, representing the High and Public School Teachers and Inspectors of this Province, desire to convey to the organization over which you preside their high appreciation of this visit. Not a few of your members have long been known by reputation to Canadian teachers as able and influential members of the profession ; as writers of more than national repute on educational topics ; as authorities — almost too high for criticism — in all things pedagogical; as fellow-laborers in the cause of education — they are held in honor by us as by yourselves. Our aims, our labors, our hopes, are the same ; and while our methods may exhibit local differences and peculiarities, the opportunity afforded by this Convention for a free interchange of thought on educational subjects ought to, and will, do much to en- large our conceptions, broaden our theories, unify our methods, unite our efforts, and combine and increase our influence in every department of educational work ; while any feeling of national prejudice which may exist will be dissipated, and those right- eous bonds be more strongly cemented, which must of necessity exist between nations linked to each other by a common love of freedom, a common ancestry, the same in-' herited language and traditions, the same love of learning, and the same rich treasury of ancestral literature. 68 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION. We hope that the personal and professional acquaintance with each other, of which this visit so pleasantly marks, for the greater number of us, the beginning, may be con- tinued from year to year, growing rapidly into an intimate and abiding friendship, firmly based on our mutual recognition of the high personal character, the noble aims, and the ennobling toils of those for whom, and those to whom, we speak. With such thoughts in our minds, and such sentiments in our hearts, we bid you welcome here— a hearty welcome to our native land, to this fair city, to its educational halls, to our homes. R. W. Goan, Secretary, W. Mackintosh, President, 0. T. A. Ontario Teachers' Association. RESPONSES. the president of the association". Mr. Chairman of the Local Committee, Your Worship the Mayor of Toronto, Educators and Citizens of Canada : The National Educational Association of the United States, for the first time in its history, meets upon foreign soil. The hospitable recep- tion which you have given us, and your cordial words of welcome, set our hearts aglow with fraternal sentiments, and make us forget that we have crossed a political boundary line to meet you. Two years ago the Principal of the Normal School of Toronto visited our Association at Nashville, bearing a message from the Minister of Education of Ontario, and from the educational authorities of every prov- ince in Canada, inviting us to meet in Toronto. Last year at St. Paul a similar message was borne to us by the inspector of the schools of Toronto, who is now so pleasantly known to us as the Chairman of the Local Executive Committee. This invitation, too cordial in its terms to be mistaken for an idle compliment, touched a responsive chord in the hearts of the educators of the United States. We felt deeply this mark of friendship from our kinsmen in Canada. As we reflected upon the common lineage, upon the common language which we love to call " our mother tongue," and upon the many inherited institutions and sentiments which will forever mark us as kinsmen, our hearts overleaped the political boundary line which separates the educa- tional brethren of Canada and the United States. You are not prouder of being subjects of Great Britain than we are of being her descendants. Secure of our welcome, we have now crossed that line, and we find our- selves, indeed, among brethren. We find that a local committee with a complete organization has been at work for seven months to make arrange- ments for our entertainment, and have provided for our comfort with a BESPONSES. 69 kind foresight which demands our gratitude. We have shared the warm grasp of the hand from your educators and your citizens. The hospita- ble doors of Toronto have flown open at our approach. Distinguished representatives of education from the various provinces of Canada, His Worship the Mayor of Toronto, have addressed us in words whose cordiality has given us a thrill of pleasure, and completes the assurance of our welcome. In responding to this generous reception, we have but one cause of embarrassment — the lack of fitting terms in which to express our thanks. We condense them in the words of the sweetest poet of our common language : "We take thy courtesy, by Heaven, As freely as 'tis nobly given." In the exercises that are to follow, we anticipate much pleasure and profit in the interchange of thought. We shall freely receive and freely give. Whatever we find in Canadian systems or methods of education or in Canadian thought which is better than our own, we shall bear it home, with your permission, as a pleasant lesson and a grateful memento of this international meeting. If you should find in our systems or methods or thoughts anything suggestive or useful, " 'Twas ours ; 'tis yours." Inspired by the presence of this grand international assembly, which gathers in one fraternal meeting educators from the Gulf of Mexico to the northern limits of America, from the Atlantic to the Pacific, I feel tempted to address you more at length, but I must forbear. The enthu- siasm which has been kindled in your cordial invitation and your gener- ous hospitality demands expression from all portions of our country. I shall, therefore, have the pleasure of introducing to you a number of dis- tinguished educators representing the several geographical sections of the United States. In order that all may be heard, it is necessary to limit the time of each. This limitation, which it will become my duty to enforce, it is now my duty to obey. But, first, responses will be made for the Association by the members of the Executive Committee. I regret that I am denied the pleasure of presenting to you the First Vice-President, whose voice has so often been heard in acknowledging the courtesies which have been extended to the Association, and who has taken a lively interest in the arrangements for this international meeting. Hoping that he might be present, and with- out awaiting his consent, I have placed his name on the program for a response. I regret that the pressure of his duties as Chancellor of the University of Nebraska prevent him from being with us. I now take pleasure in introducing to you the Secretary of the Associ- ation, Mr. E. II. Cook, of New York. 70 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION THE SECRETARY E. H. COOK. Mr. President, and Gentlemen of the Welcoming Committee: It is my pleasant and agreeable duty, in behalf of the officers and Executive Committee of the National Educational Association, to return our sincere thanks, not only to the kind words of welcome, but to the various local committees, for the cordiality and the unsurpassed hospitality with which we have been received and entertained during our several visits to Toronto, while engaged in maTdng preparations for this present conven- tion. We desire to extend to your several committees our hearty thanks and grateful appreciation of their untiring efforts and earnest co-operation in preparing for our coming and arranging for our comfort, and we extend to the teachers of Canada a warm, hearty invitation to meet with us in our future gatherings. I am asked to respond in behalf of that large body of educational work- ers whose members comprise more than four-fifths of the great teaching force of the country — the ladies. Who, by words, can express the debt of gratitude which the world owes to woman in her untiring efforts and unremitting zeal in the great work of guiding to intellectual excellence and eminence the boys and girls who are to become the future citizens of the world? But let me give a word of warning to the young unmarried men engaged in educational work in Canada. These ladies believe thoroughly and honestly in annexation and reciprocity (matrimonially). May the present convention result in many happy unions of hands and intellects and hearts. Allow me here, in behalf of the ladies, to thank you for the ample provisions that you have made for their special enjoyment and happiness, and assure you that they will be most happy to reciprocate when oppor- tunity offers. THE TREASURER J. M. GREENWOOD. Mr. President, Ladies and Gentlemen: Only thirty-four years ago, during a naval engagement on the coast of China, when a British com- mander was wounded and the sailors were struggling in the water, an American commander, Chatmoah, a witness of that engagement, observed, the English soldiers and sailors as they were being fired upon by the enemy, and sent his men to the rescue. They picked these struggling men up out of the water, and took them to the American vessel. After- wards, when they came back to our own country, and the question was raised, why did he interfere as a neutral, he replied, and his response touched every heart of Great Britain, as well as of our own country, " Blood is thicker than water. " When Inspector Hughes came to St. Paul RESPONSES. 71 last year, and I had the pleasure of meeting a man whose works I have been reading for years, and I looked into his eye, and when as represen- tative of this country solicited us to come to this side of the line, I said: " I will cast my vote, and whatever influence I possess as a member of the National Association, to visit Toronto; and why? We are the same peo- ple; you believe in your institutions; we believe in ours; but we are all engaged in the same great work — in the work of humanity, in the work of elevating the people to a higher plane of thought, of training the intelligent, moral and physical nature of the children that are grow- ing up under these flags that, representing fraternal relationship and kinship, we see overhead to-day. I hope to see upon the next programme a different line from the one I behold here. It says " Official Programme, National Educational Association of the United States of America." I hope we may soon have an official programme of the International Edu- cational Association of America. These are my sentiments on the ques- tion of reciprocity. THE CHAIRMAN OF THE BOARD OF TRUSTEES — N. A. CALKINS. Mr. President, and representatives of the different organizations and provinces of the Dominion, who have extended to us such a hearty wel- come : I am called upon in behalf of the Board of Trustees of the National Educational Association to respond to many hearty welcomes that have been extended to us. Though this Board of Trustees is a small body, numbering only five in its organization, it is large enough and old enough to embrace within it the first President of the National Educational Association, who occupied its chair thirty-three years ago, and the last President, who wields the gavel to-day. I am happy to-day in realizing that which I anticipated last November, when I came here to meet the citizens of Toronto, and to look about your commodious city, and at your spacious buildings. Although we asked much then, and expected many things, we hardly anticipated provisions so ample, and so much of com- fort as we have found since coming here. My chief fear was in regard to comfort, owing to the fact that wherever this Association meets it usually receives a very warm welcome. Sometimes the warmth is measured in the nineties — by the thermometer ; but I am happy that in Toronto the breezes from your lake have made our reception so delightful that we shall remember it as a royal welcome, and we hope that the smiles of your charming weather may continue to greet us during our stay here. As we meet in our gatherings from day to day I trust that we shall receive inspiration from your presence and instruction from your words, and go home feeling more than ever that we are all at work in the same great cause of uplifting the educational forces of our common country. 72 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION. IT. S. COMMISSIONER OF EDUCATION W. T. HARRIS. In behalf of the people of the United States I thank yon for this cordial welcome to your hospitable city. We have long heard of your thrift, and of the sobriety of your manners, and we have listened with great interest to the story of your happy adjustment of local self-gov- ernment with centralized power. The fame of your educational insti- tutions has created in us a warm desire to come to your provinces and see them for ourselves. We come not as entire strangers, nor indeed as people differing widely in language or political institutions ; on the contrary, we claim close relationship, almost brotherhood, as descended from a common mother nation, the great Anglo-Saxon Britannia, ruler of the seas. We are the elder and you are the younger offspring of that nation whose glory in the world's history is that of the invention of local self-government, the greatest political device ever invented by man for the protection of the individual and the preservation of his liberties. Like all valuable contributions to the forms of civilization,this device is not the invention of theoretical thinkers. It is something far deeper. It was born of great national struggles, the collision of races, — the Celt, the Saxon, the Dane, and the Norman meeting in bloody conflict, and the innate stubbornness of each furnishing an element in the four-fold product — the British Constitution. The mutual toleration, the sense of fair play, the readiness of all to defend each in the exercise of his individual prerogative, the profound respect for established law — these characteristics belong essentially to the original people that invented local self-government. We both of us here unite in gratitude toward that common ancestor, still young in strength and beauty. But we must remember at this point that you are still living in the old family as an integral part of it. We have long since gone out from that family, but while no one of us regrets our separate independence, yet we do not for a moment suppose that we have taken with us all the good things. In studying your own social and political forms we see that you who still hold fealty to the British flag have preserved features that we may well imitate. _ Your union of central and local powers is more perfect than that which we have yet achieved in the States. Our own history, beginning with a bloody revolution, has always shown a tendency in the people to dread the centralizing of power in the government. There is a deep-seated jealousy, even at this late day, of centralized power. The consequence of this has been that we have never evolved that perfect balance between local and central powers. We behold in your dominion a more perfect balance in this respect than RESPONSES. 73 we have yet been able to attain. We see this in yc-nr political govern- ment and in your schools. It is a great opportunity that we have, and we rejoice in the oppor- tunity, to study and learn from a fresh experiment at local self- government and the preservation of it by common-school education. You, too, like ourselves, have your conservative appliance in the education of the youth, and your movements in this great cause have attracted our attention for a long time. The honored names — honored wherever edu- cational history is studied — the honored names of Ryerson, Hodgins and Ross stand for us as significant of new departures full of promise in educational methods and organizations. We thank you for your hearty reception; we congratulate you on the liberty and the prosperity which you enjoy within the old national family. May the day when you shall feel a necessity for separation from that family never come. But let another and dilferent day draw near — when all English-speaking peoples shall form one grand confederation of independent nations, settling all questions of difference by international conferences. On the basis of local self-government there is no limit to the extent of the territory that may be united, for, according to its principle, each province, each section, governs itself in all local interests. Only in common interests is there a common authority. Only in supreme concerns does the supreme power interfere. Let us all who have common share in Runnymede and in Shakspere, and who love England and Scotland as the home of our ancestry, — let us study here the problems of education in the light of our similar social and political problems, being assured that a civilization whose symbols are the railroad, the public school, and the morning newspaper, shall find in this study the best key to its sphinx riddles and to the perplexing issues which the Time-spirit offers to our peoples. Teachers and citizens of Canada, we, as your cousins and brethren, thank you. RAY GREENE HULING, PRESIDENT OF THE AMERICAN INSTITUTE OF INSTRUCTION. Mr. President, Ladies and Gentlemen of Toronto and of Canada: I should be delighted to say a word suitable to respond to these words of welcome with which you have greeted us, but the English language appears to have been exhausted by the gentleman who has preceded me. Just think what a welcoming you have given to us! We have heard your honey-laden words; we have seen your flags intertwined with ours, and that we are always glad to see, never gladder to see our flag than when it is united with the Union Jack of Britain. And your very sparrows have been pressed into the service to give us a welcome. The clouds have been invited down to enwrap us in their gentle embrace; and if 74 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION I mistake not, our Chairman, Mr. Hughes, has been hard at work getting the sun to come out, and if you will only wait until to-morrow morning, and allow the ladies present here from the States to unite their efforts with his, I am very sure you will see sunshine all about you. What shall we say to these words of welcome? Simply this: We are bound to meet you half way. If any of you stretch out a welcoming hand, you will find one of ours coming out to clasp it. If you have anything for us to enjoy, we are here for a holiday and to enjoy it to the full, and we know how to enjoy a holiday, too. There are some things which Providence has denied to school-ma'ams of New England, — hus- bands, for instance, — but it has not denied the speaking tongue, or hear- ing ear, or the eye that sees everything that is good, and you may be sure that all you have of value or interest we shall be eager to see, and not slow to inquire about. But I come to speak to this, the largest association in America, as a messenger, in a sense, from the oldest association of teachers now living in the world — the old American Institute of Instruction. We have just finished her sixty-second annual meeting — one of the richest in her history — and we bring to you an omen of success, to lay before you as your omen for the present meeting. I come, too, to represent the educa- tional interests of the North-eastern States. We have been fortunate in some respects there. We had the advantage of beginning early. We had the opportunity to lay a foundation, and we are very glad to find that these elementary steps of ours have been carried forward, and carried further in many cases, in the interior and through the West and even in the South. L. H. JONES, OF INDIANA. I come forward, Mr. President, as the representative in a way of the North Central States of the United States. We of that section feel that we too have a part in this royal welcome which has been tendered to the teachers of " The States" by the authorities and people of this beautiful city ; and we therefore esteem it a privilege and a pleasure to be allowed to express in this formal way the great pleasure your courteous attentions have given us. Even if your good- will and kindly personal interest had been less marked, we should still have been obliged to admire the executive ability which has planned so admirably for our comfort. In speaking for our people, I can fully assure you that this invasion of your city which comes up from the South-land, while it may tax the capacity of your hotels, and may even test the measure of your private hospitality, has no such sanguinary intentions as did that body of walking delegates that came upon your city in 1866. There may be indeed with us a great war of worth, but doubtless it RESPONSES. 75 will end in words ; and we shall, I trust, do our wrangling chiefly among ourselves. In behalf of the section whose people I especially represent, then, I desire in this formal manner to return our most heartfelt thanks for your many courtesies extended. We ourselves of the North Central States are a very modest people, and are not disposed to puff ourselves up with much vanity. Yet we are not entirely wanting in those elements of worth which might make us in some sense worthy of your notice. AVe are known at home as the North Central States — North Central doubtless because we occupy the northern portion of the great Mississippi Valley, a region in which some of the problems of humanity are destined, as we believe, to find at least a partial solution — North Central States because we are at once the centre of population and — culture of the American Union. At least, when the census of 1890 was taken, the centre of population was found to be in the State from which I have the honor to come ; but since that census was taken, so many great universities, like Leland Stanford, Cornell, and others, have had to be supplied with presidents and professors, and so many State normal schools have had to be supplied with presidents, that our population has thereby been greatly diminished. But, as I told you before, we are a very modest people, and easily give up the distinction of being the centre of population, and content our- selves in remaining merely the centre of education and culture. There are in the immediate section which I represent more than 5,000,000 of children in the public schools, taught by a corps of intelligent and conscientious teachers. These teachers are not engaged giving intellectual education alone, but are instilling into the hearts of these children those cardinal virtues which prepare the child, as he advances, to become a worthy member of the state, the church, the family and civil society. They are trying to develop in these children such ideals of life and duty as shall make life seem to them worth the living; and at the same time they are trying to instil into these children such notions of institutional life as shall make them worth living with — such notions of law and order as shall make them in the future the safe custodians of the people's liberty. And now, we — these teachers — have come to meet the teachers of the other sections of our United States, hoping to benefit ourselves, not alone by contact with one another, but also by exchange of ideas with the prominent leaders of educational thought and practice of your city and province. We shall freely give of our best, and feel assured that we shall as freely receive at your hands: to the end that reciprocity between our respective countries may not pertain alone to material things, but to ideas and spiritual things as well. 76 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION WM. M. BEARDSHEAR, OF IOWA. Mr. President, Ladies and Gentlemen: It is a happy attribute of human nature that every man believes his government and his country to be the choicest government and the best country under the sun. In representing to you the North-western States of America it is not neces- sary for me, however, to depend upon this philosophy of human nature to fit my case. All men from every clime who have visited that country come to admire it, and if they stay they have come to love it. In this North-western country we love our government and her institutions. But if it were our lot to-day to choose a locality other than the great Northwest, we would select this land of freedom, and live under the reign of that noble woman of queenly deeds, eminent wisdom, exalted character, and true womanhood — her most gracious majesty, Queen Victoria, beloved by all. This national association has had a peculiar history in one respect, to which I shall in a word refer. It has not only had the purpose of unify- ing us with reference to our educational methods and systems, but it has had a refining influence in the United States. First, when they started, they went up into New England, and there its members learned to respect the ingenuity, power and grand scholarship of the Easterner. Then they went out West, and there the Easterner saw what a vast West we had. Then when the nation came to the great strife in the early sixties, when brother took up sword against brother, and learned to respect each other at the bayonet's point and the cannon's mouth, after that, and early in 1868, they were the first national organization to go down into that sunny land and there talk together again of the common interests, and endeavor to promote the welfare of our common country and common brotherhood. And then they went over the great States back and forth, until recently again, in 1889, they were down in that country at Nashville, when they found that all hostility was buried and all enmity gone, and when they found that, in heart as well as in word and hand, that friend and foe, North and South, had been made one again. And having accomplished this work we did not sit down like Alexander of old and cry for new worlds to conquer, but by your generous invitation we have come into Canada, and I warn you all to look out for the blissful consequences. F. B. GAULT, OF TACOMA, WASH. A little less than a century ago Capt. Vancouver first sailed the great inland sea which he named Puget Sound. He narrowly missed making another great discovery upon the north Pacific coast. He failed to find "where rolls the Oregon." Capt. Gray was more fortunate, and to this " Achilles of Rivers " he gave the name of his ship, the historic name, Columbia! RESPONSES. 77 A half century ago California was a Mexican province, and Oregon, which included all the north coast, was a vast game preserve. Less than ;i half century ago those great statesmen and diplomatists, Ash burton and Webster, were adjusting the north-western boundary matter, but neither thought Oregon was worth having. The leading English and American statesmen, and the leading journals of each country, condemned Oregon as unfit for civilized man. An English authority insisted that it "was not worth 20,000 pounds." An American senator, not to be outdone in extravagant language, said it was not worth a " pinch of snuff." Another proposed that " Oregon should sink into Symmes's Hole," and thus fill a vacuum and dispose of a worthless region. A distinguished American statesman, the greatest friend the unexplored West ever had, asserted that " the statue of the fabled god Terminus should be raised upon the highest peak of the Rocky Mountains, never to be thrown down. " Less than fifty years ago Whitman made his memorable ride to prove to the American authorities that Oregon was worth having. This feat of physical endur- ance, of moral heroism, and of unselfish patriotism, was never surpassed upon this continent. Only the most consummate diplomacy prevented the two nations from a fierce struggle over the Oregon question. Less than twenty years ago Emperor William decided the controversy, and the last British soldier marched out of the territory, now the State of Washington. The Pacific Coast! What an empire! There is California, Oregon, Washington — yes, and there is British Columbia, whose capital city bears the proud name of her majesty, the Queen. We are one people out there — there is but one Pacific Coast. We have a great history, and a great literature, too, though mainly of the boom character. Educationally we are alive ; we are not in Symmes's Hole. Not Mt. Hood, not Shasta, not Tacoma is big enough for the pedestal of the god Terminus. A modern god is on every peak, in every valley, in every school-house — it is the god Get There. And that is what brought us here. T. MARCELLUS MARSHALL, OF NEW MEXICO. People of Canada, Officers and Citizens of Toronto : Eight hundred thousand square miles of mountains and of valleys in the " South-land " of the West heard your invitations, so loud and so strong, and now responds to your welcomes so free and so warm. The land of the cactus and the pine; the land of the orange and the palm; the land of earth's most arid wastes, and of her richest, ever-producing fields; the land in parts of which it burns by day and freezes by night, and in other parts of which it neither burns nor freezes during all the rolling year; the land of Montezuma's "Children of the Sun," which by the Romish Spaniard was later overrun, but in which American civilization is just 78 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION. begun ; the land of castles in ruins, and of silent cities hewn into the faces of the cliffs; the one only cradle of civilization in all North America; seven empires with a republic; aland in which three great civilizations, and the remains of fiercest barbarism, side by side, in peace, beneath the "stars and stripes" to-day abide; and in which the two most wide-spread languages of earth, the sweet, dignified, heavenly Spanish, and the strong, clear, exact, business-like English are vernac- ular; the land that lies adjacent earth's greatest ocean, and in the valley of the world's longest river, that saddles herself upon the continent's mightiest mountain chain, — she, even she, amid her silver sands, has lifted up her golden ears, and heard and come, at your invitation to this fair Canada land, to this beautiful, moral, Protestant city of To- ronto, chaste Queen of the North, and now from her life-giving air and cloudless skies, and unfathomed possibilities, responds with all her warm southern Spanish heart to your grand and gracious welcome. Boasting house and towns with dwellers now as they were when Columbus came, she also boasts a middle civilization, as well as the newest of the name. The red man still bends his bow upon the game; the Pueblo dances to Montezuma and Malinche, and elects his governors and his captains once a year; the Mexican, son of Spanish "conquistador," in his utter illiteracy, yet bows down to sticks and stones, carries his fetishes about his fields in solemn procession to pray for rain, and sheds his own blood to absolve his own sins,— an ignoble, superstitious slave. The American has come with rail and wire, with printing press and Protestant missionary, with light and law and learning, — and the * desert begins to blossom as the rose." " San Miguel College," founded before Harvard University, and the public school master, who can- not write his own name, must now do, or die forever. The seven em- pires of the "South-west" respond: "Viva Canada! Viva Toronto! Viva la Reina Victoria!" W. H. BARTHOLOMEW, OF KENTUCKY. Mr. President, Ladies and Gentlemen : I wish I had the eloquence to properly represent the portion of the United -States from which I came, that I might express to you with proper grace our thanks for the wel- come which you have tendered us here in Toronto. It has been in- timated here this afternoon that it seems to be an open question as to the annexation of Canada to the United States. That question was settled in our section of the country at least ten years ago. It is not now a debatable question. I want simply to say this, that those who come to Kentucky, and Virginia, Tennessee and other States that constitute the central portion of the United States, will be united to the United States, and never get back again. A story was told RESPONSES. 79 to-day about a Kentucky family, where a boy seventy-five years old was punished by his father because he had treated his grandfather with dis- respect. I want to call your attention simply to the fact that in the region of country from which I come the principles of justice and of truth have been so adhered to that the boys and girls in that section never grow old. The time was when we said " ne plus ultra " ; the time now is when we say " plus ultra. " We have come to take Canada into the United States, not on political grounds, but upon the broad platform by which we hope to see the nations of the earth bound together in the principles of truth and righteousness. We feel that in God we come to ask Canada to help us do that great and grand thing, and we promise from the central Southern States the utmost fealty. We believe that power is inherent in the people. We believe there are certain common interests, and we believe that when all the nations of the earth shall per- form that fidelity, the obligations they owe to common popular educa- tion, the best days will be seen. We believe that popular education is absolutely necessary for every good government, and we come here to- day to give you all we have in faith, in intelligence, in power of whatever kind, whether it be material or otherwise. JOSIAH H. SHINN, PRESIDENT SOUTHERN" EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION. Mr. President, Ladies and Gentlemen; Members of the Welcoming Committee of Canada: It was not my proud pleasure to listen to the splendid addresses made by your representatives, but I need no such addresses to know the spirit of welcome that lies in your heart. One hundred and ninety teachers over here at this little port of yours were stopped by your customs officers, and three hundred and eighty grip- sacks violently laid hold of, in the name of the law, and not even a single one was opened. The majesty of the British law failed before the matchless power of the school-teachers of the South when an English customs man opened his heart, cast aside the mandate of the laws, and led us to your doors. I know from all of this we are welcome. I knew when we reached your little station called Stratford, where we found about four hundred baskets, and a lot of bread and butter, and no waiters to hand out that which is pleasant and nice to two hundred teachers, and we were given the liberty of walking up to the counter and taking the rest, I knew we were welcome. When we were way back in our beloved " South-land " we knew that Canadians had taken the word of welcome, and had written it high above all others, except virtue, love and truth. We knew that you, in common with us, had inherited a hospitality from the mother country. We thank you most heartily for this royal reception. 80 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION. Ladies and gentlemen, I cannot do much more than to say that I am proud to stand to-day before these magnificent faces of Americans — Amer- ican, whether they live north of the St. Lawrence or south of it, common denizen of one grand country. I know when we go back to our homes south of the St. Lawrence, we will carry with us some recollection of some bonded ideas that we always carried when we came in contact with the true English home. Once more let me say, I need no speech of welcome from these magnificent gentlemen. We have been quartering at your fine hotels, which are such a credit to your proud city; we have been taken into the residences along the lines of your beautiful avenues ; the Cana- dians have taken out their latch-strings, and have taken the doors off of their hinges, and bidden us walk in and be at our ease. We have had a glimpse of your private home life, which I am proud to know is the same home life Avhich we have always been taught to love, far down in the matchless stretch of the country which sends you a greeting to-day, the beloved South-land of America. JOHN E. MASSEY, OF VIRGINIA. Mr. President, Ladies and Gentlemen : I most fully sympathize with the sentiment which has been expressed by almost every speaker who has traced what pleasure they experienced as they witnessed the blending to- gether of these national emblems, and as they witnessed still more, the mingling together of those of different nationalities, and living under different forms of government. Most heartily do I sympathize with the sentiment. Had I not been informed of the fact, when looking over this audience I should not have supposed but what I was then in my native State, so alike are the countenances and features, and so little is there to mark a difference between those who reside on one side or the other of the imaginary line that divides the United States and Canada. One thing, Mr. President, I cannot forget, — that though we represent different na- tionalities, though we live under different forms of government, though we may differ in some respects, in one thing we are blended together, and we are engaged in the same work of aiming to accomplish the same ends, of working together for the elevation of our race and of nations, seeking as far as we can to raise them to the highest standard of intellectual sentiment of our own land and other lands. But, Mr. President, I shall not, in the brief time allotted me, be able to respond to the noble, kind words of wel- come to which we have listened from the different persons. Different sections have been ably represented, and their peculiar advantages and merits have been discussed. How shall I, sir, representing the galaxy of States, the great centre, this Old Dominion of Virginia — how shall I, in the brief space allotted me, express the feeling which animates the hearts of all true citizens, and I may say especially of Virginians? One thing RESPONSES. 81 gratifies me, and that is, that the Old Dominion speaks for herself. It is not in a feeble voice, as if to utter her principles were mean. Why, sir, if I needed I would point around to our sons, and those who came from the soil of the Old Dominion of Virginia; I would point to a great num- ber of populous States which have sprung from Old Virginia, and say, "These are our sons, speaking for us." Not only that, sir, but if I should be disposed to further eulogize Virginia, what more need I say than that it was necessary to go to the Old Dominion for the very head of this organization. Take away the Virginians from this body and you have no head. I have the honor to address a native Virginian. Others have spoken of different portions of our South-land. A few years ago a dark cloud overshadowed us, and many predicted it would be a land of waste and desolation. They had counted without their hosts; they knew not the character of those who inhabited it ; they knew not the noble character of the soil, and the more noble character of the masters of it, whose boys were growing up, until now the land which was supposed to be doomed to be a waste and howling wilderness, is blossom- ing like the rose. But great as has been her progress in her material growth, her progress educationally has been far greater. . Now we find that in all of these States you have called upon to respond, they have their universities, their colleges, their academies, and their high schools, and in each one there is a grand system of public education. In express- ing to you these few words I wish to say, ladies and gentlemen, that you are engaged in one of the noblest works in which men and women can be engaged. I want you to bear in mind the grand work you are doing in training the rising generation, not only for life, but for some- thing higher, nobler, grander than anything that this life can give. There is one other point I want to allude to, and that is, to express my gratification for the steps that' are being taken for the higher education of women. If you will allow me, sir, I will say that I would be gratified if every institution of learning should throw its doors as wide open to women as they do to men. Why shouldn't they? Now, ladies and gen- tlemen, I claim not simply to represent these Atlantic Southern States; I claim we represent the whole of the South-land, and we shall bid you welcome whenever you come ; we shall rejoice to see yon in our Association here or there. If it should be proclaimed to be an International As- sociation, it would please us; but the work is one we are all engaged in, — a grand, noble work — and I trust we shall never falter in it, but shall still carry it forward until we place the common school and the cause of com- mon education upon the highest pedestal on which it can stand. 82 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION. THE SCHOOL OF THE FUTURE. FRANCIS W. PARKER, COOK COUNTY NORMAL SCHOOL, CHICAGO, ILL. The common school is the newest of all the great human institutions that make for righteousness; scarcely two generations have lived and died since the common school was fully established in the Northern States (with four exceptions), and one generation measures the life of the common school in the Southern States. We are apt to fancy, some of us, because we are growing old, that the beloved institution with which we are so intimately connected is also growing old. But this is not the case. The common school is relatively a babe in its swaddling clothes, in comparison with the other great insti- tutions of the earth. But the doctrine that the highest duty of a nation or community is to educate each and all of its members in schools common to all, at the public expense, was born and nurtured on American soil, and to-day it is practised nowhere else outside of America. It was the inspired conviction of our forefathers that common educa- tion is as essential to democratic government and growth as air is to life. Our forefathers had an inspiration and a belief ; they had no prescribed plan, or no precedent for that plan. They did not have the least con- ception of the mighty growth of the seed which they planted. The common school furnishes the essential principles in the develop- ment and perpetuation of a democracy, and its growth and progress has been purely democratic; it has been and is, "of the people, for the people, and by the people. " The common school had its birth in the New England school district; and the New England school district with the town is the root from which sprung all the democratic forms of govern- ment which have developed in our country. In a word, the spirit and nourishment of the common-school system has always depended, and de- pends to-day, entirely upon the will of the majority. State and national officials are given little more than advisory influences. There has been no active attempt at centralization. It is exceedingly difficult for our foreign friends and critics to understand our so-called school system. They are accustomed to look upon public schools from the standpoint of centralization, which produces uniformity, conformity and evenness, so that the endless variety, the total lack of uniformity, the innumerable differences which our schools present, is to them almost incomprehensible. Each and every school district has a pronounced individuality. Every state and stage of progress, from the early nebulous formative period to THE SCHOOL OF THE FUTURE. 83 the highest products of Oswego and Bridgewater, may now be found in adjoining districts. The soul seeking peace and comfort under the dominance and perma- nence of fixed ideals shrinks with dismay from the inevitable blunders, stupidity, ignorance and calamities that invariably accompany all demo- cratic growth. The short road of centralization seems to reach in a day that which takes years to accomplish under the patient waiting for that slow dawning of intelligence which leads to right action on the part of democratic communities. Our foreign critics mistake variety and honest individual striving for chaos. That which has its birth in the desires and intelligences of the people, and is applied by the will of the people, becomes an organic, per- manent factor in the progress of civilization of that people. It is rooted and grounded upon the people — " vox populi, vox dei." But that which is imposed upon a people by any authority below heaven breaks into atoms when the intelligence and power of a people can reach and control it. Centralized power may be a necessity for infancy, but manhood sheds it off for the strong wings of freedom. It may be claimed that a centralized plan would have produced to-day far better results in America than have been produced by the present plan. It must be conceded that the schools of Prussia are far better in relation to systematic, scientific instruction than those of America. Still one may not hesitate to assert that the common-school system of America to-day contains more elements of healthy progress than any other system under the sun. And he can safely prophesy that the common school is destined to lead the world, for growth means the enhancement of individ- ual freedom, from which springs investigation, invention, discovery, and consequent progress. The greatest difficulties to-day under which the common-school system labors is due to our inheritance from centralized forms of government. It is almost impossible for us to conceive at the present day with what meagre appliances our forefathers began the great work of promoting human intelligence. A glance at the progress of the nineteenth century, and of the last fifty years, is sufficient to show how comparatively little they had for the initial steps of the common school. It is generally conceded that no book upon science or history is of any economic value for the primary or fundamental study of subjects which was published before the time of Darwin. A newly elected rector of a great Scotch university is quoted as saying, when asked by the librarian what books should be left upon the shelf for the students : " Leave no books upon the shelves that are more than ten years old. " In a word, the books extant at the time the common schools were established are now chiefly valuable for history. 84 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION Psychology. — The one central basis of pedagogical science, psychology itself, has been re-created within the last few years. Eibot says: "Al- though it has cut a good figure enough, the old psychology is doomed. In the new surroundings that have recently grown up, the conditions of its existence have disappeared. Its methods do not suffice for the in- creasing difficulties of the task, for the growing exigencies of the scien- tific spirit. It is compelled to live on its past. Feeble and old, it makes no progress, and asks only to be let alone that it may spend its age in peace." Anthropology, which is freighted with so much help for teachers, is a science that has been developed by living men like Tyler and Bastian. Ethnographic psychology, the study of the growth of communities and nations, has scarcely yet a name. More works upon pedagogics and peda- gogy have been published in English within the last ten years than were ever before published in that language throughout the long centuries. In 1787 Webster's blue-back spelling-book was published, and was for years the epitome of the new education of the earlier times. It is im- possible to enumerate in this brief half -hour the new sciences, new books, new forces and new systems which have entered, and are about to enter, the field of pedagogics. Co-education, the education of women in colleges, the re-creation of history as a subject, the practical application of mathematics, the estab- lishment of chairs of pedagogics in universities, and, best of all, the found- ing of the kindergarten, which is the mightiest influence in the progress of education in this century, are all decidedly new; they are in the main the products of the last half-century. Their influences have scarcely reached the doors of the common school. The Evolution of the Common School. — The evolution of the com- mon school has been simply marvellous. The log school-house, the old unpainted, weather-beaten structure, has evolved into beautiful, well ven- tilated, well warmed and well furnished temples of learning. The old spelling-book of our fathers, into the beautifully illustrated and well written. text-books of to-day. The meagre geography of the past, which consisted of one-tenth truth and nine-tenths fiction, has changed to the scientific works of Ritter, Guyot and Peschel. The hedgerow and dame school pedagogue, whose prototype was imported from the Old World, is slowly becoming transformed by normal schools into the trained, skilful, devoted teacher. It must be granted, however, that the evolution of the trained teacher has been, and will be, slower than the evolution of ma- terial appliance. Opposition. — Every step of progress, every new demand for the better education of the people, every detail of the work, has been met by pro- longed, bitter, obstinate opposition. The history of the common-school THE SCHOOL OF THE FUTURE. 85 system of the United States has yet to be written. When it is written it will depict the grandest conflict for human freedom of all the ages. It will show that its fundamental motive was a divine love for human- ity, springing directly from the people, nurtured and supported by the people. It will tell of the profound indifference on the part of the peo- ple for public education ; of the ignorance and pedantry of teachers, of the corruption of politics, an awful necessity of democratic growth; and above all, it will tell of the tremendous power, the organization of cen- turies, the power of the old civilization, that has stood, and to-day stands the mightiest barrier of human progress. If we would prophesy of the school of the future we must count the forces which are to-day in action that make for education into freedom, and we must thoroughly understand the gigantic strength and the methods of the old civilization which has controlled the world up to a recent period. The fundamental principle of that old civilization is the permanency of fixed ideas in state, society and religious creeds. The motive of the old civilization was to hold the nations and communities to the strictest conformity to governments, dogmatic authority and unwritten social laws. Segregation in education was and is absolutely necessary, to keep the constituents of a government or the followers of a creed bound to the fixed beliefs. The method of segregation is reenf orced by the method of instruction, the study and consequent implicit belief in the carefully prepared text, whose direct outcome is perfect reliance upon human authority. The aim and end in the education of the old civilization is the development of character without freedom ; that form of character which complies strictly with the great negations of the decalogue without one scintilla of that freedom which has for its fundamental principles the Beatitudes of Christ. The postulate of character without freedom is ac- cepted by all monarchs, aristocrats, and hierarchs. It comprehends strict compliance and implicit obedience to human authority. It also admits the broadest erudition, encyclopaedic knowledge, that knowledge which shuts man up in the past and robs him of all the power of prophesy. Stratified education, or education by classes, is the foundation upon which thrones rest and monarchs remain in confident security. Segregated education perpetuates dogmatism and bigotry, and places its vassals under the dominance of fixed ideas. Its product is faithful servitors, not sov- ereigns. This old civilization, perfectly organized, the product of the mightiest human forces of the past, projected itself, with its principles, motives, and methods into the new civilization at the founding of the new repub- lic. And to-day these methods are dominant in the common-school sys- tem of America; dogmatic instruction is the prevailing method of our 86 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION. common schools. Motive always determines the method. And, I repeat, the method of fixed ideas imperatively demands character without freedom. Individual freedom has been the right name of fixed ideas from the begin- ning. And to-day, my fellow-teachers, there are drawn up the cohorts of the old civilization to fight the fiercest battle against the progress of the human race ever won or lost by any and all the armies of the past. Herr Cahensly has, in a few words, summed up the methods of the old civilization. He says,, practically, if you would hold your peoples who emigrate to America, you must keep them strictly to their mother tongue. You must segregate them in their country life ; you must keep them out of the common schools. In other words, you must keep them from becoming Americans ; you must keep them from the means of free- dom. "There should be," he says, plaintively, "twenty-six millions of one sect in the United States of America, and, alas! there are really only ten millions. Where have the sixteen millions gone?" These children of the Old World have been fused, blended, melted into the great army of human progress, under the dominance of the new civ- ilization with the common school for its right hand. Every force, every compact organization, every social influence which the old civilization knows so well how to manage, is to-day ready to do or die for the doctrine of fixed ideas and the permanence of the institutions of the past. The old civilization fully recognizes what we, as Americans, have as yet failed to thoroughly understand — that the social factor in education is the paramount factor; that it stands above all other principles and methods ever yet discovered or devised. I have said that the common school is the infant republic, because in the common school all castes, classes, shades of belief, meet and learn to love and to live for each other. Under the divine influence of the com- mon school that bigotry and hate and narrowness which perpetuate fixed ideas vanish and give place to the profoundest human sympathy. The supreme duty of a nation is to give to each and all under its aegis the liberty and the means of becoming free. Liberty is granted by con- stitutions and laws. The common school is the one central institution which presents to each the means of freedom. Freedom is gained by the knowledge and obedience to God's laws. Perfect obedience is perfect freedom. The inspired- sentences which explained divine freedom are: " The truth shall make you free." " He that doeth the will shall know of the doctrine." "He that doeth righteousness is righteous." "Work out your own salvation." The common school has for its ideal the common education of all the people of a nation — all races, classes, sexes and sects, and social positions in one school, common to all, from the kindergarten to the university inclusive. Thus the ideal education of America makes the kindergarten, THE SCHOOL OF THE FUTURE. 87 the high school and the university as free to all as the primary and grammar schools are. The ideal education of the common school comprehends all charities; it sums them up in one gift — that of character — the character which includes the performance of the duties of life, the highest citizenship, and the only basis for moral and ethical life. The fragmentary and desultory charities of the past sink into utter insignificance before this supreme gift of the means of freedom. The republic says to its citizens, " You cannot be educated outside of the common school, for the common school is the infant republic." The new civilization has for its motive that much-abused and grand word — democracy. True democracy imperatively demands the education of children into that ideal of character which comprehends freedom in its fullest sense. The children of a republic are to receive the education of sovereigns, because their highest duty and strongest obligation is to give their lives for the whole. To take the words of Froebel, the new teacher, with his hand lovingly in the hand of the child, points to the Invisible Third, and says, " Let us find the truth; let us seek it together." The common schools of America are established. They are rooted and grounded in the hearts of the people. No power on earth can abolish them except civil war, and that cannot, for at the word millions would rise and battle for this child of America — the common school. The old civilization cannot abolish the common school, but it can and is doing one thing that we, as Americans, should thoroughly understand. You will all grant that the main line of progress is the exaltation of the office of the teacher ; the enhancement of the culture and training of the teacher. " As is the teacher, so is the school," is a truth universally accepted. Now the plan of battle of the old civilization may be summed up in a few words. It cannot abolish the common school, but it can do one ter- rible thing: it can keep back, by political chicanery, the much-needed progress of the common schools ; it can keep at a low level the standard of the teacher ; it can admit into the ranks of teaching a vast horde of in- competents ; it can render the common school unpopular with the intel- ligent people and sink them into an institution for the poor children, thus destroying the preeminent social factor. And the purpose of this course is perfectly plain. So long as the standard of the school is kept low, so long as intelligent parents know that there is inefficiency in the school, so long as the school fails to elevate their children, just so long they will be driven to seek other schools, and thus private, parochial and sectarian schools will be filled, and the work of segregation perpetuated. The work of all private schools of any kind, whether sectarian or secu- 88 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION. lar, should be measured entirely by their direct influence for good upon the common school, into which they will one day all be merged as soon as democratic growth demands that step. Horace Mann's heroic efforts to raise the sunken condition of the com- mon schools of Massachusetts were met by the obstinate opposition on the part of the patrons of academies. The founding of normal schools in the Empire State was opposed for years by the same influences. We make a mistake when we charge the mighty obstructing forces to' the promotion of common schools upon any one or two religious sects. " Who is not with us is against us." Every parent who has children too good to mingle with the Hoi polloi and to learn to become a democrat is practically against the common schools. Not by any rampant, bigoted Americanism, falsely so-called, not by knownothingism, truly so-called, can this mightiest barrier to human progress be overcome. Bigotry only compacts bigotry, making it more intense and more powerful. Hate is the devil, and should be remanded to the infernal regions, else there is a hell on earth. There is one line of battle whose course is bright as the sun and clear as noonday, before which the old civilization will melt away, as hate melts before love and gives place to the principles of the Prince of Peace — and that line is the exaltation of the common school by the scientific application of the laws of human growth and human freedom. The people have the choice of schools, and they will always choose the best. Herr Cahensly's lost sixteen millions tell that story. The great army of one-half a million teachers on the continent of North America should have close to their hearts one great central purpose, and that is the education, culture, and professional training of teachers. The day is long past since every thoughtful educator has fully recog- nized the imperative necessity of the highest professional education for those who have the strongest influence upon the perpetuity of the re- public. Horace Mann felt this deeply when he found that the hope of a free people was vanishing in the degrading common schools of Massachusetts, which were fast becoming schools for the poorest people. After a pro- longed and bitter struggle he founded, in 1839, the first normal school on the continent of America, near the old battle-ground of Lexington. From this seed in fifty-two short years have sprung one hundred and fifty state, city, and county normal schools. There is only one of the latter. The state normal schools were founded and supported by the agricul- tural peoples, for the main purpose of furnishing high schools for their children. Without this support they never could have existed. This purpose has forced the normal schools, common high schools, with THE SCHOOL OF THE FUTURE. 89 a supplementary course in psychology, pedagogics and the practice of leaching. The education at the base has been necessarily imperfect, and the professional training insufficient. Notwithstanding these obstacles in the way of ideal normal training, the normal schools of America have done more for progress in teaching than all other influences combined. One school alone has thrown more light upon better methods than any two universities in the land — that of Oswego, and Dr. Sheldon is its prophet. The whole nation is crying out for great teachers, great educators, and, above all, great superintendents. The present normal schools have done their work thoroughly and well; they have made a far higher professional training possible. My fellow-teachers, the day has now fully come when high-grade pro- fessional training schools and colleges are an absolute necessity. The day has come when steps should be taken to see that no college or university graduate is ever allowed to take upon himself the sacred office of teacher without at least two years' professional training in a school or college fully equipped for that purpose. Here lies the way of the future school. Exalt the common schools by the exaltation of the teacher. Make thoroughly educated men and women fully capable of taking the priceless treasures of truth, revealed in this mighty century, to the school-room, and putting them in the souls of the children. Make them capable of undertaking the problem of man and the destinies of humanity. Raise the teacher from the low conflict over petty methods and devices to the higher atmosphere of principles and laws. Our interminable squabbles over this method or that device would, under such teaching, vanish into thin air; our profession would be lifted where it belongs, to the head of all professions, and the army of such teachers would set God's people free. This great International Convention of Teachers can at this convoca- tion do no grander work for humanity than to consider thoughtfully, prayerfully, and profoundly the training of the future teacher for the fu- ture school— the school which must be sufficient for the exigencies of the future, the common school which stands in the forefront of the new civ- ilization, the civilization born on the hills of Bethlehem, and destined to permeate the whole earth. Some of us, my dear fellow-teachers, have nearly finished our imperfect work. What more priceless legacy can we leave the millions yet to be than to make it possible for our spiritual descendants to be so educated and trained that they will, under God, effectually work out the destiny of this mighty continent, and through it of all humanity. dO THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION DISCUSSION. A. P. Marble, of Worcester, Mass. : — No observations about the future of schools could be made intelligible without reference to the schools of the past and the schools of the present. Education, like government and religion, has undergone great modifications since this country was first settled, and especially within the last century. In this republic (and for the purposes of my remarks the United States and Canada are one) the democratic idea has seen its fullest and freest devel- opment. The divine right of kings is a thing of the past; and on this continent the divine right of the people has succeeded to its place. The individual, his welfare, his opportunity — this is now the efficient unit of governmental authority; and the aggregation of these units is the nation. Nor is this idea confined to our own continent. It prevails in England under monarchical forms. It has taken root in France. Italy and Spain have felt its renovating force. The German Emperor exhibits the symp- toms of its workings. And no super-prophetic eye is needed to predict that, not many generations hence, the democratic idea will pervade the world. This idea may not have originated with our forefathers. They found a locality where the seed, produced long before, in the time of Magna Charta, could germinate ; and the Pilgrims felt the influence of that free- dom which the Dutch, among whom they temporarily lived, had enjoyed. Similar changes have taken place in religious notions. There was a time when religious doctrine handed down from above was received with unquestioning submission, just as the authority of kings was undisputed. That time has passed. For though the forms of the ancient faith still remain, the brilliant lights of intelligent criticism are turned upon them at every point ; and the doctrines, and the forms in which they are re- vealed, stand unshaken only so far as they are founded on eternal truth and commend themselves to cultivated reason. Something analogous to these changes in government and in popular religious thought has taken place in education ; and in this also it is our own country that has taken the lead. The founders of New England, whether from the necessities of the case or from the inspiration of a far- reaching wisdom, made provision for education at the public expense within two decades of the landing at Plymouth. They missed the ancient foundations of the English schools and universities ; they perceived the necessity for something similar here, if their own efforts to found a free and prosperous state were to succeed; among them there were no rich men to found institutions of learning ; and so they, the people, founded in- stitutions themselves, for themselves and their posterity. But from these earlier institutions, as a corollary to them, has grown up the system of DISCUSSION. free public schools. Education in this country is now universal, com- pulsory, and free ; — that is, every child is, by law, entitled to an element- ary education; he cannot be deprived of it; and it is free. If this high ideal is not yet enacted into law in any given locality, or if it is not fully realized in others, the trend is powerful in that direction; and it is only a question of a brief time when this ideal will be realized every- where, as it now is in many favored States. Contrast this state of things — potentially and in aim, if not yet in fact — with the conditions in Eng- land, the country from which the founders of our system derived their inspiration. In that enlightened country the school has never been free. The children of the rich have been taught in public schools, — Eton, Rugby, Harrow and the rest, — but these schools are not free ; the children of the poor have been taught in charity schools, or not taught at all. By the school law of 1870, in that country, public schools open to all were established, similar to ours ; but they are not wholly free ; — there are rate- bills for parents to pay. And now, twenty-one years later, parliament is endeavoring to enact a law which shall make these schools really free, as ours are free, and attendance upon them compulsory ; and this compul- sory clause is a logical necessity for free education, since the only ground on which the man of property, without children, can be taxed to support schools, is, that the children shall receive instruction, not merely for their own benefit, but for the good of the state. Nor have Germany and France yet risen to the complete American idea of education, excellent and worthy of imitation in many respects as their schools are. In France the Minister of Instruction ordains; and there are certain notable advantages in such an organization. The Minister knows better than the whole people, no doubt, what is the best system, and what will secure the best results with the least outlay. On the other hand the people learn by doing. They frequently make mistakes in edu- cation, as they do in government, very likely. A few men in every town, in every state, in the nation at large, could probably adminis- ter the government better than it is now conducted; it costs the country an immense sum to conduct a general election. But experience has demonstrated that a government by the few eventually becomes cor- rupt ; and the cost of a general election, even the cost of unwise legisla- tion, is more than made up in the resultant education of the people. So it is with a system of education managed by the people as a whole. It may not at first be the best ; false theories and false practices may pre- vail; but sad experience will at length reveal the errors, and after they have been detected the errors are not likely to be repeated, since there are always clear-headed men in any community ready to point them out, if only the community is invested with the responsibility. If the people cannot be trusted in the long run, then there is no trust anywhere. 92 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION The school of the future will be in the hands of the people ; — a purely democratic institution. In Germany the case is not unlike what it is in France. Government, more or less of arbitrariness, pervades the system of education. Unless a boy attains a certain standard of scholarship he must serve in the army from the age of twenty-one to twenty-four ! German pupils sit on benches without backs. Their schools are class schools. German girls have no fair chance. German pupils are driven so mercilessly that a frightful percent- age of them commit suicide. French schools confine their pupils as many hours in eight years as American schools in ten. English schools still retain an amount of forced drill that would stunt the growth of a healthy American boy or girl. In all these schools there is much to admire — the methods, the cur- ricula, the product ; but it wearies me to hear the wholesale laudation of foreign schools, to the disparagement of our own. Many a traveller on the continent returns from a visit to those schools and dilates upon their excellencies to gaping audiences filled with wide-eared wonder, and says nothing about their defects, or their want of adaptability to our condi- tions. The public receive the impression that there is nothing worthy of note in our own country. Without stopping to investigate, a few peo- ple begin to cry for a revolution of they know not what. I am education- ally no Anglomaniac, no Francomaniac, no Germaniac. I am American politically, educationally, and forever. The school of the future will not be German, nor French, nor English. From the above it is my hope that you will perceive my aim to be to represent the school of the future, not as a foreign importation but as an American development ; not as a resurrection of any ancient excellencies, but as a creation of an American life under the new conditions of dem- ocratic freedom, and in the electric light of the twentieth century progress, not in the dim candle-light of a former age. In its early stage the American school had a very limited scope, and almost a single aim. The population was mainly rural. In the few cities the chief business was commerce. Prior to the American Revolution the great bulk of the population were intelligent from the necessities of the case. A New England or Middle State farmer was a whole community in himself ; he raised or manufactured nearly all that he and his family consumed. All he required of a school was to teach reading and writing and a little ciphering. The education in its broad sense was conducted at home. Physical training took care of itself; moral culture was left to parental influence and the ministrations of the clergy. Newspapers were infrequent; books, a rarity. With the growth of the country all this has changed. More than twenty per cent, of the population live in cities. Society has become complex. Labor has been divided and sub- DISCUSSION. 93 divided. Industry has organized like a vast machine; that which any individual performs is a very small part of the general whole, and it is becoming less and less year by year. The periodical press floods the country like an avalanche. Railroads bind together all parts of the country, and by telegraph the whole world is at our feet. In all this wonderful activity the parent has not the time to educate his family, even if he is intelligent. Instead of a school, then, in its early sense, we have the whole work of education thrust upon us; and it is no wonder that the system has not yet fully adapted itself to the enlarged requirements. The school, having undertaken to train the intellect of boys and girls, is now quite generally expected to take entire charge of their education, — intellectual, physical and moral. This is beyond the original contract; and if so broad and general an end is to be attempted, then time must be given to enlarge the plant — to reorganize the system, and adapt it to such an aim. If the school of the future is to take the place of the parent, and at- tend to the entire training of children — to be responsible for bodily health, intellectual training, and moral culture ; if the duty of parents is to cease when once the child is old enough to enter the kindergarten, and the school is to turn him out fully equipped for the battle of life, and for entrance into a blissful hereafter, — then we must have a good deal more time and more funds. It would seem as if so broad an aim would need to include dormitories, clothing-stores, and refectories. Such was the Spartan scheme of education. It is not likely to be repeated. It is not desirable. Nothing of a public and institutional nature can sup- ply the place of parents. They were ordained of God ; and no incubator of modern science or education should ever supplant them. The duty of rearing and disciplining their children ought to be thrown back upon them to the largest possible extent ; any institution or any school which tends to beget in the parental mind a feeling of irresponsibility is evil, and only evil, and that continually. The school of the future will not usurp the functions of the parent. The school of the future will be differentiated — as labor is divided and subdivided. It will confine itself to a few things well done. The present tendency is in the direction of assuming larger responsibilities than it is competent for, or than it can become competent for. In closing let me hint at one direction in which the school of the fu- ture will enlarge its borders : — moral training. This is a subject very much discussed by the clergy of many denomina- tions. But the moral training of the future will not be on the lines which many men of that worthy profession now follow. 94 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION Respecting this kind of training, the schools are much maligned. From my acquaintance with them, it is my firm belief that the moral training in many, if not in most public schools, is of a superior order ; and that it will compare favorably with that of most religionists. If in his school exercises a child learns to be truthful, to respect the rights of others, to revere those sacred things which he cannot yet comprehend, and to follow what is right, at all hazards, then he has laid the founda- tion of sound morality and of true religion. But the school of the future will do more than this. It will teach, upon a scientific basis, and from facts derived from the careful study of mind and mental phenomena, the great truths about the hereafter ; and science will confirm, harmonize, corroborate, and coincide with revelation. If this is a startling statement, consider the wonderful developments and applications of electricity within a decade — a force almost as subtle as vitality and, till very recently, as little known ; consider the revela- tions in the study of mind, physiologically — that each bodily and mental function has been located and mapped out in the structure of the brain as accurately as the lunar landscape, or terrestrial objects upon a globe ; and beyond this following of the mental process to the remotest nerve- cell where the living spirit manifests itself, consider what has been done and is now doing in the study of psychology on the spiritual side — not a priori, the attempt, that is, to conform facts to a preconceived theory, but the observation of facts in the growing minds of children, in minds diseased (by which discoveries are made, just as the function of the stomach was observed through the wound in the side of Alexis St. Martin), and in healthy minds — facts that point directly to infallible conclusions; note the phenomena of hypnotism, and of somnambulism; consider all this, and then reflect whether it is not now more probable that a scientific conclusion respecting a future state of existence will be reached before the twentieth century closes than it was fifty years ago that intelligence would be flashed three-thousand miles under the sea with almost the speed of thought, and more probable than it was twenty years ago that you could stand in Toronto and recognize a friend's voice speaking in Montreal. With such a basis, that scepticism, so wide-spread and so natural, con- cerning the sacred things of faith may disappear ; and the trained minds of future generations may rest as calmly in contemplation of the future life as they now do in confidence in the working of natural law in the material universe. As the tempest, the volcano, the earthquake, are no longer a terror to the instructed, so may the terrors about the great here- after at length be dispelled. Let me close with an illustration from a recent number of the " Nine- teenth Century" magazine: DISCUSSION. 95 A larva was dissecting the dead body of one of its kind. He saw in the various organs and their functions wonderful adaptability to the life of himself and other larvae on the leaf of a cabbage. But he noticed also certain other undeveloped organs and possible functions that were not brought into action in the life he then lived ; they seemed to point to something beyond and to come. These he could not account for. While he studied upon them a butterfly lighted upon the cabbage-leaf, and soon he flew away. But the larva did not perceive his future life in the butterfly's life. We perceive within ourselves the spiritual organs and their functions apart, perhaps, from what is necessary to our existence here. The but- terfly we do not see, but in time, perhaps, we may. The school of the future will concern itself less than the school of the present does with the material and the perishable; it will lead up more and more towards that which is spiritual and divine. James L. Hughes, Inspector of Public Schools, Toronto: — 1. The school of the future will be better than the school of the present. The educational development of the past two hundred years forms a solid rock on which to base high hopes for educational progress in the future. The accelerated rapidity of educational advancement during the last fifty years justifies the faith that predicts still more rapid improvement in the future. We have not reached the best. Thank God there is always another hill to climb. There is always gold higher up. There is joy in the thought that we have emerged from the educational wilderness in which our forefathers wandered, but there is greater joy in the con- sciousness that the mountain still towers in illimitable heights above us, so that we may climb forever. It is an inspiration to a true teacher to know that he may— nay, that he was intended to lead to heights never yet discovered, and bring his fellow-men into a clearer light than they have yet enjoyed. He is partially dead who is limited by a narrow view. We are not truly alive if we are content to be mere imitators. The future shall be grander than the present. Let us hopefully do our part in moulding it. 2. The school of the future will develop the physical nature more perfectly than at present. It will do so to strengthen the bodies of the race and make them more energetic in action and graceful in form; to make men more healthful and less liable to disease ; to remove hereditary diseases and counteract hereditary tendencies; to make the body more definitely responsive to the will ; to develop the will itself, by the exer- cise of its executive activity through the agency of the body ; and to give intellectual and moral vigor. There are men who sneer at the " physical education craze." How they would pity themselves if they could realize how little they see of the real meaning and scope of physical education, 96 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION and how dimly they see even that little. The formal exercises, gymnas- tics and calisthenics will in the future be specially adapted to the varied needs of the pupils of different ages and conditions, and they will be ap- plied with a definite consciousness on the part of the teacher of the re- sults to be accomplished by their use. But in physical development, as in all other departments of human culture, the law holds good that the informal is better than the formal, giving as it does, not merely greater power, but greater spontaneity and freedom also ; so the games of the yard and field will be recognized as forming one of the most important depart- ments of physical, intellectual and moral training. New games will be devised by the highest medical councils of the world, in consultation with the best minds in the teaching profession. Games may be improved without limiting the freedom and spontaneity of the playground. The games are really the best means provided in the schools of to-day for the exercise of the complete self-activity of the pupils ; the only agencies for the full development of executive power; the only school process that completes the essential sequence of feeling, thought, decision, action, in application to the threefold nature of the child. The educators will not continue long to be mad enough to leave so potent an educational agency as games to chance. 3. The school of the future will devote special attention to strength- ening the weakest part of the child. No one can do his best work so long as one department of his nature is weaker than the others. Har- mony gives power. Man is a perfect type of an organic unity, and in every organic unity harmony promotes growth ; lack of harmony leads to weakness and decay. The school should counteract the evil influences of heredity. If a boy is born with a weak physical or mental or moral na- ture, the first work of the school should be to overcome the hereditary weakness and restore the lost balance. Too often the weaker nature suffers in the uneven contest with its stronger rivals. He who develops either the physical, the intellectual or the moral nature at the expense of the other two, fights against God. 4. In the school of the future the pupil will originate most of the problems. The solution of problems is not so difficult as their conception. The power to recognize problems definitely is infinitely more important than the power to solve them. The most marked characteristic of child- hood is its power to recognize the multitudes of new problems by which it is surrounded, and because this power is so strong it is therefore pos- sible to develop it rapidly and definitely, and it was intended that it should so develop through the recognition of our material environment to the power of clear conception of all the problems connected with our intellectual and spiritual life. Yet this power grows weaker instead of stronger as we grow older. The DISCUSSION. 97 schools absolutely reverse the plan of nature. Before the child goes to school he discovers his own problems and solves most of them unaided. The few that he cannot comprehend he brings to his seniors. When he goes to school his teacher brings the problems to him. Nature made him a questioner, a seeker after truth ; the school makes him an answerer. Nature made his mind to think, the school makes it a receptacle for other people's thoughts. Nature gave him power to see the relationships between himself and his environment, and his fellow-men, and his Cre- ator; the school dwarfs this power by preventing its activity. We are often startled at the simplicity of new discoveries and inventions, and we wonder why we did not make them ourselves. Every new discovery or invention is merely the solution of a new problem in the relationship of natural forces. The power of solution depends on the power of recogni- tion. We could have solved the problems, if we had been definitely con- scious of them. They were near us, but we did not see them. If we had the power to see clearly the thousands of physical, intellectual and spirit- ual problems that are ever near us, how swiftly the world would move onward, how definite would be our conscious growth towards God. But the schools train men to solve, not to find problems ; to answer questions, not to recognize the mighty questions that need answering, and so there is not so much power of original investigation and independent growth in the world as there should be. The school of the future will preserve and develop the child's conceptive relationship to nature and God intel- lectually and spiritually. 5. The school of the future will train the executive powers. The saddest sight in the world is a man who uses his power for evil. It is nearly as sad to see one who plans to do good but fails to accomplish his plans. Both are failures, and both fail because their executive powers, were not trained in harmony with their receptive and reflective powers. Education should remedy this great defect in human character. Instead of doing so, it often produces feebleness where it should develop strength, and turns out men who, like Mr. Leigh, " possess almost every gift except the gift of the power to use them." Man was created a unity, with receptive, reflective, and executive pow- ers. He should be trained as a unity. His receptive, reflective, and ex- ecutive powers should be trained harmoniously and definitely. Men are made waak by training their receptive and reflective powers without train- ing their executive powers. The true test of education is the amount of productive activity it develops. Man's power to do determines his power for good. His accomplishing power and productive activity measure his real manhood, and fix the standard as an agent for the overthrow of evil and the establishment of good. The receptive and reflective powers . are practically useless without the executive powers. The executive pow- 98 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION ers are the only means for the true development of the receptive and reflective powers. We must make the power of attainment equal to the power of insight. Moral degeneracy follows the consciousness that we are not living in har- mony with our best thought. It is an awful thing to give a man more power to think without at the same time giving him a correspondingly increased power and tendency to execute his thought. 6. The school of the future will give ample opportunity for awaken- ing and cultivating the special power of each individual. The whole being grows most rapidly in the direction of its own self-activity along the lines of its greatest power. No life can be complete unless it is wrought out on the direction of its greatest aptitude. The school, by its courses of study, by its options, by its variety of materials for inves- tigation, experiment, and constructive application, and by its improved educational processes, will yet guide the pupils in defining and increasing their greatest individual powers. The school can never do its proper work until it becomes a controlling force in the evolution of the individ- uality, the essential manhood or womanhood of each child. 7. But the schools of the future will not be satisfied with the develop- ment of individuality. Individual power and individual liberty lose their influence and their sacredness if confined to the individual. The mighti- est agencies for good become most potent for evil when perverted. In- dividual power demands individual liberty, individual liberty brings individual responsibility, and individual responsibility is glorified by co- operation. Individuality purified from selfishness is the lever that must lift the world. This is the great lesson taught to the world by Christ, and all real educational development since Christ has centred on this truth. Co-operative individual self-activity will be the crowning ideal of the edu- cational systems of the future. Humanity can learn great truths only by living them. Each pupil in the ideal school will have definite respon- sibilities, and the chief function of the teacher will be to adapt responsi- bilities to individual powers, and see that duty is performed. Co-opera- tion should be suggestive as well as responsive. Pupils should originate as well as execute. Responsibilities so assumed and executed make char- acter, and character is the grandest development of the school. Stanley Hall, of Worcester, Mass. : — Mr. President, Ladies and Gentlemen : When I came here to-night I had no thought of saving any- thing, but I cannot hold my peace when the subject of so great importance as the one we are considering to-night is up. Do you realize, ladies and gentlemen, that the past fifteen years has seen a greater development edu- cationally than all the history of the world shows before, measured by money alone? Do you realize that since 1865, in a remote and lately civilized country like New Zealand, and in nearly every South American state, DISCUSSION. 99 Ilayti, in Eastern and Southern Russia and in Scandinavia, in Finland, in Australia, and throughout the world, new and comprehensive school sys- tems have been instituted that are rapidly moulding the sentiment of the world ?There has never been in history an institution so potent in mould- ing character and in shaping the physical development of young men and women, and it is doing far more than the Church itself. The common- school system is doing far more even than the Church, for it is gradually uniting all creeds and hastening the grand federation of mankind. And to-day there is a concensus which unites men of all civilizations, all races of people of all ages and sex, and they believe in the elevating, moralizing power of school education. Doesn't all this make the school sarced? Doesn't it give it more of consecration than the Church? The answer comes to us in the volume of money in every state for schools of all grades. The popularity of the school has grown more rapidly, not only in the past fifteen years, but in the past five years it has been more rapid than in all the history of the country before. The people realize that underneath all the industries, and all the arts of peace and war, are educational pro- cesses in the development of which alone can there be commercial and mili- tary success. Immediately after the great Franco- Prussian war military schools were founded, because it was realized that these must be the most magnificent and effective of the world. There was the greatest ambition in all the countries of Europe to excel. And so the arts of peace, which are far larger and more useful, have prompted these countries to compete with each other along such lines, for instance, as commercial industry. It is just the same way with education, which is moulding the religious and professional spirit, whether ministers of the Gospel, students of the law, or in the medical profession. The principles of law depend upon the state of education, and whether our religious conceptions are exalted in the sense of that noble paper of Mr. Hughes. Everything we are living for to-day depends upon the state of education in a sense unknown in history hitherto. Then my final point is this: It is not strange that with such an institution men are ready to rush to war, as they are now doing in Russia and Austria; it is not strange that in some of these coun- tries they are ready to sacrifice the individual for which we are pleading to-night. So that with this magnificent development comes a danger wherein the institutions of government tyrannize over the mind of man and seek to extinguish human knowledge. The danger of the day is that the tender bodies and minds of our children will be injured by this mag- nificent machine, which can do so much for good and so much for law and order. For that reason, too, I want to join my voice in pleading for the individual, and quote the words of the brilliant Doctor Powell, who said, that in individuality is strength ; and that is true, not only of individual boys and girls, but it is just as true of institutions. I plead for individ- 100 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION uality in the college and in the university as well as in the school. The day for institutions, of the high grade or low grade, that cover the whole field of human knowledge is gone, and gone forever. No matter how far- reaching our university may be, it can never cover the whole field. " In individuality is strength." Miss Schofield, of South Carolina: — My Friends and Fellow- teachers : To-day when I sat here and listened to the words of welcome, I listened in vain for words of welcome to those who have been brought to this country — those who followed the north star. I wish to say to these people of Toronto, that some of us came here with hearts overflow- ing, because slaves could not breathe in England. I stand here to rep- resent, as well as one woman, who for twenty-five years has spent her labor and her time as a teacher among the colored people of the South, can, — I stand here to ask that in the schools of the future they who are so needy get more of their share than they are geting now. I ask that in the schools of the future such organizations as this shall look to the time when our country and your country, my friends, will help lift up this forty-five per cent, of ignorance into education and citizenship. I ask that we, who are talking so much about individual liberty, shall look to the liberty of those who are making our laws, and who will continue to help make them. I ask for the schools of the future we that begin now, that those schools may be what they should be, that the common schools everywhere may be lifted up, because we have reached higher and higher in our work and nearer and nearer to that standard which is of God, who is no respecter of persons. Nicholas Murray Butler, of New York City: — Mr. President, Ladies and Gentlemen : I too wish to add a single word for individuality, but with this caution and this reminiscence of its history. Society was originally individualistic, and it was but anarchy. It has taken the his- tory of civilization to teach the individual to be an individual and to be social as well. The great problem, then, of the school of the future is to train the individual in the direction of this ultraism, which means the ability to live and to let live, to co-operate and to let co-operate. We have passed from the old individuality and are progressing toward the new individuality, which is an organic unity. It is therefore the study of the individual child from the standpoint of the history of the race, from the standpoint of the history of civilization, as well as from the standpoint of the individual nature of the child. There has been a contribution to individuality made by history, and the great social pageantry has im- pressed that upon the leaders of the human race, and now the time has come when the schools, through the training of the individual, may give back, with interest a thousandfold, that which it has absorbed from humanity. DISCUSSION. 101 S. Jones : — Mr. President : 1 am known on the road as Sam Jones, but I am not the Sam Jones so famous in the United States, and I am not here at all in the capacity of your Evangelist; but I would like to be permitted to speak a few words. I would like to be eloquent enough to echo the sentiments of the lady who spoke in such high praise of the educational movement, and emphasize the abolition of slavery. I only hope and trust that the school of the future will be so adjusted as to reform the industrial world. In this age we have slavery, the out- growth of an industrial system which fills your roads with tramps. I am afraid this subject has not been grasped, and that our most potent, grave and reverend seniors who deal in higher education think it rather ber neath them. I would like mildly to suggest, if you will permit me, with- out any intentional purpose of offending, that the subject of sociology be made one of the main planks in the new platform of popular education. It is a disease for which there must be found a remedy. You will not only have your schools swamped, but the whole industrial world will feel the ill effects of the condition now prevailing, if you do not do some- thing to stem the tide. I apologize for introducing what might seem to be a foreign element. Francis W. Parker, of Illinois, closed the discussion as follows : — Mr. President, Ladies and Gentlemen : I know I made a failure to-night, because in all my past experience I never had a discussion of the subject which I presented that did not attack me very strongly; and therefore I think I must have made a great mistake in this paper. Why it is I have not been attacked, I know not. It may be because I said things that are so generally true that no one would attack me. However, I have just a word to say. I followed my brother Marble closely to find something. But I could not accept one thing. He said there might, there was great danger that the school would absorb the work of the home and the home would not have anything to do. Now I think that the teacher, the mother, the father, the sisters and brothers can all actively engage in the youngest child and have plenty to do all around. I believe, of course, that the home is the centre of the world, and the time is coming when mothers are to study the subject of education. The time is coming when no college course, or high-school course, will be complete unless our girls are obliged in the curriculum to study the child and the laws of human growth. And that brings me to the one thing: All our progress in education from the beginning, every step, has been in the study of that mystery of all mysteries — the little child. The heavenly light that fell on the hills of Bethlehem teaches us of the divinity of the little child. And to-day, my fellow-teachers, there is one thing I can say, that every step of progress that ever has been made in education has been the discovery, by actual observation and study of the child, of the L02 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION laws of growth, and that is the study of the future; that will lead us on. We find in that Book of books the inspired sentences that seem to con- firm the pedagogical truth, " A little child shall lead us unto the truth." In that study all minor differences will fall, and we shall find the truth as it is in that little child, the example for all humanity. I commend you the study of the little child, and the study of Him who was that lit- tle child, and whose last words as He fought His battle on this earth, and when He left it, He said to His trained disciples, to His sturdy teachers, " Simon, son of Jonas, lovest thou Me?" He knew the battle for human- ity and He gave the keynote, " Simon, son of Jonas, lovest thou me?" And the sturdy Peter said, " Nay, Lord, thou knowest I love thee." And then came the answer that has rolled down the ages and which comes to us in America to-day: " Feed my lambs, feed my lambs"; and the gates of glory shall be lifted up and the King of glory shall enter in. TEACHING PATRIOTISM. J. R. PRESTON, STATE SUPT. OF PUBLIC INSTRUCTION, JACKSON, MISS. The time-limit of thirty minutes demands that I confine this paper to what can be done and should be done in the United States to develop patriotism in the great mass of children, whose only instruction is given by the public schools. To die for one's country is the definition of patriotism which has been handed down the ages. To live for one's country is true patriotism. Government is for man, not man for government, is the trend of modern thought and practice. Our republic was founded and is maintained upon the theory that the people through the representatives they choose, will make laws and manage the government for the highest good to the greatest number. Its best claim to superiority and its hope of perpetuity is that it is for the people. Just now many thoughtful men who are true to its principles entertain grave doubts as to the accomplishment of its design. Here is a catalogue of conditions usually set up to justify their doubts: corrupt municipal administrations ; public revenues inequitably collected through protective tariffs ; a system of pensions costlier than a standing army, sapping the very manhood of its beneficiaries ; an overflow of immigrants in the great North-west ; three millions of paupers, living parasites on the body poli- tic ; eight millions of negroes producing political congestion in the South ; party politics in the hands of spoilsmen, who buy and sell the votes of free- TEACHING PATRIOTISM. 103 men; monopolies and vast combinations of capital sweeping the wealth into the coffers of the few; a brutal conflict between labor and capital; the tillers of the soil striking defiantly for relief from unjust discrimina- tion against their interests; the poor glaring fiendishly at the rich be- cause, through existing conditions, twenty-five thousand persons have been enabled to get possession of half the wealth of sixty-four millions. Ours is a nation of busy people, each doing his level best to push his own enterprise to highest results. As a people they have never stopped to see which way the nation is drifting. When they had a war to fight they laid aside their daily pursuits and with mighty valor and business- like activity fought it to a finish. They recognized a conflict which war alone could terminate, and in a terrible civil war they decided that a state could not secede and that slavery must go. The grave political and social evils above mentioned, and many others resulting therefrom, are pressing to the front to-day for adjustment and correction. It must be conceded that they are of as vital import to the destiny of our nation and possibly more difficult to settle than the issues of the civil war. The strongest cohesive forces of a nationality are common sympathies, identity of race and descent, the same language, the same religion, iden- tity of political antecedents. Not one of these forces operates throughout our republic. Our congressmen, representing the wishes of their dis- tricts, strive for the interests of their sections with little care for the rest of the country. One political policy does not suit the manufacturing East and the agricultural West. We have half the railways of the world to exchange our products for us and to facilitate the intermingling of our people. This is a strong mechanical bond, but it appeals to no higher motive than self-interest, and therefore cannot be relied upon to pro- mote a true spirit of nationality. The press, except in rare cases, speaks only to the section in which it is printed. Sectional interests and preju- dice once parted our nation in two ; and there is danger ahead that this same spirit, if not counteracted, may sever us again. This time not the North and South ; but the East, the West, the South, the Centre. We need the force of a dominant national patriotism to counterwork the perilous tendencies of this sectional spirit. Sober, reflecting men — not alarmists, but true patriots — recognize these dangers, and are seeking to face them with candor and to lay the burden of averting them upon some efficient and responsible agency. Among these, I need hardly add, is not found the partisan politician. Felicity in dodging issues has marked his tribe since the days of ^Eschines. Many of the troubles above adverted to are directly traceable to the cor- rupt measures and methods instituted for party supremacy; and we may as well trust bacilli to cure us of yellow fever as to expect a politician to 104 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION. take a square stand against the wishes, interests, or prejudices of any considerable number of voters. Witness the contest last year, over the ''little red school-house." With full confidence I assert that the public school is the agency we must rely upon. Its army of half a million teachers, sustained by popular devotion to the cause, must in times of peace and through peaceful meas- ures fight this continuous battle for the perpetuity of national life. This army stands to-day holding the hands and hearts of to-morrow's nation. To make a citizenship whose intelligence, moral rectitude, and steadfast virtues will counteract these disintegrating forces and social disorders is the function and the mission of our public schools. Taxing property for education smacks of socialism, however much we may glorify it as an American idea. It won the sanction of common consent only because education, by producing counter currents, reacts on the worst tendencies of socialism. Since true patriotism is to live for one's country, teaching patriotism resolves itself into making the best citizens. It is a step towards the evo- lution of a truer conception when the leading educational forces of a country are concentrated, as they are now, with practical unanimity, upon so vital a point. The patriotism which can be developed by the schools is of two kinds: (1.) that which comes through exercise of the emotions; (2.) that which comes through a knowledge of the rights and duties of the citizen. Ex- ercising patriotic emotions is but kindling the fire which is to fuse into a symmetrical whole and render stable the principles and convictions of rational patriotism. As a foundation for teaching emotional patriotism we have the uni- versal instinctive love of home, which draws its earliest breath from the caressing touch of a mother's hand, which is hallowed and strengthened by the sacred relations of the family, which throughout life is the anchor to upright conduct, nobility of character and good citizenship. The pertinent question is: How upon this basis can we best build up loyalty and love of country in the hearts and intellects of the millions who never enter college? Into the public schools they come from every kind of home — an incongruous collection, differing in capacity, hereditary proclivities, in passions, in tastes ; similar in this, that they are integral units of the future state, that they bear a significant relation to each other, that they are susceptible to training. When they step over the door-sill of the public school they enter a sphere of equal rights and equal privileges, and out of these rights and privileges begin to germinate a respect and love for the unseen agency which has provided such blessings. The transition from love of home to love of country is easy, and should be made a fascinating and memorable experience. In his treatise on TEACHING PATRIOTISM. 105 teaching patriotism, Col. Balch, of New York, has elaborated a plan for accomplishing this — by the use of flags and badges. With proper modi- fications to suit particular environments, this plan, if adopted and taught according to its spirit, would in a few years excite a patriotic enthusi- asm glowing enough to win over the obdurate immigrant, and strong enough to uplift the children of all classes to that plane of recognized equality so dear to the human heart, so essential to the fibre of a true American citizen. As a perpetual inspiration to patriotism every school should have a national and a state flag, and should teach their significance as symbols of law, justice, protection, liberty, government. Sentiments of rever- ence steadily develop as it dawns upon the mind of childhood, however vaguely, that through its flag the nation guarantees these inalienable rights. Moreover, child-mind needs something tangible, some emblem constantly in sight, around which it can cluster the virtues of citizen- ship and merge them into a feeling of patriotism. As form, color, size, arc best taught by comparison of objects, noting agreements and differ- ences, so may be instilled the clearest conception of all the qualities and duties of a true citizen. When presented first as a mere object-lesson, the sensible properties of the flag will arouse curiosity and induce a strong desire to know its mean- ing. Here is the basis of its truly valuable use, viz : as an object-text, about which week after week can be grouped the most delightful and stimulating lessons of patriotic devotion. The occasions should be few or many as the character of the pupils demands. A rural school com- posed of the children of well-to-do, native-born farmers requires less in- struction in patriotism than one in a colony of immigrants or in the pauper quarter of a city. National holidays, memorial days, decoration days, and such other events as are pertinent and readily associated with the glory of our coun- try should be freely used to give variety and vitality to lessons which may otherwise become monotonous and even dwarfing to the very senti- ments they are intended to inspire. The willing spirits of children can be firmly biased by the exalted purposes formed by occasions like these. One school day should be set apart every year as Patriots' Day. Plant- ing trees and floAvers to adorn school premises — an engaging practice now in vogue in most of the states — is undoubtedly a potent means of establish- ing attractive associations, and of endearing the school, and through it the state, to the hearts of future citizens. If this be a laudable practice, how much more worthy and significant to utilize a day to implant in their natures the seeds of genuine patriotism. Just as ground is prepared to nourish tree and flower so may hearts and intellects be quickened to cherish high resolve. 106 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION So let as have Patriots' Day dedicated as a national holiday, on which to focalize the light and grandeur of our country and photograph its glory upon the hearts of the children. Let parents and the community at large congregate at the school, and in song and recitation and patriotic speeches revive their love of country and deepen their spirit of fidelity to its principles. Our mechanics are turning to labor unions for relief ; farmers are look- ing to the Alliance for protection and redress of grievances. The immi- grant locates in a new home and is expected to become Americanized without one chance to learn what that means. His mother tongue, cus- toms, prejudices and inherent love of native land are realities to him; he clings to them stubbornly; they are his possessions. All these classes must be made to feel that the federal union was formed to " promote the general welfare and secure the blessings of liberty," and that they are the rulers of it, as well as the beneficiaries. I am convinced that Patriots' Day will be of immediate and permanent value in this direction. Parental love, pride and hope — benignant and all-pervading influences — will draw the people together, will stimulate feelings of harmony and good will, and excite to activity the best impulses of their natures. The perceptive powers and emotions of the individual will be quickened and reenforced by the presence and mass-force of the multitude. These con- ditions will be most favorable to arousing a keen and genuine spirit of patriotic ardor. What a transcendent spectacle it would be — this grand, patriotic, na- tional object-lesson! Fifteen millions of children standing before the people of the nation,. congregated in all the school-houses of the land ; the young and old, the rich and poor, the immigrant and native, all sharing alike the common glory of their country, praising and fostering those blessings of liberty and equality which were bought by the blood of the fathers and guaranteed to posterity in the federal constitution. Let Americans call a halt for one day to their everlasting business rush ; let her myriad of families assemble, so that the inspiration of Patriots' Day may sink into the heart oe the nation like a divine benediction. So much for the development of emotional patriotism. As affluents to the stream we should begin early to introduce lessons which appeal to all the higher emotions and tend to lead the child to right feeling, right thought and right action. On the first and last day in school, and on every day between, some principle of practical ethics should be incul- cated : obedience and courage, honor and courtesy, honesty and charity, truthfulness and justice, self-control and self-denial, attention, industry, self-respect, patient labor. These are the prime elements of fine manhood and womanhood, and it takes every one of them to make a truly patriotic TEACHING PATRIOTISM. 107 citizen. Our school men call this character-building. It has been much more talked of than taught, and I fear it will so continue until every teacher can stand before his pupils an exemplar of these virtues, and not a mere prater about them. Much of the training in this line must be incidental, but the central truth I would enforce is, that it stands pre- eminent as true education. I am not giving you a recipe to make saints. If you but consider your own life, and that of your worthiest neighbors, you will see how little they have been affected by what was taught in the ordinary school lessons, and how much of their success and of real man- hood is due to these every-day moral factors. These constitute the true measure of a man, whether in his relations to the family, to society, or to the state. Childhood confidingly takes and briskly assimilates; so these solid attributes should be continually presented with the utmost de- gree of vividness. Our school training should all tend to one end — to fit man to be subject and sovereign of himself. From ten or eleven years of age, systematic instruction should be given in text-books. Here begins civics, or the science of citizenship, which covers a wide field, with rather shadowy boundaries as yet. Training in emotional patriotism, and the moral attributes which reenforce and con- firm it, will have laid the foundation well. Children begin to slip away at twelve, some even earlier; hence we must discriminate sharply and determine what and how much text-book instruction can be given. I think all will agree that the leading facts of state and national his- tory, and a brief, simple, lucid treatise on civil government, can be taught before the vanishing point of attendance comes into sight. In the history of our country we meet the very finest topics for the in- culcation of lofty patriotism. An abiding loyalty and love of country will be implanted as we dwell upon the indomitable spirit and far-reach- ing wisdom of the patriots who formed our union, their heroic deeds in the Revolutionary War, the creation and adoption of the constitution, the exalted character of the first president and his compatriots, the influence of America in liberalizing the governments of Europe, the wonderful ca- reer of development up to the Civil War, the matchless valor of Americans in that unhappy conflict, the onward mighty sweep since, our inventions, our literature, our unparalleled advance in the mechanic arts. Then looking over the first century of the nation, at whose birth La Fayette ex- claimed, " Humanity has won its suit and liberty will never more want an asylum," we can point to a manhood eminent in loyalty, piety and patriotism — those sterling qualities that forever challenge the admiration of the human mind. State pride should be developed and drawn upon to add zest to the study of state history, which coming close home fires a boy with zeal to know the lives, and with ambition to emulate the virtues of those who 108 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION. have reflected honor on his commonwealth. " I never heard the story of Percy and Douglas that I found not my heart more moved than with a trumpet," said Philip Sidney. So may be stirred the hearts of the youth of our land by stories of the lives of American heroes — the peers of the world's bravest and best. As to civil government, we must not wait till the high school years. A primary text-book on this subject, as well as on history, can be handled very early. The average pupil, under a live teacher, can take it readily at ten or eleven. The instruction should be synthetic and conform to the method of teaching geography, beginning with a study of the town or township as the unit, extending to the county, to the state, and lastly to the general government. First, teach all about that civil unit, where the acts of a citizen count immediately for good or evil, where his neighbors and friends live, vote, and have their homes. Here the ties of association can be made valu- able adjuncts to the instruction. A boy can be shown the rights and the duties of citizen and officer, and impressed with the sacredness of suffrage and the gravity of official acts. The real object is on hand for illustra- tion. Elections, officers' meetings, assessments, levy and collection of taxes, courts and schools, — all furnish texts for making the whole matter of local government a living reality. These are before the pupil's eyes, and he can learn them as he learns streets or roads and his neighbors who walk along them. Through mock exercises we can induct the boys into the actual practice of many of the functions of citizenship. It will count for much if we can bring our boys to the threshold of manhood with clear-cut knowledge and confirmed views about these prac- tical details. Along with history and civil government the patriotic gems of litera- ture should be read, and the best of them memorized and occasionally re- cited. These will broaden the pupil's view of patriotism and show him that, in all lands and times, love of country has been regarded among the worthiest emotions of the human heart. Above all, and through all, let us exalt and inculcate a sacred devotion to the fundamental principle of local self-government, so that the youth, knowing its value, shall have courage to preserve this priceless bequest of centuries of struggle, this, inheritance we hold in common with all En- glish-speaking people, this keystone in the arch of American liberty. I have now briefly touched upon what in my judgment can and should be done to teach patriotism to all children who enter our public schools. If I have laid what seems to be too much stress upon emotional cultivation, it is because I believe no people can be truly great without great emotions. As to the higher branches of civics, I will only add that all through the grammar school, the high school, and the college, should be contin- CACHING PATRIOTISM. 109 ued the study of the science of citizenship, to the end that the highly cultured of our people, by knowing the history and principles of our gov- ernment best, may love it most and lead the masses into the light of that knowledge and love. " How to govern and be governed is the chief thing learned at Sparta," said one of her rulers twenty-three centuries ago. To-day in every school in our republic should hang this motto: Teach the children how to gov- ern and be governed, for each is to be a sovereign citizen. Proper instruction in patriotism and civics will require time and tal- ented instructors. So be it. Take the time, employ the teachers. Prune the overcrowded curriculum. Much of it consists of dead branches, and much of the teaching is worse than folly. The " cold gray eye of the crit- ical public " is to-day turned upon our public schools. It sees puny weaklings in the rank and file of so-called teachers; the intellectually halt, lame and blind leading our children into darkness. We need a Dr. Hopkins or a Dr. Wayland in every school-room in the land. They are not to be had, you say? Then let our nation make them. You may de- clare this utopian ; I rejoin, it is self-deluding to attempt otherwise to educate properly the people of our republic. The vastness of our nation in area and resources and its dazzling devel- opment have induced among us a habit of thinking and speaking in the superlative degree. We brag about everything, even our public schools. It is a great theory — this thing of the state's providing education from the infant school to the university. A little vanity about it is allowable ; but we must be careful not to let our vanity and boasting divest us of sober judgment. In practice, public education in the United States is not meeting the demands or fulfilling the promises of the theory. Teachers, superintend- ents, school journals, politicians, even this august body, have been boast- ing about it long and loud ; yet the states spend comparatively a mere pittance in its support. The last congress appropriated nearly one bill- ion dollars of the people's money — six times as much as the annual expenditures for the public schools in all the states — more for pensions alone than for the education of all the children. This contrast shows that in some lines we are running to seed, and need topping in order that we may put out more branches for fruit. Education, properly understood, means making the citizens of to-mor- row's nation ; nay more, making and keeping the nation worthy to sur- vive the perils that continually threaten it. So it follows that teaching patriotism, in whatever way, is reduced at last to training and inspiring youth to live most worthily, to shape their lives after the character-models of humanity's noblest and truest, to develop their highest individual powers, and lock into their hearts the sublime word — duty. 110 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION. Phidias was honored in Athens, and since in all the world, because he could chisel from inanimate marble the best figure of a perfect man. The patriotic problem before America to-day is to put a Phidias into every school-room, to mould a perfect citizen from the living child. If it costs ten times the treasure now spent, and showers of honor besides, let it all be freely given. True teachers have uplifted humanity the world over, and our republic must utilize her highest and best talent in teaching if she would fulfil her princely destiny as the crown-jewel of nations. I have a supreme belief in the perpetuity of our Union. Ours is a com- posite nation akin to all the world, to which the immigrant ever comes, and from which none go to seek a better land ; and I have faith that the eternal principles of its free government will fuse all discordant elements into a homogeneous whole. The public schools are the great fusing fur- nace. From the plastic stream of American childhood they must mould American patriots. DISCUSSION. A. H. McKay, Nova Scotia : — Mr. President, Ladies and Gentlemen : When you asked me to open the discussion of the paper on the teaching of patriotism, by a man from Mississippi, I felt a little strange, because in reading the patriotism of our books, and of the past, I knew while it was described so eloquently by Superintendent Preston that one should be ready to die for one's country; but I felt all along that with that thought there was also coupled another one, if not expressed, yet often entertained, that before you die kill as many as you can of the enemy. But the pos- sibility of the representatives of two great nations meeting together and discussing the question of teaching patriotism, on a common platform, shows that the old notion is becoming wider, and that with the develop- ment in every other direction we have also a development in patriotism. I cannot do better here on this occasion, I think, than reiterate the words which have been so ably expressed by Superintendent Preston, and so far as these can apply to Canada they are just the words which would make us a great and noble people, and one worthy to be associated with you in every good work looking to the patriotism of the world. Superintendent Preston has given us two capital heads which I might now take for a text for my closing remarks : the emotional side and the side of knowledge. The word patriotism implies fatherland, and it implies something more — the love of the fatherland. What is the fatherland? Is it that small piece of rock or soil on which we were born? Some people have DISCUSSION. 1 1 1 fought for the few inches, and fought for it so energetically that they died even on the gallows. But that was not their fatherland, nor did they re- ceive very much honor in that. The fatherland is greater than the farm on which we were born. Is the township the fatherland, is the county the fatherland, is the state the fatherland? To these and other questions various answers would be given in a study of the world's history in the development of civilization. In the rudest condition we find the family attachment very strong, and almost the only inspiration of patriotism. When civilization has made some headway, families join together and we find the clan or the tribe. Civilization must make a very great stride and did make great strides before the tribes were united together to form the state. But it is left for the present day and present civilization to gather together the greater units in a federal union such as the great union which now extends from one side of this continent to the other, or the still greater union of kindred and the same people which encircles the globe. Commissioner Harris very eloquently and forcibly laid stress upon the familiar part of the institutions of the English people. Those institu- tions came to us in the form of local government. Local government — if we are going to study government, we are first to commence studying it locally, as has been beautifully pointed out by Superintendent Preston. We must have no patriotism that attaches us too closely to a locality. The government of the locality is only a part of the greater organization. We must have our local institutions grouped together : the township, county, and the state collected together in the larger organizations of the federal government ; and without that bond, as has been so powerfully said, we may lapse again into the same element from which we grew up. Now what is the grand force which is to unite these larger molecules of society of the world? It is the love of the fatherland. So the love of the father- land must increase, must go out from the county to the state, and must go out from the state to the general federation, and the individual must so realize the necessity of that, the necessity of the vast benefit from an utilitarian point of view, that we can appeal to those who can only under- stand the use of it, and we can also employ the implements which have been so graphically brought before us, and picture it in such a way as to win hearts, not only for the smaller organization, but for the greater organ- ization. Now, in order to teach patriotism which will give us a love for country, I think it is necessary that we should be teachers of a proper sys- tem, and must be an inspiration in ourselves. Then every illustration in the school-room history, geography, and all others, will be filled with an inspiration which helps us and the children under our charge in feeling an inspiration which brings about a love for country and humanity. If we are going to make a grand success over the olden times we must teach that the work of the patriot is not so much to work and fight and die for 112 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION. his country, as it is to work and live to make it a grand nation. There is sometimes danger that we lay too much stress upon a narrow patriotism. For instance, your Independence Day is well worthy not only of your admiration, but the admiration of all people, for yours, like the English people, have been good fighters; but I do not think we ought to lay too much stress on our fighting. But I prefer to regard the larger patriotism that is bound to come in the progress of this grand evolution. Now there is very little difference between us. At a certain point in your history you came to a conclusion that a revolution was necessary to give you a larger liberty. We did not go that way altogether, but we have arrived at the very same result by a process of evolution, and I think at the pres- ent day our personal liberty is as great as that of any nation on the earth, and we will perhaps move the government more rapidly in response to the popular will than even your grand government on the other side of the line. Now if we are to teach the highest patriotism, we must not only know Our own country, but as teachers must understand history. As Canadi- ans we should study your history, and take advantage of the grand points there, and if there is anything we can do better we will try to do it. In like manner you will study our history, and if we have any good points we know you will give us credit for them. In that way we would live to- gether ; although we are separated by little political lines, yet we would be united even down to our method of teaching patriotism, and we would be practically united in every way, except by this little boundary line, which is perhaps a necessity for our better development. It may be, for this reason, that we will let evolution and revolution run side by side, and we will see how it comes out, which will turn out people who will not fight among themselves, but who will stand up for right even though it is on the other side of the line ; who will not say, " Let us take from other lands whatever we can get, in whatever way we can, by fraud or force." They will not say that people of our own blood are not our brethren, but will stand up for giving out right and justice, as we would do right and be just with each other. And perhaps this union is coming a little nearer than some of us think. I could not help applauding with all my force the beautiful thought given us by Commis- sioner Harris yesterday, -and I think we are coming to it. The fact that we can meet together and discuss patriotism on a common platform shows that we have taken one grand step in the right direction. Soon we will take the next great step, and then our fatherland will be a land filled by people (not by English people), but by people worshipping English insti- tutions all through the world. And then there will be one step more to take, and that will follow naturally and easily, and that is when the whole world will be organized, and the armies of the world will be turned into DISCUSSION. 113 the paths oi productive industry, and international law will control and set- tle all the affairs of the world. Then you will have the poetic dreamer realizing the federation of the world : 1 ' When the war-drum beats no longer, And the battle-flag is furled, In the parliament of man, The federation of the world." Then the world will be our fatherland, and the sentimental argument then will be — love for humanity all the world o'er. Me. Williams, of Missouri : — Our country is either the natural or the adopted parent of us all, and the love of our country, next to the love of God, is one of the strongest and purest affections of mankind. It is that deep-seated emotion in the human heart, more powerful than reason, which in all ages, and under all skies, has ever found expression in noble deeds and in the glory of individual sacrifice and in the vindication of all that is national in honor or national in right. The world's history is full of examples ; they are imperishable ; they have in them eternal ideas, which outlive thrones and empires, and even civilization itself. Everywhere we see them pictured, perpetuated in the sublime measures of poetry and praise, and in the transporting rapture of song. The love of country is the mother love that came in with the civilization of the race, and will remain with it to the end. Teaching patriotism is teaching love of home and native land; love for the flag, whether it be the Union Jack of grand old England, or the Star Spangled Banner of our glorious American Union. Teach the national airs, whether it be " God Save the Queen," or " America," or the " Marseillaise" hymn. Teach patriotism as you teach national history ; teach loyalty and fidelity to the government, whether that government be a republic, an empire, or a kingdom. Teach the duty of true citizenship. Teach the triumph of national genius. Teach the achievements of nations. Teach the richness and productiveness of the nation's soil. Teach the grandeur and beauty of the nation's art and of its scenery. Teach everything and anything, in fact, in nature, or in the nations, or in individuals, which will make the student stronger, which will make him patriotic, faithful and true. Teach a patriotism to our children, a love of country, of our country's traditions, of the traditions of our mothers, of our country in the past, of our country in its present pride and power, and our country in its future and its great destiny, its vast resources, constitutional liberty, and above all, our country in its freedom and union forever. The love that found expression in " Home, Sweet Home " is universal. That touch of nature makes mankind akin. We all love the home of our birth ; that much is instinctive, untaught. " Breathes there a man with soul so dead Who never to himself hath said, This is my own, my native land." 114 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION Chakles A. Blanchard : — I wanted to say, fellow- teachers, one or two words about the paper read by the gentleman from Mississippi. If I were considering the subject I think I would put his second point first. I think the great point in teaching patriotism is the point which he mentions second, namely, that we must develop in men thoroughly hon- orable character. When I was listening to the discussion last night, I had to pinch myself three or four times, to learn whether or not there was any liberty in the world, and if there was where it came from. I sup- posed that our English-speaking ancestors battled with the house of Stuart for a hundred years for the privilege of self-government, and that they won in that battle ; and I supposed that our Pilgrim fathers fought for liberty in the early times, and I supposed that they accomplished that result. And I suppose that when in the empire of Germany, at the time that Charles V., and Philip II. was at its head, a great battle was carried on, and that they who loved liberty won in that fight for themselves and those who came after them, — I had supposed that there had been educational processes at work in this world which had made men love liberty; which had made men love to live for it and willing to die for it. It seems to me as I look over history that the main thing necessary to get people to be patriotic is to get them to be good men. If we want to find the force which has ruled the world, look for the finest individual character ; if we want to find the most lofty national development, if we look at the greatest results which have been attained in civilization and patriotism, it seems to me we must go right back to the people in place of trying to dodge this way or the other. Patriotism should be an element in the character of every man and every woman, which would make them good. What is the use in trying to teach a young man to be a good mid- dle-aged man, or a woman to be a good girl and a good old lady, when she is an old lady and a good person ready to die, just as she gets to the end of life? What is the use of teaching men to be honest farmers and merchants? In place of teaching the minister to be a good minister, why not go back to the central foundations of character and have Christian education for these men and women? I was wonderfully pleased in our meeting in Chicago with the papers which we had when we were discuss- ing the subject of modern education. The first topic under modern edu- cation was the Socratic element. That is, when we want to discuss modern education we go back three thousand years and take from history everything that is valuable in it. AVhen we teach patriotism or anything else, isn't it wise for us to consider those men who have gone before us, and who have builded for us the platform on which we stand? Francis W. Parker: — There is no goodness except doing good, and doing good for others; that is the essential patriotism, it seems to me. It is not the abstract goodness of the decalogue, but it is the positive DISCUSSION. 115 goodness of the beatitude, that marks true patriotism. That is the kiud of patriotism that is lasting. My brother is right. Everything has its root in the past, but it is not best to stand by the roots all the time, which is the patriotism of the family instinctively. If patriotism does not go beyond the family it does not accomplish its greatest good. There is a patriotism of the community which is beautiful, but if it does not extend to the state it does not accomplish its best purpose. There is a patriotism of the state, but if you stand by the state against the whole you die. There is the patriotism of the nation; but all patriotism summed up is only real patriotism as it takes in Christ's life and the life of every child under the shining sun. Certainly we go back to the best there is in the past ; but we must look forward. It is right for this great race of people to reverence the past, but there is a vast difference between a worship of the past and a reverence for it. Our ancestors away back in prehistoric times worshipped their ancestors, and it was a good thing, because we must have an ideal ; but should every father say to his son, M My son, be like your grandfather ; do as he did ; he was a great, brave and true man; be like him"? All through the ages our ideals have been in the past ; but the verdict of this age is, that we are slowly turning from the great and good past to the mighty ideal of the future. When people say, " Oh, you do not reverence the past enough," I deny it, but I do say that we do not worship it. We do not worship Socrates, but we love and reverence him for the example he has given us for our guidance and encouragement in dealing with the mighty problems of the future. W. D. Atkinson : — Mr. Chairman : I differ so radically from the Su- perintendent of Education from Mississippi, that I cannot refrain from expressing my sentiment on this occasion. It is rather difficult to express what I wish to say in an impromptu speech. He who stands before me, however, in my mind's eye, as the highest, truest ideal of a patriot is the immortal Gladstone. I would instance what happened a few years ago, in English history, in a contest between the government of Great Britain and a little insignificant prince down in South Africa. England could have wiped him out of existence in a week, but Gladstone with- drew from the contest and gave the Natal prince the right he con- tended for, to the astonishment of the whole world, and thus showed that right and truth stood more in his estimation than simply the abstract right of his government. True patriotism is the endeavor to elevate my country's standard of honor up to that which is right and true, and I should love my country for that in her which is devoted to righteous- ness. I should love the truth and righteousness which God has given us, and seek to bring my country up to it. I am not to make patriotism, therefore, the end, but rather the means by which I may hope to bring the nation to a love of truth, to a love of righteousness. I do not think 116 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION the observance of any Patriots' Day will ever attain that result. The time wasted or spent in that could be better spent in educating the young men in these moral truths and principles which will make the citizen seek that which will be for his country's highest good ; hence it is not patri- otism in itself we are striving to attain, but it is love of truth, of right and righteousness. Patriotism is nothing more than this ; that is the highest patriotism. W. A. Douglass : — Mr. President, Fellow- Citizens, and Friends from the great United States : Allow me to commence by making a little per- sonal explanation. I think it is a little more than two years ago that I visited the State of New York, during the time there was a great contest as to which party should obtain power. Everywhere we went there were big pictures of one man called Cleveland, and another Harrison. If I read a Republican paper I found they told of an angel who had come to earth and was running for the presidency. If I read the Democratic paper I found there was another angel also a candidate. If I read the papers of the other side I found their opponent was spoken of as the meanest of all men. And I have wondered that some of the speakers have not said something about the progress of humanity, something about the progress of freedom. One night in New York I went to hear one of the principal orators of the United States. The speaker said that in the year 1847 there was a famine in Ireland; in the year 1854 there was a war between England and Russia; and consequently we were pros- perous. Well, I said, God save us from prosperity if it must rest upon that. I walked up the avenue and I saw an immense procession. It reached, I do not know how many miles. I could not see the tail of it, it was so far off. I walked along, looking at the illuminations until I came to one, and do you know what it said? "Down with Britain." Well, I was born in Britain. I had lived in Canada a great many years; I had studied its history, and I had studied the history of the United States, as I think men ought to study history to see the progress of humanity. I was puzzled, and I hunted up one of the leading men, or one who looked like a leading man, because he had a big rosette on his bosom, and I asked him what it meant. I said, " I came as a visitor to the coun- try, to observe your institutions, and is this the education you are giving your men, that the prosperity of the United States is to be founded on the destruction of friendly nations?" I asked myself, " Is that the outcome of education in the United States ?" And then I remembered that about the year 1848 a terrible calamity overtook Ireland, and then I remem- bered that America laid aside everything else and sent food, that they might feed the hungry. I thought again of the time when yon were passing through the throes of a terrible war, and yet sent ship-loads of DISCUSSION. 117 food to feed the people over there. And from all these I knew that a feeling for humanity had an abiding-place in your hearts, and that that showed the conscience, the heart of the American nation, and that that was true patriotism. Now let me tell you a little further about my personal experience in this matter. I passed through our normal school here, and spent some fif- teen years as a pedagogue, and then, like a great many pedagogues, the first chance I got I quit the profession. It was a very honorable, noble profession; I always felt rich in soul, but not in purse. I was expected to do the work of an archangel and be satisfied with $700 a year; and so an institution needed a man, at a great deal better pay, for counting dollars, and I went to counting dollars. Sordid, it is true, but I find that is human nature. After having passed through our normal schools, having passed through college, the question was put to me one day — if it had been in Greek literature, or Latin, or mineralogy, or zoology, or about the distance of the stars, or the chemical properties of stone, I might have told something about it ; but the question was simply this : " Have the people of this continent enough common sense to know where to buy their groceries and dry goods?" But I did not know; I felt within my soul I did not. What is the first duty in patriotism? It is to preserve human rights. If we learn what are our human rights, then what are national rights will come to be easily understood. Let me say another thing. Our good friend has said we want good men. We want something more than that, as humanity and society is organized. Good bricks are necessary and good architecture is necessary to construct a substantial building. We want to know something about society and a proper arrangement and adjustment of its parts, in order that we may develop the best in humanity; and, it seems to me, we want a careful investigation. Mr. Prestos, of Mississippi, closed the discussion as follows: — My Fel- low-Citizens:— I wish to speak now a few words only to my fellow-citi- zens. When I began this paper it was with great difficulty that I could narrow it down to a limit where, in my judgment, no antagonistic ideas would be injected into it. I am a Southern man, and my folks, my kin- dred, and my people fought in the Southern war against the Union. I remember their deeds of heroism, and I honor them for standing by their honest convictions and offering their lives as a sacrifice upon the altar of their honest belief. And now I wish to say to those of you who come from the broad Northwest and the East, that the people of these South- ern States to-day are patriotic, that the people of the Southern States are to-day most loyal to this grand Union of ours. They fought for what they believed to be a principle of government fixed in our Constitution. 118 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION It has been settled definitely, and differently from their view, and they have accepted the decision, and they are as true to-day to the Union as they ever were before ; and I may say that I believe that the young manhood of the Southern States to-day is more patriotic than it has ever been. Let me narrate a little incident that happened within my own personal observation within the past sixty days. We built a monu- ment at Jackson, Mississippi, and dedicated it to the heroes who fell fight- ing in that cause. In the speeches that were made there there was not one unpatriotic word uttered. What I wanted to call your attention to is this, that in the Senate Chamber, next to my office, the young men, sons of Confederate veterans, organized a company, and they discussed there for two nights. The first night the discussion was as to whether they should carry the Confederate flag, or whether they should carry the Union flag, or whether they should carry both flags, the next day in the pro- cession. Finally they decided they would carry simply the Confederate flag, which they had adopted as their ensign. The second night they called themselves together again, and after a heated debate they decided they would carry both flags together. I want to say to you, that although they discussed that question, fifty or seventy-five of them, for two nights, there was not an unpatriotic word spoken during the whole time ; and I felt proud that the time had gone by when sectional feeling wrangled in the hearts of men. I felt proud that our people had not handed down to their sons any feelings of enmity to our grand government. We are patriotic, we are patriotic; and I am gratified that there is a spirit of liberty abounding in our people. When we were in distress at Charleston, or along the Mississippi, with the yellow fever, down come the bounteous gifts from the magnanimous people of the North ; and when you are in distress we contribute our little mite to help you, as we did at Johnstown. We love the Union, and we know that all prejudice has been obliterated, and we too are anxiously looking forward to the glorious confederation, when all the governments of the world shall be united. HISTORICAL SKETCH OF THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION Z. RICHARDS, WASHINGTON, D. C. The present name of this association was assumed in 1870, at the an- nual meeting, held in the city of Cleveland, Ohio. Previous to that date it bore the name of " The National Teachers' Association." This latter SKETCH OF THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION 110 name was assumed at its first organization in Philadelphia, August 26, 1857. This association has a legitimate origin. It is not the result of any faction, accident, or antagonism. Neither ambition nor rivalry fur- nished any incentives for its formation ; for it was the natural outgrowth from the spirit of the times and the demands of the period. It is true that at the time of its origin there were not less than twenty- three state educational associations in this country, the first of which was organized in the State of New York in 1845. With pleasure we also speak of the "American Institute of Instruction," organized in 1830, which is still doing efficient and highly commendable work in its New England field. The next year after, 1831, "The Western College of Teachers " was organized in Ohio. This western association should be specially commended and honored for the evolutionary influence which it exerted, not only upon the teaching fraternity of Ohio, but upon the teachers of many other states. So far as we know now, the first educational association in this coun- try was organized in Middletown, Conn., under the name of " The Mid- dlesex County Association for the Improvement of Common Schools." (See note, " Barnard's Journal of Education," vol. ii., p. 19). We would also especially refer to " The American Association for the Advancement of Education," which was the result of a " Convention of the Friends of Common Schools and of Universal Education," held in Philadelphia, in December, 1849, and which completed its organization in 1850. Its prominent original movers and officers for 1849 were Hon. Horace Mann, Pres. ; Joseph Henry, John Griscom, Samuel Lewis, Dr. Alonzo Potter, Greer B. Duncan, Vice-Presidents; Charles Northend, P. Pemberton Morris, Solomon Jenner, Secretaries. The Business Committee were Henry Barnard, John S. Hart, Nathan Bishop, II. H. Barney, and Thomas H. Benton, Jr. These are all venerable names of noble men, whose influence in the cause of educa- tion, public and private, will never cease to be felt both in our own and in other countries. The influence of all these associations was felt more or less by the first movers in the organization of the " National Teachers 'Association " ; but the most direct influence came from the " American Institute of In- struction," the "New York Teachers' Association," and the "American Association for the Advancement of Education." Of the eleven original founders of the " National Teachers' Association," six of whom are now living, three, viz., T. W. Valentine, the first to suggest its organization, and at the time President of the "New York Teachers' Association," J. W. Bulkley, and James Cruikshank were representatives of the " New York Teachers' Association." 120 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION. Two of these founders, viz., I). B. Hagar, who prepared the original call and drew up the constitution, and Wm. E. Sheldon, who, with the speaker, are the only members present to-day, were representatives of the " Amer- ican Institute of Instruction " and of the " Massachusetts State Teachers' Association." Three of them were representatives of educational work in Pennsylvania, viz., J. P. Wickersham, Wm. Roberts, and Edward Brooks. One, C. S. Pennell, was from Missouri ; one, J. I). Geddings, was from South Carolina; and one, the writer, Z. Richards, from the District of Columbia, who was also a representative of the " American Institute of Instruction" and of the " American Association for the Ad- vancement of Education." Five of this number, viz., T. W. Valentine, J. W. Bulkley, Wm. Roberts, J. D. Geddings, and J. P. Wickersham have closed their educational work on earth to enter upon a higher and nobler employment. As above intimated, T. W. Valentine, then President of the " New York Teachers' Association," the oldest state teachers' association in our coun- try, was the first to suggest the formation of the " National Teachers' Association." After consulting with D. B. Hagar, of Massachusetts, and with others, he requested Mr. Hagar to prepare a call for a convention of the Presidents of the various State Teachers' Associations, with a few other prominent educators at that time. Mr. Hagar prepared the call, and Mr. Valentine sent copies to the officers and workers in the teachers' associations of the whole country, asking for their co-operation ; but only ten Presidents responded, or con- sented to attach their names to the call. Some viewed the call with sus- picion; some, as visionary; and some with indifference. The call was as follows: TO THE TEACHERS OP THE UNITED STATES: The eminent success which has attended the establishment and operations of the several Teachers' Associations in the States of this country is the source of mutual congratu- lations among all friends of popular education. To the direct agency and the diffused influence of these Associations, more, perhaps, than to any other cause, are due the mani- fest improvement of schools in all their relations, the rapid intellectual and social eleva- tion of teachers as a class, and the vast development of public interest in all that con- cerns the education of the young. That the State Associations have already accomplished great good, and that they are destined to exert a still broader and more beneficent influence, no wise observer will deny. Believing that what has been accomplished for the States by State Associations may be done for the whole country by a National Association, we, the undersigned, invite our fellow-teachers throughout the United States to assemble in Philadelphia on the 26th day of August next, for the purpose of organizing a National Teachers' Association. We cordially extend this invitation to all practical teachers in the North, the South, the East, and the West, who are willing to unite in a general effort to promote the general welfare of our country by concentrating the wisdom and power of numerous minds, and by distributing among all the accumulated experiences of all ; who are ready SKETCH OF THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION 121 to devote their energies and their means to advance the dignity, respectability, and usefulness of their calling; and who, in fine, believe that the time has come when the teachers of the nation should gather into one great Educational Brotherhood. As the permanent success of any association depends very much upon the auspices at- tending its establishment, and the character of the organic laws it adopts, it is hoped that all parts of the Union will be largely represented at the inauguration of the pro- posed enterprise. Signed by T. W. Valentine, President of the New York Teacl D. B. Hagar, «. Massachusetts W. T. Lucky, u Missouri J. Tenny, " New Hampshire J. G. May, " Indiana W. Roberts, a Pennsylvania C. Pease, " Vermont D. Franklin Wells J Iowa A. C. Spicer, u Wisconsin S. Wright, u Illinois In accordance with the above call, many teachers of the United States assembled at the " Athaeneum Building," in Philadelphia, at ten o'clock A. m., August 26, 1857. The meeting was called to order by T. W. Valentine, of New York, who read the call and made the following statement, in substance : " We assemble here to-day under circumstances of more than ordinary interest. It is true that our meeting is not large in numbers, as our coming together has not been publicly announced in naming advertise- ments. We have not expected that the quiet gathering of a body of teachers in this great city would create such a sensation as a political or commercial convention representing merely material interests might do, yet in its results upon the great cause of education directly, and upon the well-being of the country ultimately, this meeting may prove as important as many of those of a more pretentious character. " We cannot always see the end from the beginning. That noble band of patriots who, more than eighty years ago, sent forth to the world, from this city, the immortal Declaration of Independence, could scarcely have realized the mighty influence which their action was calculated to exert upon our country and the world. All experience, as well as the word of inspiration, admonishes us not to ' despise the day of small things. ' " Twelve years ago, in the Empire State, the first State Association of Teachers in this country was formed. Some of us now here, who were instrumental in its formation, can well remember the fear and trembling with which that enterprise was commenced. Previous to this organiza- tion teachers everywhere were almost entirely unacquainted with each other. But what a mighty change a few years have wrought! Besides many minor organizations, there are now not less than twenty- three State Teachers' Associations, each doing good work in its own sphere of 122 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION labor, and to-day I trust we shall proceed to raise the cap-stone which shall bind all together in one solid, substantial structure. " In our proposed organization we shall have no antagonisms with any of the State Associations, for they have their peculiar local work, nor with the venerable 'American Institute of Instruction,' for its field lias always been New England, nor with the ' American Association for the Advancement of Education,' which was not designed to be specifi- cally an association of teachers. " What we want is an association that shall embrace all the teachers of our whole country, which shall hold its meetings at such central points as shall accommodate all sections and combine all interests. And we need this not merely to promote the interests of our own profession, but to gather up and arrange the educational statistics of our country, so that the people may know what is really being done for public education, and what yet remains to be done. I trust the time will come when our gov- ernment will have its educational department just as it now has one for agriculture, for the interior, for the navy, etc. " We need such an organization as shall bring the teachers of this coun- try more together, and disseminate as well as collect educational intel- ligence. "Such an effort is imperatively demanded of us; and I trust we shall now go forward and devise measures to accomplish these great objects." After the close of Mr. Valentine's address, Mr. James L. Enos, of Iowa, was made chairman pro tern., and Mr. Wm. E. Sheldon, of Massachu- setts, secretary pro tern. After prayer by Rev. Dr. Challen, of Philadelphia, Mr. Hagar, of Massa- chusetts, offered the following resolutions : Resolved, That, in the opinion of the teachers now present as representa- tives of various parts of the United Slates, it is expedient to organize a "National Teachers' Association." Resolved, That a Committee of three be appointed by the Chair to prepare a Constitution adapted to such an Association. After a full and free discussion of the resolutions they were adopted unanimously, and the chair appointed Messrs. Hagar, of Massachusetts, Cann, of Georgia, and. Challen, of Indiana, to prepare and report a con- stitution. The convention then engaged in a general discussion upon the condi- tion of educational systems and methods in different parts of our coun- try. In the afternoon the Committee on a Constitution reported the following copy, which, after being examined and discussed, article by article, was, with slight changes, unanimously adopted, as follows: SKETCH OF THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION. 123 PREAMBLE. To elevate the character and advance the interests of the profession of teaching, and to promote the cause of popular education in the United States, we, whose names are subjoined, agree to adopt the following CONSTITUTION. ARTICLE I. — NAME. This association shall be styled "The National Teachers' Association." ART. II. — MEMBERS. Any gentleman who is regularly occupied in teaching in a public or private elemen- tary school, college or university, or who is regularly employed as a private tutor, as the editor of an educational journal, or as a superintendent of schools, shall be eligible to membership. Application for admission to membership shall be made or referred to the Board of Directors, or to such a committee of their number as they shall appoint; and all who may be recommended by them, and accepted by a majority vote of the membei's present, shall be entitled to the privileges of the association upon paying one dollar and signing the constitution. Upon the recommendation of the Board of Directors, gentlemen may be elected hon- orary members by a two-thirds vote of the members present, and as such shall have all the rights of regular members, except those of voting and holding office. Ladies engaged in teaching may, on the recommendation of the Board of Directors, become honorary members, and shall thereby possess the right of presenting, in the form of written essays (to be read by the Secretary, or any other member whom they may select) , their views upon the subject assigned for discussion. Whenever a member of this Association shall abandon the profession of teaching, or the business of editing an educational journal, or of superintending schools, he shall cease to be a member. If one member shall be charged by another with immoral or dishonorable conduct, the charge shall be referred to the Board of Directors, or such committee as they shall appoint; and if the charge shall be sustained by them, and afterwards by a two-thirds vote of the members present, at a regular meeting of the Association, the member so charged shall forfeit his membership. There shall be an annual fee of one dollar. If any one shall omit paying his fee for four years his connection with the association shall cease. A person eligible to membership may become a life member by paying, at once, ten dollars. ART. III. — OFFICERS. The Officers of this Association shall be a President, twelve Vice-Presidents, a Secre- tary, a Treasurer, and one Counsellor for each State, District, or Territory repre- sented in the association. These Officers, all of whom shall be elected by ballot, a majority of votes cast being necessary for a choice, shall constitute the Board of Directors, and shall have power to appoint committees from their own number such as they shall deem expedient. The President shall preside at all meetings of the Association and of the Board of Directors, and shall perform such other duties, and enjoy such privileges, as by custom devolve upon and are enjoyed by a presiding officer. In his absence the Vice-President, in order, who is present, shall preside ; and in the absence of all the Vice-Presidents a pro tempore chairman shall be appointed on nomi- nation— the Secretary putting the question. The Secretary shall keep a full and just record of the proceedings of the Association, and of the Board of Directors, shall notify each member of the Association, or Board, shall conduct such correspondence as the Directors may assign, and shall have his records present at all meetings of the Association and of the Board of Directors. In his absence, a Secretary pro tern, may be appointed. 124 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION. The Treasurer shall receive and hold in safe keeping all moneys paid to the Associ- ation ; shall expend the same, in accordance with the vote of the Directors, or of the Association ; and shall keep an exact account of his receipts and expenditures, with vouchers of the latter, which account he shall render to the Board of Directors prior to each regular meeting of the Association ; he shall also present an abstract thereof to the Association. The Treasurer shall give such bonds for the faithful discharge of his duties, as may be required by the Board of Directors. The Counsellors shall have equal powers with the other Directors in performing the duties belonging to the board. The Board of Directors shall have power to fill vacancies in their own body, shall have in charge the general interests of the Association, shall make all necessary arrangements for its meetings, and shall do all in their power to render it a useful and honorable institution. ART. IV.— MEETINGS. A meeting shall be held in August, 1858, after which the meetings shall be held bien- nially. [Afterwards changed to annually.] The place and precise time of meeting shall be determined by the Board of Directors. The Board of Directors shall hold their regular meetings at the place and two hours before the time of the assembling of the Association, and immediately after the adjourn- ment of the same. Special meetings may be held at such other times and places as the Board or the President may determine. ART. V.— BY-LAWS. By-laws, not inconsistent with this constitution, may be adopted by a two-thirds vote of the Association. ART. VI. — AMENDMENTS. This constitution may be altered or amended at a regular meeting by the unanimous vote of the members present, provided the alteration or amendment has been presented, or substantially proposed, at a previous regular meeting. Immediately after the adoption of the above constitution, on motion of T. W. Valentine a committee of one from each state and district rep- resented in the convention was appointed by the chair to nominate a list of officers at the evening session. The following persons were appointed, viz. : Wm. Eoberts, of Pennsylvania; J. F. Cann, of Georgia; James Cm ik- shank, of New York; D. B. Hagar, of Massachusetts; James L. Enos, of Iowa; N. R. Lynch, of Delaware; J. E. Challen, of Indiana; Thomas Grauger, of Illinois; E. W. Whelan, of Missouri; J. W. Barnett, of Illi- nois; Z. Richards, of the District of Columbia; and J. D. Geddings, of South Carolina. At the opening of the evening session, Chairman Enos presiding, Mr. T. W. Valentine was called upon to read the specially prepared and valu- able address of Professor Wm. Russell, of Massachusetts, whose ill- health prevented his attendance. This address set forth the importance of this convention, to organize an association of professional teachers that shall be national in its character : First, As regards wider and juster views of education, and correspond- ing methods of instruction. SKETCH OF THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION. 125 . Second, As giving an opportunity for the establishing of a national society of teachers, from which we may expect great national benefits. After the reading of the address, the committee on nomination of the first officers made the following report. (See Prof. Russell's Address, in full, in " Barnard's Journal of Education," vol. iv., new series, 1864.) NOMINATIONS. For President : Z. Richards, of Washington, D. C. For Vice-Presidents : T. W. Valentine, New York ; D. B. Hagar, Massachusetts; Wm. Roberts, Pennsylvania; J. F. Cann, Georgia; J. L. Enos, Iowa; T. C. Taylor, Delaware; J. R. Challen, Indiana; E. W. Whelan, Missouri; P. F. Smith, South Carolina; D. Wilkins, Illinois; T. Granger, Indiana; and L. Andrews, Ohio. For Secretary : J. W. Bulkley, New York. For Treasurer: T. M. Cann, Delaware. For Counsellors : Wm. E. Sheldon, Massachusetts ; James Cruikshank, New York; P. A. Cregar, Pennsylvania; N. R. Lynch, Delaware; Wm. Morrison, Maryland; 0. C. Wight, District of Columbia; Wm. S. Bogart, Georgia; Wm. T. Luckey, Missouri; A. J. Stevens, Iowa; Wm. H. Wills, Illinois. This inaugural meeting was harmonious, enthusiastic, and character- istic of the founders, the future workers, and the future meetings of the Association. At a meeting of the Directors, after adjournment, they resolved to hold the first annual meeting in Cincinnati, Ohio, on the second Wed- nesday in August, 1858, at ten o'clock a. m. After making full arrange- ments for the next meeting, and expressing their harmonious purposes, the Directors adjourned. THE FIEST ANNUAL MEETING. Of the thirty-eight signers of the constitution at the time of its adop- tion only five were present at the first annual meeting. Appropriate ar- rangements, however, had been made by Mr. A. J. Rickoff, Superintendent of the Cincinnati public schools, as chairman of the local committee, for the reception of a large delegation. When the time came for calling the meeting to order it was found that only five of the constituent members were present, viz., the president, the first vice-president, the secretary, and two counsellors. These few members, however, were heartily welcomed by a very large audience, who were then, and have always been, in blissful ignorance of the small representation of actual members. After the usual welcome by the dignitaries of Cincinnati, the president called his four coadjutors into service by keeping the secretary by his 12G THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION side on the platform, and by assigning special duties to the three other members, who were located in different parts of the large audience. Upon the motion of one of these members the secretary was called upon to read the constitution of the Association, for the information of those present who might be disposed to become members. After the reading of the constitution, and some explanatory remarks by the president, another of these members moved that an opportunity be given for any person to become a member. The opportunity was granted of course. The secretary and, in the absence of the treasurer, one of the three others acting as treasurer, were kept busy for some time in receiving fees and in recording names of applicants, until the number of new members had reached about seventy-five. This movement, fortunately, furnished a good working body, and pre- pared the way for other additions. The president, thus being relieved from apprehended embarrassment, in consequence of the small number of members, at first proceeded to deliver his inaugural address, in which he pointed out the causes and the demands for forming a " National Teachers' Association," and urged the following important ends to be aimed at in its future work : First : The union of all teachers, North, South, East, and AVest, in friendly associated action, for strengthening the cause of education. Second : To create and permanently establish a teachers' profession by methods usually adopted by other professions. Third : To secure the examination of all teachers, by making the exam- ining boards to consist of competent, practical teachers. Fourth : To increase the number of normal schools, and establish de- partments of pedagogics in connection with all schools which send out persons to teach. During the sessions of this first anniversary there was a full attendance, a deep interest and close attention to all the exercises of the programme. Among the large number of representative teachers and educators pres- ent, besides the officers, were the following persons : Hon. Horace Mann, Superintendent J. D. Philbrick, John Hancock, A. J. Rickoff, I. W. An- drews, Wm. Russell, W. E. Crosby, John Ogden, C. E. Hovey, Rev. J. N. MacJilton, Professor Daniel Read, Anson Smyth, 0. C. Wight and others. LECTURES AND PAPERS. 1st. The Inaugural Address of the President. 2d. " The Educational Tendencies and Progress of the past Thirty Years," by Prof. Daniel Read. 3d. " The Laws of Nature," by Prof. John Young. 4th. " On Moral Education," by Supt. John D. Philbrick. 5th. " The Teacher's Motives," by Hon. Horace Mann, of Massachusetts. SKETCH OF THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION 127 ELECTION OF OFFICERS. For President : Andrew J. Rickoff, Cincinnati, Ohio. For Vice-Presidents: T. W. Valentine, New York; D. B. Hagar, Massachusetts; 13. M. Kerr, Pennsylvania; J. F. Cann, Georgia; J. S. Adams, Vermont; 13. T. Hoyt, Iowa; C. E. Hovey, Illinois; I. W. Andrews, Ohio; A. Drury, Kentucky; Daniel Read, Wisconsin; J. N. MacJilton, Maryland; Thomas Bragg, Alabama. For Secretary : J. W. Bulkley, New York. For Treasurer: 0. S. Pennell, Missouri. For Counsellors : James Cruikshank, New York; Wm. E. Sheldon, Massachusetts; S. R. Gummere, New Jersey; J. D. Yeates, Maryland; S. I. C. Swezy, Alabama; J. B. Dodd, Kentucky; N. D. Tirrel, Missouri; C. C. Nestlerode, Iowa; L. C. Draper, Wisconsin; Isaac Stone, Illinois; E. P. Cole, Indiana; R. W. McMillan, Ohio; 0. C. Wight, District of Columbia; H. C. Hickok, Pennsylvania; C. Pease, Vermont. One of the most prominent questions discussed at this first annual meet- ing was that of " Parochial Schools." The leading thought of the dis- cussion was, that "moral training, without sectarianism, is necessary." The inspiring influence of woman in our educational meetings was welcomed and emphasized by the Association. After the adjournment of the Association, the Board of Directors met and agreed to hold the next annual meeting in the city of Washington, D. C, and appointed Mr. Z. Richards, of Washington, as chairman of the local committee, to make all local arrangements. From a careful examination and study of the following partially tabu- lated work of the Association, from its origin to the present time, we shall be forcibly impressed with the magnitude and importance of its work, and become convinced that this Association has given an impulse and dig- nity to all the schools and educational institutions of our country. As proof of the genuine national spirit of the originators of this Associ- ation, we may refer to one of the first resolutions, passed at the time of its organization, as follows : Resolved, That there shall be six lecturers appointed for the next meeting: two from the Southern, two from the Western, one from the Middle, and one from the Eastern States. As this resolution was offered by a true blue New Englander, it shows the characteristic modesty of the Eastern States in not assuming honors which belong equally to the other States. This liberal spirit has at all times characterized the operations of this Association. It started out with high patriotic purposes, and to its honor it may be recorded that there has never been a single manifestation in any of its official operations of a spirit of sectionalism or of partisanship. Its officers and its managers have generally been selected, first, from its most faithful and best quali- 128 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION fied workers, which should always be the case, and, second, as represen- tatives of all sections of our country. Its friends have worked assiduously for the general cause of public and universal education, and not for pecuniary advantage, nor for office, nor for personal honor. As a historian, having personally known every prominent officer from the first to the last, I can most unreservedly assert and put on record the fact that every officer has been a true gentleman, a sound scholar, an unselfish and loyal friend to universal education, and an honest and an honorable man. If any one of the officers has had enemies and traducers, it has been the result of ignorance, or of envy, or of malice. During the first twenty years of its operations its officers were often obliged to put their hands down deep into their own pockets, to meet the annual current expenses. This had to be done in addition to the regular membership fee and the often very heavy travelling expenses. But in 1884 a new era dawned upon the association. It is true that the enlargement of the association's field of labor in 1870, at the Cleve- land meeting, by engrafting upon itself the more specific work of the departments of superintendents of normal schools, of higher instruction, and of elementary training, besides providing constitutionally for creat- ing other departments, has done much to broaden the sphere of its work and inspire confidence in its plan of operations. But no organization in this age of the world can work or exist long, without money. Many of the real friends of this association found that the constant draining of their pockets to keep the ponderous wheels in motion was also draining their patience and weakening their faith in its perpetuity. Some of the hopeful members had heard of an eastern man who had come to the rescue of the "American Institute of Instruction" when it was almost ready to perish. This man was made president of that insti- tute, and he made a grand rally, which gathered together such a multi- tude of educators at the White Mountains of New Hampshire that the increased income has been sufficient to keep that Institute in a pros- perous condition ever since. This gratifying success inspired some of the almost despairing mem- bers of the " National Educational Association " to call to its leadership the Honorable Thomas W. Bicknell, of Massachusetts. The grand suc- cess of the "Madison Meeting," in Wisconsin, in 1884, inaugurated a new financial era by largely increasing the number of members. Since then, by making the annual meetings attractive, and by lessening the expense of attending them, the membership has so increased that the funds of our treasury, now safely invested in interest-bearing bonds, are SKETCH OF THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION. 129 cises, sufficient, with prudent management, to forever insure the associa- tion against financial embarrassment. This financial security serves to increase the usefulness of the associa- tion, and to guarantee its permanency. At the close of the Madison meeting, Hon. E. E. White offered the following resolution, which shows how highly the association appreciated the services of President Bicknell. The resolution was passed unanimously: Resolved, That the unparalleled success of this meeting is chiefly due to the energy, devotion, and organizing ability of Hon. T. W. Bicknell, the President of this Association, whose wise and comprehensive plans, enthusiastic and self-sacrificing efforts, and di- recting hand have inspired and guided the great undertaking from its inception to its present triumphant close, and no formal words can properly express our thankful appreciation. Historically, let it be added, that not one dollar of these funds has ever been added to the emolument of an officer, nor furnished him any " boodle " for speculation. Until 1870 all the educational topics were discussed before the whole association as a body. While this method of performing educational work has many superior advantages, it would be hazardous either to abandon the plan of departments or to proportionately extend the length or number of sessions so that the whole membership could have an oppor- tunity to listen to all papers and discussions. It may not, however, be improper for me here to suggest that if the higher and secondary departments were consolidated, also the industrial and the art department, and also the elementary and the kindergarten de- partments, making three departments out of the six, and then, by giv- ing four days of actual sessions, that an opportunity could then be given for all who desired to listen to all papers and discussions. Let the length of many of the papers be shortened by judicious condensation, and let the length of discussions be limited, and we shall have better papers, and the beneficial results of our asso<-iational work will be essentially increased. At the Cleveland meeting, in 1870, the constitution was so amended as to admit co-operation and combination with two other educational associations: first, "The American Normal Association," which was organized in 1864; second, " The National Superintendents' Association," organized in 1865. At the same timQ the constitution was so amended that other departments could be organized, and immediately two other departments were organized, viz. , " The Department of Higher Instruc- tion," and "The Department of Primary or Elementary Instruction." A full set of subordinate officers, viz., a president and secretary for each department, was chosen, who were to provide their own programme of exer- cises, for their annual meetings. 130 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION In 1875 the " Industrial Department" was organized and admitted under the constitutional provision. In 1880 " The National Council of Education" was organized as a de- partment, but under a constitution of its own, which required its fifty or more members to be chosen from the general association, and from the several departments. But its meetings and deliberations were to be held so as not to inter- fere with the general association and the department meetings. In 1884 three new departments were organized and entered upon their peculiar work. These were the " Froebel or Kindergarten," " The Art," and the "Music Departments." In 1885 the "Department of Secondary Education" was added to the list, making the whole number ten. These departments are all legiti- mate children, though two of them have been adopted and are older than their parent. But they are a harmonious, hard working, and a thriving family. If any one needs to be convinced of the truth of this statement let him undertake to read and thoroughly digest even one of the late volumes of the annual Proceedings. If one copy does not con- vince him, let him procure a full set of the twenty- two copies from our custodian at AVashington, and he will have one of the best pedagogical libraries, especially if he will add to it the twenty-live or thirty volumes of " Barnard's Journal of Education." The amount of original educational matter now presented at each of our annual meetings is some six or eight times greater than it was for each of the first fifteen or eighteen years of its work. What still adds to the value of these volumes is the generally improved character of the papers and discussions. While very many of the early papers read before the association cannot be excelled in value and importance, still, during these later years, the officers have taken special care to let nothing but new and original mattei be presented to the various departments from year to year. As the authors of these papers are generally selected from the large number of first-class educators in our growing country, the papers are becoming more and more elevated and valuable, and contain the best and ripest thoughts of this educational era. The same may be said in regard to the character of the discussions in these various depart- ments, which are quite- fully published in these volumes. The influence of this national educational association is diffusive and permeating, and is giving character to the systems of education and of school work in all parts of our own country and in other countries — as in South America, Japan, and the Sandwich Islands, and perhaps in some of the old countries of Europe. There is not a state, county, city or town in all our country where the influence of our associational work is not more or less felt. Even the colleges, the universities, and jjrivate SKETCH OF THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION. 131 educational institutions are perhaps, unconsciously to themselves, feeling this diffusive influence. Very few persons are aware of the important work performed by the "National Council of Education," unless they attend its sessions, or read its papers and discussions from year to year. Though the influence of the association is more plainly, effectually, and promptly felt in the newer portions of our country, yet those states and cities which have been pioneers in educational work so long as to be sometimes chargeable with " old fogyism " have felt, and are now feeling, the transforming influences of the papers and discussions of this great body of educators. The membership of the association is made up, first, of annual members who, in its origin, paid one dollar ($1) a year, but now pay two dollars (12) ; second, of life members, who pay twenty dollars ($20) ; third, of life directors, who pay one hundred dollars (1100) ; fourth, of perpetual direc- torships, who pay one hundred dollars ($100). The number of annual members has varied from 100 to 9322. This largest number, viz., 9322, was received at Chicago, 111., in 1887. The State of Illinois alone sent 1748. The next largest number was received at San Francisco, in 1888, amounting to 7258, and from California alone 4278, the banner state for membership. The first of the very large increase of members was at Madison, Wis., in 1884, when about 3000 members were added. At the last meeting, held in St. Paul, Minn., about 6000 new mem- bers were received, one thousand of whom were from Minnesota. It will be seen that these large and migratory meetings, from Boston to San Francisco, and from St. Paul to New Orleans, naturally make the membership variable. The constant and unchangeable membership is made up mostly of life members and life directors, of whom there have been only about two hundred from the beginning. It would be a wise and an economical move if the younger members, both male and female, who wish to retain their working membership should add eighteen dollars to their annual membership fee at once, and thus constitute themselves life members. The great advantages of these large migratory meetings is not confined, to the financial benefits of this association, for it is a generally acknowl- edged fact that their influence has been essentially beneficial to the cities and states where they have been held, and that the cause of edu- cation and public-school instruction has been elevated and greatly im- proved in every section of our country. This association has been, and now is, the body-guard of public-school instruction in our country. 132 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION THE SCHOOL EXPOSITIONS. Since the organization of the Industrial, the Art, and the Kindergarten Departments and their auxiliary combination with the general associa- tion, the interest in the annual meetings has greatly increased. The school exhibits in many instances have been of a remarkable character, and it must be admitted by every careful observer of their influence upon the practical life of our youth that they have contributed essentially to the educative power of the public-school systems. The readers of the annual Proceedings will find the reports of these exhibits highly suggestive and instructive. THE WORKERS OF THE ASSOCIATION. A merciful Providence has kindly watched over the friends and sup- porters of this association. Thirty men have been called to preside over and direct its interests during the thirty-four years of its existence. No meetings were held in 1861, 1862, 1867, and 1878. Twenty-one of its presidents are now living. Nine honored men have been called to go up higher, viz. : John W. Bulkley, of Brooklyn, N. Y. , the third president; John I). Philbrick, of Boston, Mass., the fourth president; Wm. H. Wells, of Chicago, 111., the fifth president; S. S. Greene, of Providence, R. I., the sixth president; S. H. White, of Peoria, 111., the fourteenth president ; Gustavus J. Orr, of Atlanta, Ga. , the twenty-first president; Eli T. Tappan, of Ohio, the twenty-second president ; J. P. Wickersham, of Pennsylvania, the seventh president; and John Han- cock, of Columbus, Ohio, the eighteenth president. These were all men of educational faith, who performed the work of their life nobly, and have gone to their graves greatly honored and be- loved by all who knew them. We have good reason to believe and ex- pect that the twenty-one surviving presidents will be able to go to their final reward, when it is to be rendered, with equally untarnished honors, and with a revered memory. Wre have heretofore alluded to the lamented death of Vice-President T. W. Valentine, of Brooklyn, N. Y., the first person who suggested the formation of this association. Those who knew him will never fail to revere his memory. We feel also constrained to express our high appreciation and com- mendation of one of our most faithful and indefatigable secretaries, W. D. Henkle, of Ohio. At our second anniversary in Washington the association was called upon to express its deep sorrow and regret at the death of the Hon. Horace Mann, who gave a valuable lecture at our first anniversary. Other true and valuable members have closed their educational work DISCUSSION. 133 on earth to engage in a higher and nobler work, we trust, in the spirit- ual mansions of the Great Teacher. Before closing this sketch let me add that I have prepared some itemized and tabulated statements which will greatly increase the value of this historical sketch, but which, as they will probably be published in a separate volume, it will not be best for me to read on this occasion. The first tabulated form or statement gives the place and time of each meeting in order, and the name and residence of the three princi- pal officers, viz., the president, secretary, and treasurer. The second tabulated statement gives also the place and time and presiding officer of each of the meetings of the general association, and of each of the departments; and also the subjects of papers, reports and discussions of each department at each meeting, with the names of the authors. The third statement contains an alphabetical list of the authors of such papers and discussions as are published in the Proceedings, with the titles of papers following the name, and the volume in which it can be found. These tables furnish a complete index of the work and of the workers of the association from the beginning. A FEW FACTS. In 1888 California sent 4278 paid memberships, making it the Banner State. In 1887 Illinois sent 1748 paid memberships. AVisconsin has 24 life memberships and 20 perpetual memberships. Ohio has 22 life members, and Kansas 21 life members. The whole number of members enrolled at Chicago was 9322; the whole number of members enrolled at San Francisco, 7258 ; the whole number of papers and discussions since 1857, about 1000; the whole number of authors of papers, etc., since 1857, about 500; the whole number of original members in 1857 was 38. DISCUSSION. E. C. Hewett, of Illinois: — Mr. President: This matter of his- tory to our young members perhaps is not very interesting, and yet I should like to believe that they are interested, and that those who have been here with us this morning will take to heart what has been said. I am sure that if the association is good for anything it is a good 134 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION. thing for its members to know its origin, its aim, and the variety of steps by which it has come thus far on its journey. It was a thing of the utmost propriety that Dr. Richards, its first president, should give you what he has given you this morning. I honor the president of the asso- ciation for calling on him for that work. No man could do it better; no man could have the facilities for doing it. But, Mr. President, I do not know why you have asked me to make the first speech on this paper in its discussion. It is true. I have had something to do with the asso- ciation for the last ten years, but previous to that time I had only at- tended two or three meetings. We have heard this morning about the formation of the association in 1857. I was then a boy, teaching school in Massachusetts; and I count myself one of the boys yet, notwith- standing my hair is a little gray. I will call your attention for just a moment to what Mr. Richards alluded to, the great meeting at Madison, in 1884, the first of the great meetings, when the association began to be boomed. I was reminded as Dr. Richards was reading that the result at Madison was the natural outcome of the labor and zeal that had been bestowed in the work of the association from the start ; that that was the original intention. Let me enumerate some of the advantages that I think have come especially from this renewed life that was put into our meetings from that time forward. One thing is that the press of the country have found out that there is such a thing as the National Educational Association. They have found out that it gets together numerous assemblages from time to time, from all parts of the country. The railroads have found out our power, and they are ready to treat us with a great deal of consider- ation. They have granted us a great many favors, for which we are thankful. They leave us to do the work, while they work for their in- terest and we work for ours. You were told that our conventions have been in a flourishing condition since that time. We have paid all our expenses, and we have now securely invested a sum of $36,000, so we feel we are not to be troubled from time to time financially, as they were in the older days, with a lack of the necessary money to pay expenses. The acquaintances that are formed here, this bringing together, and allowing them to get acquainted, of men and women from one end of the country to the other,- from the North and South, in these conventions is not only one of its most pleasant features, but it is very profitable, I am sure. I would not sell if I could the acquaintances I have formed at these association meetings for any reasonable sum of money. It is one of the largest benefits, this coming together from year to year, like brothers and sisters in a common cause, and we go back feeling that we have been once again to the old college and academy. And the geo- graphical knowledge that is gained in respect to the country and its prod- DISCUSSION. 135 ucts, and the pleasure and instruction that come from visiting famous resorts and seeing grand scenery, the knowledge of the world that comes from travelling, which has been placed within reach of our young mem- bers at small expense by these meetings, is worth more than all they have cost. And then the enthusiasm and instruction that come from an attendance upon the discussion of important subjects by the leading minds is worth a great deal. We come to Toronto fifteen thousand strong; we went to California, some three thousand five hundred of us, away over the mountains, and met our western brethren. And then the enthusiasm that comes from these great gatherings has its influence upon every member. Of course there is some criticism that in these great gatherings all cannot hear. Of course if there are eight or ten different exercises going on in the convention at the same time we can- not very well attend them all at once ; but you get all of the proceedings in a bound volume, and while here you can attend the one you choose. So I do not think that criticism amounts to much. It has been said that this institution, like most all others, political or otherwise, is under the rule of a ring. Well, I do not know that it is ; I guess not. I know there are some men who have put a good many hundred dollars' worth of work every year into this association, who have cared for its interests, and have done it free of cost to you. If they constitute a ring, I think it has been a happy thing for the association that it has had a ring. I do not believe you can make this thing go successfully without a similar ring in the future, if you can find men willing and able to do this work. Now a word about the future of the association. We see some things that we think are necessary to be done; something was said about the constitution. There are some points that the changed conditions make necessary for us to adopt. I understand that at this meeting the di- rectors are to take the matter in hand, and we hope to adopt a constitu- tion which may be better fitted for the larger work of the association. I may say for myself that I have a strong conviction that the one thing this association ought to do, and do it quick, is to appoint a permanent secretary, to conduct all the vast miscellaneous business of this association, and be paid for it. A man of affairs, a man whom we can trust, a man who is known in the educational world, and who will give his whole time to this matter of doing the work that is now done, and a good deal more that might be done, in the way of visiting all parts of the country and stirring up a still deeper interest, increasing our attendance. He should have an office at the head of the government, close by the Bureau of Edu- cation, so that we should have a head, and a home where we could store our papers and books, and where our interests could be properly protected. That could be done, it seems to me, with our present fund very easily. The interest on the fund is not sufficient to pay the proper salary for 136 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION such a man, but it comes pretty well towards it, and I believe such a man would increase our income enough to more than pay the balance. It may be we shall very soon have such a man, so that our president will be relieved from this half-year of hard work, and so that he can devote his time to the arrangement of the programme; so that the secretary shall merely have to make up his records and pass them over; then we shall have some one man who shall have the responsibility year after year, and we may have the benefit. of his experience in preparing our volumes. Now I believe that this association is going to continue to prosper. When the proposition was made to come over here I heard a few growls about going out of the country, as though there were not cities in the United States big enough and good enough ; but I am glad we came. We came in numbers larger than I expected. When we go back I trust we shall leave a good impression with our friends in the Dominion, and I am sure we shall carry back with us a larger knowledge and a larger charity for our Canadian brethren. THE PRESENT STATUS OF EDUCATION IN THE UNITED STATES. WILLIAM T. HARRIS, COMMISSIONER OF EDUCATION, U. S. The educational questions which at present excite most attention among the people of the United States relate either to the extension of the free public elementary schools, or to the adjustment of the colleges and universities to the preparatory schools. In those states where the public school systems are newest, as in the Southern States, and in the states on the western borderland, it is quite natural that the chief educational interest concentrates on the problem of extending the free schools in such a manner as to provide, by public taxation, for longer school sessions, better teachers, better school build- ings, increased attendance upon school. In the older and richer states of the North Atlantic, including New England and the Middle States, there is much thought and discussion going on regarding the future place and function of the small colleges, and regarding the relation which college work holds to university work. There is even more interest manifested in the proper limits of secondary education. The question relates to the free public high school, on the one hand, and to the private endowed academies and classical preparatory schools that furnish the great part of students for the colleges. STATUS OF EDUCATION IN THE UNITED STATES. 13*3 The friends of education who live in the Northern States behold the spectacle of the establishment of the free common school system in the Southern States with a feeling of pride. The extension of the system has been so rapid in those states, and its rate of increase so uniform, that all who believe local self-government and universal participation in the right to vote must be preceded by universal education in common schools have reason to be satisfied with the promise for the future. In the thirteen years for which separate statistics for the white and black races in the South are accessible, the white children enrolled in the public schools have increased from 1,827,139 to 3,197,830, or about seventy-five per cent., while the increase of the total white population has been only thirty-four per cent. The school attendance has increased more than twice as fast as the population. All this has been done amidst the poverty which followed the most devastating war of modern times. But the education of the colored race has a still better record to show. In thirteen years the enrollment has increased from 571,506 to 1,213,092, an increase of one hundred and twelve per cent. , while the total colored population has increased only twenty-seven per cent. In other words, the school attendance has increased more than four times as fast as the population among the colored people of the Southern States. In this same connection I mention the fact that the attendance of the colored people on normal schools, high schools and colleges has increased during the same period of thirteen years, previous to 1890, from a total of 8511 to a total of 25,540 — almost exactly three times the former number. We all know that an increase in school facilities and a more general attendance on schools means more careful supervision and improvements in methods. Teachers will manage in some way to learn by the experi- ments of their fellow-teachers. There have been, during the past twenty years, many eminent men who have filled the positions of state superin- tendent and of city superintendent in that southern section of the country. Two hundred and sixteen millions of dollars have been paid from the public taxes for the support of the schools, white and colored, during the period of thirteen years mentioned. The labors of the superintend- ents in improving the quality of the teaching forces by institutes, associ- ations and normal schools have shown good results. The increase of the appropriations from $11,231,073 in 1877 to $23,225,982 in 1889 has re- enforced their labors by attracting a higher order of talent into the work of instruction. The devotion of the western borderlands to the cause of common schools may be inferred from the fact that they expend annually from public funds the sum of $4.11 for each man, woman and child of the population for their schools — a sum nearly double the average sum 138 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION expended per capita by the rest of the United States. In those distant regions the cost of living is greater, and the salaries must be larger to secure talent and skill in the teacher. The effort in the South now tends in the direction of increasing the length of the annual school term. While the number of different pupils enrolled in school is quite as large a proportion of the population in the South as in the North, and indeed somewhat larger, yet the number of days for the average school . session is much less. While the North At- lantic schools average 164 days in a year, the South Atlantic average only 100 days. While the North Central schools average 147 days, the South Central average 91 days. But the states of the South expend quite as much in proportion to their wealth in taxable property for schools as do the North Atlantic States (i. e., the New England and Middle States). But the Northwestern States exceed them in the rate of tax. Looking over the whole country, we remark that in public and private schools twenty-two and one-half per cent, of the population is enrolled in school — 13, 726, 574 pupils of all grades for the year 1889. The proportion in private schools varies with the grade of work. In the elementary grades it is nine per cent. ; in the secondary, three times as large, or twenty- seven per cent. ; in the superior instruction it is seventy- three per cent. of the whole. The total amount expended for education in the United States in 1889 was $172,000,000, counting the amount for private insti- tutions at $35,000,000. In the schools of the United States there prevail two different ideals of the course of study: the one originating with the directors of higher education, and the other a growth from the common elementary school. These two ideals clash in quite important particulars. The common- school course of study, as it appears in the elementary school and in the public high school which gives secondary instruction, does not shape itself so as to fit its pupils for entrance to the colleges. At least, if we admit that as an actual fact many high school pupils do enter college, we must also admit that there is a constant tendency in the public high school to diverge in its course of study and follow a path that does not lead to the college. The older colleges of the states, following the traditions brought over from Europe, built thek course of study on mathematics and the classi- cal languages, Latin and Greek. They accordingly demanded of the preparatory schools a preliminary training or preparation along these lines, and neglected all else. Human learning at one period did not include much that was not conceived and expressed in Latin or Greek words. But within the past three hundred years there has arisen a modern tributary stream of human learning, and it has some time since begun its demand for recognition in STATUS OF EDUCATION IN THE UNITED STATES. 139 the course of study. This modern side of human learning includes the natural sciences and modern literature. These two contingents are al- most wholly the product of the past three hundred years. The demands of the sciences and the demands of the literature of the modern languages to a share in the course of study were met in one way by the college and in another way by the common school. The di- rectors of higher education affirmed that Latin, Greek and mathematics furnished the truly disciplinary studies fit for the foundation of all liberal education. Modern literature and the sciences, on the other hand, were not and could not become culture studies, although they might be useful in the way of accomplishments in practical life. Accordingly, the colleges proceeded to recognize the moderns by admit- ting them only into the course of study at the end. During the fourth, or senior year of college, the student was given a rapid survey of the sciences and of some of the great works of modern literary art. But the college did not encourage the introduction of modern literature and natural science into the preparatory school. Consequently, the pupil who left school during his preparatory course, or before the senior year of college, found himself ignorant of these two great and rapidly growing provinces of human learning. But the public school system has taken a different direction in the matter. It has been under the supervision and management of less highly educated men, — that is to say, of men less thoroughly instructed in the forms of the past, and as a result less conservative. When the moderns appealed for a place in the course of study — some concession was at once made to the demand. A tendency has been established to recognize the moderns throughout the course of study. First, modern literature was admitted in the shape of a graded series of school readers, containing many of the gems of English and American literature, and much too that was written in mere colloquial English, and much that was trashy in its style and thought. In the geographical text-book there was an attempt at a survey of the physical world in its relations to man, — the world in its mathematical fea- tures of size, shape and motions, in its physical aspects of interacting forces of light, heat, moisture and gravitation, and, finally, in its bio- logical aspects of plant life, animal life, and the races of men. This geographical text-book also drew on the social sciences, and in- troduced scraps of information regarding political economy, the occupa- tions of men, and also the political institutions, the laws and customs, and religion. Geography has therefore developed from the beginning into a sort of compend of natural science, affording the pupil a survey of the results of the modern sciences, both in the physical and social world. Having conceded to the demands of the moderns in the elementary 140 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION. school in these respects, and in the introduction of a history of the father- land, it remained next to emphasize this tendency still more in the secondary public school, and to make the high school course of study in- clude more thorough work in English literature, universal history, three or four selected sciences like geology, astronomy, physiology and chem- istry, in addition to the mathematics and some modern or ancient language. It might be claimed that the graduate of the high school had a broader education, his education, under good teachers, might even be thorough, but certainly in his preparation in Latin and Greek the amount was not sufficient to give the high school pupil a fair chance by the side of the graduate of the special preparatory school. The directors of the common schools have therefore been compelled to establish a double course, a classical and an English course, in the public high school, — a procedure so foreign to the spirit of the entire common school course of study that it has only partially succeeded. This brief statement leads us to the source of the present problems in our education. Twenty-five years ago the requirements for admission to respectable colleges were much lower than at present. It was then pos- sible for the high school graduate to enter college with a good standing. He knew nearly as much Latin and Greek as the average student from the private preparatory school, and he knew far more science and history and modern literature. These moderns gave him a decided advantage. But there has been a widespread feeling among college men that the standard for admission ought to be raised until the degree of bachelor of arts should represent more learning and greater maturity of mind and body. The bold action of some of the ablest college presidents set into more rapid motion this increase in the demand for more work in the prepara- tory schools, and the consequence has been the general elevation of the standard of admission to college by about one and one-half to two years. The results of this change have become slowly apparent. There has followed a wider separation of the higher education in the United States from its public school education. The preparatory school has been forced in to fill the place that the college formerly held, and the result is not felt to be salutary. This difficulty has been increased by the rapid mul- tiplication of public high schools, which now number some 4000. The numerous smaller colleges, having given up a year or more of their work to the preparatory schools, feel very keenly the loss of students. Inasmuch as the larger colleges have developed into universities, there is evident the beginning of a crusade against the small college that will force it to step down into the work of secondary education and renounce the work of higher instruction. This result, in fact, is unavoidable if the present high standard for admission is retained. But it has been discovered by STATUS OF EDUCATION IN THE UNITED STATES. 141 the leading minds who are directing our higher education that there are very strong reasons against this course. It is possible that there may be a change that will return the college to its old place in the educational system, and this will save all the small colleges for the useful work which they have so long and so faithfully accomplished. This same move would likewise restore the college to a harmonious relation to the public high school. Indeed, it would bring about a better adjustment than has ever been before. For it should have been stated already in this paper that the elevation of the standard for admission to college has been accompanied to some extent by requirements of preparation in moderns; some modern literature, and French or German, together with some acquaintance with science, are demanded. Hence a slight approximation of preparatory courses of study to that of the high school has been effected. If this tendency is preserved and accentuated in the change of the requirements for admission, there may come about a complete adjustment of the higher education to the common school education, and an inestimable advantage accrue to the people. For it is certainly a calamity to have the youth of the land diverted from the institutions of higher education. Although it is uncertain what decision will be taken by the directors of our higher education, we may mention another phase of the matter which bears in favor of the return of the colleges to the old standard of admis- sion. This is the recent development of a genuine university course above the traditional college course. It is to be remembered that for a long time there have been generous endowments of institutions of learning by rich men. In fact, the people of the United States are very proud of their Johns Hopkinses, Tulanes, Peabodys, Purdues, Licks, Drexels, Clarks and Stanfords. Nearly an annual average of $10,000,000 is given as endowments to various forms of higher education. The net result of these endowments may be summed up as the creation of real university work. The old college did not know how to manage the years of post-graduate study. The fellowship endowments were paid to brilliant students, who had carried off the honors, but who had worked rather for those same honors than for the sake of learning and insight. Left to themselves, without the stimulus of class work, these post-graduate students soon lost their zest in work, and unless they entered the professional school, gained very little in their subsequent residence at college. A reform of the greatest importance was inaugurated by organizing post-graduates into classes for the work of original investigation in the form of laboratory work and seminaria, wherein critical research was taught and learned. At once there sprang up a new and superior order of professors, which has been superseding step by step the type of college professor that formerly prevailed. The new university-trained professor has a very much im- 142 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION proved method of instruction, even if his work happens to be in lower schools. He carries that higher method — the method of investigation — into practice with his students, and their work becomes far more profit- able. Now it is this discovery on the part of our leading colleges of the true character of university work, that has brought about the feeling, or let us say, is in process of bringing it about, the feeling that it is not necessary to include all higher education in the college. There should be a fourth stage of education, that of the university, quite beyond the education of the college, and its characteristics should be that of specialization and original investigation. The work of the college may be improved by an infusion of the higher methods, but its essential character must not be changed. The elementary school will always have the character of memory work stamped upon it, no matter how much the educational reforms may im- prove its methods. It is not easy to overvalue the impulse of such men as Pestalozzi and Froebel. But the child's mind cannot seize great syn- theses. He bites off, as it were, only small fragments of truth at best. He gets isolated data and sees only feebly the vast network of inter-rela- tion in the world. This fragmentary, isolated character belongs essen- tially to primary education. - But just as surely does secondary education deal with relations and functions and processes. It is the stage of crude generalization. But college education strives to superinduce on the mind the habit of seeing the unity of things. The curriculum of the college is, therefore, called the philosophical faculty, using the word faculty in the French sense of the word factdte. The college rounds up the youth's view of the world and gives him an idea of the articulation of the various branches of human knowledge. But the view of this unity is both deep and shallow at the same time. It is shallow because the student has and can have only a hearsay knowl- edge of the many branches of human learning. It is a deep view because the idea of the organic unity of knowledge is always the deepest idea that can arise in the mind of man. It has been contended by some of our educational leaders in the States that this phase of education, which is founded on the search for unity, is a spurious phase of education, and they would therefore willingly rele- gate all the college work to the preparatory school and commence the work of specialization and original investigation at once after the secondary school, or even in the secondary school itself. But these zealots do not duly consider the fact that the only transition between the theoretical and the practical, that is to say, between the in- tellect and the will, takes place through the act of unifying or summing up one's knowledge. A rational man is bound to act in view of all the THE EDUCATIONAL SYSTEM OF ONTARIO. 143 circumstances. The inventory of any field of reality can never be ex- hausted, but the practical man must act. When he acts, he must stop investigating further and sum up the case ; he must declare the evidence to be all in and decide what to do from what he has already learned. This is the transition from the intellect to the will. The college has, in the past, cultivated exclusively this frame of mind which looks for the unity of knowledge, and this is an ethical point of view. It will be needed to cultivate the same ethical habit of mind in future, although it will re- quire to be supplemented by the spirit of investigation and verification, which the university method brings with it. For we must learn both these methods in order to become liberally educated. We must be observant of the trend of things and gain the power of insight into the rational unity underlying all things. This is essential to practical wisdom, and on the other hand we must learn to make original investigation and carry forward the boundaries of truth into the unknown. THE EDUCATIONAL SYSTEM OF ONTARIO. HON. GEO. W. ROSS, MINISTER OF EDUCATION, ONTARIO, CANADA. Mr. President, Ladies and Gentlemen: — I must confess that I somewhat envied the Hon. Mr. Harris in the vast lield over which he was permitted to roam at large in his most interesting essay. 1 am restricted to a smaller area. I hope I shall cover that smaller area as successfully as he did the larger one. The school system of Ontario includes the kindergarten, public and separate schools (separate schools being both Protestant and Eoman Catholic), high schools and the Provincial University. As a system of education it must be regarded as an organic whole, as a distinct unit. The kindergarten course looks towards the university, and the university course looks back towards the kindergarten. A vertical section, using the methods of geology, would be as follows : The university. The high schools. The public schools. The kindergarten. Do not suppose from this illustration that our system is a mere strati- fication ; we regard it as a development. The pupil four years of age who starts with the kindergarten and follows the curriculum prescribed by our system will reach the university in the natural order of things, 144 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION just as the early discoverers of Canada reached the lakes separating the Dominion from the United States by sailing through the waters of one into the waters of another. I may say more. The course of study in the kindergarten is intended to prepare the pupil for thoughtful observa- tion in the public school ; when the pupil exhausts the public school course (if he has capacity) he is prepared to enter the high school; when he exhausts the high school course the examination which he meets by the way admits him into the university. So much for the organic unity of our system. COURSE OF STUDY. The course of study for the subdivision of the system is framed with a view to the age and mental limitations of the pupils ordinarily ranking under that division. For instance, in the kindergarten the course is purely Froebelian; in the public school division the course is suited to the capacity of children from five to sixteen years of age. The course in the first four forms, which includes ninety-eight per cent, of the entire school population of the country, consists of reading, writing, geography, grammar and composition, history, arithmetic, temperance and hygiene, drawing and agriculture, all of which are compulsory, in the form to which they belong. In the fifth form, embracing about 10,000 children in the public schools of the province, are taught Euclid, algebra, physics, bot- any and chemistry. The classification of the school is intended to serve the great mass of our school population, who leave school at about four- teen years of age, and, as the necessities are so urgent, it is deemed of the first importance that no part of their time should be occupied except with the essential branches of a good English education. THE HIGH SCHOOL. The high school course of study includes the higher mathematics, the sciences with abundance of laboratory practice, classics and the modern languages, with a comprehensive course in English literature and compo- sition. Several options are allowed to meet the circumstances of pupils, some of whom may wish to enter the teaching profession or some other learned profession, or whose objects are merely to obtain the advantages of an English education with a view to citizenship or commercial life. The high school course practically extends over three years. Ninety-nine per cent, of the students attending our universities take their matricula- tion course in the high schools. THE UNIVERSITY. The Provincial University is under the direction of the senate, partly appointed by the government, partly ex-oflicio and partly elected by the alumni, but the action of the senate is subject to the approval of the ex- ecutive government. The university provides an arts course, with a con- THE EDUCATIONAL SYSTEM OF ONTARIO. 145 siderable number of options, and has the right to grant the usual degrees. It is open to matriculated students of both sexes. The Province of On- tario has five universities in addition to the one supported out of the provincial endowment; they have a common standard for matriculation, and all admit their students by one examination conducted on their be- half by the Education Department. TRAINING OF TEACHERS. So far I have been considering the non-professional or literary side of our system. To many of you no doubt its professional side will be even more interesting. For the purpose of providing efficient teachers, the province of Ontario has four classes of training schools; viz., two provincial kindergartens for the training of kindergarten teachers; fifty-three county model schools for the training of third-class teachers; two normal schools for the training of second-class teachers, and a school of pedagogy for the training of high school teachers. The course in the kindergarten extends, over two years; namely, one year for assistants and one for directresses, which includes the study of everything pertaining to kindergarten work. The coarse in the county model school extends over four months, and includes instruction in the theory of education, with as much observation and practical teaching as circumstances will admit. The course in the provincial normal schools extends over six months, and the school of pedagogy five months. In all these schools the course may be said to be purely professional. There may be an occasional re- view of a portion of the academic work of the teacher in training, but as a rule his whole attention is devoted to the practical and professional side of his career. It is felt that by centralizing his attention on his profes- sional duties, particularly as he is not admitted to the normal school without at least one year's experience as a teacher, he is in a condition to benefit more by such a course extending over six months than he would by a mixed academic and professional course extending over a much longer time. It will be observed that professional training applies to teachers of every grade, that no one is allowed to shirk it or evade it, and that no person who does not give reasonable evidence of fitness for the profession by showing his aptitude by actual practice in the school- room is admitted thereto. NON-PROFESSIONAL TRAINING. Teachers' certificates are divided into three grades — first, second and third. The course of study for these grades is prescribed by the Educa- tion Department, and in the majority of cases candidates for certificates, even in the lowest grade, attend a high school. The examinations for the lowest grade of first and for second and third class certificates are held simultaneously at the different high schools of the province on questions 146 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION prepared by the Education Department. The answers of candidates are returned to the department and are read by examiners appointed for that purpose. As near as possible all the certificates granted are of uniform value; the two higher subdivisions of first-class certificates, namely, A and B, are obtainable on examinations conducted by the university of the province, the papers for which are submitted and the answers read by university examiners. For high schools the qualifications are the standing of an undergraduate of two years for assistants and a full graduate for the principal, the department accepting the valuation of the university for this purpose. As the certificates are all awarded by the department, they are valid throughout the province. Third-class certificates are valid only for three years, however ; all other grades are valid during good be- havior, and all are disposed of by one annual provincial examination. ADMINISTRATION. The school system of Ontario is democratic. Every ratepayer, male or female, is an elector and eligible to hold the office of public school trustee. The area of school sections, the location of the school-house, its size and cost, the salary to be paid the teachers and the standing of the teachers to be employed, the amount of money to be expended for im- provements on the public school, are all determined by the trustees, within certain limitations to be referred to hereafter. Each board is a corpora- tion in itself, deriving its powers from the legislative assembly of the province. The executive authority in educational matters is vested in the Education Department, presided over by the Minister of Education, who is practically the chief executive officer of the whole system. While the legislative assembly is primarily the source of all legislation affect- ing the school system of the province, the minister has power under the statute to make regulations affecting the qualifications of teachers, the standard of certificates, the authorization of text-books, and such matters of details as will readily occur to every educator. It is the duty of the minister to direct all the educational forces of the country, first from his place in the legislative assembly, secondly, through the officers of his department. From the wide sweep of the legislation which he is expected to direct, and from his position as a member of the government adminis- tering the affairs of the country, he is able to advance such legislation as will preserve the unity of the system and maintain its symmetry, as well as prevent any needless innovation from pseudo reformers or visionary meddlers. RELIGIOUS INSTRUCTION. Every school is required to be opened by the reading of Scripture and by prayer, and closed with prayer. In the Roman Catholic separate schools the religious exercises are subject to the direction of the trustees. THE EDUCATIONAL SYSTEM OF ONTARIO. 147 No pupil is required to attend upon the religious exercises of the public school whose parents or guardians notify the teacher of their desire that he should absent himself. Provision is made for religious instruction by arrangement with the trustees of any denomination at such hours as may be agreed upon. TEXT-BOOKS. No text-books can be used in any public or high school of the province until sanctioned by the department. There is now but one text-book in each of the subjects taught in the public schools. In the case of high schools more than one text-book is used in some of the subjects, although the tendency is towards the same limitation as prevails in the public schools. When a text-book ceases in the opinion of the department to serve its purpose it is set aside and a more advanced one substituted. The price of the text-book, the quality of the paper, style of binding, typography, etc. , are all regulated by the department. Under a statute, boards of trustees may provide free text-books for pupils in cities, towns and incorporated villages. COMPULSORY EDUCATION. By an act of last session, the police commissioners of every city, town and incorporated village are required to appoint truant officers. This act came into effect on the 1st of this month. It may take a year or two to acquaint the people of the province with its requirements. It may also take some time to train the truant officers to the proper discharge of their duties. As the schools of Ontario have been free for over twenty years, there is no doubt the people will gladly accept their natural com- plement, compulsory education, as indispensable. THE SCHOOLS UNDENOMINATIONAL. The public schools of Ontario are undenominational. Fifty years ago the Roman Catholics were granted separate schools, and by a more recent act, in settlements where a Roman Catholic population predominated, and a Roman Catholic was employed as a teacher in the public schools, Protestants were allowed to form themselves into Protestant separate schools. These classes of schools number as follows: public schools, 5380; Catholic separate schools, 243, and Protestant separate schools, 11. The department has not the same authority under the statute over Roman Catholic separate schools as it has over the public schools. Yet in the main features, such as the qualification of teachers, excluding those in religious orders, the selection of text-books, except those required for religious exercises, the authority of the department may be said to be the same. 148 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION ADJUNCTS TO THE SYSTEM. As incidental to the educational system of the province, and indicating the jurisdiction of the Education Department, I may state that the free- library system and mechanics' institutes, numbering 234 and representing 290,617 volumes, are under the control of the department; that a system of night schools and art schools and industrial schools, each having its distinct sphere of labor, are also subject to the regulations of the depart- ment. The educational system of Ontario also includes schools for the deaf and dumb, for the blind and the idiotic. It includes a course in tech- nology on the basis of the technical school of Boston, a course in agrioul- ture extending over three years, followed by a degree in agriculture from the Provincial University. This closes my summary of the educational system of Ontario. I have not included in it other schools for the study of medicine, or law, or arch- itecture or stenography, or other subjects over which the Education De- partment has no control, but which nevertheless form part of the public education of the province. I have dealt entirely with schools for which the taxpayer is held responsible. They are not perfect in their organization by any means, but subject to constant changes and adaptations according to the wants of our people or the advances of educational reformers here and elsewhere. If they are not improved it is not because the people of the province are not fully in sympathy with a progressive system. SPELLING REFORM. H. W. BREWSTER, MINNESOTA. To the National Educational Association : — The undersigned committee have to report that language reform is one of the leading events of the last quarter of the 19th century. Since 1876 systematic movements, sup- ported by the aid of government as well as by the efforts of philologists, have been made to simplify and purify language, thus promoting its use- fulness, its power, and its beauty. The Italian and Spanish languages are now phonetic in spelling and comparatively regular in grammatical inflections. The German language is practically phonetic in spelling but in grammatical inflections it is more irregular than the English. The Scandinavian languages are now in process of a unifying transformation. The people of the English- speaking world have not been idle. The philologists of England have been working systematically since SPELLING REFORM. 149 1870 for language reform, and America's centennial year witnessed the birth of the Spelling Reform Association. For the past fifteen years the efforts of both English and American philologists have been united to make the English language worthy of the character of the race and the progress of the age. Carefully and systematically they have formulated a phonetic alphabet and twenty-four rules simplifying the spelling of 3500 words, most of the changes being the omission of letters silent, useless, and burdensome. The fruit of this labor is soon to be placed within reach of every student of the English language. Wisdom and duty unite now in calling for public attention to a matter so important and so rapidly approaching a critical issue. The school, the press, and the government are all interested and should all unite in making that issue a success to humanity. Earnest, intelligent effort means the supremacy of the English language, as the international language of the word ; inaction means its inevitable decay. The great disadvantage of the irregular spelling and inflection of the English language in a struggle for supremacy against phonetic spelling and regular inflection is well shown by Dr. J. H. Gladstone, member of the school board of London in 1879. He gives the following facts from experience : In the Government schools of Malta the children are taught, not their vernacular, which is an unwritten Arabic, but two languages equally foreign to them — Italian and English. They commence them simultaneously, and learn to read the Italian very easily by means of a box of movable letters, while they are sorely puzzled with the English. I recently examined several of the children in the Anglo-Italian night school, near Leather Lane, and satisfied myself with the ease with which they acquired the power of reading and spelling Italian. In reply to inquiries as to the comparative time a child ignorant of letters, but understanding English and Italian equally well, would take to learn how to read and write each language correctly, the principal estimated that the English language would require about twice the time of the Italian. A struggle so unequal as this between languages cannot continue a struggle for supremacy on the part of the difficult language, it must be- come a struggle for existence. Simplified English spelling and inflection would reduce the cost of books and newspapers one-sixth, would lessen the school taxes many mil- lions of money annually, would develop better reasoning power in the growing mind, would shorten the work of learning to read and write by half, and would greatly lessen the number of illiterates. The best example of the great value of governmental aid in reforming language is that of Germany. In many respects the conditions and re- lations of the German states are like those of the English-speaking world. There are, in either case, two independent governments and a large number of subordinate sovereign states. In some respects, of course, 150 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION. the conditions are different. The Cultus Minister in Germany is the official head of all schools, both public and private. The supervision and discipline of the German schools are more systematic and strict. In 1876, after long and continued agitation of the subject of language reform, the Cultus Minister called an official conference of educators in Berlin to draft a synopsis of amended orthography. Upon the rules then adopted, a correct orthography was formulated and adopted in public schools and public printing by state action. Austria led the way, August 2, 1879, Bavaria followed, Sept. 21, 1879, Prussia, Jan. 21, 1880, and the other states in rapid succession. In comparing the needs and possibilities of reform in the English language with those of the German, advantages and disadvantages ap- pear on either side. We have no official exercising the authority of the Cultus Minister and we have a much more complicated orthography to reform. On the other hand, we have national organizations of both edu- cational institutions and the press to call for organized action and to decide how fast and how far changes are needed and possible ; our inflec- tions are much simpler than theirs, and we have the great advantage of being able to profit by their example and experience. We can survey the field, organize and move onward in a well-defined course of action that will, as rapidly or as gradually as circumstances permit, simplify, purify, beautify, strengthen, and extend the English language, until it is as complete as the combined influence of art, science, philosophy, and re- ligion can make it. The grossest evils should be corrected as fast as possible in the present decade. The dawn of the 20th century should be greeted by the Eng- lish language, not deformed and clad in ancient barbaric dress, but re- formed in harmony with modern progress and dressed in artistic beauty. The constant growth and change of a living language requires some recognized authority to exercise a constant censorship over all changes guiding them for the better. For centuries the English language has grown and changed without any recognized authority to shape it into logical or artistic form. It has grown by absorption, by accretion, and by spontaneous offshoots of slang. It has accumulated abnormal forms, fossilized remnants of dead inflec- tions, and a polyglot of heterogeneous rules of spelling and pronunciation. It is deficient in needed forms of inflection, defective in technical terms and terminology, and almost devoid of decorous emotional interjections. The vigor and independent spirit of Saxon blood, especially when surging in the emotions of persons not fluent of speech, bursts from the limited range of appropriate exclamations in eruptions of slang and profanity. Quack humorists, with one eye on the dollar and the other on the pulsa- tions of current demand, fill books and periodicals with popular but de- SPELLING REFORM. 151 moralizing forms of literature, many of which, like wolves in sheep's clothing, are confused with logical and sincere attempts at amended spell- ing. The English language has been omnivorous. Its vast vocabulary has been gathered from languages as numerous and diverse as the different races from whose veins the mingled life currents of the present English- speaking races have been drawn. This miscellaneous and indiscriminate absorption of diverse elements has been a source of mingled strength and weakness. As other modern languages are reformed and purified, the accumulated defects of the English language will become more conspic- uous and burdensome. It is time for united, organized action of the school, the press, and the government. Individual effort, even when organized, is powerless to change the great current of established custom. All such attempts to establish approved changes have been failures. Prominent newspapers have tried it in vain. Teachers attempting actual changes are in oppo- sition to authority, both literary and legal. The government hesitates to amend the public printing until the success of a general reform is, in some way, assured. There seems to be a closed circle of difficulties pre- senting no weak point vulnerable to any special line of attack. The movement must be general, emanating from the school and the press and supported by government. Private effort is inadequate to such work. It cannot and should not be taken from the auspices of the organized effort already given to it and accomplished by governmental fiat; but government can and should come to the rescue with such aid as will make the work a success worthy of the language and the age. England and America should unite in establishing and supporting an international council of revision and reform, composed of representative educators that could reflect the sentiments and unite the active efforts of all educational and editorial associations of both countries. Active educators are eminently fitted to formulate changes of language; the press, to decide the time and rapidity of making them ; and both together, with the sanction and support of government, to carry them into effect. But recognized authority and financial support are needed in accomplishing so great a work as the reformation of the English language. Its vast vocabulary of nearly 200,000 words should be critically analyzed, sifted, re-classified, and extended. Its greatest of all literatures, stored with the treasures of art, science, philosophy, and religion, must be preserved. Its grandeur of genius, grace of culture, and richness and power of expression, must not be sacrificed. Its keenness of satire and pathos of humor must be retained while its tendency to vulgar slang should be corrected. 152 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION. Its deficiency of exclamations and intensives should be supplied to relieve that pressure finding vent in its notorious profanity. Its glossaries of technical terms and terminology should be systema- tized and extended. Its accumulations of fragmentary, heterogeneous, and discordant inflec- tions should be renovated and re- classified. Its principles of pronunciation should be harmonized more fully with a3sthetic taste. Its many complex rules of spelling should be replaced by Nature's simple and only rule — spell all words in the quickest, easiest way. All this should be done so as to preserve the unity of the language throughout the various countries and among all people using it. United action of school, press, and government, of both England and America is needed ; a series of excellent opportunities for such united action are now before us, and unmistakable signs of prompt and efficient action are evident. Last year the National Educational Association and the National Edi- torial Association, in their annual sessions, considered the matter sepa- rately. This year they are counselling co-operation. Next year the fruit of the labor of the philologists will be ready for their united approval. In the next year following, the World's Fair in Chicago offers an excellent opportunity to hold an international convention. The intervening time is just sufficient for the necessary action involved in arranging for calling such convention. We have precept as well as example to guide us. Prophetic utterances from the wisest and best of men have pointed out clearly the proper courses before us. The Right Hon. Wm. E. Gladstone wrote to Mr. E. Jones, June 27, 1874, as follows: There is much that might be done with advantage in the reform of spelling as to the English language ; but the main thing is, that whatever may be proposed should be proposed with the weight of great authority to back it. The best plan, if proposed with- out such backing, will, in my opinion, only tend to promote confusion. I should advise those who are interested — and very justly interested in this question — to busy themselves not so much with considering what should be done as with consider- ing in what way opinion can be brought to bear upon the matter, and some organ framed to inquire what should be proposed. It is not in my power to offer to give any time under the present circumstances to the undertaking which I recommend, and in which I should gladly have found myself able to join." From the report of Mathew Arnold, Esq., H. M. Inspector, 1877, we have the following : Our absence of any authority with such a function as the reviewing of our spelling and making it rational is well known. Englishmen generally profess to be proud of it. I am myself disposed to think that a Royal Commission might with advantage be charged, not indeed with the absurd task of inventing a brand new spelling, but with the task of reviewing our present spelling, of pointing out evident anomalies in it, of suggesting SPELLING REFORM. 153 feasible amendments of it. But such a commission should be permanent, with the function of watching our language, by no means of stereotyping it : and though ap- pointed by government in the first instance, it should recruit itself, as vacancies arose, by co-optation. Since Mr. Gladstone's letter was written there has been accumulated the great authority of the concurrent agreement of the philologists of both England and America, backing an immediate movement for reform. At this very time the National Educational Association and the National Editorial Association are in session, both counselling co-operation in the matter. United action of these great representative bodies can doubt- less secure the co-operation of all similar associations, both state and national, of the English-speaking world, and bring together an inter- national convention to plan and organize an international movement for reform. An international convention of representatives from national and state educational and editorial associations could present the matter with such intelligence and authority to the governments of England and America that both would feel justified in granting the needed authority and financial support. A body should be then so constituted by government that the men who have already spent nearly a score of years in active service could continue at the helm to guide it through. There is no time to be lost. Many of these veteran educators will probably close their labors before the fading twilight of the nineteenth century melts into the dawn of the twentieth. Organized effort, authorized and supported by government, should help to complete the work so far as possible while they are yet with us. An organization for this purpose should be as free as possible from political strife and disturbances. It should have a board of regents rep- resenting various national associations, a permanent council to remain in continual session formulating needed changes and deciding all ques- tions of doubtful usage, and a temporary working corps numbering one representative from each sovereign state of the English-speaking world, to secure the co-operation of each state in the prompt and uniform adop- tion of all approved changes. The board of regents and the temporary working corps should hold annually a joint session of one month with the permanent council for mutual deliberation and advice, until the temporary corps were no longer needed. An excellent board of regents for the representation of the United States would be found in the president and secretary of the Spelling Re- form Association, the president and secretary of the American Philolog- ical Association, the president and secretary of the National Educational Association, the president and secretary of the National Editorial Asso- 154 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION. ciation, and the United States Commissioner of Education as chair- man. If the members of the permanent council were appointed by such a board of regents, and each member of the temporary working corps were appointed by the joint action of the Governor, the state Superintendent of Public Instruction, and the president of the state university of his own state, there would be insured a representative body worthy of the nation and the work, and one free from the strife and changes of politics. By such united official action of England and America the English language could be made worthy of becoming the international language of the world. All questions of language reform were safely and wisely left to the decision of such international organization. Individual opinions vary from the conservative fogy, who would have nothing changed, to the radical crank, who would have nothing unchanged or fixed. A permanent international council of philologists could and would analyze the needs and possibilities of the language and formulate such changes as would preserve the good and remove the bad as far and as fast as possible. Etymological derivations, poetic forms and figures, and all features valuable and sacred, would be safe in their care. The corps at large of educators and journalists could decide best the time, order, and manner of carrying such changes into effect. Annual reports from all Anglo-American states, presenting the conditions and progress of the work in general to the executive heads of the great na- tional associations supervising it, would enable them to so plan it as to insure the greatest possible success. If it then appeared that few changes are possible, so let it be ; if many changes appear not only possible, but wise, thus let it be; by all means let it be as the wise and moderate counsel of those in possession of all the facts deem best. To say that the English language cannot be reformed successfully is to say that the English-speaking races cannot do what other races have just successfully done ; a slander as base as it is false. The flags now waving above us have floated over as great conflicts and grand victories as were ever waged and won by humanity. Let them advance together through this noiseless conflict to a peaceful victory that shall free the mind from servile bondage in its struggle for knowledge and truth. The magnitude and complexity of the subject of language reform, the difficulties involved in presenting it fully to the members of the associa- tion, as well as to the general public, an unexpected change in the chair- manship of the committee preventing all correspondence with state SPELLING REFORM. 155 associations, and especially the need of co-operation with the National Editorial Association, have convinced us that we are not ready as a committee to report, and that the association is not ready to decide, at this session, in favor of carrying any changes of language into immediate effect. We feel that another year is necessary for collecting data to be put into the hands of every member of the association, for corresponding with national and state associations concerning their support of both national and international efforts, and for co-operation with the National Editorial Association, before a final report is made, and also that we need the counsel and instruction of the association as to what leading propo- sition should appear in such final report. From the fact that the National Editorial Association closes its annual session to-day, rendering it impossible for the National Educational As- sociation to invite their co-operation, the committee felt it a duty as well as a privilege to invite them to appoint a committee of three to consult with us on the best course to pursue in effecting language reform, and on the advisability of calling an international convention in Chicago in 1893. Should the National Educational Association grant our request of another year's time in which to prepare plans of definite action, we would respectfully recommend, if it seem wise for the association so to do, (1) to extend an invitation to the president of the National Editorial Associa- tion, the president of the Canadian Press Association, and to the National Chautauqua Assembly, to each name a committee of three to co-operate with us in deciding all questions of language reform ; (2) to authorize the committee (a) to collect data on spelling reform for a pamphlet of not over one hundred pages to be printed by the association, one copy being sent to each member of the association, three thousand copies being delivered to the committee on spelling reform, and one thousand copies being delivered to the secretary of the association ; (b) to correspond with various national and state associations of all English- speaking countries, inviting their co-operation in language reform ; (c) to consult with other committees mentioned on the advisability of adopting the amended orthography prepared by the united efforts of the English and American philologists, recommending to the association the course of action that seems wisest ; and (d) to determine so far as possible the practicability of calling an international convention in Chicago in 1893, recommending to the association such action as shall seem best; (3) to furnish through the secretary of the association, for the necessary corre- spondence of the committee, stamped envelopes bearing the official title of the association, not to exceed two thousand in number, and letter-heads accordingly, bearing in addition to such official title the names of the committee on spelling reform, with the name of the committee changed 156 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION. from " Committee on Spelling Reform" to " Committee on Language Reform." Respectfully signed and submitted, II. W. Brewster, T. R. Viceroy, W, M. Houston, Committee on Spelling Reform. SPELLING REFORM. T. R. VICEROY, ST. LOUIS, MO. " The true and sole office of alfabetic writing is faithfully and intel- ligibly to represent spoken speech. The ideal of an alfabet is that every sound should have its own unvarying sign and every sign its own unvarying sound." The American Philological Association in 1877 proposed a complete fonetic alfabet, suggesting three new letters, a, o, v, with diacritics and digraphs. They also proposed modified letters for the name sounds, e, b, i, and y. Among persons versed in the difficulties of the spelling reform the new letters met with general favor, but digraphs and diacritics awoke no enthusiasm. Digraphs involve two letters when one is enough, and diacritics are such a severe task upon compositors and proof-readers that they must be laid aside as impracticable in the printing-office. Moreover, the distinctions of long and short are contrary to the genius of our language. The temporal element which dominated Sanscrit, Latin and Greek has disappeared in the dialects which have sprung from these languages. Modern languages possess accentual rhythm merely, and alfabetic notation should conform to this principle. Letters should therefore note the quality of a vowel, not its quantity. That committee also suggested new letters for the six consonants which are now without representation. These have received some modification, and we are now able to present six well-formed consonants. For all practical purposes each letter should have a definite character- istic shape, showing its affinity as well as its distinctive use. This will meet the needs of the printing-office, will make print legible, and in time will present an agreeable appearance. The consummation of spelling reform lies in the selection and adoption of four additional new letters, so as to have a complete alfabet of forty letters. These four letters are to represent the long round open vowel in forin, the long close vowel in rule, and the two shade vowels in care and SPELLING REFORM. 157 err. As a Romanized form of epsilon is generally preferred as the sign for long e, so a Romanized form of omega is proposed as a suitable and distinctive sign for the vowel in York. For long close u we propose a u-form very familiar to most of us, suggested by Benjamin Franklin a century ago, and distinguished by the curve of Simonides. For circum- flex a there is a familiar a-form, used by Ben Pitman and the Longleys, which we propose as the sign for flat a. For the protean vowel in her, fir, work, burr and myrrh, generally represented by e and o, we propose an epsilon modification of omicron. This is a round letter, and looks well in print. In regard to capitals and script, of the new letters these should in all cases be the same in shape as the small letters. This will economize the time in teaching a child the new alfabet. In naming the letters the name of each letter should suggest its power. Thus : c and g should be called key and ghee, h and y should be called he and ye, and w should be called wu. Thus, by naming the letters in spelling, the spoken word is easily obtained from its written form. The advantages of using an alfabet such as we have outlined are many and important: First. It would enable a child to obtain an elementary education in two years' less time, so that our youth could enter the higher institutions two years earlier. This addition of two years' culture without increased expenditure of time and money would raise the common standard of intelligence wonderfully ! Second. Pure fonetic spelling would shorten the written form of our language a little over twenty-two per cent, on the average. The copyist would be able to do as much work in thirty-nine hours as he now does in fifty hours, and instead of working eight and one-third hours a day, he could do equivalent work in six and one-half hours. As fonetic spelling shortens the form of words, the compositor would set more type in less time, because the spacing of his lines is facilitated. Third. The cost of producing periodicals and books would be lessened. A book of 500 pages in the old spelling would be reduced to one of 390 pages in the new. A book that now costs fifty cents would cost but thirty-nine cents. Fourth. But the greatest advantage would be in the prestige given to our noble English tongue throughout the world. The nations of the earth would learn our language, and the influence of our institutions and literature would bestow benedictions upon the dark places of the earth. English, no longer Canadian, American or British, would bind the mother and her children in still closer bonds. As we are one in blood and spirit, the unity of our speech will preserve us as the leading people of the earth while the sun shines above us. 158 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION For the reasons given, we propose this completed form of alfabetic notation for your consideration. Perfect this instrument, should it lack in aught. AVhatever is wanting to bring the new letters into perfect harmony with the old the artistic type-cutter will supply. The impor- tant matter is for educators to agree as to the general shape and power of the new letters. The committee do not know who proposed each and all of these letters, but have selected them wholly on account of the appropriateness of their forms. We have thus entered into the labors of others, and beg to lay our work before you, not for immediate adoption, unless you are free to do so, but for your careful consideration. Your committee suggest that, should the alfabet as a whole be accept- able, it be recommended next year for use in showing pronunciation in vocabularies and dictionaries. In this way English-speaking persons would become familiar with the power and forms of the letters, and en- thusiastic spelling reformers could publish periodicals and other literature in the ideal spelling. This would be the promise of an accomplisht reform. II. W. Brewster, Wm. Houston, T. R. Vickroy, Committee. DISCUSSION. Mr. H. H. Lincoln, of Massachusetts. — Mr. President: This report states that the first organization devoted to spelling reform, and the first efforts made in that behalf, were in 1870 and in 1876. I would like to say that we started this movement in Boston as long ago as 1840, when the sub- ject was first introduced into this country. I had the honor of being the secretary of the first American phonographic society ever formed in this country. Perhaps I ought to say, however, that I had the dishonor, for it was considered dishonorable in those far-off days to argue in favor of spelling reform. I was called in those days a fanatic, while I was simply phonetic. I had the honor of delivering an address in Tremont Temple, Boston, on this subject as long ago as 1845 or 1846. That address was entitled " Spelling, its Weaknesses and Philosophic Remedies." Now the radical change to be made in our language is this: We should have as many letters in cur alphabet as there are elementary sounds in the lan- guage. There are about forty- three elementary sounds in our language, DISCUSSION. 159 and we have but twenty-six letters, and three of these letters are of no account whatever. There is no need of the letter " c " in our language, for that is always sounded like " s " or " k." There is no need of the letter " x " in our language, for that letter is always sounded like " k-s " or " g-c." There is no need of the letter " q " in our language, for that is always sounded like " k." So we have but twenty-three effective letters in our alphabet to represent but forty-three elementary sounds. So you see what confusion occurs. Take for instance the word " shoe." " S-h-o-e" ; that sounds no doubt to most of you here like shoe. Why it seems to fit our understanding is because we have been so accustomed to it. But the fact is there is not a single sound of the letters s, h, o, or e in that word. These four letters are used to spell a word not one of which enters as an element into its pronunciation. Now you may teach a child s-h-o-e, teach him those letters, and what that word spells, and he might guess a thousand times and he never would guess it right. It has been esti- mated that the word "scissors" can be spelled in 500 different ways. Now I once taught my boys that s-t-e-p spelled " step," and h-e-n spelled "hen," and of course when they came to spelling the word "Stephen," and to pronouncing it, they called it " step-hen" instead of Stephen, and it was very hard to make them understand how " Stephen" was brought forth. The fact is, the boys thought that the man must have been a long-eared philosopher who first found out that trick. Take the letter " o." Do you know how many sounds that has in our language? Over ten. The fact is, that if we had a strictly phonetic alphabet a child would learn to read and spell in one tenth of the time he now does. Mr. Wm. Houston, of Ontario. — Mr. President, Ladies and Gentle- men : I am not going to take up much of your time in supporting the reslution for the adoption of the report to which my name is sub- scribed. I am, however, here in Canada. Although the report does not embody the statement or fact in respect to what has been accomplished or contemplated, yet we have done something in the way of progress. We have no spelling reform association here, and we have no exclusive membership like your great American Spelling Reform Association, but many of us have procured through one channel or another, and effectively studied, the documents issued during the last ten or fifteen years by the Spelling Reform Association, or by the American Philological Association. I may say we have not got beyond the stage — at least, that is my convic- tion— when sjDelling reformers are regarded, I will not say as fanatics, but the same modern term " cranks." Every spelling reform movement here has to face a certain amount of contempt, and that contempt is unfor- tunately backed up by great maintenance of public laziness. I believe a failure to adopt some sensible reform stands in the way of true scholar- ship. I notice the statement made by my predecessor on this subject. I 160 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION once made a statement before a meeting of provincial teachers that the time of every pupil in primary work up to the end of the secondary reader, at all events, was worse than wasted, to the extent of one-third, if not one-half, in not learning to read. I challenged contradiction of this statement, and I found that everybody was willing to accept it. And I believe that of all the time that a pupil spends in school up to the end of the second reader, one-third, if not one-half, is absolutely wasted on account of our bad system of spelling. It is a very important matter, therefore, for primary work in school. It is important for other reasons; but it is necessary for a true un- derstanding of the English language, for the English language depends on its pronunciation, and not on its spelling. A good many years ago I made this proposition: That we should be allowed in spelling any English word those letters with what made that spelling from either a philological, or phonetic point of view, or both; that is, we ought to be allowed to spell words better phonetically, provided we did not interfere with the history of the word; we ought to be allowed to spell words bet- ter philologically, if we did not interfere with the sound of the word. Up to that time I had not seen the last paper of the American and Eng- lish Philological Society, and I have not made any comparison of these since they appeared. But up to that time I came to the conclusion that certain of those words would be gradually improved by a phonetic spell- ing, for instance. Why should we not spell " head," h-e-d; "heart," h-a-r-t? Why should we not in eight simple verbs in all of them conform to the Latin " cedre "? why should we not spell all of them one way? As a matter of fact, we spell five of them according to the Latin root " cede," and three of them " ceed." Why should we not improve the spelling in that respect? I heartily approve of the proposition of the report that this committee, or some other Committee, should be continued along under the old name, or a new one, that during the year the information that seems to be necessary or procurable should be got together and pub- lished in pamphlet form and laid before this National Association next year. I do not know whether Canadian teachers will be represented in the National Association or not. I earnestly hope the Association will become international in character; but whether it does or not, this will always be an international association of teachers. Unless a time may come when we annex the United States of America, and then it may be- come national again; during the World's Fair at Chicago would be an admirable time to bring this thing to a climax there. I heartily approve of the resolution to adopt the report as it stands. Mr. Richards ■ — I did not propose to make a speech on this subject. When my friend Mr. Lincoln, from Boston, brought up reminiscences of the year 1845 I remembered a series of studies or efforts that I went A YEAR IN A GERMAN MODEL SCHOOL. 161 through with. I went into an investigation. I have been all through with those peculiar methods of spelling which he has referred to, and I fully sympathize with him, sir, and with the sentiment of the report which has been offered here. I had the pleasure, if not the honor, in 1859, at a lueeting of this Association, in the city of Buffalo, in 1859 or 1860, of presenting a report upon this same subject and of bringing out a great many of these peculiar peculiarities. I am heartily in favor of the prin- cipal features of the report ; whether it is our province here to adopt that report is a question in my mind. I would like to let that come up afterwards; but I fully sympathize with the sentiments that have been uttered. Any teacher in teaching the child the first lesson in reading, if he looks into the subject carefully, he will be convinced that there is a necessity for carrying out the principles that have been embodied in this report in our schools. For a good many years I have been engaged in teaching the higher branches of education. Within the last five or six years I have been engaged in teaching little children the first lessons in reading, and I have never been so thoroughly convinced in my life of the necessity for a radical reform as J have been since I have been engaged in that work. But I wish to say here, whether we have phonetic repre- sentation or not, the principles of phonetic teaching in the first elements of our language should be observed by our educators. There are not so great discrepancies in the sounds of our letters as many of us imagine, if we will but give them their phonetic element ; but I would so introduce the phonetic element as to obtain a phonetic representation. A YEAR IN A GERMAN MODEL SCHOOL. MISS JULIA TUTWILEE, LIVINGSTON, ALA. In company with friends from America I had visited the Vienna Ex- position of '73, and wished to remain somewhere in Germany to study the language, and more particularly the methods of instruction, of that land of careful attention to details. Where could an American girl, left alone, find the greatest profit and security in a foreign land? At Brussels my friends were to leave me; one of them made an excursion from that point to the little town of Kaiserswerth-am-Rhein, to visit the famous Deaconess Training Home at that place. He came back full of enthusiasm for all that he had seen, 162 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION and gave me my first knowledge of the fact that the celebrated Kaisers- werth sisterhood did not limit their labors to the care of the sick in hospitals and the training of nurses, but had under their charge a number of other institutions, and that one oi: them was a normal school for lady teachers. My resolution was at once formed ; I would put myself under the charge of these gentle Protestant sisters, and there on the banks of the Rhine, where Florence Nightingale had learned the skill in caring for the bodies of her fellow-beings, which gave victory to the armies of England in the Crimea, I would learn how best to deal with the minds of my future charges. A few hours of railroad travel from Brussels to Diisseldorf ; then I seemed to have reached what we Americans call the jumping-off place. No railroad to Kaiserswerth ! famous Kaiserswerth ! It seemed incredi- ble ; not even a dummy. On certain days of the week the stage went down, and some time the next day the steamboat from Cologne would pass. But I could not wait when so near my destination ; and at last, in spite of imperfect German, and inexperience in travelling alone, I managed to make a bargain with the driver of a dilapidated hack to take me to Kaiserswerth that very evening. Long after dark the aged sister from the House of Evening Rest, as the home for superannuated sisters is called, who acted as portress of the door of the mother house, the central building, was astonished on answering a ring at the carefully guarded portal to find an American- erin who knew so little of the red tape that binds every institution in the Fatherland that she asked to be at once admitted as an inmate into their paradise. It was the very first time in their history that such a request had come from such a source — an emanciparte Amer leaner in. The proposition seemed to create quite a flutter in the dovecote. Should a falcon come in among the pigeons? The youthful novice who attended the aged portress summoned sisters higher in authority, and the pilgrim from the Western World was thoroughly catechised as to who she was, whence she came, and what she wanted. I smile now at the recollection of the simplicity with which, without the slightest dread of disbelief or even suspicion, the American informed them that she had come to study among them, because she thought they were such very good people, and that she had no letters of introduction to their director or any one else, and did not know where she could get any. She was, after much consultation, remanded for the night to the village inn, where she found herself the only guest. There she spent a quiet, restful week, rambling through the day along the banks of the Rhine, and finding (without a guide, to her great rapture) a genuine ruined castle, with a Latin inscription, ascribing its erection to Freder- A YEAR IN A GERMAN MODEL SCHOOL. 163 ick Barbarossa. Every afternoon a gentle sister in a dark-bine print dress and big black coal-scuttle bonnet, the neat but ugly uniform of their order, came in, ostensibly to visit the stranger and cheer her loneliness, but really, as I now see, to find out whether she could with safety be ad- mitted into the fold. At the end of a week the final decision was given in her favor. And now I will leave the troublesome third person and say that nowhere have I seen the great American philosopher's rule for a true education, "plain living and high thinking," so well carried out as in the school under the care of that German sisterhood. Flowers, books and music were the only luxuries, unless the most exquisite neatness and cleanliness can be included under this head. Music was regarded as not only a recreation, but a most serious and important employment of the whole group of institutions; there were constant lessons and constant practice in choral singing, not only in our Normal School, but in the Orphan Home, the Magdalen House, the hospital for insane ladies, and also in the hospital for men, that for women, and the one for children. I suppose, even in the House of Evening Rest, the aged sisters practised together with quavering voices their daily psalms. All of these institu- tions contributed to fill the beautiful central chapel at the various Sunday and week-day services, and the flood of harmony that poured forth from the strangely constituted congregation was worthy of the land where Luther first announced that the devil is afraid of music. But we had also music even sweeter than the choral songs of trained German voices. When I read lately, in the Atlantic Monthly I believe, of the fruitless quest to and from England of Burroughs, the worthy successor of Thucan, for the nightingale, and how his only reward was to hear once a few notes of a clear, sweet whistle, quickly stilled, I felt how fortunate I am to be able to say that for one whole season I have listened to the song of the nightingale by day and by night. It is a popular error to suppose that the little songster is silent by day; often as I sat reading in a bower of the quaint gaiden on the banks of the Bhine, where flowers and vegetables mingling together made an object-lesson on the mutual helpfulness of utility and beauty, I watched the little brown- clad singer warbling his very heart away not two yards above me. It is said that he sings only during the season of wooing, and only to cap- tivate his lady-love; but to me he seemed to sing only for the joy of song, and like the minstrel in Goethe's ballad, to feel " Das Lied, das aus der Kehle dringt 1st Lohn, der reichlich lohnet," for I saw no shy Philomela within call. If I sat very still the little singer's curiosity was aroused, and he hopped lightly down from twig to twig until he was on the ground, then came nearer and nearer, 164 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION turning his little head inquisitively from side to side, his bright bead- like eyes fixed fearlessly on the intruder. If I could remain quite motionless he would come to my very feet, but if a breeze from the Rhine rustled the leaves of my book he would quickly lift his wings and seek a safe distance. Often at night when his song began I rose and knelt for hours at the window to listen to his music. In the dim moonlight of that northern land the shrubs and bowers below appeared dark, indistinguishable masses, and somewhere from among them poured forth the entrancing strain. I have heard Americans, jealous for the honor of every citizen of our land, even the tiniest, declare that the song of the mocking-bird is fully equal to that of the " sweet bird that shuns the noise of folly, most musical, most melancholy," but such boasters must have but a slight acquaintance with Philomel. The mocking-bird has but one note of his own, and that a harsh, sharp call. Naturalists say that the nightingale has sixteen distinct changes, all his very own; to me their number seemed countless. I think at Kaisers- werth he must have practised variations on his sixteen melodies. At the close of the song, there was always one sad strain that seemed to melt the heart of the listener almost to tears. The Germans call it his strain of "selmen" — yearning, longing; but to me it always seemed to speak of sorrow for the past, rather than of anticipation for the future. It sounded like the voice of a weary, innocent child who suffers without understanding the secret meaning of suffering, and grieves and wonders at his pain. The tones were almost articulate — " Oh ! dear me! Oh! dear me!" The curriculum of the school would seem strangely limited to an American teacher accustomed to catalogues in which every language and science up to Sanscrit and Ontology appear on the programme. There was no mathematics higher than arithmetic; no Latin; no Greek, of course, and hardly more of the natural sciences than might be taught in the object-lessons of an American kindergarten. What did they study then? Well, first, their own language, how to speak it with a fluency and ease which makes the simplest German house-mother a delightful narrator. She would never think of putting forward any literary claims ; yet I have often wished that I could take down in shorthand the fresh, charming narrations of « simple-hearted German who had been early taught accurate observation and fluent expression. The lessons in expression begin in the kindergarten and continue through the whole school course. At first it is naturally only oral expression, but even in the first year of school the pen comes into use, and soon becomes another tongue. Every lesson is a language-lesson. In our school there were scarcely any text-books, and these were not necessarily of the same kind. The teacher and a large bound note-book was all with which most classes A YEAR IN A GERMAN MODEL SCHOOL. 165 were provided. Constant practice through all the previous years of school life had made the pupil so expert in the taking of notes that, with- out the aid of stenography, by the close of the lesson all of its essential teachings had been written down in a beautiful hand and with method- ical neatness. During the hours of study these notes were transferred from the large book to separate volumes, each devoted to a single sub- ject. As we took our daily walk through field-paths where the rye, bright with blue corn flowers and crimson poppies, almost met above our heads, two companions would often say, " Let us study our history," or " geography," and first one and then the other would relate with ani- mated interest the last lesson copied in the note-books. I was told that the government inspectors, who are in the habit of coming into the schools of the land in as unexpected a way as possible, would probably dismiss a teacher who should be found simply hearing the lesson from a book in his hand. " Parrot teaching " was the contemptuous name given to that style of instruction by our professor in pedagogy. I stoutly denied that it was as universal in America as he stated, but I had to admit that it was too common. A German teacher once said to me that it seemed to him the height of inconsistency for a teacher supposed to possess a trained mind and thorough acquaintance with ordinary school branches to require his pupils, who had not these advantages, to come to the class having mastered a lesson which he had not himself been able to master. If the pupil should be able to recite the lesson without book, far more, he thought, should the teacher be able to teach it without. Before the great annual examination, by the government examiners, those Ehadamanthine judges from afar who were to give or withhold the cov- eted certificate, I heard that the occupants of the narrow, coffin-like beds in the dormitory drew them close together and " reviewed " all night by relating to one another the contents of note-book after note-book. Thus memory is carefully trained; but not verbal memory, rather logical mem- ory, if such an expression is permissible. This system of study gives constant practice in the ready use of their richly endowed language. Their literature was also studied with earnestness and enthusiasm which even a Browning Club could not surpass. The greatest master- pieces of the greatest writers alone were studied, and their most cele- brated passages were learned by heart, thus practising the verbal memory in a manner which must benefit, instead of doing harm, as is too often the case. I wish our American school-girls had their Shakspere and Milton on the tips of their tongues as their German cousins have their Schiller and Goethe. One branch of literature which is little regarded in our land received much attention — the study of their hymnology. German literature is richer in this respect than that of any modern lan- guage, not excepting our own; indeed, many of our noblest hymns are 166 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION translations of theirs. If a college graduate in this country knows any- thing of this great section of our literature it is an accidental accretion, not a thoroughly assimilated mental possession. An intimate acquaintance with our hymnology is limited to a few specialists here and there, enthusi- asts who explore undisturbed the mine of gold they have discovered. But in Germany, where the Bureau of Education fixes all the requirements for a teacher's certificate, down to the minutest details, the study of the hymnology of the language is as imperative as that of arithmetic. For- merly the candidate had to be prepared for examination on eighty of the classic hymns of the language ; the number has now been reduced to forty, but these must be studied with a thoroughness and care of which we do not know much in America. The candidate must be ready to re- cite any one of them with taste and expression ; then, without notes or accompaniment, to sing it to the air with which it is most commonly as- sociated. She must be able to tell the name and history of the writer of the hymns and the composer of the air. She must also be able to give a thorough analysis of the poem, giving first of all its Grund-gedanke (the leading thought) — (its reason for being), which runs, like the crim- son strand in the ropes of the royal navy, through every stanza ; then the metre, and every allusion and figure of the speech, must be explained. Those passages of the Bible which suggested the thoughts and expressions must be given, and, last, the history of the hymn itself since its birth. Perhaps it is one that the army of Gustavus Adolphus sang upon their knees before they followed the lion of the North to glorious death and victory; or in still olden days a triumphant martyr chanted its exultant strains while the wings of the fiery chariot which should bear him to paradise hovered around him. Or it may have gentler associations: a sage revered by his own and succeeding generations may have repeated one of its stanzas on his dying bed, as Sir Walter Scott the Dies free. To discover all this by original investigation is beyond the capacity of the average candidate ; therefore, a school manual of hymnology has been prepared for this purpose, containing in brief compass all that can be known about these forty hymns. We have nothing corresponding to this among our school-books, and the preparation of such a volume is another of my tasks which is awaiting that month of golden leisure, the mirage ever floating before the busy teacher. Geography was studied in a delightful way, combining with it the history of the countries studied, and descriptions of their present customs and manners. The history of their own country was, of course, a specialty ; but as it takes the learner back some thousands of years it is really the history of Europe, and far more fertilizing to the mind of the pupil than the history of the United States, on which so much of our school-time is spent. Here I would like to protest respectfully against the amount of time A YEAR IN A GERMAN MODEL SCHOOL. 1G7 spent on this study in our schools. There seems to me something mis- leading in the manner in which this one act in that great drama, God's Education of Man, which we call history, is cut off and separated from its natural connections. The study of their national history was illustrated by all that poetry, the charms and romance have given to adorn it. I saw one book the plan of which I thought particularly worthy of imitation — " Niemeyer's Vater- landische Gedichte." It is a collection, arranged in chronological order, of all the finest short poems of their language which have for their theme events in German history. Similar collections for English and American schools would supply a need. Most of the pupils spoke, read and wrote French with ease ; they also spoke English almost as well as I did. In fact, they criticised my accent rather severely, and accused me of an American brogue. English and American stories — "The Daisy Chain," "Little Women," "The Wide, Wide World," " The Heir of Redcliffe " — were the greatest favorites in the school library. There are few books of this type in their language. German girls being less important factors in their nation than American girls in theirs, it has not perhaps seemed worth while to build up a lit- erature especially for their benefit. In the normal school there were, of course, lectures on Methods of Instruction and Child-training, and practice lessons were given by the pupils in the presence of the professor and their fellow-pupils to the children of the Orphan Home. The pupils also learned plain sewing and fancy-work ; at least all except the American- erin, as her time was too valuable to thus be spent. At the great govern- ment examination each candidate for a certificate had to display an exquisite piece of fancy-work, and — strange requirement — a linen shirt, all made by her own fingers, with stitches that Titania might have copied. The large school-room looked quite like a bazaar when all this fancy-work was tastefully arranged upon the wall, the shirts lying more modestly upon the tables, each with a card stitched on its front bearing the name of the maker in exquisite writing. Housewifery was also taught, so far as was practicable under the circumstances. Our meals were cooked in the great central Mother House of the sisterhood, and brought over to us, except the coffee and the unfailing soup; on these we tried our prentice hands in daily rotation. The care of the house — a building fitted up as school and home for fifty inmates — the task of keeping it exquisitely clean and neat, all devolved on the pupils, even the care of lights and fires; yet the labor was so carefully apportioned that no one worked more than a half-hour each day. Even the great garret under the tiles, where our trunks were kept, was so swept and dusted daily that a spider would as soon have chosen as a fit place to spin his web Kaiser Wilhelm's Hall of State as its darkest nook. 168 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION. And was this all? Let us see what it amounted to. The perfect mastery of their own language, and of two others, both living ones, whose home is not far from them; geography combined with history, es- pecially the history of their own people, which is the history of Europe ; an enthusiastic knowledge and love of their own literature; the ability to sing with taste and feeling, alone or with others, the songs and hymns of their land ; some acquaintance with housewifery ; a practical knowledge of arithmetic, and a slight acquaintance with the more common phenom- ena of the natural sciences. This is a meagre list of attainments com- pared to that of the sweet girl-graduate in America; yet I had to admire very much the type of woman which it developed — gentle, thoughtful, intelligent women — clear-headed and open-minded, with the power to think accurately and express their thoughts plainly. There was nothing muddled in their brains — nothing that indicated a mind surcharged with more than it could digest, and consequently congested. I have seen something like this in the United States. I hope such a condition of mind is unknown among your graduates in Canada. But I did not attribute the characters developed by this school wholly, or even mostly, to the simplicity and thoroughness of its curriculum. At the risk of being old-fashioned and unprogressive, far behind the spirit of the age, I will say that I attribute the best results of this school to its distinctive Christian teaching. The truths of the Bible were taught, as in all German schools, but not here, as in many, in a perfunctory manner. Everywhere and in everything we saw and felt that all the other teaching was based on this. The great Christian festivals, Christmas, Easter, Pentecost, were as truly joyful festivals as is the anniversary of the coronation day of a beloved sovereign. A new and living interest was attached to these themes by not relegating them to a separate day and a different teacher, but allow- ing them not only to take their regular place in school knowledge, but to promote and color the whole course of instruction. In the United States many hold that a school under state supervision cannot with propriety teach the Bible ; that only the denominational institutions can do this. I believe only two of our states have gone so far as to forbid the use of the Bible altogether in the public schools, yet most have limited and restricted it. At the risk of a seeming digression, I will mention here that the pub- lic schools of London — the Board Schools, as they are called — have solved this difficulty in a manner worthy of that great nation, distinguished above all others for its practical good sense and love of fair play. The supervisors have argued that it is a manifest injustice to the large majority of the pupils, because of the objection of a small minority, to shut them out from the systematic and well-directed study of the most A YEAR IN A GERMAN MODEL SCHOOL. 169 important collection extant of the literature of ancient times, the sixty- six books, a veritable treasure-house of literary antiquities. The School Board, composed of practical business men, professional teachers, and some of the wisest and most learned of literary Englishmen, has therefore marked out the course of Bible instruction with as much care as that of mathematics or the natural sciences. In every grade of the London schools an assigned portion of the Bible is to be carefully studied, and certain passages of special literary and ethical value are to be learned by heart. Thus the pupils become familiar with some of the noblest prose and poetry in all literature. To avoid wounding the consciences of those who sincerely believe this study to be useless or injurious, any pupil is excused from this class Avhose parent or guardian makes a written request to this effect of the Board of Directors. The pupils thus excused have another lesson in his- tory or literature at the same hour in another room. I was told in Lon- don that the requests for such excuses become every year less and less frequent, and are now too few to be of any importance. I stand before what I justly regard as the most important and influ" ential assemblage upon earth. What comparison does the task of fram- ing laws for the adult mind bear to that of framing the minds themselves which shall make laws for future generations — more especially when these generations belong to the two great English-speaking nations ap- pointed by Heaven to lead the van of mankind's onward march? I must therefore take the opportunity to plead before this assemblage for that educational measure which I believe to be of paramount importance. When Julian the apostate forbade to the schools of the Christians the writings of Homer, Virgil, and Horace, saying with a sneer that since their professors did not believe in his gods it was a waste of time for them to read and teach what these poets had said about them, it was ac- counted a malicious and tyrannical enactment. Yet this injury was a slight one compared to the forbidding, because of a small minority, the systematic school study of the sacred books of Christendom to the great majority of the youths of these lands. As Cato ended every speech, no matter on what subject, with his Carthago delenda est, I should like to end every paper I write on education with the words, Biblia conservanda sunt — the story of the Bible must be preserved. 170 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION A BASIS FOE ETHICAL TRAINING IN ELEMENTARY SCHOOLS. PRES. CHAS. DE GARMO, OF SWARTHMORE COLLEGE, PA. It cannot justly be charged that American teachers are indifferent to the moral training of their pupils, for they are not. It is probably true, however, that most of them are guided in their efforts to upbuild char- acter more by undefined yearnings than by pedagogical insight into definite, desirable ends, and available means of reaching them. The authoritative basis of moral instruction found in the Bible has been taken from the public schools, and nothing tangible has been devised to take its place. Enemies persistently bring the charge of godlessness against the schools, only to have the charge indignantly denied by defenders who regard the righteousness of their intentions rather than the formal piety of their deeds. For half a century the American teacher has turned his attention to the development of instruction upon its intellectual side. He has, indeed, ever stood ready to appeal to the will by manly example, by reproof and commendation, but he has never set himself seriously to the task of developing a pedagogy of will-training. Is it unreasonable to think that this is our most promising line of advance for the immediate future? Heretofore, the only visible basis for ethical training, outside of mere precept and example, appears to have been the prosy details of the monotonous daily school life. But behavior in the school ought to be the idealized consequence of proper ethical instruction, rather than the commonplace source of its lessons for life. I have no more desire to underrate the value of school discipline, even in its most barren plainness, than I have to forget the friends of youth while winning the more useful ones of manhood. Yet the fact need not be concealed that when our teachers turn their vigorous thought to the possibilities and methods of training the will they will be able to accomplish far more than where everything is left to luck, or to effort unseasoned by reflection. Ethical training of a certain sort we already have in the schools, nor must it be supposed that this paper advocates its abolition. To make clear what further basis is possible, or desirable, I wish to call attention to a valid distinction in will activity. One phase of morality deals with God in the heart; the other deals with God in the world. One is subjective and individual, the other is objective and universal. The first treats of man in relation to himself and to God, where conscience is the supreme question. " As a man ETHICAL TRAINING IN ELEMENTARY SCHOOLS. 171 thinketh in his heart, so is he." The second treats of man in relation to his fellows, where the written or unwritten laws lying at the founda- tion of all forms of social life become the guide to conduct. " As a man sows so shall he reap." It is to the first of these phases of character that we have devoted most care. We have sought to bring about that state of inner freedom that always ensues when volition and judgment agree. We have sought to make the conscience tender and imperative in its demands, and in so doing we have done well. But the maxims " Be true to thyself," " Obey thy conscience" are abstract and formal in their character. They have no necessary content. For all we know this state of inner freedom may have dwelt in the breast of the Duke of Alva, who (in a few years) took the lives of thousands of his fellow-beings because their religious views did not accord with those of his sovereign and nation. A formal prin- ciple of morality is not sufficient; there must be a wide-reaching and well-articulated body of doctrine as to what are right and wrong actions. And not only must the judgment be trained in regard to duty, but the soul must become stable in a passion for righteousness. It is the plea of this paper that a training leading, in the main, to this end is within the range of pedagogical possibility, and it is its purpose (as far as may be) to point out the way. The problem of the teacher is, then, to reveal the ethical duty of man to man, and to find means for inducing the youthful mind to live in accordance with this ethical order, to submit itself freely to that system of law which we speak of as God in the world ; or, in other words, to bring about a permanent harmony between the individual, subjective disposition of the heart, and the laws that condition the stability and progress of human society. An indispensable requisite for effective will-training is a psychology that reveals the springs and processes of volition. We shall get little help from any psychological analysis that does not show the genesis of volitional activity in knowledge, and that does not trace its progress up to the fulness of the deed. In a paper as brief as this must be there is not time for more than a sketch of the various stages. Attention is the starting-point; it may be forced or spontaneous. It is forced when induced by external authority or indirect means; it is spontaneous when induced by the attractiveness of external phenomena, or by the effort of the self to realize some desired end. The child gives spontaneous attention to that which appeals to his senses in an unusual manner, or in a way already found agreeable; he attends to the novel, the variegated, the mysterious, that which calls for the question Why ? What for ? — that which stimulates the fancy or the taste for the beautiful. An attention caused by compulsion is withdrawn as soon as the compulsion ceases. 172 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION When spontaneous attention returns over and over again to the same object, what we call a direct interest arises. Interest naturally culmin- ates in desire and motive, and this is the direct road to volition. Reversing the order, volition is always in obedience to motive, motives arise from desires, desires from matters of direct interest, and interest presupposes an unforced attention. Interest stands in the middle, therefore, between contemplation and action. It is the half-way station between passive attention and active volition. As soon as strong desire is awakened, the will may freely force the attention, or the muscles, as the case may be, for that which now compels the attention is internal and not external. It is the very self striving to realize the ideal that interest has generated. If interest can be aroused and sustained and developed in that which is rich in moral contents, then moral ideals must be formed which will serve as crystallizing points for moral charac- ter. Great moral ideals, however, are formed only where they are brought repeatedly face to face with the mind. They may be presented in the way of information, or in that of warning and exhortation, but in these cases they lack the * warming power of interest ; they may, indeed, lead to a performance of stern duty, but they awake no passion for the good. The better way is to present these moral ideals as a series of will activities, in which motives, whether good or bad, and actions and their natural con- sequences are portrayed. Here we carry with us the warm and vital in- terest of the pupil, and induce him to pass an unbiased judgment upon the moral or immoral quality of the deed and its attendant recompense. If we would teach the child to manifest the ethical virtue of good- will toward his fellows, we should do it, not by didactic instructions, but by concrete will-pictures in which this idea is vividly portrayed. Thus, when the lawyer inquired of Christ, Who is my neighbor? the answer was not a definition, but a narrative about the man who fell among thieves. There was no escape from the correct moral judgment. History and literature abound in concrete illustrations of actions spring- ing from the sentiment of good-will : the story of Damon and Pythias, the dying Sir Philip Sidney, who gave his cup of water to a soldier whose need, as he said, was greater than his. By such psychological procedure, habitual right action has some chance of becoming an expression of the real self, rather than the resultant of external forces of direction or repression. This objective, practical morality, that men should practice in their intercourse with their fellows, can and should be taught so as to enlist not only the intellect, but also the very heart and soul of the child. The teacher should study ethics long enough to discover the fundamental ideas of social organization. ETHICAL TRAINING IN ELEMENTARY SCHOOLS. 173 Turning briefly now to this field where man must utter himself in his ethical relations to others, we come to four great ideas that lie at the basis of all modern social life. 1. It is a natural impulse of each individual to make himself the end and centre of all that he comes in contact with, to make himself the master, to which everything else must be subordinate. But experience soon teaches him, in a measure, that if he would have his own selfhood respected at all, he must respect that of others. There thus arises in the mind the idea that Christianity calls good-will. It is the state of mind that wills the good of a foreign ego as if it were one's own. Its opposite is ill-will, a feeling whose impulse is to injure, or destroy, or subordinate a foreign ego. 2. The second idea comes to light when two individuals strive for the possession of that which, in the nature of the case, only one of them can have. It is the idea of rights, which lies at the basis of most of our laws. 3. The third idea is that of requital for good or bad deeds, and it demands that the requital shall be adequate to the deed. This idea is the basis for the system of rewards and punishments that society has gradually evolved. 4. The fourth idea arises from the necessary constitution of society, in which each individual is compelled to enter into combination with his fellows in order to realize his greatest possibilities in economic thrift and rational freedom. It is known as the doctrine of service, in which he serves himself best who serves others. These four ideas reveal in a measure the ethical relations that must exist between the members of a complicated civilization. Are these ideas, and all that they involve, embodied in any form cap- able of appealing to childhood? Can we find an embodiment, a concrete manifestation of the ethical order of the world? Is the expression " God in the world" an empty and meaningless phrase, or is it one of the most concrete of realities? In answer to these questions we need now to see that in a sense the past has lived and wrought for the sake of the present, for the sake of each man and woman that now lives, and that the present is as truly living for the future. No real progress that man makes in mastery of the material universe is lost, but each new advance is recorded, or fixed, or embodied in some material contrivance that secures it for the race. A few years ago the lightning was " an untamed monster of the skies"; now he is the willing servant of man. Every advance that men have taken in this conquest is fixed by a machine, so that we have the telegraph, the telephone, the phonograph, the dynamo, the incandescent lamp, and the arc light. The same is true for every department of manufacture or transportation, as well as in the destruc- tive arts of war. 174 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION Man's conquests in the realm of spirit are no less marked and no less permanently recorded. The means of permanent embodiment here is not a machine, but what we call an institution. These institutions are the state, with its political constitution and laws; the church, with its spiritual canons; the family, with its marital laws and regulations; the school, with its educational laws; society, with its social code; the busi- ness world, with its written and unwritten rules of contract. Each of these institutions represents. the recorded progress of centuries. We are " the heirs of all the ages " just because each age has recorded, in these permanent forms, every new insight it has had into the spiritual well- being of the race. It is the inconceivably important mission of the schools to bring each individual into his inheritance as one of the heirs of all the ages. By means of institutions the love, the devotion, the sacrifice of the past enfold in their protecting arms each individual of the present, pro- tecting him even against himself. If others would oppress him, it is found that the past would encircle him with the bulwarks of civil lib- erty; if he would, of himself, fall back into the irrational realm of caprice and savagery, dragging others with him, the past and present, with their organized institutions, compel him to live in accord with the established ethical order, or perish. We get here a glimpse of what the term " God in the world " means, and of how this ethical order embodies and maintains itself. We have here a series of categorical imperatives whose enforcement is not left to subjective caprice. If any man, by his acts, refuses substantial good-will, or justice, or fair requital, or honest service, his punishment is always sure, and is often swift. History reveals this truth, that nations, too, are subject to the same law, but it reveals it slowly. Centuries may often stand between a deed and its ultimate requital. The mind of youth is not capable of deducing clearly the more important ethical lessons of history. There is too much of pomp and circumstance, the lapse of time is too great, the component factors too numerous and too complex for the youthful mind to unravel the tangled skein, and to see the end from the beginning. It is only in song and story, in biography and memoir, that the child is able to apprehend something of the ethical mission of history. In what realm besides history shall we find a portrayal of the ethical relations of men? Evidently not in nature, not in science, or mathe- matics, or language, as such, but in imaginative and dramatic literature; for here man has recorded the movings of his own spirit. Myths, leg- ends, folk-lore, fairy tales and dramas are all freighted with the same ethical lessons to man: the blessings of good-will and justice, fair requital and honest service; the curse of ill-will, injustice, failure of requital or service ; the inevitable return of the deed upon the doer ; the ETHICAL TRAINING IN ELEMENTARY SCHOOLS. 175 destruction of those who will not repent of evil deeds or restore that which was wrongfully taken away ; the moral salvation of those who do the good, or who undo their evil deeds by repentance and restitution. There is not a phase of virtue, or its opposite, that is not embodied in a thousand forms in classic literature, both for young and old. Unimag- inative thought is inclined to deny that any such content is to be found in literature, or if there, that it can be of any practical utility in the moral education of the young. People of this manner of thinking see no truth in anything not strictly material fact. The story of the trav- eller on the Jericho road is to them a baseless fabrication if the incident did not actually happen. They have no patience with the ideal in art, for the ideal is never a concrete, individual fact. The sublimest ethical truths are mere moonshine and vain imaginings if they are clothed in the garb of fancy. But it is not to this hard and dry materialism, this insensibility to the truth that is not seen and touched, that this paper is directed. In the words of Professor Bowne, " People in this phase of existence can only remind us of Adam and Eve before the fall, of whom it is said, they were naked and were not ashamed." But the argument is meant to reach those who can recognize a truth when not dressed in homespun, who see that the imagination makes man free by enabling him to break the bonds of a material servitude, by making it possible for him ideally to pass through the experience of the race without the pain that the original experience cost. Who that has read the masterpieces of the world's literature can doubt their ethical content? Think of Shakspere. His works are the embodiment of the ethical order of the world. He is the great institutional poet. What the legislator writes in the book of laws, he embodies in the forms of art. Every play opens with an offence against the ethical order as exhibited in some institution. Think of Lear in his overblown folly, and of the crimes of his daughters; of Macbeth, whose great deed in saving the king from his enemies bears the seeds of his own destruction ; of Duke Frederick and Oliver in " As You Like It," who usurp the rights of their brothers. Every one of Shakspere's plays moves on from the initial wrong to its culmination, when the world begins to purge itself of the unethical condition of things. This is done in the tragedies by the death of the offenders, and in the com- edies by their repentance and restitution. What is Dante's " Divine Comedy " but a picture of human life? One is in the Inferno when ruled by his animal nature, when he denies the validity of good-will, justice, fair requital, service. He is in the " Purgatorio " when he is purging himself of these stains by resisting them and burning them out. He is in the " Paradiso " when lie has come to stand in right ethical relations to his fellows in the institutional life. Faust goes through his struggle 176 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION. with the modern devil — a devil devoid of horns and tail, indeed, but without any diminution of satanic virtues. AVhat is Homer but a more boyish exposition of the same eternal ethical struggle in which the race has ever been plunged? The opening is the same. " I sing the wrath of Peleus' son," says the poet. But the wrath of Peleus' son, like the wrath of other sons, soon passes its proper limits. Homer tells of the wrong done by Agamemnon, king of men ; the unreasoning rage of Achilles, which passes from just indignation to irrational hate ; the return of his deed upon himself, in the death of his friend, Patroclus. Here is the same eternal message coming to us from the boyhood of the race. But the " Iliad " and " Odyssey " themselves are based upon leg- ends and myths of gods and men which bear still the story of the strug- gle of men with soil in their efforts to be free. They are, as Dr. Harris says, the transfigured history of the race, and in them the experience of the race is embodied. The advantage of the classical, imaginative literature for the young is that it portrays the ethical lessons of life in a form that most power- fully appeals to the child's natural interests. To many it is a familiar thought that the stages of a child's mental development correspond to the stages of culture through which the world has passed. If this is true, as it must be in some sense, then thoughtful experiment with classical literary forms will enable us to find that best adapted to any given stage of child development. All education is a process of attain- ing intellectual and moral freedom. The true fairy tale not only embodies an ethical truth, but it frees the puny child from the iron bands of time and place and circumstance. The child of penury may dwell in marble halls with princes of the blood, and eat the food of the gods. Mrs. Burnett has beautifully illustrated this power of the imag- ination in " Sara Crew." The curly-headed lad at his father's knee may quickly become the armed hero, doing mighty deeds for the right. This emancipation from the physical limitations may soon be trans- formed to the moral field. I have said that it is the mission of litera- ture to enable the individual ideally to pass through the experience of the race without the pain that the original experience cost. What a weary round of scourgings the race has gone through to arrive at its present state of material, political, and ethical freedom! All this is portrayed figuratively in literature, and literally in history. The child is born now, as ever, with all his experiences before him. Must he, for the lack of education, tread again the thorny path of his race? We do not ask it with regard to his material or intellectual welfare ; why should we with the moral? Shall we not rather portray the inevitable struggle in forms that he can understand, teaching him to win the victory before the battle is fought? ETHICAL TRAINING IN ELEMENTARY SCHOOLS. 177 The basis for ethical training in elementary education advocated in this paper is to be found, therefore, primarily in a graduated course in classical literature, beginning with fairy tales, myths, legends, and folk- lore, and culminating with the higher dramatic literature ; and second- arily, in the concrete biographical and narrative elements of history. The argument has run as follows : 1. There is a subjective and individual morality in which the har- mony of conscience and volition is the main thing; and, on the other hand, an objective morality, which has to do with ethical relations as determined by institutions of society. The child needs an ethical train- ing in this second realm, in addition to all that is done in the first, in order that God in the heart and God in the world may be one thing. 2. This training should aim not only to give instruction in ethical duties, but to train the will to perform them as an expression of the inner life. 3. The best method of doing this is to awaken an active interest in that which has the ethical content, since such an interest is essential to the formation of the adequate moral ideals. 4. The ethical order of the world establishes and maintains itself as an objective fact in institutions of family, school, church, state, and the business world. 5. The four fundamental ethical ideas, good-will, justice, adequate requital and honest service, together with all their manifold variations, are embodied in ideal form, capable of appealing powerfully to the apprehending capacity and natural interests of childhood in the juvenile and adult classical literature of the world. 6. The elementary schools should establish a systematic training in such literature, to the end that in the field of practical ethics, as else- where, the child may share in the spiritual conquests of his race ; that he may enter into his inheritance as an heir of all the ages, earning the inheritance anew, not actually with the original passion and pain, but ideally in the quiet realms of thought. DISCUSSION. F. M. McMurray of Illinois: — Mr. President, Ladies and Gentle- wen : The problem is the selection of literature or history for each of the eight years of the public school which will contain an abun- dance of moral ideas, and will present them in such a way that the 178 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION child will become so thoroughly interested in them that his character will thereby be affected. For many years it has been believed by teachers that the literatures of the higher course will accomplish this object. During the last few years there has been a growing conviction that in the lowest grades ideals may be presented to the children which will affect their character. The literature, however, must be chosen of different kinds. There is a conviction growing that all imaginative literature is suitable to affect the child in the first year, and, for that reason, the imaginative story, the fairy tale, has been chosen; there is a strong feeling on the part of many against the selection of this literature. But it is possible to make such a selection, presenting good moral ideas in such a way that the children can enjoy them. If we can accomplish that object, certainly the character of the child will be so reached that moral ideas will control their action and they can be given motives in that way. Also the conviction is growing that in the third, fourth, and fifth grades history and literature may be taught in such a way as to reach the character of the child. It seems to me we can do that, provided we let alone the teaching of so many dead, unmeaning facts, and direct the attention of the child more to the motives which should '•overn men. It is my purpose, however, only to speak of one piece of literature, which seems to me to contain much more of the essential requirements than any other for children in the second or third year. This literature should contain much that is instructive, and, altogether, it seems to me that the story of Robinson Crusoe embraces the essential condition and contains that of the greatest moral worth. The story of Eobinson Crusoe is really the history of the human soul. The boy at home was a good-for-nothing and worthless lad, for whom no one cared, and in whom no one took any special interest besides the parents. He ran away and landed upon an island, after being first shipwrecked, when he came to his senses. He looked about for his companions, and he was horror-stricken when he discovered they were all lost. He was over- whelmed with sorrow, and in the midst of his sorrow he went to God for forgiveness for his wrong-doing, and resolved to live a changed life from that time on. The first few days of his life upon the island seemed to be especially lonesome, -and then he thought he would die of starvation and be destroyed by wild beasts. The island was uninhabited, and so each day he prayed to God for protection from hunger and wild beasts. He discovers a Bible upon the old vessel, and carries it to his little home, and there he studies it some each day. It has become a habit with him. He is beginning to rely upon God each day, when he discovers grain growing before his door, and that brings out that portion of the Lord's prayer " give us this day our daily bread." In the midst of his sickness ETHICAL TRAINING IN ELEMENTARY SCHOOLS. 179 he relied upon the protection of God. He prays to God frequently, and when his recovery takes place, it seems to be as an answer to his prayer; and finally he develops the true Christian character. Once a man comes upon the island, an ignorant savage, and he tells him about God, how much he loves him and how much he cares for him. It seems to me you see in that story the development of the human soul from an almost worthless condition to that of the higher Christian type, and the whole is presented in such a way that the child can thoroughly under- stand and enjoy it. If all of these thoughts were presented in a few days it is quite likely the effect upon the character of the child would not be great, and I am speaking of the story as being taught for an entire year, or for a larger portion of the year. Suppose the child becomes thoroughly interested in the story of Eobinson Crusoe ; he lives right there with Robinson Crusoe, all through his religious experience and moral feeling. Will he not naturally feel as Robinson Crusoe did? So much for the moral worth of this story. But further than that, it seems to me, it is a pleasant history. The child follows Robinson Crusoe through his long trouble to make his own living. The thought is con- stantly impressed upon the child that Robinson should have some friend, and from the story the child also gets the most important education that history can give, and that is, that great progress has been going ofi in civilization all the time. He sees the simple beginning, and he sees what the present state of society is, and he realizes that people must be compelled to start way back from that simple condition to reach the present high condition — an important thought in history. The fact that Robinson Crusoe has no companions about him, has no home, emphasizes decidedly the importance of home, and the child learns to realize how important his own home may be to him, and how important it is that he should have companions to associate with him. Besides all this, a large amount of useful knowledge is given to the child from this story. Another thing the child would gather from this is that he is to understand that new problems are constantly rising before him to be solved, as they did before Robinson. All the way through the work there is a lively exercise for the imagination, and when the child reads with interest the story of Robinson Crusoe, his imagination is given wide play; and so self-activity in the child may be developed from a careful study of this book. All this, and many others, would seem to furnish a good reason for its being taught. 180 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION THE PROFESSION OF TEACHING FOR LIGHT AND POWER. PRESIDENT MERRILL E. GATES, AMHERST, MASS. Mr. President, Ladies and Gentlemen : — We have no standing armies in America. In Europe 'tis an old saying that every productive laborer must carry on his back an idle, full-armed soldier. Not so with us. America does not wish for membership in that " International League" where the big royal boys of Europe waste treasure and life in the costly game of war — " check" to your adversary's policy by moving out a hundred thousand prettily caparisoned men. It was in part the lack of this pageantry of war that led Matthew Arnold to criticise life in America as " uninterest- ing." But to the men whose eyes are opened the interest of American life lies not in the bloody play of war, nor in piles of architecture, nor in social forms bequeathed from a storied antiquity ; but in the noble strife, everywhere evident, to educate, to uplift the masses. We believe in the common, every-day people. With Lincoln we are ready to say " God Almighty must think a great deal of commonplace people, or he never would have made so many of them." With us, in the States and in Canada, the industrial organization has replaced the military. We build railroads and operate factories by the help of those millions of men whom England keeps in arms and trains to enforced idleness. The peaceful triumphs of engineering make magazine articles as brilliantly interesting as those that chronicle the achievements of our veteran soldiers, now peaceful citizens. In a peace- ful, industrial society, engaged in developing the resources of a conti- nent, we do our work as teachers. May the lesson of the American continent to the world — yes, the lesson of the great Anglo-American- Australian, English-speaking race to the world it almost girdles — be the possibility of peaceful relations without constant menace of war. But in this peaceful life there are still heroic contests to be waged. And this body of teachers represents the assembled forces of our party. " The ultimate question between every two human beings," says Carlyle, " is, can I kill thee or canst thou kill me?" Carried into the realm of ideas, this is a striking description of the contest that engages our ener- gies. The struggle between ideas and righteousness on the one side and stupidity and sin on the other is a warfare that never ceases. Unless the men of ideas kill stupidity into a higher life stupidity will * President Gates spoke without manuscript, and the stenographer failed to take a verbatim report; therefore, this address is from notes only. TEACHING FOR LIGHT AND POWER. 181 kill ideas. However society may be reorganized, it is still ideas that must rule, if the world is to prosper. Only by welcoming in your own life, and by diffusing among others, the sway of ideas, can you be mas- ters of the art of living well. But, forgetting for a little this warfare of ideas with stupidity, in which you are all leaders, if we try the teacher's work by economic tests, its value is manifest and is immeasurable. When we take into account the vast educational system here represented, no meeting that assembles on the continent this year represents so vast a productive force as does this Association. You know how slight an element in the money value of the finished watch is the rough weight of metal in its make-up. Skilled labor expended on that metal has given it its high value. The difference in worth to society, to the state, between the stolid, unskilled, ignorant laborer who has known nothing of the uplift of education and the most intelligent and public-spirited of our citizens — who can estimate? All due credit given to the influence of home and family, it is still the school, our system of education, from its lowest grades to its highest institutions, which works this difference. There are no such producers of values as are true teachers. All men ought to be laborers. It is an honorable title, that of worker. I claim it for myself and for you. All men have a right to it who work faithfully, whether with hands or head. Let no attempts to refine upon distinctions between capital and labor deprive you of your honor- able right to be classed as one who labors. " It is a contemptible thing to luxuriate in idleness; it is a most royal thing to labor," said Alex- ander the Great; and never did he utter a more royal truth. Let us claim a place for teachers and scholars among the workingmen, the pro- ducers of values. Close beside the honorable title of the laborer to universal respect lies one of the most dangerous and misleading maxims of the socialistic and anarchic labor agitators. They build their demands for the entire over- throw of the present industrial system on this proposition: "Labor" (and they mean to limit the term to labor with the hands) " Labor is the source of all wealth." Hence, all who do not labor with their hands they call drones. But shall the man who manages the machine be called a productive laborer, and the man who, by patient study, contrived the machine be called unproductive and a drone? The laborer controls and directs the work of the machine because he has intelligence and the machine has not. Just in proportion as a laborer's intelligence and skill increase, his efficiency and value as a productive laborer increase. Added power so to use his brains as to make the work of his hands more effective does not make him any the less truly a laborer. When he becomes 1S2 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION sufficiently intelligent to guide and direct the work of other men, as well as of machines; when he has saved from his wages the means to purchase an interest in the business; when, as manager, he works and plans for his business half the night as well as all the day, is he any less a productive laborer because he cannot now " quit " at five or six o'clock? Clearly not. Close, accurate, consecutive thinking is the hardest work men do. When we seek for the common manhood which makes all men brethren we find one mark . of it in the common obligation to work. But those who seek so to limit " work " and " labor " as to shut out intel- ligence and brain power are levelling down, not up. By such an argument they seek a basis for brotherhood among men in that mere power of brawn which marks the horse and the ox. They kill hope and cut the nerve of effort. " Labor is the source of all wealth" only when laborers are understood to include all who work with hands or brain ; and when we thus understand it, dangerous, socialistic talk of the natural antag- onism between labor and capital becomes pointless. True education increases knowledge, but still more emphatically does it develop power. Our own age is awakening wonderfully to the truth that education is essential to true manhood, and that all sorts and con- ditions of men should receive an education. The desirability of an education for all has never before been clear to all classes of men. We no longer find any who venture to argue that it is well to have an igno- rant body of toilers to do the world's hardest work. Toilers with the hand are now expected to be men who think, men w.ho, at least, wish their children educated. " Congresses of labor " discuss the deepest sociological problems. Grad- ually man is taking possession of his entire being, is learning that, what- ever may be his occupation, he has a right to use fully all his powers. In war, "bayonets that think" make victorious armies; in the nobler contests of peace, workmen who think, workmen who know, win the triumphs of industrialism. Practically and manifestly to-day the question of popular education is the all-important question. What the ardent prophets of two or three generations ago foretold when their souls were fired by visions of universal suffrage, the civilized world has practically accepted now. The only hope for the world in which popular government is to prevail lies in increasing popular intel- ligence, and popular virtue and goodness, and in embodying these results of education in institutions, laws, and governments. The school takes the child out of the home, the family, where love and self-sacrifice are the law and the ideal of life, and introduces him to relations of equity with his equals, where are formed his life-long conditioning habits of intercourse with others. TEACHING FOR LIGHT AND POWER. 183 The school thus forms the future citizen. " What you would have come out in the life of the nation you must put into the schools and the universities," has long been a maxim of government in Germany. To form a true man is the highest object of all teaching. The ideals under which the teacher does his work will, in no slight measure, deter- mine his power thus to train manly men, and true, womanly women. Since " duty is the one art to be daily practiced," since even Professor Huxley defines the object of an education to be " the ability to do the thing you have to do, when it ought to be done, whether you like to do it or not," the strengthening of the will, the development of character — that is to say, of moral power — is the most important phase of the teacher's work. Can conscience, can moral law, be made dominant in society, in poli- tics, in international relations? Some notable indications of progress toward this goal have been manifest, recently, in the quick retirement from American political life of the prominent politician who main- tained that there "was no place in politics for the decalogue," in the quick and clear appreciation of moral standards by the public, where cases of immorality were involved, in the army and in high social circles in England, and by the notable lessons of peaceful arbitration given to the world by the two nations represented here to-night — by Great Britain and the United States. That moral power in character may result from the teacher's work, the teacher must know the power of personality, must learn to draw moral power from that One Supreme Personality whose will and work are manifest in the world of nature, in the light of reason, and in that revelation of His will which shows to us the One Perfect Man, who is also God, whose love furnishes the moral dynamic which holds men true to goodness and saves the world. In the effort to build up character while acquiring knowledge, do we not come to know the need of some strong elemental force that shall draw us, by a powerful attraction, toward goodness and duty, when duty is clearly seen? Can any man watch the development of the growing powers of early manhood without seeing clearly the need of some mighty energizing force which, like heat, or light, or life, shall transmute knowledge into wisdom, ethics into goodness of life, and noble thoughts and purposes into a will-power used in just and pure and noble living? The great want of our schools, colleges, and universities to-day is a deeper, fuller, more abounding life in the young. We want more light ! We want more power ! We want more life ! Life is from Christ, our sun of righteousness. Given that subtle architectonic principle which builds up each organism after its kind, given that life-principle which no analysis can quite reach and which 184 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION refuses to resolve itself into other forces, and biology shows us that we are still directly dependent upon light and heat for the development of life. Not only must we go to Christ for the teaching from above that originates life, and gives new life when the soul is born again, but for heat and light, without which life must perish; we depend still on the Sun of our Soul. No sun, no life or growth ! But once possessed of Christian life, how shall we get work done — work by the intellect, by the will, lighted by the intellect and impelled by the emotions? We want not merely potential energy of soul, but kinetic energy, force, expended in good work done. How move the dead weight of social statics and carry the burdens of social reform? From what source shall men draw the power needed to transmute ethical con- victions into practical goodness of life? Is there a source of power to which we may safely send the young, that they may draw unfailing sup- plies, that their lives may go on in achievement and in development, may produce the most ample and satisfactory results? Here, too, we turn to the sun. All forms of power which we use in the physical world the sun has stored up for us. We simply draw upon the limitless reserve of sun power! Do we use steam, it matters not whether we draw our heat from wood or coal, or the mineral ores; we are drawing it in the last analysis from the sun. But steam gives way to electricity, you say. Already this subtle power does service in a thousand ways. But for the supply of electricity already thoughtful inventors are turning towards the sun. Already they store up power from the restless tossing of the waves which the sun-moved air-currents have set playing. Already they store up energy, and heat, and electri- city by using the changes in tide-levels; and thus, for our daily tasks, harness the vast bulk of that huge, plunging ox, the moon, with crater- callous shoulder, to our yoke, and thus make fresh use of the sun's motor power. But subtler still is the potent, silent power of the sun. The sun, shining calmly on the sensitive thermo-electric piles that simply absorb his rays, starts currents of power which, stored up for us, shall do our work through all dark days, and shall banish with brilliant life the darkness of our nights. Does not all this most wonderfully answer to the work on men's hearts of the Sun of Righteousness? From Christ, our Sun of Righteousness, stream light and life and power. That we may be filled with energy and light and power from Him, we need only turn our faces fully toward Him and draw life and strength from vision. Let us rest for a moment in the thought of the unchanging value of the work of education. Education, in its large essential features, has been the chief occupa- TEACHING FOR LIGHT AND POWER. 185 tion of the lenders of our race from a time far earlier than the dawn of history. It is the superintendence of education, from generation to generation, which has preserved the solidarity of the race. Since the World began, to educate mankind has been always unconsciously the result, and sometimes consciously the goal, of all the efforts men have made in advancing their material interests and in building up and defining clearly the institutional life of the family, the church, and the state. Self-education has attended all the conscious and unconscious efforts of the race toward a higher civilization, a nobler manhood. The patriarchal heads of clans and tribes were superintending their educa- tion. The founders of cities, the legislators of nascent commonwealths, were mighty schoolmasters. The great names which the world honors in history, in art, and in literature, are the names of those who have given emphasis to this work of teaching men — the directors of the . world's greatest work — the education of mankind. The roll of the world's patriots and statesmen is the list of those who have been charged with the task of embodying the ideas of the great educators in institutions and laws, to guide the race aright, and to confirm it in justice and righteousness. The poets and historians are the critic-teachers in man- kind's vast system of public education, selecting for praise or censure those who, by ideas or by deeds, have been the teachers of the race, and in poems and inspired prose enforcing these lessons on all who hear or read. As love in the human heart has been " the great conservator of good," has kept alive the virtues through all the ages, so the work of education, consciously or unconsciously carried forward, has constantly been the developing force in the melioration of mankind. By ideas embodied in literature, in art, in institutions, and in con- quests over stubborn matter, the work of education is seen to have been more and more evidently the conscious aim of the leaders of the race. But there is a narrower use of the term education, which lays emphasis upon man's conscious effort to secure the full development of all his powers. Well or ill, every man must, in a sense, be educated by the experience of life. But the education which interests us is something more definite than this; it is the intelligent adaptation of chosen means to the definite end of developing fully all the powers of body, mind, and spirit. It is the formation of character. No human law is so mighty as a principle cherished in the heart. No sway is so powerful as the sway of a thought lovingly held at life's centre. It is the beliefs and the hopes which a man unconsciously repeats to himself in his quiet moments that control and shape his life. Not the creeds which bodies of men in concert publicly recite, but the creed intimately cherished by each man, held so close to life's centre that it becomes half unconscious, mingles with the affections, and directs the daily and the hourly choices 18G THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION which make np the sum of living — this creed it is that moulds the man. These intensely real beliefs of its individual citizens shape the life of the nation. To keep these fountains of action clear and sweet is to transform the nations. Only as we teach men, one by one, to open their hearts to the daylight can we bring in " the better day" for mankind. There is an intensely vital relation between principles cherished in the heart and actions worked out in the life. It is this that gives practical value to right thinking, sound knowledge, and the love of truth and right principles. It can never more be with you as if you had not seen these things. Noblesse oblige. The world has a right to look to men of ideas for noble living. It is a reasonable demand that men of education be men of high character. Minds that have come into close relation with truth are seized on by a higher power. Lives that come willingly into close contact with the mighty laws which govern God's universe become magnetized by truth. Human wills laid in loving and intelligent submission alongside that mighty current of personified will that "makes for righteousness" in God's government of the universe become magnetized by God's truth, swing readily to the right course when God's purposes go thrilling through the lives and hearts of men, are seized unon by a higher power, and henceforth and for eternity become witnesses to the truth. If the life of each one of you is thus brought into line with God's great purposes there will flow through your lives a strength greater than the power of man — yes, greater than all the powers of evil — that splen- did power of eternal righteousness which enables men who will receive it to move the world, and, " having done all, to stand." Fellow-teachers, science bids us work for law and order everywhere. We are to learn morals, too, under Him who is the mightiest teacher. We are to teach our pupils to look to God for will-power. The Great Teacher is He of whom Jean Paul says that He was " The lowliest among the mighty and the mightiest among the lowly, who with his pierced hand has lifted the gates of empires off their hinges, turned the course of history out of its channel, and still governs the centuries." My brothers, my sisters, in our teaching let us look for guidance to the Supreme Teacher. Let us at least touch the hem of His garment, that virtue may pass into us for our work. Nay, rather let us walk with our hand in His, that we may always have light and power to lead others to Him. For to lead men to look up to Him, and to serve Him, in serving well their fellow-men, is the supreme work of the profession which we love. ELEMENTARY EDUCATION IN ENGLAND. 187 ELEMENTARY EDUCATION IN ENGLAND. PROFESSOR WILLIAM CLARK, TRINITY UNIVERSITY, TORONTO. Mr. Chairman, Ladies and Gentlemen: — It is not allowed a public speaker to make an apology before his audience, and I am not going to claim any such privilege, but it is proper I should explain why my re- marks must take the form they will assume. You have already partially explained it in stating that I have been called here on very short notice to take the place of a distinguished gentleman who was expected here to-night. The audience must not expect from me an elaborate paper, which I have not had time to write, but bear with me as I briefly refer to the subject of elementary education in Great Britain. I wish to say first of all on this subject that there is this difference between education in England and education on this side of the Atlantic. We have here what I might call either a ready-made imported article, or an article which we have manufactured on the spot, in accordance with some theory or theories; whereas in England they have an educa- tional system which has been the outgrowth of time, like her civiliza- tion, and a great many other things in England. Many people looking at the English system of education, understanding some of its defects, I dare say think they are inconsistent and illogical — that the Eng- lish people are always illogical. A good story is told of a splendid French constitution, which was made according to the best pattern, but it would not work. The English constitution has been made according to no pattern ; nobody can tell what it is in itself. Now, sir, when we stop to consider elementary education in Great Britain we at once think of the two countries, England and Scotland. I will not touch upon Ireland, because the case is very different; it would need some explanation. But England and Scotland are different. The course of the two countries has been entirely different. Scotland has had a really excellent system of elementary education, not merely from the time of the Reformation, when it was organized by the great John Knox, but even before the Reformation. And I suppose I may say (because I was born in Scotland) that, in my opinion, the peasantry of Scotland are the best educated peasantry of the world. I believe there are many men present in this city of Toronto who received their early education in the ele- mentary schools of Scotland. This system of education in Scotland went on from the time of the Reformation to our time, with only such modifi- cations as are forced upon any system by surrounding circumstances. Quite recently, however, since the date of the passage of the educational act in 1870, for England, education has been taken out of the hands of 188 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION. the Presbyterian Church, the established church, and has been placed in the hands of the School Board. Whether it has been improved by that process, I really do not know. I do not find that changes in educational systems are always important. I am to be followed by a very distin- guished representative of the great University of Oxford, and perhaps he will tell you something about the changes. But I am considering for a moment this Scottish system and the English system. Let us remember what the early history of education in England and Scotland is. You and I are just as much, and just as little, responsible as any- body. We all of us, whether Canadians, Englishmen, or Scotchmen, inherit this past; it is ours. After the Danish invasion, and during the time of Alfred, few of the priests were able to read a page of Latin. Great intellectual darkness pervaded England during and subsequent to the Wars of the Koses. During the reign of Edward VI. the foun- dations of education had been diverted from their general purposes, and in some places charity schools were established; and this led on in 1781 to the establishment of Sunday-schools. Many parochial schools were subsequently founded, and in 1811 the national society was brought into existence. Between 1811 and 1841 no fewer than thirteen thou- sand new schools had been established. Up to this time the government had taken no part in the work. It was in 1832 that the British government began to subsidize the educational movement. In 1832 the first grant of £30,000 was made by the imperial parliament to carry on the work of education in England. In 1839 a Board of Education was formed, and the grant was increased £30,000, principally for the building of schools. In 1846 the government made an augmentation of teachers' salaries, and also boys and girls who came from school had an allowance made to them during the time of their training for being masters. In 1853 the system of having the school examined by her Ma- jesty's inspector was introduced, and then a certain grant was made for every pupil who had attended a certain period during the year. This brings me to the point of the introduction of the educational act of 1870. For the information of those who are not familiar with these facts, I may say that up to the year 1870 there was no regular pro- vision for the education of the poorer classes in England. On this question there were extremists on both sides. The clergymen of the Church of England had done a great deal for the education of the poor during this century ; many of the clergy badly paid, supported to the extent of one third or one half the cost of their parochial schools. However when the work was once fairly started, Robert Lowe declared- that now we must educate our masses. And in the House of Commons, in 1870, Sir William Foster declared that the Education Act did not propose to sweep away anything that existed. For example, this Act ELEMENTARY EDUCATION IN ENGLAND. 189 of 1870 did not require that the school board should be set up in every place ; provided there was education efficient and sufficient in every place things were allowed to go on as they were, the revenues of the school being derived from three sources: First. Voluntary subscription. Second. Children's pence. Third. Government grant. The government grant often amounted to about one half of the whole expense of the school. The government said, if these family and private schools are sufficient for the population we will not interfere, if our inspectors find that the children are properly taught. And in the larger English schools and the other parochial schools the children may receive instruction there without taking religious instruction. The government said then, we will recognize your school and we will sub- sidize it. We will give you a grant in accordance with the number of children who pass our examination and who attend your school. So this kind of a mixed system grew up. Wherever there was not sufficient provision, there the school board was set up directly. You can easily see the difficulties which the voluntary schools had to deal with. Every one had to pay his own rate whether he subscribed to the voluntary schools or not. Consequently they found it difficult to get both rates of subscription from the same person. This caused more difficulty, and in many places no doubt some of the English church schools were closed. In the country places, I believe, there are very few parishes in Eng- land in which there is a school board. The old system goes on — na- tional schools as they are called. In the large cities and towns there are school boards, but in some of the smaller towns there are not. Generally speaking, a change has been brought about on the part of the clergymen. Where there have been active clergymen, there the national schools were helped on, but religious instruction is given in them accord- ing to the Church of England, whilst other children can attend without being present at religious lessons. This condition of things in England continued to the year 1870. Now there are, perhaps, very few children in the island but what attend every day regularly at these schools, whether national, British, or boarding schools. Two or three years after 1870, by the Act of 1873, which was extended in 1876, compulsory attendance was required, and there were school-board officers who went around and saw that the children attended school, and the parents were liable to be imprisoned if they did not send their children to school. During all this time, however, I ought to mention that school fees, to some extent — sometimes small and sometimes large — have been paid in all of these voluntary schools, of course excepting the large free schools, of which there were some existing throughout the country. I 190 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION do not at this moment remember the number of board schools which are actually free. Of course the majority of board schools can do precisely as they like because they have the power of taxation. There has recently been introduced into the House of Commons a measure for free education of the poorer classes in England. It is a very interesting question, and I believe the bill will pass into a law. I can very well imagine, sir, that much of what I have been saying may have sounded slightly irrational to the people on this side. There it has not been considered wise to destroy' a system which has existed for so long a time and has worked pretty well. There it is not considered wise to inter- fere with a system which has produced a result which perhaps cannot be produced by a system which you would put in its place. Therefore it is now proposed to make grants to all schools who give free education, in order to prevent the diminution of these voluntary schools. Now, sir, that is substantially the state of things with regard to ele- mentary education in England at this moment. You have perceived that my sympathies are with the method pursued in England. But I hope that that fact has not caused me to misrepresent or distort any historical facts which I have thus briefly, and I am afraid rather imper- fectly, brought before this meeting. One thing it seems to me must be quite clear, that by the method now pursued in England there is no difficulty about imparting religious instruction. I ought, perhaps, to mention that in 1870 there was introduced a measure which allowed the rates to be paid to the Church of England schools or independent schools of any kind — Christian undenominational schools — not separate schools, but simply part of the rates might go to that school so long as that school was doing this work, and this movement received the great regard of the clergymen and my own regard. But there is no chance at all in England of getting separate schools. In England they would be devoutly thankful to get what the Roman Catholics have in Ontario. Whether that is desirable or not we have not the disposition to argue ; we have no chance to get it. Now while I admire very much indeed the system which prevails in the Province, where I believe the schools should be equal to anything which could possibly exist, and while I think that those of the Old World have something to learn-from their children in the New, yet we have something to learn from our relations across the water, and that is in regard to religious education. We do not have the Bible. I do not understand why it is unrighteous to make selections from the Bible as they say. The Congregationalist does so. They tell us we are not going to have a selection from the Bible, but must have the whole Bible taught to these uneducated children in our schools, as if there was any Christian denomination that did not make selections from the Bible. ELEMENTARY EDUCATION IN ENGLAND. 191 Why should it be regarded as inconsistent for school superintendents to make these selections for the sake of their children? Now, in this country there is no intelligent instructor that I know of who does not complain of the want of individuality, and when I cross the border to the United States — I am sure no one will be offended at what I am say- ing— I hear the same complaint from the clergy and from the laity that we are turning out our best girls and young men on rather too large a pattern. Undoubtedly there are defects in the English system ; I am not denying that, but I say in the respect referred to, English education is way ahead of our own. From the general education of England we have something to learn in the light and shade and individuality which we fail to produce here. I am not speaking of the great schools of Eton and Oxford. Of course those are great schools, but I speak of the sys- tem of common education in England ; I say they produce types of char- acter very beautiful, very characteristic, and I say we have something to learn from the system of general education in England. And I am not speaking here merely of the national education, of Oxford and Cambridge, where is produced the large intelligence, although we have endeavored to imitate it with regard to our surroundings and adopt its use in this country; but, notwithstanding we have endeavored to reproduce the English type of education, I do not see that individualism among our young men which I have seen at Oxford or in the old universities of Scotland. Therefore, sir, in conclusion, while we are not disposed to boast — we boast a great deal too much — we are a great deal more conceited here than they are in the old country ; I think we boast a great deal more than is good for us, but John Bull never boasts. I repeat that most emphatically, John Bull hardly ever boasts, because, generally speak- ing, he is so well satisfied with himself that there is no occasion for it. (Laughter). Other nations are often anxious to know what their neighbors think of them or their country. John Bull does not care one straw what any one thinks of England, for John Bull is perfectly certain that any one who does not appreciate England must be a born fool. At the same time it might be better if we were all to learn a little humility, for has it not been said, — " That the Kingdom of Knowledge can be entered no otherwise than the Kingdom of Heaven, by becoming a little child." This, too, is a lesson which we may learn by contact with our neigh- bors and a study of their methods. Therefore, while we ought not to boast, but thank God for what we have done in this country in the matter of education, still we have a great deal to be thankful for in what has come to us from that country whose inheritance we regard as ours, whose people 192 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION. speak the same tongue, have the same institutions and substantially the same laws. I say, while we love and honor our own institutions, let us remember the great races across the Atlantic from which we came, and if we are willing to teach them something I believe they are willing to learn it, and if there is anything in their institutions that will improve our system, let us adopt it in order that the world may go forward and the great work in which we are engaged may be progresssed. President Garrett: — The association will learn with much pleasure that we have present to-night a distinguished gentleman whose reputation has reached wherever the English language is spoken, and with whom many of us have communed through his public works. I know it will give you pleasure to-night to see and hear Professor Goldwin Smith, of Toronto, who has consented to speak to us a few words. Professor Goldwin Smith spoke as follows: — Mr. President, Ladies and Gentlemen : — I am not going to inflict a speech upon you on the subject of English education or any other sub- ject. In fact I have not the strength to address this audience in such a hall. I come forward to add only one voice to the welcome which has received you here. I cannot pretend to be connected with education in this place, but I am connected with its student life, and in that char- acter I heartily greet you. I used to know something about the state of English education, for I was a member of the Royal Commission which was appointed about thirty years ago to inquire into the state of educa- tion and frame a national scheme ; but events since then have marred it, and all I clearly see now is that there is a conflict going on in my na- tive country between two principles : the secular and the state system on the one hand and the voluntary or parental system on the other. There are those two currents of conflicting opinion. The state or secular ap- pears to be the stronger, and in the eddies created by that conflict the politicians of both parties are fishing for votes. Heaven preserve educa- tion from politics! Now my memory carries me back to the old English village school, a very antediluvian institution. We have advanced far, very far beyond it in apparatus, in text-books, in pedagogic science, and in the training of our teachers. I wish I felt quite sure that we had advanced far beyond it in the formation of character. However, that depended in a great degree upon the social influence in the old English parish. One system will not do for all Countries in education, any more than in any other department. This is a new country where men begin with a clean sheet of paper. England is an old country on which ages have written their legends. No one system, I say, will do for all countries, and the old English system had virtues which belonged to itself and which we caunot transplant here. I have always been rather inclined, I must con- THE PROFESSIONAL TRAINING OF TEACHERS. 193 fess — perhaps I ought to be ashamed to confess — to the voluntary or parental system. The voluntary system has, of course, great shortcom- ings and defects, but it has not the fatal malady of routine. Average men and women must work, and we should not expect, what speakers seem often to expect, a seraphic zeal and a Solomon's wisdom for four or five hundred dollars a year. The universities of England, I am happy to say, are still ruled by a policy as wise as it is magnificent, and entirely free from the influence of politics. The two great universities are surrounded by proper safe- guards and every necessary reform is speedily adopted. They are, I repeat, governed under a policy as wise as it is magnificent, kept entirely apart from the politics of the hour ; and are devoted exclusively to the advancement of knowledge and truth. Ladies and Gentlemen, I have an abiding faith in liberty. When liberty is attained, the most rapid progress of the world will be assured. There must be no isolated selfishness, but true, full, and hearty co-operation looking to the amel- ioration of the human race. Once more, without attempting further to dilate on this subject, let me, as a student of Toronto and history, greet you and welcome you here. I trust your visit to us has been pleasant and profitable — be sure we have all felt it a great honor to have you here. THE PROFESSIONAL TRAINING OF TEACHERS. D. J. GOGGIN, WINNIPEG, MANITOBA. It is assumed that it is the duty of the state to establish, support, and control public schools, in order that its youth shall receive that instruc- tion, discipline, and training necessary for the enlightened discharge of the duties of citizenship. There cannot be good public schools without good teachers. It may be affirmed generally that in teaching, as in every other work, the trained man is superior to the untrained one. Experience has shown that unless the state provides this training, the supply of such teachers is insufficient to do the work which the public school was established to perform. The object of this paper is to show : — A. What this training should include. B. How it may be provided. 194 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION All plans for the training of teachers mnst be based upon a considera- tion of what a teacher should know in order to achieve the highest success. This may be briefly stated thus : — 1. He should know the Philosophy of Education, which determines its nature, defines its limits, and states its aim. 2. He should know Man — his physical, intellectual, and moral nature. 3. He should know the Subject-matter employed in educating, and its values for the purpose of discipline, knowledge, and culture. 4. He should know Method, which deals with the right adjustment and presentation of this Subject-matter to mind. 5. He should know the History of Education, which describes theories and systems of education, and sets forth the practice of great educators. To these should be added observation of the work of skilled teachers, practice-teaching under rational criticism, and a period of probation sufficient to test power of independent management. A fuller statement of these topics is now given. 1. THE PHILOSOPHY OF EDUCATION. The Nature of Education. — Respecting this there are at least two prominent theories. One views mind as a self-active agent selecting from its environment what is useful for its development. The other views mind as a result produced by environment. The one considers chiefly how mind develops through assimilating knowledge, the other, what knowledge shall be assimilated. A true theory, through proper selection and adjustment of subject-matter and its right presentation, combines these one-sided views. The Limits of Education. — John Stuart Mill says education " includes whatever we do for ourselves and whatever is done for us by others, for the express purpose of bringing us nearer to the perfection of our nature ; in its largest acceptation it comprehends even the indirect effects pro- duced on character and on the human faculties by things of which the direct purposes are different; by laws, by forms of government, by the industrial arts, by modes of social life, nay, even by physical facts not dependent on human will; by climate, soil, and local position." As a preventive of narrowness, such a view of education is a helpful one, but for our purpose it is too- wide. The teacher is but one of many agencies, and the school but one of many institutions that educate. For our dis- cussion, education must be limited to the purposed effect of the teacher and the school upon the individual pupil, who is himself affected by the forces of heredity and environment, and limited by the amount of nerv- ous energy originally possessed. The Aim of Education. — The means and the method in education will depend upon the aim, Landon says, " When a person has stored his THE PROFESSIONAL TRAINING OF TEACHERS. 195 mind with all serviceable materials, and cultivated his faculties to such an extent that he is able to make a vigorous use of the knowledge he possesses; when his moral power has become so developed and experi- enced that he not only has a delicate appreciation of duty, but his conscience gives its sanction to that which his intelligence dictates; when his will has been strengthened to such a degree that he is able to act with decision and bear with constancy the strain of difficulty and disappointment; when he recognizes his relationship to a Superior Being, and realizes that his every action may have an influence not only for time, but for eternity; and lastly, when his mind has acquired such keen susceptibility to the beauties both of nature and art that it adds to his pleasures and softens his cares — then he is educated." Briefly stated, the aim of education is the formation of character through moral and intellectual instruction, discipline, and training. 2. MAN". His Physical Nature. — The teacher must have a general knowledge of the human system, must know the effect upon health of proper heating, lighting, seating, and ventilation of school buildings ; and how recesses, gymnastics, and athletics affect physical development. He must under- stand the growth, waste, and repair of the nervous system, and the educational lessons to be drawn therefrom. In short, he must know the doctrine of physical conditions in relation to the receptivity and activity of mind, so that he may do his part in building up a healthy body as the home of a sound mind. His Intellectual Nature. — Intellectual instruction, discipline, and training are necessary in the formation of character. This discipline and training must be given in accordance with the laws of mind; and all subject-matter of instruction must be adjusted in conformity with these laws. Psychology furnishes these laws. The intellectual nature may be studied in several ways. One may observe his own mental acts ; he may read in books how the mind per- ceives, remembers, and knows, and compare this with his own experi- ences; he may observe the acts of others, preferably of children, and interpret them through comparison with what he has read and experi- enced; and he may "supplement the properly psychological study of mind by the psychological study of its nervous conditions and concomi- tants." Indeed, unless psychology is studied in all these ways, it will not yield that information about mental processes upon which educa- tional principles must be based. To psychological information must be added the psychological spirit and method. His Moral Nature. — Instruction in moral duties is not enough. There must be training in moral practices. Ethical knowledge must 196 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION find concrete manifestation in good action. Action depends on will ; will depends on feelings for its motives or impelling forces, and on knowledge for its illumination or guidance. The teacher must under- stand the nature of the will he has to train, and its relation to moral action. He must understand the culture of the feelings, know the value of the motives he employs to secure action, know how to gradually sub- stitute the higher for the lower motives, leading his pupils out from the bondage of external authority into the freedom of internal control, ever aiming at that crowning stage when they shall become self-governing beings, doing the right because it is the right. He must know the duties that man owes to himself, to his fellows, to the family, and the state, that he may teach them to his pupils. Ethics discusses these duties, and gives the laws of development of our moral nature. The teacher needs to know these laws, and the prin- ciples of education derivable therefrom, that he may cause all school work to be so done as to assist in the formation of that character which is the aim of education. SUBJECTS OR MATTER OF INSTRUCTION. The teacher must know the subject-matter of education, and its effect upon the pupils. His knowledge of the subject-matter should be gener- ous. No broad professional knowledge can rest on narrow scholarship. The wider his knowledge, the more clearly will he see the relation of each part of a subject to the whole, and the relation of subjects to each other. This will simplify his presentation of a subject, will provide for such arrangements of parts as the exigencies of a particular lesson may demand, and will secure attention to essentials. It will also prevent unnecessary repetition of work already provided in other subjects, and will give unity to instruction. The effect of a study upon a pupil — its educational value — depends upon its nature, and upon the way in which it is taught. According to their nature, studies furnish knowledge useful for guidance, or for pleasure considered apart from use ; according to the way in which they are taught, they yield a mental discipline. These three values are usu- ally described by the terms practical, culture, and disciplinary. Each subject of study, by its nature, tends to give a special mental habit to the student of it. This habit is affected by the method of teaching. Studies may also be considered from the stand-point of mental powers specially affected by them. Without such knowledge as this the teacher cannot know what subjects he ought to teach, or in what order, logical and psychological, they should be presented so as best to further the aim which the school has in view. THE PROFESSIONAL TRAINING OF TEACHERS. 197 METHOD OR FORM OF INSTRUCTION. This deals with the adjustment and adaptation of the subject-matter in such a way as to insure its assimilation by the pupil, and afford right mental discipline. It may be considered under three heads — the method in the learner, the method in the subject-matter, and the method in the teaching process. The method in the learner is determined by the order of development of the mental powers, irrespective of impressions made upon them by the subject-matter. It may be briefly described thus : — 1. The assimilation of new individual notions. 2. The transition from individual to general notions in the form of rules, definitions, etc. 3. The application of these general notions to new particulars. The method in the subject-matter deals with the relation of parts of a subject of instruction to its whole, and the relation of subjects to sub- jects, as regards logical dependence. The method in the teaching process includes the order of procedure and the technique of instruction. The order of procedure may be ana- lytic— from wholes to parts, or synthetic — from parts to wholes, or a combination of these. The teacher may proceed by lecture (monologue), by question and answer (dialogue), or by a combination of these. He may make use of whatever devices the practice of good teachers has shown to be help- ful, in adapting the subject-matter to the consciousness of the pupil at any particular stage. These, together with those peculiarities of manner which are the outgrowth of personality, are included under the term, technique of instruction. Until training-schools treat method as a special subject of study, after instruction in psychology and logic has been given, until they compel students to account for each step in a lesson by reference to fundamental principles, they cannot well defend themselves against the charge some- times made, that their students are mere imitators— the slaves of the rule that kills, rather than the master of the principle that makes alive. Free- dom comes to the student through rational, not mechanical, methods. HISTORY OF EDUCATION. The history of education will furnish those enduring truths which are the basis of a sound theory of education, will describe those modes of organization which have best combined economy with efficiency, and will set forth the philosophy and practice of famous teachers. Nor should the broadening, inspiring effect of this study for the teacher be overlooked. 198 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION. "For giving breadth of view and steadiness of purpose," says Com- payre, " nothing more helpful can be recommended to the teacher than a critical survey of the manifold experiments and experiences in educa- tional practice. The acutest thinkers of all ages have worked at the solution of the educational problem, and the educating art has been practised under every variety of conditions — civil, social, religious, philosophic, and ethic." Such knowledge is a necessary condition of sure and steady progress. More attention should be given to the history of modern education. The educational experiments of Britain, France, and Germany during the present century are worth more to us, from the practical stand-point, than those of Greece, Rome, and the Oriental nations. A study of the system of organization, courses of study, and plans of teaching employed to-day in Boston, Chicago, San Francisco, or Toronto is at least as interesting and more helpful than a similar study of any of the Old- World cities during the seventeenth or eighteenth centuries. This statement is made not- to disparage the study of the earlier periods but to empha- size the value of the study of experiments being made by those cities and countries which are striving, in circumstances not unlike our own, to master difficulties which are taxing our best energies. PRACTICE-TEACHING. Teaching is an art, as well as a science. The knowledge of doctrine, method, and history is acquired with a view to its application in prac- tice. The teacher may make some mistakes in the art, through miscon- ception of the theory, or through inability to apply it. Practice affords opportunities for correcting these mistakes. The value of this practice is an unsettled question. Some believe in much practice after, or along with, comparatively little theory. They say it is not so much information about methods, etc., as training in methods that is needed. This kind of training tends to slavish imitation of individuals and mechanical copying of devices. Some believe in a comparatively small amount of practice, following after a careful and extended course in theory and observation. The teacher so trained may not have the mechanical expertness of the former at the start, but he is conscious of the principles upon which his method depends, is, through his observation in the practice-school, familiar with the mechanics of the schoolroom, and, so soon as he has been led through trial lessons to be his own critic, may be trusted to grow into a good teacher, preserving his individuality. It is the kind, rather than the amount, of practice that is valuable. Others hold that after a thorough course in theory it wi1! be sufficient for the teacher to observe the work in a good school, and account for the methods employed in teaching and THE PROFESSIONAL TRAINING OF TEACHERS. 199 government. They say that the teacher, when well instructed in theory, will be able to evolve therefrom the art for himself, that it is impossible in any practice-school to reproduce the conditions under which a teacher will work in his own school. Here they are certainly correct, and that his skill in teaching, and his powers of government, can only be tested where he has had for some time independent control — that is, in his own school. These also object to children being kept to be experimented upon by teachers in training. To these it may be replied that "studies are perfected by experience," and that the study of theory can only be rightly understood through attempts to apply it. The teacher's atten- tion can then be directed sufficiently often to the blunders he is sure to make, to cause him to become self-critical. When this stage is reached,, the practice-school can do little for him. So far as the children are concerned, the teacher in learning his art must experiment upon chil- dren, either in the practice-school or in a school of his own. Nowhere will this experimenting be done so economically and harmlessly as in a practice-school, where the teacher is carefully watched by his trainers, and the children taught during the remainder of the day by experts. The excellent progress made by the children in good practice-schools shows how little there is in this objection. CRITICISM. The value of practice-teaching depends very much upon the character of the criticism. Rational criticism calls on the teacher to state what principles each step in the lesson is an example of, or to show how a given principle may be applied in a certain subject. Empirical criticism busies itself with the devices employed, with the technique of instruction. Rational criticism tends to develop originality. Empirical criticism tends to compel imitation of the plans used by the critic teacher. It is not knowledge of so-called " methods," so much as insight into the pur- pose of each "method," that the teacher needs. With much insight be may grow into an artist, without it he must remain an artisan. The professor who gives the theory in any subject should be the real critic teacher of that subject. He can best say whether the teacher intelligently applies this theory. His profounder knowledge of theory should keep him from drifting into that empirical criticism which is the bane of the regular critic teacher. His observation of the work of his teachers, and the specimen lessons regularly given by him to classes of children in the presence of his teachers, will cause him to confine his prelections on theory within the bounds of the practical, and keep him what he should always be — an expert teacher, whose preaching is valued because his practice is commmensurate therewith. 200 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION PROBATION. Recognizing the impossibility of creating in a practice-school the conditions necessary for a competent test of a teacher's qualifications, many countries have established periods of probation in practical school work, varying from one to six years, after the completion of the normal- school course. In Prussia, not earlier than two years nor later than five years after his first or provisional examination, the teacher must pass the examina- tion required for a permanent license. In France, two years must elapse before the final tests — theoretical and practical — are applied. In Eng- land, a teacher must receive at least two favorable reports, at intervals of not less than six months. In Manitoba, certificates are provisional for one year, and are made permanent upon a satisfactory report of an inspector. According to the views here presented, a curriculum for the training of teachers must include pedagogy, psychology, ethics, logic, method, history of education, practice, and criticism. This curriculum calls for the establishment of training substitutes fitted for teachers. HOW TO PROVIDE THIS TRAINING. Forms of Training Institutions. — Historically, three theories have in succession determined the forms of training institutions. At first, academic preparation alone was demanded of teachers — this being given in the schools and universities. Next, with academic there was com- bined some professional instruction, and this was given in a high school or college, with a training annex. The principle of the division of labor, and the incompatibility of general and technical training, have brought about the separation of academic and professional instruction, and the latter is now given in normal schools. To the academic-professional type belong most of the state normal schools in Germany, France, England, and the United States. In each of these countries it has been claimed that it is impossible to secure as teachers in training persons who have the requisite academic education on which to base professional training. An examination of a number of their courses of study shows that in these schools the work is separated into two parts, the preparatory work being almost entirely academic, and the final work almost entirely professional. As the high schools and colleges have increased in number and efficiency, the need for academic work in the Normal School has decreased until, as in Ontario, Manitoba, and in some of the city training-schools in the United States, the academic work has been dropped and professional work alone under- taken. This is the specific work of the training-school, and it should undertake no other. THE PROFESSIONAL TRAINING OF TEACHERS. 201 Relation of Academic and Professional Work. — The relation of aca- demic to professional work was so clearly presented in the report made in 1889 to this association, by Dr. Gray, on behalf of the normal-school department, that a full discussion of that topic is not undertaken here. That report shows how strong is the feeling of the normal-school teachers in the United States in favor of a separation of these two lines of work. The same feeling, I believe, exists in Canada. In Ontario and Manitoba no person is admitted to a normal school until he is certified to be familiar with the subject-matter of all branches lie will have to teach. If, after admission, any candidate is found to be deficient in scholarship, he should be promptly dismissed. The high schools and colleges can do this work quite as well, if not better than the normal schools can, while the latter, if they do it at all, must do it by a sacrifice of time that should be spent in their own distinctive work. In teaching method there must be a review of the subject-matter of each branch taught in the schools, but the object of this review is not to extend the boundaries of the teacher's academic knowledge, but to lead him to view the subject-matter from the teacher's stand-point. The stress of instruction is placed not so much on what he knows as on how he came to know it, and how he will cause others to know it. No exaltation of method at the expense of scholarship is proposed. If a choice has to be made between scholarship and method, the former should be chosen without hesitation, but it is submitted that in Canada such a choice is not forced upon us. Normal Schools. — The work of the purely professional training-school has already been indicated. It has been thus described : " The normal school is not a school for general culture for its own sake. It is a pro- fessional school. Its central idea is to confer that knowledge which constitutes the science of education, and to train students in the art of instruction and school management. Its leading aim is to give that knowledge and training which belong as distinctly to the teacher as does the science of medicine to the physician, or the science of law to the legal practioner. A school is a normal school only when it makes these its controlling ends." Out of the necessities of the state has arisen a series of institutions, each doing its share of the educational work. These are known as kindergarten, primary, intermediate, and high schools and universities. Each undertakes special work, for which special fitness and, hence, special training is required. This division of schools has practically compelled a corresponding division of training institutions. These are known under varying names, but may be sufficiently described, for the present, by the terms kindergarten, primary, intermediate, and high normal schools and university chairs of pedagogy. 202 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION It is possible, but it does not seem practicable, to unite these institu- tions in one great school of pedagogy for each state. Tlie Kindergarten Normal School. — Compared with other schools, kindergartens are very few in number, and the demand for trained kindergartners very limited. Accordingly, but a passing reference is made to them, in order that time may be secured to speak at greater length on these institutions that affect the greater number of schools. The importance of the kindergarten is not underrated. The value of its underlying principles is fully appreciated, and the wish is expressed that soon every teacher of primary classes shall have opportunity while at training-school to at least visit the kindergarten, see its practical working, become familiar with its gifts, occupations, and songs, and catch something of that enthusiasm which marks the true kindergartner. Primary Normal Schools. — Statistics show that from about one half to two thirds of the schools in each state or province on this continent are taught by teachers holding certificates of the third, or lowest class. The scholarship of these persons is insufficient to secure their admission into the intermediate normal schools, even if there were a sufficient number of these institutions to train them. The value of training being admitted, there has arisen a demand for a class of training-schools which shall take young persons of somewhat limited education and give them in a comparatively short time such training as will preserve the chil- dren under them from the grosser mistakes made by untrained beginners. The primary normal school undertakes this work. Since the majority of the school is under the control of its graduates, it is scarcely necessary to say that its courses should be planned with care, its training given by men of exceptional skill, and its sessions made as long as possible. In Ontario, under the name of County Model Schools, such institutions were founded in 1877 in each county. The requirement for entrance is a third-class certificate; the course is professional, the session 15 weeks in length. No person is permitted to begin teaching until after this course is completed. Manitoba established similar schools in 1884. They are taught at selected local centres by government inspectors, and the teachers in the intermediate normal school and all persons wishing to teach must, four months after obtaining" a third-class certificate, present themselves for training at one of these schools. New York State established these training-classes in 1890. A third- class certificate is the requirement for entrance. The sessions are sixteen weeks in length, but attendance is not compulsory. After fourteen years' experience in conducting and supervising these schools, I offer the following recommendations to those who have estab- lished such institutions or may be about to do so. THE PROFESSIONAL TRAINING OF TEACHERS. 203 The principal should hold a certificate of the highest class, should have been trained in a high normal school, and should be the supervis- ing principal of the schools used for practice. Evidence of successful experience should be a condition of appointment, and all appointments should be subject to the approval of the State Department of Education. The teachers in the practice schools should be at least graduates of an intermediate normal school. No school having less than eight separate departments for practice should be chosen. Not more than thirty students should be admitted to any session. Each session should be at least five months in length. This will allow two sessions in each year. These primary normal schools should be subject to uniform supervision. Outline Course of Studies. — The following outline course of study includes all essential topics. It has been tested with satisfactory results. T1ie~ Science of Education. — Nature and aim of education, teaching, instruction. Outline of fruitful portions of mental and moral science ; application of the principles derived therefrom to teaching and govern- ment. THE ART OF EDUCATION". 1. Method of teaching each subject on the programme of studies for rural schools. School organization, including the duties of teachers and pupils as set forth in the school law and regulations. School manage- ment. School Hygiene. Physical culture. 2. Practice in teaching. THE HISTORY OF EDUCATION. Considering the needs of the rural schools and the scholastic equip- ments of these teachers, the history of education is confined to a study of the lives and doctrines of Comenius, Locke, Jacotot, Pestalozzi, and Froebel — Quick? s Educational Reformers being the text. THE INTERMEDIATE NORMAL SCHOOL. This school trains teachers who hold certificates of the second class. A large majority of its graduates become assistants in town or city schools, or take charge of village and large rural schools. The normal schools in Toronto, Ottawa, and Winnipeg are intermediate normal schools. In Ontario, a student must have completed a course at a primary normal school (County Model School) and have taught successfully at least one year before being permitted to enter an intermediate normal school. In Manitoba, he may, for the present, enter without previous training or experience. In Ontario, the certificate granted on gradua- tion is a permanent one. In Manitoba, it is not made permanent till the teacher has presented evidence of one year's successful experience after graduation. 204 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION. OUTLINE COURSE OF STUDY. The following outline course of study includes all essential topics. It has been tested with satisfactory results. The Science of Education. — The nature and aim of education, teaching, and instruction. Psychology, logic, and ethics as the scientific basis of the art of education ; application of these in development and training of the intellectual and moral powers. The Art of Education. — 1. Outlines of general methods: their appli- cation in the teaching of each subject on the public-school course of study. School organiation, including school law. School management. School hygiene. Physical culture. 2. Practice in teaching. The History of Education. — Systems and theories of education. Em- inent educators. In addition to the prescribed work, meetings are held each week for the debating of important pedagogical questions, and for the reading of reviews of books and summaries of valuable articles in educational jour- nals. No teacher should leave the intermediate normal school without having been introduced to the educational classics, having thought on the educational problems of the present, and having become familiar with a portion, at least, of the writings of the leading educators of the day. THE HIGH NORMAL SCHOOL. Training is considered indispensable for elementary teachers. A wider scholarship does not remove the necessity for training being given to those who are to teach advanced subjects to older pupils. The prob- lems that arise in the organization, management, teaching, and discipline of high schools are not solved by intuition. The supervision of schools, the determination of courses of study, the examination and certification of teachers, etc., are matters that can only fall within the province of those who have a wider scholarship and a broader view of education than can reasonably be expected of elementary teachers. Out of such considerations as these has arisen a demand for the establishment of high normal schools, to do for inspectors and teachers in high schools that which the primary and intermediate normal schools do for elementary teachers. From this school must also come the principles of the lower normal schools. It will be an important factor in directing and unify- ing educational effort, and its influence will be felt in all grades of schools. Such schools already exist. In France there are two — one established in 1880 at Fontenay aux Roses to train the female teachers of the lower THE PROFESSIONAL TRAINING OF TEACHERS. 205 normal schools, the other at St. Cloud in 1882 to train masters for these schools, and applicants for professorships and directorships. The State Normal College at Albany, New York, becomes a purely professional in 1892, and undertakes the training of graduates of colleges and universities. The course may be completed in one year, and the diploma is a license to teach. It is not compulsory on teachers of high schools to take this training. In Ontario, graduates of the universities and teachers holding certifi- cates of the first class attend a training institute or school of pedagogy in Toronto. Applicants for admission must have had previous training and experience. The session is fifteen weeks in length. Practice- teaching is done in the city high schools. The course includes the sci- ence of education, school organization and management, history of education, methods in mathematics and English, drill gymnastics and calisthenics, temperance and hygiene, school law and regulations. Can- didates holding the university qualifications must also take methods in Latin and methods either in Greek or in French and German; other candidates, methods in science or classics or moderns. The department masters in the Toronto high schools are specialists; each develops systematically the best modes of dealing with each subject in his department at each stage of a pupil's progress. Each supervises the practice- teaching in his department, and acts as critic. The prin- cipal of the training-school gives the lectures on the theory and history of education. This course is now compulsory on all persons desiring to qualify themselves to teach in high schools or to act as inspectors. In Manitoba, university graduates and teachers holding certificates of the first class attend a special course in the normal school. The session is six and a half months in length. Eor the present, no previous train- ing or experience is required. The course is compulsory. No person is now licensed to teach in a high school, or to act as an inspector, until he has completed this course and has furnished evidence of at least one year's successful experience. After three years of experience in this work, the following course is submitted as a contribution toward the formation of an ideal curriculum for such schools. It is, with some modifications, caused by local circum- stances, the course which our students will begin in Winnipeg in Sep- tember next. Practice-teaching is done in the Winnipeg schools. CONDITIONS OF ADMITTANCE. Scholarship. — Teachers shall be graduates in arts of a university, or holders of certificates of the first class. Experience. — Teachers should have received a training in a lower nor- mal school, and should have had at least one year's experience. 206 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION Length of Session. — If previous training and experience are compul- sory, a session of five months is sufficient; if not, the usual scholastic year of eight months is short enough. COUESE OF STUDY. Philosophy of Education. — Various theories of education that have prevailed; the nature, form, and limits of education. Instruction, teaching. (Refer to History of Education. ) Psychology. — The nature of mind; methods of studying it; its phases or powers — their development and training. Principles of education derived from this study ; their application in teaching. METHOD. Such a knowledge of deductive and inductive logic as will make clear the principles and rules of general method. Education values ; sequence of subjects. Special methods in intellectual education: English, science, mathe- matics, classics, etc. Special method in moral education : Duties to self, others, etc. (Refer to Ethics.) Special methods in physical education : Gymnastics, drill, etc. (Refer to School Hygiene.) ETHICS. The Feelings, the Conscience, the Will. — Pedagogical conclusions derived from the study of man's ethical nature; applications of these to instruc- tion in moral duties and training in moral practices; ethical value of motives used to secure intellectual progress; bearing of aesthetics on the moral life; relation of moral to physical and intellectual education. HISTORY OF EDUCATION. Selected portions that best exhibit the growth of educational ideas and furnish most help in organization and instruction. Theories of education: Formalist, realist, etc. (Refer to Philosophy of Education.) Systems of education :- General — national, theocratic, humanitarian — their essential features. Special — outline study of selected systems; particular study of modern systems, through state and city reports and monographs. Eminent educators: Only those whose philosophy or practice or enthusiasm renders their labors valuable for guidance or inspiration. The results intellectually, morally, and physically of each theory and system ; features of these that may profitably be introduced into ours. THE PROFESSIONAL TRAINING OF TEACHERS. 207 » SCHOOL GOVERNMENT. a. School law of the state — the acts under which the system is carried on. b. General regulations for administration of a system. c. Discipline of pupils. (Refer to Ethics and Method.) SCHOOL HYGIENE. Relation of physical welfare to intellectual and moral growth. (Refer to lectures on psychology, ethics, and history of education.) Physical culture — gymnastics, drill, play, athletics, etc. Construction of school buildings — their ventilation, heating, lighting, and seating. PRACTICE. a. Observation of work in — 1. Primary department and intermediate schools ; schools which these teachers may afterwards supervise. (This may be omitted when teachers have attended a full course in a lower normal school.) 2. Observation of work in high schools — schools which they may afterwards teach. b. Criticism of such work through statement of underlying principles. c. Teaching, after having submitted the lesson in outline to the critic, having accounted for the plan proposed, and having received his criti- cisms; criticism after the lesson has been given. d. Purpose and methods of supervision and inspection of schools. Purpose and management of institutes. DISCUSSIONS. Digests of works on pedagogy, and of important educational articles in current periodicals; conferences on educational topics of present interest, e. g., manual training, Sloyd, higher education of women — co- education, separate college or annex, university extension, etc. It is the business of the normal school not only to foster a taste for, but to form a correct method of, reading pedagogical works and articles. These digests compel careful, selective critical reading and condensed accurate statement. They furnish to each the fruits of the labors of all. The weekly conferences not only make the teachers conversant with the educational topics of the day, familiar with the rules of debate, and ready of speech, but also afford the professor in charge opportunities for insisting on arguments being based on principles rather than opinions. The time given for the preparation of these digests and debates should be ample, so that in substance and literary form they will serve as evi- dence of the teacher's power and skill. 208 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION. MUSEUM. This should consist of a library containing the more notable books on the theory, practice, and history of education. School reports, and laws of different countries, cities, and towns ; important monographs ; collec- tions of specimen text-books and charts in each department of study; school periodicals; samples of school work done by classes of pupils; plans of school buildings; samples of illustrative apparatus and school furniture. These pedagogical museums are estabished in South Kensington, St. Petersburg, Paris, Washington, and other great centres. Toronto has made a beginning. No teacher should complete his training without having an opportunity to see what a body of literature and what an amount of illustrative ma- terial there is devoted to this profession. An organized system of training has been sketched. It may be repre- sented by four concentric circles, the inner standing for the kindergarten and the outer for the high normal school. All departments of study considered in the outer circle are begun in the inner, for the child is the centre of each. CHAIRS OF PEDAGOGY IN UNIVERSITIES. There is but a moment left to consider the work of chairs of pedagogy in universities. Instruction and research are the two great functions of a university. It may offer to its students instruction in education as in other subjects. " I shall not surely be told," says Prof. Laurie, " that the question of the growth and life of the human mind, and the way in which human char- acter is built up, are subjects unworthy to stand side by side on the academic platform with inquiries into the growth and life of molluscs, mosses, and crayfish, or the making of bridges and engines." It may investigate unsolved problems in education ; it may collate and interpret pedagogical data, and so increase the sum of pedagogical knowledge; it may, through its recognition, strengthen and dignify the teacher's calling, but unless the normal -school idea is an unsound one it cannot, through lectures alone, however excellent, prepare men for the practical work of the schoolroom. Broadly speaking, university work in peda- gogy ends with knowing, normal-school work with doing. The best students of the high and normal schools will take post-graduate courses in education at the university, and add to practical skill that compre- hensive knowledge which will fit them for leadership in their chosen field of labor. Ladies and gentlemen, I have outlined the preparation we should make for our profession. It means work, it takes time; but the calling EDUCATIONAL PROPAGANDA. 209 which we have voluntarily chosen is a noble one — one worthy of our supremest efforts. It demands scholarship and training and enthusiastic devotion. We work on human souls, and the effect of our work outlasts time itself. Can any preparation be too complete for such labor? And what is our reward? Money? Scarcely so! To be treasured up not in one soul, but in many souls; to live not in your own life, but in hun- dreds and hundreds of other lives made wiser, purer and happier through yours; to be woven into the warp and woof of boyhood's strong, firm web ; to gleam and flash in the finer, subtler texture of girlhood — this is the teacher's great reward. We may not be able to realize our ideals, but woe to us if we have no ideals to realize ! EDUCATIONAL PROPAGANDA. A. J. EICKOFF, NEW YOEK. The National Educational Association is to-day, and for a decade or more has been, one of the most, if not the most, useful agencies in the promotion of the cause of education. It is not necessary to recount its services or to point out the mode in which its influences operate. That it has united into one mass the edu- cators of the whole country is sufficient to establish its claim for services rendered. And it is to be hoped that it may live yet for many a year, spreading and strengthening its influences as it grows in age. It has not reached its present commanding position through a finely elaborated plan of organization. It is the simplest possible response to the needs of the time, and it has succeeded only by the employment of agencies that have lain ready at hand and in the line of least resistance. It is the purpose of this paper to raise the question whether we have not made a mistake in directing our work too exclusively to the education of the teacher, and confining our discussions to questions of pedagogical inquiry; and in the mean time neglecting to keep the people informed of the progress of the schools, and especially of the difficulties in the way of their best development. In the old conventions of teachers and friends of education these questions used to form the main subjects of discourse. When, however, the first obstacles were got out of the way, when school systems had been established in every state, when normal schools had been established and school supervision finally secured, the 210 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION. lawyers, the doctors, the clergymen, intelligent merchants and mechanics, who had battled for the needed legislation, stepped aside and left the work to be carried on by the teachers. At once a very considerable change took place in the membership of our educational gatherings, and we lost, to a great degree, the active co-operation of those who had been classed in the earlier associations as the friends of education. This was unfortunate. The influence of these men had given a great impulse to the cause, but the schools did not cease to need their active support. There are few of us who have not felt it, and at times very severely. It is needed in the rural districts, in the smaller towns, in the great cities, to obtain needed legislation and to protect the interests of the schools against encroachments on their funds, against measures insidiously designed to impair their usefulness or bring them into public contempt. The influence of these men is still needed to secure the establishment of a greater number of normal schools, a more efficient supervision of school work, better provisions for primary classes, the reduction of the number of their attendants to one half the average now placed under the instruc- tion of a teacher — especially in the cities — the election of competent men on boards of education, the support of superintendents in their efforts to secure the best class of teachers, and in every wise measure designed to promote the efficiency of the school. To secure the aid and active co-operation of the friends of education of every class, they should by every means possible be engaged in the work. Men feel an interest in what they favor, but love what they work for. But we need the act- ive support of the less educated, even of the illiterate classes, and so should take every means to keep them informed of the work that is done for their children. The influence of the professional man on those who can give less attention to literature and educational affairs, will secure their aid and co-operation, and then of both those classes upon those whose lot in life is still less fortunate, but who love their children — the illiterate — will go far to make a constituency for the schools that will look out for their interests in the caucus, the primary meeting and the election of school officers. But to obtain the co-operation of so many agencies, organization and the aid of the press is indispensable. The nature of the organization should be determined with great caution, and the mode of its operation would be the result, perhaps, of many trials, and it may be of some fail- ures ; but it must come sooner or later. In the beginning it may come from individual enthusiasm and devo- tion to the cause of education, as in the case of the Rev. Mr. Mayo, who has given many years to the building up of an educational sentiment among the uneducated masses of the South. It may originate in the action to be taken by state educational associations, or possibly, through THE INDEPENDENT DISTRICT SYSTEM. 211 the agency of a permanent secretary of this association. But whether its origin shall be in the individual inspiration, in state associations, in the National Association, or in some great educational missionary society, it must be thoroughly organized and extend its influence to every school district, north, south, east, and west. No cause has ever had a more powerful, a more intelligent agency within its immediate control than this would have; every teacher of the land would be a possible agent. THE INDEPENDENT DISTRICT SYSTEM. JOHN A. M' DONALD, TOPEKA, KANSAS. A new country ; a few settlers on the banks of a stream, in the woods, or on the prairies, without township government or county government, school system, schoolhouse or schoolmaster. To these scattered groups of people there comes soon the necessity for schools of some sort. A meeting is called ; arrangements for school are made, assessments, teachers, and other essential matters are considered ; then, to carry into effect the plans outlined and agreed upon, three persons are elected as a committee. Other groups of people similarly situated, and scattered over a vast area of country, do likewise. Finally these various groups coming into relation with each other establish the State, and, in the regular course of things, the best school system for a commonwealth comes to be discussed. The future is to be considered as well as the present ; the best system for pos- sible millions yet to come, as well as for the thousands now here. Need for divine wisdom here, surely ! Inspired from some source, not of the highest it is certain, some incipient legislator suggests: " Our school system is here now. Scattered over the face of this infant state are these groups, each with its committee or board of three. Go to now, brethren; with these committees as a basis, let us build a school system which will be the admiration of the centuries yet to come, of nations yet unborn." And the convention, assembly, or legislature, like those short-sighted mortals on the plains of Shinar who essayed to build the first Eiffel Tower, the top whereof was to reach to heaven, but which fell so infinitely short of it, adopted the suggestion with loud acclaims; the groups were connected by legislative ropes of sand, and the independent district was established. At least it is imagined that such must have been the origin of it, though it is fair to say that, according to other most respectable authorities, the origin of the independent system is, 212 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION as Mrs. Partington would say, lost in the mists of iniquity, — an atmos- phere of indubitable fitness for the origin of such a system. Had the system itself, with all the appurtenances thereof, been lost in those same mists, what vexation of spirit would have been saved to several genera- tions and millions of people! But in this, as in all else, the sins of the fathers shall be visited upon the children unto the third and fourth generations; and, alas, will continue to be so visited until the fifth, sixth, and seventh generations. And with that tendency of our people noted and commented upon by observant philosophers — to follow in the footsteps of their neighbors, to drift by communities into the same order or disorder of architecture, the same laws, the same clothing, lightning- rods, gates, and fences, other States, still in the formative condition, viewing the group system from afar, and learning mainly from politi- cians, newspapers, and real-estate agents of its marvellous adaptation to the educational needs of all peoples, adopted unthinkingly and without investigation the group plan as a school system. And thus it has come to pass that this independent school district system, in one or another of its forms, like the Old Man of the Sea, has fastened itself, so to speak, around the neck of each of thirty-five States, choking the educational energies of communities, and paralyzing the efforts of educational leaders. An independent district is a tract of country from one to twenty or thirty square miles in area. It elects its own officers, in many cases levies its own taxes, employs its own teachers, determines the length of school terms to be three, four, five, six, or nine months as the whim of the moment may move the voters in annual meeting assembled to deter- mine, adopts a course of study, or more- often, allows the course to follow the devious path marked out at the sweet will of each teacher and pupil. Or, if one desires to examine this unique system from another point of view, to secure other effects of light and shade, mainly the last named, suppose that in the city of Chicago, with its 1,200,000 people, each block on every street is for school purposes independent of every other block and of the city as a whole; that each block has its board of three, levies its own taxes on its own assessed valuation ; that a block in the poorer part of the city has a school term of four months ; on Wabash Avenue, ten months; on other blocks, five, six, seven months. Imagine an annual meeting in each block. Suppose further, that each block follows such a course of study as the whim or caprice of its board, teacher, or pupils may determine. What sort of work could Superintendent Howland or any other human being extract out of such unspeakably exasperating unevenness of conditions? Does it need any prophetic gifts to predict that such a system, or rather chaotic fragments of a system, if followed a quarter of a century, would develop not the marvellous energy and THE INDEPENDENT DISTRICT SYSTEM. 213 public-spiritedness we find in Chicago to-day, but, as an inevitable result of the J)lock system of education, a city of blockheads. Yet the block system under various forms prevails in many States of the Union, thirty- five at least; nay, is held up before mankind as the model system; a glorious triumph of civilization; a system which one governor, with reckless unveracity, declared to be the most perfect in the world, and which a certain editor asserted to be without a flaw — which is more than could be said for either the editor or the governor. In the old-time sermon it is remembered by some of us — not without unmixed joy — that the preacher divided his sermon into seven heads, and we were fortunate indeed if he forgot to divide each of these into four subheads. So after the fashion of the fathers it may be said that the objections to the independent district system are seven-fold. Objection 1. — The system in some States at least — notably so in Kan- sas— is responsible for the most iniquitous distribution conceivable of the burdens of school taxation. For the school revenues of an independent district are derived mainly from its own resources ; the proceeds of a tax levied on the real and personal property of the district. District No. 6, owing to the accidents of its geographical situation, has a wealth of fertile valley land, two railroads pass through its terri- tory, and its assessed valuation is $120,000. District No. 60, separated from No. 6 by an imaginary line, is com- posed mainly of the hill land overlooking the valley. It has no rail- road ; but let the fact be noted that No. 60 is taxed to pay the bonds issued to aid in constructing the two railroads passing through No. 6. Yet the wealthy district receives all the school tax derived from the five and a half miles of railroad within its boundaries. The aggregate assessed valuation of No. 60 is $10,000; that is, its value is to that of No. 6 as 1 is to 12. Theoretically all the people and children are equal before the law, are entitled to equal school privileges, and are supposed to have no more than an equitable share of school taxes to pay. And here we find these two districts side by side — one compelled to levy twenty mills on the dollar to educate its children, the other providing ample school facilities for its children nine months each year with a levy of one, two, or three mills on the dollar. On the hill the heavy tax is barely sufficient to keep school open five or six months, probably not more than four, and to pay the minimum rate of wages. These contrasts are not exceptional; they can be found by the score in every county of every State which has the iniquitous independent system of school taxation. In the table hereinafter given the inequali- ties of valuations and taxation are shown so clearly that it is hoped that even the wayfaring man, though a fool or a politician, can be convinced, and that he who runs may read. 214 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION. Statistics abound on every hand, obtrude themselves on any one who devotes but an hour of serious study to the subject. Facts and figures from Kansas counties are taken because they were to this writer more easily accessible. And he may remark here in passing, that persons who desire to study the independent system in its most unadulterated vicious- ness should turn their gaze upon the school systems of Kansas, Nebraska, and other Western States. But to check misunderstandings and misin- terpretations it must further be said, and said with emphasis, that the spirit of the Kansas people and of the Western people in general can- not, in doing educational work, be surpassed on this terrestrial ball. They are, and have been, doing noble things; doing these, too, mainly in spite of school systems, and not because of them. In the West we have a magnificent motive power and the most unspeakably inadequate machinery. But we must return to our statistics. In the following table are given the maximum and minimum valuations of school districts in each of the counties named; also the maximum and minimum tax levies : — Counties. Allen Anderson Butler Cowley Dickinson Douglas Harper Jackson Kingman Lyon Lincoln Leavenworth* Mitchell Montgomery. Miami Neosho Osborne Ottawa Phillips Republic Rice Sumner Saline Wabaunsee. . Washington . Woodson Wyandotte . . Maximum Valuation. $62,415 57,524 55,305 63,458 79,399 93,710 49,635 68,161 108,467 121.387 78; 047 142,380 66,309 54,823 87,578 132,518 23,707 59,715 42,752 46,988 57,567 60,695 80,939 73,715 46,240 80,734 360,598 Minimum Valuation. $20,251 11,434 6,209 7,920 11,767 16,270 6,810 14,532 6,801 15,883 6,848 20,420 5,940 7,451 12,922 10,841 5,260 6,367 5,524 8,374 9,205 12,580 8,867 10,129 7,000 10,690 18,245 Maximum Tax Levy, Mills on $1. 14 20^ 20 20 30 20 20 40 20 32 20 18 20 Minimum Tax Levy, Mills on $1. 4 IK 2 2^ 3 0 2-3 2 3 2 2X 4 5 4 3 3 3 5 2 3 It needs no flowers of rhetoric to set forth the significance of these figures. They speak for themselves silently, but with tremendous, and surely with convincing, force. Just a note or two here on possible objections. It may be urged that the wealthy district may be required to do more with its wealth than the poor district with its poverty. Not THE INDEPENDENT DISTRICT SYSTEM. 215 so. Each district whose valuation is given needs but one teacher; indeed it is not infrequently the case that the number of children in the district of low valuation may be to the number in the other as 50 is to 12. As to statistics showing the injustices of the independent system of school taxation, there are almost boundless supplies on every hand. The temptation to pour forth avalanches of figures is almost irresistible, but in mercy to his audience the writer forbears, and he now leaves the table as an object-lesson to be perused and pondered by all. Objection 2. — As a consequence or corollary of the unevenness of valua- tion and taxation already outlined, it is hoped with sufficient clearness, it is more the rule than otherwise to find districts in the same neighbor- hoods having yearly school terms lasting four, five, six, seven, eight, and nine months respectively. These districts may, and often do, lie side by side, separated only by imaginary lines. No profound knowledge of mathematics is needed to prove that the opportunities and advantages of the child in whose district the schoolroom is open nine months each year are to those of the unfortunate in the four-month district beyond the imaginary line as nine is to four. Yet looking at these unevennesses and inequalities the educational journalists and philosophers, in peristent and boisterous chorus, ask why we do not grade our country schools. Like that unreasoning reprobate who demanded that a people, willing enough to do, were suitable mater- ials accessible, should make bricks without straw. "Impossible!" exclaimed Mirabeau to some person who said the doing of a certain thing was impossible, "never mention to me that beast of a word." But Mirabeau, it is certain, never was confronted by the complex inequali- ties of the independent district system. To grade our country schools so that at the end of a given period of years the child, attending school but four months each year, shall march abreast of the child who has school privileges provided for him nine months out of every twelve. To reduce the varying lengths of terms to a common denominator, or to secure in some mysterious way that unity in variety which is said to be the chief beauty of Gothic architecture. These questions, suggested as one hurriedly passes along, must be left for some solution with the educational journals and philosophers. Objection 3. — Under the independent district system it is often impos- sible to secure well-qualified officers. Given a rectangular surface; area, 12 square miles; number of adult residents, ten. From among the ten, three must be selected. It may be the three fitted by nature and acquired qualifications to manage the school interests of a district are there, and it may be the one or more fit persons may refuse to serve. The certain thing is that the halt, the 216 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION maimed, and the blind are often, and must be, chosen. It is true, alas, that absolute, dense, and dark illiteracy is sometimes found on the board, and that the condition of mind which is next door to illiteracy, the mere ability, and nothing more, to write scrawling letters with painful effort and protruded tongue, is often predominant on the boards of inde- pendent districts. Good judgment, we are told, may often be bound up with absolute or semi-illiteracy. It may ; but good judgment must be based upon an intelligent conception of the work to be done, and how can clear conceptions be extracted from solid ignorance? Objection Jf. — The independent district system compels the State to maintain a standing army of educational officials. Note the following figures from representative counties in Kansas: Marshall County requires 420 persons to manage its educational affairs; Smith County, 432; Reno County, 438; Cowley County, 456; Sedgwick County, 477; Jewell County, 483; Butler County, 483; Phillips County, 490; Sumner County, 579; and the total number of officers in Kansas is about 27,000, an army large enough to repel the threatened Italian invasion. Objection 5. — The system is inelastic, not easily adapted to changing conditions, and requires needlessly elaborate machinery to secure insig- nificant ends. From a mass of statistics sent in from thirteen counties in Kansas, the following facts have been sifted : That there are many school districts in which two members of the board are of the same family; that in a number of districts the entire board is in one family; that there are a number of districts in which the board, teacher, and school are of one family and are living under the same roof. As to the infinite possibilities of the independent system, note these facts called out of many. In a certain county of western Kansas, the entire popu- lation consisted of one family. The husband was director of the dis- trict, his wife the clerk, and his son-in-law the treasurer. His eldest daughter, wife of the aforesaid son, was the teacher, and the younger daughter of the director was the sole pupil. The school was held in the front room of the house. Coal and all other necessaries and appendages were of course furnished at the expense of the district, and everybody was happy. All this elaborate machinery — director, clerk, treasurer, reports of various kinds, International Dictionary, coal, annual meeting, tax levies — was set in motion by the State so that one little girl in the front room of her father's house should learn to read, to write, and to spell. And it is a solemn fact that to stop all that machinery and to extricate that little girl, or in other words to disorganize the district, would require a special act of the Kansas legislature. The force of ridiculousness can no further go. Objection 6. — The system is too costly. The education of the unfor- tunate child exhibited here as a terrible example cost $40 or $50 per IE INDEPENDENT DISTRICT SYSTEM. 217 month. This, it will be said, is an extreme case, but districts in which a schoolhouse with all necessary incidentals and a teacher must be pro- vided for from three to seven children can be found by the hundred. Objection 7, and last. — The district annual meeting, that relic of primitive times, has outlived its usefulness, if it ever had any; is and has been these many years a dead- weight on all educational progress ; is and has been and will continue to be the source and generator of perennial feuds, the focal point to which all neighborhood animosities converge, the storm centre of every district. The annual meeting, we are told, is our only surviving relic of a pure democracy. For this infinite bless- ing let thanks without ceasing be given. Yet in passing let it be asked, is self-government any less apparent in a township 100 square miles in area, or even in a county 1000 square miles in area, than in a district containing 10 square miles, any less apparent when in the hands of 1000 or 100 persons than when in the hands of 10? " It has been said," remarks Superintendent J. W. Patterson, of New Hampshire, in his report for 1887, " that the school district was a little republic, and that citizens learned the art of government in its meet- ings. This may do for rhetoric, but has little foundation in fact. Like the republic of Venice it was more prolific of family feuds than of states- manship. I observed that it was difficult to secure a quorum at its meetings, and when secured, if there was not some quarrel on the carpet, they were generally very stupid affairs." Superintendent Patterson's observations will be echoed from the West and from the South. Sometimes at these meetings the schoolhouse is crowded with the adherents and camp-followers of the two factions into which the typical independent district is usually divided. Sometimes stagnation reigns supreme, and the meeting consists of but three persons, the members of the board. These go through the formality of elect- ing themselves, voting taxes and all else, as their spirits may move them. At one meeting, representative of many such, there were present three persons, the director ex officio occupying the chair, a husband and wife constituting the deliberative assembly, supreme council or parliament of the district. The husband offered the resolutions, the wife seconded them, the director put them, and they were carried unanimously. Otherwise, domestic wars, and £he wrath to come. As the partisan newspaper usually says of a political meeting of an unusually turbulent kind, " the utmost harmony prevailed." Still treading in the footsteps of the fathers, following heads and sub- heads in religious and logical sequence, comes the application and, beyond, a conclusion of some sort must be reached. The independent system has been weighed in the balances and has been found wanting. Its chaotic complexities, iniquitous inequalities, 218 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION tyrannical restrictions, and unspeakable inadequacies are surely apparent enough to all who have eyes to see and ears to hear. The system, if such it can be called, was adapted to the conditions which prevailed when States were without form and communities were separated by vast soli- tudes. But in these days, when territories have become great states and deserts have become peopled, we must, in educational systems, as in all else, put away childish things. Spasmodic and vigorous efforts have been made in many common- wealths to shake off this Old Man of the Sea and to cast him into outer darkness, but venerable conservatism, the traditions of the elders, the inertness of whole peoples, obstacles, which, as Richter says of stupidity, "would baffle even the very gods," have impeded the progress of every advancing step. Indiana, after struggling for years against entrenched prejudices, infinite stupidities, and let-alone lunacies, abolished the independent system, and established upon its ruins what is thought to be the best system in the United States. For more than eighty years New Hampshire groaned and fretted and struggled laboriously under this "last surviving relic of a pure democracy," and at last in 1886, inspired by the energetic and far-seeing leadership of that courageous man, Superintendent J. W. Patterson, the New Hampshire legislature swept into oblivion, it is fervently hoped, the independent district with all the appurtenances thereof. Superintendent Patterson has been instrumental in lifting the educational interests of New Hampshire out of a system which in his own words " had exhausted its power and furnished no hope of improvement." But how to proceed in the work of reform, by semi-revolution as in Indiana and New Hampshire, or by evolution as was attempted in Ohio, a State which is afflicted with a peculiarly malignant type of the inde- pendent system. Theoretically, the township system prevails in Ohio; practically, the subdistricts have swallowed the townships. An Ohio township divided into ten districts has a board composed of ten members, the clerk of each subdistrict being ex officio a member of the township board. Each subdistrict has three officers. It is commonly supposed that the town- ship is the unit in the Ohio school system, but the subdistrict, far from being a sub, is a sovereign corporation. Vigorous and various efforts have been made by the Ohio people to simplify the educational machin- ery of the State. The Albaugh Bill, having for its blessed purpose the annihilation of two thirds of the school officers of Ohio, was introduced twice in the legislature, but failed to pass, and the Buckeye State still groans under its Old Man of the Sea. After examining analytically the systems of all the States, we find in Indiana and Pennsylvania the nearest approach to our ideals. THE INDEPENDENT DISTRICT SYSTEM. 219 Pennsylvania has the township system but requires six officers for each township. Thus, a county having twenty townships, and there are many such in the West, would, under the Pennsylvania laws, have a County Board of Education numbering 120; too cumbersome an execu- tive committee to transact business with effectiveness and dispatch. Our machinery must be reduced to the simplest form. In the Pennsylvania system there are excellences which must find a place in the educational system yet to bj, but in the matter of local control, Indiana, it is believed, shows us a more excellent way. In Indiana the management of the schools in each township is in the haneis of one officer, known as a trustee. The County Board of Education is composed of all the trus- tees in the county. This Board appoints the county superintendent. Objection has been made that the one-man power is dangerous in educa- tional affairs as in all else, but what our schools are suffering from in many States of the Union to-day is the 200, 300, or 500 man-power in counties. When the school laws now in force in Indiana were enacted, the pur- pose was to make the township trustee a local superintendent of schools. But a mistake was made in permitting other than school work to be imposed on the trustee. The officer who is required to build bridges, repair roads, and provide for paupers cannot give his undivided atten- tion to the schools, and the effectiveness of his work as a school inspector must be greatly decreased. In recommending the outlines of the Indiana system, one may be pre- pared to hear a protesting chorus from the good old commonwealth of Massachusetts. Lo! have we not the ideal system? Behold our township mass meetings, prudential committees, and so forth, a pure democracy and township government. But Massachusetts must remember that in many Western townships every man and woman has a vote on school affairs, and that in a popu- lous township a school meeting would probably mean a thousand voters in tumultuous and discordant session. A fierce as well as a pure democ- racy it might be found to be. The subject expands before us as we proceed, but the temptation to continue must be resisted, for the dead line has been reached, the patient forbearance of the audience must not be recklessly trespassed upon, and it will be wise to respect the inexorable gavel of the presiding officer. The facts and reflections herein presented are surely sufficient to show that the independent district system has had its day and should cease to be. We have outgrown its exceedingly narrow limits. " When I was a child, I spoke as a child, I understood as a child, I thought as a child; but when I became a man I put away childish things." But we, in 220 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION our maturity and in our manhood, solemnly and even boastingly stalk around in our short dresses, a spectacle to gods and men. As to the sys- tem which should be, and that speedily, evolved out of the primitive crudi- ties we have been discussing, there may be among educational reformers a difference of opinion as to detail, but concerning the outlines there is substantial unanimity. The township should be the. unit. An officer whose duties should be exclusively educational should be elected in each township. The town- ship officers of a county should constitute the County Board of Educa- tion. This board should be the supreme educational council of the county. It should appoint the county superintendent ; should prepare a course of study for the schools of the county; should determine what text-books should be used ; should levy a county school tax, and, in brief, should have much the same authority in managing the school interests of the county as boards of education have in cities. In each subdistrict of a township a local director should be appointed by the township trustee to care for the school buildings and grounds. These suggestions are by no means original. Their substance, and much else worthy to be pondered, can be found in the report made by Superintendent J. H. Smart, of Indiana, to the Department of Superintendence in 1880. Glancing even in a random manner at the school laws of forty-four States, and considering the weaknesses, crudities, and infinite inade- quacy of even the best system, do we not feel that our boasting is vain, and that as a people we need above all else in educational matters to be clothed with humility. The politician, ah ! the sinful, reckless stump orator, if some blessed power could induce or compel him to perish from the earth with his glittering and meaningless phrases, " school system without a flaw, " " most perfect system on earth, " etc. , etc. , what a relief it would be, and how easy it would become to build up the waste places! In truth, we are still but in our infancy, groping, often enough uncer- tainly, toward better things. For this, and this only, let unceasing- thanks be given that our course is clearly forward and not backward. We do not, it is hoped, despise nor depreciate the educational work of the past. The fathers, perhaps, in the flickering light of their tallow candles did the duty lying next to them more faithfully than we do ours, living, as we are, in "the full splendor of electric light. To them was given one talent ; to us, ten. It is for us with our ten talents to do work mostly of our day and generation. Laying aside the educational weights which have so grievously and so persistently beset us, we should at once, silently, without flourish of trumpets or vain boasting, begin to lay the foundations of school systems the glories of which it hath not entered into the hearts of our people to conceive, — systems which will be as far above ours as ours are above the primitive systems of the fathers. MILITARY EDUCATION IN THE UNITED STATES. 221 MILITARY EDUCATION IN THE UNITED STATES. CAPT. ALLEN ALLENSWORTH, NEW MEXICO. The United States is not satisfied with only an intelligent youth, manhood, and old age in the various commercial and social circles of its citizenship, but aims to have a moral, intelligent, and efficient soldiery, the preservers of its peace and defenders of its flag. Therefore we present to you this paper on Education in the United States Army, in compliance with a demand for more information on the subject, and it is not offered, therefore, as a discussion of the details and methods of its military education. Major- General 0. 0. Howard, U. S. A., describes the army as an active school in the following language : — " The little army of to-day is in itself a most pregnant and active school ; I mean over and beyond the armories and arsenals, the torpedo and engineer school of Willet's Point, the artillery teaching at Fort Monroe, the cavalry at Fort Eiley, and the infantry at Fort Leavenworth. " At all the posts and garrisons there is an extensive curriculum of theoretical and practical military instruction that is fitting every intelli- gent, patriotic officer and man to handle armies. It is all this — the regular army in its entirety, staff and line, that brings by its constant study and practice the art of war up to date; assimilates all the new discoveries in mechanics to the country's need; follows up with experi- ments all advances in electricity, high explosives, the use of steel and other metals, hydraulics and steam power." As we are engaged in dis- cussing various educational systems and their relations to the people at large, the question may be asked, what relation does education in the army sustain to our youth in civil life, or to the public at large? This is readily answered and the relation easily defined, when we consider the fact that, as some one has said, in the practical operation of such educa- tion, scores of men graduating from military institutions find their way into various civil pursuits, and as officers, scholars, and statesmen they form a valuable acquisition to the community in which they live. Leaving out the idea of making armies, the discipline of the military schools and the army is the best possible education for a large percentage of our youth. Arid as for questions of national defence and safety, the statesmen must ever consider these the essential ideas of all state education. It is not infrequent that men, graduates from military schools, have done their state and country great service by devoting themselves to the study of science. In order to comprehend the military education of the United States and that of its army, we will consider — (1) The relation 222 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION that the United States army sustains to national education or to the people at large; and (2) The specific, or technical education of its officers and privates. In the earlier history of the army it was considered sufficient for a soldier to be able to march and handle his musket. This view has been changed, and it is now a recognized fact that to be a good soldier a man must be a good citizen, therefore the United States Government aims at giving its soldiers a fair English education. It does this not only with a view of utilizing their increased knowledge in its defence, but with the object of returning him to civil life a more intelligent citizen. " To accomplish this purpose the War Department is aiming to secure additional legislation to enable it to increase the efficiency of its present defective system, which was established in compliance with the provi- sions of 1231, Revised Statutes, which says: " Schools shall be established at all posts, garrisons, and permanent camps, at which the enlisted men may be instructed in the common English branches of education, and especially in the history of the United States, and the Secretary of War may detail such officers and enlisted men as may be necessary to carry out this provision. " It shall be the duty of the post- commander to set apart a suitable room or building for school and religious purposes." To carry out the provisions of this law the Secretary of War, in 1878, convened a board of officers consisting of the Quartermaster-General, the Adjutant-General, and the Judge-Advocate-General to consider what steps should be taken to carry it out. The board met and recommended a system of evening schools for men and schools during the day for the children of officers and privates. The teachers for the schools were to be detailed from among the soldiers and paid 35 cents per diem as extra-duty pay. The proceedings of this board were approved by the Secretary of War and announced to the army in General Orders No. 24, of date May 18, 1878. After the announcement of the rules and regulations to govern these schools an aide-de-camp to the General of the army was detailed to visit and inspect regularly the various post-schools. It was made his duty to examine into the systems adopted by the various post-com- manders, to advise commanders of posts of defects which may be discov- ered and to suggest methods of improvements, to endeavor to bring about uniformity in the methods of management and instruction, and to make known throughout the army the best methods and systems in existence at any military post. The result of his inspections Avas re- ported fully to the War Department. The system adopted proved unsatisfactory, and many efforts have been made by the War Department to improve it so that the schools would be MILITARY EDUCATION IN THE UNITED STATES. 223 of service to the government and a blessing to the soldiers and their children. General Sheridan while in command of the army, in an annual report to the Secretary of War said on this subject ; " While the subject (edu- cation) is one of much interest, the present scheme of education in the army still remains a partial failure, owing to the radical defects of the system. To make it a success education should not be purely elementary; attendance must be part of the duty of the soldier, and the hours fixed during the time of the day allotted to the performance of duties." I will here state that this view has recently been adopted by the War Department, and school attendance by men in their first and second enlistments, if they cannot pass a prescribed examination, is made a military duty. In reference to teachers General Sheridan said : " The teachers must be thoroughly fitted for their important position, possess suitable rank to secure attention and respect, for obvious reasons, should not be subject to the fluctuations of change of stations — at one point leaving a school without a teacher to arrive at another where, from local or other reasons, the teacher will find himself without a school." He further said : " The question of education in the army will always remain one of importance, demanding thoughtful attention and consid- eration; but without legislative action on the above suggestions the system must necessarily remain in its present condition more or less barren in results." General Schofield, the successor of General Sheridan, concurs in his predecessor's opinion, and says in a report to the Secretary of War, that " it is now a rare occurrence to find a soldier who cannot sign the pay-roll, but there are a good many of them who do a little beyond that. In these days of open-order firing, fighting, and extended formations, there is no telling when a short written report from an observant soldier may produce very important results. " If reading and writing have become necessary to the soldier for the proper performance of his duties, the qualifications that will fit him to meet these new demands can be required of him with as much propriety as there is in the compulsory education to which he is now to submit in being taught to read and record the signs of the signal service, the object of both being to prepare him to meet, satisfactorily, some accidental military emergency. " The desirability of having every enlisted man qualified to read any written instructions that may be given him, and to write intelligent reports, does not admit of denial. Furthermore, why should we not avail ourselves of the opportunity thus put in our hands to make these unfortunate men learn to read, write, and think. Aside from the fact that by- so doing we would make better soldiers of them (for modern 224 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION conditions demand that every soldier be capable of thought), we would return them to civil life at the expiration of their engagement, qualified to make much better citizens." Our present Secretary of War, the Hon. Redfield Proctor, in his annual report, pleading for the soldier, says: "Give the soldier an opportunity to improve himself, that when he leaves the service he may be better fitted for civil life than when he entered it." The department desires legislation by Congress to enable it to improve its common-school system within the army. I quote from the report of the Secretary of War; asking for legislation on this subject he says: " The most pressing necessity for giving effect to a successful educational system in the army is a supply of competent teachers; the experiment of detailing enlisted men for such duty having proved unsatisfactory and embarrassing, statutory authority should be given for the enlistment of one hundred and fifty competent instructors, with rank and pay of commissary sergeants. " In this connection I will remark that the convention should appreciate the effort the War Department is making to perfect its system of educa- tion to the extent of appointing a committee to co-operate with the War Department in bringing the subject before Congress and securing the desired legislation." Having noticed the common education of the soldier, I will now notice the education of children. a. Those in any way connected with the army. While the War Department discourages the marriage of its soldiers and refuses to enlist married men, except after they have married while in the service, and only then on approval of the soldier's immediate commanding officer, yet it aims to provide for the education of the children of its soldiers. The establishment of these schools is left to the discretion of the post- commander, who is allowed to furnish teachers from among the teachers detailed to teach the soldiers' school. Attendance upon these schools, when established, is made compulsory with the children of the soldiers and optional with officers, who, when good teachers are employed, avail themselves of the opportunity of sending their children to them. It is important that such schools be established and maintained to accommodate the civilian employees and the children whose parents live in close proximity to military posts, where in sparsely settled communi- ties no schools are established by the civil authorities. b. Provisions for the children in no way connected with the army. This includes the military education of the youth, through army officers detailed for duty at military and other schools in the different states; these officers, in a number of instances, give instruction in the MILITARY EDUCATION IN THE UNITED STATES. 225 higher mathematics in addition to the purely technical instruction. I will here remark that the three graduates from these schools in merit are named in the annual Army Register as candidates for appointment in the army as commissioned officers. The demand in the interest of education the government makes on its officers, other than professional, is illustrated by details made for explorations for the general information and instruction of the public, by the Greely expedition, the explora- tion of Alaska, and the last detail of officers for duty in Central America in connection with the Inter-Colonial Railroad. The Specific or Technical Education in the United States Army. This commences with the West Point Military Academy, established for the theoretical instruction in military science and art. The experience of Washington and other statesmen, during the War of the Revolution, convinced them of the need of an institution for this purpose ; although the first expression on record of sentiments in favor of such an institution did not come from Washington, yet it is due to him more than any other that such an institution was established. He maintained that in time of peace training for war is necessary to prepare for emergencies that may rise. General Scott confirmed this conviction by the remark, " I give it as my fixed opinion that, but for our graduated cadets, the war between the United States and Mexico might, and prob- ably would, have lasted some four or five years; within its first half, more defeats than victories falling to our share ; whereas, in less than two campaigns we conquered a great country, and peace without the loss of a single battle or skirmish." WEST POINT AND ITS HISTORY. The Continental Congress, on the 20th of September, 1776, appointed a committee, consisting of Messrs. Sherman, Gerry, and Lewis, in accord- ance with a resolution of the same date " to repair to head-quarters near New York, to inquire into the state of the army, and the best means of supplying its wants." On the third of October this committee submitted a report which was read and ordered to lie on the table. The committee reported that after three day's conference with general officers, and an interview with many of the staff, they found that some of the troops in camp were badly officered, and not subject to the com- mand which good troops ought ever to be; that the Articles of War and General Orders were frequently transgressed, and the Commander-in- chief had the mortification to see that some of his officers, instead of suppressing disorderly behavior, encouraged tlie soldiers by their exam- ples to plunder and commit other offences, or endeavored to screen them from just punishment by partial trials. 226 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION These facts so deeply impressed the committee with the importance of having officers of known honored ability, and education, to officer the regiments, that they earnestly called on the States to resort to more effective measures for the purpose ; and among many resolutions then adopted, the following is found : Resolved, That the Board of War be directed to prepare a Continental Laboratory and Military Academy and provide the same with proper officers. This board was furnished with " Hints for the improvement of the Artillery of the United States " by the distinguished officer, Colonel Henry Knox. The following extract is quoted, under the belief that it is the earliest record of a plan for a United States Military Academy bear- ing any resemblance in its design to the one now in existence : And as officers can never act with confidence until they are masters of their profes- sion, an Academy established on a liberal plan would be of the utmost service to the Continent, where the whole theory and practice of fortification and gunnery should be taught ; to be nearly on the same plan as that at Woolwich, making allowance for the difference of circumstances ; a place to which our enemies are indebted for the superi- ority of their artillery to all who have opposed them. Two days before the committee submitted their report and three days after the " Hints" were furnished, the following entry is to be found on the Journal, Continental Congress, Oct. 1, 1776: Resolved, That a Committee of five be appointed to prepare and bring in a plan of a Military Academy at the army. It does not appear that this committee ever reported, or that any further active measures were ever devised to carry out the intention so clearly disclosed, and so distinctly recognized as necessary to the welfare of the army, until the termination of the Revolutionary War. The proclamation for a cessation of hostilities was adopted in Congress on the 11th day of April, 1783; on the same day Colonel Alexander Hamil- ton, the chairman of the Committee for Peace Arrangements, communi- cated to the General-in-chief a wish to be furnished with his opinions as to what ought to constitute a proper peace establishment. This request was laid before the officers of the army, then encamped at Newburg and New Windsor, who were requested to report to the Commander, in writ- ing, their views; and, guided by the experience of eight years of active field service, the necessity of a Military Academy was not overlooked in the voluminous papers submitted. Colonel Timothy Pickering, the Quartermaster-general of the Army, after combating the idea of insti- tuting academies for military purposes at the different arsenals in the United States — a scheme that had found favor with some of the officers — proceeds to say : " If anything like a military academy in America be practicable at this time, it must be grounded on the permanent military MILITARY EDUCATION IN THE UNITED STATES. 227 establishment, for our frontier posts and arsenals and the wants of the States, separately, of officers to command the defences on their sea- coasts." On this principle it might be expedient to establish a military school or academy at West Point, and the vacancies in the standing regiment should be supplied from thence, those few instances excepted where it would be just to promote a very meritorious sergeant. For this end the number which shall be judged requisite to supply vacancies in the standing regiment might be fixed, and that of the students who are admitted with the expectation of filling them, and limited accordingly. They might be allowed subsistence at the public expense. If any other youth desired to pursue the same studies at the Military Academy, they be admitted, only subsisting themselves. Those students should be instructed in what is usually called military discipline, tactics, and the theory and practice of fortification and gunnery. These suggestions, although not productive of immediate results, did not fail to arrest the attention of statesmen and legislators on the general subject of military education at a later day. Our statesmen and legislators perceived that, although the ordinary subordinate and mechanical duties of a soldier and officer might be performed without special training, the higher class of duties, and the capacity for command, could be understood and exercised only by those whose intellectual faculties had been carefully cultivated. They felt that the common interpretation of the axiom that " knowledge is power," significant and important as it is, was not its noblest and worthiest interpretation. Power over matter, and over the minds of others, is not the choicest gift of knowledge, enviable and glorious though it be; it is, in truth, a dangerous gift. But power over the mind of its possessor, purifying and elevating it, subduing all that is low and selfish to the authority of duty and virtue — this is the distinguishing, the kingly gift of knowledge. They felt, therefore, that the moral as well as the intellectual nature should be sedulously nurtured. Many of them had been observers or partakers of the moral dangers of a military life ; they were aware of the impoverished means of the members of the army, and of the probable inability of the country, for a long period, to provide more for them than a mere support; and they were, consequently, solicitous to impart to them knowledge, in itself an economical possession, the pursuit of which is inconsistent with, and destroys the desire for, indulgence in idle or vicious amusements. To these general considerations were added others, growing out of our peculiar form of government, and the sentiments and prepossessions of the people. 228 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION. A striking illustration of the justness of these views is contained in an official report made by General Knox, then Secretary of War, to the President, January 21, 1790. In this report the position is laid down that all discussions on the subject of a powerful militia will result in one or other of the fol- lowing principles : 1. Either efficient institutions must be established for the military education of the youth, and the knowledge acquired therein be dif- fused throughout the country by means of rotation ; or, 2, the militia must be formed of substitutes, after the manner of the militia of Great Britain. "If the United States possess the vigor of mind," says the Secretary, " to establish the first institution, it may reasonably be expected to pro- duce the most unequivocal advantages; a glorious national spirit will be introduced, with its extensive train of political consequences." THE APPOINTMENT AND ADMISSION OF CADETS TO THE U. S. MILITARY ACADEMY. Appointments, How Made. — Each Congressional district and terri- tory— also the District of Columbia — is entitled to have one cadet at the Academy. Ten are also appointed at large. Date of Appointments. — Appointments are required by law to be made one year in advance of the date of admission, except in cases where, by reason of death or other cause, a vacancy occurs which cannot be pro- vided for by such appointment in advance. These vacancies are filled in time for the next annual examination. Admission of Cadets. — A candidate, upon receiving his conditional appointment, is ordered to report at West Point, to the Superintendent of the Military Academy, in time to appear before the Academic Board for examination at its meeting early in June, unless there be good rea- sons for designating another time. The candidate, soon after his arrival at West Point, is subjected to a rigid physical examination by a board of experienced surgeons of the army. If he passes successfully this examination, he is then ex- amined by the Academic Board. These examinations are made with as little delay as practicable after the candidate reports to the Superin- tendent. The candidate who passes successfully these examinations is admitted at once to the Academy, without returning to his home. CHARACTER OF EXAMINATIONS. Academical Examination. — The requirements in this department can be found in the annual circular of the War Department. MILITARY EDUCATION IN THE UNITED STATES. 229 ACADEMIC DUTIES. The academic duties and exercises commence on the first of September and continue until the first of June. Examinations of the several classes are held in January and June, and at the former such of the new cadets as are found proficient in studies, and have been correct in conduct, are given the particular standing in their class to which their merits entitle them. Af^er each examination cadets found deficient in conduct or studies are discharged from the Academy, unless the Academic Board, for special reasons in each case, should otherwise recommend. Similar examina- tions are held every January and June during the four years comprising the course of studies. These examinations are very thorough, and require from the cadet a close and persevering attention to study, without evasion or slighting of any part of the course, as no relaxations of any kind can be made by the examiners. MILITARY INSTRUCTION. From the termination of the examination in June to the end of August the cadets live in camp, engaged only in military duties and exercises and receiving practical military instruction. Except in extreme cases, cadets are allowed but one leave of absence during the four years' course; as a rule, the leave is granted at the end of the first two years' course of study. PAY OF CADETS. The pay of a cadet is $540 per year, to commence with his admission to the Academy, and is sufficient, with proper economy, for his support. No cadet is permitted to receive money, or any other supplies, from his parents, or from any person whomsoever, without the sanction of the Superintendent. Cadets are required to wear the prescribed uniform. All articles of their clothing are of a uniform pattern, and are sold to cadets at West Point at regulated prices. EXPENSES OF CANDIDATES PRIOR TO ADMISSION. The expenses of a candidate for board, washing, lights, etc., after he has reported and prior to admission, will be about $10. Immediately after being admitted to the institution he must be provided with an outfit of uniform, the cost of which will be about $90, making a total sum of $100, which must be deposited with the Treasurer of the Acad- emy before the candidate is admitted. It is best for a candidate to take with him more money than will defray his travelling expenses, and for the parent or guardian to send to " The Treasurer, TJ. S. Military Acad- emy " the required deposit of $100. Any deviation from the rule as to 230 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION the amount or manner of making the deposit must be explained in writing by the parent or guardian of the candidate to the Superinten- dent of the Academy. ASSIGNMENT TO CORPS AFTER GRADUATION. The attention of applicants and candidates is called to the following provisions of an act of Congress, approved May 17, 1886, to regulate the promotion of graduates of the United States Military Academy : That when any cadet of the United States Military Academy has gone through all its classes and received a regular diploma from the academic staff, he may be promoted and commissioned as a second lieutenant in any arm or corps of the army in which there may be a vacancy, and the duties of which he may have been judged competent to perform ; and in case there shall not at the time be a vacancy in such arm or corps, he may, at the discretion of the President, be promoted and commissioned in it as an additional second lieutenant, with the usual pay and allowances of a second lieutenant, until a vacancy shall happen. GENERAL QUALIFICATIONS, A sound body and constitution, suitable ' preparation, good natural capacity, an aptitude for study, industrious habits, perseverance and obedient and orderly disposition, and a correct moral deportment, are such essential qualifications that candidates knowingly deficient in any of these respects should not, as many do, subject themselves and their friends to the chances of future mortification and disappointment by accepting appointments at the Academy and entering upon a career which they cannot successfully pursue. COURSE OF STUDY AND BOOKS USED AT THE MILITARY ACADEMY. First Year, Fourth Class. — Department: Mathematics; modern lan- guages; history, geography and ethics; drill regulations of artillery and infantry ; use of the sword, etc. Second Year, Third Class. — Department: Mathematics; modern lan- guages; drawing; drill regulations of artillery, infantry and cavalry. Third Year, Second Class. — Department: Natural and experimental philosophy; chemistry, mineralogy and geology; drawing; drill regula- tions of artillery, infantry and cavalry ; practical military engineering. Fourth Year, First Class. — Department: Civil and military engineer- ing and science of war ; modern languages ; law ; history, geography and ethics; practical military engineering; drill regulations of artillery, infantry and cavalry ; ordnance and gunnery. Growing out of the establishment of West Point, and its success as a school of theory in the science and art of war, are the four schools of application. MILITARY EDUCATION IN THE UNITED STATES. 231 These schools of application are of the nature of post-graduate institu- tions, and the instruction given in them is in the nature of practical application of principles already learned, as well as the solution of prob- lems in minor tactics, so that the instruction conveyed in these schools is purely technical, either practical or theoretical. The first in chronolog- ical order is the Artillery School of Application at Fort Monroe, which was established in 1833. In 1842 it was discontinued, but reestablished in 1858, and was again closed when the war began in 1861. Near the close of 1867 it was again established, and is now in successful operation. The instruction is both theoretical and practical, with a course of two years for officers and one for enlisted men. There is one foot-battery from the artillery regiments detailed to serve at the school. The next school of application established was the Engineer School at Willet's Point, New York Harbor. The duties of engineer troops in war are of the most important char- acter, including the defence of our coasts with submarine torpedoes, military reconnoissances, duplication of maps by photography and photo- lithography, the attack and defence of military positions by saps, mines and other military bridge constructions. To keep the troops always ready to perform these duties, which require not only high intelligence, but also long and continued training, and to afford graduates of the Military Academy assigned to the Corps of Engi- neers an opportunity to acquire practical experience — only to be had by serving with troops and by applying their theoretical knowledge of engi- neering to actual practice — was the post at Willet's Point transformed into a useful school of application. Three years constitutes the full course for officers, and a special course of seven months in torpedoes. The offi- cers, in order to become conversant with mechanical operations of pro- fessional interest, visit the several large manufacturing establishments in the vicinity to witness their operations. The following constitute the course of instruction: For Officers. — First winter's course: The course for engineer officers spending their first winter at the school will be: Torpedoes, nineteen weeks; surveying, two weeks. For officers of other arms of the service detailed for special instruction in the torpedo service : Torpedoes, twenty- one weeks. Torpedoes.— Text-books and instructions as follows: 1. So much of Abbot's " Notes on Electricity " as relates to electrical units, batteries, elec- trical measuring instruments, electrical measurements and magneto- exploders; supplemented by extensive laboratory practice in the solution of practical electrical problems. 2. Abbot's " New Torpedo Manual." 3. So much of Part II., " Professional Papers No. 23, Corps of Engineers," as relates to the manipulation of the fish torpedo. 232 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION Theoretical and Practical Instruction. — 1. Incandescent electric light- ing, as applied to the lighting of barracks, magazines, casemates, etc., in extensive systems of fortification. 2. The details of an electric search- light plant. 3. The problem of the electrical transmission of energy. Surveying. — Last two weeks of the course, and preparatory to actual field work : Such parts as may be designated by the academic staff of Johnson's " Theory and Practice of Surveying." Second Winter's Course. —Civil engineering, five weeks; military engi- neering, seven weeks; photography, five weeks; torpedoes, four weeks. Subjects. 1. Measurement of river discharge. 2. Improvement of non- tidal rivers. 3. Improvement of tidal rivers. Military Engineering. — Subjects: 1. Modern guns, carriages and pro- jectiles. 2. Steel compound, wrought and cast iron armor. 3. Modern ships of war and sea-coast defences. 4. Modern fortifications, and their attack and defence. Military Photography. — Practice will be had in the following methods: Negatives by wet and dry processes; developers and intensifiers; silver printing, and finishing and mounting of prints; map printing; photo- lithography, including the negative and transfer to stone and printing. Each officer to submit twelve printed copies of his map. Torpedoes. — One or more officers of the second and third winter's course will be detailed weekly to report to the instructor in torpedoes as assistant for testing core joints and instructing enlisted men on the torpedo detail. Third Winter's Course. — Civil engineering (eight weeks). Subjects: 1. Wave and current action and improvement of harbors. 2. Canals. 3. Steam-engines and pumps. Military Engineering. — (Eight weeks) Hamley's" Operations of War," and preparation of project for the defence of such place as may be desig- nated by the instructor. Torpedoes. — (Five weeks). See paragraph of torpedoes in second winter's course. Instruction during the summer season consists of military engineer- ing, torpedo drills, civil engineering, field astronomy and military photography. Course for Enlisted Men. — One sergeant, one corporal and twelve privates are detailed for one, and from the companies in turn, for instruction in telegraphing with the dial instrument, including the code for action, and practice in the Morse system of telegraphy; the duties of the loading room, and, so far as practicable, of the boat service as prescribed in the torpedo manual, comprise preparing the plugs of the buoyant and ground torpedoes, charging the mines, charging the cut-off boxes, three methods, jointing the cores, making turk's heads in the electrical cable, using the junction boxes, attaching a cable stop, splicing and knotting MILITARY EDUCATION IN THE UNITED STATES. 233 hemp rope, inserting thimble in wire mooring rope. They are also instructed in photography and map drawing. THE UNITED STATES INFANTRY AND CAVALRY SCHOOL. This school is situated at Fort Leavenworth, Kansas; was established in December, 1881. The objects of this school are: 1. To supply the need of a course of military instruction to those officers of the army who. are not graduates of the United States Military Academy. 2. To furnish graduates a course of instruction in the higher branches of the profession. The school is to consist habitually of not less than three field officers of cavalry or infantry and one light battery of artillery. The students at this school consist of one officer from each infantry and cavalry regiment, nominated by the regimental commanders, also lieuten- ants belonging to companies which compose the garrison. All are attached in turn to companies of infantry and cavalry and the light battery, for the purpose of thoroughly acquainting each officer with the drill as well as service. The practical course of instruction is so conducted, by the means of daily drills, that upon completion of the course each student will have acted in the capacity of recruit in cavalry and artillery, as well as com- mander of a company and battalion (both infantry and cavalry), and as a chief of section and platoon in the light battery. Practical instruction is also given in the use of machine guns and the Hotchkiss revolving cannon. Proficiency in drill, as well as promptness and punctuality in attend- ance upon the various duties imposed, and soldierly conduct in general, enter as large factors in determining the place of each student in the final general merit-roll. Special mention is made at the final examination of each officer who is considered deserving of it, a report of which is forwarded to the Adjutant-General. The instructors are taken from among officers belonging to companies composing the garrison, as well as a few who are specially detailed by the War Department. The departments embrace the courses of study as follows: Department of Military Art — The courses of military art. Department of Infantry — The course of infantry. Department of Cavalry — The course of cavalry. Department of Law — The courses of law. Department of Engineering — The courses of engineering, topography, military signaling, telegraphy and mathematics. Department of Artillery, including a limited course in ordnance and gunnery — The courses of artillery, ordnance and gunnery. 234 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION. FORT EILEY SCHOOL. By act of January 29, 1887, Congress appropriated $200,000 for the establishment of a school of instruction for cavalry and artillery upon the reservation of Fort Eiley, Kansas. This school is in process of organization, and when it shall have been completed and developed, the military educational system of the United States will approximate perfection, and will have an army equal in effi- ciency and intelligence, if not in numbers — because of its education — to any in the world. INDIAN EDUCATION. DR. ORONHYATEKHA, OF TORONTO, CANADA. When my friend, Mr. Hughes, extended to me an invitation to prepare a paper upon the subject of the education of my people in this country, to be presented before this convention, I forgot the usual habits of my people, and began an immediate reply that I would be very happy to com- ply with his request. Had I followed the methods of my people and rested on the subject over night, I am afraid I should not now be here before you. Having been absent, recently, from the country, until a few days ago, I regret very much that my pressing engagement had pre- vented me from preparing a paper worthy of being presented before an audience of this character. I am sure, however, you will receive the few remarks I have to make with all due leniency. You understand that I am a full-blooded Mohawk Indian, holding tribal relations with my own people. I am a member of the Mohawks, which is the head tribe of the Six Nations, Indians who formerly lived in the State of New York, the Mohawks having their headquarters in and about Albany, and the Senecas upon the Niagara frontier, the other extremity of the immediate possessions of the Six Nations. In the Revo- lutionary War, being prior to that date in alliance with the British, my forefathers remained faithful to their friends and allies and took part on the side of the British in the Revolutionary War. When unfortunately we got the worst of the little unpleasantness which then occurred, all of the Mohawks, and a majority of the other five tribes, rather than live under the stars and stripes, chose to migrate to the wilderness of Canada and carve for themselves a new home in the wilds of the Canadian forest. I do not know whether you will regard this of much credit to their heads, but I think you will at least say that much credit is due them for their fidelity to their friends, and for sharing with them in their adversity. When after the Revolutionary War your forefathers gained their inde- pendence, the Six Nations moved from the State of New York first to INDIAN EDUCATION 235 Lactone, near Montreal, where they remained for a period of six or seven years. At the end of this period two delegations had been selected by their leaders and chiefs, Capt. Joseph Brandt and Capt. John and other Mohawk chiefs, and they selected reservations, one near Kingston, known as the Bay of Twenty Reservation, and the other and the larger reserva- tion being located on the Grand River near the city of Branford, in the county of Brandt, in this province. The first school opened on the Six Nations Indian Reservation was by the Colonial Government in 1827, a day-school, to which an appropriation was made. A day-school was built for the Six Nations Indians, and an appropriation of £25, about $100, was made by the government for the education of their wards of the Six Nations. In 1824, I think it was, the New England company began their educational operations among the Six Nations Indians, and they continue their work down to the present time ; and I may say that the principal credit for the education and civ- ilization of my own people is very largely due to the operations of this corporation, which has its headquarters in the city of London, England. The Six Nations Indians, especially the Mohawks, were Christianized many years ago. We have been told, and my friend, Principal Grant told you, that the early settlers were very much hindered in their prog- ress in Canada by the obstacles which they encountered in the savage forest, and more savage Indians, and the trained armies of France. We had a great deal to contend with, and were very much hindered in our progress by our coming in contact with the uncivilized white man. When I tell you that the first Christian church in what was then called Upper Canada, now the great province of Ontario, was built by Mohawk Indians, and is still standing upon our reservation, about a mile and a half from Branford, you may understand that we were not so bad. Regular services of the Church of England have been held in that sacred edifice from that time down to the present day. I have in my hands now a prayer- book which was published for the use of our people in 1842. Prior to this, Indian lay-readers had to officiate for the edification of the Indians who assembled in that church. I will ask the President of the National Educational Association to read a sentence from this Indian prayer-book. Pres. Garrett: I will have to admit being one of those uncivilized white men the gentleman refers to. (Dr. Oronhyatekha read a sentence from the prayer-book in his native tongue, and then gave the translation as follows : " Almighty and most merciful God, we have erred and strayed from Thy wise law.") This prayer-book has been used until a very recent date in the church service, because of the fact that our fathers and mothers do not understand Eng- lish sufficiently to enable them to comprehend a church service unless it be read in their own language. 236 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION The education of the Indian, as probably some of the ladies and gentle- men in this audience know, is attended with great difficulty. Yet in Canada I think that we can fairly assume to have been successful ; not only in the education of the Indians mentally and morally, but in civilizing them in the true sense of the term. I have had compiled from the " Blue Book," which is a return made to the government annually, some statistics with regard to the results of our labors among the Indians in civilizing them. In the province of Ontario, Quebec, New Brunswick and Nova Scotia, 27,823 Indians. In the province of Manitoba and the northwest we have 24,157 Indians left; and in British Columbia, 23,620; leaving to us an Indian population to deal with of 75,600 in this great Dominion of ours. At the present time among these Indians there are 14,963 children of school age. Established by the missionary societies, such as the English Company, and by the government, there are 216 day-schools, with 5649 day-pupils enrolled. The average daily attendance is 2902. The number of industrial schools is 19. And I will say here, in passing, that in my opinion the only proper and successful way of educating the Indian is through the method of industrial establishments. [Applause.] Among the best of this class of schools is that at the Grand Eiver Eeservation, the Mohawk Institution, supported entirely by the funds of the New England Company, and from which, I take pleasure in saying, I myself graduated. In these 19 industrial schools there are enrolled 920 pupils, with an aver- age daily attendance of 836. The Indians in Ontario possess 949 dwelling- houses, some of them brick, and a very large proportion of them good frame dwelling-houses, ranging in value from $200 and $250 to $10,000. They have 585 barns and stables. They possess 2649 head of cattle, 1099 horses, 493 sheep and 2041 hogs. They have 1952 agricultural implements, and they raised in 1890 — which was a very bad year for Canadian farmers — 121,153 bushels of grain, 5400 bushels of potatoes and 2050 tons of hay, and other scattering products of the farm amount- ing to $7444, representing a value, on a very low estimate much below the market quotation, of about $100,000, — all raised by the Six Nations Indians. These statistics apply simply to the Indians on the Six Nations Reservation, and the Mohawk Reservation on the Bay of Twenty. They have, on the Bay of Twenty, four day-schools, three of them sup- ported by fees derivable from the Indians themselves, and one by fees from the New England Company. On the reservation upon the Grand River there are ten schools, including the Industrial School supported by the New England Company. The Indians on both these reservations, and, I may say, in nearly all the older provinces of Canada, are at the present day farmers, supporting themselves and their families almost INDIAN EDUCATION 237 exclusively from the products of the farm. Some three or four years ago the government recognized the advancement which had been made by the Indian and granted to us the great boon of the franchise. [Great applause.] So that to-day in Canada, or, rather, in the older province, the province of Ontario, the Indians have the right to vote for members of Parliament. When the measure was first introduced, under the gov- ernment of the late premier, the Eight Honorable Sir John A. Macdonald, it met with a great deal of opposition on the part of the gentlemen who sat in the House and are known as Her Majesty's Royal Opposition. I am informed that this opposition arose from a fear that if the Indians were enfranchised by the party in power, that they would — in fact it was so stated — that they would vote in a body at election for the party in power who gave them the franchise ; and, in order to defeat the measure, very many hard things were said to us by Her Majesty's Royal Opposition. But I am very glad to be able to tell you that in the two or three years the act has been in operation, not only the governing party, but Her Majesty's Royal Opposition, have become better acquainted with us, and they now think we are the best fellows in the world. [Applause.] At least, so we are frequently told (for elections take place frequently in Canada) by the leaders of the respective parties. To show you the independence of thought and the civilization of the Six Nations Indians, I may tell you that at the very first election nearly one half of the people voted on one side and the other half upon the other. So that, notwithstanding all that had been said of them upon one side and the other, their own political opinions had not been affected in the least, and they voted in accordance with their convictions as to what was best for the government. And I may state this other fact, as some evidence of the advancement in the civilization of our people, that at the polls where the Indians voted not a single ballot was spoiled; while, even in the great city of Toronto, our white neighbors very fre- quently spoil their ballots, and thus lose their votes. So that in Canada to-day the Indian has his position in the body politic; and I know of nothing which has taken place in the history of our country which is likely to bring the Indian power to a status equal to that of the white man, so far as politics and other relations are concerned. I am reminded that I have occupied the full time assigned me, and I will just in conclusion say to you, as I have sometimes had occasion to say to my own tribe and fellow- citizens in Canada, that I do not admit for one moment that my race, my people, are one whit inferior to the whites. All that we have lacked in the past are the magnificent oppor- tunities accorded to the white people under the splendid educational sys- tem of this country and yours. I may tell you that among the Mohawks it is impossible to use profane 238 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION. words. There are no cuss- words in the Mohawk language. If a Mohawk must swear, he must do it in English. I have been told by learned men that the philology of a nation is an index, to a great extent, of its char- acter ; and the purity of the Mohawk language, I think, is an index of the character of the people who use it. I regret exceedingly, Mr. President, and Ladies and Gentlemen, that time prevented me from preparing a suitable paper, which might have been printed in your record, and which might have led to some good to my fellow-countrymen upon your side of the line, for, having been two years in the Western Academy of Wilbraham, Massachusetts, as a student, and for four years a student in the college at Gambier, Ohio, and having mingled with the people of the United States, I know that the great heart of the American nation beats warmly for their Indian wards, — as warmly as it can possibly beat in any other nationality. All that the subject requires is, that the people be made acquainted with the wants of the Indians of the United States, and they will have given to them the same opportunities of improvement, the same opportunities of becoming citizens of the States, as our Indians have been given in this great Dominion. I thank you most sincerely for having given me this opportunity to speak to you. I have brought with me a portion of the communion plate given to the Mohawks by Queen Anne, about 1712, and it is here on the platform for your inspection. It is inscribed as the gift of Her Majesty Anne, by the Grace of God Queen of Great Britain, France, and Ireland. This plate was used among the Mohawks, even while they were living in the State of New York, in the communion service in the Church of England. When the fortunes of war went against us, the plate was bur- ied in the State of New York, and six or seven years afterward, when we had settled upon our reservations, a party was sent back to New York ; and, fortunately, no white man had found the treasure and it was dug up and brought back to the Mohawks, and divided between the Mohawks of the Grand Eiver and the Mohawks of the Bay of Twenty; and these, with the other pieces of the plate, is what remains to us now, the Mohawks of the Bay of Twenty, of that magnificent gift. The chalice was lost by a clergyman to whom it was loaned to take to England and exhibit, when going there to raise money for the use of a mission. I do not sup- pose that he disposed of the chalice to enhance his funds. I presume it was legitimately lost. However, my people are exceedingly jealous of what is remaining, and I had very great difficulty in persuading my wife's mother, who is the great granddaughter of Captain Joseph, to let me have this, even for two or three days, in order that it might be presented before you. IN SEARCH OF AN EDUCATION 239 IN SEARCH OF AN EDUCATION. MOMOLU MASSAQUOY, PRINCE OF THE VEY NATION, AFRICA. Mr. President, Members of the National Educational Association, Ladies ami Gentlemen: — I deem it an honor to stand as a speaker before such a great body, — whose aims are to arouse the interest of the people of America in a higher technical and industrial education, to make wise the unwise, and to polish the mind of the uncultivated. But what shall I say? I am not old enough to give counsel, I am not wise to entertain this intelligent audience. I am not of a race that has played an impor- tant part in the history of our present civilization, nor am I of a Christian parentage. I am simply a son of a heathen chieftain and a Mohammedan convert. These being the circumstances, I have selected no educational subject that might suit the occasion, but shall speak on the outlook for Africa, as it relates to the subject assigned — " In Search of an Education." I appear in my native costume because of the love I have for my coun- try, and in memory of its people ; and, above all, because it was presented by my own dear mother, from whom it has pleased God to part me, per- haps for his own service in the future. Indeed, there is a great outlook for Africa. The question may be asked, Upon whom does the future greatness, the civilization, and evang- elization of Africa depend? I answer, upon the native African, and his brother in America, who, as Joseph of old, was sold in bondage, in order that he might comfort sorrowing Jacob and assist his brothers in their distress. I have not, of course, forgotten the work of our Caucasian brethren, who for years have sacrificed their homes, spent their money, and even laid down their lives, in order that we might enjoy the life that they enjoy ; but the situation of Africa is such that it can only be the habita- tion of the black race, and his deliverer must be his black brother. Another question may arise, Whence will the greatness of Africa come? I answer the question by pointing to its vast mountains stored with min- erals of all kinds, its dense forests abounding with all sorts of costly wood, its tall palm trees that supply its people with oil, wine, material for meat, basket and net, its gigantic elephants that furnish the civilized world with the most brilliant ivory, and its fertile soil, which is ever producing the most luxuriant vegetation. Some, in solving our problem, have said that, notwithstanding all these advantages that nature has bestowed upon the " Dark Continent," yet our intellectual capacities are not of that standard that will enable us to 240 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION. grasp and utilize them. This assertion has been proven false in your vari- ous colleges and universities to which the negro is admitted. That the negro has not the capacity of forming a government is clearly demonstrated by Liberia and Hayti. If these things are true, then, with the co-operation of our brothers in America, a great reformation may be expected. By our brothers among themselves, I do not mean that every descendant of Africa has this ability developed now ; for there are colored people m this country who have no higher aim than to be waiters in saloons, to gamble, to loaf, to drink whiskey whenever they want it, and think of nothing but what they eat and drink. Such a class of people is not needed in Africa, and there is no room for them anywhere. We want men and women of a high Christian principle, men who are interested in the race, wise men, well versed in the different arts and sciences. When these needs shall have been well supplied, then shall the day be near when the prophecy will be fulfilled, " There shall come princes out of Egypt, and Ethiopia shall stretch forth her hands to God." There are to-day young men from Africa in all parts of Continental Europe, British America, and the United States, preparing themselves for the work of elevating their people. Missionaries from all parts of the civilized world are laboring in various portions of Africa, and their labors have resulted in leading many souls to the light of civilization and Christianity. Experience as well as observation has convinced me of the fact that the anxiety of the native African children for knowledge exceeds that of children in Liberia or this country. Native children brought into school in Liberia soon master the Liberian brogue, which, as they advance in study, is reduced into good English. In the Vey Territory, where we have a written language, every Vey child is taught early how to study ; so they are not strangers to this exer- cise when they enter an English-speaking school. Their training-school, or " Gri Gri Bush," as the Liberians call it, where they are taught the laws and customs of their tribes, teaches them self-management; and those who are trained in it make very few mistakes in etiquette, even in this country. One of the greatest things impressed upon the Vey child is honesty. The rogue is quite often burnt to ashes, and one who constantly lies and misleads strangers gets his tongue split. In the interior, where the native chief rules, very little lying, stealing, and other things of the same character exist. It sometimes occurs to me that dishonesty is the result of civilization, IN SEARCH OF AN EDUCATION. 241 and that civilized man is constantly trying to invent a scientific way of getting a thing without paying for it. One of the greatest evils in Liberia is, perhaps, the treatment of the aborigines by their brothers from America. It is not all those who are from America that do thus, for there are men and women in Liberia who love and respect the aborigines as they do any Americo-Liberian. It is that low class of people who went simply for their own welfare and not to advance the race. This class of people has been the cause of three principal conflicts, — the Grebo, the first and second Gbassa wars, and several minor conflicts; and to-day the condition of the aborigines is not any better. In Liberia proper, the aborigines are called "countrymen," or "bush- men " ; and, in a quarrel between a native and Americo-Liberian boy, the latter would say to the former, "You country dog, you!" No provision, as far as I know, is made for the native children in the public schools of Liberia; nor is there a special training-school for them, outside of the mission-schools, where they are admitted and where their ill-treatment is not tolerated. Read the history of the proud Romans, and form a clear imagination of the affairs between the patricians and plebeians, both socially and politically; then travel over your fair country and notice the treatment of the negro by the lower class of the Caucasian race, and you will have a clear idea of the condition of affairs in Liberia. Another great evil in Liberia is the liquor traffic, carried on by the American and European merchants. Many a gallon of whiskey is daily poured into the throat of both aborigines and Americo-Liberians (Chris- tians and Mohammedans excepted). We hear of slavery, wars, and extermination of missionaries ; all of these are caused by the influence of the alcoholic drinks. The heathen, when under the influence of liquor, tries to make war with other tribes, which sometimes costs thousands of lives; sometimes many children are parted, as slaves, from their mothers, wives from their husbands, to serve an unknown tribe. Missionaries who warn them to abstain from the alcoholic drinks receive the following reply : Here is a man (referring to the merchant) from your own country ; he sold us this sweet water, and after we pay our money for it, you don't want us to drink it. How two persons from the same country can look alike, dress alike, speak the same tongue, have a different belief, is a mystery to the heathen mind. One of the chief religions of Western Africa is Mohammedanism. " God is God and Mohammed is his prophet" is their constant cry. The "Gri Gri Bush," which was briefly mentioned, is the institution 242 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION. among the Vey and adjacent tribes, which all boys and girls are requested to attend before they are recognized as men and women in their respect- ive tribes. In this institution, the boys are taught farming, theory and practice of prophecy, magic art, conjuration, laws of their country, and everything that fits them as men and husbands in that country. The girls are taught all things pertaining to family, — housekeeping, cooking, basket-making, fishing, and other industrial pursuits for girls in Africa. At the head of the " Gri Gri Bush" stands the " Gri Gri Devil," who wears a cap of six or seven faces, which makes him appear as a real devil. But through the grace of our loving Saviour, the day is coming when discrimination shall be blotted out of our country, when Christian America and Europe will no more send that cursed water into our land, when Mohammedanism shall be abolished, when Christianity shall be her sole religion, when railroads and telegraphic wires shall stretch across her bosom, and when Africa with her population shall stand on an equality with the most potential nations of the world. In 1877, Bishop C. C. Penick, now of Louisville, Ky., opened the St. John Mission, an Episcopal school ; invited father and other chieftains to bring their children into the school where they could be educated. In less than a year, the school was full of boys and girls. At first I could not bear the idea of giving up my former way of worship, leave the Mohammedan priest under whose tuition I was placed, and all the dear ones at home, and be posted as a student under a white-faced people ; nor would my ambition permit me to abandon the thoughts of attending the various institutions of my tribe, well familiarizing myself with the Koran and Mohammedanism, and being the priest and prince of the Vey nation, as my parent had hoped. But to overcome these difficulties, the mission- aries were accustomed to distribute candies, sugar, cakes, and other attractive things, among the little children, whenever they preached in a native village. This so attracted me to the missionaries, that when my uncle, who has an idea of civilized life, asked me again to go into the mission school, I was willing to go where I could be fed with candy, sup- posing that the missionaries must have a whole city filled with these good things. The parental love and care of that God's own consecrated man, Bishop Penick, and his co-workers for these young heathen, was such as to create a personal love in us, and in our parent, for them. As I advanced in study and embraced the Christian religion, my parents, who are of the Mohammedan faith, were greatly dissatisfied, and sought to take me home. Knowing that if I returned to my native town, I would soon indulge in IN SEARCH OF AN EDUCATION 243 my heathen, or Mohammedan, practices again, I escaped and came to America; and through Bishop Penick, who had provided for me a bene- factress, the late Mrs. Emily J. Albert, of Baltimore, whom I trust is now in heaven, I have advanced to the happy position I now occupy. They sent me to Nashville, Tenn., the Athens of the South, a city that is loved by all lovers of knowledge, to attend the Central Tennessee College, one of the three great colored institutions of that city. And now I am struggling for an education, getting my support for my service, and by lecturing on the customs of my people, in different places during vacations. It is my aim to complete my education ; go back to my native land, and take the place of my father, who was chief of the (Northern) Vey Territory (but who rumor says is dead), not for fame nor for riches, but for the purpose of uplifting my people. And if I have to eat grass seven years, as Nebuchadnezzar, I will complete my education, D. V. Now, ladies and gentlemen, I congratulate you upon the fact that your education and your civilization have Christianity as their base. Empires that preceded you failed to produce such a system of education and civilization; nor will unborn nations produce a higher standard, without having Christianity as a foundation. Egypt, the foremost nation of ancient civilization, permitted her people to weep over dead animals; well did Assyria divide the Zodiac into twelve signs, named the Zodiacal Constellations, that will forever witness their astronomical attainment, dividing the year into twelve months and the month into four weeks, — but she was a worshipper of Baal. And I may speak of Greece and Rome, the fame of whose civilization will still whirl through coming generations, and whose histories will for- ever be read with an undying interest by nations yet to come. But they were blinded with paganism and scepticism. May success attend the labor of the various educational associations, and may their Christian trainings have such an effect that many sons of America will join in the Gospel song: " They call us to deliver Their land from error's chain." To the friends in United States I say, " May you forever be united!" and to the friends in the Dominion of Canada, " God save your Queen!" 244 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION THE INFLUENCE OF THE PUBLIC SCHOOL NATIONALLY AND INTERNATIONALLY. REV. PRINCIPAL GEORGE M. GRANT, QUEEN S UNIVERSITY, KINGSTON, ONTARIO. The public school is not an institution of American origin, as is sometimes claimed, but it is a basal necessity of government by the pub- ijC) — a form of government that is becoming universal in Christendom. There are, indeed, checks on the direct action of the people in the most democratic country, and these checks are even more deeply imbedded in the constitution of the United States than in that of Great Britain. The difficulty of making a constitutional amendment is far greater in the United States than in a country governed by parliament and without a written constitution, like Great Britain. But in an old country like Britain, where conservative forces are interwoven into the warp and woof of every class, indirect checks supply the place of the impediments that the constitution of the United States interposes in the way of hasty popular action. In Canada, however, democracy is not only omnipotent but it may act with almost lightning rapidity. Our Parliament repre- sents a people instinct with the energy of the New World, without aris- tocracy, or established church, or moneyed or leisure class; and it can set up or pull down by its vote any institution that is not specially exempted by the Constitution from its jurisdiction. In Britain, parlia- ment is omnipotent, and its jurisdiction is unlimited. It can do any- thing that is competent to human authority. In Canada, parliament is also supreme, is the supreme executive as well as the legislative authority ; but its province is defined by a written constitution that gives exclusive powers to local legislatures. While, then, in all countries where gov- ernment is by and for the people, the public school is a necessity on political grounds, you can see that it is a more pressing political necessity in Canada than even in the United States or Britain. Only a small percentage of the children in any country will ever reach the high school, and a still smaller the university ; yet all citizens are politically equal, and the nation will be to-morrow what the children are to-day. If the people are ignorant, reckless, or immoral, the downfall of a state governed by the people is certain. In self-defence, therefore, the state must insist that its future citizens shall know how to read, shall be in sympathy with its history and fundamental ideas, shall form habits of sobriety, truthfulness, and respect for law, and shall be taught that there is a divine or absolute basis for morality. Attendance at the public sohool must be made compulsory, as in Germany, for all children from THE PUBLIC SCHOOL NATIONALLY AND INTERNATIONALLY. 245 six to fourteen years old who are not obtaining instruction elsewhere ; and the correlative of universal compulsory attendance, as a conservative government in England now almost admits, is the abolition of school fees. Faithfulness in carrying out this fundamental requirement may yet give us, in Canada and the United States, the spendidly low average that Bavaria, Saxony, and Baden have attained, of something less than one half per cent of illiterates. The point of view, then, from which I look at the public school is its political necessity. Self-preservation is a fundamental law for the individual anjl for the state ; and the modern state cannot exist unless a reasonable amount of mental and moral development is secured to all who are to be citizens. The importance of the family in promoting that development is not ignored when the fundamental proposition is laid down, that the school is essential to securing it fully, and, therefore, that schools fitted to do the requisite work must be established. The state must see to it that this work is done, and done on its part " with- out resting, without hasting." Neither does our fundamental position ignore the work of the church, nor overlook the fact that the origin of the primary school may be ascribed to Christianity. " There is no time in the Christian Church when schools did not exist," Brother Azarias points out in his article, in the Educational Revieiv for March, on the Abbe Alain's volumes. " Wherever monastic institutions were established, schools flourished. Then there was the Episcopal school, the Cathedral school, the parish school, the burgh school, the rural school, schools attached to the hospitals for the poor, — all of which flourished at one or other time during the Middle Ages throughout Christendom. " These primary schools were far more gen- eral, both in the cities and in the country, than is generally supposed. No doubt the teachers were often as miserable and merciless as Eras- mus pictures the grammarians, or teachers of private schools, in his day ; for then, as now, the rule of "poor pay, poor preach" held good. But the times were rough, and the use of the rod was all but universal, in the home as well as the school. To dispense with it would have been considered to fly in the face of divine authority. Solomon was consid- ered a higher authority than the spirit of the Christian religion. James Grant tells us that in Scotland the pupil carried to the school the rod with which he was to be punished, — so resolute were the parents that full justice should be done their children. The rod did not hurt then as it would now, we must remember. People thought less of their own feelings, and much less of the feelings of their children, than we usually do. As to the origin and multiplicity of schools in Scotland, Grant says : " Our burgh schools were not established by an act of parliament ; they had their origin in connection with the Church, or were called into 246 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION. existence by the people themselves; but in whatever way they were founded, undoubtedly, toward the end of the fifteenth century schools were planted in every considerable town in Scotland." This view of the origin of the nation and of the school out of the Church, is commended to the consideration of those who think that national churches are inconsistent with religious liberty. It is well, too, to be reminded that even John Knox's magnificent scheme of public education, outlined in the first Book of Discipline, was not a new thing under the sun. Like everything great and good, it had its roots in the past, and was an evo- lution rather than a creation. In heaven, Minervas may spring full- grown and full-armed from the brain of Jupiter, but on earth they are born in the usual way, and have to struggle for life and to worry through all kinds of impediments before they attain to lusty strength. While the mediaeval Church had so much to do with establishing the school and founding the state, and while it would be unhistorical as well as ungenerous to forget this, it is quite clear that the modern state is strong enough to stand on its own feet, and that no other organization can now be entrusted with the establishment of common schools. No other can do the work with even an approach to thoroughness and completeness. Local effort must be encouraged; the co-operation of individuals, voluntary societies, and churches may be accepted, indeed ought to be welcomed, but the state must lay down its own fundamental requirements, and, so far as these are concerned, must supervise and control. 1. In considering the influence of the school on the nation, I begin with a definition: The ideal education which the state should aim at is the full development of the faculties and the character essential to modern citizenship. The influence of the school nationally must be estimated by its success in these respects. If the school encourages the best physical development, if it not only teaches to read but inspires the average pupil with a love for reading, if it interests him in the history of his nation, feeds his imagination with suitable food, draws out his powers of observation, stores his memory with a few classic pieces that shall be to him permanent models, and, above all, roots in him habits of order, accuracy, courtesy, truthfulness, self-reverence, and reverence for the highest, — then it has done its work. This ideal is surely not impos- sible. In the eight formative years between six and fourteen, so much ought to be accomplished, if the teacher is at all fit for his place, and if the state insists on the pupils' regular attendance and provides proper buildings, grounds, and inspection. Physical development does not demand gymnasium apparatus or a drill sergeant. As a rule children will see to this matter for themselves, in the best ways, if only oppor- tunities are allowed. The games of children are, for the great mass, the THE PUBLIC SCHOOL NATIONALLY AND INTERNATIONALLY. 247 very best means of securing good physical culture. Play, and plenty of it, is indispensable in education. Play means harmonious development of the body without fostering the self-consciousness that is apt to be induced by modern pretentious substitutes in the shape of military drill and gymnastic exercises. As to the rest of the education that is required, everything depends on getting good teachers, and on rational aims and methods. Good teachers! You may well stop me and ask, How are these to be had in sufficient numbers? Here is the supreme difficulty. Not only is the salary of the public-school teacher small, his work monotonous and his place in society of little account, but his tenure of office is insecure, and he is often so hampered by multiplied and ever-changing regulations, that he is not so much a free being as a cog in a vast machine that counts only by statistics. Statistics are needed, but they cannot esti- mate the highest results. In these circumstances, the influence of teachers on scholars, so far as character-building is concerned, is reduced to a minimum ; for the influence of one soul on another is a very subtle thing, and the atmosphere of freedom is essential to the impartation of it to a class or school. " You can never touch the heart of another with emotion," says Goethe, "unless the emotion is genuine from your own heart," or, as Horace puts it: "If you wish me to weep, you must first weep yourself: — " " Si vis me flere, dolendum est Primum ipsi tibi." But pure emotion cannot co-exist long with a mechanical system, or payment by results, or with the other conditions to which I have referred. This problem of how to get the best teachers is too large to be discussed here, but it must be solved if the school is to serve the state efficiently. That every future citizen shall be taught to read is much. That he shall be taught to observe and to think is more. But that he should learn to love, admire, and revere that which is worthy, and hate that which is unworthy, is most of all. But how shall the average boy learn these highest things save through the voice, tones, and whole life of his teacher? Can the state, then, do anything to make the position of so important a functionary more dignified than it is, and can special honor be paid to those who have served longest? These are questions that are more easily asked than answered. The mediaeval Church, by selecting for schoolmaster a young cleric who assisted the pastor, or a layman who could perform minor functions in the church, conferred honor on the office in an age when it was an honor to be in any way connected with the worship of God. There were decrees to the effect that " schoolmasters clothed in their surplices should be incensed in the church, and should hold the place of honor above all the laity, even the aristocracy 248 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION. of the parish. " The parish schoolmasters of Scotland, under the old system of life- tenure, which lasted down to a recent date, also held a position that was always respectable in the eyes of the pupils and of the community. Now that the state is more directly responsible for the schools, is it not possible to do something in the same line? How it should be done is worthy of the most serious consideration, but I am too conscious of the difficulties in the way to do more at present than point out the need. I see most hope in the employment of efficient, sympathetic, well-educated female teachers, who are not in a hurry to get married. The next ques- tion, that of rational aims and methods, is bound up with the one we have just raised. To attempt too much, or expect too much from the school, is a mistake. To attempt too many things, a greater mistake. But to attempt to teach subjects for which there are not qualified teachers is the greatest mistake of all. For instance, one would suppose that the state should insist on history being taught in its elementary schools, so that every citizen might know something of the causes that determine the rise and fall of nations, and might be in sympathy with the history and the aims of his own nation. Teaching history in this way would be one of the best methods of teaching morality and the great facts of the spiritual world, as well as history. But how can lads, or slips of girls, who have no conception of what is meant by the life of the race, who have never come in contact with cultured minds, and who get their certificates by simply passing examinations on text-books that they have memorized, rise to this point of view? Or if they have to cram their pupils, in order that they may pass examinations, with facts of Canadian or American history that they cannot appreciate or relate to the princi- ples that are at the root of national development; if they have to make boys and girls write and learn by rote paragraphs of the British North American Act, or even the Constitution of the United States, or the number of men killed in battles that might as well be forgotten, — what earthly use will such cramming be to unformed teacher and unawakened pupil? The remedy for our crude methods must be along the lines of inducing teachers to take a partial, if not a full, university course, and of imitating the German system of teaching history. In the German common schools, the famous stories of classical times, and the biogra- phies of eminent men indifferent nations — especially their own nation — are read; and a basis of comparison is laid by instruction in the Old Testament histories. The comparative method of study is the modern method, in all subjects, and nowhere is there a better basis for historic com- parison than in those brief sketches, written from a prophetic or ideal stand- point, in the books of Judges, Samuel, and Kings, — sketches and sum- maries that combine pregnant and glowing reflection with all the charm of concrete details. By this method of studying history, the child will, THE PUBLIC SCHOOL NATIONALLY AND INTERNATIONALLY. 249 unconsciously, get hold of links of connection between history and geog- raphy, and history and literature, and between these and life. His learning will prove of permanent interest and value. He is led to think of other nations and other generations in relation to himself and to the men and women he lives with, instead of misconceiving them as abstrac- tions invented to torment schoolboys, or as mere "pagans," with whom he is not expected to have any sympathy. The difficulty of teaching literature to children is very great, perhaps greater than of teaching history itself; and the usual mistake is in being too formal, too didactic, too analytic, and too ambitious. The children must be interested, and they can be interested only through their imaginations. Mr. Gradgrind would give them " facts. " I would give them stories and tales instead; books like Hans Andersen's and Grimm's tales, the Arabian Nights, Robinson Crusoe, and the Synoptic Gospels, to begin with; to be fol- lowed by Scott's poems, selections of ballad poetry, and selections from Scripture. " The best literature for children, from their seventh to their fourteenth years," says Rosenkranz, " consists always of that which is honored by nations and the world at large," and if the books I have mentioned are objected to, choose at any rate others that have stood the test of time and a jury that may be said to comprise universal humanity. The vexed question of text-books should come in here, but the subject is so vast that I trust you will set apart an afternoon or evening for its discussion next year. Select a bold man, your boldest, to open it up ; for he is certain to stir up a hornets' nest. There are vested inter- ests connected with the supply of text-books, and these, when stirred up, will surely sting. I will not state offhand which country in the world has solved the problem best of reconciling on the one hand, the free competition in production which is the only way of getting the best ar- ticle, and the free choice — within prescribed limits — due to teachers and school-boards, and, on the other hand, the necessity of having a limited number of books from which to choose, and the necessity for all reason- able economy, — no matter whether the books are supplied by the state or the parents; but I may say, with submission, that the United States would not have the slightest chance of getting a prize for its solution of the problem, from any independent commission. There may be different opinions as to which country has effected the best possible reconciliation of opposing difficulties, but all will agree that there is nothing to be said on behalf of a school-book combine that unites in itself the worst features of all other combines. In speaking of the books to be read, we must remember that the object of the common school is not industrial. It should not regard children as the raw material of craftsmen, and aim at making infant mechanics. Children are organisms in the flower of life, and the best fruit will be 250 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION. had if you give the flower free play and do not expect it to be fruit. The fruit will come in due time, if you do not handle or test the flower too often. The aim of the school is to make children happy, healthy, and natural ; to give them a love for their country and for one another ; to open their eyes to the beauty of nature and the meaning of life; to give them a love for reading, and a taste that will enable them in some degree to discern good reading from bad; and to form in them habits that will make the end of their school days to be but the beginning of their education. It may be said that all this and more too is being done now. Possibly it is in some places. Improvement, too, there has been of late years, in the general diffusion of education and educational appliances, and, above all, in the increase of popular interest in the common school. But no one will say that the influence of teachers on society, or the influence of the school on the formation of character, is what was at one time hoped for ; and how, then, can we profess to be satisfied? Unless the people are becoming more intelligent and more moral, the school has failed. Unless there is a higher political life, the state cannot be satisfied. So great are the possibilities of the public school, however, that despair must not be thought of. We must learn wisdom from comparative failure, and bend all our energies to solve the great problems that must be solved to make free government permanent. The only hope for humanity lies in freedom; for despotism in every shape and form is a confession of defeat, a confession that reason and conscience are not to be trusted in a free and open field ; and the only hope for free government is in securing not only a saving remnant of good men, but in elevating the masses to sympathize with, to select, and to vote for, their best and wisest to be their governors. In vain is it to have a good political constitution, good laws, a good country, and a good tariff, if we have not men and women animated with wise, noble, and devout sentiment. The constitution and the laws make the people only to a very limited degree. The people made the constitution to begin with, and, then, can unmake it or make a better ; and the great instrument they have for making the next generation wiser and better than themselves is the school. Therefore, 0 brother and sister teachers ! magnify your office. Ours is a higher position than that of kings. We are king-makers. 2. The influence of the school internationally. The school, I have said, should teach patriotism ; and let us not forget that there is as great a difference between patriotism and the blatant, arrogant spread-eagleism which in Europe is called Chauvinism, as there is between enthusiasm and fanaticism. The one is healthy and full of generous inspirations, and the other, unhealthy and the destroyer of true patriotism and morality. The one teaches us to love our own land and race first, THE PUBLIC SCHOOL NATIONALLY AND INTERNATIONALLY. 251 because it is ours and we believe that it has done, and that it promises to do, most for man and for that which is best in man — especially for the good old cause of liberty, peace, and righteousness. The other teaches us to hate men, for the love of God or the love of country. The common school is, we have seen, broad as the nation, and neces- sary to the existence and well-being of the nation. May we not find for it a broader base? Yes. Our fundamental proposition implies that its basis must be wide as the English-speaking race, for all the divisions of this imperial race are self-governing, and, in the next place, wide enough to underlie all nations, that, in accordance with the principles of modern society, are governed by representatives who express the will of the people. Think of the influence that the school might exert if it realized that its mission was to educate the children in all our English-speaking lands " so that we might again become as one people." This was the expression used by John Jay, one of the American commissioners who negotiated the settlement of peace and reconciliation with the mother country, in 1783. This was the key-note struck by Jay, Adams, and Franklin, and it was adopted on the British side by the Prime Minister, Lord Shel- burne, with a frankness and generosity that disconcerted the sinister designs of France and Spain at the time, and led to far-reaching conse- quences that are only now being understood by the world. If the facts concerning the history of this settlement of 1783 that are revealed in Fitzmaurice's "Life of Lord Shelburne" and the ." Critical History" of Justin Winsor, the librarian of Harvard, had been known to past gener- ations of school teachers on this continent, the invasion of Canada in 1812-15 would not have taken place, and the game of twisting the lion's tail would not be so popular in the United States as it still is in a good many places, from Congress downwards and upwards. Eead the sum- mary of these facts presented by Mr. 0. A. Howland in that noble work of his just published in Toronto with the suggestive title of " The New Empire," and then let us all go hence to explain to the millions of future citizens on both sides of the line and across the Atlantic and the Pacific what were the inspiring ideals of the men who, after seven years, fighting, thought not only of peace, but of permanent reconciliation, absolute freedom of trade, and the promotion of each other's prosperity. Would there then be any further waving of the bloody shirt that is more than a century old? The men who try to keep up hatred between North and South because of battles that took place a quarter of a century ago are estimated aright. What should be thought of those who would rake up the ashes of old feuds that were buried in 1783? Is it not time that that very ancient bloody shirt should be reverently laid aside? It should now be well understood that, at the close of the war, France repudiated the idea of the United States being allowed to practically 252 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION. monopolize the continent. The thirteen colonies were to be restricted to their own narrow boundaries between the Atlantic and the Alle- ghanies. Spain had joined the alliance on this condition. Great Britain was expected as a matter of course to have the same views; for the great West, from the Ohio to the Mississippi, belonged to the Province of Quebec or Canada, and was, of course, to be conceded to her, while the remainder of the continent was to be the share of Spain. Against such a combination the States, exhausted by the long war, would have been helpless, even had they been willing to fight for empty spaces of which they knew nothing. But, as Mr. Jay said, " the one government which had the power to determine the boundaries " was Great Britain, and the young republic found then, as subsequently in a more recent crisis, when Napoleon III. was the tempter, that in the opinion of British statesmen "blood was thicker than water." England, in 1783, "endowed" the United States, to use Jay's words, with the great West, to the unbounded amazement of France and Spain; and she did so because Jay and his colleagues pointed out that the vast commerce of America would always be open to Great Britain, and that that would mean perpetual and mutual prosperity. All honor to the memory of Lord Shelburne. " He," as Morellet, the French philosopher wrote to him, " actually put in practice in public life what Adam Smith had only put in words." And he did so because, as he himself wrote, " the people throughout the world have but one interest, if properly understood." Golden words, these — words to be taught as an axiom in political science in every school, church, caucus, and parliament. If there are two nations in the world that ought to trade freely with each other, and to be in perpetual alliance, these two are the British commonwealth and the United States ; and the part of the world-wide commonwealth that should be the link between the two is Canada. History, in these days of scientific investi- gation, has at last been brought into court and given conclusive evidence to the effect that such were the intentions of the great men who drew up the settlement of 1783, and that the British minister then laid the most magnificent basis for permanent friendship and co-operation that the representatives of Congress could suggest. Surely, if any history should be taught in the common school, this outstanding fact should have the first place ; and the lesson would flow naturally from it that the time that is past should suffice for the recriminations, jealousies, and suspicions of small men, and that we are now called upon to join hands all round and secure the peace of the world and the coming of the king- dom for which we profess to pray daily. The Britain of Queen Victoria is not the Britain of George III. Britain is as truly governed by the democracy as the United States is, and Canada is more frankly demo- cratic than either. This being the case, there is no more possibility of THE PUBLIC SCHOOL NATIONALLY AND INTERNATIONALLY. 253 diversity of interest between them than there is between Maine, Michi- gan, and Mississippi. If this were understood, it would also be seen that secession is as totally out of the question in the British Empire as war proved it to be in the United States, and that the idea that material considerations might tempt a portion of either commonwealth to abandon its flag is insulting, whether made on the north or on the south side of the line. Will you permit me a word of personal reference here? A daily paper in this city quoted the last sentences of my words of welcome to you on Tuesday afternoon ; spoke of them as illustrating my fondness for giving my friends "surprises," and added that the sentiments were excellent, but that surely the gentleman that uttered them was not the Principal Grant who has been one of the ardent Imperial Federationists. I own to you frankly that I am the man, and, as I do not wish to sail under false colors, I must ask you if there is anything " surprising " in a man being in favor of the unity of all the parts of the empire covered by his own flag and being in favor, at the same time, of the most cordial relations with a neighbor country that he loves best next to his own? If there is an inconsistency, then am I an offender. If there is not, then the paper that professes to be Canadian and British, yet is opposed to national unity, is the offender. In your glorious struggle for the Union, many respectable men and papers in the North opposed you — generally with half-truths, partial reports of your words and deeds, sneers and innuendoes. What did you call them? Copperheads. Why? Because the copperhead was the most dangerous snake known to you. The common school, then, might legitimately be made an instrument to promote the permanent reconciliation of the two great countries into which our race divided more than a century ago, and which have ever since stood apart, Their scars remaining Like cliffs which have been torn asunder. Nor would such a work exhaust the international possibilities of the com- mon school. The mediaeval Church is broken up, and the nations of Christendom no longer pay allegiance to one earthly head and centre of authority. But Christendom is still one, in the spiritual unity of the great nations that constitute it, and that express in their literatures their conceptions of the universe. These conceptions are essentially Christian, though each nation expresses them after its own fashion. Why, then, should there not be a Reader for use in the schools of Christendom, consisting of selections from the best English, French, German, Italian, Spanish, and Russian literature? The mere reading of such a book would do more to convince those who are to be the governors of the nations that all men are brothers, that all think alike, that all hearts turn to one pole, and that the interests of all are identical, than 254 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION. the memorizing of the best formal catechism that ever has been or could be written. A world so instructed would know that war is the sum of human villainy, and that it is opposed to the interest of every people. Just as there are courts to decide between neighbors in the same country, so the necessity would be felt of having courts to decide between neigh- bor nations; and, just as the decision of a feeble old judge, or the nod of a single policeman, is accepted because it is known that the whole might of the nation is behind the wig or the baton, so would the decis- ions of the international courts be universally accepted. The common school would not be the only force in operation producing this result, but it ought to be the prime and all-embracing force ; for it reaches all the common people, and reaches them while in the plastic state; and the common people rule. It may be said that I have presented an ideal out of all proportion to the real, and that it is absurd to attribute such vast possibilities of influence to an agency which, when considered in detail, is so insignifi- cant. Certainly the average common-school teacher is a feeble instrument to work such wonders as those that have been described. Admittedly, the university don seems a much more imposing personage. No one questions the dignity of his work or his place in society, and generally his salary is pretty good and his tenure of office all that could be desired, and sometimes a little more than is desirable. It would ill become me to underrate the importance of the university man. If a genius of orig- inal force, or a man of lofty character, he is the fountain-head of innumerable creative iniiuences. To him the young men who are the hope of the future owe their intellectual and spiritual birth. In educa- tion, too, we must never forget that improvement begins from above. But the common-school teacher represents a still mightier force. The great forces operate silently, and on so vast a scale that they are often unnoticed, or when looked at in detail appear unworthy of notice. It is still true that God chooses the weak things of the world to confound the mighty ; not that they are weak, but because to our dull eyes they seem to be weak. Brother and sister teachers, the mission of the com- mon school is to enlighten the State, to make the British commonwealth and the American Union friends, and to link the nations together in a holy brotherhood. I would have you so filled with this lofty ideal that you may always be inspired, in the doing of your work or drudgery, with a due sense of the issues for time and eternity that are involved. REPORT OF COMMITTEE ON EXHIBITS. 255 REPORT OF COMMITTEE ON EXHIBITS. Mr. W. R. Garrett, President National Association : Dear Sir : The exhibit of pupils' work at the Toronto meeting of the National Association was small and fragmentary. It contained, however, some excellent features and a considerable number of specimens of excel- lent work. It illustrated the tendency to extend various forms of manual training and to incorporate them into the ordinary work of the public schools. It also showed the increase of graphic and objective devices in teaching the familiar subjects, and an effort to bring school work more and more within the scope of practical aims. The exhibits were displayed in two large adjoining rinks; and great credit is due to the Committee of Arrangements at Toronto for the excellent provision made for this feature of the N. E. A. meeting. I have the honor to transmit herewith the following documents relating to the exhibit, viz. : I. Catalogue of Exhibits, prepared by Mr. David Boyle, of Toronto, the Superintendent of the exhibition. II. Report on Color and Form, by Miss L. E. Fay, of Springfield, Mass. III. Report on Drawing, by Mr. Walter S. Goodnough, of Brooklyn, N. Y. IV. Report on Kindergarten Exhibits, by Mr. S. B. Sinclair and Mrs. Xewcombe, of Hamilton, Ontario. V. Special Report on the Kindergarten and Color Exhibits of Dr. and Mrs. Hailman, of La Porte, Indiana. (Prepared by request. ) Respectfully submitted. John E. Bradley, Chairman Committee on Educational Exhibits. John E. Bradley, Esq., Supt. of Schools, Minneapolis, and Chairman of Com. on Exhibits, {N E. A.). Sir: In accordance with your request, I herewith submit a list of exhibitors at the National Educational Exhibition, held in Toronto, July 14th to 17th inclusive, with such other particulars as may prove interesting in connection with the very excellent display made on that occasion. Big Rapids, Mich., S. W. Baker. — Language, map-drawing, penman- ship, and kindergarten; space, 80x5-£ ft. wall, and 10x10 table. Brantford, Ont., W. Wilkinson. — Map-drawing, free-hand drawing, and penmanship; space, 12x12 ft. wall, and 6x10 table. Brantford, Ont., A. II. Dymond (Asylum for Blind). — Photos of classes and of buildings, and specimens of kindergarten work; 10x7 wall. 256 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION. Brantford, Ont., Mrs. M. J. B. Wylie. — Kindergarten; 40x5-^ wall, and 10 X 10 table. Boston, Mass., Normal Art School, G. H. Bartlett. — Drawings, plans, paintings, models, and plaster casts ; 135 X 10 wall, and 30 X 10 table. Chatham, Ont. — Map-drawing. Chicago, 111., Miss Eva B. Whitmore. — Kindergarten; 20x5|wall and table. Cincinnati, 0., Mrs. F. D. M. Bratten. — Kindergarten; 20x5| wall and table. Dartmouth, Nova Scotia, H. S. Congdon. — Kindergarten display, in book form. Denver, Col., F. H. Collins. — Drawings made by pupils of school dis- trict No. 1, Arapahoe Co. ; 1600 sq. ft. wall, and 200 sq. ft. table. Guelph, Ont., D. Young. — Writing, drawing, maps, bookkeeping, and other public-school work ; 30 sq. ft. wall, and 20 sq. ft. table. Hamilton, Ont., Art School, S. J. Ireland. — Drawings, paintings, designs, plaster models, wood-carving, and engraving ; 500 sq. ft. wall, and 100 sq. ft. table. Hamilton, Ont., Pat. Schools. — Drawing and penmanship; 200 sq. ft. Hamilton, Ont., Mrs. L. F. Newcombe. — Kindergarten; 200 sq. ft. wall, and 100 sq. ft. table. Kansas City, Mo., Carl Betz. — Physical training-apparatus used in Mis- souri public schools; 100 sq. ft. wall, and 100 sq. ft. floor. Kingston, Ont., C. E. Wrenshall. — Drawing from antique in light and shade, industrial designs and work in oil, water, and pastel; 150 sq. ft. wall. Lawreuce, Mass. — Drawings and kindergarten work; 200 sq. ft. wall. La Porte, Ind., Mrs. Hailman. — Kindergarten; 150 sq. ft. Madison, Wis., O. E. Wells. — Large silk banner and set of state cata- logues and reports; 100 sq. ft. wall, and 25 sq. ft. table. Manitowoc, Wis., Mr. Holden. — Manuscript book prepared by pupils of public schools, containing drawings of state fauna with descrip- tions. Montreal, Quebec Council of Arts and Manufactures, S. C. Stevenson. — Freehand, mechanical, and architectural drawing, lithography, pho- tography, modelling, and wood-carving ; 600 sq. ft. wall and table. Muskegon, Mich., Oilman C. Fisher. — Drawing, elementary science, and kindergarten; 400 sq. ft. wall. New York College for Training Teachers, C. W. Eaton. — Drawing and modelling; 250 sq. ft. wall, and 50 sq. ft. table. Philadelphia, — Pennsylvania Museum and School of Industrial Art, L. W.Miller. — Specimens of woven fabrics from accompanying designs, industrial drawings; 300 sq. ft. wall. REPORT OF COMMITTEE ON EXHIBITS. 257 Quincy, Mass., Jessie N. Prince. — Illustration of "Logical Course in Art," for elementary schools; 500 sq. ft. wall, and 150 sq. ft. table. San Francisco, Cal., Mrs. Sarah B. Cooper. — Kindergarten display; 450 sq. ft. wall. St. Thomas, Out., Alma College, B. F. Austin. — Models of Palestine and Jerusalem. Somerville, Mass.,C. E. Meleney. — Kindergarten and drawing; 200 sq. ft. wall. Springfield, Mass., T. M. Balliett. — School work; 375 sq. ft. wall. PUBLISHERS, MANUFACTURERS, ETC. American School Journal, Andrews (A. D. W.), Kirkwood, N. Y. — Perfection fractional chart. Appleton & Co., N. Y. — Educational books; 60 sq. ft. Brackett (W. P.), Cambridgeport, Mass. — School square for making drawings when drawing-books are used. Bradley & Co. — Kindergarten supplies, per Selby & Co., Toronto; 100 sq. ft. Canadian School Furniture Co., W. Stalschmidt, Preston. — Desks and kindergarten furniture; 230 sq. ft. Copp. Clark Co., Toronto. — School books; 18 sq. ft. Cuthbert (W. N.). — Reversible blackboard for teaching mental arith- metic in public schools. Educational Pub. Co., Boston. — Books and educational periodicals. Effingham, Maynard & Co. — School books. English (Mary C). — Numeral frame. Electric Signal Clock Co., Waynesboro', Penn. — Electric multi-pro- gramme clocks and bells. Flanagan (A.), Chicago. — Teachers' books and devices used in teaching; 120 sq. ft. Gage (W. J.), Toronto. — Maps, globes, etc. ; 60 sq. ft. . Ginn & Co., N. Y.— Text-books for teachers; 250 sq. ft. Hewitt (O. H.), Manitowoc, Mich. — Four-ball tellurian and map. Kellogg & Co., New York. — Educational magazines and papers; 100 sq. ft. Laine (T. L. P.). — School desk and ink-wells. Map and School Supply Co., Toronto. — Maps, apparatus; 390 sq. ft. Merritt (J. P.) — Chart of universal history. National School Furniture Co., Chicago. — Physical instruments and chemical apparatus; 150 sq, ft. New England Pub. Co., Boston, Mass. — Books and papers; 50 sq. ft. Narragansett Machine Co., Providence, B. I. — Standard club- weights and books on physical culture. 258 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION Pattengill (H. R.). — School moderator, manual of orthography, primers, etc. Prang Ed. Co. (John S. Clark, Boston). — Drawing and color work; 750 sq. ft. wall. Presbrey (0. F.).— "Public Opinion." Porter ( F.), Toronto. — Normal, model, and public-school text-books of Ontario. Rand, McNally & Co., Chicago. — School maps; 48 sq. ft. floor. Riley (A.), Toronto. — "One Hundred Lessons in Business"; 50 sq. ft. Simpson (C. P.), Leamington, Ont. — Phonetic charts. Specialty Mfg. Co., Toronto. — School desks and bells; 150 sq. ft. Stockham (Cora L.), Chicago. — "Mothers' Portfolio," and "Kindergar- ten Magazine" ; 100 sq. ft. Summy (C. F.), Chicago. — Smedley's scale map and modulator; 45 sq. ft. Teachers' Pub. Co. — Teachers' books, and "Teachers' World." Williamson & Co., Toronto. — Turnbull's globes and telescope; 100 sq. ft. Ward's Museum, Rochester, N. Y. — Minerals and natural-history speci- mens; 150 sq. ft. The exhibition was held in two adjoining curling rinks, — each about 200 feet long and 100 feet wide. Yours respectfully, David Boyle. To Dr. John E. Bradley, Chairman Committee on Exhibits : In compliance with your request, the following report is submitted : — Color and its presentation in the schoolroom was a prominent feature of the public-school exhibits at Toronto. In fact, it seemed the one subject discussed by the groups of casual observers, as well as by careful students of the exhibition. The color-teaching below the high school was represented by work from La Porte, Ind., Lawrence, Somerville, Springfield, and Quincy, Mass., Muskegon, Mich., and by an exhibit of the Prang Educational Co. In each case colored papers are used to teach recognition of color and principles of harmony. La Porte, Ind., presents the following plan for color-teaching: I. A. Analytic, color studied. 1. Contrasts, single colors with neutrals. 2. Bright opposites. 3. Adjacent (transition) colors. 4. Arranging col- ors from order of spectrum. 5. Rainbow games, social. 6. The full spectrum. 7. Complementaries. 8. Studies (individual). 9. Tints and shades. 10. Border elements. B. Synthetic, color used; water color, clay, paper. Dictation and discussion. Direct and foster growth and development. II. Artistic. This phase of the work is confined to higher grades and is not fully developed. It deals with conventional decoration, his- hUMITTEE ON EXHIBITS. toric ornament, natural study, and the deliberate application of laws of color harmony. This plan was illustrated by work from all grades, and the delicate color and harmonious combinations in the water-color designs of the upper grades show marked growth when compared with the exer- cises of the primary classes. Quincy, Mass., ever equal to her record, comes to the front with designs based upon an outline of color-teaching that is attracting much attention. Although the work has not passed beyond the stage of exper- iment, the results already show the value of definite teaching in color education. The outline is as follows : — First year : Spectrum as a whole ; recognition and naming of spec- trum colors; contrasted harmony. Second year: Eecognition of six standard colors; contrasted harmony. Tliird year: Eecognition and naming of twelve spectrum hues; contrasted harmony. Fourth year: Classification by values; scales of colors; dominant harmony. Fifth year : Classification by values ; scales of color ; dominant harmony. Sixth year : Classification by composition; simple and binary colors; complementary harmony. Seventh year : Classification by composition ; simple and binary colors; analogous harmony. Eighth year: Classi- fication by qualities; natural and acquired effects of juxtaposition; per- fected harmony. The solar spectrum is made the standard of comparison, and the colored papers used have been manufactured by the Milton Bradley Company, with the purpose of expressing as nearly as possible the spectrum standards and hues, their shades and tints. The color scheme of the Prang Educational Company was fully illus- trated. Claiming that it will not do to depend upon the solar spectrum, for various reasons, they present as a standard of comparison " Prang's Normal Spectrum," made of their papers. By the use of these spectrum colors, their shades and tints and a line of browns and grays, harmonious combinations of colored papers were shown in designs adapted to all grades. Most of the designs were in tones of the same scale and beau- tifully illustrated the possibilities of working in one scale. The work of the New York College for the Training of Teachers was displayed by the Prangs as illustrative of their system. The examples of historic ornament from this school were good lessons in refined coloring. The water-color studies and delicately colored designs from Pratt Institute, shown as the " Suggestive High-school Work" of the Prang course, could not fail to place high ideals before every drawing-teacher, although the work of an art school can hardly do more than suggest what can be accomplished in weekly or semi-weekly lessons in high- school drawing classes. Lawrence, Mass., showed experimental work with colored papers in 260 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION. the graded schools, and, in the high school, systematic teaching of the harmony of color based on the study of the spectrum. Somerville, Mass., presented designs in colored papers from each grade, illustrating combinations of the spectrum colors, their shades and tints, and of browns and grays. Muskegon, Mich., commences designing with the same line of colors, and in the higher grades produces pleasing effects by the use of gold paint and colored crayons on cartridge paper. Springfield, Mass., teaches six colors and their hues from the solar spectrum, and uses colored papers to illustrate principles of design and produce harmonious combinations of color. Color is made prominent in the lowest grades by means of kindergarten sewing and weaving, as well as by the use of colored papers in connection with drawing. The knowledge of water colors gained in the regular high-school course is utilized by the pupils in their work in botany and zoology, with marked success. The Canadian Art Schools of Toronto, Ontario, Kingston, London, and Hamilton were represented by studies in water colors and oils from still-life and nature. The Pennsylvania Museum and School of Indus- trial Art, in addition to the studies of still-life and flowers, exhibited designs for oil-cloths, wall-papers, prints, and ginghams, and the woven fabrics, manufactured from pupils' designs, showing the practical test to which all designs may be subjected. The Massachusetts Normal Art School, in class A, presents color in relation to design; in class B, color studies in both oil and water colors and from nature, as applied to design. This school, to which the ele- mentary art education of this country owes so much, excelled itself in the Toronto exhibit. The modelling of class D, from the round and flat and from life, was the highest expression of form in the entire exhi- bition. Not many would see in this a logical development of the form- study of the normal class of the same institution, yet careful study of the latter work shows at every step the relation of the elementary to the advanced study of form. Form is so generally recognized as an essential part of public-school drawing, that it is a difficult matter to speak of form and not of drawing. When a child's drawing tells what he has discovered for himself as to the facts or appearance of objects, form- study in a broad sense is the basis of his drawing. From careful obser- vation of the various exhibits it is evident that such study has entered largely into the work, and that the power of the average child to draw depends upon the thoroughness of this study. District Number One, Denver, commences the study of type forms in the third year, and while the work is by no means limited to these solids, they are thoroughly studied, particularly in relation to the sub- REPORT OF COMMITTEE ON EXHIBITS. 261 ject of working-drawings and card-board construction. Study of the facts of form is followed by observation of proportion and contour, and appearance is not considered until proportions are readily determined. The work of the fourth year shows how readily the average child can represent a variety of objects as they appear. A noteworthy feature is the fact that most of the objects studied are collected by the pupils, who delight in providing themselves with subjects of greater interest than the ever-present " sphere, cube, and cylinder." Every student of the Denver exhibit must admit that such form-study produces excellent drawing. Quincy, Mass., uses the following plan: First year : Sphere, cylinder, cube, with their bisections. Second year : Sphere, cylinder, cube, and their quadrisections, quarter sphere, quarter cylinder, circular plinth, square plinth, square prism, triangular prism. Third year : Modifications of the sphere, cylinder, and cube; 1. Flat spheroid. 2. Long spheroid. 3. Ovoid. 4. Cone. 5. Pyramid. These solids, their modifications and similar natural forms, are the basis of the work in geometric, mechanical, and pictorial drawing out- lined for the remaining five years of the course. The work in clay and card-board furnished complete illustrations of the plan of form-study in this " Logical Course," as it is named. The Public School Class of the Massachusetts Normal Art School pre- sents a course of form-study with which the Quincy course is identical in essentials. An interesting feature of this course is the use of archi- tectural photographs in connection with the elementary study of type- forms, and the marked recognition, from the lowest class onward, of the relations of the elements of each subject to the highest phase of its development. The illustrative Prang exhibit presented their well-known course of form-study, in which the typical geometric solids are studied in the primary grades to develop clear concepts of form, while, in the grammar grades, working drawings are made of the same solids and their modifi- cations, and the principles of free-hand perspective learned by studying their appearance. This course was well illustrated by the work of Muskegon, Mich., and of Somerville and Lawrence, Mass. The same general plan can be traced in the work of the primary grades of Springfield, Mass. Law- rence showed clay modelling, and Springfield, making in card-board from the pupils' drawings. Form-study in Canada was represented by type forms made of card-board ; from St. John, by modelling in clay, and making in card-board from Dartmouth. A small exhibit from Hamilton also tells of form-study in all grades. The children in these Ontario 262 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION schools have had a year in kindergarten training, and enter the primary school with a knowledge of form that tells materially in every kind of work. A general re iew of the exhibition of 1891 indicates that form-study is partially recognized at its true value; and it is to be hoped that, in later exhibitions, its relation can be shown to number and geometry as well as to drawing. L. E. Fay. REPORT ON DRAWING AT THE EDUCATIONAL EXHIBITION HELD IN CONNECTION WITH THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION, TORONTO, ONT., JULY, 1891. Superintendent Bradley, Chairman: Dear Sir: Having been appointed to report on the exhibit of draw- ing, I beg leave to submit the following: Though the exhibit was large, it seemed smaller than most exhibitions held in connection with the National Association for the past few years, and to include fewer large representative cities. The public schools of the following cities were represented : Denver, Col. ; Muskegon, Mich. ; Springfield, Lawrence, Quincy, and Somerville, Mass. ; Toronto and Hamilton, Ont. There was a typical public-school exhibit by the Prang Educational Company of Boston, Mass. New York City was represented by the College for the Training of Teachers. Of art-school exhibits there were the following : Massachusetts Normal Art School, Pennsylvania School of Industrial Art, Toronto Art School, Ottawa Art School, London Art School, Que- bec Council of Art and Manufactures, Kingston Art School, Albert College, Ontario Ladies' College; Miss Temple's School, Portage la Prairie ; Central Ontario Art Association. It will be seen that Canadian art schools were fairly well represented ; that there were but two public-school systems of the provinces exhibited; that the Western States, usually so strong at these meetings and in the character of the work shown, were represented by two cities, — one of them small ; and that the public schools of the East sent work only from the four Massachusetts cities named. It could have been wished that, meeting for the first time on foreign soil, the public schools of the REPORT ON DRAWING AT EDUCATIONAL EXHIBITION 263 United States might have been more fully represented, and our methods shown to our Canadian friends; more especially as we are, in many respcts, leading the world in this subject in those schools. A comparison of the work from the public, elementary, and art schools of the United States with those of Canada was very interesting, as showing the great strides made in the United States during the past few years in plan, method, and execution ; and though the United States exhibit was not fully representative, it certainly must have shown to an impartial, competent observer how far behind Canadian educators are in this matter, though it was evident that much attention is given by them to it. It is a required study, and is directed from the Central Educational Department, as other educational affairs are. The importance of art and industrial education seemed to be recog- nized quite fully ; more fully, in fact, than in many of the states of the Union. It simply lacked wise direction, which, accompanied by the evident desire, official recognition and generous expenditures, should accomplish far more, educationally, industrially, artistically, than was indicated. It was plainly evident that the work was founded upon and largely influenced by the methods of South Kensington and other English schools, which have been but slightly changed, while the best work of the United States, starting twenty years ago from the same source, has been greatly modified and broadened by adaptation of the best ideas of French and German art and education, and the addition of much that is entirely American. The result is what may be aptly styled an Ameri- can system, not by any means perfect, but which is being rapidly improved, becoming an important factor in general education, and influencing largely methods of instruction in other subjects. The most striking element of difference was, that in the work from the United States there seemed to be a careful consideration of the edu- cational value and bearing of each step. Particularly was it made plain that every effort was being made to bring methods and aims in this sub- ject into the closest harmony with the most recent accepted and progres- sive thought in general education. Froebel and Pestalozzi and others had been studied, not to be imitated, but to be understood in their spirit and aims, and adapted to present conditions. Throughout it all there was abundant evidence of an artistic spirit permeating the work from the cities of the Union, from the lowest primary to the high and art schools. Could a representative American exhibit be made, showing the best that is being done everywhere, this spirit would be yet more evident. At Chicago, in 1893, the truth will undoubtedly be told. To those who have studied such exhibitions for fifteen years past, the Canadian exhibit was in striking contrast. The most apparent element 264 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION was an almost entire absence of real artistic work, from all grades, even including art schools, which, in some essential respects, most certainly miss their purpose and aim in not developing art and artistic work more fully. It may be claimed that it is industrial art at which these schools are aiming, which is evidently the case, as most of them had courses in mechanical, architectural, and machine drawing. Dr. Wm. T. Harris says, " Works of art or ornament that shall com- mand the markets of the world must pay their respects to the standard of the beautiful set by the Greeks for all the world." Ruskin says : " Do you fancy a Greek workman ever made a vase by measurement? He dashed it from his hand on the wheel, and it was beautiful ; and a Venetian glass-blower swept you a curve of crystal from the end of his pipe ; and Reynolds and Tintoretto swept a curve of color v from their pencils as a musician the cadence of a note, unerring, and to be measured, if you please, afterwards, with the exactitude of Divine law." Industrial art education, failing to develop a feeling for the beautiful, a correct taste, and an appreciation of harmony and refinement of form and color, certainly misses its purpose. In most of the public-school exhibits from the United States, and in the art schools, in the excellent exhibits of the New York College for the Training of Teachers and of the Prang Educational Company, it was apparent, by the beauty, refine- ment, and harmony of line, form, and color, that more is being accom- plished than in the past in real art education. We are no longer satisfied for our pupils to draw and paint in a hard, mechanical manner, lifeless and devoid of artistic merit, but in many ways we are reaching and developing the aesthetic, the artistic, in a way that affords much hope for a close wedding of art to industry, and a broader, fuller development of men. This tendency was evinced in many directions, but more especially in the modelling, making, and color-work. The raw, crude coloring so frequent in the exhibitions of a few years past was seen but seldom. In the opinion of your committee, the use of color in the primary and grammar schools, in the shape of colored paper or of pigments, has done much, and will do more,~to develop the artistic nature of the individual than any other means available in the schools. Form-study and draw- ing, including as it now does modelling and color, has a great and important mission to perform in public elementary education, and is performing it nobly. European nations will yet come to America to learn how to teach elementary art education in the public schools. We will make brief mention of the individual exhibits. Denver, Col., had one of the largest and most ambitious exhibits, — being, indeed, REPORT ON DRAWING AT EDUCATIONAL EXHIBITION 265 the largest city represented. There was much that was good in it, and some things in which it was wanting. There was no work below the third year of school, though all other grades were shown. From an educational standpoint, the work of the lowest two grades is most inter- esting. It is of immense value in the right mental development of little children. In the early years it is superior to many other kinds of school work. It was evident that Denver was not deriving the benefit it should in this direction, as a descriptive circular stated that nothing was done the first three years. This is the time when some of the most important work of the whole course is accomplished in other cities, not only as the work bears upon the future development of the study in the higher grades but as it affects the mental growth of the pupil and his capacity for the best results in all other school work. A broader and deeper study of the educational bearing of form-study and drawing will doubtless result in a decided modification of the present plan. This exhibit, as a whole, was not well arranged to show the plan. Different classes of work were mixed and some subjects were repeated many times. The intention seemed to be to show what every member of the class could do. In some cases eighteen drawings identically alike were displayed, and so scattered that it was troublesome and annoying to pick out those illustrating the course. At such exhibitions, quantity should not be the aim; and even quality not the sole aim. Plan, method, as well as results are looked for by the student of the exhibition. This exhibit seemed to tend more to what is sometimes called the practical rather than to the artistic. Little attention seemed to be given, below the high school, to quality of line for artistic expression, either in unity of effect, for difference in distance, or for textures. The design was largely in weak, flat washes, which added no beauty. The constructive work was much the best. The high-school work was superior to that in the lower grades, though here the design was lacking and the constructive work the best, — there being some excellent architectural and machine drawing that showed careful teaching. Some of the representative work in charcoal was very creditable, but that of the two higher classes was a little too ambitious in subject for the ability the pupils had acquired, — being poorer than that in lower classes. Considering the length of time drawing has been taught in these schools, there is much to commend. Muskegon, Mich. — The work was large, bold, and broad in treatment. It was well arranged, showing a well-developed plan. Work was shown from all grades below the high school, most of which was of a superior quality, considering the length of time the plan has been pursued. The lines were excellent. Springfield, Mass. — Work was shown from all grades, including the 266 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION Manual Training Department of the high school. Much was expected from this city, as it has long had excellent results in this subject. Con- sidering the fact that the supervisor of drawing had been on leave of absence during the year, there was a very creditable showing. A special feature, not seen as fully elsewhere, was the application of drawing in common and natural forms, particularly those of natural history. In Springfield there is a close union made between drawing and all other school work, which it would be well for other cities to consider. The time devoted on the time-tables to drawing is very properly given to a well-rounded course in this subject ; but, more than this, the pupils and teachers are so trained, and the requirements of the Superintendent of Schools are such, that there is constant application of drawing in all other school studies, especially in arithmetic, language, geography, and science study. Drawing is constantly made a means to an end, and that end the best development of the child. Lawrence, Mass. — Work from all grades was shown. It was to be regretted that most of it was on a very small scale, the paper used being but six inches square. Larger, bolder form would certainly be more valuable. The work was systematically arranged and classed as " geo- metric," "pictorial," and "decorative." Under the head of pictorial work, flat or geometric views seemed to be the requirement the first three years, no roundness or solidity being represented till the fourth year, and only single objects till the sixth year. Very simple leaf-forms were shown as the work of the sixth, sev- enth, and eighth years, which are within the ability of pupils of from the second to the fourth years. The decorative work below the high school was in colored paper, but only several tones of the same color appeared in the whole exhibit, which would indicate a narrow range of color teaching. The arrangements in the designs were good. The high school work was better, comparatively, than that of the lower grades, and indicated a broad course of study capable of some improvement in detail. The constructive work consisted of various machine details, as screws, lathe chucks, and gearing; architectural details, and plans and elevations of a cottage. The representative work included models and casts in out- line, groups, and casts of ornament, and masks shaded in stump or charcoal. In decoration there were designs in color for various articles. Quincy, Mass. — Work of all grades was shown, including the high school, and there was much that was good and worthy of study, — espe- cially as this exhibit was shown as a representative one, illustrating what is termed the " Massachusetts Course in Art Instruction for Public Schools," prepared by four Massachusetts supervisors. Quincy being REPORT ON DRAWING AT EDUCATIONAL EXHIBITION 267 selected as a proper exponent of this course, the exhibit will be consid- ered from that point of view. Along with the exhibit was a printed outline of the course, so that it could be studied intelligently. The whole showed a carefully laid, detailed plan, somewhat rigid and illogical in places. Definite work was giveu in the course for every day in the school year for eight years. In the first three years, an optional exercise or review lesson was given for each week, while in grades above there was good provision for the application of principle and all new points developed. This is to be commended, as it provides for all new points to be fully understood, and for the varying capacity of different pupils or classes, and, at the same time, makes greater indi- viduality possible on the part of those following the course. It seemed that if there had been provision for a little greater elasticity in the lower grades, it would have been an improvement. For example, one would hardly be content to have, every year, every class of a certain grade, not only in every school of a city, but in every city following the course, " make, on the 4th day of the 18th week of school, a griddle-cake shovel." That kind of rigid uniformity is not advisable. Further, " griddle-cake shovels," "troughs," "graters," "scoops," are not quite of a class of objects calculated to instil ideas of the beautiful into the mind of the young child. If it is possible to select other objects, where at least some ideas of beauty of form may be obtained, would not broader ends be reached without any sacrifice of the particular one in view? It seemed that the school work illustrating the course showed a realistic or utili- tarian tendency, rather than an artistic one. In seeking for the intensely practical, we must take a broad view of what will actually prove prac- tical, of most solid worth to our thousands of school children, when they shall have taken up their life work, whatever it may be. If by the practical is meant that which will enable all to most directly, thoroughly, and admirably live and do the work which falls to one, then all must, sooner or later, recognize the fact that art is a practical thing for the every-day person, and that all courses of art education in public schools should make definite and careful provision for development of true art feeling and appreciation. Only in this way can our industries be rightly influenced by that which pretends to be for their good. The day for courses in mere " drawing " in public schools is past, although it may be so taught as to be an aid in many classes of work. Any ade- quate course should provide for the best mental, manual, and artistic development of every individual, in a simple, practical way. Thus will not only his life be affected for the better, but the quality of whatever production may come from his hand will be improved. His business success, if a merchant or distributor or director of industrial produc- tion, will be additionally secured. 268 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION The Massachusetts course, as planned and illustrated by the Quincy schools, seemed to be largely technical rather than artistic. It does not plan to accomplish all it should, in either pictorial or decorative work, the fault lying largely in the primary grades. As a consequence, when the higher grammar grades are reached, pupils are engaged upon what might have been done in the middle or lower ones. The first pictorial drawing is commenced in the fourth year, and the first drawing of the appearances of objects bounded by edges occurs in the fifth year. Pupils of the seventh and eighth years are still drawing mostly single objects, instead of gaining ideas of composition. Doubtless more or less change and improvement will be made as the result of experience in working out this course. In the hands of inex- perienced teachers it is so literal that the best results could not be expected. Wise, efficient direction and supervision are necessary, which could be supplemented advantageously with proper books or manuals. The course is planned for work on blank paper, which we deem objec- tionable. The Quincy schools, as illustrative of this course, had much that was good in all grades, including the high school. Somerville, Mass. — Somerville was represented by some excellent work. It was a modest exhibit. No modelling was shown, but the drawing was characterized by good form and composition and excellent finish, which might be termed artistic. Even the lowest primary grades showed work on paper, proving how much more it is possible to accomplish in those grades, without any attempt at forcing matters, than some cities realize. Toronto, Ont., Public Schools. — A collection was shown from these schools which was a mixture of such a nature, and, especially, done by such methods, as were generally abandoned in the United States years ago. It is to be hoped that a better course and methods will soon prevail, which will prove of greater worth educationally, artistically, industrially. Hamilton, Ont., Public Schools. — These schools are making efforts that will repay them if continued. If the same good work and methods which are evidently prevailing in the general school work of Toronto and Hamilton, could be applied to the course and methods in drawing, much less of fruitless effort would be expended. Apparently, wise, competent direction and careful train- ing of teachers are necessary. Prang Educational Company, Boston, Mass. — There was a typical ex- hibit in form-study and drawing by this firm, which was in every way deserving of study for several reasons. First, because the work of this company, through its normal training classes for teachers and through its publications, has influenced very largely the teaching of elementary art education in the United States. Second, on account of the fulness and completeness of the course of REPORT ON DRAWING AT EDUCATIONAL EXHIBITION. 269 study as illustrated for all grades of school, from the lowest through the high school. Though not all of the work was from actual school pupils, some of it being from pupil teachers in training, yet everything shown was only what could be expected and is being obtained, to a greater or less extent, in many cities of the country. It is not the quality of the execution that should be considered in such an exhibit, but its plan and purpose. This, then, should be studied as a plan, — a most valuable suggestion of what may be accomplished in any city where the work is under competent direction for a sufficient length of time. The work for the lowest grades was on paper, where slates are so often used to the detriment of pupils and their work. It was all based on the careful study of form, and, above the two lowest grades, planned for drawing-books. This is on the theory that, though nearly all the work is done from objects, and drawing from the flat copy is condemned as a means of learning to draw, yet, if pupils are to acquire any proper technique and method, and have their appreciation of the beautiful and their artistic sense trained, there must be something for primary and grammar pupils which will serve the same purpose for them as the photographs, casts, and other works of art that are deemed necessary for all higher art instruction, whether fine or industrial. The mass of teachers in the public schools have had no art training, and are unable to place before their pupils, on the black-board or else- where, such examples as will give right ideas of treatment to produce artistic results; nor would they have the time, in the lower grades, even if they could do so. Good drawing, except that which is strictly mechanical, is something more than the exact, literal imitation of every edge, contour, line, or detail. This is essential in its place ; and pupils must have the ability to do it and more which is higher and better. Not, then, for the representation of the form, but for the artistic expression of whatever subjects are placed before the pupils, will it always be necessary to place before them, in some shape, the best art products the circumstances will permit, if we are to get a real develop- ment of the art sense. Proper drawing books, with suggestions of method, and artistic or technical rendering, are as necessary as models in the primary and grammar grades as the picture gallery or exhibition to the painter, or the example of the master in music to his pupil. The work of the pupil, however, should be original and from objects. Only in exceptional cases should they draw from flat copies, but they should gather whatever suggestions are possible from them. Historical ornament, which deserves a more important place in our courses in drawing, can, in its simplest form, be taught only by copies, which must be provided either in books or on charts. In higher grades, relief productions in plaster or other material are necessary. 270 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION The Prang exhibit illustrated the three lines of work which now seem to be generally recognized as essential to a broad educational or indus- trial course — namely, constructive, representative, and decorative work. These three distinctive but mutually helpful lines of work, commenced in the lowest grades, showed their full development in the high school, where some beautiful work was shown, especially in design. Bearing in mind that this was the work, not of any one school, not all of it by school children, but was shown as a typical exhibit, our conviction is still strong that such work can and should be obtained in our best city schools, where the instruction is in competent hands. One of the noticeable features, one which will undoubtedly be more prominent in the future, was the attempt to show how drawing can be applied successfully and to advantage in the teaching of other subjects, including numbers. COLLEGE FOR THE TRAINING OF TEACHERS, NEW YORK CITY. There was an excellent exhibit from this school, showing the three lines of work indicated above. The constructive drawing made intimate connection with the manual training work taken in this school. The representative work in clay was the best in the exhibition, — large, bold, artistically treated. The cast drawing was after a good method and was good. It is evident that the pupils in the art department of this school are not allowed to work and " niggle " over their drawing, but that they are taught to look first at the broad masses of form or light and shade, and to see things in the order of their importance. Rather than spend the time in making one or two finely finished draw- ings, which are themselves the results sought, it is deemed wiser, in a school of this kind, to train the pupils, by drawing many subjects in a broad, simple, free way, to look for essentials first. When they are cor- rect, less important particulars may be added as time permits. We learned that the practice is to shade in masses first, then in values, — working for transparency and breadth of effect — which was well illus- trated in the work shown. In designs, the historical work exhibited was large, bold, and of quiet, pleasing, harmonious colors. MASSACHUSETTS NORMAL ART SCHOOL, BOSTON, MASS. This school might well be called the source from which has sprung nearly all that is good in industrial art education in public, day, evening, or art schools. Since its organization, eighteen years ago, many teachers and directors of drawing or art education have gone forth all over this land and abroad, and their influence and efforts can hardly be measured. No city has achieved fame which has not had a graduate or former stu- dent of this school at the helm. Many have departed more or less from what they learned there, and have worked in independent ways. REPORT ON DRAWING AT EDUCATIONAL EXHIBITION 271 The school had a large and excellent representation of its four classes or departments, covering its four years' course of study. Every step or subject of study was shown; and Class D, or Sculpture, was exhibited completely for the first time in the history of the school. There is not space to enumerate the various kinds of work. The oil painting and modelling from the flat, round, and life were especially good. PENNSYLVANIA SCHOOL OF INDUSTRIAL ART, PHILADELPHIA. This is essentially an industrial art school, — its purpose being to develop the art industries of the State by broad art instruction and technical application in its textile, fictile, and other departments. It occupies a unique position among the art schools of America, has a definite purpose, and is fulfilling it well. The following extract from the Annual Report of the Secretary of International Affairs of Pennsyl- vania states this concisely : " Among the movements which have been made in recent years in the direction of advancing the interests of the textile industries of Philadelphia, the establishment of a school in which the knowledge and skill which underlie all success in the conduct of these industries shall be successfully and thoroughly taught, is certainly one of the important, if not the most important, of all. Such a school has been established as a department of the Pennsylvania Museum and School of Industrial Arts. It is an institution destined to reflect, to an increasing extent, credit upon its promoters and upon the State ; and it represents, more directly, perhaps, than any other single agency that could be pointed out, the most powerful influences which are being exerted to-day in shaping the industrial destiny of the Commonwealth." The classes of this school in free-hand, instrumental, and decorative work were quite fully represented. There were some especially good, bold, and free pen-and-ink sketches. The water-color work was not quite so strong. There were many practical designs for prints, oil-cloths, wall- papers and other things. CANADIAN ART SCHOOLS. These schools have already been mentioned in a general way. We can but feel that they either did not do themselves justice as a whole or that the best schools were not represented. OTTAWA ART SCHOOL. This exhibit was not arranged to show the plan of the course. The still-life work was far from what it should be, the oil work too dull and low of tone. LONDON ART SCHOOL. The architectural and machine work appeared to be from copy. The work from life was ordinary. 272 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION TORONTO ART SCHOOL. The life work in charcoal and in oil from this school was creditable. CENTRAL ONTARIO ART ASSOCIATION. The machine drawing showed painstaking finish with the brush, of one view of a model, pictorial rather than a help towards construction. Only single views were shown, no working drawings or details. miss temple's school, portage la prairie. The still-life and oil work was crude, and hard or mechanical. KINGSTON ART SCHOOL. The work shown from this school was mediocre. HAMILTON ART SCHOOL. The cast work was painful, harsh, and hard; shadows black. The designs were fair. The architectural perspective was good. The oil work was not what it should be, the monochrome being better. ONTARIO LADIES' COLLEGE. The cast work was labored ; water color heavy and crude. ALBERT COLLEGE. The oil work was over-finished; no distance; lack of artistic expres- sion. The water color was better. Kespectfully, Walter S. Goodnough. The La Porte (Indiana) color work, as far as exhibited, is strictly elementary in its character. Its purpose is not to transmit to the child certain established rules, and deductions of established conventional art, but rather to stimulate in the children the aesthetic sense, with reference to color, and to lift it gradually into a condition that may enable them to receive art training intelligently. Its criteria are to be found, there- fore, not in the rules of established conventional art, but in the growth and development of aesthetic activity evinced in the spontaneous produc- tions or creations of the_ children. The work exhibited extended over a period of six school years. It was arranged in two groups, which, however, in their development in the schoolroom run parallel. The first of these groups contains analyt- ical work. The children play with card-board tablets covered with the pure color-paper prepared by the Milton Bradley Company. These tab- lets are of various shapes, adapted to the ready formation of geometric designs. With their help the children study analytically and succes- sively under the teacher's direction the relations of colors in various REPORT OF DRAWING AT EDUCATIONAL EXHIBITION 273 contrasts and harmonies, and the various devices for softening and har- monizing contrasts. Every discovery made by them is at once applied by them in pleasing combinations of their own invention, the children working individually or in social groups of four. The educative value of the social work, which Superintendent Hailman considers indispensable, was well shown in the evidences of rapid gains in discovery indicated. The gradual but sure growth of the children out of the half savage pleasure in glaring contrasts into the deeper enjoyment of softer Mend- ings was clearly shown, and in this development the social work was evidently the chief factor. The second group of the exhibit consisted of a series of cards on which were mounted the results of the synthetic work of the children. For the purposes of this work the children use blank, white painting paper, ruled faintly in squares of one half inch, and water-colors prepared for school use by the Nicholson Company of Rochester (N. Y.). The designs of the children are based at first upon geometric forms, but later, on spontaneously found plant forms. In these designs dictation enters to a limited extent, but always in such a way as to stimulate spontaneous invention. No dictation ever ends with itself, but is always used merely as a starting point for spontaneous work on the children's part. Indeed, in most cases these spontaneous additions are sufficiently elaborate to conceal the dictation to the eyes of the superficial observer. The evidences of care and patient labor in this part of the exhibit give proof of the deep spon- taneous interest on the children's part. Throughout, too, there is manifest healthy growth towards correct and refined color intuition. The analytic work of the first group runs through the first four years of school life ; the synthetic work of the second group runs through the first six years. At the close of this period the children are supposed to be ready for instruction and practice in conventional decorative art. The results of this third course Mr. Hailman hopes to place before the teachers at Chicago in 1893. PROCEEDINGS OP THE ELEVENTH ANNUAL MEETING OP THE NATIONAL COUNCIL OF EDUCATION NATIONAL COUNCIL OF EDUCATION. EEPORT OF SECRETARY. Toronto, Ont., July 10, 1891. OPENING SESSION. At 9 : 30 o'clock, President Peabody in the chair, the Council was called to order. Prayer was offered by Dr. Peabody. An invitation was received and accepted from the local Executive Committee of the city to take a drive about the city, to start at 4 p. m. Voted, that the Chair be authorized to invite Dr. Hodgins, Minister Eoss, Principal Kirkland, and others identified with education in this city and province, to sit with this Council during its sessions. Voted, that the rule requiring the Chair to notify each speaker dis- cussing papers at the end of five minutes be enforced. Mr. Fitzpatrick was appointed to report the discussion of the report. The report of the Committee on State-School Systems, subject, " Com- pulsory Education," was presented by D. L. Kiehle, chairman. The report was discussed by Messrs. White, Sheldon, Fitzpatrick, Rounds, Richards, Brown, and Allyn. Voted, that the report be accepted and ordered printed. Voted, that the Chair appoint the usual standing committees. The following members were present: Messrs. Allyn, Baker, Brown, Calkins, Dougherty, Fitzpatrick, Garrett, Greenwood, Hoose, Irwin, L. H. Jones, H. S. Jones, Kiehle, Peabody, Rickoff, Richards, Rounds, H. Sabin, Sheldon, White. Also Mr. J. W. Dickinson of the honorary membership. Adjourned till 2 : 30 p. m. AFTERNOON SESSION. Council met at 2 : 30 p. m. " In Memoriam " remarks upon the life and character of John Han- cock, deceased, were made by Messrs. White, Rickoff, Harris, Allyn, Richards, Hinsdale, and Brown; also an appropriate communication from Dr. Pickard. Mr. White was requested to prepare his remarks for insertion in the records of the Council. 278 NATIONAL COUNCIL OF EDUCATION Voted, that the report of the Committee on Reorganization of the Council be read in Executive Session this evening. Minority report on the subject, "The Education of Girls," was pre- sented by Mr. Allyn. The following committees were announced: On Membership : Brown, Calkins, Sheldon. On Officers: Hinsdale, Dougherty, Irwin. On Accounts : Rounds, L. H. Jones, Richards. Voted, to meet in executive session this evening, at Queen's Hotel par- lors, at 8 p. m. ; to meet to-morrow morning at 9 : 30 A. m. The following persons were present at this session: Allyn, Baker, Bradley, Brown, Calkins, Draper, Dougherty, Fitzpatrick, Garrett, Greenwood, Harris, Hinsdale, Hoose, Howland, Irwin, L. H. Jones, H. S. Jones, Kiehle, Nicholson, Peabody, Rickoff, Richards, Rounds, H. Sabin, Sheldon, White, and Dickinson, honorary member. Adjourned. EVENING SESSION. Pursuant to adjournment, the Council met in Executive Session at 8 p.m. The report of the Committee on Reorganization of the Council, Mr. Sheldon, chairman, was received and read. Moved by Mr. Hoose and voted, that the report be accepted and that we now proceed to its consideration seriatim. The report was discussed by Messrs. Harris, Hoose, Brown, Draper, White, Rounds, Garrett, — upon which all the paragraphs and recom- mendations thereof were approved, except the third paragraph arid the fifth recommendation, which were laid over for farther consideration. Voted, that this committee be requested to prepare for consideration necessary amendments to Constitution and By-laws, as required by adopted changes. Voted to adjourn. SECOND DAY— July 11, 1891. MORNING SESSION. Council met at 9 : 30 A. M. Prayer was offered by Dr. Hodgins. The report of the Committee on Secondary Education, Mr. Baker, chairman, subject, " Uniformity in Requirements for Admission to Col- lege," was received. The report was discussed by Messrs. Hinsdale, Bradley, Fairchild, Coy, Harris, Dr. Hodgins. There were present: Allyn, Baker, Bradley, Brown, Calkins, Coy, Draper, Fairchild, Fitzpatrick, Greenwood, Harris, Hinsdale, Hewett, REPORT OF SECRETARY. 279 Hoose, Rowland, Irwin, L. II. Jones, H. S. Jones, Kiehle, King, Miss Nicholson, Peabody, Richards, Hounds, II. Sabin, Sheldon, Stevenson, Tarbell, White; and also Dickinson, Dunton, Bicknell, Stockwell, honorary members. The discussion upon Mr. Baker's report was closed at twelve o'clock. It was voted that the report be accepted, commended, and printed in the proceedings. The closing portion was referred to the same committee, with authority to correspond farther and report next year. Mr. Harris presented the following resolution, which was adopted : To the Honorable Committee on Classifications of World"1 s Columbian Exposition, Chicago : The National Council of Education has learned with great satisfaction that the Com- mittee has under consideration a reclassification of the Department of Liberal Arts, so that it may the more perfectly represent the relative importance and real magnitude of American institutions. In view of the position of education as the foundation of our material as well as intellectual distinction ; of the wide scope of our public and private institutions for the education of our children and youth ; of the great numbers employed as educators and the great body of youth under instruction; of the vast wealth now devoted to education, and the large sums annually paid to instructors ; of the immense and rich material for the illustration of educational processes and results; and of the high rank that education holds in the esteem and love of the American people; there- fore, for these and various other just and weighty reasons, the National Council urges that education be made a distinct and separate department in the World's Exposition. The President was directed to telegraph the same to Mr. Geo. R. Davis, Director-General of the Columbian Exposition at Chicago. After roll-call adjourned. AFTERNOON SESSION— JULY 11. Council opened its session at 2 : 30 p. m. The Committee on Normal Education made a report on " City Normal Schools," the report being read by L. H. Jones, of Indiana. The report was discussed by Messrs. Rickoff, Dunton, Sheldon, Hoose, Draper, Rounds, and Bradley. On motion of Mr. Hinsdale, it was voted that the discussion close at half past four o'clock. The discussion was continued by Messrs. Hinsdale, H. Sabin, White, Kirkland, and Jones. Voted, that the report be received and printed. On motion, it was voted to go into Executive Session. The Council having entered into Executive Session, the report of the Committee on Reorganization was taken up and considered. After full discussion and the adoption of various amendments, the report was referred back to the committee for the incorporation of amendments and codification, and to report at the session of Tuesday next. 280 NATIONAL COUNCIL OF EDUCATION. There were present the following members: Allyn, Baker, Bradley, Brown, Calkins, Coy, Draper, Dougherty, Fairchild, Fitzpatrick, Harris, Hinsdale, Hewett, Hoose, Howland, Irwin, L. H. Jones, H. S. Jones, King, Miss Nicholson, Peabody, Rickoff, Richards, Rounds, H. Sabin, Sheldon, Tarbell, White; and Dickinson, Dunton, Bicknell, Mrs. Sud- borough, Hunter, and Stockwell. Adjourned. THIRD DAY— July 13. MORNING SESSION. Council met at 9 : 30 A. m. Prayer was offered by Dr. King. Voted, that the Committee on Membership be authorized to make a partial report. This committee made the following report of nominations, which was unanimously adopted : L. H. Jones, Indianapolis, Ind. , C. M. Woodward, St. Louis, Mo., W. N. Hailman, Laporte, Ind. — each of the above to be his own successor. Charles De Garmo, Champlain, 111., in place of Josiah L. Pickard, retired at his own request. Nicholas Murray Butler, New Jersey, in place of N. R. II. Dawson. The Committee on Pedagogics, Mr. Geo. P. Brown, chairman, made report: subject, "The Education of the Will." The report was discussed by Messrs Harris, Hailman, Hewett, H ins- dab, Schaeffer, Hoose. Voted to receive and publish this report. The following members were present : Allyn, Baker, Baldwin, Brad- ley, Brown, Calkins, Coy, Draper, Fairchild, Fitzpatrick, Greenwood, Hailman, Harris, Hinsdale, Hewett, Hoose, Howland, Irwin, L. H. Jones, H. S. Jones, Kiehle, King, Miss Nicholson, Peabody, Rick off, Richards, Rounds, H. Sabin, Sheldon, Stevenson, Schaeffer, Tarbell, Butler, and Dickinson, Dunton, Mrs. Sudborough, Hunter, Hall, Bar- ringer, Stockwell. Adjourned. AFTERNOON SESSION. Council met at 2: 30 o'clock. The report of the Committee on Hygiene, Miss Clara Conway, chair- man, was received. Subject, "Physical Education." The report was considered by Messrs. Hall, Richards, Harris, Baldwin, Fairchild, Miss Conway. Voted, that the report be accepted and printed. There were present: Messrs. Allyn, Baker, Baldwin, Bradley, Miss REPORT OF SECRETARY. 281 Conway, Coy, Draper, Eairchild, Greenwood, Hailman, Harris, Hins- dale, Hevvett, Hoose, Howland, Irwin, L. H. Jones, II. S. Jones, Kiehle, King, Lyte, Miss Nicholson, Peabody, Rickoff, Richards, Rounds, H. Sabin, Sheldon, Stevenson, Schaeffer, White, Dickinson, Dunton, Mrs. Sudborough, Hunter, Hall, Barringer, Stockwell, Newell. Adjourned. FOURTH DAY— July 14. MORNING SESSION. Council met at 9 : 30 A. m. The report on Educational Statistics, Mr. W. A. Harris, chairman, was received. The report was discussed by Messrs. Hinsdale, Hall, Hailman, Bald- win, and Eaton. Voted, that the report be received and printed. On motion of Mr. Hailman, it was voted that Dr. Stanley Hall be requested to present at the next meeting of the Council a scheme for the collection of vital statistics. Voted to enter Executive Session. The Committee on Reorganization of the Council made report of changes required by vote of the Council, which was adopted, and reads as follows : THE REPORT OF THE COMMITTEE ON REORGANIZATION OF THE COUNCIL, AS APPROVED BY THE COUNCIL AFTER DISCUSSION AND AMENDMENT. To the Council of Education : — The Special Committee on Changes in the Organization and Work of the Council begs leave to submit the following report: Your Committee is of the opinion that the present organization of the Council is an almost ideal one for the purposes in view, and that but few changes therein are neces- sary. The changes more specially needed relate to the work of the Council — its admin- istration as a body and the work of its committees — and these changes have been largely suggested by experience. It seems to your Committee that nothing will be gained by increasing the membership of the Council at the present time, or by changing the plan of selecting and appointing members. The present membership, including active and honorary members, consists of over one hundred of the representative educators of the country. At least one half of the honorary members are still interested in the Council, and their continued co-opera- tion in its work may be secured. This gives a membership of some seventy-five educa- tors, personally interested in the Council's proceedings. This membership ought to be sufficiently large for the highest efficiency and success. If for any reason a larger mem- bership be desired, your Committee earnestly recommends that the increase be limited to twelve members, thus giving a total of seventy-two active members, and that the question of increase be referred to the next meeting of the Council for final action. We recommend no change in the number of standing committees. The present com- mittees survey nearly the entire field of education. 282 NATIONAL COUNCIL OF EDUCATION. Your Committee recommends the following changes : First. — That the names of the last four Standing Committees (9, 10, 11, and 12) be changed as follows : (a.) That the Committee on the "Education of Girls" be changed to Committee on Moral Education. (6.) That the Committee on "Hygiene in Education" be changed to Committee on School Sanitation, Hygiene, and Physical Training. (c.) That the Committee on "Educational Literature" be changed to Committee on Psychological Inquiry, (d.) That the Committee on." Educational Statistics" be changed to Committee on Educational Reports and Statistics. It is believed that these changes will bring before the Council a series of reports of special interest at the present time. The Committees on the " Education of Girls" and " Educational Literature" have submitted reports on the more important phases of these subjects, and it seems to your Committee that formal inquiries in these fields may for the time be suspended to permit investigations of more special interest. Moral educa- tion, including both instruction and training, now demands earnest consideration, and there is an increasing interest in psychological inquiry, including child study. More- over, pedagogical literature properly comes under the survey of the Committee on "Pedagogics." The widening of the investigations of the Committee on "Hygiene" to include school sanitation, physical training, and the Committee on " Educational Statis- tics," to include educational reports, seems very desirable, if these committees are to continue to report. Second. — It is also recommended that individual preferences be regarded as far as may be practicable in assigning members to the several committees. When a first choice cannot be heeded, a second or third choice may be feasible, but in all assignments indi- vidual wishes should yield to the true interests of the Council. A member who is mak- ing a special study of any subject should, if possible, be so assigned as to give the Council the benefit of such study. Third. — Your Committee also recommends that all reports be carefully considered in Committee before they are presented to the Council, and that no member sign a report which contains statements to which he does not assent. To these ends, meetings of com- mittees should be called at the place where the Council meets for the final consideration of reports, and attendance at these committee meetings should be regarded as a most important duty. There should not only be the freest discussion of every report in com- mittee, but when any statements in it do not meet with the approval of all the members, differences of opinion, expressed in writing, should be appended and submitted with the report to the Council. Members of committees should be encouraged to state carefully all differences of opinion, and every report should come before the Council as the best possible embodiment of the views of the committee making it. It is not meant in the above suggestions that all interchange of views should be deferred to the final consideration of a report at the Council meeting. The Chairman should early in the year solicit suggestions from each member, and these should be communicated to all the members as a basis for a further exchange of opinion, and when practicable the resulting report, prepared by the Chairman, should be sent to each member of the committee; and better plans of investigation, exchange of views, etc., may be devised by committees. But whatever may be done in these directions will not obviate the necessity of a face-to-face meeting of the committee before its report is pre- sented to the Council. In our judgment the change in the work of the Council most imperatively demanded is a more thorough and careful preparation of reports by the standing committees. This work is vital, and a failure here seriously cripples the Council. We are aware that the members are, almost without exception, busy men, and they find it difficult to give the Council's work early and adequate attention; but we are confident that needed per- sonal sacrifice will be made when it is fully realized that the success of the Council demands it. But nothing in this recommendation is to be construed as forbidding the presentation of an individual report in place of a committee report. REPORT OF SECRETARY. 283 Fourth —The Council decided at the St. Paul meeting to return to the former method of discussing and disposing of the reports of the standing committees, and it is recom- mended that this method be again given a faithful trial. All reports should be con- sidered point by point in the order of presentation before they are discussed as a whole. This will not only secure a clear understanding of the statements of the committee, but it will afford opportunities to ascertain, by questions or otherwise, the grounds of the same. This will avoid the waste of time occasioned by misunderstandings, and it will also give point and directness to the discussion, as past experience has happily shown. It will also remove the necessity of printing reports before their discussion by the Council, as recommended at the St. Paul meeting. Your Committee suggest that this action of the Council be rescinded. Fifth. — We also recommend that reports which clearly express a consensus of opin- ion on questions of great practical interest may be formally approved by the Council by a unanimous vote. When a report has been carefully considered and approved by a standing committee, and when its discussion by the members of the Council discloses a general agreement with its positions, its formal approval by the Council seems a natural and proper procedure, and especially when the report deals with practical questions of school administration. Such action by the Council is only the approval of a report by a larger committee — the Committee of the Whole — and this expresses the opinion of the Council as a body. Such an approval of a report would call attention to it, and other- wise add to its usefulness as a means of educating professional and public opinion. It is believed that the adoption of one or two exceptional reports each year would increase the influence of the Council in educational affairs. It is true that this will involve a wise discrimination both as to subjects and treatment, but this ought not to be a diffi- cult condition in such a body as this. Sixth.— Your Committee further recommends that not exceeding a half -day may be devoted at each annual meeting of the Council for the reading of voluntary papers pre- pared by members — active or honorary — under these conditions: (a.) Voluntary papers not to contain more than two thousand words each. (b.) Voluntary papers to be presented to the President of the Council and approved by him as a condition of presentation to the Council, (c.) No voluntary paper to be presented to the Council in the absence of its author, (d.) Voluntary papers to be printed in the volume of Proceedings only by vote of the Council. The Committee cannot close its report without congratulating the members of the Council on the good work already accomplished. The nine volumes of Proceedings now published contain valuable papers on many of the most important subjects connected with education. These papers have been carefully considered by the Council, differ- ences of opinion recorded in the reports of discussions, and several of these papers have been deemed worthy of formal approval. Nor has the influence of the Council's work been confined to its members. Our annual sessions have been attended by many interested educators, and our procedings have been published, not only in a separate volume, but also with the Proceedings of the National Educational Association. The Council has thus reached thousands of per- sons interested in education. It is doubtless true that too much time has been devoted to the discussion of topics that have little present interest, and that too many reports have not embodied the results of special research by committees ; and it is for the correction of these and other defects that the above changes have been proposed. It must, however, be remembered that all phases of school administration demand careful and constant scrutiny. What is accepted as final to-day may be boldly and successfully questioned to-morrow. Respectfully submitted. William E. Sheldon, Emerson E. White, Geo. P. Brown, N. A. Calkins, B. A. Hinsdale, Committee. 284 NATIONAL COUNCIL OF EDUCATION. The following amendments of the Constitution of the Council, having been reported by the Committee, were approved by the Council : CHANGES IN CONSTITUTION. Article IV. Amend the latter part of the section to read as follows: 9. Committee on Moral Education. 10. Committee on School Sanitation, Hygiene, and Physical Training. 11. Committee on Psychological Inquiry. 12. Committee on Educational Reports and Statistics. Article V.— Duties op Standing Committees. It shall be the duty of the standing committees to observe the new educational experiments and original investigations within the scope of their assigned topics, and report the same, from time to time, to the President of the Council. Article VI. — Meeting op Committees for Special Work. A half -day at each Annual Session shall be set apart for " Round-Table" discussions, and each standing committee may conduct its own meeting separately, inviting at its pleasure experts, original investigators, or other persons to present their experience, or theoretical views, before it for discussion. Article IX. — Arrangement of Annual Programme. The President, in making up the Annual Programme of exercises, may select any of the twelve standing committees which will in his opinion prepare work for the Coun- cil of the most timely and vital character, and he shall not be limited in his choice by considerations of routine. The committees thus repoi-ting may introduce before the Council such specialists, experts, original investigators, or inventors of new methods as they may deem essential to present effectively their subject-matter before the Council for discussion. It shall be the duty of the President to present an annual report of the work of the Council to the National Educational Association. Voted, that the incoming President be requested to call the special attention of members to the changes. The report of the Auditing Committee upon the account of the Treasurer was received and adopted. Toronto, Can., July 14, 1891. D. L. Kiehle, Treasurer, in account with National Council of Education. 1890. receipts. i — To balance on hand Jul3 1891. July 10— To dues received for 1890-91. . disbursements 1890. Oct. 17 — By paid printing bill, " 10 — " " express charges u 24— " " " " Sept. 11— " " " 1891. July 10— " " S. H. Peabody " 11— « " S. H. Peabody " 13— " " D. S. Gear " 13— Balance on hand No. 1. " 2. " 3. " 4. " 5. " 7. " 8. $152 28 92 00 155 90 30 3 35 30 31 93 4 97 50 00 97 53 $244 28 $244 28 REPORT OF SECRETARY. 285 Voted, that the report of the stenographer be referred to the President for editing, and that the remarks of members be referred to members for revision or withdrawal. Voted, that the President be authorized to employ a stenographer for next meeting. The report of the Committee on Membership was received and adopted as follows: To the National Council of Education : Your Committee on Membership present the following report, supplementing the partial report made and adopted at a former session of this meeting : Six vacancies have occurred because of absence from two successive meetings, and one has been caused by death. The following persons are nominated to fill these vacan- cies: 1. William W. Parsons, of Terre Haute, Ind., for the vacancy caused by the death of John Hancock; term to expire in 1893. 2. William H.Maxwell, of Brooklyn, N. Y., is nominated for the vacancy caused by the absence from the meetings of Ira G. Hoitt ; term to expire in 1892. 3. John T. Prince, of Boston, Mass., for the vacancy caused by the absence from the meetings of Thos. J. Morgan ; term to expire in 1894. 4. H. H. Seerley , of Cedar Falls, for the place made vacant by absence of Homer B. Sprague ; term to expire in 1894. 5. Jas. L. Hughes, of Toronto, Can., for the vacancy caused by the absence of L. S. Thompson; term to expire in 1895. 6. Miss Bettie A. Dutton, of Cleveland, Ohio, to fill the vacancy caused by the absence of Wm. H. Payne. 7. The Committee also report in favor of the transfer of John W. Dickinson, of Boston, from the class of honorary members to that of active members, to fill the vacancy caused by the absence from the meetings of Daniel B. Hagar. The Committee further recommended that Dr. J.George Hodgins, LL.D. of Toronto, and Principal Thomas Kirkland, M. A., of Toronto, be elected honorary members of this Council. Respectfully submitted. Geo. P. Brown, Chairman. W. E. Sheldon, N. A. Calkins, Committee. The following vote of thanks was adopted : Resolved : That the thanks of the members of the National Council of Education are hereby tendered to Hon. James L.Hughes, M.A., Inspector of Schools of Toronto, and his associate members of the Local Executive Committee of the N. E. A. , of which he is chairman, for the very complete arrangements that enabled the members and their many friends to participate in and enjoy a charming drive about the city and vicinity, and for the other many and varied courtesies so generously and gracefully tendered. The following report of the Committee on Nominations was received and adopted : President. — J. H. Baker. Vice President.— E. W. Coy. Secretary and Treasurer. — N. C. Schaeffer. Executive Committee.— A. S. Draper, Mary E. Nicholson, F. A. Fitzpatrick, W. R. Thigpen. Respectfully submitted. B. A. Hinsdale, N. C. Dougherty, Jno. S. Irwin. July 14, 1891. 286 NATIONAL COUNCIL OF EDUCATION The President appointed Dr. Harris and Dr. Allyn to conduct Mr. Baker to the chair. Voted, that surplus copies of reports be sent to Zalmon Richards, Washington, D. C. Voted, that the thanks of the Council be extended to the retiring officers. The following members were present: Allyn, Baker, Baldwin, Brad- ley, Brown, Miss Conway, Coy, Draper, Dougherty, Eaton, Fairchild, Greenwood, Hailman, Harris, Hinsdale, Hewett, Hoose, Howland, Ir- win, Kiehle, King, Lyte, Miss Nicholson, Peabody, Rickoff, Richards, Rounds, H. Sabin, Sheldon, Schaeffer, Tarbell, Butler, Dickinson, Mrs. Sudborough, Hall, Barringer, Stockwell, Newell. Adjourned. REPORT OF ATTENDANCE. PRESENCE AT ONE OR MORE OF THE DAILY SESSIONS OF THE ANNUAL, MEETINGS FOR 1890 AND 1891 IS INDICATED BY A "P." R. Allyn J. H. Baker J. Baldwin J. E. Bradley. . . . G. P. Brown N. M. Butler N. A. Calkins.... J. H. Canfield.... Clara Conway E. W. Coy N. C. Dougherty. A. S. Draper J. Eaton G. T. Fairchild. . F. A. Fitzpatrick A. Gove W. R. Garrett. . . J. M. Greenwood. W. N. Hailman.. W. T. Harris.... J. Hancock B. A. Hinsdale. . . E. C. Hewett.... J. H. Hoose G. Howland 1890. 1891 J. S. Irwin H. M. James H. S. Jones L. H. Jones D. L. Kiehle W. F. King Lillie J. Martin. . . Mary E. Nicholson S. S. Parr S. H. Peabody J. L. Pickard A. J. Rickoff Z. Richards C. C. Rounds W. E. Sheldon.... R. W. Stevenson.. F. L. Soldan N. C. Schaeffer.... H. Sabin H. S. Tarbell W. R. Thigpen.... Delia L. Williams. E. E. White C. M. Woodward.. 1890. 1891. IN MEMORIAM. 287 IFn /IDemoriam. JOHN HANCOCK, LL. D. At the opening of the meeting of the afternoon session of Friday, July 10th, the President said : — Friends in Council: While looking towards the preparation of this programme, I remember the very earnest congratulation which I felt that no member of our body had been taken away during the year; scarcely had the feeling gone from me, when I received the sad intelli- gence that our beloved and distinguished colleague, John Hancock, of Ohio, had passed away. I may not pronounce his eulogy. That duty is reserved for others much more competent than myself. He was one whom we all rejoiced to meet, whom we would remember with tender affection. We have assigned a portion of this session to memorial ser- vices in his honor, and I have first to call upon Mr. White, of Ohio, his nearest colleague, to present a tribute to the memory of our deceased friend and brother. Mr. White : John Hancock was born on one of the hill-farms back of Point Pleasant, Clermont County, Ohio, — the birthplace of General Grant, — on the 18th day of February, 1825, and he died on the 1st day of June, 1891, in the sixty-seventh year of his age. He was the eldest of five children. His father, David Hancock, was born in Western Pennsylvania, and his grandfather, Henry Hancock, was a native of New Jersey. His mother died at the age of thirty-five. Dr. Hancock spent his childhood and youth on the farm, receiving his early education in the district school. In his later years he often referred with gratitude to one of his early teachers, who awoke in him a desire for reading and a taste for good books. At the age of nineteen Mr. Hancock taught his first school; and during the four succeeding years he taught school in the winter, and, in the intervening months, supplemented farm work by study under the private tuition of Mr. James K. Parker, Principal of the Clermont Academy. In 1850 Dr. Joseph Ray, of Cincinnati, met Mr. Hancock at a teachers' gathering in Clermont County; and, on Dr. Ray's recommen- dation, he was elected first assistant in what was then known as the Upper Race-Street School, Cincinnati, Mr. Andrew J. Rickoff being the principal. Here Dr. Hancock began his real life-work. He used with alacrity the opportunities for self-improvement which the city afforded. He continued his studies, joined scientific and literary clubs, and other- wise widened his scholastic and literary attainments. The habit of 288 NATIONAL COUNCIL OF EDUCATION. reading thus formed followed him through life. It is but a few months since the writer heard him say playfully that he was then reading " two miles of Shakspere daily," — in the street-car on his way to and from his office. In 1856 the honorary degree of Master of Arts was conferred on him by Kenyon College, and, in 1876, the honorary degree of Doctor of Philosophy by the University of Wooster. On Mr. Rickoff's election as superintendent of schools, in 1853, Mr. Hancock became principal of the Race-Street School, and a year later he became principal of the new First Intermediate School, a posi- tion which he filled for ten years. Mr. Hancock's work as assistant and principal did much to shape early instruction in the Cincinnati schools, and in these years he won a high reputation as a teacher and manager. In 1864 he resigned the principalship of the First Intermediate School to accept a position in Nelson's Business College. He was attracted to the position, not only by the increased salary, but chiefly by the coveted opportunity for literary work as editor of The News and Educator, a new and bright magazine which Mr. Nelson was then publishing. Mr. Hancock's work as editor showed those literary resources which his later life so fully disclosed. He filled this position nearly two years, and then accepted the duties of assistant in the editor's department of the publishing house of Sargent, Wilson & Hinkle, Cincinnati. A year later he turned away from literary work to accept the superin- tendency of the Cincinnati schools, — a position for which his previous training had been an excellent preparation. He filled this responsible position for seven years, to the high satisfaction of all interested in pub- lic education. He introduced few marked changes in school organization or instruction, but he strengthened the best features, increased the attention given to literary culture, quickened the professional spirit of the teachers, and gave emphasis to all those elements of discipline and instruction that make true and manly pupils. In the seventh year of his efficient administration, party politics, for the first time in the his- tory of the schools, entered into the election of superintendent, and Dr. Hancock was retired. He next accepted the superintendency of the public schools of Dayton, Ohio, — filling the office with great fidelity and efficiency for a period of ten years. It was here that Superintendent Hancock seemed to recog- nize more fully than before the fact that all true instruction emanates from the individual teacher; and, while he called for good results, he gave the teachers larger freedom in their work, and, as a result, there was less of mechanism and more of individual influence and power in the schools. He stepped down from this place of great usefulness at the demand of party politics, while all who knew aught of his work in the IN MEMORIAM. 289 schools bore enthusiastic testimony to his efficiency as a superintendent and his high character as a man. In 1886 Dr. Hancock took charge, by state appointment, of the Ohio Education Exhibit in the World's Fair at New Orleans; and, on his return, he accepted the superintendency of the public schools of Chilli- cothe, to which he had been unanimously chosen. He filled the position with high satisfaction until November, 1888, when, in response to the wishes of the leading educators of Ohio, he was appointed by the Governor, State Commissioner of Common Schools, to fill the vacancy caused by the death of Dr. Eli T. Tappan. He accepted the position, though it involved considerable pecuniary sacrifice, and entered with zeal upon what proved to be his final work. He filled the unexpired term, and in July, 1890, entered upon a full term, — having been elected by a popular vote that happily attested the people's recognition of his high qualifications and efficiency. In his first term he successfully Inaugurated the new compulsory system, and in his second he secured amendments to the compulsory law which greatly increased its efficiency. On Monday morning, June 1, 1891, he entered his office and, greet- ing his assistants in his usual cheerful manner, took his seat at his desk to attend to correspondence. He had written only a few letters when he was stricken with paralysis, and, without a word or sign, passed from his earthly service to a heavenly reward. He left a devoted wife and five worthy children, — a daughter and four sons. Dr. Hancock devoted more than forty years to public education in his native State, and during most of these years he took a prominent part in all important efforts to improve its educational policy. He was an early and earnest advocate of normal training, county supervision, the town- ship system, and other measures of school progress. He served as a member of the State Board of Examiners, as a trustee of the McNeely Normal School, — an institution founded by the late Cyrus McNeely, and by him intrusted to the direction of the State Teachers' Association, — and also of the Ohio University at Athens, — taking an active part in the establishment of the Normal Department therein. He was early in the institute work in the State, and long served as an instructor, — few men receiving a more appreciative hearing. As early as 1852 he became a member of the Ohio Teachers' Association, in 1859 its president, and earlier or later filled nearly every position of responsibility in its gift. Nor were Dr. Hancock's interest and efforts in behalf of education confined to his native State. He became a member of the National Educational Association, then called the National Teachers' Association, at the first regular meeting, held in Cincinnati in 1858. He was present at all the subsequent meetings, possibly with one, at most, two excep- tions, and always took an active part in the proceedings. He presided 290 NATIONAL COUNCIL OF EDUCATION with great acceptance at the eighteenth annual meeting, held in Phila- delphia in 1879, and before and since filled other important official posi- tions in the Association with marked fidelity. He never sought honor or preferment in the Association, but he filled every position to which he was assigned by his fellow-members with honor and success. But it is not Dr. Hancock's official service in the Association that should be most gratefully remembered, but his earnest devotion to its interests as a member. In the times that tried men's pockets, so dis- tinctly remembered, he loyally sustained the Association, not only by his presence and service but by his means. He enjoyed the meetings and was always an attentive and discriminating listener. In all the history of the Association, Dr. Hancock has been one of its leading and most influential members. He specially enjoyed the meeting of old friends at these annual gatherings, and his good cheer, genial wit, generous sym- pathy, and warm friendship always secured for him a hearty welcome. Dr. Hancock was present at the preliminary meeting for the organi- zation of this Council, held in Chautauqua in 1880, and his name is in the roll of its first members. He was elected a member of the first exec- utive committee, and he subsequently served the Council on several other important committees. He was present at every meeting of the Council held, certainly since 1881,* and was in his place at nearly every day's session. It need not be added, in this presence, that no other member has shown greater personal interest in the welfare of the Council, and that few, if any, have more frequently or intelligently participated in its discussions. The annual volumes of Proceedings contain several reports and papers prepared by him — the last and j)robably the best (on " Co-education") being presented at the last annual meeting, in St Paul. At the Nashville meeting, in 1889, he read an admirable tribute to the memory of the lamented Dr. Tappan. At this meeting of the Council we all sadly miss the familiar form and voice of our departed associate. We find ourselves waiting uncon- sciously for his entrance, as of old, but he comes not, and will not come again; but his memory here will long be green. As the members of this body shall in the future gather at its annual council-fires, memory will lovingly recall the genial humor, the earnest words, and the noble spirit of our lamented brother. It is difficult to present in a few sentences a just estimate of Dr. Han- cock's ability and character. He was endowed with an acute and versa- tile mind, and also with an earnest desire for knowledge; and these qualities made a broad self-education possible. He not only read widely and thoughtfully, but he improved every opportunity to widen his * The Secretary's minutes do not include his name in the list of members present at the first regular meeting in Atlanta in 1881. IN MEMORIAM. 291 attainments. He was an earnest student of education, but was more interested in its practical than in its speculative phases. He was an alert and discriminate reader and listener, — quickly seizing the more salient points of a writer or speaker and seeing their practical import and bear- ing. This quality and habit made him ready as a speaker, especially in conversation or discussion. But John Hancock's noblest characteristic was his high moral purpose and life. Not only were his personal habits above criticism, but he was the soul of purity and honor and rectitude. Neither his character nor his word needed an indorser. He not only hated self-seeking, trickery, and double-dealing in others, but was himself incapable of indirection and subterfuge. He admired professional courtesy and honor, was true to his friends, and just and generous to those with whom he differed ; and no educator in Ohio had more friends and fewer enemies than he. Dr. Hancock was in the best sense a manly man, and his influence and sympathies were always with the right, as he saw the right. He had a deep reverence for sacred things and a deepening religious faith. A few years before his death he made a public profession of religion, uniting with the Broad Street Presbyterian Church of Colum- bus. As he wrote of the noble Tappan, John Hancock was " not only upright, but he was uprightness itself." In the past few years Death has been busy among the Ohio members of this Council. Four of the original members from the State have been called to a higher service : W. D. Henkle, I. W. Andrews, Eli T. Tappan, and John Hancock, — all men of blessed memory ; men who were an honor to the noble commonwealth which they served; men who repre- sented its ripest scholarship, its highest character, and its best service in the cause of education. Mr. Rickoff referred to the tender relations which had subsisted between himself and the deceased as fellow-teachers, members of the little club for the study of psychology, and of the Round Table for years, — then the intimate correspondence that followed. " I have lost one whose loss seems to remind me of the end of all things. Mr. Hancock was always true as the needle to the pole, — hearty, . earnest, sturdy in the maintenance of these principles, which were lofty." Mr. Harris: I remember meeting Mr. Hancock for the first time at Cleveland, Ohio. The National Association met there in 1870. I was greatly attracted to him from the first. He was always entertaining, and chaffed his friends with the most delicate quality of good humor. When the school superintendents of the Western cities (Chicago, Cin- cinnati, Cleveland, Columbus, Detroit, Indianapolis, and St. Louis) formed their "Round Table," — holding their annual meeting in one Of another of these cities, and discussing informally the peculiarities found 292 NATIONAL COUNCIL OF EDUCATION to exist in the educational system under inspection, — Mr. Hancock was ever a central figure, full of thoughtful suggestions of his own and gen- erously appreciative of the views and achievements of others. He possessed a great heart ; he was a man of humanity and a lover of the humanities. By the humanities, we understand, technically, the studies that cluster around literature as a centre. Mr. Hancock was especially a lover of good literature. I think that he drew his best inspiration for his educational work from the great poets and prose writers, and it was a fine inspiration that he derived from that source and communicated to others. Mr. Hancock was an ardent optimist — always looking to the future for better things than have been achieved in the past ; and yet he never undervalued the past. His optimism and his kind-heartedness towards everybody, his love of literature and the aspiration kindled by its study, fitted him peculiarly for seeing the possibilities in school edu- cation, and made him a choice guide for a corps of teachers, and an ideal manager of a system of schools. In this Council of Education there rests upon us at this time a feeling of bereavement. We have lost a fellow member endeared to us by strong personal ties, a friend and a brother. Mk. Allyn : I became acquainted with Mr. Hancock in the winter of 1857-8, in Columbus, Ohio, at the annual meeting of the Ohio State Teachers' Association, — a noble body of men, among whom were Loren Andrews, James Garfield, John Canfield, Israel Andrews, Eli Tappan, and Wm. Hinkle, — all now in the better land. Mr. Hancock at once attracted me by the frank friendliness of his manner, the vivacity of his spirit, and the earnestness of his advocacy of his convictions. And when later I removed to Cincinnati, where he was teaching, we grew intimate friends. We were fellow-members of the little club already referred to, and I recall, as an illustration of what has been said of his purity of mind, this incident: One of our members was particularly fond of the writings of Swift, and would once in a while read passages from them. On one occasion, he read one of the most indecorous parts. It would have rejoiced any pure mind to see the look of Mr. Hancock's face as the reading ended, and his severe silence when it was expected that the laughter would come in. That man never attempted another such reading. Mr. Hancock was a man of sturdy common-sense honesty, and he was as genial as he was honest. He drew to himself children and young people, and especially boys, with whom he was always a favor- ite. My son was a pupil in his school, and to-day John Hancock is his ideal of a perfect man and a gentleman. Mr. Hinsdale: The deceased was remarkable for the good cheer which he carried into all circles in which he mingled. At St. Paul last year, all who saw him must have remarked the fine condition in which IN MEMORIAM. 293 Mr. Hancock appeared to be, both in body and spirits. It was remarked in my hearing that the paper which he read at that meeting was the best he had ever read in the Association. In his last conversation he spoke of his sound health, — remarking that he " was made of iron," that he was never sick, and could read without glasses at sixty-five. Mr. Brown, talking from the stand-point of one of the boys whom he helped, said: I desire to testify to the excellent service that Mr. Hancock did to the younger men of the profession. I knew him first in 1857, when I visited his school in Cincinnati to learn something about school-teaching as it was done there ; and I shall never cease to be grate- ful to him for the service he did me as a boy, in explaining fully every- thing that was done in his school and why he did it. During the half- day I spent with him I think the subject of education was opened to me as I had never seen it before. His exceeding kindness won my affection at once. Afterwards my intimacy with him, both in correspondence and the discussion of school matters was close ; and for a short time I was a member of the Round Table of which the gentlemen have spoken. It seems to me that the strength of Mr. Hancock was his sterling char- acter. The President: We have presented our homage over the grave of our deceased brother. We hang our garlands upon his monument. The hour has been one of interest, and another hour might be spent in repeating and re-enforcing the thoughts that have been presented in regard to him; but other duties demand our attention, and unless there be some special message we shall consider this service as complete. 294 NATIONAL COUNCIL OF EDUCATION REPORT OF THE COMMITTEE ON STATE SCHOOL SYSTEMS. COMPULSORY EDUCATION. Your committee feel that the importance of this report at this time consists not so much in a complete discussion of the history and theory of the law of compulsory education, as in presenting to this council the present situation of a question which has taken on some new and impor- tant phases, the outcome of which is not clear to any one. In getting at the important part of this matter I beg your indulgence if I repeat some well-worn maxims, familiar to education and statesman- ship : — (1.) Intelligence and morality are absolutely essential to the perpe- tuity of our government. If passengers are kept in the hold, a wise captain and his crew can run the ship, but if all the passengers, steerage and cabin, are on deck with a voice in the choice of the captain, and to whom he must report his plans for their approval, then of course the passengers must be wise, else they will all soon go to the bottom together. (2.) The theory of our government — so axiomatic that it has hardly been stated — is that freedom and its blessings are universally desirable ; that a free government by the people no more needs protection against the people than a man needs protection against himself. To see is to believe ; to enjoy it is to be loyal. In this spirit we have taken down the walls of our cities, we have dis- banded our armies, we have invited the world, we have sent for them, not to live with us merely, but to be of us and to share our inheritance and our destiny. (3.) In this it is also assumed that a free people will surely respond to the obligations of industry and citizenship ; that they will improve the material condition of themselves and their families, and will exercise their judgment and influence in the selection of rulers and legislators who will most wisely serve the commonwealth. It deserves notice that no other nation in history ever ventured upon this experiment. Whether the time is not near when the exigencies of our condition will not compel us to modify our view is already being considered with some seriousness, being suggested by facts like the fol- lowing : — COMPULSORY EDUCATION. 295 (1.) Idleness, vice, and crime ure filling our jails, prisons, and reform* atories. (2.) The ballot in the hands of ignorance and corruption defeats the ends of justice and good government. (3.) Foreign influence has begun a system of colonization with a pur- pose of preserving foreign languages and traditions and proportionately of destroying distinctive Americanism. It has made alliance with relig- ion and in some measure has gained the support of Protestant and Catholic. Where now is the corrective? The only answer thus far given is " education," — education in its broad American sense for body, mind, and morals; for every position of man- ual industry, social or civil service. True, we have not found education effective against idleness and the vicious. This has not been a surprise ; for these have resisted the incen- tives to industry and social respectability; they have fallen without the social pale ; they are the open enemies of the state and must be governed by the law which compels and punishes. For this same reason a compulsory education law has been enacted to protect society from the evil influences of these people, who disregard the most common parental and social duty in the care of their children. The state must protect the children in their rights to an education as it does to food and clothing. Thus far our course has been clear and consistent. But another and very different phase of the problem is now before us. Industrious, moral, and well-disposed people, loving and caring for their children, and with no conscious disloyal purposes, are among us in large and influential numbers, who refuse to send to the public schools, who insist upon the exclusive control and direction of the education of their children, and refuse to guarantee to society that they shall be educated as American citizens in the language, history, traditions, and govern- mental principles of their adopted country. Why do they do it? The answer is simply this: They are foreigners. They have come, unavoidably bringing the customs, habits, attachments, and traditions of another land, and all in a tongue which is the channel of every thought, feeling, and religious sentiment. The transition to an American citizenship and its civilization is doubtless fraught with its dangers to morals, manners, and religious faith. Indeed it is no easy thing to break loose from ancient, guiding, and protecting habits and customs, and turn one's children over to be taught in and to speak a language unknown to their parents, and to practise customs that are strange. Realizing this, a class of their for- eign clergy advise a retention of their nationality. They say that to 296 NATIONAL COUNCIL OF EDUCATION denationalize is to demoralize. Hence they oppose every Americanizing influence. They fear the public schools because they are American in spirit, and they insist upon parochial schools, not merely in the interest of religion but of religion in a foreign tongue. This condition of things is further aggravated by the influence of a class of bi-lingual politicians whose business it is to represent in civil affairs a people circumscribed and made dependent upon them by their foreign tongue. Now as to the remedy. Every one, and very certainly every educator, will place the first stress upon the natural, self-commanding, and assim- ilating power of a public free-school system, and will agree that this should be perfected to meet every demand of the highest standard of physical, intellectual, and moral training; that it should be protected from every corrupting influence and every political or religious entanglement, and that its true value by every means should be impressed upon the public mind. Next as to the necessity and practicability of applying the compul- sory feature for the general enforcement of attendance, there will be various opinions, according to points and circumstances of observation. In some large cities, and especially in manufacturing districts, where children are at the mercy of soulless corporations, the State has success- fully enforced a compulsory law, but in the state at large, and especially in agricultural districts, your committee are not aware of any enforce- ment of a compulsory law, which proves that it can be made an effective part of our educational system. What exigencies may arise to entirely revolutionize public sentiment it is quite impossible to anticipate. It is not to be ignored that the late very positive un-American religio-political movement in Wisconsin and Illinois, and the very recent publication of a foreign scheme, to be sup- ported by foreign governmental and ecclesiastical influence, for the pur- pose of fostering and protecting a foreign colonization, have been quite startling to our proverbial sense of security ; but there are not wanting evidences that the rebuke already administered to such astounding pre- sumption by the offended sentiment of the entire nation of every Chris- tian faith and every language will prove to be the sufficient remedy, as well as the best. It is well to notice that we have other questions which have developed of late years in the Southern States, in which the people who are the main support of the civil and social structure entertain views and sup- port policies which in principle seem to be un-American and uncon- stitutional. Concerning these people we have yet to decide whether legislation should compel, or whether time and its influences will not effect, a more certain and permanent solution. COMPULSORY EDUCATION. 297 In concluding this report, it may be noted with propriety that when the nation comes to the earnest consideration of some of the great prob- lems of citizenship, such as the limitation of immigration to the moral and industrious, and the limitation of the elective franchise by exclud- ing the grossly ignorant and vicious classes, the educational problem will be somewhat relieved. If this were possible, then those who neglect their educational oppor- tunities would suffer a natural penalty in the disfranchisement of igno- rance, and society would be protected in the exclusion of such influence from the direction of civil affairs, and the public school would be given greater prominence and honor as the highway to personal prosperity and to the privileges of citizenship. D. L. Kiehle, St. Paul, Minn., Chairman. J. L. Pickard, Iowa City, Iowa. J. H. Canfield, Lawrence, Kans. Ira G. Hoitt, Sacramento, Cal. W, D. Parker, Madison, Wis. DISCUSSION. [REPORTED BY THE STENOGRAPHER, DAVID S. QEER.] Mr. Sheldon: You say that the law can be enforced in the large cities, and has been enforced in the manufacturing towns; but that it cannot be enforced in the agricultural districts with our present condi- tions of civilization. What then do we see as the result of these two propositions? Do we have the best municipal life, the best home life, the best forms of civilization, in the large cities and towns or among the agricultural people who have an honest and virtuous home environ- ment? If the results of morality and of the intelligence of a free people are best illustrated in the agricultural districts, why press these laws? Mr. E. E. White : The two remedies suggested in this report to meet this new condition of things are : First, a limitation of the franchise and an educational qualification by which the vicious and ignorant shall be excluded from participation in government ; second, that education be extended through compulsory laws. But on the last the report seems to be indefinite and non-committal — that hitherto such legislation has not effected anything except in cities and manufacturing districts, and therefore we do not gain much by general acts on the subject. Mr. Sheldon : That is just my point exactly. Mr. White: The question is whether the writer intended to leave the subject in that indefinite position. 298 NATIONAL COUNCIL OF EDUCATION Mr. Kiehle: That is very nearly correct. I desired to state the sit- uation, as correctly as I could understand it, thus: That the Government ought to look to the limitation and improvement of its citizenship, and that we as educators ought to put more stress upon the improvement and extension of our educational system by educational methods. Our system ought to be perfected. We ought to do more for our young peo- ple. We ought to make our system less objectionable. We ought to introduce the moral element as perfectly as possible to meet the demands of that class of people who have been accustomed to associate religious instruction with secular instruction. [" That's right."] Now, coming to the legislative part, theoretically your committee has no doubt that it is perfectly legitimate that men be required to do these things ; but practically, it questions whether it is not better to enforce the compul- sory law in our towns and cities moderately, watching the development of circumstances, and not relying on the law to effect very much at pres- ent in agricultural districts or over the country at large, but at all times holding it as a subordinate feature of our educational system. Mr. Sheldon: You don't deny that they don't need it in agricul- tural districts as much as in cities? Mr. Kiehle: Oh, no! Mr. George P. Brown: This report assumes that when the people established this Government they had a certain standard of intelligence and morality ; and that an intelligent and moral people will conform to the requirements of good citizenship. In these later years, it says, peo- ple have come here who are not entitled to freedom in the same sense as those who established this Government were entitled to freedom ; in other words, whose idea of freedom is too low ; and the question now is, Shall we maintain the original conception of freedom — that, in order to be free, persons must reach a standard of intelligence and morals as it has been heretofore established — or shall we lower this idea of intelligence and morality to the standard of that class? If this majority element shall determine what shall be the standard of citizenship, then it legislates for this class that would determine something else ; that is, it legislates for a class of people that we, from the very nature of the case, declare are not free. The majority sentiment of this country says that they must be intelligent and moral before they can be free, and before they can become an essential and vital part of this republic. Now, it seems to me the report is in doubt whether that shall be done or not. It does not seem to me that there can be any question of doubt on that subject. We must either maintain this high standard of preparation for citizenship in this country or we must yield and lower the standard of citizenship — and therefore the standard of civilization — in this country. I don't think this Council is prepared to take this latter position. COMPULSORY EDUCATION. 299 Mr. Richards : Is it not true that a larger proportion of the children in our agricultural districts attend the usual public schools, where they are established, than actually attend in the cities? In the cities, where we have a compulsory law in force, are there not more that are kept out of school and under bad influences than in the country? Do we not find that the majority of children who come from the country to the city are generally more moral, more correct in their deportment, than those who are educated even in the city, with their compulsory systems? [" No."] My experience is that we do. I was brought up in the country ; and I believe the boys and girls of those old district schools were trained to be better citizens every way than they are now in the cities, and that they are the men and women who are giving character to the educational interests of our country. I well remember the influence of that good old parson who used to come into our old red district schoolhouse every Saturday and hear us say the Assembly's Catechism till we got it per- fected ; and I know that those boys and girls, all of them now living, are scattered over the country, exerting a good moral influence, and the bad boys were those that were down in the villages and cities. And you find the same to-day everywhere. Mr. Sheldon : Mr. Richards would not recommend the introduction of the catechism in Wisconsin? Mr. Richards : Yes, I think they ought to know it there. Mr. Allyn : I am glad to note that the report presents so clearly and forcibly the three characteristics of a good citizen: intelligence, patriot- ism, and virtue; but I beg to change their order a little. These are indeed the foundations and the securities of our republican government. I think, however, that virtue, or honesty, stands first, patriotism second, and intelligence third. I think that we shall find that an honest, rural population, even though it may be comparatively ignorant, is a much better basis for a good government than what is often called an intellect- ual, wide-awake, newspaper-reading, money-loving, city population. I should therefore put virtue — sterling honesty is the better word — as the first qualification for citizenship. We ought to begin with it and insist that if a man desires to be a citizen of our self-governing republic he shall first show some certificate or intention of real integrity. The second necessary qualification of a good citizen is a genuine love for country — patriotism. Then follows intelligence, but a long way after the others. A true love for one's country, because it is his country, his pride and his glory, can never be left out of account when we undertake to make up our catalogue of patriotic or national virtues. Goldsmith, in his "Traveller," presents this as the grandest characteristic of the poor, hard-toiling, Swiss peasantry. They love their native land even the more because it is full of hardship and danger. 300 NATIONAL COUNCIL OF EDUCATION. " Thus every good his native wilds impart Imprints the patriot passion on his heart ; And e'en those hills that round his mansion rise Enhance the bliss his scanty food supplies. Dear is that shed to which his soul conforms, And dear that hill which lif ts him to the storms ; And as a child when scaring sounds molest, Clings close and closer to his mother's breast." These Switzers love their country, and that is the element of their national stability as a republic among the twenty haughty monarchies of Europe. Not their intelligence, extensive though it be, but their virtuous patriotism has preserved them and made them a noble and hon- ored people. A part of our danger arises necessarily from the foreigners who come among us with European notions and European ideals of freedom, and who fail to grasp the real conception of American liberty, as it must be in an Anglo-American republic. They loved their fatherland before they loved ours, as was natural. They will, therefore, always have some admiration for European institutions and hence they cannot speedily rise to the lofty plane of the truest American patriotism. But I wish to urge that the danger from the simple vices of the poor and ignorant is not so great as that from the luxurious vices of the ambitiously learned, and from those made suddenly rich by our unex- ampled opportunities for acquiring wealth. Our educated and opulent men and women are seeking for a frivolous life of ease and genteel refine- ment in idleness, and their example has infected nearly the whole com- munity, so that almost everybody wishes to imitate them; we need, rather, to rise to the simple virtues of the poor, and to shun the luxu- rious vices of the rich, and then I think we shall have far better govern- ment. Above all, we must teach the children in our public schools to under- stand and love the simple conception of American liberty, and the unostentatious habits and institutions of our forefathers. I have no prejudices against the foreigners who come among us to better their con- dition, nor against such as adopt our country as their own, because they intelligently prefer republican to monarchical institutions. I cordially welcome both classes. Yet I reckon it is but safe to us and not unjust to them to demand some fair probation, some assurance that they will conform to our laws and customs and will not strive to make us conform to customs and institutions which they have voluntarily abandoned. Look at a fact or two. Three of the largest States of our Union — New York, Pennsylvania, and Illinois — have more than a third of their respective populations within a radius of not much more than ten miles from the centres of our largest three cities. Probably one-half the male COMPULSORY EDUCATION. 301 population residing in them is foreign born. Probably, also, not one half of- those who vote at the polls possess a dollar of taxable property, or ever pay a dime toward the support of the Government, unless they are caught by the police and fined by the courts for some breach of the laws. Our own countrymen are imitating European habits and customs, and recently imported foreigners, who might naturally be expected to be partial to their home institutions, are helping us to demoralization. I would, therefore, demand of all candidates for the franchise of Ameri- can citizenship some qualification or guarantee of virtue or honest char- acter, and some sign of genuine love for the land of their adoption, as well as the attainment of knowledge or intelligence. Mr. Fitzpateick : One feature of this discussion is the common con- sent given to the statement that the general basis of intelligence in the country has largely deteriorated in consequence of the influx of this foreign element. All biologists will agree that where there is any race admixture the progeny of that admixture partakes, mentally and mor- ally, of the inferior race; and the problem that we have is a simple problem of assimilation. Now, in many respects, the foreign popula- tion that comes to our shores is superior to the home population ; that is, in the qualities Mr. Allyn has eulogized, of unswerving honesty and unswerving virtue ; and the great majority of the people who have come to our shores have come from this element. The paper hints at another point that I think is not in the province of the public school, — to war on private schools in any way. In my city it would require an increase of fifteen per cent, in the taxes to provide accommodations in the public schools for all the children. The patriotism of the foreign element to fatherland is really a patriotism to mother-tongue that is bred in the bone; and I can undertsand how they would feel that this is an unauthor- ized espionage upon them, just as the foreign element in Kansas look upon the prohibitory law as an outburst of religious and secular intolerance. I think we owe a very great debt to the foreign element which has come in and broken up and recrystallized some of our habits and customs. As to limitations of citizenship, no nation ever submitted to that, or ever will. AVe invited the foreign element to settle on our shores, which we intended should be the refuge for the oppressed of all people, and now we are getting to believe that we ought to call a halt. Now, when we ascertain that we have a polyglotted condition of things in our coun- try, and that some dangerous tendencies and elements are coming out, some of our friends rise up and say : " If we can only get these people all into the public schools and get them educated in this way, these things will disappear." But they won't disappear until the various strands of blood and race and kinship running through have been amal- 302 NATIONAL COUNCIL OF EDUCATION gamated. We have broken up the old homogeneousness, and we have now a heterogeneousness which must be recrystallized and redeveloped. While the condition looks bad, there never was a country in the world that was so homogeneous as the United States. We have one common language. There may be many isolated foreign communities in Wis- consin and Kansas; I know in Kansas there are localities where there are two or three hundred souls that do not speak anything but Russian ; but their children come up and branch out of these relations ; and the post-office department, which spreads its arms into every home, and the lines of communication and commerce spreading out, continuously oper- ate in breaking up this solidarity. We do not want to go back and crystallize a condition such as we have in the South in many respects. They have not been affected by immigration ; but they have their prob- lems to deal with; and I believe that when we inject into this discus- sion, or into the report, or into our views, any question of antagonism to any species, of schools we make a mistake. The anarchists and com- munists of Chicago are the warmest supporters of the common schools ; they are a unit on that question. Then there are some foreign people in Chicago that are bitter antagonists on personal grounds ; but if we look around at the people that are educated in some of these private schools we find they become good citizens, although they do not be- lieve in the observance of the Sabbath and a great many things that we do. Mr. White : Is there anything in the report that refers to parochial schools at all? Mr. Kiehle : Only an incidental reference. Mr. White: This is a problem that needs more than ordinary care, and I appreciate the hesitancy of the writer. We cannot solve it on the line of limited citizenship. The ballot cannot be taken from the hands of any j)ortion of our people. The ballot will be in more hands instead of fewer in the future of the republic. Then universal educa- tion that prepares for citizenship is our only hope; and the question — and one of great difficulty — is, how to make the schools meet fully the demands of citizenship? Where public sentiment supports and demands it, compulsory education is good policy; but we must wait for the senti- ment to enforce it. In Ohio a compulsory law was a dead letter fifteen years ago, and now such a law is enforced without friction and is doing great good. Just to the extent that the people feel the importance of universal education, we will have wise legislation to this end. I believe that compulsory education is to be a source of strength in the future, perhaps in the near future; but it seems to me that it is now hazard- ous and unnecessary to couple with this question the control of private schools. [Hear, hear.] COMPULSORY EDUCATION. 303 The imperative need is that the people be educated, no matter where. If the private schools are imperfect, they will be improved through the very necessities of the case ; the parents will not continue long to send their children to inferior schools. I think this compulsory education should be an English education, that American children should be taught the language of the country ; and I do not see any difficulty in securing this in all public schools. We have had such a law thirty years in Ohio. I am told that there are localities in some of the Western States where the instruction in the public school is not in English. No one can object to stopping that ; but the difficulty is in demanding that instruction in private schools shall be in English. This may be right, but it brings an element into the question that gives trouble. In many private schools the teachers themselves cannot speak English, and for that reason English is not taught. The compulsory teaching of English in private schools and the state supervision of private schools are ques- tions that I would like to see approached slowly. The people in most of the States are not yet familiar with the compulsory system. Mr. Kiehle : I am not aware that the parochial-school question is in the report. There was no intention of having it in. The only refer- ence to it is by way of illustration, or rather reference, in speaking of that class of our foreign population in the United States who are deter- mined to continue their foreign nationality and traditions in parochial schools, — a particular class of parochial schools. In reference to compul- sory education, there is no intimation in the report that education shall be in the public schools. Now, speaking for myself in this matter, in writing the report I endeavored to state it as generally and broadly and carefully as would be approved by this general committee. I cannot see that any of the views expressed by Mr. White are in any essential respect different from those that are intended in this report. I believe that our public-school system, as a system, is the sheet anchor of our liberty, and the guarantee for the perpetuity of our Government. I believe that but few of us realize, unless we give special attention to it, the power which the public-school system is having over the children of our foreign population. One of our Minnesota teachers told me yester- day that most of her scholars are foreigners' children, unable to speak English. In a little while they learn to speak English, and they won't speak anything else at home, and they are offended at being called Polanders on the play-ground. It does not take long to infuse an Amer- ican spirit of patriotism through these public schools ; and out in the country on the Fourth of July you will see the flag of Sweden and the flag of the American Republic floating together; and the first name they learn is that of George Washington, and he is the ideal of everything that is good. 304 NATIONAL COUNCIL OF EDUCATION Mr. Sheldon: Don't they all yearn to know the English language as quickly as possible? Mr. Kiehle: All do yearn to know it; the girls give up the foreign tongue first, and the boys follow right behind, or next to them. I have supreme confidence in the public-school system as we have it now. I think that the first and most important thing is to protect it from entanglements. The coming question that is pressing upon us is this : Inasmuch as a large percentage of the people of America are supportiug parochial schools, private schools, good schools, and they have so patiently endured taxation for the support of other people's schools, ought not the generous-hearted American people now to divide school funds? I think the important part of it is to see that our public-school system is perfected, and see that everything that looks toward an under- mining of it, or a modifying of the attitude toward the public at large, is warded off, and that it remains a school for all the people. Now, with regard to the compulsory feature, this report suggests that when you come to care for that class of people who are outside of all these educational influences, religious and social and industrial, we must take care of them by law; they must be made to live within these limitations or suffer for it. But when you come to that other class of people— good, virtuous, religious people — it is a serious question whether you ought to begin to compel them ; that is my opinion about it. We have had lots of compulsion in this world. It is an old doctrine, that if people don't do what you know they ought to do, it's a blessed thing to make them do it. And inasmuch as thinking is the basis of all action, if they don't think right, then make them think right; it is a good thing for them, and it is the salvation of the country and the world. We have gone above or under that; we have got an idea that truth is self-demonstrat- ing. You keep holding up a true doctrine to the people, and get them to looking at it and discussing it, and by and by, like the sunlight of heaven, they will unconsciously believe it. Now, that is the position we take in respect to religion. We don't allow any more binding. If Christianity cannot propagate itself without a compulsory law, it has got to go, that's all. Now, the institutions of the Government of America are in a sense similar. We have taken the position that our Government is so reasonably good that if we present it and keep it before them they will love it, and that patriotism will be the natural result. We are depending upon that very largely. Now, the result of our pub- lic-school system is certainly very gratifying ; and with regard to for- eigners, while I believe in compulsory education — I think they all ought to be educated in English — I have unbounded respect for the attach- ments and the affections of our foreign population to their fatherland and COMPULSORY EDUCATION. 305 its language. I think we don't appreciate what it means to let one's children grow up in total ignorance of them, and that the feelings of these people ought to be considered. I believe in holding to the com- pulsory law ; in adopting it just as rapidly as public sentiment will per- mit ; but in that great area of our population where public sentiment is positively opposed to it, we must depend very largely upon the strength of our educational institutions, including the public-school system. 306 NATIONAL COUNCIL OF EDUCATION. REPORT OF COMMITTEE ON SECONDARY EDUCATION. UNIFORMITY IN REQUIREMENTS FOR ADMISSION TO COLLEGE. While it is conceded that much of the praise usually bestowed on the schools of the United States is fully merited, it has been the purpose of the Committee, as was proper, to approach this investigation with a spirit of criticism, that certain defects might be pointed out and a remedy for them suggested. Education in the United States lacks in system much that is desirable and attainable. This fact is rapidly gaining recognition, and many arti- cles and discussions of recent date show a progressive desire to improve existing conditions. A brief preliminary examination of our school problem as a whole will reveal some of the changes needed and prepare the way for the special discussion belonging to this report. In the eight years of Elementary Education there is a close approach to uniformity in cities and large towns throughout the country, and there is an increasing tendency in villages and rural districts to conform Ele- mentary work to that of the cities. One finds little difficulty in admit- ting to High schools on a common basis pupils from reputable Grammar schools widely separated. We find in this country no distinction in elementary courses based upon social rank, a distinction which exists in England, where pupils who aim at Higher Education pursue a special course almost from the first. If a pupil of low social rank desires Higher Education, he must be transferred to the so-called Grammar School as early as the age of eleven. In Germany the differentiation is yet earlier, and, while the lad who is destined to remain a peasant continues in the Burgerschule, his more fortunate companion enters the Gymnasium at the age of ten, and prepares for the University. A pupil in our schools may have a great advantage because differentiation usually does not begin until the age of fourteen, and he may then elect College preparation.* * My opinion is that it would be much better for our boys and girls to begin their preparation for College at least two years earlier than they now do. If our High Schools could receive the pupils at eleven or twelve instead of fourteen, the preparation for College would be completed by sixteen, instead of eighteen, as is now generally the case. E. W. Coy. Mr. Mowry and Mr. Tarbell of the Committee would also begin College preparation earlier, and would have students admitted to Scientific Courses on the preparation afforded by a good general high-school course. REQUIREMENTS FOR ADMISSION TO COLLEGE. 307 Until this period the child's education is conducted, theoretically, in accordance with the laws of mental growth and not with reference to his future studies or occupation. There is a close connection between Elementary and Secondary education. In large towns the majority of Grammar-School graduates pass directly into the High School. Among Secondary Schools greater differences exist than among the Elementary. Most of the largest and best public High Schools cover a period of four years and present General courses in Mathematics, Sci- ence, History, Literature, and the Languages; also a College Prepara- tory Course in Greek, Latin, Mathematics, etc. So far as we can discover uniformity in Higher Education there is a tendency to build upon the High-School Course, first, Colleges of the Liberal Arts; second, various Scientific Courses; third, Professional Courses. But the departures from this plan, if such a plan may be said to exist, are numerous, important, and widespread. The College proper, together with the Scientific and Professional Schools, constitutes the University as it is known in this country. Some Universities add "Graduate Courses." There are great differences, even among the best institutions of higher learning, in requirements for admission to the various courses, length of the courses, and the character of the work in them. From Universities of the better class we tabulate the following : Years of preparation beyond the Grammar Course. Length of Course. School required for admission with view to a degree. Collegiate, 4 yrs. 3 to 4 yrs. Scientific, 3 to 4 yrs. 2 to 3 yrs. Law, 2 to 3 yrs. 0 to 3 yrs. Medical, 3 yrs. I to 2 yrs. Theological, 3 yrs. 4 to 8 yrs. In Illinois the number of years beyond the Grammar School required to secure the degree of A. B. varies in the different colleges from 5 to 7 years, and in many other States of the Union the condition of higher education is worse. A glance at the statistics of professional schools, in the report of the Commissioner of Education, will show that many of the schools of Law, Medicine, and Theology, throughout the country, require no examination for admission and that the percentage of profes- sional students who hold a college diploma is absurdly small. The num- ber and value of degrees conferred by American Universities is beyond the knowledge of any one educator. Ex-President Andrew D. White says, " It is evident that the present so-called University System of the United States is a jumble of institutions that ought to be Colleges, with institutions which ought to be Universities." When we add to the dif- ferences in requirements for admission and length of courses, the plan of electives as now employed in many Colleges, we see how great are the variations in our university system. 308 NATIONAL COUNCIL OF EDUCATION We may now tabulate some results : Elementary Education (6 to 14). — Satisfactory tendencies toward uni- formity. Closely connected with Secondary Education. Secondary Education (14 to 18). — In one of its phases the special sub- ject of this report. Not closely related to Higher Education. University Education. — In every way lacking desirable system, in amount and kind of required preparation, in length of courses, in choice and character of work in them. In the opinion of many defective in entire plan and organization. The English University aims at mere general training ; it is a con- tinuation of the Preparatory School. The French "Faculties" are special schools which prepare directly for professional life. The German University employs the method of the English institutions, that is, the method of general education ; in aim it is like the French Faculties, since it prepares for special callings. There are many indications in this country of growth toward the German University System. This appears in the increasing use of laboratory and " Seminary" methods, in the demand to shorten the period of Preparatory and Collegiate edu- cation, and in the belief that all professional courses should be based upon a more complete general education. Such men as Ex-President Folwell, of the University of Minnesota, and President Adams, of Cornell, favor something like the German System. To such an end the modi- fications of our present system would be about as follows: (1) Reducing College work one or two years; (2) building upon the College course all the Graduate and Professional courses, making them at least three years in length. By the advocates of this plan it is suggested that under it many more students would advance beyond the High School, a much larger number would secure the Doctor's degree, and the number of educated professional men would be greatly increased. It is also held that our present College would not be lost, since Graduate Courses of the University would offer literary and philosophical studies. On the other hand, many claim that our College is peculiarly adapted to Ameri- can institutions and should be preserved. One correspondent writes concerning the change above outlined: "This ought not to be done. The College of America is a growth of 200 years. The curriculum con- sists in part of the study of Mathematics, the Natural Sciences, the Lan- guages, etc. ; in part of the Humanities, Metaphysics, etc. Now both these classes of studies should exist together in the Colleges. Suppose the new plan were adopted ; the Colleges would then teach only what are now Freshman and Sophomore studies; the studies of the Junior and Senior years would be relegated to the Universities. Only a small por- tion of those now in college would then go beyond the college. The result would be a lowering of education for America. The American REQUIREMENTS FOR ADMISSION TO COLLEGE. 309 College should stand between Secondary Education and the Professional Schools, and we should urge the professional schools to a higher standard of admission." At least two members of the Committee hold the opin- ion above quoted. President Eliot, of Harvard, would shorten the Ele- mentary-School period by important modifications in the Studies and bring students into the college at an earlier age. He would then reduce the college period to three years and emphasize the " Graduate Courses." President Gilman, of Johns Hopkins, also advocates an earlier age for college matriculation, but does not suggest any shortening of the college course. He would require the Bachelor's degree as a basis for profes- sional degrees and for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy. The Har- vard idea of Electives is too well known to require special mention. It is certain that the whole subject of University Education should be considered in a convention representing the leading Universities of the whole country. Any sectional discussion of this broad theme leads to results in which sectionalism is apparent. Whatever might be agreed to and adopted by a dozen leading institutions would be accepted by most of the universities, and many of the colleges would soon fashion their requirements in accordance with the academic work of the univer- sities. If such a convention should consider no radical changes, much good would follow, if these results should be obtained: (1) A recom- mendation that all preparatory courses cover a period of at least three years. (2) An agreement that all scientific and professional courses should be based on at least a complete high-school education. (3) Regulation of University degrees. (4) A more intimate connection between Secondary and Higher Education. IS UNIFORMITY DESIRABLE? BASIS OF PRINCIPLES. The preceding section presents a brief view of our educational system, and it need arouse no extended discussion except as to its correctness. We would proceed at once to the practical part of this report, and let the special case stand upon its own merits, but some may demand a basis of principles, and we venture to present a few general statements, even at the risk of turning the discussion from our particular problem, namely, the desirability of a guarded uniformity in college admission to be attained through voluntary national organization. (1) (a) As society progresses, sectionalism is gradually converted into a broad community of interests, (b) Through contact of various ideas comes progress, usually with a tendency toward common standards. (c) The national organization of any interest is not inconsistent with individual freedom. These statements are but other expressions for well-known laws. Accepting these principles, we are warranted in dis- cussing any educational problem as a national problem, with a view 310 NATIONAL COUNCIL OF EDUCATION. toward a general adoption of the best ideas, and with a confident belief that voluntary national organization will oppose no healthy individual tendencies. (2) The period of Secondary Education is the period when the foun- dation of all the higher aptitudes should be laid; it is not the period for specializing; hence, under substantially the same conditions, there may be uniformity of preparation for higher education. Those who believe that differentiation should begin at an early period will, nevertheless, we think, admit the desirability of some degree of uniformity in the differentiation. (3) While in different parts of the United States there is a variation of interests and of physical surroundings, there is a national community of psychical conditions which are more potent than local factors. We have uniformity of government and institutions, of traditions and ideas. The educated youth of Denver bears about the same relation to the country and the world as does the educated youth of San Francisco or Boston. In the main there is no ineradicable distinction between classes. There is no demand for separate kinds of education tending to foster caste. While education may not be carried so far in new and struggling communities as in old and wealthy ones, there is no reason why educa- tion of the same grade should not be substantially the same throughout the country. (4) By considering the essential principles and by examining the requirements of the best educational institutions, preparatory studies and methods may be selected and recommended for general adoption. While absolute and enforced uniformity in any part of a school system would undoubtedly prove harmful, a progressive tendency toward stand- ard courses can be created. In view of the foregoing principles the Committee is confident of both the desirability and the feasibility of a nearer approach toward uniform college preparation. PRESENT STATUS OF COLLEGE PREPARATION. Let me examine the present status of college preparation as demanded by leading institutions. A prominent High School of an Eastern State reports, " We are fitting-boys and girls for twelve or fifteen colleges, and no two require the same preparation.' A leading High School of the West reports a similar condition. The Principal of a well-known Pre- paratory School in New England says, " The present diversity is dis- tracting and demoralizing, unreasonable and unnecessary." John Tetlow, in a paper on Modern Languages written in 1888, referring to Harvard, Wellesley, and Smith, says: "A class containing pupils fitting for each of these three colleges must either be broken up into three REQUIREMENTS FOR ADMISSION TO COLLEGE. 311 classes in French, or must do at least double the amount of work required by any one college in the group. My brethren, these things ought not so to be." A similar statement would be true of many of the present variations from a possible common standard. While there is substantial agreement among leading colleges as to height of standard for admission, there are great variations as to specific kinds and amounts — variations that represent no important principle and stand for noth- ing but an uneasy desire to be peculiar. Some of the demands upon Classical Preparatory Courses which are variations from a common standard of admission that might be selected from the catalogues of leading colleges are as follows: VARIATIONS FROM COMMON STANDARD. Mathematics. — Solid Geometry, Euclid, University Algebra. Latin. — Eight books of iEneid, 6 books of Caesar, Eclogues, Georgics, Ovid, Sallust, Excess of Sight Reading. Greek. — Four books of Iliad, Excess of Sight Reading. History, etc. — Bible History, Ancient Geography as a special study. French. — Not required by some colleges. Science. — Not required by some colleges. When required the varia- tions run nearly through the list of sciences. English. — Not required by some colleges. When required there are troublesome variations. In the regular Preparatory Course from which Greek is omitted the variations are more marked. One College advertises such equivalents as belong properly to no high or preparatory school, such as University Algebra; Surveying and Navigation; Analytical Geometry; Mechanics; Latin, excess of sight reading; Greek, excess of sight reading; German and French beyond proper work of Secondary schools. Scientific schools vary still more. One requires, for instance, French or German; another, French and German; another, Latin; another, no foreign language ; and so on ad infinitum. No school, public or private, can meet this variety of demands with- out great dissipation of energy, and needless expense, and the Committee believes that among colleges of the higher class any important variation in admission from a common standard that might easily be adopted is unnecessary. The time is ripe for an attempt at a solution of the diffi- culty. BASIS FOR PARTIAL ADJUSTMENT. PLAN FOR COMPLETE ADJUSTMENT. Some of the principles which may fairly govern an attempt to bring about uniformity of college admission are here presented. (1) By comparison of the requirements of leading colleges a standard 312 NATIONAL COUNCIL OF EDUCATION. classical course may be selected which could at once be adopted without essential modification by those colleges. (2) A Preparatory Course omitting Greek may also be recommended in which the substitution for Greek shall fall within regular High-School tvork. Such a course may be made up from the catalogues of those col- leges which do not require Greek. It may here be noted that in this country, in Germany, and in England, there are indications that Greek is no longer to be compulsory for College and University degrees. But at the same time the advantage of taking at least one classical language, especially the Latin, is strongly urged. The Head Master of Harrow, while he would not make Greek a compulsory study, urges the desira- bility of retaining Latin about as follows: "For scientific study a dead language possesses an advantage in that it does not invite the sacrifice of accuracy to utility. Latin is the language of law, of liberty, of religion. It is the parent of half the languages in Europe. It is strong and pre- cise in grammatical idioms. It is furnished with the necessary means and appliances for teaching. I cannot help thinking it would be an educational mistake of serious magnitude to lose the universality of the Latin language as an element of the higher education." We may add that Latin is required or advocated by most scientific schools and that its retention is generally desired. (3) Colleges and Preparatory Schools not at present able to adopt standard preparation in full should pursue standard lines so that the work would all count toward the desired end, if the pupil wished to supplement it for an institution of the best class. (4) A complete adjustment of the relation between High Schools and Colleges should be sought on the basis of a general High-School course. This idea will be subject to special consideration. The Committee will venture to suggest a Classical Preparatory Course made up from the catalogues of several of the best colleges. In this course a little is taken from the Latin required by some colleges, and. a concession is made to those which demand a Modern Language and some Science and Literature. Physics is selected because it includes more generic principles than any other science. The Committee believes that this course thus made up is not a jumble of fragments, but that it has a natural coherence in plan and purpose, as much as any one of the courses upon which it is based. It should be especially noted that this course is suggested, not as the best possible one but rather as an exam- ple of a course that might be established. It is also intended to show the folly of the present variations. REQUIREMENTS FOR ADMISSION TO COLLEGE. 313 CLASSICAL COUltSE. Mathematics. — Algebra (Elementary complete); Plane Geometry (with exercises). Greek. — Four books of Anabasis; 3 books of Iliad; limited amount of sight reading ; composition. Latin. — Four books of Caesar; 7 orations of Cicero; 6 books of iEneid ; limited amount of sight reading ; composition. French. — Easy translation. Science. — Physics with experiments and notes. History. — Greece and Eome (Geography, incidental). English. — As recommended by the New England Association. The colleges admitting without Greek substitute increased amounts of Mathematics, of Science, or of the Modern Languages. Therefore the following substitutes for Greek may be suggested, the rest of the course remaining the same as the regular classical course. The addi- tional sciences selected have the prestige of influential recommendation. COUKSE OMITTING GREEK. (Substitutions for Greek. ) Solid Geometry and Plane Trigonometry. Additional year of French. Chemistry (with experiments and notes) and Botany. Remainder of course same as Classical. A careful comparison of the courses above suggested as a provisional basis for uniformity with the courses of standard colleges will show that most Colleges, High and Preparatory Schools could at once afford to agree to some such uniform requirements, and that the changes necessary for an adjustment would in no instance be vital or even important. Could uniform courses once be recommended by an influential convention of colleges and schools, every fitting school could adopt the one standard and say to the colleges, "Take our students if you wish them." Most colleges would be compelled to adopt the courses recommended. But by far the most important and most troublesome problem is the complete adjustment of Higher to Secondary Education. In the opin- ion of the Committee the connection must be made by adjusting the Colleges to the Secondary Schools and not the Secondary Schools to the Colleges. President Eliot some years since pointed out that a good high school finishing course must become more and more a good preparatory course. Mr. Harris is understood to maintain that the studies adapted to the age of secondary education should also furnish a good college preparation. This is in accord also with Mr. Hill's principles in the 314 NATIONAL COUNCIL OF EDUCATION. "True Order of Studies." It would be unsafe to deny that Secondary education, which is adapted to the development of the mental powers and the enlargement of knowledge in the given period, is a good prepa- ration for higher education. If elementary science and history and literature and art, as well as mathematics and classical languages, are adapted to the period of Secondary education, then they are excellent as a basis for college work. From the tendency of our institutions, we must believe that more and more will the High Schools become feeders of the Colleges. The inter- ests of Colleges and High Schools will be greatly enhanced by the closest union, and one important result will be an increase in the number who will seek Higher Education. There is one great advantage in postpon- ing to as late a day as possible the necessity of decision regarding a col- lege course. Whenever a boy decides to go to college he should find himself on the road thither. Already Michigan University and the University of California admit to a four-years' general course without any foreign language, while North- western University admits students with only one foreign language, ancient or modern. The State universities, we think, can afford to meet the regular work of the High Schools. It is understood that there are some troublesome adjustments arising from the union of Classical and English students in college classes. In large colleges the problem is not serious because classes are divided. In smaller institutions a list of electives will make the necessary adjustment possible. Even in an inflexible course some substitutions are possible, as Solid Geometry and Plane Trigonometry for Freshman Mathematics. This phase of the problem, however, is not the most serious one. We will proceed to suggest a high-school course that might be gener- ally adopted. We include it in the five " Fundamental Disciplines" pointed out by Mr. Harris; a selection in general harmony with Mr. Hill's analysis. Since this theory of studies is now widely adopted we expect no opposition to our basic principles. In choice of specific studies, in arrangement and amounts we are governed in part by com- parison of many courses of study as well as by thought upon relative values. The Committee endorses the custom of requiring a foreign lan- guage in a high-school course, and for reasons previously cited would give the preference to Latin. The Committee does not advance a defi- nite opinion that more than one course is necessary for a high school or that the preparatory and the finishing courses might be identical. AVe simply suggest a basis for present uniformity and adjustment under existing conditions. REQUIREMENTS FOR ADMISSION TO COLLEGE. 315 GENERAL HIGH-SCHOOL COURSE. Mathematics. — Algebra, Plane and Solid Geometry. Plane Trigo- nometry. Foreign Languages.^ At least three years of some foreign language, Greek or Latin or French or German, but preferably Latin. Science. — * Physiology, Physics, Chemistry, and at least Botany or Zoology, and Geology or Astronomy, and Mental Science. History. — Greek, Roman, English, and Epochs of Modern Civil Gov- ernment, Political Economy. English. — History of Literature, Study of Selections, Rhetoric, Com- positions. Art. — Drawing and Music. WHAT HAS BEEN DONE TOWARD UNIFORMITY? In the interest of uniformity the " Association of Colleges and Pre- paratory Schools" and the " Commission of Colleges" in New England have been formed, and progress has been made in recommending and securing the adoption of uniform requirements in English, in Greek and Latin, and in Modern Languages. The State of Ohio has secured an agreement between the Colleges and High Schools through the medi- ation of the State Teachers' Association. The plan there adopted tends to make a perfect connection between High Schools and the Colleges. The report of Professor King and that of Mr. White made during the consideration of the problem contain many valuable suggestions. Many other States through their Associations or their State Universities are aiming at uniformity and at a closer relation between the colleges and the high schools. But it should be noted that State uniformity may hinder rather than aid national uniformity. State boundaries have nothing whatever to do with the choice of a college. As soon as possible educators should make the question a national one, instead of wasting energy in creating organized differences. Of nearly 60 answers received from leading High and Preparatory Schools and Colleges and from State Superintendents addressed by cir- cular letter, about 70 per cent, are favorable to uniformity, although many doubts are expressed concerning the feasibility of the scheme. * I do not agree with the course in Science. I think that Physiology, or at least that part of it that is ordinarily taught, belongs to the Grammar School. If taught in the High School at all, it should be comparative, and be taught in connection with Zoology. I should substitute Physical Geography for Geology and Astronomy ; this could be so taught as to include both, and would give a complete view of the physical universe. In short, I think the tendency should be to concentrate the attention on a few sciences. I should like the course in Science to read: Botany or Zoology, Physics, Chemistry, Physical Geography, Mental Science. Lillie J. Martin. 316 NATIONAL COUNCIL OF EDUCATION But those who expressed an opinion adverse to its feasibility appeared to think that absolute uniformity was intended instead of an influen- tial recommendation creating a tendency toward uniformity. Hence we may infer that most colleges and large high and preparatory schools would hail any important movement to secure 'uniformity and would co-operate heartily toward that end. Indeed such was the expressed sentiment of the majority of our correspondents. SCHEME FOR SECURING FULL CONSIDERATION OP THE SUBJECT. This report is not made with an idle purpose. It heartily believes in the desirability and feasibility of creating at once a tendency toward a uniformity which represents the best. While we are aware that this Committee, the Council and the General Association have no authority in the matter and that this report can do no more than mark an epoch in the history of the movement for uniformity, we shall venture to pro- pose a possible scheme and hope that definite action of adoption or rejection will be taken by the Council. We suggest — 1. That a committee be appointed by this Council to select a dozen Universities and Colleges and a dozen High and Preparatory Schools to be represented in a convention to consider the problems of Secondary and Higher Education, time and place of meeting to be the same as that of the next National Association ; and that in the choice of institutions size, age, and standing be considered. That, in consideration of the fact that radical changes are slowly Wrought, the recommendation be made to consider the problems in order from the minor to the major as follows : a. Recommending a Classical Preparatory Course for general adoption. b. Eecommending a Preparatory Course, omitting Greek. c. Recommending a standard preparation for scientific Schools. d. Considering a plan for complete adjustment between Secondary Schools and Colleges, whether on the basis of one course or of several courses, to the end that a good High-School course may become a good preparation for Colleges. e. Considering the feasibility of building all university courses upon at least a complete High-School course. James H. Baker, Chairman. William A. Mowry, Lillie J. Martin, H. S. Tarbell, E. W. Coy, Committee, REQUIREMENTS FOR ADMISSION TO COLLEGE. 317 DISCUSSION. Mr. Bradley: In the main, 1 agree with the paper. Rigid and absolute uniformity is not to be expected nor, indeed, desired. But by an approximate uniformity many advantages are secured. More students will complete a high-school course and more students will take a college course if uniformity in requirements for admission to college can be secured. And this is really a very important consideration. The con- stant temptation presented to high-school students is to leave school and go into business. During the eighteen years I was principal of a high school, I was constantly impressed with this fact. We fitted many boys for college, but very few of them entered the high school with any expectation of ever going to college. Few of them had any desire to go. We persuaded them to it, and guided their study with reference to it. We often found, however, that the boys preferred a course of study which did not prepare students for college. Their parents had the same preference for them. Now it often happened that after they had been in the high school a year or two, they would discover a desire to go to college. A new ambition was aroused, and then they had to go back and begin a new course of study or do extra work in order to fit for college. It was said yesterday by a member of this Council that there are too many students entering college ; that we have too many colleges and too many college students; too many college-bred men. If that is so, then we want just as little uniformity as possible so as to make it difficult to enter college. But I believe in educated men and women in all the positions and relations of life, and I believe in an education that will give tone and character to their work. And so I believe that the high school should lead step by step to the college. If a boy after being in a high school two years decides that he will go to college, he should find himself already advanced two years on the way. We need not in any way sacrifice the pupils who want a general education and who do not go to college ; but we should be especially solicitous to aid and guide the boys and girls who grow ambitious. The high schools should be like recruiting stations all over the land, finding out the young men and women of promise and bringing them forward into the influence which they ought to exert. They will be successful, but their success will be of a very different kind if they have the benefit of a thorough education. Their influence in the community where they reside will be very dif- ferent. Mr. Fairchild : I have some doubt about the scientific and profes- sional course. The basis of science is very broad, and the scientific course ought to be a very broad one. A professional course may not be 318 NATIONAL COUNCIL OF EDUCATION. a broad one, though it may be a deep one. It does not seem to me to suit the demand of a full scientific course, where one must lay a broad foundation in the sciences before he takes up his specialty. The high- school course is not broad enough for scientific studies. Mr. Coy: The first question raised in the report is whether uniform- ity is desirable. I declined at first to sign the report on account of doubt on this point. I have some doubt still as to whether it is possible or desirable to obtain uniformity in the high schools throughout the country; I scarcely think we are homogeneous enough for that. The new University of South Dakota, for instance, would make a great mis- take if it were to adopt the course of study of Harvard College. A high school situated in a new and sparsely settled community would make a similar mistake if it should adopt the course of study of one of the long-established high schools in an older and more homogeneous com- munity. In different parts of the country different conditions may prevail, and hence it may be better to adopt different lines of work to suit the varying conditions. The question of uniformity lies at the foundation of the report, and I still doubt whether the time has arrived when we can secure anything like uniformity either in our colleges or high schools. It has been difficult even in New England to secure uni- formity in colleges and high schools, and the difficulty will be much greater when you attempt to take in the whole country. Mr. Hinsdale: I suppose when we discuss this question of uniform- ity we use the word in a relative sense: The question of absolute uni- formity in the secondary schools, colleges, or universities is a question utterly unworthy (I express my own opinion now) owing to its hopeless impracticability ; you might as well discuss a course of study for Utopia as to discuss that. I understand that when we discuss that subject we are, by implication at least, to limit the word uniformity to relative uniformity. My own opinion is that a greater degree of uniformity than we now have is desirable, and that it is attainable. How far attainable and how far desirable are questions not easy to answer. The trouble attending any practical discussion of the question is to get the question in definite form. I do not understand the Committee used the term uniformity in the broadest sense. It is plain to me that there is and there should be a very considerable diversion in this matter. Mr. Bradley calls our attention to the fact that many pupils come to the high school not knowing that they want to go to college. In that respect, American society is different from the society of France, Ger- many, or England. This grows out of social conditions, and we are not going soon to pass out of those conditions. I am not saying whether it is desirable or not. As to the suggestion that we should have a course of study so that REQUIREMENTS FOR ADMISSION TO COLLEGE. 319 pupils would be put on the college-track without knowing it, if we are going to put boys and girls in the high school on the track for college without their knowing it or their parents knowing it, when those who are interested find out what we have done they will demand modification in secondary instruction quite beyond anything that lies within the vis- ion of this Council. Mr. Harris : We can discuss this question from two points of view. We wish merely to find out what is and announce it, or we may seek an ideal course of study. The former is not so profitable labor as the latter. It is better to seek some rational basis for this course of study. There is certainly a conviction in the minds of the people with regard to the course of study, that it is not grounded in reason. It does not seem to me there can be any rational consideration of this subject that does not go into the grounds and ask why do we have a course of study of this kind. Is it desirable for all secondary education to move towards uni- formity? If it is we ought to state our reasons for it. If, on the other hand, it is desirable to have various courses of study, one going in one direction and another in another, it ought to be possible to make this clear and produce unity of sentiment. How can we discuss this paper without considering that question? Without going into the question of the rationale of the course of study and the question whether a person who is getting a liberal education should have the same course as the one that is to stop half-way, we cannot arrive at any conclusion. Should not the partial course be a section of the large course? Now the primary difficulty, the primary occasion for a division of courses of study, is the claim of classical studies to supersede the modern. I remember (about forty years ago) when I first began to read protests against classic study which said : " What is the use of studying the dead languages and making that study the chief thing in your education? Do you wish to talk Latin and Greek? Have you anything sensible to say that you cannot express in some living language?" At first I was persuaded by the specious arguments against the classic course; then I remember meeting in my experience one after the other the grounds which exist for the educational system as it is with its foundation of classic study, and I recall with what surprise those grounds first struck me. I remember coming, after ten or fifteen years, to see that the edu- cational system which undertakes to educate the individual out of his first crude, shallow opinions, and lead him down to the basis, has to show him the development and genesis of his civilization. The most important thing, in fact, is the education of the individual into civil- ization ; and our civilization, being that of Anglo-Saxon people, is derived from a twofold source, — the Roman on the one side and the Greek on the other. I found that it is very necessary to have an education that takes 320 NATIONAL COUNCIL OF EDUCATION the pupil back to these old civilizations, and there is only one way to get the most efficient help in the briefest possible time, and that is the study of the Latin and Greek languages and literature. And I have never seen anything during the past twenty years which shook my con- viction with regard to the importance of the classic studies in education. There would be still less doubt about the importance of mathematical study. For mathematics is important to a study of the whole physical world, because matter and movement are governed by mathematical laws. So, too, Latin and Greek furnish fundamental elements in our civiliza- tion just as mathematics reveal the constitution of time and space and lie at the foundation of all study of nature. We have the classical course of work which fits for our colleges and which has created for itself a class of secondary schools, or preparatory schools. On the other hand, we have taken reading, writing, and arithmetic and made a common- school course of study. The staples of higher education, Latin, Greek, and mathematics, three solid pillars, comprehended nearly all learning less than three hundred years ago, but since then two other pillars, so to speak, have been added: natural science, that has almost entirely grown up in the last two hundred years, and modern literature. French and German literature is all quite modern, English somewhat older, and Italian the oldest. We have now a literature as great as classic litera- ture. How shall we bring this in, — the modern as well as the ancient course? I think that the only answer that will meet the case will have to affirm the necessity of both classics and moderns in all courses of study. Latin ought to be in the first year of the high school for all pupils, if it does not stay any longer than the first year. Natural Science and English Literature ought to be taught in all schools from the lowest grade to the highest. I do not see how we are going to do anything with this paper unless we discuss the question of the rationale of the course of study and try to spread enlightened views on the subject and root out the plentiful Philistinism that prevails. The report before us recommends a good practical course and is in other respects one of the ablest reports ever made to this Council. Mk. Hoose: I will venture to give my opinion concerning modern courses of study. It seems to me that the older courses of study — those pursued before people considered the practical value of branches — were the bases of utilitarian investigations. The evolution of the modern electives is the history of the practical utilities, as they appear in schools. Social forms are growths, not formed from a consensus of opinions. I may be wrong, but it appears to me that the field at issue is the field of practical values; that the final question is one of the greatest utility in studies. REQUIREMENTS FOR ADMISSION TO COLLEGE. 321 Mr. HlNSDALE: I would like to ask Mr. Harris a question concern- ing the argument he brought forward in favor of the study of classical languages, with which argument some of us at least are familiar. I confess that has always seemed to me to be a very peculiar argument, and from a certain stand-point to be extremely cogent. No doubt for the purpose of the historian, for the purpose of the scholar, the study of Greek and Latin would be of great value as an introduction to Greece and Rome; but will Mr. Harris explain how it is so valuable to the ordinary student? Mr. Harris: The question asked bears on a passage in the report. It has been said that we should have studies that fit the student for practical life. Inasmuch as the vocations of men differ, there being some five hundred different kinds of business in the civilized commu- nity, why should not the course of study vary also to correspond? What will be the vocation of the future man is not, as yet, determined while the child is at school. The child is educated not only because he is to be an individual plying a special vocation, but because he is to be a member of the family and the civil society and the State. Now the school education proposes to give to him this general education, fitting him to combine with his fellows so that he will be sure not to make any mistake in his higher life or fail to participate in civilization. There should be such an education as is adapted to take the individual out of his idiosyncrasy as an individual, and make him a universal person, and thus round out his nature and help him to advance the civilization in which he lives. That is the primary purpose and function of education, that which will elevate the individual and give to him the benefit of the experience of all mankind. That should be the ground of all courses of study. It is not to take this individual or that individual who lives in a little narrow sphere with the horizon close by and make him more that individual, but the education should be the training of his mind, giving him power to perceive, lifting him out of his little self into the greater civilization that is around him. I am in favor of the study of Greek and Latin. Take it in the West and there you find the vast majority of men who get into the city councils, who are the persons who keep order in a com- munity, who go to the legislature, who preside over the courts, those who have, to a greater or less degree, pursued the study of the classics in their youth. This is what all should expect; for our civilization is derivative, borrowing its legal forms from the Romans, and its scientific, literary, and art forms from the Greeks. Hence all the forms by which we combine into corporations, municipalities, and cities are of Roman origin. So are the forms of acquiring, holding, and transferring prop- erty ; also the forms for punishing crime. It is not the philosophy of the will that one learns by studying Latin, but rather a practical insight 322 NATIONAL COUNCIL OF EDUCATION into the working of forms and usages. A boy may study Latin for six months only and yet receive a certain impulse in his habits of observa- tion which will turn his attention to the legal aspect of deeds, and throughout his life he will grow more observant in this direction. Mr. White [Ohio] : I thoroughly concur with what Mr. Harris has said respecting the desirability of shaping every child's education to meet the demands of manhood, and not simply of the workman. The differentiations in courses of study that look towards employments should be in incidentals and not in fundamentals. It is possible to have a course of study for all which shall be uniform in fundamental disci- plines, and it seems to me we shall reach this result best by placing before all who have to do with education, courses that embody these different elements in their proper relation. A true course of study con- forms to the essential principles in the right training of the entire nat- ure of the child. When we get down to bed-rock in education, we shall find that the best course of training for the young does not need to be adjusted every four years or every eight years. The best course of study is that which best trains the child to the best possible ideal. A course of study, prepared without any reference to sound pedagogic principles, without any reference to what the human soul needs, which asks what the pupil is to do, by what kind of hand work he is to earn a living, will necessarily afford very imperfect training. A boy after having spent four years with the expectation of being a mechanic, will find himself endowed with powers for some other calling. A young man said to me at the close of his college course, " I have made a serious mistake ; that for which I thought I was fitted is not my true work." So it seems to me that a course of study which gives us fundamental disciplines is the proper one. I see no solution of this question except by taking hold of the question of education from a fundamental stand-point and determin- ing what ideal course will make the best men and women. When this has been done we shall have a fundamental course, and then variations as pupils advance in the course, will not disturb the essentials in edu- cation. The essentials should be uniform ; the variations should be in non-essentials. For that reason I think the high-school course ought to be so arranged that the boy who takes it is on the road to college. The high school should lead directly to the college, and until we get our col- leges and high schools into this harmony, there will be thousands of youth who will fail to make the best of their opportunities and the best of life. It seems to me here is the true basis for adjustment, and I am glad that it is recognized in this excellent report. I do not believe the edu- cational men and women in this country are without power and influ- ence, and I think that the system of education in the United States REQUIREMENTS FOR ADMISSION TO COLLEGE. 323 within the next century can be and ought to be shaped by the best thought of the country. Mr. Baker : The courses of study described in this report are not put forward as ideals ; they are presented to show how easy it would be to secure uniformity. Everything in this report is intended to show that the present condition of affairs is chaotic, and that it may be improved in many respects. On page 11, a voluntary national organization to consider these things is suggested. That is all that is recommended. The New England Association of Colleges has agreed upon a scheme of preparation in literature for all of its colleges. Ohio and Colorado have adopted the New England recommendations, and I think California has done the same. All that the report asks is that such a movement should become national rather than local. The question before us is simply this : Will the Council recommend the consideration of some of these problems as national questions? 324 NATIONAL COUNCIL OF EDUCATION REPORT OF COMMITTEE ON NORMAL EDUCATION. CITY NORMAL SCHOOLS. City normal schools are the outgrowth of a local need. They do not propose to give a general normal -school education, but to supply trained teachers for the schools of their respective cities. To this peculiarity of their purpose we are indebted for some of their most marked successes, likewise for some of their most pronounced defects. Genetically, they are the offspring of the weekly teachers' meeting or Saturday institute, and could have never come into being had not intelligent supervision demonstrated the value of the teachers' meeting. In this way these nor- mal schools were established in a small way in many cities whose States as a whole had not yet appreciated the value of normal-school training. The local advantages have been found so great in many instances that state institutions since founded have not been able to supplant the city normal school. Among the advantages of the city normal school are especially the following : — 1. Pupils who enter state normal schools expect upon graduation to go wherever higher salaries or superior inducements lead them ; those who enter the city normal school usually do so expressly to prepare them- selves to teach in the city schools of their own home. They are enabled to remain at home during their normal training, and subsequently while teaching. A city normal school, therefore, if sustained from year to year, fills the schools with teachers who are resident citizens, connected in business and social relations with the community in which they teach. Teachers who thus teach in their own communities, mingle in helpful ways in church, Sunday-school, and general society, avoiding that seclu- sion from society which so often precludes in the teacher the compre- hension of business life, social forces, and life motives. Patrons, too, are more likely to give moral support to a teacher who, outside of the schoolroom as well as in it, sustains her reputation for common sense, and shows herself amenable to the motives common to cultivated people in other vocations; and especially is this true if the patron himself has some relative, or some particular friend, engaged as teacher in the same system of schools. Thus through the city normal school the teacher comes to be regarded as a reputable part of the community, and not as is otherwise too fre- quently the case, a peculiar person, fit only to teach school — which too )RMAL SCHOOLS. often means to associate with and control children, by motives found nowhere but in the schoolroom. 2. Each city normal school will doubtless be organized and conducted upon a plan in harmony with the general and special views of the super- intendent of schools in such city. Its graduates, then, having been indoctrinated with such views of school management and instruction as are inculcated by the superintendent in his general supervision, are already, in the principles and methods of work, in full harmony with the system in which they work, and need, therefore, less subsequent supervision. Any well-conducted city normal school will thus save to the city its running expenses, in the lessened cost of supervision. The advantages just recited grow out of the local character of the city normal school ; and your Committee believe these advantages to be gen- uine and of considerable moment. But some serious defects grow out of this same local character of the institution. But one of these needs to be mentioned here. Because the graduates of the city normal school teach in the same system in which they were educated as pupils, and under the supervision of the persons who control the thought which underlies their own train- ing, they are peculiarly liable to fall into a dull uniformity of method and practice, which leaves no motive to originality, and supplies no stimulus to continuous improvement in teaching. The tendency toward this lifeless uniformity is so great that no city can afford to supply all its teachers from its own schools ; but each system must provide for the necessary contrasts of method and practice by importing some capable teachers each year from other well-organized systems of schools. A few of the conditions will now be stated, under which it is believed the city normal school can best succeed in fulfilling its purpose. I. The city normal school should not admit pupils who have less than the ordinary high-school education. The shortness of the course of study in such schools, and the almost universal tendency in them to teach methods, devices, and forms, instead of principles and systems of philosophy, make it particularly dangerous to admit pupils of limited education. It often occurs that bright pupil-teachers with slight edu- cation, but quick observing powers, and sympathetic knowledge of chil- dren, learn these methods, devices, and forms with astonishing readiness, and almost deceive the very elect with their immediately successful practice-teaching. But such teachers, having no ample knowledge of subjects, and no real knowledge of the principles of good teaching, degenerate into routine drillers at an early period of their teaching; and from such professional death there is no resurrection. Besides, there is no well-grounded reason for admitting persons of limited education. If no local talent be admitted to the corps of teach- 326 NATIONAL COUNCIL OF EDUCATION. ers of a city except through graduation from its normal school, and if the normal school admit only graduates of the high school, the high school will soon nourish, and such city may soon find a necessity for a competitive examination among its high-school graduates for admission to the normal school. Further, the city normal school should admit only so many pupils as will furnish each year about one half or two thirds of the number of new teachers needed by the city, thus leaving opportunity for the employ- ment of specially excellent applicants from other sources. II. The city normal school must have a well- considered course of study and practice. It may be well to consider this subject under the heads of (1) The theory department, in which the course of study is pursued, and (2) The practice department, in which the course of practice-teaching is car- ried on. The theory department is the place in which the transformation of the student into the teacher chiefly occurs. This is accomplished through the mastery by the pupil of the normal school course of study. During the process of change, the subject of it may well be denominated a pupil-teacher, as the same person may equally well be denominated a practice- teacher during her sojourn in the practice department, reducing to practice the theories learned as pupil-teacher. It is not intended to discuss in full a course of study for normal schools ; but rather to speak of the proper use of some parts of such course by city normal schools under the description and limitations laid down in the early part of this report. The process of transformation which must take place in one who has hitherto been student, in order to become teacher, and which, therefore, is supposed to be taking place in the pupil-teacher, is one affecting more or less all the powers of the being, — and is, therefore, in some sense intel- lectual, emotional, and volitional. Intellectually, it is one of the acquisi- tions of new ideas, and also one of the cognition of familiar ideas in new relations. In the latter case lies the difference between a knowledge of a branch of study such as will satisfy the demands of the student, and the knowledge of the same subject such as fits one to teach that subject to others. It is only necessary here to call attention to this difference, and assert that such difference is essential and vital and grounded in the difference in the nature of the two uses of the knowledge ; and not at all to state in what this essential difference consists. The fact of the existence of this difference is ground for the assertion that the pupil- teacher in the city normal school must review the branches which she expects subsequently to teach — not review the ideas which constitute such subject merely as logically related to each other in a scientific system CITY NORMAL SCHOOLS. 327 of thought — but consider them us related to the discovering mind of a learner — consider them genetically. In the former — the acquisition of new ideas — the attention of the pupil-teacher is directed to certain new branches of study — peculiar to normal schools and grounded in the necessities of the teacher. But two of these need attention here. The first is the study of psychology, and the second is the study of the essential nature of the school as an insti- tution. Normal schools have brought psychology into great contempt. This is because they have taught a set of dry formulae about mind, and have pretended that such knowledge would assist the practice-teacher in her work in practice, and subsequently in her independent teaching. The subject deserves to be rescued from the obloquy which has recently been heaped upon it. Eightly taught, it is the science of spiritual life in full action; and a good text-book which states the universal principles of the subject, veri- fied by the pupil-teacher by reference to her own consciousness, and enlarged by observation of children in a good school, will make such growth in the pupil-teacher herself — will give such insight into proc- esses of thinking and feeling, motives and social forces generally, as will give to such pupil-teacher multiplied power to teach, not by consciously following formulated processes or methods, but through unconscious enlargement and enrichment of her character and such unconscious quickening of her sympathies as will make her a teacher in spite of all obstacles. It is the presence-power of character that teaches, and not the routine following of special methods. The second — the study of the school as an institution — likewise fur- nishes new ideas, and through these new ideas produces in like manner an enlargement and enrichment of character that can scarcely be reached otherwise. In order that the graduate of the city normal school shall not be immediately engulfed in that vast system into which she is plunged at graduation, she should be led to contemplate the school in its evolution into an institution. The school is the offspring of the family, and only an adopted child of the state. As an organization, it has parts, and forces which must be harmonized to form a school. Its parts are two — teacher and pupil — never more nor less. The pupil always appears in his own proper person. There is no learning by proxy. But the teacher appears at various stages under protean forms and many names. At first, he was the parent, and taught his child as love and instinct led the way; but in process of evolution, and of the division of labor, the parent soon relegated his power and responsibility to others; and now we recognize the various names of school committeeman, director, trustee, 328 NATIONAL COUNCIL OF EDUCATION and commissioner as merely some of the terms applied to the various stages of development of the organ of the school most commonly entitled the teacher. The forces of the school are the powers to think, to feel and to do which lie in pupils and teacher, and such accumulation and transforma- tion of these as arise in the association of these as organic parts of the same institution. For instance, the pupil's powers to know or feel or to execute are greatly modified by the presence of the teacher ; as indeed they are often likewise greatly modified by the presence of the other pupils. But the essential nature of the school as an institution is most clearly seen in the study of its purpose. Its purpose is the education of the pupil — a process to be commenced and carried on within him. The pur- pose of the school is to be realized by a process of development in the pupil. All organization, processes and methods must be directed to this end. The school does not realize its end in the teacher nor the parent, nor in anybody except the pupil. The teacher must not seek his own development nor his own ease ; he must seek not merely to conciliate par- ents, but he must seek solely the proper education of the pupil. No regulation should be established in the school that cannot be justified by its helpful influence upon the pupil ; to the end that when the pupil has graduated from the school he will be fitted to live in the other institutions which man has constructed, — the state, the church, the fam- ily, and civil society. If the graduate of the city normal school be thus indoctrinated with the principles of the school as an institution, and have thus shown to her the proper and just relations of this institution to all others, she will be reasonably safe from the dulling effects of the system so often too prominent in the administration of city schools. But the final transformation of the pupil-teacher, and the further fit- ting of her to be a practice-teacher is largely ethical. Studies such as have been hastily outlined have great power to develop the will into moral power ; and the transformation should be made fuller and more complete by the systematic study of the principles of morals — moral philosophy. The effect aimed at here should be the refinement of the feelings, and the development of the will as moral power or character. The development of the" will as executive force is the peculiar province of the practice department. And to that department as the last topic of this report, we must hasten. If the theory department have done its work well, the practice depart- ment will have but one end to accomplish, viz., to develop the will of the practice-teacher into executive force, in accordance with the ideals and principles taught in the theory department. If left to herself, the young teacher loses her ideals, drops to the level of the actual, and CITY NORMAL SCHOOLS. 329 oftentimes lowers the standard of the actual. It is delicate work to pre- serve her ideals till her will develops into executive force sufficient to resist the tendency to deterioration. To this end the young teacher in practice should be placed in a real school, in full charge, but under the care of a sympathetic helper or critic. It is possible for one critic to superintend three such practice-teachers, as it is best that she should be absent from the room a considerable portion of the time. The work of the critic is of the most delicate nature. Good critics are born so, not produced by art. Her business is to be a helper and comforter to the practice-teacher, to revivify ideals when those become obscured, and to furnish inspiration when the spirits of the young teacher run low. Through her the beneficent work of the city normal school is perfected. L. H. Jones, Chairman. DISCUSSION. Mr. Rickoff : I trust those who discuss this paper will touch upon the difficulty we encounter in city normal schools, because pupils come into them who are deficient in the culture that comes from correct fam- ily associations, and therefore without discipline in many of those essen- tials necessary in the teacher. Not long ago in conversation with a lady connected with the normal schools I asked her how many there were coming from such schools whom she would trust with the education of a number of children from good families, or, indeed, from any families, whom she would trust with a confident assurance that the children would receive from the teacher a higher, better, purer culture because of her ministrations. If that expression is too strong, I may still say that a great many go into the public schools from these channels who are not qualified to teach the children whom they find there. When I asked tli is teacher what proportion she would trust of these teachers from the normal schools, what proportion she thought fit and proper teachers for the children of the schools, she said that there would not be one fifth of them. Now, this seems to me a vital objection to the law in many States which requires teachers to be selected only from the graduates of the normal school. Those who administer the affairs of the public schools, such as superintendents, boards of education, committees on teachers, should look to the highest and best culture, to the best develop- ment of the affections, the best development of the intellect, the best development of all that goes to make up the culture of the individual. Mr. Hinsdale: Do you think the criticism is true of all normal schools? 330 NATIONAL COUNCIL OF EDUCATION Mr. Rickoff : I think the requirements of the law making it neces- sary to select from the normal schools narrows the field from which teachers may be selected. Mr. Dunton: What is the objection against city normal schools? Mr. Rickoff: The objection is against the law requiring the avenue through which men and women come into the profession of teachers shall be graduation from a high school or a normal school. Mr. Dunton: And does not the normal school help just so much? Mr. Rickoff : It does help, but from my observation so many harm- ful results flow from the system that they are often held up as warnings to boards of education against the policy. Mr. Dunton : I happen to have had charge of a city normal school for the last nineteen years, and perhaps three fifths of the teachers of my city are graduates of the city normal school, and I must say that the culture of the graduate of the normal school is equal, if not superior, to that of teachers from places outside. A few years ago I went with my teachers over a list of eight or nine hundred graduates of my school, beginning with graduates who had been out of the school for ten or twelve years and coming down to those of more recent date, and in nine cases out of ten, in our judgment, those graduates had failed to succeed in securing places in the city who should have failed. The weakest ones were not appointed; and that was true in nine cases out of ten with hundreds of graduates of the school. Mr. Sheldon : May I ask Mr. Dunton if his pupils do not come to the city normal school almost exclusively from the schools of the city where they are expected to teach afterwards? Mr. Dunton: Perhaps four fifths of them. Mr. Sheldon : Now is there not a little danger of selecting too large a percentage of the graduates from the city normal school that come directly from the Boston schools and thus perpetuating the system of instruction that obtains in the city school, and in this way lose the good effect of new blood, new enthusiasm, and new spirit? Mr. Dunton : I will answer that by asking my friend from Boston whether he thinks the most economical way to reform methods of instruction is to work up through the old conservatism of all the grades, or to work from the head' of the school down? Mr. Sheldon : I believe in general culture ; that the widest culture is best for the teacher. I will say it is absolutely essential. To secure that culture I think it is the right and privilege of every school board in Toronto or in Boston or anywhere else to be permitted to fill any par- ticular niche with a teacher from anywhere on this continent. I think that every school officer should have the right to go where he can get the best talent, — that the school officials of Boston should be permitted to go CITY NORMAL SCHOOLS. 331 to Providence, to Newton, to New Haven, anywhere, if by so doing the best talent for teaching can be obtained. Mk. Dunton : I am well aware that there are some excellent teachers in all the places named, but I think the schools of Boston are equally good, and that the resulting culture is equally high. Mr. Sheldon: I acknowledge that. Does not the success of the schools of Boston, from 1860 on, come largely from the fact that the masters were permitted and encouraged by their school board to look for the choicest spirit that was specially fitted for any particular position by experience, by culture, or by special adaptation, and to introduce that talent into the system of public instruction in that city? Mr. Dunton: I would not restrict the employment of teachers to the graduates of the city normal school. " New blood " is desirable. But it should be borne in mind that in 1860, when my friend was a Boston mas- ter, there was no city normal school, and that many of the " choicest spirits" selected from the adjoining towns by the masters of that time, would not now be tolerated in Boston schools for a single day, so lacking were they in breadth of education as well as in professional training. Mr. Hoose : This discussion is delightful ; this new-blood fire is good. But there is an idea in this paper to the effect that the normal schools of the country have brought the subject of psychology into contempt. Now, the bare mention of that, Mr. Chairman, in that way may be good for the purpose of the paper, but it is exceedingly bad for the purpose of psychology. What has given the subject of mental science an impetus? What has brought it to the front? What has brought for- ward the study of psychology so that it has become instead of a specula- tive study the study of science on scientific methods? What has done all of this but the normal school? I dislike to criticise the paper, but for the sake of the profession I have serious objections to the statement. Now a word more about the motive referred to on page 325 of the report. The theory of education should be taught in such a way that the teacher will become a living, moving power to do original work in the schoolroom, and in this way become the source of new blood. I am in full sympathy with the normal school. It seems to me that we depart to one side if we follow out the line suggested in the paper. In respect to those who are after new blood, I wish to call attention to one point on page 329 : It is possible for one critic to superintend three such practice-teachers, as it is best that she should be absent from the room a considerable portion of the time. The work of the critic is of the most delicate nature. Any school is fortunate that can have one critic for three practice-teachers ; ordinarily, you can have only one for thirty, or fifteen, or twenty. Mr. Dunton: That would undoubtedly be true in small towns. In 332 NATIONAL COUNCIL OF EDUCATION connection with my own school, one hundred pupils have one hundred critic-teachers to • superintend their work. I am trying now to have the practice department so organized that for one hundred pupils there shall be about fifty special training teachers, and that these special teachers shall be so trained as to make them accomplished training teachers. Our plan has always been to have but one pupil-teacher in a room at a time, and that room is presided over constantly by one of the able teach- ers of the city. She may be absent an hour out of half a day, but we never abuse the children by putting them, for the first two months, exclusively in the hands of an inexperienced woman. We have always a first-rate teacher in the room in addition to the pupil-teacher. Mr. Draper: The suggestion of Mr. Sheldon is important. I fully concur with him in the statement that the usefulness of the schools would be promoted if the best teachers available can be drawn from out- side the city, in certain cases. It may be different in the city of Boston if the board of education is composed of educated men, independent of local political relations, and actuated solely by a desire to promote the welfare of the school system ; but those are not the existing conditions throughout the country. I lay down the proposition as true that in nine tenths of the cities of this country, the board of education will be influenced in the appointment of teachers, and will appoint whomever the law and the existing regulations of that city will permit them to appoint as teachers, regardless of the peculiar fitness or adaptability of the applicant for the position. The conditions should be regulated by statute law. You must guard the teaching service against incompe- tency. I undertake to say that in nine tenths of the cities of the coun- try you will get a stronger corps of teachers from regulations which provide that only graduates of the city high school or the city normal schools or the training schools are eligible to appointment, than you will if you throw the matter open and let the board select and bring in "the new blood," because the board, as a rule, will abuse the opportu- nity thrown open to them. In an ideal city like Boston the thing may work differently, but in a real city like New York or Albany where the board of education is made up not of angels but of men, their power to select teachers must be limited, controlled, and regulated, or you will get into your service a corps of teachers in no wise fitted for the respon- sibility. If I had the power I would enact a law that no board should appoint any teacher in the public schools of that city who had not taken the high-school course and a year or more in a training class. Mr. Sheldon : You would not object to an experienced teacher from Boston being transferred to New York City? Mr. Draper: Certainly not, provided there was reciprocity; but I would object to the board being permitted under the guise of drawing CITY NORMAL SCHOOLS. 333 an experienced teacher from elsewhere to evade the law. If you leave a discretion with the board it will be abused. Mil. Sheldon: Then I understand you would have a State law to regulate the matter. Mr. Draper: I would. I would have a statute law which would pre- vent the employment of a teacher who did not have the equipment of a high-school course, and at least a year's professional training in addi- tion to it. Mr. Hinsdale: One thing I do not see exactly as my friend sees. He would have stringent regulations governing the board of education. I think it ought to be so provided that experienced and suitable teachers can be brought in from whatever source. Mr. Draper : In my experience I have found no difficulty in bring- ing experienced teachers from elsewhere, yet I venture the suggestion that if the law leaves it open for the board to bring in outside teachers that power will be abused. Mr. Hinsdale : Undoubtedly. But the practical question is whether it is not so important and desirable that it should be possible in some way to bring in desirable teachers from outside. There is some evidence that the notion is abroad in the land that home industry must be protected. Mr. Eickoff : I did not mean anything of that kind. Mr. Hinsdale: You recognize the truth of it. That is where I wanted you to broaden out your argument a little. We all know there are cities in this country where it is impossible to bring in teachers from the outside, through local influence that prevents it. That feeling I know to be very strong in the State of Michigan, and I believe it is an influence that works great mischief. I understand it is practically impossible for a person outside of the city of Cincinnati to get a position to teach in that city. Mr. White : That is a sweeping statement. In the past three years there have been as many as twenty people employed from outside of the city. Mr. Hinsdale: In what grades? Mr. White: In all grades. There is great difficulty in getting teachers from outside, but it is not so great as stated. Mr. Draper: Take the case of a city in which there is a strong feel- ing that home industries should be protected, that home boys and girls should be given these places in the schools, and where there are more applicants than positions; isn't it true that the home boys and girls get the places? Mr. Hinsdale : They will, as a rule. Mr. Draper: That being so, will not these regulations minimize the bad results which flow from the other system? 334 NATIONAL COUNCIL OF EDUCATION. Mr. Hinsdale: It may minimize the result; it may also result in strangulation. Mr. Draper: Will not the establishment of local training schools and these regulations go further than almost anything else to educate local public sentiment? Mr. Hinsdale : I do not believe it will. Mr. Draper: I do not go to the extent of saying they shall be appointed exclusively from these graduates who have passed the high- school course and a year in the training class, and not from persons who can show equivalent training elsewhere. Mr. Hinsdale : I am in favor of teachers being properly prepared, but I would like a superintendent in Boston to go out to Newton or any- where where he can obtain a teacher with equal or superior qualifica- tions. Mr. Sabin : I wish to say that much of the difficulty which exists in Michigan and the East does not exist west of the Mississippi Kiver, because there we pretend to be broad-minded people, and we employ competent teachers wherever we can find them. In discussing this ques- tion we are confronted by a fact, not by a theory. It does not relate alone to Cincinnati or Boston, but to every city all over the country. We all find difficulty in getting good teachers. Now, I have seen in these cities a board of education which would be glad to be relieved of the responsibility of putting high-school girls into the schools, as indi- cated by their passing a resolution that no graduate of the high school shall be entitled to admission to the school at full pay until she has spent a year in the school of practice. Four or five high-school graduates are put into one building, each in charge of a room, but under the control and instruction of a skilful training-teacher. They are kept there for a year, under a small compensation, which is gradually increased. At the end of the year they are generally able to do good work in the regular grades. Then when the local politician comes to the school board and demands a position for his girl, it is easy to say that the only way in which his girl can obtain the place is by a year's service in the school of practice. Mr. Dunton : Under these regulations requiring a high qualification in teachers, the tendency is to diminish the supply by just so much. But if you lower the qualifications then you diminish to that extent the culture. Mr. Draper : May I remark on that point that it would be true if it were not for the fact that the city normal school and the eighty training schools of New York, with her great examination system practically even throughout, exist so that every teacher in the city or at the cross-roads can have a suitable education and training? CITY NORMAL SCHOOLS. S'dl Mr. Dunton : Do your normal schools supply teachers enough for all the schools in your State? Mr. Draper: Not more than ten per cent, perhaps. Mr. Dunton: Precisely so. But my friend from New York seemed to assume that I disagreed with him in thinking that it is not wise to restrict the appointment of teachers in any city to the graduates of the training school. Not at all. The point I make is beyond that. The assumption is made that if a particular city goes outside and brings in the best teachers that there are in other towns, even though the other towns supply their places by those a great deal worse, therefore the qual- ity of the teaching force in the State is increased. I do not believe that. What I want is to adopt a plan which will make it impossible to employ any but trained teachers in any school. Mr. White : There is another point in the report to which I wish to refer. It seems to me unwise to limit the number of persons in the training school to the number of teachers required, as proposed. Cin- cinnati has furnished through its training school a considerable number of trained teachers for the graded schools in the vicinity, and it has supplied several cities and towns with training-teachers. The limita- tion proposed would prevent this. I really see no good reason why the doors of the city training school should not be open to all qualified appli- cants who desire to be teachers. The diploma should be given only to those who meet the requirements, and these should be further tested by employment as temporary teachers and substitutes. These processes will settle the question of fitness. Mr. Kirkland : If there be a few minutes I will attempt to explain the method which we adopt for training teachers for the city of Toronto. It corresponds in many respects with the requirements which have been suggested here. First, it is laid down that no person shall teach who has not received a professional training. The qualifications are passed upon by a committee appointed partly by the Minister of Education, and partly by other officers. That meets the point suggested by Mr. Draper and Mr. White — that is, a committee appointed to test the qual- ifications should be an independent committee, in no way connected with those who have the appointment. If the applicants pass the examina- tion of that committee, certificates will be given and the applicants will then spend one year in the school in Toronto where they will receive lectures from Superintendent Hughes and his assistants. After they have spent a year they are then examined, and if they pass the examina- tion, they are not eligible to teach in the city, but they are eligible to come to the city normal school. They then spend five months in pro- fessional study and in the practice-schools, and at the end of the time they are examined in science and in practical teaching. They are then 336 NATIONAL COUNCIL OF EDUCATION examined by officers appointed by the Minister of Education. If they pass that examination they then get a certificate good for life. They are then eligible to be appointed, and any city board can only appoint those who have got certificates that way. Mr. Jones: Any one coming into the room and hearing only the dis- cussion might gather the impression that the report recommended a course of study in city normal schools limited to one year. On the con- trary, the report describes a kind of training and culture which cannot be given in a year. The report intended to leave all these matters for adjustment with the different localities. Also one who did not hear the paper but heard the discussion, might be under the impression that the report recommended exclusively for appointment graduates of city normal schools ; although attention was called once during the discussion to the fact that the report distinctly excluded that possibility. The report is intended to emphasize the fact that competition should be strong and sharp at the entrance to the nor- mal school for the sake of saving the children from being practised upon by persons who by nature and education will prove themselves incompe- tent. But it is also intended to emphasize the fact that there must also be competition in appointments. Secondly, I wish to say that experience has shown, at least in the city from which I come, that the city normal school has been one of the strongest influences there in elevating the standard of fitness for teach- ing. So while in these cities sustaining training schools there is a dis- position to bring many teachers from abroad, no teacher can come there from abroad who has not had a professional training. THE EDUCATION OF THE WILL. 337 REPORT OF COMMITTEE ON PEDAGOGY. THE EDUCATION OF THE WILL. Any doctrine concerning the education of the will must rest upon a theory of the nature of the will. The theory which this paper assumes to be true, but does not undertake to establish, is, that mind is activity that is self-caused. It is that phase of energy that knows itself — is self- conscious. Any phase of energy that is not self -knowing may be called matter, to distinguish it from mind. Emerson declares that " there is one mind common to all individual men." This is believed to be not a figure of speech, but a simple, pro- saic statement of the truth. Mind is the absolute. It is the essence, the true being of all that is. All things spiritual and material are phases of its activity. The form of its activity is that of. consciousness. It is its own object. The universe of existence is the infinity of predi- cates that mind affirms of itself. lam this or that predicate is the form of all mind-activity. The Hebrew's definition of God was the " I Am." Every existent thing may be viewed as energy in some stage of its prog- ress toward self-knowledge. The human mind is a phase of mind-energy capable of developing indefinitely into conscious identity with the absolute mind. The education of the human mind is the process by which it identi- fies itself with the all-mind by enlarging the range of its self-conscious- ness. Its life consists in its progressive ascent toward the absolute consciousness, and in so far as it comes into this consciousnes it is iden- tified with it, — "It is one with the Father." Psychology treats of the different forms or phases of the activity of the human mind by which it rises from mere potentiality to actualized self-consciousness. Mind is essentially active. It is ever doing something. It is, there- fore, of the nature of will. Mind and will I have so far used as synon- ymous terms. But the name will has a more specific meaning. It is applied to that phase of the conscious activity of mind in which it rises to a knowledge of itself as the cause of its own acts. It knows its power to choose an end. Whether it really has this power or not, it is not the purpose of this paper to consider. Each individual mind is con- scious of possessing the power, and judges himself and is judged by others accordingly. A discussion of the education of this particular phase of mind-activity 338 NATIONAL COUNCIL OF EDUCATION cannot be pursued intelligently without taking note of those other activities that result in doing things in response to ideas, and where there is no conscious choice of ends. In this paper such doing of things is called the act of the involuntary will. The human mind comes into being as potentiality only. The condi- tion of the realization of this potentiality is stimulus from without. No stimulus, no realization. The first effect of this stimulus is sensa- tion, which is that phase of conscious activity that has not risen into knowledge. It is feeling, and is purely subjective. This is the lowest form of the activity of the involuntary will. Sen- sation conditions the awakening of the mind to knowledge. Knowl- edge projects its predicates or experiences, making them external and objective. They are viewed as a not-self — an object in space and time. This is the second phase of the activity of the involuntary will. In feeling and knowledge the / or self is relatively passive. It is dependent upon stimuli to awaken it to action, and it acts under their lead or suggestion. Knowledge and feeling are the condition for another phase of activity of the ego called doing. Knowledge and feeling con- struct an objective world of things and a subjective world of ideas. The natural tendency of the mind in striving to enlarge its consciousness is in two directions: (1) The first is that of combining its ideas with others into larger unities by the process of apperception. (2) The second is that of embodying its ideals in external forms — making them real in the world. These tendencies call for the organization of the instinctive impulses to action so as to work toward an end. This is a higher form of the involuntary will acting toward an end by the organization of means, in response to the stimulus of an idea. The next phase of the activity of the ego in the order of development is the voluntary will. This becomes active when there is a conscious conflict of ideas. In its impulse to realize itself the mind constructs two or more ideal selves, each more desirable than the actual self. Only one of these can be realized. A choice must be made. In this act of choosing the ego comes into the full consciousness of its freedom in initiating and directing activity. This is offered as a definition of will and the relation it bears to cer- tain other forms of mind-activity. ATTENTION. There is a unique form of will action called attention that bears so important a relation to any process of educating the will that it needs to be considered briefly. Attention is a focussing of the mental energy upon one group or series of apperceived ideas, to the exclusion of others. In the beginning it is directly responsive to external stimuli. Later, THE EDUCATION OF THE WILL. 339 the self, as attention, selects from the mass of material gathered by experience, such as must be apperceived with the end it sets up. This activity is largely involuntary in the early years of the development of the consciousness. Accidental combinations, or combinations under instruction that have resulted in desired ends give direction to the impulse to realize the present end. If those that attention selects fail, others are chosen. There is one series of spontaneous and tentative efforts following another until the end is realized. The character of the ends to which attention is directed will depend much upon the character of the experiences in the past life. The ideals spring from the life, and the process of realizing them is largely of the nature of impulse flowing in channels worn by experience, more than the result of reflection and deliberate choice. The mind attends to only the one selected line of apperceived ideas, and the impulse to embody its ideal in external action is guided by these without any conscious effort of will. An immense number of human experiences are here described that do not differ essen- tially from those of the higher orders of animals. Attention may not only fuse' co-existent elements into a single process in consciousness; it may also hold before the self two or more ideals and different processes for their realization. There are opposing activities that may neutralize one another and reduce the realizing effort to zero. All the mind's energy is expended in the conflict of these mutually opposing ideas. There is much in the character of Hamlet that suggests this condition. If it be declared that a conflict of ideas is meaningless, and that one complex state of consciousness is succeeded by another less complex in which the objectifying impulse is free to act, it may be admitted, but the reason for its inactivity in the former state will still be the inhibi- tion resulting from divided attention. All the battles over the freedom of the will are waged at this point. But this paper is written in the interest of peace. A conflict of ideas has its analogue in the conflict of forces in space. But it will not do to say that all the laws of physical forces apply to them. The several ideas do not fuse into one that is the resultant of the combination of all, but the ego consents to one in preference to oth- ers, and the entire energy flows toward the making of this idea a reality. Whether the scientist is right or wrong who declares that the freedom of the will is an illusion, it still remains true that all the institutions of man are built upon this illusion, and that the business of education is to prepare human beings for institutional life. If everything is predeter- mined, the belief in freedom is one of the predetermined activities, and we are all predetermined to think and to act under the conviction that we are free and responsible for our conduct. 340 NATIONAL COUNCIL OF EDUCATION INTEREST. The relation of interest to the education of the will also needs to be considered. Interest is feeling. It belongs to what Mr. Bain calls the intellectual emotions. It is a pleasurable feeling. It is the feeling that accompanies the knowledge of the relation of ideas, especially of such relations as tend toward the unity of these ideas. Interest rests satis- fied with contemplation. The satisfaction resulting from the discovery of truth stimulates a desire to continue the search. This desire stimu- lates the attention and the volition. EDUCATION OF THE WILL. Prof. Wm. James says that " by the education of the will is meant (1) the whole of one's training to moral and prudential conduct and of one's learning to adapt means to ends, involving association of ideas in all of its varieties and complications, together with (2) the power of inhibit- ing impulses irrelevant to the ends desired, and of initiating movements contributory thereto." This definition assumes the existence of impulses to action. The pur- pose of will education is to bring these impulses under the control of the conscious self. The most important field of effort during the early life of the child is that of the involuntary will. In this the child's voli- tions obey his ideas, and the ideas are dependent upon the environment. There is little conscious choice between means for the accomplishment of ends. The attention being fixed upon the end apperceives a series of connecting ideas as the process by which the end can be attained. This is spontaneous and practically automatic in response to the sug- gestion of environment or remembered experience. The process of edu- cating the will in this stage consists largely in supplying the environ- ment that shall lead to a rational process of realizing ends. But the consciously rational activity is that of the person who supplies the environment. The child's act is that of the involuntary will. The suggestions of environment and his former experience largely determine his acts. Shall this environment prompt to good or to bad ends, and shall these be attained by a rational or by an irrational method? Desir- able results in the education of the will demand the former of each of these alternatives. The idea which dominates the volitions should be what reason would supply if the age of reason had been reached. AN IDEA DEFINED. It may not be amiss to consider very briefly what is the nature of an idea. This is the name of a psychical activity that is generally the result of the fusion of a number of constituent activities ; or it may be THE EDUCATION OF THE WILL. 341 the connection of distinct ideas into a larger unity. For instance, the idea of an apple is the fusion of a number of different perceptions into one. This idea can be re-experienced upon the suggestion of a word, or of the object, or of something else that bears some near relation to it. Or the idea may be that of the self in possession of the apple. In either case it is a certain limited activity of the ego. In the latter case the dominating idea is a complex of several simple ones, which act of con- sciousness may stimulate the self to make objective and actual what is now but an idea. Hypnotism is seemingly the abnormal concentration of the attention upon the realization of some idea to the complete exclu- sion of all others. How to make the ideal dominant that ought to dom- inate is the problem of will education in this stage of its development. INCENTIVES. The highest pedagogical incentive is that of interest in the idea. Others are desire and authority. Interest gives dominance to an idea because of what it is intrinsically. Desire is that complex state of con- sciousness in which the self is conceived to be the recipient of some good by the realization of the idea. Authority gives a commanding influence to the idea because of reverence felt for the source of the command, or because of some anticipated evil that will otherwise come to self. The skill of the educator is displayed in manipulating these incentives so as to contribute most toward the formation of character. Desire is probably the incentive that is most influential from the first. But authority follows close upon the heels of it (imitation, I imagine, is the unconscious child of reverence), and interest, while the most desirable of all the incentives, is the most difficult to arouse in early childhood. Authority is coming to rank now as an incentive when it makes prominent the suggestion of punishment. There is a prevailing sentiment that incentives suggestive of pain are to be abolished from our curriculum of will-training. The anticipated pleasures of right doing are to be substituted everywhere for the anticipated pains of wrong doing. This finds expression in some large cities in the aboli- tion, by order of the school authorities, of all punishment. The pulpit is influenced by this sentiment, oftentimes, to the extent of ignoring punishment for sin. The family is often dominated by the child's impulses, for the reason that it is unable to make desire, reverence, or interest effective in giving dominance to ideas of obedience, and it rejects the incentive of pain as brutal. It is the conviction of the writer of this paper that fear has its place among the incentives in the early training of the will. The purpose of will-training, it has been said, is character. By char- acter is meant those established and fixed tendencies that are so strong as 342 NATIONAL COUNCIL 01 EDUCATION. to give direction to conduct. The education of the will in that phase of its development which has been called the " involuntary will" is the establishment of the dominance of certain ideas in the mind by the influence of such incentives as will tend to give these ideas prominence. This is the phase of will-education that may properly be called will- training. Impulse has become subject to the direction of ideas, and ideas have become established by the repeated activity of them in con- trolling conduct. But character has two elements or characteristics. (1) It is the estab- lishment of the unreflecting response of the volitions to certain ideas. (2) It is a disposition to be loyal to conviction. It is this second char- acteristic that most persons seem to have in mind when they speak of the education of the will. In the former phase of will-training, " to doubt is to be lost." In the latter it is through doubt that salvation is attained. This is the stage of inquiry, and of conscious freedom in the choice of alternatives. The writer does not intend to say that this phase of the activity of the will is not found in children of all stages of maturity. It is. The purpose here is simply to call attention to it as something different from the other in that the element of deliberate choice is here active. The will now sets up for itself two ends. (1) One of these is that of advantage or profit to the self. (2) The other is that of right in view of one's relations to others. The one may be called the prudential will and the other the moral will. A large majority of the acts of the prudential will have nothing of the moral in them. The only choice of which the actor is conscious is that between means for the accomplishment of desired ends; and these ends always centre in the subjective, particular self. The proper education of the will in this phase of its activity is a development of the intelli- gence. The crowning purpose of education is to make the will follow the lead of conviction in all matters involving the idea of duty. The moral will is the significance, so to speak, of all the other activities of the mind. Institutional life is the moral will as it has realized itself. The ethical ideal is actualized in human society to the extent that it is common to the particular members. "The principle of conduct in the ethical world is what is known as the moral law. This law is the universal conviction that every act of each particular member of the ethical whole should be such that when it is made universal, that is, becomes the act of all, it will return upon the doer to bless and not to curse him. In this way the institutional world becomes a ministration of grace; each citizen receiving in return for every good deed the good increased a thousand- fold. THE EDUCATION OF THE WILL. 343 The principles active in institutional life which maintain and nourish it are the principles that must guide in directing the education of the will. And these, too, are what are sometimes called the cardinal virtues of the school. The discipline of a good school will emphasize in the school life of the pupils the cardinal virtues of our civiliza- tion— the ethical world for which the child must be prepared. This thought was fully elaborated before this Council at a former meeting by a distinguished member, and to that admirable report you are re- ferred. The present purpose of the writer is to call attention to this striking resemblance between the principles governing conduct in institutional life and in school life for any suggestions of method that may result from the comparison. The teacher is the expounder to the child of his relations to the school in so far as the child can understand them, and he is there to see that the child is obedient to the requirements of the school, whether he understand the rationale of them or not. Habits of conformity in response to the authority of requirement he considers quite as important as conformity in response to the dictates of the child's reason. The teacher will also see the importance of using such incentives to make the proper ideas dominate the conduct of the child as shall pre- pare him to enter the ethical world familiar with its methods. The child must learn in his school life how inexorable is the law of the ethi- cal world in its demands upon him for conformity. This will put more virility, more back-bone, into the government of the school than many schools now possess. It is not strange that even the best teachers do not escape the contagion of the pernicious sentiment that the way of the child must be ever strewn with roses — that whatever he does must be prompted by desire. The child properly trained loves to be obedient to authority, and the surest road to happiness is through obedience to the stern requirements of duty. And, too, the roses that are found bor- dering the path of duty will not be few, and will far exceed in fragrance those that border the way of impulse and desire. The pressing need of the schools is a large number of teachers pos- sessed of moral earnestness and of sufficient intelligence to make it effective. It is not the purpose of this paper to speak at length of methods of procedure in conducting the education of the will. It is probably evi- dent to all that the writer believes in inculcating morality by practising it rather than by theorizing about it. But the time comes in the edu- cation of the child when the doctrine that has guided the teacher in fix- ing dominant ideas in the mind of his pupil shall be made known to the pupil. Although, as in many other matters, the theory of morals may 344 NATIONAL COUNCIL OF EDUCATION well be left until the pupil is well on his way in the practice of morality, this does not preclude the formulating of moral principles and laws which are exemplified in conduct, whenever the child is prepared to recognize them in this form; and the organizing of these into a system of ethics at a later period would be the culminating act of an ideal method of edu- cating the will. A failure to re-enforce the practice of right doing by a rational theory of one's relations and consequent obligations, would be to omit the most effective defense against the ever-recurring attacks of passion and sense. George P. Brown, Chairman. DISCUSSION. Mr. Harris : This discussion of the will of course interests us all, since we know that it is the most fundamental ' question in education. If there is no freedom of the will there is no self-activity or moral responsibility, there is nothing that is distinctively human, and there is nothing that is distinctively divine in man. It is always well to take psychological discussions and hold them up in historical perspective. I want to call attention first to the fact that this view of the will is accidental — that it is western in the history of the world rather than eastern. The Asiatic view tends to hold that the will power of the indi- vidual is a sort of disease that has come to exist by some sort of evil, and ought to be gotten rid of. This doctrine is sometimes heard announced in the Christian church, namely : that we should give up our will to God's will, and not merely this, but that we should not will at all, but listen to pious impulses simply and not think out for ourselves what is reasonable. This is quietism and opposed to the true spirit of Chris- tianity, which teaches to know and do good. This doctrine of the will it seems to me has been presented very admirably in this report. I think that the report should show a little more fully how centrally this doctrine of the will underlies the Christian civilization as over against the other civilizations in the history of the world. If you look into these other civilizations from this stand-point, you shall find the Christian to be the only one that recognizes the infinite power of the will to deter- mine itself. God made man in His image and endowed him with self- determination. The doctrine of the Inferno arises from this doctrine of freedom. Were not man free there could be no hell, for hell is the return of man's deeds upon himself as doer, and presupposes responsi- bility on his part. If you will look into this from this stand-point, THE EDUCATION OF THE WILL. U5 3-011 will find that the Christian only recognizes the infinite will-power that made man in His image and endowed him with a will-power. Mi;. IIailmann: I consider this discussion of the freedom of the will a fundamental problem in education. I speak of it from a common- sense stand-point. It seems to me from this stand-point the business of the mind is self-expansion in all its phases, which of course implies all that is conveyed in the term self-activity. The first phase of self- expansion is self-assertion. In this first phase of self-assertion the child is to be led to another higher phase, and that is self-adaptation. As he moves from the phase of self-assertion to the phase of self-adaptation, he earns a higher stage of development and a wider sphere of life as his true reward. The business of education is to lead the child, the grow- ing human being, constantly in that direction. I am so fully in sym- pathy with the paper that I see little in it to oppose. As to one point I make a protest ; that is, to the emphasis which is laid upon fear or reverence for authority. The teacher should constantly keep alive in the child motives of faith rather than those of fear. The genesis of faith is a distinctly human achievement. In his life man meets mystery upon mystery. These he, at first, fears, but, as he advances in experience, he finds behind each mystery a goodness, and henceforth he greets new mysteries with faith. To rely on fear and external authority in education is to retard development. Mr. Hewett : Although this paper is the individual production of Mr. Brown, yet I am on the committee, and I wish to say that in all the prac- tical conclusions of the paper I heartily concur. As to the second and third paragraphs on the first page, with the exception of the last part of the third, I think I am somewhat of an agnostic. I would like to ask Mr. Brown one or two questions. The report says that attention is a focussing of the mental energy upon one group or series of apperceived ideas to the exclusion of others. Would the writer confine attention to that and nothing else? Mr. Brown: That entire page is a definition of attention. It is not limited to that. Mr. Hewett: Also in respect to " interest. " It says interest "is a pleasurable feeling." Shall we confine interest to that? One thing more he says, " Interest rests satisfied with contemplation." Mb. Brown: I mean simply that interest is the satisfaction which I feel in the contemplation of an ideal. Mr. Hewett : Now I will hurriedly pass over a review of the paper. First, the mind is that phase of energy that knows itself, is self-conscious. Further on the report says, psychology treats of the different forms or phases of the activity of the human mind by which it rises from mere potentiality to actualized self-consciousness. Reference is made to the 346 NATIONAL COUNCIL OF EDUCATION. freedom of the will. Each individual mind is conscious of possessing that power, and judges himself and is judged by others accordingly. To all these statements I would say, amen. There are various other sections of the report that are highly instructive and which I enjoy. Mr. Hinsdale : There can be no doubt as to what the report states relative to the development of the soul ideal, and with respect to the time when distinctively ethical sentiment appears in the child life. We all understand that at the beginning that idea is not formed and that incentive does not act. I am not clear, however, that he is correct as to the sequence in which knowledge of the moral, love, desire, and authority declare themselves. It seems to me the child learns his first practical moral lesson from being brought into conflict or contact with authority. Mr. Schaeffer: I am pleased with the paper by reason of the place assigned to motives and authority in the genesis of the will. In the handling of boys very much depends upon the power that can be put back of the will. At first the child lives for the gratification of self. Sons of the rich are often allowed to grow up with little thought of anything beyond self-gratification. The farmer's son, on the contrary, is taught to deny himself for the sake of a crop. The practice of self-denial lifts him to a much higher stage of development. To reach this advanced stage authority is necessary to prescribe lines of conduct that help to unself the will. There is a stage beyond this — a stage in which the will comes under the inspiration of the right. The will, then, becomes a law unto itself, and the need for authority ceases. Mr. Sabin : There is a point in this most admirable paper to which I wish to call attention. The paper says that the child must learn in his school life how inexorable is the law of the ethical world in its demands upon him for conformity. This will put more virility, more backbone, into the government of the school than many schools now That I think is sound doctrine ; but when we are told, as we have been told this morning, that authority is a mere expedient, to be dispensed with as soon as possible, it seems to me to be a step in the wrong direc- tion. Authority is a fundamental principle of the government of the world, of the state, of the family, of the school. We cannot dispense with it in the education of the child, as long as children remain children, and human nature is human nature. Mr. Schaeffer: I do not understand what the brother from Iowa means by authority. If by authority he means a power outside of the will, then I wish to say that that is simply a means to an end. I, of course, honor an authority that is to be found in a will which is a law unto itself. I hope this council will some day discuss the subject of the genesis and development of the will. I hope some of these days Presi- THE EDUCATION OF THE WILL. 347 dent Fairchild will tell us what the particular features of the Agricul- tural College life are that give specific form to will development in the graduates of those institutions. It seems to me the subject is opened in a way for as fco investigate, in a manner hardly touched upon in our books of psychology, which devote but few pages to the will. I simply wish to express my dissent from statements which intimate that external author- ity is a continuing authority. I want an authority to be so lodged in the will itself that the will becomes a law unto itself under the inspiration of the right. Mr. Hailmann: It was against external authority that I spoke; against external authority which comes to the child like an obstruction ; which arbitrarily opposes the will of the child. I believe in an authority rightly applied and understood. I am no anarchist nor socialist. I believe in the authority of law and righteousness. The teacher and the child must be in harmony, mutually and intelligently obeying the same law, and this excludes even the semblance of an external authority. Whenever the teacher puts himself into an attitude of antagonism toward the child, he is not in a position to do his best work. Mr. Sabin : Sometimes there is danger that our pedagogical princi- ples run counter to our common sense. From the day we are born to the day we die this whole life is simply a progress toward a nobler end, I hope. None of us is independent of external authority. When we are talking about an escape from external authority, we are talking about something which never has existed, and never will exist until the environments of the child are radically changed from what they are at present. 348 NATIONAL COUNCIL OF EDUCATION REPORT OF COMMITTEE ON HYGIENE. PHYSICAL EDUCATION. Good exists in God; it is the essential expression of His nature, the reflected light of His personality. Personality makes a man morally akin to God, and places him in conscious relation to law. What is this law? Christ answers the question: " Love is the fulfilling of the law." " Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, with all thy mind, with all thy strength, and thy neighbor as thyself/' Man's per- sonality, therefore, cannot be an end to itself. The tendency of Greek thought was to regard man as a self-centred being; to look for the springs of moral action and the power of progress within human nature. Christianity rates highly the work of the individual ; and her task is to develop each human personality, to bring it into contact with the per- sonality of God. Human personality in relation to God is wisdom; in relation to one's neighbor, is justice ; in relation to one's self, is temperance. There is a trinity — wisdom, justice, temperance — forming a perfect personality, and creating harmony between the man and his highest environments. This is to be secured only by the culture of his facul- ties, powers, and organs — the spirit, the mind, the body. The most active agencies in this work are the church, the home, the school. Neither has an exclusive duty ; and the work of each is so co- ordinated that the neglect or abuse of one destroys the harmony of the whole. There must be a general and distinct recognition of the shares of each, and a mutual support. The training of the spirit and the mind has a strong vital relation to the training of the body, inasmuch as the measure of a man's vitality is the measure of his working power. " To possess every faculty and function of the body in harmonious working power is to be healthy; to be healthy with a high degree of vital force is to be strong." The power for work is due not so much to moral energy as to the prepara- tion for life; it is less a matter of temperament than of acquired habit. Function makes structure, the physiologists say. One accustomed to systematic, well-directed, and intelligent physical exercise improves his organs, learns to use them with more skill and to better advantage. Physical education means an economy of force, for the reason that every movement is intrusted to the muscle best fitted to the end in view. If PHYSICAL EDUCATION. 349 inaction, or the defective action of an organ, causes atrophy, it must fol- low that its frequent activity promotes increased development. This is true of the brain and of all the nervous elements used in physical move- ment. Not only is it true that the nervous system has a share in the organic changes made by physical exercises, but it is as true that the psychical faculties are strongly influenced. The will is developed and improved by a systematic command of muscle, and this increase of will- power is a large factor in the growth of character. Training is defined as the adaptation of the organism to certain par- ticular conditions of activity. The need for training answers two phy- siological demands, that waste material be consumed, and that a stimulus be furnished to arouse sluggish functions to activity. Increased com- bustion and awakened functional activity demand larger supplies of oxy- gen, and the result is stimulation, increased vitality, active response of the muscles, and a healthy organism. But the voice of solicitation, if unheeded, becomes weaker day by day, and the silence is followed by total depression of the vital functions. Hence the importance of daily systematic exercise in youth in order to acquire the aptitude. Is it best that the same exercise should be practised by those of dif- ferent temperaments? There is no doubt that to a certain point the same kinds of physical exercise act with favorable effect upon organic conditions. If the power of assimilation is weak and small, exercise increases it, and thereby adds new tissues to the body ; if the process of assimilation is imperfect, exercise facilitates it, and thereby leads to the destruction of certain materials. In the first instance, nutrition becomes more active, which implies absorption of food material, and the necessary deposits of this material in the organs and tissues. The cells receive increased stimulus from the nerves and the blood ; the composi- tion of the blood is modified by an excess of oxygen, its vivifying power is increased ; and this stimulus increases the activity of the functions. In the second instance, where assimilation is defective, there is an accu- mulation of useless material which clogs the machine and causes disease and general enfeeblement of the system. The effect of exercise in this case is to use up the reserve materials as rapidly as they are formed, and this incessant combustion brings about such a conformation of the human machine as best fits it for the regular performance of all vital action. Hence we see that exercise tends to modify all constitutions so as to bring about the perfect equilibrium of the functions which make health. And hence it is a necessity for all constitutions. How much? Not to the same degree, since the benefit is not equal in all cases. If work increases both the gains and the losses, these opposite results should be balanced. Hence the need of special exercise in special cases, and 350 NATIONAL COUNCIL OF EDUCATION the importance of care, prudence, and intelligence in dealing with the nervous and over-taxed. Beyond the point named above, it seems true that to nourish all the organs equally is to nourish them unequally, since human beings are unequally organized as regards the various functions, some being strong in the organs of digestion, others in the brain, still others in the muscular system, and so on. Hence, any plan or system of physical training which gives no attention to individual needs is defective. But here lies the chief danger : namely, that the lack of wisdom or skill in the use of apparatus may lead to serious results. There is no doubt that ill-chosen or ill-directed exercise in the gymnasium is a cause of deformity. The frequent and prolonged performance of unnatural movements is a fruitful source of enfeeble- ment and nervous disease. There is fortunately a strong reactionary movement against excessive work in the gymnasium, and the wisest are those who see that no movement they can prescribe can take the place of free, voluntary out-of-door exercise, in which the activities have full play, and in which the emotion of pleasure is a strong element. The law of will must be in force : hence, there is doubt if physical exercise imposed upon pupils under protest of the will can be effective. On the other hand, in dealing with nervous or over-taxed students care should be taken to avoid exercises which require sustained attention, and more still to avoid excessive exercises, the results of which are as serious as those of overwork. When the brain is heavily taxed, any physical exercise is excessive, unless it be automatic, that is, without special activity of the brain. In performing automatic or reflex action, the spinal cord takes the place of the brain. The brain is a centre of reflex motion, but it is also a centre of voluntary motion. The nerves, the spinal cord, and the brain are the telegraphic wires between the will and the muscles. They are not the motor power ; they only transmit to the muscles the stimulus of the will ; neither is the will itself the source of the motor power. The necessary condition of movement in the human body is the production of heat, and this is produced by the com- bustion of its own materials. But if the heat is excessive, the activity of muscle is retarded or destroyed. The overheated blood poisons the nerve centres. The sensation of fatigue has its seat in the nerve cen- tres. A movement requiring the active exercise of will causes fatigue more easily than an automatic motion. The relation of mental and physical work is very close and vital, and yet in a careful study of the question, how to give at the same time work to the inactive muscles of the child and repose to his overtaxed brain, there seems to be a kind of contradiction which makes the solution of the problem very difficult. The conditions of the work are the same for the brain which thinks and the muscle which contracts, and in both these PHYSICAL EDUCATION. 351 organs greater activity of function is accompanied by greater production of heat. In the laborer and in the thinker alike there is an increased flow of blood toward the organ which works, and a greater vibration of heat within the acti/e element. In difficult gymnastics, there is a strong exercise of the will, judgment, and other psychical faculties, and if there is economy in the expenditure of muscular force, it is at the expense of the nerves and the brain. Therefore, it is impossible that the nerve centres gain repose under the influence of movements which excite the whole nervous system. The overworked student requires economy of nervous energy, perfect repose of the brain, and rest of the psychical powers. A run in the green fields will free the mind and rest the head better than any system ever invented, because the head has no part in the lively exercise of running. All thoughtful teachers with gymnasia at command have noticed the indifference and apathy of intellectual students in the matter of difficult exercise. The reason is physiological and ought to be regarded. The tired brain makes strong and instinctive protest against an exercise requir- ing as much effort of the brain as of the body. In every case of this . kind the discriminating teacher will prescribe exercise producing muscu- lar and not nervous fatigue. Exercises which have been long practised and have been mastered are performed automatically, and require no brain activity, while at the same time they quicken the blood current, regulate the respiration, and give tone to the digestive functions. There are conditions of mental sluggishness for which one remedy is the per- formance of physical exercises, requiring the concentration of will-power and sustained attention; no system of education is complete which ignores this fact. But for the over-worked child, help comes best from long walks with mother nature over the hills, from the old popular games, and indeed, from anything rather than difficult gymnastics. In a paper which appeared in the Popular Science Monthly of 1890, Prof. Axel Key, of Stockholm, gives figures and facts of great impor- tance. He says, in relation to the physical education of children, that the first fundamental research was instituted by Doctor Hertel, in Copen- hagen, in 1881, with results so significant that a special hygienic com- mission was appointed to examine into the conditions of health in all the schools of the kingdom. At the same time, a grand school commis- sion was named by the government of Sweden to inquire into the organ- ization of the whole higher school life. It was found that more than one-third were ill or afflicted with chronic maladies. Thirteen and a half per cent, of the boys suffered from habitual headache, and diseases of the lungs were frequent. Sixty-one per cent, of the girls, all belong- ing to the prosperous classes, were ill or afflicted with serious chronic disorders; thirty-six per cent, suffered from habitual headache, and at 352 NATIONAL COUNCIL OF EDUCATION least ten per cent, had spinal disorders. The average time daily demanded by the school for work in class and at home is, according to gymnasial schedules, seven hours in the lowest classes, and it rises rap- idly and constantly until, in the upper classes, eleven or twelve hours are required. How do children, he asks, thus situated find time for meals, for rest, for exercise in the open air, for recreation, and, above all, for sleep? Must not their mental force be worn out and benumbed by such a bur- den, their physical growth and health suffer, and their capacity to resist unwholesome influences of every kind be diminished? The conditions in American school life, although not the same as in Sweden, yet have the same tendency, and our first duty as the guardians of the child is to see with all possible care that the growth of childhood be not disturbed or distorted by any influences adverse to nature. But how? By such a nice adjustment of mental and physical work that one be not made to suffer at the expense of the other; by systematic daily exercise in order to acquire the aptitude. To this end we place walking first; well-selected games second; gymnastics third. Walking, as a physical exercise merely, is a perfect exercise, because it taxes the . whole system ; every muscle, every nerve and fibre is brought into play. And when to this is added the interest awakened by the love of nature, a study of birds, a hunt for flowers, a search for insects, the temper is sweetened, the imagination brightened, the mind broadened, the spirit lifted near to God. It is something, says John Burroughs, to press the pulse of our old mother by mountain lakes and streams and know what health and vigor are in her being. Games rank next. There seems to be a close relation between pleasure and high vitality or the vigor of the system, and between pain and the feebleness of the system. Hence, the law of self -conservation. But the games should be carefully selected. Girls and boys left to themselves in this matter make their choice without considering the importance of quality and quantity. Gymnastics have a value, too, which we must not underestimate in the general summing up, but in this day and genera- tion, when the world is alive to the supreme importance of a healthy body, and physical culture is the latest fashionable " fad," not many words are needed here. The first benefit derived from the practice of gymnastics, says an eminent physiologist, is the education of movements. The country boy, rough, clumsy, and uncultured, rapidly gains ease, grace, and polish. His muscles, hitherto used to slow obedience, learn to obey with rapidity and precision, and thus undergo a discipline to which they had been strangers. The gymnastic work, carefully done, gives strength, and strength gives confidence. There is a way of stand- ing, walking, and sitting not only easy and graceful, but requiring the PHYSICAL EDUCATION. 353 least expenditure of force. " Strength at the centre, and freedom at the surface," should be- a precept of the gymnasium. "Let soul demand and body respond " should be another. Much of the work of the gym- nasium is reformatory or hospital work. There is a patient uprooting of physical faults growing out of inheritance and out of environment and habits of life, and in their stead are established fine, graceful car- riage, ease of manner, new and correct habits. In the hands of skill and wisdom the gymnasium is a powerful means for the freeing of the body, until it becomes, not only the fit temple of God but the expression of his best thought. Should boys and girls engage in the same exercises? Doctor Sargent answers the question in these words: Up to ten years of age, any exer- cise that will be beneficial to a boy will be just as valuable to a girl. Between ten and fourteen, girls should take lighter exercise, with more frequent intervals of rest. After that age, it is simply a question of time, amount, and degree, rather than of quality. As a general rule, he says, girls need more muscle-making exercise than they get, not so much for the sake of acquiring greater strength as for the influence that well- developed muscles have upon the brain, nerve-centres, and other parts of the system. For this reason many of the so-called calisthenic move- ments do not meet the demands of the female organism. They weary and exhaust, without giving anything adequate in return. These mat- ters can safely be left to the judgment of a well-trained teacher. The corset should be taken off and kept off, or, what is better, never put ou, in order that the body may be built up with the new material that will come to it as the result of the exercise, and to eliminate the old broken- down tissue from the system. Should the schools be furnished with the apparatus of the gymna- sium We answer that no gift in the power of the state is too rare or pre- cious for the child in its keeping, and no expense too great for the pro- cess of preparation for American citizenship. If the eminent specialists, who are doing so much for the causes of physical education, will demon- strate beyond question their ability and power — and we think they can — to remedy the evils of imperfect physical organizations — then the state owes it to the child, through the school, not only to provide the neces- sary means, but to furnish also the teacher, wise by natural fitness, and skilled by the best training of the schools. What system? The answer is brief. Any system that is good, or a combination of the best in every system. Conclusion. Wisdom — justice — temperance — the trinity which makes a perfect 354 NATIONAL COUNCIL OF EDUCATION. human personality. The last, temperance, includes a reverent care of the body — " The temple of the Holy Ghost." The earthen vessel is holy because the treasure which it contains binds us " By golden chains about the feet of God." Clara Conway, Chairman. DISCUSSION. G. Stanley Hall: I did not intend to speak upon this subject, but it is so important, and there are so many things left unsaid in this admirable paper, that I shall take the opportunity of calling attention to two or three of them. In the first place, it seems to me we are beginning to realize now, as never before, that health is the criterion of everything in education. If our school system injures the body, it is bad, no matter how much good it may do to the mind. The system of education to-day is the most powerful system that the world has ever seen. There is a greater agreement about education than about anything that the world has ever seen. There has never been such a consensus of all minds — of all degrees of intelligence, and in all countries — as there is about education to-day. The church, the state, have never brought such a degree of unanimity as exists now with regard to the system of education. The advancement which has been made in the last decade has witnessed changes so momen- tous, systems so far-reaching and complete, that the modern school has a control over the minds and bodies of the young men and young women for more days of the week and more hours of the day than the Church or any other system has ever held. It is no wonder then that men are proud to serve such a system ; but there never was so much danger of an injury to the body and mind as now. These statements, to which reference has been made, and the investi- gations carried on within the last five years in so many countries, show results which are appalling. They show a percentage of ill-health 33, even 40, per cent. , and a good deal we can never tell, perhaps, is actually caused by the failure to regard certain rules absolutely necessary to health. First, in the development of what is known .as the nascent period. We have learned that there are certain periods of growth when each function and each organ develops very rapidly. It has been said by a recent investigator that there are two years, somewhere between thirteen and eighteen, where the hand centres, for instance the brain, controlling the hand or fingers develop more than they develop for many years before and after. Now whenever this nascent period is, it is well established PHYSICAL EDUCATION. 355 that over-exercise before it is far more liable than afterward to produce an ill-effect. Many diseases are due to over-straining. Each organ, each function, the hand, the eye, etc., all organs have their nascent periods just as the organs of sex when they develop and new functions come into play ; and over-exertion of any of these functions before their matur- ity is injurious, and the effects are physiologically analogous to what it would be to lay burdens upon the sexual organs before their maturity is complete. The body does not grow in all directions at once: now a certain func- tion, and now another, develops. The second point is this : That, as Professor Key has pointed out, and as confirmed by other investigators, quite contrary to the early idea, during the nascent period, whether of special functions or the gen- eral period of growth (like that great period that takes place during adolescence), the body is more able to resist disease, and is more able to resist strains. It used to be said that when boys were growing there must be special precautions taken in order to prevent excesses. Now it is known that during the period of most rapid growth there is the greatest resistance to disease. With regard to fatigue. There have been within five years a number of careful observances of the effects of over-training. Many of these have been experimental. They have been applied to animals, and in many cases where the living nerve-cell is observed under the microscope while the organ of which it is the centre is being fatigued, and from these results has come the very important conclusion which is now gen- erally established, that the difference between the rested brain or nerve- cell and the fatigued cell is very great indeed — that it is great enough to explain a great many of the conditions which have been thought hith- erto to be abnormal. So that a great many of the conclusions that have been ascribed hitherto to disease must be entirely revised and much pathological work must be done over again. Many things thought to be due to disease are now known to be the direct results of fatigue. The change taking place in a living cell under fatigue is very great. Under the microscope the cell almost collapses, where the sensitive parts of it are pale and thin ; and this appears in the rhythm daily. Every day has its rhythm. It is now known that there is a rhythm ; for instance, in the forenoon, say ten or eleven o'clock, many men are at the greatest energy. After dinner, at four or five o'clock, with other men energy is at its greatest and best. Now there is no education that is modern except active education, which involves the expenditure of activity and energy muscles, if you please, since one-half of the whole body is known to be muscle. A large .fraction of the whole energy goes out to the ani- mal. What we want is a method that will tend to develop the whole 356 NATIONAL COUNCIL OF EDUCATION body properly, in order that none of the great opportunities of these nascent periods may be missed and none of them abused. It is not merely physical exercise, but it is original research, whether anything substan- tial results or not. Whatever it is, there is the activity. I would rather have a boy who has but little training in college attempt to add some- thing to the world's knowledge than attempt to attain a high state of learning. It is the exercise of the mind, and also an exercise of the body, and if well conducted the exercise increases the muscle, increases the number of cells, and it adds an increase to the num- ber of nerve fibres just as much as it increases the bulk of the mus- cles and muscle fibres. Some of us have progressed to the point where we feel that no system of education is beneficial if the young person leaves the schoolroom in worse health than he entered it. Mr. Richards: This question is important. The object of physical training in schools is not to train our children to be gymnasts or to be specially prepared for physical exhibitions; but to us, as educators, it seems to me the question is, how can we develop the powers of the body and the powers of the mind, along in the same line at the same time. We are not to labor simply for a more excellent system of physical train- ing, but that we may have such a physical training as will develop the body along with the mind of the pupil and, above all, preserve the moral health of the student. I indorse most fully the sentiments of this paper. I want to call atten- tion to one remark that the writer has made under the head of " Economy of the Nervous Force." She says that " in every case a discriminat- ing teacher will prescribe exercise producing muscular and not nervous fatigue." Exercises which have been long practised and have been mas- tered are performed automatically. Then there are conditions of men- tal sluggishness for which one remedy is the performance of physical exercise requiring the concentration of will-power and sustained ten- sion. Most systems of physical education have completely ignored this fact. I have noticed in some schools these exercises, where there was appar- ently no more exercise of the will or mind than there would be if the pupils were machines ; all motions were made in a sort of mechanical way, without any apparent thought. It has been an opinion of mine that all exercises that are introduced should have a mental as well as a physical end in view. The mind should be trained so that it can act. These exercises should be regular and uniform, with a view to making a more perfect child, a more perfect man or woman, so that the body and the mind will grow together, and that the child, when he leaves the school, will leave it with a well-rounded character. PHYSICAL EDUCATION. 357 Mr. Harris: I see things a little differently from the last speaker, and understand this paper to condemn his theory. I think that physi- cal exercise ought not to be set as a task when it is intended to serve as recreation. It seems to me that it has been one of the great defects in physical education, that it has been brought into the schools and made a will training, so that the child who has been exhausting his nervous energy all the morning at his lessons in school is then called upon to exhaust it even more rapidly in set forms of exercise, instead of relax- ing as he ought to. The child must stand up ; he must not lean ; he must pay strict attention and imitate precisely the motions prescribed. This is a strain on the will-power, and calisthenics as practiced in many cases exhausts nervous energy faster than a class exercise in Latin or Greek. I was glad to hear what the report says with reference to school gymnastics being a training of the will, and to notice that the author recommends a free run in the fields as better. Now I am a great stick- ler for the old-fashioned recess, the wild recess [applause], the pupil bursting out of the school-room, running about, shouting, and pushing his fellows. It is this recess that recreates the pupil and restores his nervous energy. After the enjoyment of a little freedom and a run, the child returns to the schoolroom and does his work better. But these set exercises which strain the attention of the child are hurtful. It may crush his health, especially when he is growing, and at these criti- cal periods that Dr. Hall has mentioned. It is a very important sub- ject. It is to be hoped that we shall know a great deal more about it through the labors of specialists, and it is encouraging to know that something has already been done in that direction, for it was growing clear to the most ordinary observer that a mistake is made by imposing the strain of calisthenics as a substitute for play. This strain may be too much and may crush the child or produce an arrest of growth. An arrested development, intellectually, happens often through excess of memory culture, and the child does not get above it into rationality and deep thinking. In fact, he recedes. In this sense I understood Mr. Hall. There is great danger in this matter of physical exercise, of over- straining in certain directions, and producing permanent weakness. When one looks at the danger of half knowledge in this matter, one is almost frightened. In my own career I have espoused hobbies in the matter of physical education, hobbies which I look back upon with hor- ror; I know they were injurious to me and to my fellows who shared in my views. Gymnastic exercises which develop the muscles perhaps are good for two-fifths of the body. If the muscles are considered to be the whole body and no account is made of the digestive organs or of the adipose tissues, there will be a tendency to cultivate the muscles or the voluntary movements at the expense of the involuntary powers of 358 NATIONAL COUNCIL OF EDUCATION. the body that are manifested in the heart, lungs, and digestive organs. It is dangerous to encroach on these involuntary powers by overcultiva- tion of the muscles. The muscles are the organs of the will, and a mod- erate training of these, with a view to make them ready servants of the will, is both healthful and useful. Mr. Hoose: I would like to ask Mr. Harris a question. Which is better from an educational stand-point, that the children shall have physical exercise under some formula rigidly adhered to, or physical exercise at will in a miscellaneous form? That is a question I have before me from time to time, and concerning which I have serious doubts in my mind. Mr. Harris: The report says that there is, fortunately, a strong reactionary movement against excessive work in the gymnasium, and the wisest are those who see that no movement they can prescribe can take the place of free, voluntary, out-of-door exercise in which the activities have full play, and in which the emotion of pleasure is a strong element. I endorse this heartily. Mr. Sheldon: I would like to ask Mr. Harris if the kindergarten — say from infancy to four or five years of age — I would like to ask if that system is thought desirable, if it is well to have a regular system of gym- nastic exercises for little children. Mr. Harris : Mr. Sheldon is the most competent man in this audi- ence to answer that question, so I repeat it to him. His answer would be that Froebel never imposed any such martinet system on the child. Mr. Hall: I think the answer to that question is very easy. If the object of the exercise is to increase the strength and physical develop- ment, it should always be when the body is rested and fresh. But if the object is divergence, in order to further intellectual work, it is a totally different thing. Then it should come when they are fatigued. Physical exercise is not one thing, but it is a great many things. I do not think we realize what a vast problem this is. Mr. Hoose: I will put two cases before Dr. Hall: One is that of a boy who is vigorous and has a good deal of mental strength. In another case the boy must use his physical strength sparingly. Now, as between those two cases, what would Mr. Hall recommend? Mr. Hall: I do not understand the question. Mr. Hoose : Let me state the case again. Here is a person who sets himself to work with a great deal of force — runs fast, walks rapidly, studies rapidly, gets tired, works at physical exercise with vigor, keeps on that way, accumulates strength easily, and goes on expending the maximum of force. There is another boy who works less rapidly, who exhausts his energy with less rapidity, but who accomplishes a certain PHYSICAL EDUCATION. 359 amount of work. Now, as an educational question, what would you say was the best method for training those boys? Mr. Hall: This question of spurtiveness is a good one, but it is an individual question. I have had many pupils whom I wished to heaven I could get to spurt. On the other hand, I have had a great many pupils, nervous boys, in whom that is just the thing to avoid. That is a question to which a careful answer must be made in each case. Mr. Fairchild: Another phase of physical training that some of us have had to do with shows that we cannot answer some of these ques- tions without going into philosophy. I suppose many of you are con- versant with the system of manual training and shop work of various kinds connected with some of the schools for older children, and some of you have found undoubtedly that the kind of recreation which comes in that line is real and genuine, and that the purpose that lies behind the work itself is the best possible stimulant and brings exercise to the mus- cles as well as rest to the brain. I know in our shop, where we have as many as 200 young men at work each day, there is the utmost interest. Although the will is engaged, it is engaged in such a way as not to be overtaxed. The work is so arranged that the young men consider this part of their daily routine as a recreation, although they do a great deal of work in the hours given to manual training. I have been again and again surprised to find how much can be accomplished in actual training during a few hours each week, and to observe that the pupils come from the work feeling that they have enjoyed a recreation, full of renewed energy and renewed thought. I believe it is producing a marked bene- ficial effect on the health of our young community. We have in the neighborhood of 600 students, and during the twelve years of my con- nection with the State Agricultural College of Kansas, there have been but three deaths in the whole body of students — one from measles, one from drowning, and one from typhoid fever brought to the college. There is no sickness with us; no reason for sickness. No system of education is complete where the students deteriorate physically while they grow mentally. Miss Conway : The words of the report are the result of experience and observation. I have frequently, in the school-room, seen pupils object to the physical exercise when the hour came, and upon investiga- tion, I find that the pupil is tired. In such a case I think it common sense that the pupil be allowed to rest, or sent out in the air and sunshine, where she may have the best rest. I think it would be cruel, I think it would be an outrage, to compel a girl to take physical exercise under those circumstances. On the other hand, I am not prepared to state that physical exercise should be dispensed with. I believe in physical exercise, but if it is observed that physical exercise is harmful it should be abandoned. 360 NATIONAL COUNCIL OF EDUCATION There are times when physical exercise should be given to tired pupils who are mentally fatigued, and in that case it should be such exercise that the attention of the student is not required, and where no concen- tration of the mental faculties is necessary, but in which the exercise is merely automatic. SCHOOL STATISTICS. 361 REPORT OF THE COMMITTEE ON EDUCATIONAL STATISTICS. SCHOOL STATISTICS. The undersigned Committee on Statistics begs leave to offer the fol- lowing report, in which it has endeavored to discuss some of the prelimi- nary questions relative to the character of the statistics which it is considered desirable to obtain. The report of your Committee offers (1) some general remarks on the nature and significance of statistics; (2) a survey of the chief divisions under which educational statistics may be grouped ; (3) some references to the difficulties that arise in the ascer- tainment of the most important items — difficulties that arise at the out- set, as it were, and vitiate the results of tabulation and comparison even in the most general data. Through statistics we complete our inventory of the reality; we ascertain the kind and amount that is or has been in actual existence. Vague, common observation and experience is unmethodic and inaccu- rate. It is impressed by a few unusual data and makes sweeping infer- ences that are not justified by the real state of facts. Only when the data are inventoried and counted accurately is it possible to make relia- ble inferences. There is experience enough and observation enough in any age to furnish data for a complete science of nature and man, but from the circumstance that it is not quantified, this experience all goes for little or nothing. The generalizations are so crude that they conflict with each other, the inferences of one day refute those of the previous day, and in the end all is reduced to zero. The facts of the world as given to us are dead results, and in order to attain any scientific knowledge — or any practical wisdom — in regard to them we must go behind these dead results to the causes, forces, or ener- gies that have produced them. We must learn to see all real things in the processes that have brought these dead results here and will presently remove them hence. For the real things before us do not stay; they have come out of the region of possibility, and they will go again into that region as soon as they have masqueraded a longer or a shorter inter- val of time. The realities before our senses are, then, not true actuali- ties, but only passing phases of some process or other. They are, in the language of recent natural science, mere phenomena. Science for this 362 NATIONAL COUNCIL OF EDUCATION reason inquires rather into the process than into the immediate reality. The process abides, its dead results are in a state of change and vanish- ing. But we can learn the process only by the study of these same dead results. We must make them the basis of our inference. We must learn from them the processes. Here it is that quantity becomes so important. Our statistics record the exact limits of reality, and show us the strength of forces and the quality of the forces. The present existing things reveal the process by showing us what forces are at work. A comparison of to-day with that of yesterday fixes the trend of the process. It is changing, and there is increase or diminution in the strength of the forces involved ; some are yielding to others. For the reason that science goes at once behind things and events to their moving causes, it is clear that quantitative data are absolutely essential to it. Science inquires what relation each thing or event has to other things and events that precede or follow it. It seeks the rela- tion of things to environments and the relation of events to preceding and following events. In this way each thing or event is made to throw light on all others, and all things and events are made to throw light on each. This is what makes science so important to men. The relation of one thing or event to another is of no account for science, except so far as it is a relation of influence — a relation of action and reaction. This proves the correctness of the statement made that science goes at once behind immediate things and events to inquire into the moving causes — to inquire into the living process, in short. Science gives system because it connects all these isolated data in the unity of the living proc- ess which acts through forces. The lowest stage of mental power in the human being is satisfied with the simple quantity of objects — satisfied if it can identify things and name them. It is therefore satisfied with unsystematic details, and does not inquire into the relations which one thing or event bears to another. Hence it does not ascend to the contemplation of process instead of dead result. In order to make this ascent, as we have said, there must be quantifi- cation. To those interested in the philosophy of mathematics it is apparent that quantity itself bears some important relation to quality, or else it could not serve this function of lifting our common knowledge up to scientific knowledge. The lowest stage of mental power seizes quality ; the next higher seizes quantity. The lowest stage seizes each thing or event as something having an environment, but as having complete inde- pendence, full reality in itself. The second stage of mental power sees things as products of a force or SCHOOL STATISTICS. 363 energy — or, in other words, as results of a proeess. Hence it implies the idea of genus and species, or rather the idea of species and individuals. All things or events are real individuals that have been produced by a general process; they are repetitions of its action. If the process abides as species, the individual things or events pass away as particular speci- mens or realizations of the underlying process. " The species lives, the individual dies." The philosophy of mathematics, therefore, reveals the real significance of the ascent of the mind from common empiricism, which never gets at a knowledge which can command nature, up to science, which conquers nature and emancipates man from thraldom and drudgery. Science with its quantitative view looks at genera and species, instead of men, things, and events. It does not, however, regard these as mere classifica- tions. It looks upon processes or living energies — complexes of forces so to speak — these are its genera and species. Hence, science sees essences instead of mere phenomena. It looks for and finds substantial beings behind the visible but transient things and events which are before the senses. Quantity implies repetition of individuals of the same kind, and this similarity of individuals points each to a common origin. This is the significance of the mere classification. Science inventories first and then classifies; then from the classes it infers the forces or proc- ess. This is what quantity means; this is the significance of sta- tistics. All real things and events in the world are fleeting manifestations of what is more real and abiding in the form of process. Perhaps these considerations may seem too curious and subtle as a reply to those who object to school statistics. We assume that those interested in education, as a potent effort in the welfare of mankind, will admit that a knowledge of the social process going on is essential to a wise and practical management of the every-day details. Directive power depends on insight into the forces that are working. It ought to be evident, therefore, to all sceptics who consider these principles that accurate statistics furnish the first requisite toward wise directive power. The statesman or legislator who is providing for the school system must know the present status of school attendance, the rate of progress in the course of study, the supply and efficiency of teachers, and the revenue and expenditure involved. The teacher and the specialist needs many other quantitative inqui- ries. He needs to inventory quantitatively the successive steps of the growth of the infant's powers and faculties — or the same quantitative information regarding the mastery of the branches of study, or the effects of confinement in school, the different kinds of exercise, the varieties of discipline, etc. There are thousands of special lines of investigation, 364 NATIONAL COUNCIL OF EDUCATION. where careful quantitative analysis will reveal data regarding the laws of educative growth. But the four great lines of educational statistics are well marked. The public opinion, which is the basis of all most advanced government in the world, desires to know concerning — I. The attendance of pupils on school ; II. The advancement in the course of study ; III. The teaching forces and appliances ; and, IV. The revenues and expenditures. The sociological interest is primarily occupied with the first and fourth — 'the enrollment of pupils in the schools and the provision of means to support the schools. Next, after something has been done in these two essentials, there comes in the question of teachers (our third rubric) — how to provide for a constant supply of good teachers, and how to keep these in a state of growth in culture and professional skill. Lastly, even the general public gets interested in questions relating to the second need — the course of study — and wishes to know why these and not other branches are taught; why they are taught in a certain order, why so much time is devoted to this or that branch. It gradually goes farther, and inquires into the educating value of each branch — its effect in open- ing the windows of the soul, and in making the child participative in the products of industry and the mental acquisitions of his fellow-men. It inquires into the best order of development of the child's powers, and specializes its inquiries in many ways into the physical and mental condi- tions of education. Taking a closer survey of these, our four items of statistics, let us con- sider some of the subordinate needs of each. I. The first is that of attendance on school. The subheads under this relate to (a) number of pupils attending; (b) the duration of attend- ance; (c) the personal items relating to those pupils. Hence we have to inquire first, what is the total number of different pupils enrolled in school in the course of the year? This is the simplest of all inquiries, and yet there is great difficulty in obtaining accuracy in regard to it, for the reasons : first, inaccurate book-keeping by the teacher ; secondly, the habit of duplicate registrations. The statistics of no country or state can be considered as yet perfectly reliable in this item. Here are some of the ways in which duplicate reg- istration comes in. (ay In rural districts a winter-school is kept by one teacher, probably a man, and in the summer another session is kept, and by a woman. The statistics of these schools are reported to the cen- tral office of the town and thence to the State without making account of the duplicate registration of pupils. The summer school registers a large number of new pupils, especially of young children, but retains a good many of the winter pupils. As towns grow populous the two-session school is supplanted by the SCHOOL STATISTICS. 305 continuous term school, and one registration takes the place of two. The States with rural districts which are gradually adopting the contin- uous term school, therefore, frequently show a decrease in the annual enrollment of pupils, and seem, therefore, to be retrograding, whereas they are improving the quality and quantity of their education by increasing the annual term of school, and by engaging better teachers, and by actually enrolling a larger number of pupils, though not count- ing any of these twice. (b) But there is another source of duplicate enrollment in the fact that some schools — private academies being the first to do this — count each term of the year a separate affair, and give the enrollment for each of the three or four terms first in detail and then in the aggregate, with- out deducting duplications. (c) A third and more dangerous form of duplicate enrollment comes from enrolling twice those who are promoted from one school to another during the year ; they are counted once in the primary school, for exam- ple, and again in the intermediate or grammar school to which they are transferred. This third form of duplicate enrollment used to vitiate the statistics of the large cities on the Atlantic coast — Philadelphia, in one year, for example, counting some 70,000 pupils twice in its returns, and making an aggregate of 177,000, when only 107,000 different pupils were actually enrolled. (d) Another cause of duplication is the neglect to make a matter of registration of the item of attendance of a pupil in another school within the same year, when receiving him by transfer. The constantly shifting population of a city causes this to be a considerable item. (e) Lastly, carelessness in keeping the annual register of a large school leads to a duplicate enrollment of many pupils who leave in the fall and return to school in the spring. Their former attendance has been forgotten by the principal of the school. There is need for a good device to prevent this duplicate enrollment, which vitiates all conclusions based on the item of actual school attend- ance. It should be required of each teacher to enter in a column after each pupil's name the fact of attendance or non-attendance previously in the same year in any other school in the State. In all large schools, where there are many teachers and many separate roll-books kept, it should be required by the principal that each teacher should keep a column in which he or she write after each pupil's name the " annual register number," for the pupils enrolled m the annual reg- ister should be numbered. This " annual register number" will prevent duplicate registration in the same school, and will facilitate the transfer of items of each separate teacher's roll-book to the general register. Besides his number of separate pupils enrolled it is important to know 366 NATIONAL COUNCIL OF EDUCATION the actual average attendance. This should be taken by averaging the daily attendance, but is, in fact, taken in the schools of France and Ger- many by selecting two specimen days and counting the attendance on those days. Besides average attendance we should have the item of tardiness kept accurately, inasmuch as punctuality is very important in forming the character of the pupil. Under the second item of attendance we wish the number of daily school sessions for the year and the hours of a school session, the length and hour of recesses and intermissions. Under the third item of personality we include such items as, first, How many of each sex? Second, How many of each year of age, and the average age? Third, Race? Fourth, How many born in the town or State where the school is situated? Fifth, How many born in other parts of the same nation? Sixth, How many born abroad? Occupation of parents? II. Under the second of our four chief heads we would ask for statis- tics regarding the course of study, and thus determine by this the grade of schools as follows : (a) Kindergarten; (b) Primary and Grammar school ; (c) Secondary education ; (d) Higher education. We should ask very carefully as to the relations of. these items to the first class of items, especially age, sex, and average attendance. The primary and grammar schools are to be distinguished from the secondary schools by the following test : The introduction of algebra, or of an ancient or modern language, marks the beginning of the secondary course of study. The higher course of study should be marked by ana- lytical mathematics, or by logical and philosophical studies, or by advanced language studies. III. The third general head, "The Teaching Forces and Appliances," includes : (1) Buildings and accommodations. (2) Size of schools under one principal teacher (number of pupils per teacher). (3) Number of teachers. (4) Supervision. (5) Means of training teach- ers. (6) Examination of teachers. (7) Methods of discipline and instruction used by the teachers. IV. The fourth general head, " The Support of Schools," includes (1) Revenue, items of: (a) Receipts from State and local taxation ; (b) receipts from funds or productive property ; (c) receipts, if any, from tuition. (2) Expenditures: (a) For teachers' salaries, including super- vision; (b) incidentals, including janitor's hire, fuel, apparatus, and cur- rent expenses ; (c) permanent investments, including buildings and repairs. The most difficult of these latter items to get with accuracy is that which relate to the current expenses for incidentals, as distinguished from the item for permanent improvements. SCHOOL STATISTICS. 367 The items of sex of pupils and teachers — there is need for these items in explaining the facts of progress of schools, from ungraded to graded, and in explaining other matters of regularity of attendance and progress in course of study. As illustrative of some of the points referred to, a letter written by Mr. James Blodgett, an expert of the United States Census Bureau, is herewith submitted. Dear Sir: In response to your request for suggestions regarding statistics of schools, I have the honor to submit the following: PUBLIC SCHOOLS. No item of school statistics is now uniformly recorded throughout the country. No plan of uniformity can be made immediately and wholly effective. It seems important, therefore, to use inquiries selected not wholly in order of intrinsic value, but in part in order of availability. A. Number of Pupils. — It is of the first importance to know how many different pupils are enrolled in the year, excluding duplicates. The legal school age varies greatly, but several States admit pupils over or under school age. It should be possible to obtain a total without age limitations, with a distinct statement of the number admitted by special arrangement in any State. (a) Sex. — In entering names the sex is plain, (b) Color. — Color, an evidence of race, is plain at enrollment. Sex and color, therefore, are readily determined in connection with number. B. Apparent Effectiveness of Schools. — The second item in importance is the time of attendance by pupils as a measure of apparent effectiveness of schools, which might be expressed primarily in days, obtained by adding the day's attendance of all scholars in a school. C. Teachers. — Inquiry should be made for the number, sex, and color of teachers, but the variable length of service and other circumstances will, for the present, prevent any satisfactory comparison of nominally uniform modes of counting teachers. Theoretically, the days taught by each teacher in the year would be an apparent measure of effectiveness. The number of teachers in the country as a whole is known to be rela- tively large for the number of pupils, and the main stress of effort for improved personal statistics may be advantageously centered for the next decade on the record of pupils. D. Finance. — The tax-payer is entitled to a balance-sheet. There is great diversity of detail in different States as to raising and expending money for schools. The varied items should be reducible for general reports to something like the following form : 3G8 NATIONAL COUNCIL OF EDUCATION FINANCES. Balance on hand beginning of year $ RECEIPTS. From local tax $ From other public funds From loans (issue of notes, bonds, etc. ) From all other sources Total ; $ EXPENDITURES. For salaries $ For repairs For improvements For interest For principal of loans For all other expenses Total $ Balance on hand end of year VALUE OF PROPERTY. Sites I Buildings and furniture Library and apparatus Total $ Many States profitably tabulate a wider range of facts, but it seems best to urge at this time only a very few salient and comprehensive items that all can use. Details locally peculiar could be discussed to any desired extent in the State report. The general statistics of courses of study, though defective, are far in advance of those of number, effective attendance, and finance, and tend to a general grouping as elementary, secondary, and superior. They are likely to improve rapidly by reason of current conditions, to whose influ- ence for the time they might be left. For example, certain State univer- sities are rapidly harmonizing the statistics of studies in their respective States. It may be stated that the Census Office has not attempted to secure the effective attendance of pupils from school officers, since it could not be given at this time by some States, and therefore could not be a comparable item in the census reports. It is hoped that enumerators' returns will be of value in this regard under the reports of occupations. The item of average daily attendance is not kept in all States, nor would it be of value as obtainable, since a six-weeks' school, well attended, would make an equal showing with a six-months' school of vastly greater effectiveness. SCHOOL STATISTICS. 369 PRIVATE SCHOOLS. The co-operation of those in charge of private schools, including the subdivision parochial schools, is important. It will be almost unani- mously accorded as of common interest for all the above-named inquiries except as to finance. The managers of private enterprises do not regard the details of their financial affairs as proper subjects of public inquiry, and no balance-sheet can profitably be asked of them. A census bulletin will presently be issued, to which I beg to refer you for further detail upon the present condition of school records. For the committee, W. T. Harris, Chairman. DISCUSSION. Mr. Hinsdale: Not long ago I studied somewhat hurriedly one or two of the documents that have been published by the Census Bureau, and I discovered some facts which I was at a loss to understand. The bulletins that I refer to gave, for example, the per cent, of increase of the population of the States, and the per cent, of increase of attendance upon the public schools. In some of the States the attendance upon the schools had grown much more rapidly than the population. In many instances I thought I could discover the reason why the school attend- ance should increase more rapidly than the population. In a consider- able number of cases the two rates of increase were about the same; there were no such discrepancies as should excite curiosity. But in a number of cases the attendance upon schools had not kept pace with the increase in population. I do not mean it had actually fallen off, but it had materially fallen off as compared with the increase of population. If I remember right, Massachusetts was one of those States where the population has increased more rapidly than the school attendance. It is also the case with Ohio. I do not remember the figures, but my pres- ent impression is that the rate of increase of population is double the rate of increase in school attendance. I would like to have Mr. Harris from his point of observation explain that feature of his subject a little more fully. Mr. Harris : I have devoted the larger part of the paper to the dis- cussion of the question that Mr. Hinsdale presents. I hold that the apparent shrinkage in school enrollment in the Northern States is due to duplicate registration; that in proportion as teachers become more careful to exclude duplicate registration, a worse comparative showing 370 NATIONAL COUNCIL OF EDUCATION is made for the State. New Hampshire appears by its returns to have fallen off absolutely, and to have not merely a smaller ratio of its popu- lation in school, but an actually smaller number than formerly. But I do not think that it is really so; New Hampshire, under Superintend- ent Patterson, has been adopting better methods of book-keeping, and its teachers and school officers have become more careful to exclude duplicate registration. In the cities and towns, and even in the rural districts, they are getting rid of their old methods, and the exclusion of the names of pupils enrolled in the winter schools from the summer enrollment makes an apparent decrease. Mr. Hinsdale : I wish to ask you a little more definitely. Is it a matter of knowledge with you or anybody else that in Ohio there has been such an improvement in methods as will explain that very striking discrepancy? Mr. Harris : Many State superintendents are present here, and they should be able to answer you. I do not know in regard to particular cases; I only know that duplicate enrollment is a general cause for inflated school statistics, while accurate book-keeping corrects this infla- tion and seems to show a depleting of the school attendance. There are five kinds of duplication that take place. There is hardly a State or city but has some items of duplication — even where the work is most carefully done. It would seem almost impossible to prevent it. I know that in my own school in St. Louis, Missouri, where we had enrolled over six hundred pupils the first year, there were some twenty- five or twenty-six pupils found to be entered twice on the annual reg- ister. I found one curious case in which the same boy had been entered several times, each time with a different spelling of his name. Mr. G. Stanley Hall : We have received a very interesting report from Mr. Harris. There is one thing he said, however, which I heard with a great deal of regret. We have been accustomed to consider the foreign method, especially the French method and the South German method to which he referred, as the very best method that has yet been devised. He spoke of it in a somewhat disparaging way, I thought. At least he said it was possible that the teachers, knowing the day on which the inventory would be made, would in some way or other cause an increased attendance on that day. I have often conversed with officials in both those countries in regard to that precise point, and I found that every possible precaution is taken that there should be no knowledge whatever of the day on which this inventory is made. It is all over the country that the same half-day is used, and every possible precaution taken, and there is no boy registered twice. There are no five systems of duplica- tion, as Mr. Harris has described, and no one of these five methods are possible. I think by taking the attendance at an average day, with- SCHOOL STATISTICS. 371 out any foreknowledge possible, then at the end of six months, and aver- aging those reports, is by far the best method of getting the result that has yet been devised. Mr. Kickoff : Is this a daily report, or is it taken upon some specific day? Mr. Hall : For instance, in France in the primary years it is only taken once in three years. The number in actual attendance at a certain half-day is reported in every school in France for that half-day ; so there can be no duplication. Mr. Rickoff: It may be that the day might be so stormy that there would be few pupils out in certain sections of the empire. Mr. Hall: The attendance is far less, as every one familiar with European schools knows, affected by weather than it is here. This is taken, as I said, twice a year, with six months' interval, and then averaged, and then published once in three years. I listened attentively to hear Mr. Harris describe some of these newer methods of statistics, but I did not hear him say anything about these. I find by a careful study of the subject, in seventeen cities in different countries in Europe within the last few years very careful statistics have been collected with regard to various matters. Sometimes there are many points considered, some- times few. Sometimes they are all about growth of children, sometimes all about health, and these furnish a very valuable and entirely new contribution to the subject of pedagogy. I lay so much stress upon this that I believe it will give in the near future a new and hitherto unknown scientific basis to education. We are getting to know what the con- census of the school system is upon hygiene and methods of work. I do not know how far the statistics commonly published in this country treat of these subjects; but I wish very much that this great national association, which has been so favored pecuniarily in the last few years, would set apart, at least as an experiment, a small sum of its $35,000, in order to utilize certain material already collected, or to collect more in this direction. I know of one or two places where there are already very valuable new statistics of the most vital concern to us awaiting a good collaborator, and where $500 or $1,000 to pay the salary of the proper man for a single year would give us new material which I believe would be of the greatest importance. I go so far then as to wish that the Board of Directors of this Association would follow the example of all other scientific bodies that I know anything of, and set apart a little out of their surplus for this great work, and give us a contribution that would be distinctively American. The third and last point is this: I listened with some dismay to the introduction of this otherwise judicious report. I, for one, do not see the practical bearing of all this abstract discussion of quantity and qual- 372 NATIONAL COUNCIL OF EDUCATION. ity upon statistics. Education cannot be based upon metaphysics. I believe that qualities are just as valuable as quantities. In the British Association in 1862 or 1863 a member read an elabo- rate discussion about the indistinct inscription upon the famous Aber- deenshire stone, then just found. He argued that it was Phoenician, and must be read from right to left. In this way he puzzled it out to read "Han thanet zenaniah," etc. Translated, "Magistrate saturated with sorrow," etc. It proved a very early Semitic occupancy of the coun- try, he said. When he was done, a young expert who had been scruti- nizing the cast of the stone, said this interpretation was ingenious and interesting, but only learned nonsense. The inscription read the other way, from left to right, on an ordinary tombstone : " Hie jacet constan- tanius fillius," etc., an interpretation which the Association readily admitted. Mr. Harris: If these persons had considered the form of their method there would have been no difficulty of that kind. Mr. Johjs; Eaton: I regret very much I did not hear the entire report, but I gained this delightful impression, that Mr. Harris is find- ing a way to reach definite and satisfactory results in dealing with this question of statistics. That is, there is assurance of growth, and with that assurance I think there should be courage ; and that is given still further in the observation of our friend Mr. Hall. Of course these statistical investigations should find out what the population is, what the child population is, what is the age, what is the sex, and all other things that are essential, and then ascertain over against that what is done. As I heard the report, it gives a very interesting view of what it is possible to do, but it did not bring specially into view certain facts bearing on what is the population and how shall we ascertain it — the child population to be benefited by the school. We have had great difficulties ; a great many local elements come in ; there is a great variety of methods, so that it has been almost impossible to find averages, and statistics have been greatly embarrassed in all these directions. You know the original idea of the census was to find out how many men could bear arms and take the lives of other men. Now we are beginning to look for other qualities of citizenship. We cannot over- estimate the importance of correct statistics, and should not lose sight of the progress that has been made in this regard since 1870. Mr. Harris : In reply to what Mr. Hall said in regard to the accuracy of school statistics in France and Germany, I have no doubt of the great accuracy of many of their items; but I have made my strictures on the item of average* attendance from my knowledge of the running of schools and the actual methods of ascertaining the average attendance and the SCHOOL STATISTICS. 373 annual enrollment, having served as a superintendent of city schools for a long time, and having investigated the methods of other cities, and especially of Boston, where they have a good truant law, which is, I think, quite as efficiently executed as it is in any other place in the world, certainly more efficiently than would be practicable for a whole nation, like France, for instance. I do not believe that the statistics of any State or city can be correct if they show ninety per cent, and over in actual average daily attendance on the total number enrolled for the year ; I do not believe that such a high rate is possible. We find some countries of Europe claiming that ratio of average attendance, and when we, in the Bureau of Education, not long since, were undertaking to make up some comparative tables of school attendance, and we found that in Europe such higher percentages were claimed, I said with confi- dence that there was some mistake in the data ; probably the technical terms mean something else than the items we were considering. We wrote to two countries of Europe, and found that they took statistics of attendance twice a year. It is possible that an average of two special counts will give ninety per cent, and upward of the number on the annual registers, or it is possible that the number belonging to school on a particular day without deducting those absent temporarily may be ninety per cent, of those enrolled. But I cannot believe that the actual average attendance for a year can be ninety per cent, of the total num- ber of different pupils admitted to school in the course of that year. There have been invented a great many little devices to assist teachers to keep these items in an accurate manner, such for example as the " annual register number" that I described. In Boston, where they have a larger percentage of attendance upon the entire enrollment than in other city of this country, they have not yet been able to secure the high per cent, claimed in France and Germany for the school system of the entire nation. I conclude that it is impossible anywhere in the world to get such high percentages as they report. I wanted to put myself right with Mr. Hall, and so I made the second item of my report deal with the course of study, and I described it as the fourth step of progress in educational affairs, where the whole com- munity became interested in the matter of the course of study and the educative value of the several branches. The first item relates to the attendance of pupils; the third item to the revenues, and fourth, to the education of teachers ; the second inquires into the why of the course of study and the peculiar educative values of the several studies to the pupil, and Mr. Hall has done more than anybody else to attract atten- tion to the central importance of this item. Mr. Draper: I am not willing that the entire point, the only advan- 374 NATIONAL COUNCIL OF EDUCATION tage which might flow from the work of this committee, shall be lost by reason of the failure to call attention to the practical application of it, and therefore I take a half a minute of time to say that while I am delighted with the reasoning of this committee, no practical result will flow from it unless they shall go on and formulate the rules under which these statistics shall be taken. THE EDUCATION OF GIRLS. 375 VOLUNTEER PAPER. THE EDUCATION OF GIRLS. A PAPER SUPPLEMENTAL TO THE REPORT OF THE STANDING COMMITTEE ON THE EDUCATION OF GIRLS, MADE AT ST. PAUL, 1890. At the last session of the Council of the National Educational Associa- tion " A Report" was made by the Committee on the " Education of Girls," which, to many of the members, was hardly satisfactory. It insisted on only one point, and that already practically settled, namely, that girls ought to receive the large part of their education in immediate co-operation with boys. It did not appear to recognize woman as hav- ing any nature or function different in life or society from man. Thus, instead of addressing its task to the specific training of girls, it did treat solely of the education of the race. The subject should be reopened and discussed from the stand-point of woman's distinctive functions in life, in society, and in civilization. And as woman must, in almost every post in which she can be placed, discharge functions different from man, most certainly her education should prepare her for specific duties indicated by those functions. The law of economy of effort and that of division of labor demands that there should be, in part at least, a similar division of the work requisite for the training of woman for the proper exercise of her peculiar function. Let it not be forgotten, however, that, as many of the labors of men and women are performed in common and call for the same kind of skill, both sexes may properly learn these in common, or. in co-operation with each other ; and that just as lawyers, doctors, clergymen, merchants, and housekeepers, employers and employed, all learn in the same school and the same studies by the same methods, so the large part of the education of both men and women may, and, for economy sake, must, be obtained in the same places, and will be better learned and better practised for the being thus mutually learned under the same teachers. Granting all this and insisting upon it, may there not come a time when the sexes need to be separated for a functional education as we may call it, just as we select the persons designed to be preachers or engineers and send them to different schools of apprenticeship, to acquire the professional knowledge and skill which is to fit each one for his special calling? So a proper regard for propriety and economy would 376 NATIONAL COUNCIL OF EDUCATION suggest that boys and girls should at some time be taught in separate schools, where they can learn the distinctive duties belonging respect- ively to the high callings of the two sexes. Both are simply human beings in the first consideration, and therefore they may in the first of life learn most things in common and side by side. But when either sex would be fully prepared for peculiar functions let there be a dis- tinctive education or training in those peculiar specialties. No one doubts but that the one special function of woman is to be a mother. Not that every woman will attain to that high nobility. It does not follow, however, that the sex should not generally contemplate a preparation for such a proud distinction. Another of woman's grand duties is to make the home and to maintain the home life and instinct, as against the monastic isolation on the one hand, and on the other against the gregarious herding of the modern hotel system. Woman by her instinct seeks a home, and thereby sets herself to fill the world with all the graces and amenities which afford the race pleasure or lift it into civilization and comfort. The woman professionally — pardon the uncommon and almost mercenary use for the word in this connection — is a mother and a controller of society, a reformer and upholder of the good, the religious, and the beautifully noble in every relation and inter- est in life. She is, in short, the embodiment of the morality and virtue of every age. Does she not therefore need a preparation, an education, for this her profession? How very grand and useful she can be in the vocation of a reformer and organizer of private and public charities, let the names of Elizabeth Fry, Dorothea Dix, Florence Nightingale, and Frances Willard bear witness. Does not she want a training for such noble duties? They certainly will not get themselves done without her; and will not the race profit by giving her an outfit for them? Besides, she needs to know social forms and customs, to be familiar with the usages of polished society and to be accustomed to the harmless cere- monies by which rudeness is repressed and refinement encouraged. Where is it possible for her to obtain instruction in these? The answer is, nowhere but in the home — the best place in the world when it is the best home. But as the majority of homes are, they do not teach such things at all. A few schools promise something of this, but they are so few and expensive" that they can accomplish only a very little. We are therefore obliged to say that while the many homes of the land are so imperfectly organized, and presided over by so little grace and wisdom, it is a forlorn hope to expect that they will teach the perfect manner and refinements which the world so greatly needs. There is also a physiological education — Rosenkrantz calls it sexual — necessary to be learned, if the race is to be kept in health and vigor, and which is likely to be acquired from the most ignorant and the basest, THE EDUCATION OF GIRLS. 377 unless it is taught early by those who know how to do it, with pure hearts and in chaste words, and at proper times and under the noblest sanctions. The two agencies above named, the home and the special school, alone can do this work. We have schools to teach dancing and music, to impart grace of carriage and control of the voice, schools of carpentry and cooking and sewing, to give instruction and practice in the arts that adorn life and make it comfortable and successful ; why not schools in which young women can be taught and trained to under- stand themselves and their particular functions in life, and where they may get an appreciation of their high and dignified calling, as the mother element of the world, and, therefore, the makers of society, the conservators of religion and morality, of truth and honor, the founders of home and the builders of the nation and the government? It is the distinctive function of woman to make and keep a home, and thus to con- serve and promote all public and private virtue. She therefore needs a training by herself in all the knowledge and duties, the graces and amusements, the occupations and privileges growing out of those differ- ing functions and capabilities. The mother should be wise to impart an early education which shall save the child from the danger which con- stantly threatens, of a training which exposes all children to unnatural vices, and which only does not plunge them into the worst of crimes, incest, because of their impotence. The parent alone can perform this duty for the child, but he needs to be instructed how to do it so as not to injure delicate modesty and so as at the same time to increase refine- ment. But this is the precise point at which this essay aims. When girls have reached a certain age and are approaching maturity they are liable to certain ailments and exposed to certain temptations, and they do require specific education and peculiar guardianship. And hence the plea that, at least for a little time, they be segregated in separate schools for a professional training in a knowledge of the woman's functions, such as home-making, child-nursing and training, society-guiding and adorn- ing, where they shall be instructed and practised in these arts, as law or medicine or pedagogy are taught in their distinct schools. Here is a branch of human culture which it seems a National Council of Education ought to insist upon and recommend to the public. Let us have places where girls can be quietly and modestly instructed and trained in the duties of nursing the sick and caring for young children or the aged and unfortunate. For while it is reckoned one of the chief glories of woman's nature that she has an instinctive talent for such duties, it is equally well known that the knowledge and skill for performing them no more come by nature than do reading and writing. And it is legitimate to remark that the education of girls ought to 378 NATIONAL COUNCIL OF EDUCATION begin with that of their fathers and mothers and law-makers also. Look at only one ugly fact, not at all creditable to the state of public opinion, and of too much importance to be omitted, though it is often considered indelicate to speak of it. All of our States, I believe, have laws relating to what is called " the age of consent," a fact which goes far to prove the need of more education in this direction. In most cases this age is fixed at fourteen years ; that is, a girl, at an age when she is a mere child, totally irresponsible for any legal contract, four years before she may lawfully sell her cast-off clothing, and when she is most of all susceptible of the most dangerous temptations, may give up, or be seduced to part with, that which is dearer than life, and all that makes life valuable to her or to society, and neither she nor the community has a remedy. This I know is a very coarse statement, but no more polite words can express the enormity of the crime which a State is committing against itself when it allows such a possibility. The damage to the girl herself is indeed irreparable, but to the social life it is beyond conception dam- nable. It is domestic and national suicide by a slow process of carefully breeding vice and its consequent rottenness under color of legal permis- sion. Girls far more than boys, if possible, require the education which protects them from social villainy and which preserves the bloom of the most delicate purity. Then how multifarious are the complicated duties of domestic econ- omy, which is not only a fine art but is conservative of all the arts and social amenities of the race. All the sanitary conditions of the home, all its culinary arrangements, all its operations for comfort and peace, are very clearly dependent on the woman. The continuance of the race is bound up in these things. How much does the mother want enlighten- ment on matters which the world scorns to notice, or, worse still, seeks to hide, and it is she alone who can protect the child in its infancy against the questionable practices of nurses, and thus preserve its purity and honor till it can protect itself. We must not think that ignorance is purity or a defence against allurements of baseness. In fact, virtue is genuine only when it is a positive character in man, founded on intelli- gence and choice, deliberately made by a will guided by an enlightened conscience. And the plea here is that our girls ought to have an oppor- tunity to learn, in secluded schools, all the knowledge which women, as women and as the best guardians of the highest interest of the race, need to know; and that they should learn these things, as physicians and lawyers learn the particular duties of their respective professions, under competent teachers of their own sex. Hobekt Allyn. PROCEEDINGS Department of School Superintendence Department of Superintendence. SECRETARY'S MINUTES. FIRST DAY.— Morning Session. Tuesday, February 24, 1891. The Department of Superintendence of the National Educational As- sociation met in Association Hall, Fifteenth and Chestnut Streets, Phila- delphia, Pa., on Tuesday morning, February 24, 1891. The meeting was called to order at 10 o'clock, by the President, Andrew S. Draper, State Superintendent of New York. Prayer was offered by the Rev. Dr. George Dana Boardman of the First Baptist Church of Philadelphia. Addresses of welcome were delivered as follows : By Dr. William Pepper, Provost of the University of Pennsylvania, in behalf of the University and the higher educational institutions of the city. By President James MacAlister, of Drexel Institute, in behalf of the city. By Mrs. Mary E. Mumford, in behalf of the Board of Education. President MacAlister presented the compliments of the following insti- tutions, extending cordial invitations to the members of the Department to visit any or all of them as occasion and inclination might offer : Philadel- phia Art Club, Academy of Fine Arts, Historical Society of Pennsylvania, Academy of Sciences, Philadelphia Museum of Industrial Art, and Girard College. To these addresses and invitations the President of the Department made suitable response in behalf of the Department, tendering thanks for the same and accepting the invitations proffered. After preliminary remarks touching the aims and work of the Depart- ment, the President took up the regular work of the programme. Supt. J. M. Greenwood, of Kansas City, Mo., was appointed to report the discussions of the morning session. Supt. N. C. Dougherty, of Peoria, 111., read a paper on Compulsory Education in Illinois and Wisconsin. The subject was further discussed by the Hon. John Hancock, State Superintendent of Ohio; President James MacAlister, of the Drexel In stitute, Philadelphia ; John Mac Donald, of the Western School Journal, 382 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION. Topeka, Kansas, and the Hon. 0. E. Wells, State Superintendent of Wis- consin. Mr. George H. Martin, Agent of the Massachusetts State Board of Edu- cation, read a paper on Compulsory Education in Massachusetts. The question was further discussed by Supt. Edwin P. Seaver, of Bos- ton, Mass. ; Supt. I. N. Mitchell, of Fond du Lac, Wis. ; Supt. A. P. Marble, of Worcester, Mass.; Hon. B. G. Northrop, of Connecticut, and Hon. Thos. B. Stockwell, State Superintendent of Rhode Island. The President appointed the following Committee on Resolutions : Supt. A. P. Marble, of Massachusetts ; Supt. W. R. Garrett, of Tennessee ; Supt. A. B. Blodgett, of New York ; Supt. Henry Sabin, of Iowa, and Supt. H. W. Compton, of Ohio. Supt. Edwin P. Seaver was appointed to report the discussions of the afternoon. Adjourned to meet at 3 o'clock p.m. AFTERNOON SESSION. The Department reassembled at 3 o'clock, President Draper in the chair. Superintendent J. M. Greenwood presented his report of the morn- ing discussions. Report approved. The following resolution, by Superintendent Greenwood, was adopted : That each speaker who participates in the discussion of any topic on the programme shall be limited to five minutes, unless further time be granted by the Department. Supt. Aaron Grove, of Denver, offered the following resolution : That the Executive Committee of the National Educational Association, consisting of the President. Secretary, Treasurer, the First Vice-President, and the President of the Board of Trustees, be requested to report to this Department before the adjournment of this session, whether they can provide for the immediate publication of the volume of this meeting. Resolution unanimously adopted. By Mr. W. E. Sheldon, of Massachusetts : That the President appoint the usual Committees. Adopted. Supt. W. E. Anderson, of Milwaukee, Wis., read a paper on the Quali- fication and Supply of Teachers for City Schools. The subject was further discussed by Messrs. A. B. Blodgett, of Syracuse, N. Y. ; L. 0. Foose, of Harrisburg, Pa.; D. W. Harlan, of Wilmington, Del.; W. N. Barringer, of Newark, N. J.; Thos. Walton, of Philadelphia ; John T. Prince, of Boston ; C. W. Bardeen, of the School Bulletin of Syra- cuse, N. Y. ; Thos. M. Balliet, of Springfield, Mass. ; James MacAlister, of Philadelphia ; S. T. Dutton, of Brookline, Mass. ; J. M. Greenwood, of Kansas City, Mo.; E. E. White, of Cincinnati, Ohio ; E. Stanley Hall, of REPORT OF SECRETARY. 383 Clark University, Worcester, Mass.; S. A. Ellis, of Rochester, N. Y., and A. S. Draper, the Chairman, of Albany, N. Y. The discussion was closed by Mr. Anderson, who offered the following resolution : Resolved, That in the opinion of the Department of Superintendence the time has come when it is practicable to establish a professional standard for all teachers employed in City Public Schools, and the interests of Education require School Boards and Su- perintendents to establish a standard as an indispensable prerequisite to employment in the schools. Referred to the Committee on Qualification of Teachers, appointed at the Washington meeting in 1889, and continued in 1890. President James MacAlister presented the greetings of the Mayor of the city, and upon his suggestion the Department decided to call upon his honor in a body at the close of the Wednesday morning session. The following Committee on Nomination of Officers for the ensuing year was then announced : W. E. Sheldon, of Massachusetts ; J. H. Shinn, of Arkansas ; C. W. Bardeen, of New York ; N. C. Dougherty, of Illinois, and Aaron Gove, of Colorado. Supt. S. T. Dutton was appointed to report the discussion on Commis- sioner Harris's paper. Adjourned to meet at 8 o'clock, p.m. EVENING SESSION. The Department convened at 8 o'clock, President Draper in the chair. Mr. W. E. Sheldon moved that the name of Mr. N. A. Calkins, Chair- man of the Board of Trustees of the National Educational Association, be added to the Committee consisting of the President, Secretary, and Treas- urer of the National Association, to report on the immediate publication of proceedings. Adopted unanimously. Mr. Henry E. Edmonds, of the Board of Public Education of Philadel- phia, presented the greetings of that body, and extended an invitation to members of the Department to attend a reception to be given in their honor on Thursday evening. The invitation was accepted, and the Presi- dent authorized to make any necessary rearrangement of the programme to obviate the necessity of a regular meeting on that evening. United States Commissioner W. T. Harris then read a paper on the National Educational Association, its Organization and Functions. The subject was further discussed by Messrs. Gove, of Colorado ; Green- wood, of Missouri ; Hancock, of Ohio ; Northrop, of Connecticut ; Hal!, of Massachusetts ; White, of Ohio ; Shinn, of Arkansas ; Garrett, of Ten- nessee, and Mowry, of Massachusetts. Secretary E. H. Cook, of the National Educational Association, made a number of important announcements in reference to the Toronto meeting. Adjourned to meet at 10 o'clock on Wednesday. 384 TEE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION. SECOND DAY.— Morning Session. Wednesday, February 25. The Department convened at 10 o'clock, President Draper in the chair. Superintendent Seaver, of Boston, read his report of the discussion on Mr. Anderson's paper on the Qualification and Supply of Teachers. Re- port approved. A communication was received from the Union League of Philadelphia, inviting the members of the Department to visit their rooms, as they might find it convenient. The invitation was accepted by the President in behalf of the Department. A communication was received from the Governor and the school author- ities of Wisconsin, and the Mayor of Milwaukee, inviting the Department to meet in Milwaukee next year. Action deferred, and communication filed. Supt. Eugene Bouton, Bridgeport, Conn., was appointed to report the morning discussions. President James MacAlister, of Drexel Institute, Philadelphia, Pa., read a paper on Art Education in the Public Schools. The subject was further discussed by Supt. Thos. M. Balliet, of Spring- field, Mass., and Dr. J. H. Hoose, of the State Normal School, Cortland, N. Y. Prof. Frank Aborn, Director of Drawing, Cleveland, Ohio, read a paper on the Highest Office of Drawing. The subject was further discussed by Supt. Charles E. Gorton, of Yonkers, N. Y. Inspector James L. Hughes, of Toronto, Canada, Chairman of the Local Executive Committee of the National Educational Association, was intro- duced. He assured the Department that Canada is being aroused on the approach of the meeting of the National Educational Association, and that however far Canada might be from political union with the United States, she was ready to engage in unrestricted reciprocity with this coun- try in all matters of educational progress. He stated that arrangements were being made for the free passage of educational exhibits to the meet- ing of the Association, and for their free return, though the freedom of the Custom House might not be extended to the contents of the trunks of the ladies. Both the Government and the people of Canada extend a cordial welcome. The President made a number of necessary announcements, and declared a recess until 3 p.m. AFTERNOON SESSION. The Department was called to order at 3 p.m., President Draper in the chair. REPORT OF SECRETARY. 385 Supt. 8. T. Dutton read his report of the discussion of Commissioner Harris's paper. Supt. R. H. Pratt, of the Indian Schools, at Carlisle, Pa., was intro- duced. He spoke briefly in reference to the schools under his charge and of the education of Indian youth generally. General Anderson, of Hampton, Virginia, was also introduced by the President. He spoke briefly upon the education of the negro. The Committee on School Statistics, appointed one year ago, reported as follows : TO THE DEPARTMENT OF SUPERINTENDENCE, NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION. Gentlemen: — Your Committee, appointed at the last annual meeting, for the purpose of considering and reporting on the subject of School Statistics, beg leave to offer the following preliminary report, setting forth the results of their studies on the subject, and postponing for another meeting, or for the work of another committee, if it be your pleasure, the completion of the details of a scheme of statistics which will afford the data required for a comparative study of domestic and foreign educational systems. Your Committee would first call attention to the object and purpose of collection of statistics, which they conceive to be the following : Statistics reveal the nature and efficiency of the powers and forces involved in a process. Forces and powers are revealed in their results. Their results are of little mo- ment, if dead results, except as they indicate what the living power has been and still is. In matters of education we inquire into the aims and purposes of the educative process and learn this by a quantitative study of the means employed and the results attained. It is evident, therefore, at the outset, that the quantities given by our statistical tables can have no significance except in connection with the quantitative elements involved. We pass over at once from the how many to the what kind. We seek, again, new quan- titative data that may indicate the quality, but we never reach quantitative data that are significant in and for themselves. Your Committee would suggest as the four principal heads under which school sta- tistics may be grouped : First. Attendance of Pupils. Second. Course of Study. Third. Teaching Forces and Appliances. Fourth. Support — Revenue and Expenditures. Under these four heads they would group the following details: I. Statistics of attendance should answer questions like the following — (a) How many ? (b) How long ? (c) Who? That is to say (1) How many pupils in the aggregate ? (2) How many relatively to the entire population ? (3) How many relatively to the population of the school age, say 5 to 21, 6 to 14, or some other period agreed upon ? Then this item should be further de- fined in five items : (1) How many enrolled during the annual session of school? (2) How many as average belonging ? (3) How many in actual average daily attendance ? 386 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION (4) How many were dropped and afterwards readmitted ? (5) The number of cases of tardiness. Under the second item of attendance (How long) we wish the number of daily school sessions for the year and the hours of a school session, the length and hour of recesses and intermissions. Under the third item of Who we include such items as — (1) How many of each sex ? (2) How many at each year of age, and the average age ? (3) Race. (4) How many born in the town or State where the school is situated ? (5) How many born in other parts of the same nation ? (6) How many born abroad ? (7) Occupations of parents. II. Under the second of our four chief heads we should ask for statistics regarding the course of study, and thus determine by this grade of schools as follows — (a) Kindergarten. (&) Primary and Grammar School. (c) Secondary Education. (d) Higher Education. We should ask very carefully as to the relations of these items to the first class of items, especially age, sex, and average attendance. The Primary and Grammar Schools are to be distinguished from the Secondary Schools by the following test : The introduction of Algebra, or of an ancient or modern language, marks the beginning of the secondary course of study. The higher course of study should be marked by analytic mathematics, or by logical and philosophical studies, or by advanced language studies. The third general head, " The Teaching Forces and Appliances," includes — (1) Buildings and accommodations. (2) Size of schools under one principal teacher (number of pupils per teacher). (3) Number of teachers. (4) Supervision. (5) Means of training teachers. (6) Examinations of teachers. (7) Methods of discipline and instruction used by teachers. The fourth general head, " The Support of Schools," includes — (1) Revenue. Items of. (a) Receipts from State and local taxation. (p) Receipts from funds or productive property. (c) Receipts, if any, from tuition. (2) Expenditures. (a) For teachers' salaries, including supervision. (b) Incidentals, including janitor hire, fuel, apparatus and current expenses. (c) Permanent investments, including building and repairs. Your Committee would call attention to the importance of a detailed discussion of the use to be made of these several items in studying the effective forces of educational systems and in comparing one with another. Such discussion is not here attempted, but is suggested as a proper subject of a supplementary report. Moreover, your Com- REPORT OF SECRETARY. 387 mittee have observed the prime necessity for such a definition of the several items as to prevent misunderstanding. A description of the best methods of keeping and tabulating the several items would also be a very useful addition to such a report. In dealing with reports, not merely reports from a foreign country, but with reports from different sections of the United States, your Committee has been impressed with the necessity of a glossary of terms used in tabulating statistics. There should be a careful collation of all terms and designations used here and abroad, and so minute a description given of the processes of ascertaining the data under the several heads, as to leave no doubt in the mind as to the exact meaning of each. Without this accurate information there can be no satisfactory comparative study of school systems. All of which is respectfully submitted. W. T. Harris. Jas. MacAlister. The above report was received, approved, and again referred to the Committee for further elaboration and report at the next meeting, one year hence. Mr. W. E. Sheldon presented a verbal report of the Committee on Publication, appointed at the New York meeting in 1890. He stated that arrangements were made at the St. Paul meeting of the National Associa- tion by which the proceedings, addresses, etc., of this Department are hereafter to appear in the regular volume issued by the Association. Dr. N. A. Calkins, of the Executive Committee of the National Edu- cational Association, to whom the matter of the immediate publication of the proceedings, papers, and discussions of the present meeting was referred, submitted the following report : The matter submitted to the Executive Committee of the National Educational As- sociation,* relating to the publication of the proceedings of the present meeting of the Department of Superintendence, prior to the publication in the volume of the General Proceedings of the National Educational Association for 1891, has been considered by this Committee. While there does not appear to be any special provision of authority for final action in this matter, the Committee, believing that an early publication of the proceedings of this meeting is important, and should be provided for, therefore submit the following proposition: That the Executive Committee will provide for an early publication, in pamphlet form, of the proceedings of the Department of Superintendence, held in Philadelphia in February, 1891, provided that the members of this Department will pledge themselves to sustain such action and to advocate its approval by the Board of Directors of the National Educational Association at the meeting to be held at Toronto next July. For the Committee, N. A. CALKINS, Chairman Board of Trustees. The report was unanimously approved. The Committee on the Qualification of Teachers, appointed at the * The Executive Committee for the ensuing year shall consist of the President, the Secretary, the Treasurer, the First Vice-President, and the President of Board of Trustees, with full power to act in all matters connected with the meeting for 1891. (Proceedings of St. Paul meeting, page 33.) 388 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION Washington meeting in 1889, and given further time at the New York meeting, submitted the following report : Your Committee, to whom was referred the question of the qualifications for teachers' licenses in cities, respectfully report : That it is the sense of the Department of Superintendence of the National Educa- tional Association that the following qualifications should be required of all local candi- dates for positions as teachers : 1. In scholarship, the minimum requirement should be graduation from the local High School, or some institution of similar or higher rank, with such further examina- tion as conditions may warrant or require. 2. In professional training, a course of at least one year in the principles and methods of education in a local training class or school, or in some similar institution officially recognized by the State Department of Public Instruction. 3. In experience, at least one year's satisfactory trial on provisional certificate before a permanent certificate is granted. For candidates from without the city your Committee do not feel authorized, in the present unsettled and various standards of certification, to advise the employment of teachers below the rank of Principal, except upon examination by the City Superin- tendent. No person should be licensed to teach who is not possessed of sound scholarship, and either has had professional training, or proved his fitness for his work by practical experience. Wm. H. Maxwell. W. E. Sheldon. Eeport adopted. The Committee on the Nomination of Officers reported as follows : President — Henry Sabin, Des Moines, Iowa. First Vice-President — V. C. Curtis, New Haven, Conn. Second Vice-President — Oscar H. Cooper, Galveston, Tex. Secretary — L. W. Day, Cleveland, Ohio. The report was received, and the persons named elected. Brooklyn, N. Y., was selected as the place of the next meeting of the Department. The President declared a recess until 8 o'clock. EVENING SESSION. The Department convened at 8 o'clock, President Draper in the chair. Chancellor George William Curtis, of the University of New York, delivered an address on Civil Service and the Public School. President Draper, speaking for the members, conveyed to Mr. Curtis their thanks for the excellent address. This assurance was further emphasized by a rising vote of the Department. General Thos. J. Morgan, Commissioner of Indian Affairs, was intro- duced by the President. He spoke briefly in relation to the education of the Indian and the management of Indian affairs. Adjourned, to meet at 10 o'clock on Thursday. REPORT OF SECRETARY. 389 THIRD DAY.— Morning Session. Thursday, February 26. The Department was called to order by the President at 10 o'clock. Superintendent Bouton presented his report of the discussion on Mr. MacAlister's and Mr. Aborn's papers. Report approved. President MacAlister, on behalf of the University of Pennsylvania, extended an invitation to the Department to visit the psychological laboratory of that institution. Invitation accepted. Commissioner Harris presented the following letter from the Swiss Legation, and urged the importance of definite action on the part of the Department. LEGATION DE SUISSE AUX ETATS-UNIS. Washington, D. C, February 23, 1891. Sir : — The Board of Managers of the International Geography Congress, which is to convene in the city of Berne on the 10th of August next, has decided to organize for that occasion an exposition, of which the first section will comprise objects relating to the instruction of geography in schools, such as text-books and other appliances, methods, and programmes, the work of pupils, etc. The Exposition will be opened on the 1st of August, and continue until the 15th of that month, and is open alike to individuals of all nations as to authorities. Realizing the importance of securing as complete an exhibit as possible, the managers have requested the Department of Foreign Affairs of Switzerland, through its diplomatic and consular representatives abroad, to extend a cordial invitation to all parties likely to be interested in such an Exposition to participate in the display on that occasion. This legation, inclosing herewith a number of copies of the official invitation for distribution, would therefore solicit your honor, as chief of the National Bureau of Education of the United States, kindly to bring this subject to the attention of the Superintendents of Education at their meeting in Philadelphia, to-morrow, the 24th inst., and in behalf of this legation express the hope that, wherever practicable, their several schools will participate in said Exhibition. Thanking your honor for the interest you wdl be pleased to take in this matter, I have the honor to remain, Sir, with highest consideration, THE SWISS MINISTER. In his absence, (Signed) K. Kloss, Counsellor Swiss Legation. On motion of Mr. Harris, a committee of five was appointed to take charge of the whole matter in the most effective way. The committee consists of A. G. Lane, of Chicago, 111. ; C. W. Bardeen, of Syracuse, N. Y. ; John Hancock, of Columbus, Ohio; John T. Prince, of Newtonville, Mass., and D. J. Waller, Jr., of Harrisburg, Pa. Commissioner Harris, referring to the report on the Henry Barnard fund at the St. Puul meeting in July last, urged the members of the Department to make vigorous efforts in their respective localities to secure the necessary subscriptions at the earliest practicable time. 390 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION President MacAlister emphasized the suggestions and recommendations of Mr. Harris, and paid a high tribute to the life and work of Henry Barnard. Mr. Bardeen urged the importance of the movement, stating that with- out such fund it will be impossible to bring the valuable publications of Mr. Barnard into accessible shape. He stated, also, that the Commis- sioner of Education would publish a full index of the work, which would render it invaluable. Mr. Eickoff thought the raising of the fund was an act of simple justice which superintendents and teachers owed Mr. Barnard. The matter was further discussed by Superintendent Buehrle, of Lan- caster, Pa. ; Professor S. G. Williams, of Cornell University ; W. E. Sheldon, of Boston, Mass.; "W. E. Anderson, of Milwaukee, Wis., and others. But no official action was taken by the Department. Supt. W. H. Maxwell was appointed to report the discussions on the morning paper. Supt. Oscar H. Cooper of Galveston, Tex., then read a paper on Uni- versities and Schools. The subject was further discussed by Pres. Harrison E. Webster, of Union College; Prof. S. G. Williams, of Cornell University; Pres. Nicholas Murray Butler, of the College for the Training of Teachers ; Supt. Eugene Bouton ; , Geo. H. Martin and Pres. G. Stanley Hall, of Clark University. The Committee on Resolutions submitted the following report : The Department of Superintendence of the National Educational Association, at the mid-year meeting for 1891, have been received and entertained in the city of Philadel- phia with a cordiality and a warmth of hospitality almost, if not quite, unprecedented; and amidst the inspiring surroundings in this historic place and by the sympathetic assistance of the citizens, this meeting has been one of the most profitable in the history of the Department. For this result the thanks of the Department are due especially, and they are hereby tendered, to President James MacAlister for his thoughtful care in making all needful arrangements for the meeting, and for his constant contributions to its interests; to the Board of Education, the city authorities, and the heads of educational and other in- stitutions here— too numerous to name especially — for our entertainment, and for the open doors which we have been invited and urged to enter, and to the railroads and hotels which have granted us reduced rates. We also thank the President and officers of the Department for a programme of un- usual interest, carried out with a promptness and effectiveness worthy of an educational Napoleon ; and we thank the several lecturers and speakers for a rare educational treat. As the result, in part, of our deliberations, we announce and place on record the fol- lowing conclusions : 1. In our free Republic the State is merely the expression of the people's will, and not an external governmental force; and taxes are levied on property for the support of schools, because universal education is indispensable to the perpetuity of the State. Education, therefore, including our acquaintance with our national language, becomes the rightful inheritance of every child. It is the right and the duty of the State not REPORT OF SECRETARY. 391 only to provide for this education, but also to insist that no child shall be deprived of this priceless heritage. The proper exercise of this right does not restrict the freedom of parents in the education of their children, except in the narrow limits of this neces- sary purpose. 2. ^Esthetic culture, the appreciation of the beautiful in nature, in literature, in the truths of science, in art, is an end towards which all good teaching aims; and this love of the beautiful, while it softens the asperities of life, and contributes largely to the sum total of human happiness, tends also to moral beauty and the development of noble character, if this love is awakened by teachers efficient and thoroughly equipped. 3. To this end we urge the establishment of normal schools, colleges for the prepara- tion of teachers, chairs of pedagogy in universities, courses of lectures in the science of teaching, educational periodicals, and all other means for the preparation of teachers for their work ; and we desire that by these means the teachers of the land may, so far as possible, fit themselves for this noblest of all professions before entering it, and that we may none of us regard the preparation for this great duty fully accomplished, so long as little children come fresh from the hands of the Creator to be guided and developed, to a great extent, if not chiefly, under our care. 4. We welcome the tendency to establish widely over our country free public libraries, in view of their nature as an educational force in school and among the people; and especially we commend the wise foresight of those men of wealth who are administering their own estates by giving liberally while living to found or to endow such libraries, especially in their own towns, where they can witness and enjoy the results. And on behalf of our constituency, now truly national, we applaud also the munificence which is establishing so many schools and colleges that open a gate much broader than the needle's eye, not only for the rich man but for a long procession of the young, to the glories of the hereafter. 5. We most emphatically commend to the country the exposition of the principles of civil service as applying to the teachers in the Public Schools, to which we have listened; and we recommend the enactment of laws in the several States, requiring, from all candidates for the office of teacher in these schools, certificates of qualification from the State authorities. Such a law would not appoint teachers: it would simply decide what candidates should not receive appointment. 6. The revival of interest in education, the emulation of authors, and the rivalry of publishers, have within the past fifty years produced great improvements in school-books for both pupils and teachers. We are opposed to State publication of school-books, because such a custom would inevitably tend to destroy this healthy emulation ; and because whatever useful and indispensable functions properly belong to the State as a corporate body, the preparation of books in a constantly growing science, and the writing of poetry, for example, are not among these functions. Experience has fully justified this belief. 7. Justice, as well as the best public service, requires the retirement and pensioning of teachers after a service of thirty years, and upon carefully devised conditions. We recommend the enactment of laws in the several States to permit and to regulate the retirement and pensioning of professional teachers. A. P. Marble, A. B. Blodgett, W. R. Garrett, Henry Sabin, Committee on Resolutions. The President declared a recess until 3 p.m. 392 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION. AFTERNOON SESSION. President Draper called the Department to order at 3 o'clock. A paper was read by State Superintendent Henry Sabin, of Iowa, on What Present Means are Available for the Preparation of Teachers for their Work ? Supt. W. E. Anderson was appointed to report the discussions on Mr. Sabin's paper. President Draper, in a few appropriate words, introduced the President- elect of the Department, Henry Sabin, of Iowa, who, after a brief address, assumed the duties of his office. Superintendent Sabin's paper was discussed by Superintendents Wm. H. Beach, of Madison, Wis., A. P. Marble, of Worcester, Mass.; J. M. Greenwood, of Kansas City, Mo.; Wm. N. Barringer, of Newark, N. J. ; H. C. Missimer, of Erie, Pa.; and A. S. Draper, of Albany, N. Y. On motion of President MacAlister, a rising vote of thanks was tendered the retiring president, Hon. A. S. Draper, for the prompt, efficient, and every way satisfactory manner in which for two years he had conducted the affairs of the Department, to which Mr. Draper made suitable response. There being no further business claiming attention, the Department adjourned, to meet next year in Brooklyn, N. Y. L. W. DAY, Secretary. RECENT LEGISLATION UPON COMPULSORY EDUCATION. 393 PAPERS AND DISCUSSIONS. RECENT LEGISLATION UPON COMPULSORY EDUCATION IN ILLINOIS AND WISCONSIN. BY N. C. DOUGHERTY, CITY SUPERINTENDENT, PEORIA, ILLINOIS. The attempts that have been made to secure the enactment of laws in these two States for the purpose of bringing all children into the schools, public or private, have excited an unusual degree of attention. Indeed, a stronger statement may be made. These attempts have created a degree of excitement seldom paralleled. It is fair to say that in both States vio- lent prejudices have been aroused. Measures which were devised for the best purposes, and which received the almost unanimous support of the Legislatures to which they were submitted, have been denounced as intend- ed to subvert the liberty of the citizen. An event so peculiar is certainly worthy of study. A careful examination of the case will bring to light some of the peculiarities of our American civilization. It will illustrate some of the political methods which it is hoped the extension of education may finally bring to an end. Such examination will also show, undoubt- edly, the necessity of unifying energy in our system of education — an energy that will harmonize into one grand, intelligent, patriotic, and vir- tuous nation the millions of separate and discordant peoples with which the land is now filled. In Illinois the necessity for a compulsory education law has long been felt. In his biennial report for the years 1871-2, Dr. Newton Bateman, then Superintendent of Public Instruction, urged upon the Legislature the necessity of a law compelling the attendance of children upon school, where such compulsion was necessary to secure them a reasonable education. He treated the matter under the head of the Educational Rights of Children. The Superintendent assumed that where the child is not sent to school, the child himself is the chief loser — the principal thing to be thought of is the securing of his rights. This is an eminently just view of the case. But the Legislature did not at once respond to Dr. Bateman's recommen- dation. It was not until ten years after this recommendation was made that the subject was positively acted upon. In 1883 a law was passed for the purpose named, but it had been carefully drawn in such a way as to offend no one. The consequence was that almost no good was accom- 394 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION. plished by it. There is no record of any case in which it was enforced so as to secure the attendance of a single child upon school. To the educational men it became apparent that the law had no worth. It was a dead letter upon the statute-book. But in the year 1889 another law was passed of a very different charac- ter. It has the energy of an effective vitality. It provides that '-Every person having under his control a child between the ages of seven and four- teen years shall annually cause such child to attend for at least sixteen weeks, at least eight weeks of which attendance shall be consecutive, gome public day-school in the city, town, or district in which he resides, which time shall commence with the beginning of the first term of the school year, or as soon thereafter as due notice shall be served upon the person having such control, of his duty under this act." Proper penalties are provided for every neglect of such duty, consisting of a fine of not less than one, nor more than twenty dollars, and the guilty party is to stand committed until such fine and costs of suit are paid. But the person so neglecting may show, to the satisfaction of the Board of Education or of directors, that the child has attended for a like period of time a private day-school, approved by the Board of Education or of directors, of the city, town, or district in which such child resides ; or that instruction has otherwise been given such child for a like period of time in the branches commonly taught in the pub- lic schools ; or that he has already acquired the branches of learning taught in the public schools ; or that his physical or mental condition, as declared by a competent physician, is such as to make his attendance upon school inexpedient, and in that case such penalties shall not be incurred. ~No school shall be regarded as a school under this act unless there shall be taught therein, in the English language, reading, writing, arithmetic, his- tory of the United States, and geography. The law also provides for the appointment, by the Board of Education or of directors, of a truant officer or officers, whose duty it shall be to inquire concerning all supposed violations of the law, and to enter complaint against all persons who shall appear to be guilty of such violations. It is also the duty of the truant officer to arrest children of a school-going age who habitually haunt public places and have no lawful occupation, and also truant children who absent themselves from school without leave, and to place them in charge of the teacher having charge of the public school which such children are by law entitled to attend. In the Legislature the law was carefully considered and was entirely de- void of all partisan characteristics. Members of both the prominent politi- cal parties gave it their hearty support, in the belief that in thus doing they were rendering the State a noble service. Indeed, to all reasonable persons, the necessity for such a law was apparent. From the school statistics for the year 1888 it is reasonable to infer that there must have been, in the State of Uliuois, 134,000 persons under sixteen years of age, and above RECENT LEGISLATION UPON COMPULSORY EDUCATION. 395 \ six, who were not attending school of any sort, public or private. The total number enrolled in the public schools for that year was 751,349, and in the private schools of the State, 100,4(55. The number of non-attend- ants was too large a fraction of the total number for the safety of the State and for the good of the people. Certain general considerations undoubtedly had their effect upon the minds of the legislators. The fact that laws, compelling the attendance of children at school, have been enacted and are now in force among the most enlightened and freest nations of the earth ; the obvious fact that in a republic nothing is more dangerous than ignorance in the populace ; the demand of justice, that if a man is taxed without his own consent for the support of schools, for the avowed purpose of securing the universal intelligence of the people, he has a right to demand that the purpose of such taxation shall be carried out ; these, and other similar considerations, undoubtedly influenced the minds of the members of both Houses. The result was that when the final vote came to be taken the measure encoun- tered in the Senate not one opponent; and in the House, of 153 members, there were but six votes against it. The Bennett Law was prepared by Robert Luscum, Assistant City Attorney of Milwaukee, at the request of a committee appointed by a German school society. I think Mr. Luscum was familiar with the action of the Schoolmasters' Club, in Illinois, and was guided in the preparation of his bill by the one introduced in the Legislature of that State. The bill was introduced in the Assembly of the Wisconsin Legislature by Hon. Michael Bennett, an Irish Catholic, Chairman of the Committee on Education. It did not receive much consideration, except by the com- mittees on education, and there is no record that there was a vote against it in either branch. And what has been the result of the operation of these laws thus far ? I speak more especially for Illinois, as being better acquainted with the facts in that State. In the city of Chicago, during the year ending July, 1890, 10,000 children, or thereabouts, were taken from the streets during the school months and placed in the schools. In other parts of the State similar results were attained. Briefly, it may be said that the number of children thus gathered into the schools of the towns and country districts of the State, outside of Chicago, is equal to those reported in that city. And it ought not to be forgotten that this large gain to the schools was accom- plished without friction, and with almost no employment of force. In Chicago, in Springfield, and in other cities, we learn that there have been no prosecutions. Another fact is worth reciting here. Of the 10,000 children placed in the schools in Chicago, 1,500 were placed in private or parochial schools. Similar results are known to have followed in other parts of the State, but the record of them has not been so accurately kept. This has been in 396 TEE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION. exact accord with the spirit of the law. It was not intended to be hurtful to the private or parochial schools. Its object was to promote education, to secure to children their dearest and most valuable rights. But the subject may be regarded from another standpoint. Taking the statistics of the entire State, we have a gain in the enrolment in the public schools for the year ending June, 1890, over the preceding year, of 1G,454. The private schools for the same time show a gain of 6,729 over the previous year. For the year 1888 to 1889, the gain in the public school enrolment was 4,410 ; and in the private schools, for the same time, there was an absolute loss. And a record of attendance shows a still more marked improvement than that of enrolment. In the year ending June, 1889,the number of days of attendance on the public schools by pupils in this State was 80,041,817. In the year closing in June, 1890, the total number of days of attendance reached 84,659,664, or a gain of more than 4,600,000 of days of attendance during the last year over the preceding. The gain of 1889 over 1888 amounted to only 600,000 school days. The gain of 1890 over 1889 was, therefore, more than seven times as great as that of the preceding year, and only the compulsory education law can account for the difference. It ought not to be forgotten that all this good was accomplished in the face of constant and irritating opposition. No effort was spared by the enemies of the law to make it odious in the eyes of the people. Eminent lawyers were employed, wherever a prosecution was begun, to denounce the law and to defend the parties prosecuted. There seemed to be no sparing of expense in carrying on these operations. And yet, notwith- standing all this hostility, the magnificent results already named were achieved. We have enumerated some of the pleasant and encouraging results as viewed from one standpoint. But the enactment of the law, as already intimated, was followed by another class of consequences. A few of the managers of parochial schools were disturbed at the prospect of being required to teach English in their institutions. Soon after the passage of the law, certain Lutheran ministers connected with the Missouri Synod, so-called, began to criticise it, and they kept up their work assiduously. Certain politicians, being very desirous of gaining an ascendency in the State, saw in this their opportunity. They immediately began to en- courage the Lutheran malcontents to persist in their criticisms. Many Lutherans were disposed to take a reasonable view of the matter ; but the politicians, and the more unreasonable among their own number, would not permit them to remain neutral. The agitation at first was carried on mostly under cover. The general public, for a time, knew very little of it. An eminent Democratic leader advised against making the repeal of the law a plank in the State platform, but urged the party to utilize the opposition to it, wherever they could, in different localities. In this way REGENT LEGISLATION UPON COMPULSORY EDUCATION 397 a perfectly organized system was developed, and was put into vigorous operation. In the meantime, the Republican party was disinclined to take up the school issue, and its State platform on the subject was of the milk-and- water type. The campaign was under the management of a man whose contempt for schools and literary people is only exceeded by their con- tempt for him. This man regarded the office of State Superintendent as only a thing to trade upon. For the sake of securing votes for mem- bers of the Legislature, he gave it to be distinctly understood that he was willing to sacrifice the candidate for the State Superintendency. He directed the Republican orators not to refer to the compulsory education law in their speeches. But, as the months rolled on, the strength of the opposition to the law became more and more manifest, and some slight effort was made to support it. The president of this Department, Judge Draper, delivered at Peoria a convincing and inspiring address in support of the law. The Schoolmasters' Club, and other educational associations, spoke out in ringing tones upon the subject, and for the last three weeks of the campaign there was something done in the political arena in behalf of the schools. But these efforts were represented as the mere makeshift of a party reduced to extremities, and thousands upon thousands of the good citizens of the State were made to believe that there was no danger to the free-school system or the compulsory education law. But the op- ponents of the law kept up their movements vigorously. On the Sunday preceding the election violent addresses were made in all the German Lutheran churches, as well as in some of the German Catholic churches, and the preachers, with large numbers of their congregations, were detailed to act as ticket pedlers at the polls. In these pulpit harangues the simple- minded people were made to believe that the law menaced their personal liberty, that the effect of it would be to make their further residence in America intolerable. From the political platform also the most absurd appeals were made. Demagogues, who cared neither for God nor religion, declared that this measure would make it impossible for the people to worship according to their inherited faith. Every possible influence was brought to bear to secure votes. Candidates for the Legislature were secretly pledged against the law. Soon after the publication of the law in Wisconsin, the German Lutheran Synod passed resolutions condemning it, and pledging the Lutheran Church to an uncompromised repeal of it. Soon after this action by the German Lutherans, there appeared the manifesto of the three German Catholic prelates of the State. Subsequent to this there was a meeting of the Ger- man Catholic societies, which not only passed resolutions demanding the repeal of the law, but denounced Governor Hoard as an enemy of the church schools and German customs. The next organized attack on the law came from a joint meeting of German Lutherans and German Catholics, 398 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION. with a sprinkling of devout Democratic politicians. The results of the election indicate very clearly that both the German Lutheran and the German Catholic churches of the State worked and voted almost to a man in support of the Democratic ticket. The great political revolution which appears to have swept over the whole country also had its effect in the same direction in both these States. These causes operating together produced the result. Governor Hoard in Wisconsin and Dr. Edwards in Illinois were defeated. They were noble, conscientious men. They were men who had the courage of their con- victions. Each could have been elected by a large majority had he been willing to betray the right of the State or sacrifice the right of the child to an education in the English language. Each preferred defeat to such a betrayal of interests committed to his care. They went down as sacri- fices to race prejudice, and their names will ever be linked together and honored wherever freedom has a votary or liberty a home. But this result ought not to be taken as the expression of the enlightened public sentiment of the State. Thousands of persons were deceived into the belief that their personal liberty was threatened by law — a suggestion for which there was not a shadow of foundation. If the law compelled the children to learn certain dogmas, to accept certain beliefs, whether in religion or politics or social science, it might be reasonably objected to as restricting the liberty of the individual. But the compulsion is not of this kind. The compulsory education law merely compels the recog- nition of the rights of children to an amount of intelligence that will enable them to make useful and successful citizens, to secure their own happiness and to do good in the world. The compulsion that dictates the belief of a man is a trammel upon his mental freedom ; but the compul- sion that prevents one human being from keeping another human being in ignorance really promotes an enlargement of individual liberty. If these laws could be executed in a right spirit, the amount of individual freedom in these States would be immensely enlarged by their agency. Thousands of well-meaning persons, as already stated, believed that there was really no danger, either to the school system or the compulsory law. The parties hostile to the law were intensely and furiously active. Most of its friends, trusting to the inherent justice of their cause, put forth little effort. There are not wanting indications that if the same question could have been "voted upon again as soon as the result of the 4th of November became known, that result would have been emphatically reversed. One of the lamentable results of the opposition to the law is that for the time being its moral influence is diminished. Whatever legislation may be enacted, it will require strong and vigorous effort on the part of the friends of free schools to restore to these institutions their full measure of beneficent influence. REGENT LEGISLATION UPON COMPULSORY EDUCATION. 399 There is, however, inspiration in the thought that the public sentiment among educational men remains loyal to the great principle of the right of every child to an education. At the meeting of the State Teachers' Asso- ciation, held in December, 1890, the largest and most enthusiastic ever held in the State of Illinois, no sentiment uttered by any of the speakers elicited a tithe of the applause that followed every approving reference to the compulsory education law. Bishop Spaulding, in the course of his masterly address, expressed his approval of it, and the vast audience, fill- ing every square foot of the great Hall of Representatives, broke forth into tumultuous and long-continued cheering. And, near the close of the meeting, the following out-spoken resolution was adopted with entire unanimity : Resolved, That the law concerning the education of children, known as the compulsory education law, which went into effect July 1, 1889, was a measure calculated to promote intelligence, humanity, and personal liberty ; that such a measure is necessary to pro- tect the free institutions of this country against the assaults of demagogues and dog- matists ; that its purpose was to increase the amount of intelligence and personal in- dependence among our people ; that the effects produced by its enactment and right enforcement have been in a high degree salutary ; that the rate of increase in attend- ance in our schools since its enactment, compared with former years, has been more than doubled ; that the abuses that have risen under it have been very light, compared with those arising under almost any other law, and that the law, therefore, ought not to be repealed or so amended as to lessen its efficiency. What the final action of the Legislature upon the subject will be, it is impossible at this writing to determine. Undoubtedly a strong effort will be made for a complete repeal, but it is safe to say that such a proposition will not prevail. The friends of the law in the Legislature are very resolute. It is hoped that they will be able to prevent any serious impairment of the efficacy of the statute. The danger is that the politicians may be frightened into tempo- rizing by the fear of losing the ignorant vote, but Governor Fifer is himself a product of the public schools, and has the courage of his convictions. We have been accustomed to claim for our beloved country a proud pre- eminence among the nations of the earth. Our resources, our geographical position, and, above all, our institutions, put us in the lead of all the peoples in the world in respect to the privileges that we enjoy. We have not the antiquity of some of the other nationalities, but we are old enough to have produced a Washington and a Lincoln. We are old enough to have wrought out a system of government which is the admiration of all lovers of liberty in all lands. But the thought of what has gone into our national life gives us the basis for our most exalted estimate of the value of our country to-day. For that iu it which we cherish most stands for tears and toils and prayers 400 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION. and sacrifices and deaths. The blood of our ancestors is in it. The blood of dear ones, into whose faces we have looked, whose hands we have clasped and with whom we have walked in loving fellowship, is a part of this glori- ous entity that we call our country. We put value on possessions accord- ing to their cost. Can we put too high a value on that which has come to us at the cost of so much unselfish suffering ? Tennyson, in one of his poems, has expressed a doubt as to whether elevated sentiments and he- roic living can be long maintained without the shock of war — whether in times of peace men do not become mercantile in their habits and selfish in their feelings, and leave the more manly virtues to stagnate and rot into decay. We have lived through one century of government, and the record made is a magnificent one. To the challenge sent out to us from our revolutionary sires and the framers of the Constitution, "Watchman, what of the night?" we have answered back, "All is well. " But is it certain that this liberty of ours, for which men but a few years since carried muskets and died carrying them, for which they forded streams and waded through swamps and climbed mountains, and met all the ex- posure of the picket lines, and stormed forts and faced the belching month of cannon, and made the last sacrifice that it is possible for even the most devoted to make for their country — is it certain that this liberty, which has cost so much, is to go on in a kind of inevitable perpetuation? that these free institutions are to remain free institutions through their own inherent virtue ? that this cherished self-government is to need no looking after, in order to keep it moving along the lines on which our fathers projected it? Are not the conditions even now somewhat changed? Look at the large part played in the management of political affairs by the selfish and disreputable elements of society ! See how those ignorant of our country's language, of its history, of its true spirit, of its great purpose, were welded into one mass and thrown against the progress of American civilization, as was done in Illinois and Wisconsin in November ! Shall we not insist that virtue, diligently promoted, that right laws, administered and legally obeyed, that intelligence, universally diffused, are essential to the prosperity and perpetuity of our nation? For three-quarters of a century everybody could see just the point of peril to national unity and national life, and when the shock came it was not a surprise. With the existing condition which I have attempted to point out this morning, can we not see wherein the future strain is likely to become excessive ; and shall we not, as a wise people, strive to make strong that which within us is weak — to raise and illumine that which is dark? The principle on which the compulsory legislation of Wisconsin and Illinois is based — the right of a child to an elementary education in the language of the nation, and the duty of the State to secure him that right — is not dead. It lives in the Declaration of Independence, it lives in every DISCUSSION. 401 page of our country's history, and, having within it the germ of undying vigor, will continue to live — Till the sun grows cold, And the stars are old, And the leaves of the judgment -book unfold. DISCUSSION. [Reported by Supt. J. M. Greenwood, Kansas Citt, Mo.] Mr. Hancock, of Ohio, said : When he reflected on the fact that his State had no State Normal Schools, nor any kind of supervision for her ungraded schools, he felt abashed in the presence of educational repre- sentatives of States more happily situated. But in the matter of compul- sory education he believed the State was entitled to some credit. She has a compulsory law that compels ; and this law was passed in 1889 by the unanimous vote of both branches of the General Assembly, having, consequently, both the great political parties at its back. And better still, in its enforcement there has been no division of sentiment on religious lines, all denominations, with rare individual exceptions, giving it a hearty support. The age for compulsory attendance, in the law as originally passed, was of youth between eight and fourteen years, including those between four- teen and sixteen who cannot read and write ; and the time for each year, sixteen weeks in the country schools and twenty weeks in the city and vil- lage schools. But at the meeting of the Legislature in 1890, an advance step was taken scarcely less important than the passage of the original law itself. This makes attendance compulsory on the part of all youth be- tween eight and sixteen years, not engaged in some regular employment, for the whole time the schools of the several districts may be in session. Under this provision youth must, after the original compulsory period has been completed, either continue in school or go to work. The moral re- sults of this new feature of the law will undoubtedly be great. All amendments to the law, as weak places have manifested themselves in its execution, have been made with the purpose of strengthening these weak places, and with the greatest unanimity among our law-makers. The act is not yet perfect, for it requires time to perfect a law of such large application ; but if public opinion continues to hold as now — and there are no indications of a change — we shall experience no great diffi- culty in securing the needed amendatory legislation. The law provides for the supply of the necessary clothing for the chil- dren of parents too poor to make the provision themselves. But the authority to do this is now vested in the trustees of townships, and their slowness to act — or neglect to act at all — leads to great embarrassment in 402 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION. the execution of the law. It has, therefore, been concluded that it is best to have this authority transferred to the boards of education, and this is likely to be done by the present Legislature. Ohio has before had compulsory laws, but they failed because no one was specially charged with their execution. The truant officer of the present law is its essential factor ; upon him are imposed grave duties, the discharge of which requires qualifications above those required of the ordinary policeman. He must be possessed of a fair intelligence ; his heart must be in his work ; he must have an abundance of tact, and must be humane, patient, and courageous. And it may be truthfully added that the school boards of our State, as a rule, have acted in the full light of their responsibilities, and have m most cases appointed men well fitted for their places. This law means, in Ohio, as we believe, that no boy or girl hereafter born within her borders shall ever be permitted to grow up without having received at least an elementary education, or without the advantages of a definite moral training, which, more than intellectual culture, will serve to save to good citizenship the waifs and outcasts of society. Mr. John MacDonald, of Topeka, Kansas : The question now before the American people is clearly defined, and we may as well meet it. Has the State the right to insist that the instruction given in its schools must be in the English language ? Bands of foreigners in Wisconsin and else- where are making the unpatriotic demand that the language in which instruction shall be given must be determined by the community for itself. This un-American demand must and will be resisted. We have thrown wide open the doors of the Republic, and have invited all who thirst for political freedom to accept citizenship ; but it is for the nation to lay down the conditions of citizenship, and the foreign-born citizen should accept these conditions in good faith. Politicians may be deluded by temporary victories, but educational philosophers can afford to wait for the right to prevail, for the people will surely on this question be again clothed and in their right mind. In Kansas we have had for many years a general compulsory law, but when large numbers of Mennonites settled in our State some years ago, and began to use their native language exclusively in schools organized under the laws of the State, the Legislature passed a law requiring that all the instruction given in the public schools should be in the English language. That part of our compulsory law is well enforced, and has led to no discontent or mutiny, but has been accepted as a reasonable requirement. You have doubtless observed that in European countries the tendency is to disintegration ; in our own country, to centralization. In educational matters I believe in centralization to this extent, that the federal govern- COMPULSORY EDUCATION IN MASSACHUSETTS. 403 ment should have something to say as to what is taught or not taught in the schools of the land. The State is greater than the individual, and the nation is greater than the State. State Superintendent Wells, of Madison, Wisconsin, addressed the chair for the purpose of raising the issue, namely, whether it be not a legitimate question to discuss the educational results accomplished under the com- pulsory and the non-compulsory systems. He challenged the arguments used to prove the inefficiency of the school system of Wisconsin, claiming that the situation had been exaggerated to prove the necessity of drastic measures. He said that the apparent discrepancy between the total school population and the annual enrolment was accounted for by the extreme limits of enumeration, the legal school age including all persons between the ages of four and twenty. The ma- jority of pupils leave school at fourteen or fifteen, while the average age of all high-school graduates was probably under seventeen. If these did not thereafter enter school, they were counted until they were twenty-one among those not reached by the schools. More than one-half of those under the age of six were not enrolled. The records show that seven- eighths of those between seven and fourteen attend school a portion of the year. Again, the number reported attending private and parochial schools is known to be less than one-fourth of the actual attendance. Considering these facts it was evident that the schools were reasonably efficient. He affirmed that the effect of the Bennett law upon attendance had been greatly overstated. The reported increase was not so much due to a larger attendance as to greater care and thoroughness in securing the returns. One county, widely quoted as having increased its attendance 1,099 under the influence of the Bennett law, had instead an actual decrease in the enrolment of 123, and more than 23,000 days' attendance, as shown by the superintendent's report on file in the Department. At this point the speaker was interrupted by a sharp cross-fire of ques- tions relating to the effect of the Bennett law as an issue in the late po- litical campaign. While admitting that it was a large factor, he claimed that it was only one of several which contributed powerfully to the result. COMPULSORY EDUCATION IN MASSACHUSETTS. BY GEORGE H. MARTIN, AGENT MASSACHUSETTS BOARD OF EDUCATION. Compulsory education began under more favorable conditions and has had a more continuous, natural, and successful development in Massachusetts than in any other State of the Union, or in any other country in the world. 404 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION. The conditions were the following : A homogeneous and well-to-do people, coming in considerable numbers and settling somewhat close together ; This people, by a pious indirection, self-governing from the beginning, subject to no proprietor, patroon, foreign corporation, or royal governor, scarcely subject even to a king ; A central representative government having original and supreme juris- diction, by which local autonomy was rigidly circumscribed ; A considerable body of university educated men, clergymen, and others ; A suffrage restriction of such a character as to give to this body con- trolling influence. Had there been a property qualification for suffrage instead of an ecclesiastical one, the free school system would have been as long in coming in Massachusetts as it was in the other colonies ; Civil units for all local purposes instead of ecclesiastical ones, towns and not parishes ; A form of church polity democratic, corresponding to the civil polity. Under these conditions the foundations of an educational system were laid in the world-renowned law of 1642, which decreed that all the children should be brought up to learning and labor, that they should be taught to read and understand the principles of religion and the capital laws of the country. If there was at that time any such law in existence anywhere I have found no evidence of it. Other nations, drawing their inspiration from the same source, the letters and sermons of Luther, had aimed, at most, only at universal opportunity for education. This law aimed at universal education, and it made specific provision for its own execution. And it was executed. The quaintly curious records of the towns tell of the appointment of special officers to go from house to house and see that the children were put to learning and labor, or they prescribed days when all the children and apprentices should appear at the minister's to be measured as to their attainments. The more we study this law the more it impresses us. The position those early legislators took was broad, logical, tenable, wise, whether we view it as churchmen or statesmen. The men who made the law were both. It dealt directly with parents. It prescribed no means nor methods, and so neither restricted parental rights nor interfered with parental choices. It put no new obligation on the parent, but, for social and po- litical ends, sought to enforce a preexisting and natural obligation. Thus it appealed to the judgment and the conscience of all thinking and right-minded men ; and most of the early settlers were such men. So the law went out to do its work among a people largely in sympathy with it, and under controlling influences in church and state wholly in sym- pathy with it. COMPULSORY EDUCATION IN MASSACHUSETTS. 405 The principle became a part of the tissue and fibre of Massachusetts thought. Because of this, and because it was so reasonable, men of various faiths and various nationalities, who subsequently came into the State, im- bibed the doctrine as with the atmosphere, and to-day the more heterogene- ous people of Massachusetts are as firm supporters of the doctrine of com- pulsory education as were the more homogeneous people of two hundred and fifty years ago. All subsequent school legislation finds in this its sanction, and holds the relation to it of means to end. Here is the secret of the popularity and strength of all later compulsory enactments. Having made the obligation general, the next step was to furnish the parents with suitable means to meet it. Hence the compulsory school law of 1647, which required towns of fifty families to support a reading and writing school, and towns of a hundred families to support a fitting school for college. The manner of supporting the school was left for each town to determine for itself. This law was unique in that it was made by the people for the people. The schools established under it were public schools. They were set up by vote of the town. The town chose the master, and fixed his salary, in open town-meeting, or by its selectmen, under definite instructions. The town supported the school wholly or in part, sometimes by granting fixed revenues from leased lands or invested funds, sometimes by direct tax, often by both. In many towns, at first, those parents who could afford to pay tuition fees were expected to do so ; but to the children of the poor, and, in many towns, to every child, the school-house door opened as freely as it does to-day. This was no less true of the Latin school than of the English. Mr. Motley, and some recent writers on American history, have thrown out the suggestion, or directly asserted, that the Massachusetts people learned their school lesson from Holland. There is no ground for the assumption. There is not the faintest trace of Dutch influence in the early school history of Massachusetts. The Plymouth colonists, who had lived in Holland, made no public provision for schools for fifty years after their settlement. Nor could the Dutch settlers of Manhattan give much instruction to them, for in 1659 the burghers of New Amsterdam, in a petition to their lords and masters, the Dutch West India Company, ask for a man who can teach the children Latin, "for which," they say, plaintively, "there are no means nearer than Boston." Private bequests and public grants, as well as town votes, express the sentiment, and often repeat the phraseology of English instruments found- ing or aiding English schools. These early schools were " a well of Eng- lish undefyled." An analysis of these two earliest laws discloses the following principles, which are the foundation of all subsequent legislation and history : 406 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION. 1. The universal education of youth is essential to the well-being of the State. 2.. The obligation to furnish this education rests primarily on the parent. 3. The State has a right to enforce this obligation. 4. The State may fix a standard, which shall determine the kind and the minimum amount of education needed. 5. Public money, raised by general tax, may be used to provide such education as the State requires. The tax may be general, though the attendance is not. 6. Education higher than the rudiments may be supplied by the State. Whatever we may think of the principles, there they were. The compulsory school law of 1647 has undergone various modifications, some broadening its scope, some narrowing it. It remained on the statute book unchanged for a hundred and forty-two years. Then the standard was lowered. Instead of a school all the year round, in small towns a six- months school was allowed, or several schools, aggregating six months. In- stead of one hundred families, two hundred was made the minimum num- ber for supporting the Latin school. The change of a single word released one hundred and twenty towns from the obligation, which had been on them for nearly a hundred and fifty years, to keep open a free path to the university. In later years the limit has been still further raised. But this is a significant fact, that, with the exception of a few years, there has never been a time in the history of Massachusetts when a classical educa- tion has not been free in towns having 2,500 inhabitants. Whereas the early laws applied only to towns having fifty or more fam- ilies, in 1839 all towns were placed under the same obligations. In 1859 all common schools were required to be kept six months, the high schools already being required to keep ten months. Six months is now the legal minimum, but all the schools in the State were kept last year an average length of nearly nine months. By existing laws towns having 10,000 inhabitants must maintain free evening schools, and any city having 5,000 inhabitants must maintain a free evening high-school, if fifty persons of suitable age and requirements ask for it. In these evening schools there were last year under instruction about 25,000 persons. Compulsory legislation dealt next with the qualifications of teachers, requiring certificates of moral and intellectual fitness. Every schoolmaster even of an elementary school must be a graduate of some college or uni- versity, or, in lieu of this, must produce a certificate of qualifications from a learned minister well skilled in the Greek and Latin languages. These requirements have been modified from time to time, weakening on the intellectual side, while maintaining the moral standard at its highest elevation. The third step in the development of the system was in the direction of COMPULSORY EDUCATION IN MASSACHUSETTS. 407 supervision. In 1789 the selectmen and ministers, or a special committee, were directed to visit the schools at least once in six months, to inquire into their regulation and discipline, and the proficiency of the scholars. We observe that the two important functions of supervision, inspection, and examination were distinguished thus early. The hint contained in the phrase, " or other persons especially chosen for the purpose/' was quickly acted on, and in all the larger towns and in many of the smaller ones the school committee became a separate and permanent body. This law made regular inspection by public officers ob- ligatory ; the choice of officers was optional. Later, in 1826, this option was withdrawn and the specialization of functions was required. The town school committee, with almost absolute control of school affairs, was made a distinct feature of the compulsory system. At the same time the amount of supervision was increased by requiring monthly instead of semi- annual visits. Compulsory taxation for the support of the schools required by law to be kept was the next step. This appears first upon the statute book in 1827. For one hundred and eighty years it had been optional with the towns to charge tuition fees, but the option had not been exercised for generations. In my researches among the local records in the State I have found no mention of fees later than 1767, and that only in a single town. Few towns required them later than 1700, and many had never required them. Legislation here, as everywhere else in Massachusetts school history, only crystallized into statutes practices which had become well-nigh universal. There were schools almost everywhere before the law made them compul- sory. School districts and female teachers were common a hundred years before the laws recognized their existence. School committees had been chosen long before the State required supervision, and now the obliga- tion to support the public schools by general tax only embodies a public sentiment which had long been universal. A variety of conditions peculiar to New England tended to make the schools sooner or later wholly free. Common lands available as sources of town income were gradually sold. Population increased more rapidly than the income from testamentary property, so that the needs of the schools more and more outran their fixed revenues. Private benevolence lacked incentive when law made schools compulsory, and a town rate could be depended on to provide the means for their support. Tuition fees from the rich and free tuition for the poor made class distinction too prominent for a new society where in church and state all were equal. Support by town tax was simpler, easier and more uniform than by any other method. All these causes peculiar to New England colonial conditions tended to change the English schools of the earliest period to the American schools as we know them to-day. The change came more rapidly in some places than in others. Each community worked out its own problem in its own 408 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION. way, until all at last reached the same result under the law which made support by town rate permissible but not compulsory. The crowning feature in the legislation, by which the schools were made free to all, is the law of 1884, which required towns to provide at public expense all text-books and supplies needed in the schools. Along this line, too, the process of evolution is interesting. At first the town paid only for the salary of the teacher, wholly or in part. The master furnished the school-house, and the children brought the firewood and the books. The towns early relieved the teacher by building public school- houses, and before many years they relieved the parents by supplying the fuel. Free text-books are as legitimate objects of public expenditure as firewood, free school-houses, or free teachers. No line can be drawn between them which is not an arbitrary one. Massachusetts has drawn all the lines, one at a time, and has rubbed them all out. To one familiar with history, the modern outcries against free text-books seem like echoes from the acrimonious debates in Massachusetts town meetings, as one by one the burdens of school support have been shifted from the parent to the public. All the State now asks of the parent is that he furnish the children. Nor is she strenuous as to quality. She provides at public expense for the education of the deaf, the dumb, and the blind. She does not even insist upon brains, for in the ample compass of her beneficence she waits upon the slow-dawning intelligence of the idiotic and the feeble-minded. For these defective classes she provides free transportation to day-schools, and free board if the schools are far from home. This is not done as a charity, but for rich and poor alike, under the general provision for public schools, that the school opportunities shall be ample for all the children. The compulsory system assumed its modern form first in 1852, by the requirement that all children between the ages of eight and fourteen years should attend some public school at least twelve weeks in each year. It is important to notice that, in Massachusetts, this was not so much a new law as a rehabilitation of the ancient statute. It involved no new principle. It only provided a new method of enforcing the traditional principle, that every child should be educated. The selectmen could no longer keep a vigilant eye upon their neighbors to see that they brought up their children to learning and labor. The public school registers, in connection with an annual school census, might take the place of this personal oversight and inspection. Non-attendance at the public schools was made prima facie evidence of parental neglect. But the parent was as free as ever to ex- ercise his preference in the choice of means of educating ; only the burden of proof was on him to show that he was doing his duty by his child. If the child was otherwise provided with the means of education, the new law exempted the parent from its penalty. This left the way clear for home instruction and the private schools. COMPULSORY EDUCATION IN MASSACHUSETTS. 409 That the new law was evolutionary rather than revolutionary in its character is evidenced by the fact that its enactment did not produce a ripple on the current of public thought. It did not even originate as a government measure ; that is, it did not emanate from the Board of Education. Horace Mann, in one of his later reports, five years before, had eloquently pleaded for such a new departure, but the initiative was taken by a member of the House of Representatives from one of the small- est of the rural towns — towns where the evils of non-attendance were then most conspicuous. This law was weak at several points. Its enforcement was in the hands of local boards, and the town treasurers were made prosecuting officers — good men, but not especially interested in schools, and not likely to entangle themselves voluntarily in the meshes of the law. There were several underground passages by which parents might retreat. Physical disability of the child or the poverty of the parent might exempt from the penalty. And "otherwise furnished with the means of education" has proved so wide an avenue that a local judge drove not only the pro- verbial "coach and four" through the law, but a whole non-English- teaching parochial school. Subsequent legislation has broadened and strengthened the law. In 1873, when other States were passing their first compulsory laws, Massa- chusetts, as if to maintain her ancient lead, extended her required school time from twelve weeks to twenty weeks, and last year it was extended to thirty weeks where the schools keep so long ; and an order is now in the Legislature to require school attendance as long as the public schools are in session. Poverty is no longer a valid excuse for not complying with the law. The public school standard is made the universal standard. Children may attend private schools, but they must attend at least thirty weeks in the year, and the private school must be approved by the school committee. It may be so approved by the school committee only when the committee is satisfied that the instruction is in all the branches required to be taught in the public schools — is in English in all these branches, and is equal in thoroughness and efficiency to the instruction in the public schools of the locality, and that the pupils make equal progress with the public school pupils. The loose phrase, " otherwise provided with the means of educa- tion," has been changed to " otherwise instructed in the branches required to be taught in the public schools for a like period of time." These laws are supplemented by the truancy legislation of the State, and by the acts concerning the employment of children. Every town is required to make suitable provision for the confinement and instruction of truants. Every local school board is required to appoint truant officers, who are made prosecuting officers; and the county commissioners, on petition of three towns, are required to provide county truant schools. 410 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION. The whole truancy legislation has been strengthened by the recent action of the Supreme Court, issuing against a recalcitrant board of county com- missioners a writ of peremptory mandamus commanding them to proceed at once to provide a truant school. The employment of children under fourteen is practically forbidden, and minors who cannot read and write in the English language may not be employed if they have lived for a year where public evening schools are maintained, and are not regular attendants at such schools. It is evident that the legislation is ample to secure to every child in the State a good English education, including not only reading, writing, and arithmetic, but grammar, geography, United States history, temperance, physiology, and industrial drawing. The enforcement of this legislation is in the hands of local school boards, and is efficient where they do their duty — most efficient where there are superintendents. Reviewing the evolutionary process from the beginning, we note that there have been six steps — compulsory education, compulsory schools, compulsory certification of teachers, compulsory supervision, compul- sory taxation, compulsory attendance ; and it seems that Massachusetts took each of these steps in advance of the other States — a little in advance of her sister States in New England, far in advance of all the others. It is evident that at no point in the later history of Massachusetts school legislation has any new principle been introduced or any violent strain put upon the old ones. The multiplied statutes of to-day are only the expansion of the laws of 1642 and 1647, made necessary by the social development of the State. Public sentiment is a unit in favor of universal education, and of the amplest legislation to secure it. The action of Boston in 1817 expressed a feeling which has always been dominant, and never more so than to-day. When the good people of that town discovered that more than two hundred children under seven years of age did not go to school, there being no public provision for them, they gathered in Faneuil Hall and rocked that old Cradle of Liberty as it had been rocked in revolutionary days ; and, in spite of the opposition of a few social magnates, voted to establish twenty public primary schools, which in eight years increased to fifty. When, in 1820, it was -found that through the disintegrating influence of the district system the common schools were languishing, there was a revival of education which has gone on with accelerating force until the present time. The strength of this public sentiment is shown in the attitude of the courts, and in the amount of money raised for public schools. In the colonial days the magistrates and the grand juries were unrelenting in their pressure upon neglectful parents and slow-moving towns. And, throughout the history, the decisions of the higher courts have been in- COMPULSORY EDUCATION IB MASSACHUSETTS. 411 variably in favor of the most liberal interpretation of the laws on the side of the public schools. On the money side the people of the State last year spent on their public schools eight and a quarter millions of dollars, — $22.38 for each child between five and fifteen. The question which comes to us most frequently is : What has the Massachusetts system of compulsory education accomplished ? Such a question cannot be fully answered. The forces at work in modern society are too many and too subtle for minute and exact analysis. The object which the founders of the system had in view was to make intelligent and upright citizens of the civil community, and loyal subjects of the king- dom of God. How far the past and present character of the Massa- chusetts people has justified the efforts of the fathers, I will not attempt to say. But there are some specific facts which may justly be attributed to the system. By the last report of the United States Commissioner of Educa- tion, the school attendance at public schools alone throughout the State averaged 151 days for every child between the ages of six and fourteen, — in this leading all the States. Illiteracy, so far as the persons born of native parents are concerned, has been practically wiped out, only one in 714 of such persons being unable to read and write. And the same census found in the State but seventy-three Children of Massachusetts-born parents at work and illiterate. So much the system has accomplished. The character of the teaching force of the State may also legitimately be attributed to the system. Three elements determine the professional character and standing of the teachers, their training, their pay and other revenues. Forty per cent, of the teachers have attended State normal schools. The salaries of the teachers in city and country, men and women, average sixty dollars a month. Kesulting partly from these two facts, and partly from the wise legislation fixing the relation of teachers and school officers, the tenure of office is so permanent that of the whole body of teachers only fifteen per cent, is annually changed. In these particu- lars Massachusetts seems to be in the van. The reading habits of the people are a direct result of the system of education. Sixty years ago, in a little town having less than 900 inhabi- tants, there were nearly 6,000 books in public and private libraries. Forty- seven different magazines and newspapers were regularly taken, for which four hundred dollars were annually paid. To-day. the State, according to good authority, has more than half of all the free public libraries in the Union. They are open to ninety-four per cent, of her population, and their patronage is as widespread as their constituency. After all this has been said, there is another word. The success of Massa- chusetts in educating her people has not been achieved chiefly by compul- sion. The motto of the friends of progress has always been, — " Light 412 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION. before Law," so that the practice of the people has far outrun the legal requirements. Compulsory education laws can only emanate from people already educated. The laws only serve to bring up a lagging rear. The progress which the State is making now is not in the line of com- pulsion. In the quality of school buildings, in the consolidation and organization of country schools, in course of study, in methods of instruc- tion in all grades, in supply of illustrative material, in closeness, intelli- gence and efficiency of supervision, in evening schools, in high-school attendance, in industrial drawing, in the diffusion of pedagogical knowl- edge and the development of a professional spirit among teachers, in proper acceptance of progressive measures, in close and cordial relation between local and State officials, more advance has been made in the last ten years than in any previous ten. The motive to all this advance is not law, — it is the good-will of the people. Not forgetting the past, the State looks toward the future with unfal- tering purpose and unflagging effort. Nor is she isolated in her thought or feeling. If she has been so in the past it has been the inevitable isolation of the pioneer, and not the selfish isolation of the recluse. She watches with intense interest every struggle of the friends of progress, and keenly regrets every set-back. Her sympathies are national. She believes that if one member suffer all the members suffer with it. And toward her sister States she bears herself always in the spirit of Chaucer's clerk of Oxenford, "And gladly wolde he lerne and gladly teche." DISCUSSION. [Reported by Superintendent Greenwood, Kansas Citt, Mo.] Mr. Edwin P. Seaver, Boston, Mass.: Mr. President, when I told you I would discuss the topic of this paper, I promised to give you a few care- fully ascertained facts going to show how well or how ill the compulsory school attendance laws are enforced in that part of the commonwealth of Massachusetts known as Boston. Such a statement of facts may have a use in disclosing some of the difficulties in the way of procuring an ab- solutely complete obedience to the law, and in indicating the amount and kind of effort necessary to bring about such obedience. The facts I have to state are the results of thorough and repeated investigation, begun in the year 1885, and repeated every year, save one, since that date. In each individual case of reported absence from school, inquiry has been made to learn the reasons for non-attendance. To the clear cases of disobedience to the law have been added all doubtful cases. The uniform presumption has been in favor of disobedience ; and unless DISCUSSION. 413 this presumption could be overcome by positive evidence, the case has been counted as one of disobedience. No excuses save those recog- nized by the statute itself have been allowed, — not even that of extreme poverty. The general result, stated in round numbers, and as averaging the par- ticular results of several years, is this, that of 50,000 children in Boston, to whom the compulsory laws apply, the number found inexcusably absent from school during any one year is between 500 or 600, or a trifle over one per cent. Also, it is true that more than half of this unexcused absence occurs among children already fourteen years old; that is, among children just approaching the time of exemption from the compulsory law. Again, more than one-half of the remaining unexcused absences occurs among children already thirteen years old. Thus it appears that school attendance is well-nigh perfect among the younger children ; that is, among those from eight to twelve years of age, both ages included. During these five years of school life, the children are practically all in school if not physically disabled, — scarcely over one hundred absentees in a population of over 400,000. It may be added, too, and it is very important to remember, that the 500 or 600 children reported absent this year are not the same children who were so reported last year, nor again are they the same ones that will be reported next year. A comparison of the list of names in the successive years settles this point. Scarcely one name in a hundred appears on the list for two successive years. Children of school age growing up in ignorance are very rarely found in Boston ; for their absence from school almost never continues over a year at a time. It is further true, and noteworthy, that by far the larger part of the ascertained illegal non-attendance is found among the foreign and un- Americanized population. This element in our society is not reached by that strong public sentiment which characterizes the purely American and the thoroughly Americanized populations. That you may place full confidence in the statements thus far made, let me go into details somewhat minutely to describe my method of inves- tigation. Every year, in the month of May, a school-census is taken. This is a thorough house-to-house canvass of the whole city by persons of skill in such work. The names, ages, and residences of all children be- tween five and fifteen years of age are written down by the census-takers in books. Against each name is recorded the fact of attendance at a public school, or of attendance at a private or parochial school, or of non-attend- ance at any school, as the case may be, during the year from May 1st to May 1st. Also are recorded any reasons that may be learned for non-attend- ance at school. Thus, in the year 1886, I learned from these books that there were in Boston 70,090 children from five to fifteen years of age. Note, if you please, that the lower age limit is taken inclusively, the upper exclusively. Of these children 54,626 attended public schools; 7,912 414 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION attended private or parochial schools ; and 7,752 did not attend any school that year. This last number has been a somewhat troublesome item in my reports. Shallow writers, aiming at sensation, have quoted the figures as bearing official evidence that some seven or eight thousand children in Boston were growing up in ignorance. Follow me, if you will, in a close analysis of the facts, and you shall see the seven or eight thousand dwindle to a very much less alarming size. In the first place, let me set aside all the children five and six years of age. We may or may not think these children ought to be in school ; their parents certainly consider them too young ; but we may for present purposes set them aside, for their absence from school involves no disobedience to the law. Most of them will be in school by the time they are seven years old. Of these five- and six-year- olds thus set aside there are 5,625. Next may be set aside the seven-year-olds, whose cases, though carefully investigated by me for other purposes, have no bearing on our present inquiry. Their absence from school involves no disobedience to the law. There are only 443 of these cases, showing that nearly all the seven-year- olds are in school any way. These two deductions, aggregating over six thousand, having been made, there remain to be investigated 1,684 cases of children whose absence from school, if inexcusable, under the terms of the law, was illegal. The next step is to learn the reasons in each individual case for the reported non-attendance; sometimes, indeed, it is to inquire whether the report itself be not a mistake. The census-books contain remarks from which much may be learned. But I have it in my power to verify or cor- rect these remarks by a wholly independent inquiry. The truant officers, of whom Boston employs a force of sixteen, offer me all needed help for this purpose. The names, ages, and residences of all the children I wish to inquire about are copied out of the census-books and given to the truant officers, toward the end of the month following the one in which the census was taken, with my request that they ascertain by personal inquiry and report on the cards in writing the reasons, if any, for non-attendance. The report of the truant officer thus made, being compared with the remarks recorded in the census-books, which, by the bye, the truant officer does not see, enables me to decide with the confidence imparted by testi- mony from independent sources whether or not the reported absence from school was excusable under the law. This thorough double investigation is applied to the children eight to thirteen years old, both ages inclusive ; the cases of the fourteen-year-olds being treated separately, as shall be described presently. Take note here of the very significant fact that of the 1,684 cases now to be investigated, — and which contain all the disobedience to the law that we are going to find, — more than one-half are cases of children already fourteen years of age. DISCUSSION. 415 Thus: Children reported non-attendant: Aged eight to thirteen 775 Aged fourteen 909 Total 1,684 We will begin with the 775 non-attendants from eight to thirteen years old. The concurrent testimony of census-taker and truant officer shows that 260 of these are invalids, physically unfit to be in school all the year, and in many sad cases unlikely ever to be in school again. There were also thirty-eight children under care and instruction at home by private tutors or governesses ; sixty-six had lately moved into the city, and had not attended school in the towns they came from, many of them being foreigners ; and forty-four were only transiently residents within the city. So far no disobedience to the law. But the same concurrent testimony proves 117 children were "at work" or "helping at home," in non- compliance with the law. Some of these cases were well known, but had been winked at for good reasons, to be stated further on. We have left now a class of cases in which the testimony is either con- flicting or imperfect, or both. In the cases where the testimony is con- flicting there must appear clear reason for rejecting one part or the other, otherwise the conclusion is counted as doubtful and construed unfavorably. Where the point at issue is the fact of attendance the school records settle the question ; where the dispute is about the age, there are church or municipal records that can be appealed to. Among these debatable cases I find eighty-seven in which I cannot adopt a positively favorable con- clusion ; in the rest the presumption of disobedience is clearly overcome. Adding these eighty-seven doubtful cases to the 117 certain cases, we have 204 as the whole number of cases of disobedience discovered among the 775 cases with which we began. Now as to the 909 cases of fourteen-year-olds. The information con- tained in the census-books is clear enough in most cases. The assistance of truant officers is not needed and is not used. The presumption of disobedience is stronger in these cases, inasmuch as the desire both of the parents and of the children to reap the rewards of child-labor grows much stronger as the age of legal exemption from school attendance approaches. But, on the other hand, there are two considerations to explain why the amount of disobedience among the fourteen-year-olds is not very large after all. In the first place, children may be, and often are, exempt from further school attendance as early as the age of thirteen and a half years ; for the statute is fulfilled the moment the child has attended school twenty weeks* since reaching his thirteenth birthday. It is quite within the * By a recent change in the law thirty weeks is now required instead of twenty, as at the time of the investigation. 416 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION. limits of possibility, therefore, that fully a half of the children reported fourteen years old and " out of school * should be already exempt from the law. In the second place, there is a strong motive growing out of the law relating to the employment of children which operates to in- duce children to put in the last twenty weeks' attendance required of them by the law, as soon as they possibly can after reaching their thir- teenth birthday. By so doing they get an unlimited employment certi- ficate ; but by postponing their last period of attendance they can receive only a limited certificate, one obliging them to return to school again be- fore they shall be old enough to be exempt from the law altogether. With- out taking you through all the details, I may say that the results of inves- tigation for several successive years have shown that one-third is a fairly high proportion to allow for the amount of disobedience to the law in the fourteen-year-old class. This would give 303 cases in the year now under consideration, which number added to the 204 cases among the younger children already found makes 507 cases in all. This result is rather better than that of the year before, and not so good as the result two years be- fore. Now, adding about a hundred, to answer all possible cavil and doubt, and not because I can see any other reason for doing so, we have the result already given, 500 or 600 cases of illegal staying out of school during one school year, among 50,000 children whom the law touches. May I not confidently say that the Massachusetts compulsory law com- pels ? The law which thus compels has two arms. With one arm it reaches the parent and enforces the parental obligation. This arm is supported by an almost universal public sentiment. Prosecutions under it are of very rare occurrence, for the reason that the very poor, who alone violate it, have no money with which to pay fines ; and sending them to jail for non-pay- ment would be harsh treatment. The other arm of the law lays hold on employers of child-labor. Employment of children under thirteen years of age is prohibited absolutely ; and employment of those from thirteen to sixteen is forbidden under a serious penalty, unless the employer keep on file and open to inspection of State officers a certificate reciting two important facts : (1) the age of the child, (2) the fact that the law of compulsory attendance has been fully satisfied. This certificate can be ob- tained only from the superintendent of schools, who thus has the power to prevent the employment .of children who have not yet fulfilled the law. This arm of the law is very effectual. The employers are very vigilantly watched, and they are correspondingly careful not to incur the penalty. Thus children who have not attended school as required by law, find them- selves shut out of employment altogether, and discover that the best thing for them to do is to go back to school. The present employment law, which was enacted in 1888, is more strin- gent than the old law and provided with better means and agents for en- forcement. The result has already appeared in a greatly improved school discussion: 417 attendance of children thirteen and fourteen years of age. One improve- ment ought to be made in the law. The age of permitted employment ought not to begin before that of compulsory school attendance has ended. This change would save much trouble. In drawing these remarks to a close, I wish to express one thought which my observation and experience have impressed on my mind with great force. It is this, that a perfectly rigid and complete enforcement of our school-attendance laws cannot be had without an amount of suffer- ing which no humane agent of the law would willingly be responsible for. That you may the better understand the character of the cases I now allude to, permit me to quote from my report to the School Committee of Boston for the year 1886, where these cases are presented in the concrete, as it were, being more vividly described than they could be by any general phrases now at my command. " The grim struggle for existence involves every child in the family old enough to earn a dime. No officers are so unfeeling as to increase the diffi- culties of such a struggle; and therefore it is only reasonable to expect that, in the absence of other relief, the school-attendance law will go unexecuted. If it be said that the public charities should give the help needed in such cases, the answer is, first, that they do not appear to have done so hither- to ; and, secondly, even if they were now ready to do so, it would still be a serious question whether pauperization should be promoted for the sake of a little more schooling. The very point of the struggle in these cases is to live without the help of public charity. "But these questions open too wide a field of discussion for me to enter upon now. My aim is to make it clear that a perfectly rigorous execution of the present law cannot reasonably be expected. Among the cases actu- ally investigated, I find about fifty cases of great hardship ; and among those not investigated, but still within the limit of age, I should have found about as many more. Therefore, he who would insist on a perfectly rigorous execution of the law in this city must, if he would be reasonable, first provide some way of relieving about a hundred cases of hardship. What these cases are may be gathered from the following selections : " No. 1191. Boy, eight years old. ' The father of this boy has been out of work most of the winter and could not furnish all of his children with clothes and shoes. Two of the older ones are in school.' "No. 1206. Girl, eight years old. 'This family consists of three per- sons, mother and two daughters, one eight, the other four years old. The mother washes for a living and is obliged to keep the oldest girl from school to take care of the other. Both will enter school in September/ "No. 483. Girl, eight years old. 'This girl has been taking care of three younger children while the mother goes out to work. There are three older children in school. She will go in September.' 418 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION. " No. 837. Boy, nine years old. ' Father blind. Goes with him peddling." " No. 524. Boy, ten years old. ' This boy is a member of the Brim- mer School. The mother says her children had to stay away from school. No clothing. No one working but the oldest boy, who says he is fourteen y ears and six months old.' "No. 378. Girl, ten years old. ' Came from Italy a year ago. Mother has been sick in bed until a month ago, and the girl has taken care of the house and family. Can talk but little English. But mother is better now, and girl will attend school in September.' "No. 327. Girl, ten or twelve years old. ' Has been kept at home to take care of small child. Mother keeps a stand on Atlantic Avenue. The father sick for three years, and does not go out much. Three children in the family/ "Nos. 197 and 198. Boy eight and girl ten years old. 'The mother died a few months ago, and the father cannot get work to get the children clothes suitable to attend school/ "No. 181. Boy, eleven years old. 'This boy's parents are both dead. He lives with his grandmother. He has not had clothes suitable to attend school/ "No. 690. Girl, twelve years old. ' This girl's mother is dead. She has been kept at home to take care of the family of small children. They are very poor.' "No. 375. Boy, twelve (?) years old. 'Italians. None of them can talk English. A smart little interpreter says the father and mother both say the boy is fifteen years old. He cannot talk English. He plays a fiddle about the streets, and supports the family of four persons — one a sick brother.' "No. 285. Girl, twelve years old. ' The father and mother do nothing for her support. Obliged to support herself ; works for her board. Mother at Deer Island. If father has more than he spends for rum, gives her a dollar/ "No. 320. Girl, twelve years old. 'Lives with her aunt, who says she cannot afford to send her to school. Attends the evening school in the winter. Has a father and mother, but they do not support her. They drink badly.' "No. 434. Girl, twelve years old. 'This family came from Ireland about two years ago. There are nine children, five of them younger than this one. When they arrived in New York the mother became insane, and afterward died. They are very poor. This girl has to do the work in the house and take care of the children. The three older ones are in school. Can read and write well.' " No. 187. Boy, thirteen years old. ' This boy's father is dead. There are five children in the family, so this boy is obliged to work to help sup- port the family/ DISCUSSION. 419 " No. 688. Boy, thirteen years old. ' This boy's father is dead. Family very poor. He is a telegraph boy, and lias been during the past year.' "No. 684. Girl, thirteen years old. ' This girl's mother is sick, and has to keep Maggie at home to take care of her, as she is too poor to hire.' "No. 220. Girl, thirteen years old. ' This girl's mother is blind, and she is obliged to stay at home to do the work and care for her mother.' " No. 170. Girl, thirteen years old. * This girl's father is dead, and her mother is in an insane hospital. The girl is obliged to work for her own support.' "No. 440. Girl, thirteen years old. 'Father and mother dead. Living with an uncle, whose wife is dead. She keeps house and takes care of an invalid child. Will go to school in September. Was thirteen years old last October, and has been out of school two years.' " From such specimen bricks you may judge of the whole house. Me. Hancock, of Ohio, inquired whether there were not provisions in the law for the relief of such cases. Mr. Seaver : No, there is no law whatever under which public chari- table relief can be given in such cases. The families in question occupy a position just above the level of actual pauperism. The very point and stress of their strugglesjs to avoid the necessity of accepting public charity — of becoming paupers. The feeling is an honorable one, and deserves all respect. Let private charity enter into this field and occupy it, but let public charity keep away as long as possible. Mr. I. N. Mitchell, Fond du Lac, Wis. : Mr. President, I think the vital point of this paper and the discussion is that the State of Massachu- setts demands and secures the recognition of its right to supervise the work of the parochial school. These gentlemen show clearly that the course of study in the parochial school must be approved by the authorities of the public school. This is the vital question that was raised and not answered in the discussion of the first paper of the session. Mr. A. P. Marble, Worcester, Mass. : The statute of Massachusetts requires that all pupils up to the age of fourteen shall attend a public day- school at least thirty weeks in each year, or a private school approved by the school committee of the town or city for the same time. Such school attendance is not insisted on, however, in case of illness, or if it can be shown that the pupil has received an education equivalent to what is received in the schools. Employers of children under sixteen years of age are required to keep on file a certificate of the age and school attendance of each child employed ; and absence of such a certificate in case of any child found employed is prima facie evidence of a violation of the law, and subjects the employer to a fine. In giving the certificates of school attend- ance the school committee must be aware of the character of any private school, and know whether the register of attendance is properly kept, and 420 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION. whether the instruction conforms to law; that is, whether a knowledge of the English language is acquired. The agent, or whoever acts for the com- mittee, may ascertain as to the amount and the kind, of instruction by an examination of each pupil who applies for a certificate. He can learn about the register of attendance only by inquiring of the teacher of the private school ; and in case of pupils who require no certificate for entering a shop, store, or factory, the only means of knowing whether the compul- sory law is complied with is an inspection of the private school. A compulsory school law, then, implies that the State (which is only an organized form of public opinion) may take cognizance of private schools far enough to see that no child is deprived of that small amount of edu- cation on which the State insists ; that is, ability to read and write in the English language, and a moderate knowledge of arithmetic and geography, for example. But so much of oversight is not hostility to private schools, nor any infringement of parental control any more than the law requiring parents to clothe and feed their children. On the contrary, such an oversight is a positive help to a private school ; since parents would not patronize it if the children could not receive certificates to entitle them to be employed, or if their children did not receive a fair amount of education, such as the law requires. The public-school authorities, if wise, would not undertake to inspect private schools in any other than a friendly spirit and for the purpose of learning what is indispensable for them to know. They would be received cheerfully, since all schools are presumed to aim at good education ; and they would soon be welcome in making friendly criticism. And parents would not long patronize a school which refused to allow the public-school authorities to ascertain what is so important for them to know, where the principle is acted on that all children have a right to a moderate amount of education. On any other principle than that outlined above, a compul- sory school law — it would be better to call it a law for securing to each child his birthright of intelligence, since compulsion is a harsh term to American ears — on any other principle, such a law would be a dead-letter ; for if the school authorities cannot inquire into the character of any school, then by means of a fictitious school the law might be successfully and easily evaded. Examination of each pupil applying for a certificate is only an indirect and practically very cumbersome way of inspecting the school which he has attended. This is not a merely theoretical question. In my city a private or parochial school for French children has invited with great cordiality an inspection for the purpose indicated above ; and in a few instances certificates have been refused to children who had not acquired a knowledge of the English language. Hon. B. G. Northrop, Clinton, Conn.: Mr. Martin is correct in saying DISCUSSION. 421 that Massachusetts was the first State in the world that enacted the prin- ciple of compulsory education ; but her younger sister, Connecticut, though eight years later in fact, was earlier in her own history in adopting the same measure. Two hundred and thirty-nine years ago, in Connecticut, th,e selectmen in every town were required to see that so much (t barbarism was not permitted in any family, as that their children and apprentices should not be able to read the English tongue, upon penalty of twenty shillings for each neglect therein/' This law was strictly executed, and was so heartily approved, that attendance lost its involuntary character. To bring up a child, or ward, or apprentice in ignorance was shameful and barbarous in the eyes of the fathers of Connecticut. This is still the senti- ment of their genuine descendants. High appreciation of education is one of the most precious traditions of our State. In any State where there are no such traditions, and no such general and hearty appreciation of education, obligatory laws would be premature, as they would be where the State School Superintendent is understood to have no faith in them. Though there be no open opposition, if that officer simply stands aloof, as has sometimes happened, if he maintains a dignified reserve, the law will not be likely to execute itself. Firmness, united with conciliation and earnest work, are the conditions of success. Instead of falling back upon the law to do the whole work, argument, persuasion, and conciliation have been the main reliance. The right to enforce is itself an argument to persuade an authoritative appeal to good sense and parental pride. Such a law, when used as a dernier resort, in cases otherwise incorrigible, becomes a moral force, an effective advocate of education to the very class who need it most. Our law applies not only to parents and manufacturers, but to all "employers in any labor whatsoever." When I attempted to introduce a more stringent provision into the Connecticut law — that given in the last clause — the objection was made : " The laboring classes won't stand it." But it is a significant fact that the labor unions in this country and in Europe approve obligatory education. Both political parties favor it. So far as I know, no suggestion for the repeal of our rigid law has been made in the Legislature, nor in any caucus or public meeting in the State. I can confirm what Mr. Martin has so well said in regard to the free public libraries of Massachusetts. Nothing reflects more credit upon that State during the last forty years than the history of her free libraries. This marvellous multiplication of free public libraries, which is so striking a feature of our day, originated with Dr. Francis Wayland while he was President of Brown University, but so unconsciously to himself as to show that he builded better than he knew. In 1847 he tendered $500 to the little town of Massachusetts named from him, on condition that its citizens should provide an equal amount for a free public library. More than the required sum was promptly raised. The first anniversary of this library was celebrated with great enthusiasm, when a memorable address was given 422 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION. by Dr. Wayland, which was generally reported in the papers of Boston and elsewhere. He then expressed the hope that all the neighboring towns would follow the example of Wayland. That wish was soon realized. Though the sum was small, as were also his means, the eminence of the donor gave special significance to his gift and to his speech on the value of libraries, and led to the enactment of a free public library law, legaliz- ing the support of libraries by taxation. That act, passed forty years ago, which was the first of the kind in the world, has stood the crucial test of experience. While for nearly eleven years agent of the State Board of Education of Massachusetts, visiting every town and advocating the or- ganization of libraries, I seldom encountered any objections to this law. Massachusetts may well glory in the fact that it has 246 free libraries, containing in the aggregate about 2,500,000 volumes. Munificent gifts have been made to them in money — not including books — exceeding $5,500,000, and now fifty-three patronymic libraries worthily bear the names of their founders or chief benefactors. There is no other equal area on this globe so well supplied with free libraries. Only 103 towns are without such a library, but these are small towns that have declined in population during the last five years. The State is now encouraging these poor towns, by giving books to the value of $100 to any one comply- ing with the simple provisions of the law. This library movement is happily spreading over the country, and many are founding libraries in their own towns. But Andrew Carnegie is lead- ing all others in such benefactions, giving $40,000 to his native town, Dunfermline, Scotland (besides erecting commodious swimming baths for the free use of the people) ; $250,000 to the neighboring city, Edin- burgh ; $250,000 to Allegheny City, Pa. ; $50,000 to Bellevue Hospital ; $1,000,000 to Pittsburgh, Pa., besides establishing free libraries at Brad- dock, Pa., and at other places, for the benefit of his employees. QUALIFICATION AND SUPPLY OF TEACHERS FOR CITY PUBLIC SCHOOLS. BY WM. E. ANDERSON, SUPERINTENDENT OF SCHOOLS, MILWAUKEE, WIS. The aim of this discourse forbids extended mention of those obstacles to the elevation of the standard of education in city schools, which, in the form of leading prejudices, beset every school board and superintendent. Every one who is familiar with the management of city school systems is aware of the serious hindrance to progress which these prejudices set up. They cannot be argued out of existence. It is better to treat them as facts and deal with them accordingly. One of these which proves an alluring topic QUALIFICATION AND SUPPLY OF TEACI1ERS. 423 for debate is the predominance of female teachers, a fact which seems to be regretted in nearly all respectable school reports. The superiority of men over women as teachers is by a large number regarded as so self-evident that the decline in the ratio of male teachers is mentioned almost invari- ably with regret. The disproportion, which seems to increase from year to year, is, however, a fact which defies legislative remedy or control, — a fact which has its cause in certain social changes which can never be modi- fied or withstood by the puny attempts of schoolmasters and school boards. Another prejudice, existing especially in large cities, which will receive some attention in the course of my remarks, is the narrow objection to what are termed "outsiders," and the misleading and selfish sophistry which, in favor of so-called "home talent," discriminates against persons who have been educated abroad. These questions of preference, not of fitness, are quite subsidiary to the great problem of reinforcing the teaching corps of a city with an ample supply of vigorous and well-trained or experienced instructors. Paramount to all other facts connected with the appoint- ment of teachers is that of fitness; and fitness is not analyzable into any other elements than intellectual attainments, refined and cultivated character, and professional capacity and skill, either trained or developed by experience. No other modifying or conditioning circumstances, no question of sex, nationality, or residence, politics, or religion should be allowed to offset the elements which constitute superior fitness. It will be necessary to pass by another very inviting phase of this ques- tion ; namely, the vesting of the appointing of teachers in offices, in central committees, or in the hands of local commissioners. Reform and improve- ment in city schools does not depend so much upon the facts as to what persons exercise the right of nomination as upon the standard of eligi- bility which should govern and restrict the action of appointing officers. The appointment of teachers in the city schools is governed by the previous fact of qualification or certification. If the appointing power is dis- tributed among lay officers, however high may be their purposes, there is urgent necessity of rigorous rules for certification. The more widely the power of appointment is distributed, the greater the weight and influence exercised in behalf of the would-be teacher and regardless of the interests of the school. We are all acquainted with the commissioner who would be good enough to give all persons certificates whose fathers are tax-payers, who looks upon the maintenance of schools first of all with reference to the support of teachers, and who sees no farther into the problem of licensing and selecting instructors than what appears to be a charitable mission of giving to as many deserving young women as possible a chance to earn a decent living. The good man who feels that the place should be given to the applicant who comes first, to the girl who has a mother to support, to the graduate of his own school, the daughter of a local politician, or a member of the same church with himself, will always flourish in city school 424 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION. boards. He is frequently a good man for all other purposes but hiring teachers, and there is no reason for disqualifying him for exercising that function, — when his generous predilections may be rendered harmless by a little wise legislation. Another phase of the question, which you will please allow me to men- tion, in order to clearly state the main purpose of this paper, is the position of the superintendent of schools with regard to the nomination of teachers. While I do not concur in what seems to me to be an illogical theory of very respectable support, a theory which would assign to the superinten- dent the business of certificating and licensing, and exclude him from the duty of appointment or assignment, it is not permissible to show the in- consistency of that policy. But I do not wish to discuss the question as to what person or what official may, with best interest to the schools, be vested with the power of appointment. The problem which seems to me most deserving our attention, in the form of a simple proposition, may be stated thus : "What should be done to secure for a system of city schools an ample supply of well-qualified teachers ? The conditions upon which this problem is to be solved run as follows : The teaching corps of a city needs continual reinforcement to supply the places of retiring teachers, and to occupy new positions created by the growth of the system. In large cities, those of one hundred thousand population or upward, the problem of recruiting the ranks of the teaching corps is of supreme importance, and increases in difficulty as the demand for teachers increases. Unfortunately, the administrative and supervisory departments of the city school systems are not proportionally strengthened with the city's growth, and hence the need of systemization and wise rules to regulate the licensing and appointing of teachers. Notwithstanding the permanent tenure which prevails, especially in large cities, as com- pared with the average tenure prevailing in less populous communities, there is a continual change, due to voluntary retirement or to influences beyond official control, which makes necessary a continual reinforcement of the corps. A minority, — sometimes a small minority, — of the whole number of annual changes occur at the end of the school year, or at such time as enables the board to supply the vacancies from the many teachers desiring a change and free to make new annual contracts. A majority of the changes occur from time to time, during the year, at this place or that, now unexpectedly, and again after due notice, but all requiring the substitution of competent teachers. By the time the school is well opened and organized in September, there are two classes of persons which it is well to consider. The first class includes teachers of presumable com- petency and ability, engaged in the schools, but who will vacate their places before the end of the year. The second class includes an equal number of would-be teachers, novitiates, and disappointed applicants, ready, upon notice, to supply vacancies. Teachers' "supply agencies" QUALIFICATION AND SUPPLY OF TEACHERS. 425 find constant business in the fact that among a given number of teachers there is a fairly constant rate of retirement with a consequent need of an equal rate of substitution. The fact is of interest to us, inasmuch as it suggests a much more important fact; namely, that, through the occasional retirement of teachers from the corps, the character and general ability of the teaching force, and, therefore, the efficiency of the instruction, are determined, and may, by wise measures, be advanced, or, by narrowness .«md indifference, be allowed to decline irreparably. From estimates made in the Milwaukee schools in the years 1887 and 1888, when this subject was carefully examined, I found the rate of change in the personnel of the teaching corps to be from ten to twelve per cent. The present corps of more than 500 teachers at this rate needs an annual reinforcement of fifty teachers to supply vacancies, and twenty-five to fill new places caused by growth of the system, — a total of seventy-five new teachers annually. In Chicago this rate of change would approximate an annual addition to the teaching corps of 240 teachers. Perhaps the more rapid rate of expansion which has characterized the growth of Chicago would require even more than this number of annual additions to the list of teachers. In Philadelphia, I think, there are employed 2,400 or more teachers. I understand that the number now exceeds 2,600. The penalty for matrimony which some boards impose, and the same average of retire- ments through unavoidable causes which holds in Milwaukee, would require at least 250 recruits annually to supply vacancies. It is apparent, in view of these facts, that a weak and defective policy under which so many new teachers are employed must impair the work of the schools, and, in the course of time, operate as an insurmountable obstacle to progress and improvement. On the other hand, a thorough, efficient, and practical system of supplying all vacancies with the best talent procurable, and this without regard to any consideration ulterior to the prime object of good teaching, must raise and improve the standard of public education. If Superintendent Bradley and the School Board of Minneapolis, or the committee on appointments, were obliged to engage an entirely new corps of teachers annually, they would do only what must be done by such a board as that of Chicago or Philadelphia. Of course, the sources of supply in the latter-named cities must be comparatively large, but the business of selecting appointees devolves upon a board and officials of limited numbers, and it is not invidious to doubt whether the capacity of the city board increases with the increasing number of appointments to be made and the importance of the work of selection. If this important business is rele- gated to local boards or committees or commissioners, the sources of supply, though on the whole augmented, are still lower in qualification, and the danger of inferior appointments is greatly increased. The larger the city, therefore, the greater the liability from this cause to admit to the teaching corps inferior teachers, and the greater the necessity, as before 426 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION remarked, of laws and a wisely devised system of applying standards of qualification and of supplying vacancies. I am well aware that it is not conformable to general reports to cast doubt upon the ability of city boards and superintendents to maintain and advance the excellence of instruction along with the growth of the school system. Large cities are not only a law, each to itself, but the merit or the demerit of their institutions is frequently established upon their own reports. The glittering compliments to the high culture, unselfish devo- tion, professional skill, progressive spirit, and general excellence charac- terizing the teaching work, which with many of us in pretty rhetoric adorn our reports, which seem very relishable to the palate of the public, have won reputations for city schools even in the face of some very open and conspicuous facts. A few " crack " classes form no criterion of excel- lence and high standing of a city system. That can be estimated only by the general high average of the regular work performed in the large majority of the schools and by a majority of the teachers. Having suggested the comparative disabilities and disadvantages under which city boards labor in recruiting the rank and file of teachers, by reason of the large number of continually occurring vacancies, another source of weakness in city systems requires attention, — a source somewhat obscured by the prestige of city systems, and too often ignored by school boards or those intrusted with the duty of forming rules for the qualifica- tion and appointment of teachers. The higher salaries paid in large cities are supposed to attract talent, and, on the whole, to give the city schools an advantage over those of small towns, which good teachers leave, invited by better compensation and the higher satisfaction of city life. Closely connected, however, with the advantage which higher salaries are supposed to secure, are corre- sponding drawbacks. Liberal salaries are quite as attractive to the half- educated novice and the incompetent of varied trials and many failures, as they are to the well-trained and successful. Where the inducements are such as to encourage and reward the most capable, there should be strong safeguards against the presumptions of the unworthy. Boards of large cities have to contend with obstacles not felt in smaller cities and towns. They have to meet stubborn and narrow prejudices, sometimes most strongly expressed and intrenched among their own membership ; they have to maintain by wise rules a barrier against more persistent and more numerous applicants ; and, as I shall show further on, the sources whence they must draw teachers are not so fruitful of that kind of talent and ability which makes good teachers as is generally supposed. In the report of the Commissioner of Education for 1887 and 1888 may be found some information that well deserves the attention of those inter- ested in the improvement of city schools, and who realize how much depends upon the qualification of teachers. QUALIFICATION AND SUPPLY OF TEACHERS. 427 A recent proposition made in the Milwaukee Board to certificate high- school graduates brought about a comparison between the number of pupils following high-school courses in smaller cities of the State and those of Milwaukee. The comparison showed that in proportion to population and in proportion to the whole number of public school teachers employed in the small cities, there was an average of two or three times as many pupils enrolled in high schools. Making such comparison between the high-school enrollment of Philadelphia and that in other cities in Pennsylvania, the same conditions may be observed. According to this report, the forty-two cities of six thousand population and upwards had an aggregate attendance in high schools of 5,391, — two and a half times the high-school attendance of Philadelphia. The total population of these forty-two cities is given as about a thousand more than that of the great Quaker City. After making allowance for inferior grading of high schools in some of the smaller cities, there is still ground for presumption that secondary educa- tion in larger cities does not keep pace, or correspond, with their growth ; and the inference seems plain that the class of persons of education fit to recruit the ranks of public school teachers is by no means so large and promising as is generally supposed. My investigation of the subject leads me to the conclusion that the superiority of public school systems of large cities over small cities and towns is not in the development of the high school or in secondary education, but in the elementary school, and in the advantages due to close grading and organization. The apparently limited extent of secondary and professional education adds weight to the conclu- sion that as cities increase in population, the reinforcement and recruiting of the teaching force with well-qualified instructors becomes more and more difficult. It also contains a warning against the narrow policy of restrict- ing appointments to residents, and of the passing of rules to discriminate against applicants on other grounds than those of ability and character. Three classes constitute the supply of teachers for city schools. They are : First, — Teachers trained by the city in the training class or normal schools, which in turn are fed by high schools and academies. Second, — Teachers trained in distant classes or normal schools, and either by exami- nation or acceptance of diploma licensed and appointed. The majority have experience before applying for places in the city. Though profes- sionally trained, they, as a class, have qualities distinct from the city trained teachers and are not infrequently called "country teachers," or "outsiders." Third, — Teachers without professional training who, having won certifi- cates upon examination abroad or in the city, enter the rolls and abide their time to secure appointments. With these are included the unfin- ished productions of high schools and academies, and many young persons who, spurred by necessity, seek a shorter cut to the earning of a living than the way through the normal school. In some of the Western cities the list of the so-called "substitutes" is made up from this class. The 428 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION. first two sources mentioned include persons of professional training ; the third, by no means inferior in number, expect tx> make teachers of themselves after engagement. Among them may be a few having such natural gifts as to deserve the appellation "born teachers," a term which is converted into that sophism so often resorted to in proof of the inade- quacy of normal training, namely, — " teachers are born, not made." This class, however, includes a much larger number, who, for the welfare of the children whom they are entrusted to teach, might better not have been born at all. The principal point to be noticed in regard to this third class is, that they make teachers of themselves at the sacrifice of their pupils' interests, upon whom they must practice and experiment ; and, further, that cities must train teachers, and, if enough are not home-trained, get more from abroad, or allow a procession of novices to invade the schools and in their own way make teachers of themselves. Teachers are either made by systematic and scientific training wherein practice and principles are harmonized, or they gain skill in a desultory, empirical way and by mechan- ical imitation. Experience they may be said to get also, but there are two kinds of that, general and indefinite as the term is when applied to the work of teaching. It seems hardly necessary to urge to this audience the great desirability of a professional standard for admission to the ranks of city teachers, — I use the term professional in its broadest sense, to include those who are skilled in the profession by successful experience. The practical obstacles to enforcing professional training or experience as a prerequisite to a license or appointment are not so serious as to deter us from attempting the establishment of such a standard. I believe that it might be accomplished more easily than is generally supposed. Like the long deferred resumption of specie and the end of financial philosophy in the advice, "the way to resume is to resume," there is a way for city boards to lead and succeed in recognizing no one as worthy to teach who has not made special preparation under conditions favorable to combined practice and study of the art of teaching. In the absence of any profes- sional training, experience, together with proof of high general culture, should be acceptable. The establishment of such a standard would at once dispose of that army of well-intending novices who are constantly in wait- ing to fill the vacant places as they appear in public schools. It would exclude a considerable number of those immature persons who, more am- bitious than successful in their efforts before village boards, find easier access into city school-rooms by the aid of their city friends. It would, of course, exclude that large number of young people in the city who are unwilling to give to the preparation of teaching the time and labor which modern methods require. Rules faithfully enforced to accomplish this end would, in my opinion, promote the efficiency of city schools more than any other single measure which might be adopted. Allow me to indicate one helpful step toward the attainment of such a QUALIFICATION AND SUPPLY OF TEACHERS. 429 standard of eligibility for employment. Some three or four years ago an inquiry into the frequency of teachers' absences, and the average number of substitutes employed to fill such absences, suggested a change, whereby a larger number of well-qualified teachers than those assigned to places should be kept at the command of the board. In Milwaukee it was found that of a corps of 400 teachers employed at that time, there was an average absence of twelve to fifteen teachers a day, the absences some days exceed- ing twenty. This includes all vacant places, permanent and temporary. It frequently happens that two or three vacancies exist for which there is no appointee at hand. It was customary, as in other places, to occupy these by so-called substitute teachers having no certificates, or by those having the certificate, but no experience. A rule was adopted empowering a committee and the superintendent to appoint a number of supernumerary teachers to be called the reserve corps. These teachers were the best that could be obtained during the summer vacation. Their appointment was regular, and their salary the same as that of assistant teachers, no deduc- tion being made when their services were not required, providing they re- ported for service at the office. Members of the reserve corps have their predilections and aptitudes. These, known to the superintendent, are regarded when temporary assignments are made. A vacancy in a seventh or an eighth grade is supplied by a teacher who is supposed to have the capacity for teaching higher grades. A vacancy in the primary grade is supplied by a teacher who is supposed to be adapted to primary work. In the meantime the members of the reserve corps, being selected upon grounds of general efficiency, experience, and training, are eligible for appointment. Their service in temporary classes commends them for appointment, and their detail to occupy recently created vacancies is a kind of prepara- tion for appointment. If the principal is satisfied, a resolution of transfer from the reserve corps to the corps of the school is all that is required. In this way we have been able to satisfy the prerogative of local commis- sioners who select their own teachers, and with the improvement of the plan hope to introduce a larger number of capable teachers to fill vacancies. As the reserve corps is depleted, it is recruited by the committee and the superintendent, whose business it is to keep a record of applicants and to hold frequent meetings for interviewing applicants for admission to the reserve corps. The corps was first organized under rules which prohibited the employment of any teachers who had taught in the schools previously. The restriction was, however, removed, and perhaps not for the best inter- ests of the schools. Experience has shown that some teachers were kept drifting about upon the reserve corps for a whole year without finding, in the good opinion of principals and commissioners, a transfer to a perma- nent place. It is best to discontinue such teachers from the service. Otherwise the reserve corps may become occupied by a class of professional substitutes, and become an invalid corps instead of a reserve to supply 430 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION. capable and vigorous recruits. There are many good features and some unexpected drawbacks connected with the plan ; but as a plan to enable the school board to establish a standard of professional training, to provide itself with a sufficient number of teachers duly qualified to receive appoint- ment when such teachers are obtainable, it is abundantly successful. I know of nothing that effects the same ends, except it be the admirable system followed in the Washington schools. Their system seems to rest in well-based confidence in the superintendency, and in the consent of commissioners to allow the supervising officers a large measure of advisory influence. In boards organized upon a different plan from the Washing- ton board, for instance, the local system, such a scheme would be weak- ened by commissioners insisting upon their prerogative of making appoint- ments. In conclusion, I must acknowledge that an important field, suggested by the title of this address, has been but slightly scanned. The question as to what should be the nature of the examination, to test scholarship and professional knowledge, is a topic in itself. A minimum amount of exact knowledge should certainly be required ; but to cut up the whole field into eight or ten distinct portions, and these portions into as many distinct questions, giving to each subject and to each question an equal value in the total estimate of ability, is a very arbitrary proceeding. The most important feature of such examinations is usually disposed of by eight or ten questions in theory of teaching, the answers to which may be crammed with much less expenditure of time and labor than that given to a prep- aration in constitution or geography. The professional feature of teach- eis' examinations should be emphasized. Deficiency or inaccuracy in matters of fact may be overlooked in view of manifest ability in analysis and expression. Finally, I would say that the aim of this paper is to en- force and emphasize the importance of professional training, or its equiva- lent, successful and broad experience. The preventive of narrowness and mechanical imitation, remarked by competent visitors as characteristic of city schools, is a broad, thorough system of finding and bringing in quali- fied teachers. The intellectual progress of a great city is not developed exclusively from its own interior creation ; like its commercial strength, it derives stimulus and nourishment from without; and the farther are drawn the elements of its Jife, the more generously it appropriates and absorbs the talent, the skill and industry of the world, — the more certain, rapid, perfect, and beautiful is its growth. It lives for the world about it, and finds its own glory, not in a policy of intellectual exclusiveness, not in discrimination against those attracted to its borders by the rewards and satisfactions which ever invite genius, ambition, and ability, but in open- ing wide its gates and welcoming from whatever source all that elevates its social, industrial, and intellectual life. DISCUSSION. 431 DISCUSSION. [Reported by Supt. Edwin P. Seaver, op Boston.] Mr. A. B. Blodgett, Syracuse, N. Y. : Talleyrand once said,—" The art of putting the right men in the right places is first in the science of government." Change two words in the above, and we have the true key to successful school-work. The art of putting the right teachers in the right places is first in the science of education. The " qualification " of teachers in this question has reference to the right teacher, of course. Omitting the items of health, broad and accurate scholarship, etc., which must enter into the make-up of every real teacher, I shall touch briefly the following : the teacher's presence, skill, tact, and intelligence. Outside of the items just named, the teacher, though she possess in a marked degree all others of whatsoever name and nature, yet lacking these, is a failure. Prior to and without the aid of normal and training schools, these qualities were attained by teachers, if at all, at the expense of the pupils. Contrary to the old quotation, to my mind the "born teacher" was never born. There are a great many folks in this world, but very few teachers. It is true that some people have come into this world in possession of certain faculties and attributes that readily developed and expanded their possessors into natural teachers ; but the really born teacher is yet to come. In any event, if any considerable number of the teachers of our day belong to the born class, the time for regeneration is at hand. By the presence of the teacher I mean her physique, cast of countenance, and general make-up which is noticeable, as to herself, in the way she walks, in the way she stands, in what she says, in what she does not say. It is observed in her pupils by the close attention given to her every word and motion, and by their unconscious absorbing of the splendid example in all lines which such a teacher presents. A teacher with a good presence sends the pupils7 heads up and their feet down. Her clothes fit her, and a point is gained there. And then what a fund of reserve power she has ! No child has ever seen her ruffled to the depths. No emergency has arisen of which she was not the master. But I need not say more in this line ; she is to be found in all our schools. Perhaps we do not recognize as we ought the difference between skill and tact in a teacher. A really skilful teacher may be completely demoralized in presenting a lesson which she has thoroughly prepared, and all from a lack of tact. 432 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION. To illustrate : As a young teacher I frequently became disheartened by finding in educational periodicals, just as we find them to-day, a very carefully prepared set of questions and answers, showing a certain teacher's method of presenting a special lesson. First comes a very clear question, followed by a complete, round, full, explicit answer ; then another question and a similar answer, and so on, adfinitum. Every question good, every answer good, because the teacher has carefully prepared each, — for print. Now if any teacher could secure just that state of things in class-work, — but he can't do it, — it would be a skilfully arranged affair ; yet without the tact of a live teacher, one sharp question on a side issue, or an unintelligent answer on the part of some pupil, would tend to upset the well-prepared dish. So the teacher must be alive in all directions, and it requires tact more than all else to arouse the dull, to interest the listless, and to enable the teacher to discard or weave into a recitation just those things that shall be helpful in the give and take of a spirited and profitable recitation hour. Skill will help the teacher properly to connect her theory with its prac- tical presentation, and tact will enable her successfully to perceive, appre- ciate, and cope with the circumstances, incidents, and accidents which always accompany the teacher in her arduous tasks. But a keen intelligence must rule and pervade all things, if the highest eminence is to be attained. Intelligence is sought after and paid for in dogs and horses. It is a most delightful element, yet difficult to find, in a servant girl, particularly in the cook ; but we hear very little concerning it, distinctively, as a qualification of teachers. A few days since, in company with a member of our board of educa- tion, I paid a visit to some of the cities and also to one of the normal schools of our State. It was a source of delight to me to see my companion's keen discrimina- tion and appreciation of the difference in the worth of the teachers whose work we saw. Much of the work was most excellent ; some of it no better than could be found at home. Yet I observed that the teaching in which tact, intelligence, and quiet reserve power on the part of the teachers played the greater part, impressed him with much force and drew from him expressions of satisfaction. I said to him and to myself, I want every member of our board of education to see, as you have seen, the contrast between good teaching and teaching that is not so good. I say, therefore, that a good presence, skill, tact, and intelligence must be foremost among the requisites of our teachers. And where shall we procure such teachers ? Without reference to past practices I answer, teachers of known ability and successful experience from any and all sources. New teachers from normal or training schools under our own DISCUSSION. 433 supervision. But a close and careful discrimination and sifting must be pursued along the lines above discussed, as well as others, and especially during the training period, that incompetents or those giving no promise may be weeded out. I trust I may be pardoned if I refer to our own local work in this line, as I know little of these matters outside of my personal observation and experience. Our teachers' and training class course covers one year of solid work, and no application for admission to this class is considered, unless the applicant is a graduate of our high school or has completed a course of equal extent elsewhere ; and these candidates cannot enter the class till they first pass a thorough examination in subject-matter studies. The necessity of this is manifest. Just here we begin the sifting, as the fol- fowing will witness. In January last thirty graduates, as above indicated, entered this examination, and all failed. Consequently none were per- mitted to enter the training class. Having once entered the class, at the end of five months they are again tested and promoted, or, in cases that call for it, are advised to discontinue their efforts to become teachers. During the last five months, under the eye of the special critic teacher in their practice work, a still closer observance of their progress is made, and only the best are permitted to enter a final examination in conducting class recitations before a committee, as the following will show. The critic teacher, — a graduate of the Cook County normal, and a good one, — had twenty-two practice teachers in training from September till January last, and presented only nine of the twenty-two for the consideration of the committee. Of these nine six were accepted and three conditioned. In several cases the would-be teachers have failed to receive their certifi- cates, though their literary qualifications were of the best, and solely because they lacked the presence, the skill, the tact, — the discriminating intelligence necessary to the successful teacher. The names of those who meet all requirements are placed upon the list of eligible to appointment, and from this list selections are made when vacancies occur. I am proud to say at this time that, while I have sometimes been visited and importuned by parents, brothers, friends political and friends religious, we have sacredly held to the above as a basis in the appointment of teachers, and, during the two years of my superin tendency, I have not been asked by a member of our board of education to consent to the appoint- ment, nor has an appointment been made of any teacher upon whose qualifications and fitness I had not at some previous time passed favorably. Please do not gather from this that we have not had to fight to hold this position against pressure from various outside influences. In one case we fled to our State Superintendent for support, and we found him where you know he would stand, ready and able to sustain any movement for 434 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION. the uplifting of the teaching force in his State ; and he gave us a signal victory. But normal schools and training classes, at their best, are not infallible. A few weeks since a teacher, who had attended one of our normal schools, — which one I do not know, — entered a commissioner's examination for a uniform certificate. The result showed that she possessed great ab- sorbent qualities, at least, for she divided her subjects into a, i, c, a', V, c', etc., without limit, yet in subject-matters her papers stood at twenty per cent. This is no criticism upon the normal as a training school ; it simply shows a lack of preparation and intelligence. Another, a graduate of our own training class, gave promise of great success. She is an utter failure ; and it fell to my hands, after granting her our city certificate last June, to inform her a few days since that we could not give her an appointment. This question in its breadth involves the election or appointment of boards of education, as to whether each member shall represent a single ward or the city at large. This phase of it I leave to others. I desire simply to add that as State and city superintendents, and commissioners of education, we can do more to correct existing evils, relating to this question, than we have in the past ever dreamed, and in support of this statement I need only point to our own State of New York. By his elevation of qualifications in the country and village schools of our State, Superintendent Draper has served notice on the cities to move up on these lines, and we have got to do it. I have used the advance made in the rural schools of our locality during the past few years, and the position of our State Superintendent on these questions, as a strong argument in inducing our board to take advanced ground, and we have moved forward. The most serious question that confronts our city schools to-day is how to dispense with the services of incompetents of long standing, — those who never die, cannot or will not marry, and can, but will not, resign. By legislative enactments, — by the zeal, earnestness, and strong help of our State departments, — and by the taking of sound and tenable positions on the part of city superintendents, we shall in a few short years reach a position from which we can look back and wonder why we halted so long. Mr. L. 0. Foose, Harrisburg, Pa. : Owing to the limited time allowed me, I shall not attempt to discuss the admirable paper just read, but shall endeavor, briefly, to touch on one or two of the essential points of the subject under consideration. I do not find as much difficulty in getting good teachers, at present, as I do in getting good work from many who have been long in the service, or in getting rid of them, but this is foreign to the subject. DISCUSSION. 435 The first essential point is to establish a standard of qualifications for city schools sufficiently high, and then gradually, but faithfully, and none the less surely, work up to it. This can generally be done during a series of years by exercising patience and vigilance. It, of course, requires tact and judgment on the part of a superintendent, and the influential members of the board, or committee, that appoints the teachers, with now and then, perhaps, prudent concessions for the sake of harmony and the success of the cause. In an experience of a number of years I have succeeded in this matter to the extent that only trained and experienced teachers are now employed in the city whose schools I have the honor to superintend. In establishing this standard of qualifications, scholarship has been made a leading requisite, though by no means the only one. This should be ac- curate in essentials, broad in a practical direction, and as far as possible the result of original inquiry and personal investigation. The professional requirements, when the applicant has not had successful experience in teaching, should be training, founded on a psychological basis, which will lead up to practical methods, develop tact and assurance, insure growth in professional lines, and round out a personality that will render its possessor strong in all that goes to make up good teaching. The second essential point is the supply, which should be from all sources where strong teachers may be had. From those specially trained for city work in city training schools, from those trained in normal, or general training schools, and occasionally from those who have been doing advanced or university work. From home sources so as to stimulate and encourage home talent, strengthen the schools in the community, and reconcile those who advocate home production and home protection. From abroad so as to secure new life for the schools, to infuse new energy into the work, and to guard against the monotony of a dead level in methods and administration. From those who have met with success elsewhere, or who are specially strong in certain lines, and whose assistance will lift up and greatly magnify as well as dignify the work of the schools. Care, of course, must be taken to secure those who have natural fitness for the work, as training without native force will at best result in very ordinary work, if not in total failure. Much more could be said on these two points, but my time is up and I yield to others. Mr. D. W. Harlan, Wilmington, Del., said that members of boards of education in many places would have to be made to see the necessity of professional training in a much clearer light than they do, before they would provide the needed facilities for such training. To do this is one of the ways of securing a supply of well-qualified teachers. He said that the common estimate of the time spent by teachers on their work is unjust and discouraging to faithful teachers. Two hundred days of five 436 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION hours is about all that many people give teachers credit for as a year's work. He thought more expeditious ways of getting rid of teachers who will not or cannot give good service, much needed. Mr. Wm. N. Barringer, Newark, N. J., wished to add two more questions, How to get rid of poor school principals, and how to get rid of poor school superintendents. . He drew his answer from his experience on his father's farm when he was a boy. He had there learned that pull- ing weeds was hard work ; that the more he pulled the daisies out of the grass-land the more the daisies grew, and that the better way was to plough them under, and sow the land with good clean seed. He did not worry about bad teachers overmuch. The badness of teaching in the schools might be the fault of the superintendent, whom he would advise to in- quire within if he was inclined to worry over bad teaching. The super- intendent of the right sort would hold teachers* meetings, come near to the teachers, help them, give them his sympathy and encouragement ; meanwhile trusting to Providence and old bachelors to remove the in- competent. Mr. Thomas Walton, Philadelphia, Pa., who emphatically announced himself as a dweller in the "city of brotherly hate," had also learned by his experience on a farm that the longer you pulled weeds the more there were left. There were inefficient school principals and inefficient super- intendents. He wished he might trust to the widows to take care of them. His main point was that there should be a law forbidding a teacher to teach after reaching the age of fifty. The teachers in service at any time should teach the next generation, not the generation after the next. He had had something to do with bringing Mr. MacAlister to Philadelphia. Mr. John T. Prince, Agent Massachusetts State Board of, Education : Three elements should enter the preparation for the teacher's profession, — first, knowledge of subjects to be taught, which is acquired in school and college ; secondly, professional knowledge, acquired in the normal school and university ; and, thirdly, professional training, acquired in the practice school and seminary. It is our duty as professional superintendents to keep as close to this standard of qualifications for teachers as possible. At least, we should protest with all our strength against the political nomina- tion and election of teachers so frequent in many places. To be firm in this matter may cause the superintendent temporary annoyance, but in the end his opinions and recommendations will be respected. At least will he be possessed of that first element of true success, — self-respect in being guided by principles rather than by men who have no principles. Mr. C. W. Bardeen, Syracuse, N. Y. : Mr. President,— I find it diffi- cult to follow Mr. Anderson, because to discuss a paper one must find DISCUSSION. 437 something either to take issue with or to develop. I cannot take issue with him, because he stands upon precisely the ground I have always oc- cupied,— that the one requisite for good teachers is discrimination in their employment. It is not a question of pensions ; for pensions, after a cer- tain amount of service, will make it only the more difficult to get rid of incompetent teachers, who wish to complete that term of service. It is not a question of hiring teachers within the city or outside the city, for, if a high standard of qualifications is maintained, the range of territory from which teachers are drawn will necessarily be large. It is not a question of who shall appoint the teachers. In the third largest city of our State the teachers are appointed absolutely by the superintendent, and yet there is no city in the State in which it is so difficult for a super- intendent to exercise his own choice. I even know of a case where he desired to introduce a teacher for instruction in a certain branch, and was so unwilling to have it known that she came from without the city that he asked her to remove all luggage marks from her trunk. It is not a ques- tion of wages, for if only qualified teachers are hired the wrages will take care of themselves. It is simply this one point, — of demanding a certain standard of qualification, and of choosing among all applicants those who approach it most closely. This standard of qualification should include, as Mr. Pierce has said, professional training, at least for city schools ; and it would be well if at least one year's experience were required of every candidate before a permanent certificate was granted. Mr. T. M. Balliet, Springfield, Mass.: Schools cannot be reformed by a wholesale discharge of old or incompetent teachers. There is prob- ably as large a percentage of incompetent superintendents as of incompetent teachers, and it is often the incompetent superintendent that is most ready to recommend the discharge of the incompetent teacher. It is his only means of "reforming" schools. By all means have incompetent teachers discharged as soon as you are sure their incompetency is their own fault, and not the fault of the supervising officer, who fails to give them the proper direction, training, and help ; or of the board of education, which fails to support them or even hampers and embarrasses them. The first and chief duty of a superintendent of schools is to teach the teachers how to teach — to be a teacher of pedagogics. A superintendent who cannot do this is out of place in his position. He must train teachers to observe children, to put their brains into their work, and he must arouse in them inspiration and aspiration. In this way many teachers who, without such personal stimulus, were "incompetent/' will prove in the end to be among the most efficient teachers in the corps. I have personal knowledge of teachers of this character in several cities, — teachers who trace their "awakening'' and "second birth" to the stimulus they received from a live, competent superintendent. The way to reform schools is : first, to 438 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION. secure a competent superintendent ; second, to let him "reform " all the teachers who are incompetent and can be "reformed;" thirdly, to bury the dead. Pees. James MacAlistek, of Philadelphia, gave an illustration in sup- port of the doctrine maintained by the last speaker. Two important rules had been adopted by the Philadelphia Board of Education, — (1) that the superintendent should annually report for dismissal incompetent teachers, and (2) that the schools should be closed occasionally for teachers' meet- ings. Under the first rule he had done very little ; and what little had been done had been most disagreeable business. Under the second rule he had done much. He had held many meetings, attendance upon which had been voluntary, but large and constantly increasing. What improve- ment had taken place in the schools of Philadelphia since the establish- ment of the superin tendency had been due to these meetings more than to all other causes combined. Many good and faithful women there were, incompetent and inefficient indeed, but still teaching the best they knew how and up to the standard required of them when appointed many years ago. Will you turn these women out upon the streets, send them to the poor-house ? So long as we have no pensions to give them, shall we not keep them in the schools ? We must do so, and make the best we can of them. The supreme thing is for the superintendent to be a teacher of teachers. There is power enough in our hands now. We must use it. Mr. S. T. Dutton, Brookline, Mass : It is all important that persons who are to receive professional training should first have a thorough grounding in academic studies. This should be accomplished under a system that teaches how to study rather than how to cram. In taking up professional work the student should be made to feel that teaching is a process of begetting life, and that the only means of mastering that process is by studying the individual child. I regret to say that our normal schools are not fully alive to this idea. They spend too much time and effort on the metaphysical side of psychology, and too little in consider- ing the condition of child growth and the art of teaching. The normal schools may well be more courageous and enterprising in pursuing fresh lines of experimentation and in finding a more complete adaptation of means to end. Again, every town and city should inaugurate a systematic scheme for improving the quality of teaching. The superintendent should seek to create an atmosphere that is favorable to progress, and the active interest of every teacher in the corps should be enlisted. Let the teacher be emanci- pated from the bondage of examinations, and let them put the best that is in them into their teaching. The best element in school education is the . influence of one human soul that is strong and free upon another. This DISCUSSION. 439 is always wanting where the school is run strictly on schedule time, like a railway train. As regards the supply of teachers, — if we want to attract the best talent, the most cultured men and women to the profession, — we must open the doors to them and make the field as attractive as possible. A rigid system of State examinations may serve a good purpose in keeping out poor ma- terial from the teaching ranks ; but I fear it may do some harm also in making the profession distasteful to the graduates of our universities. Mr. J. M. Greenwood, Kansas City, Mo.: I will present two points only, — (1) As to the qualification of the teacher; (2) A danger to be avoided in the appointment of teachers. A teacher must be judged by the following standard, — the richness of her teaching, the vitality of her teaching, and the stability of her teaching. Richness, vitality, and stability explain themselves. They are the ideals which the true teacher endeavors to realize. An element of weakness in city schools is the determination to fill all vacancies from local graduates who have been trained in these schools. Boards, through their short-sightedness in selecting their own graduates, thus weaken their schools beyond measure. From ten to twenty per cent, of the supply may with safety be drawn from home graduates, and the general efficiency of the schools not be lowered, yet any greater per cent, will be exceedingly detrimental. There is not a city in the United States, in which the exclusive system has been adopted, that has not impaired the working force of its schools. Our children are entitled to the best instruction possible. New blood must be infused into a teaching corps, and this can be done by securing the best talent from the outside that the salaries will command. No Chinese walls should be built about a system of city schools. Dr. E. E. White only desired to emphasize what had been so well said. The supply of the schools with competent teachers is the essential thing in school administration, and to this end teachers must come to their work through the door of normal training. It is high time that this principle was considered settled. Normal training must give the teacher a knowl- edge of guiding principles. He would give more for a young teacher who knows well a few fruitful principles of her art than for one with a head full of cut-and-dried methods. The soul of a child cannot be touched by pattern. Teaching is the art of arts. Nor is it enough that teachers receive normal training before they enter upon their work. The art of teaching cannot be mastered in one or two years. The school-room should be a training school, and to this end the superintendent should be able to lead, instruct, and inspire teachers. He should set before teachers true and high ideals. But in this guidance and training of teachers the principal is an impor- 440 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION. tant factor. No superintendent is large enough to reach efficiently all of the teachers in a large city. He must depend largely on his associates in the supervisory office, and especially on the principals who stand nearest to the teachers. As a superintendent, the speaker lias been somewhat discouraged on visiting a school presided over by a principal, well-meaning and earnest, but with little or no insight into true teaching. The instruc- tion in most of the rooms was unsatisfactory. The superintendent's best instruction had not taken root. On visiting another school, with a live and competent principal, he had been delighted to find the work in the different rooms faced the right way, with cheering evidence of progress. It is as important to have trained principals as trained teachers. The man who does not know the difference between word-cramming and mental training ought not to be at the head of a modern school, or a system of schools. We need normal institutions of a higher grade than our present normal schools, — institutions for the professional training of superin- tendents and principals as well as teachers. Next to the selection and employment of competent teachers is the duty of retiring those who can neither teach nor learn to teach. But this duty is beset with peculiar difficulties. The schools in all our cities con- tain teachers who cannot teach. Some of these have done in the past excellent work, as measured by old standards ; and they are not without reputation. Other teachers have become grooved in the service, and their minds have lost their cunning for new ideas and methods. All faithful teachers, whether successful or not, should be treated with consideration and kindness. In the course of his experience the speaker had secured the retirement of teachers without dismissing them, and this was usually possible when inefficiency is due to impaired health, old age, or other infirmity. In this great work of elevating the professional attainments and effi- ciency of teachers we must be patient, provided we are making steady progress. It may take twenty-five years more to reach a reasonable standard. The schools are burdened with years of mistakes and ill-directed efforts. Their correction will require time. Pres. G. Stanley Hall, Worcester, Mass., had labored for years in the conviction that it is possible to raise the standard of teaching in this country in less than twenty-five years. Teaching should be not only a profession, but also now a mission. If somebody would heroically sacri- fice himself, some good would come of it. The Vienna Pedagogium was a model we might copy. Its sessions are held afternoons, and attended by teachers after school. He had seen something of the same sort in New York City, which was working well under Dr. Jerome Allen. What is a profession ? A body of expert knowledge and persons versed therein to profess it and apply it. It includes knowledge of history and princi- DISCUSSION. 441 pies of education, the present lack of which now in this country is deplorable. We greatly need to know what is now going on elsewhere. That is what we need in Massachusetts, notwithstanding Mr. Martin's defence of that State. We need professors of this body of expert knowledge, but where are the men ? He had been searching for them, but they were not to be found. Mr. S. A. Ellis, Rochester, N. Y. : As the method of providing for a supply of trained teachers for the Rochester schools is somewhat unique, it may be of interest to this body of superintendents to learn how the work is done. In 1883 the board of education organized a teachers' training class under the direction and control of the superintendent. From the grad- uates of these classes nearly all our teachers are chosen, it being a very difficult matter for one outside the city, at present, to secure an appoint- ment. While this is to be regretted, it must be admitted as a fact. A general view of the aim and plan of the teachers' training class is presented in the following outline : 1. Conditions of entrance. 2. Time. 3. Subjects. 4. Method of study. 5. Programme of weekly meeting, 6. Reference library. 7. Examination certificates. 8. Practice. First. Each applicant for membership must be eighteen years of age, and must have received, at least, three years of academic training and hold a regents' preliminary certificate. Second. The course embraces the forty weeks of the school year. The class meet for one hour each week to discuss the topic assigned the previous week. Third. The subjects studied are — (a) Education. (o) Teacher's Qualifications. (c) School Organization, Management, and Discipline. (d) Duties of Teachers in Reference to the Physical, Moral, and Intel- lectual Well-being of Pupils. (e) History of Pedagogy. (/) Psychology in its Practical Application to Principles of Teaching. (g) Methods of Teaching the Various School Branches. (h) Moral Training. Fourth. Questions upon each topic are arranged, printed, and distributed 442 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION. to the class a week or more previous to the discussion of that topic. Mem- bers of the class are required to prepare for the discussion by the study of the books of any good author, by personal observation, by conversation with those who have given attention to the subject, and by their own thinking and reasoning. Fifth. (a) Roll call. (b) Literary quotations from six or eight members of the class, and news items from an equal number, these having been previously appointed for the purpose. (c) Reading of the minutes of the previous meeting by any one upon whom the leader may call, and additions and corrections, comments. (d) The leader calls upon members of the class in turn (using cards), to answer and discuss the questions in the printed list, opportunity being given for voluntary remarks, or questions upon each topic thus discussed. Sixth. Books of leading authors upon all subjects in the course of study form a reference library for the special use of the training class. Seventh. A second-grade certificate is given to all members of the class who pass successfully the examination given at the close of the year's work, which is good for one year of teaching ; at the expiration of that time, all who shall have demonstrated their ability to manage and instruct a class of pupils, receive a first-grade certificate, which makes them eligible to appointment to teach in any grade in the public schools below the high school, except as principal of a grammar school. Eighth. All substitutes and temporary assistants are taken from the training class, as well as nearly all appointments to permanent positions. The only certificates now recognized by the board, besides these issued to graduates of the training class, are New York State College and Normal School certificates. As a result, our new teachers have more readily seized the reins of gov- ernment, and have the sooner settled upon the best methods of instruction, while the tone of the whole body of our teachers has been gradually ele- vated. One of our older and most experienced principals remarked the other day that no one thing in the history of our schools had been of greater advantage to the management and instruction in our schools than the work of our training class. At the present time nearly one-half of the teachers employed in our schools are graduates of our training class. This has come about in less than eight years, which shows the change- able character of the teaching profession even in our larger cities. The Chairman (Superintendent Draper, of New York) thought it was almost useless to expect superintendents to accomplish much improvement in the qualifications of newly chosen teachers under existing conditions. ITS ORGANIZATION AND FUNCTIONS. 443 Nine-tenths of the city boards of education had both the power to certify and to employ teachers, and so long as they possessed these powers they would employ their own friends in preference to some one else's friends. Sometimes they would delegate to the superintendent the authority to examine and certify candidates, for the sake of disarming criticism, but they would influence the action of the superintendent either directly or indirectly. What is needed is to give the superintendent independent, statutory powers, and charge him with the entire responsibility of examining and certifying candidates. Hold that the examining of candidates is profes- sional work which can only be performed by an expert, and that the em- ployment of them is a business matter, which may safely be transacted by any honest and fairly intelligent man, and you have accomplished much. Again, what is needed is a system which will help and at the same time direct the superintendent. In our cities, the number of candidates for teachers' positions is so great, and the facilities for acquiring proficiency so many, that it is perfectly practicable to require that all candidates shall have completed the high school course and spent a year in a normal school or training class before being given authority to teach. We passed such a law in our State last winter. It was vetoed. But we will have it yet. Some of our cities are doing precisely this now without law. All can do it and have plenty of teachers. It is no hardship to young candidates. It will work incalculable advantage to the schools. The time for talking about improving the teaching force has gone by ; it is now time to take action which will effect what is imperatively needed. Mr. Anderson, author of the paper, closed the discussion, accepting the chairman's summing up of the matter, and in the hope of securing some definite action on the part of the Department, offered the following resolution : Resolved, That in the opinion of the Department of Superintendence, the time has come when it is practicable to establish. a professional standard for all teachers em- ployed in city public schools, and the interests of education require school boards and superintendents to establish such a standard as an indispensable prerequisite to employ- ment in the schools. NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION: ITS ORGANI- ZATION AND FUNCTIONS. BY W. T. HARRIS, PH. D. Thirty-three years ago last August there met in the city of Philadelphia a handful of men to organize a National Teachers' Association. The move- ment started in New York and Massachusetts. A call had been issued and 444 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION widely circulated the year before (1856), inviting " all practical teachers in the North, the South, the East, the West, who are willing," — these are its significant words, — "who are willing to unite in a general effort to promote the general welfare of our country by concentrating the wisdom and power of numerous minds and by distributing among all the accumu- lated experiences of all ; who are ready to devote their energies and their means to advance the dignity, respectability, and usefulness of their call- ing." A constitution was drafted and adopted, and officers were elected for the following year. The directory of the newly formed Association voted to meet in Cincinnati in August, 1858. The noteworthy feature in the constitution adopted is the government of the Association by a board of directors elected at the annual meeting. This board was to consist of a large number of counsellors, one from each State, district, or Territory, together with the president, secretary, treasurer, and twelve vice-presi- dents. It also became the practice, even from this early meeting, to ap- point a large nominating committee, — one member from each State repre- sented in the convention. Inasmuch as it has frequently happened that only a single delegate was present from a State, the nominating committee has been obliged to fill out its extensive list of officers by naming its own mem- bers. The first president of the Association, as well as seven of the vice- presidents and two of the counsellors, ten in all, were members of the nominating committee that reported their names. While this strikes us at first as bad form, or even as dangerous to the usefulness of the Associa- tion, a moment's reflection convinces us that the danger is imaginary, and affects the form rather than the substance of the thing. If an entire assembly appoint itself on a nominating body, and then names all of its members to one office or another, it amounts to the same as a committee of the whole for the nomination of officers and a distribution of offices to all. In later years, since the Association has grown to gigantic proportions, it is true that this large committee has dwindled in comparison to the size of the body it represents. But the fact that the rule requires that all the States, districts, and Territories shall be represented on the board of directors, secures a variety of interests in that board, which prevents the possibility of clannishness or misrule. Should, however, it be deemed desirable to provide even a wider par- ticipation of the rank and file of the Association in the election of its directory, this could be easily effected by a constitutional provision per- mitting each State delegation to select its member of the nominating committee, leaving the president to select, as heretofore, for those States that decline or neglect to act. Practically, this would be a safeguard against any possible influence that might come from partisanship or political management, but it is quite difficult to conceive any circum- stances wherein danger is to be apprehended from such source. All will ITS ORGANIZATION AND FUNCTIONS. 445 agree, however, that the highest usefulness of the Association depends on the complete subordination of the political partisan element. We may here properly inquire what the legitimate results are for which we should look to come from this annual gathering of teachers from the length and breadth of the land. The main answer to this is provided for us in the words of the original call issued in 185G. In the language al- ready quoted, the Association should " concentrate the wisdom and power of numerous minds, and distribute among all the experiences of all." This call was written by Dr. Daniel B. Hagar, then president of the Massa- chusetts Teachers' Association. It was stated at the Philadelphia meeting in 1857 that there were already in existence twenty-three State Teachers' Associations, besides larger and smaller associations not bounded by State lines, — such, for example, as the American Institute of Instruction in New England, and the American Association for the Advancement of Education, which had been formed in Philadelphia. These associations had demonstrated the value of general conferences in which educational topics were discussed. The wisdom and power of many minds con- centrated on the difficult problems of the profession brought light such as none had seen before. The accumulated experience of all was thus distributed to each. The individual teacher, in his uneven development, strong in some points, and weak in others, found complementary strength in the experience of his fellow-teachers, strong where he was weak, and perhaps weak where he was strong. The divine principle of vicariousness that prevails in the spiritual world, rendering it possible for each man, woman, and child to participate profit- ably in the experience of another human being, — so that the spectacle of a deed and its consequences renders it entirely unnecessary to perform the deed itself in order to get what of good comes from doing it as a life ex- perience,— this divine principle of vicariousness in the life of human souls at once explains for us the true function of teachers' associations, and also the function of education itself in its entirety. What, indeed, is all edu- cation except the reenforcement of the individual by the experience of the family, the community, the nation, the race ? Education is, therefore, properly defined as the elevation of the individual into participation in the life of the species. While the brute inherits organically in his muscles and nerves and brain the experience of his progenitors in such a way that the life of his race appears as instinctive impulse, man, on the other hand, not only inherits the results of the life of his ancestry in the form of instincts and aspira- tions, but he can by language receive and communicate the outcome of his life direct. Hence his ability to collect within himself the results of others' lives is increased infinitely beyond that narrow line of hereditary descent ; for he can, through language, avail himself of the sense-perception of others far removed in time and space, making himself thereby a sort of 446 TEE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION omnipresence in space and time. Then, too, he can avail himself in like manner of the thoughts and reflections of his fellow-men, especially the thoughts and reflections of those most gifted minds that have done most to solve the problems of life and explain the anomalies of experience. More than this, too, he learns not only through their perceiving and by their thinking on what they perceive, but he learns by seeing their doing, and by the story of their doing, what to do himself and what to refrain from doing. Thus, by language, the individual is enabled to live vicari- ously the life of the race, and to live his own life vicariously for others. Whatever one does, goes into the reservoir of human experience as some- thing of value ; if it is a negative deed, bringing with it its punishment, the knowledge of it renders unnecessary the repetition of its like by others. If it is a positive deed, securing for it the normal development of the soul, then it is a precious discovery, and it may be adopted by all men as a new ethical form or moral law. Thus the very principle of all education, — the principle that makes pos- sible what we value as civilization in contrast to savage life, — this principle is appealed to as explaining and justifying the existence of a national edu- cational association. " Concentrate the wisdom and power of numerous minds ; distribute to each the accumulated experience of all." Who can say, looking back down the ladder of thirty-three years, that this beneficent process of giving and receiving has not characterized every stage of its ascent ? Spiritual giving, we are taught, is not a giving which diminishes the supply of the giver. In material giving, there is a transfer which makes him who gives poorer by the amount of his gift. But he who imparts his experience to others, possesses all the more firmly all the fruits of his own experience. Every teacher who has risen in this National Educational Association to expound his own observations or reflections, or to give the results of his experience, has, in the act of doing it, helped himself first of all to see more clearly than before the true lesson of his life. In spiritual participation, there is no division or loss. In material things, — in food, clothing, and shelter, — to share is to divide and diminish the part that goes to each. But these general principles we may admit, and yet fail to see in the work of the National Educational Association anything worthy of being classed under such high rubrics. Let us, therefore, take up in detail, that all may recognize some of the phases of the teacher's work that have been under discussion at the annual gatherings. I find, on looking over the table of contents of the annual volumes of proceedings, that there have been presented 241 papers on the five parts of the school system, namely : twenty-eight on the kindergartens, twenty- seven on primary work, seventy-five on high schools and colleges, fifty-six on normal schools, forty-five on manual training and technical schools. These 241 papers have all related, incidentally, to matters of course of ITS ORGANIZATION AND FUNCTIONS. 447 study and methods. But besides these there were twenty-one papers relating especially to the philosophy of methods ; eighty-one to various branches of the theory of education and psychology ; twenty -nine to the course of study ; ten to the peculiarities of graded and ungraded schools ; twenty-five to musical instruction ; ten to natural sciences ; forty on drawing ; and twenty-four to the important subject of moral and religious instruction. These make 240 additional papers on special themes of course of study and methods of discipline and management, — in the aggre- gate nearly 500 papers on these themes. Besides these papers, there are others, — on building, heating, and venti- lation, three ; national aid to education, fourteen ; education for Chinese, Indians, and colored people, eight ; on supervision of schools, ten ; on the uses and abuses of text-books, nine ; on examinations of teachers and of pupils, eight ; on compulsory education, three ; foreign educational systems, ten ; education and crime, two ; on the best methods of keeping statistics, four; on the criticisms urged against our schools, eight; in all, nearly a hundred more papers on important questions. We all remember with some remaining feelings of dismay the old- fashioned essays read at teachers' gatherings. The following titles will suggest them : " The Teachers' Motives "; "■ The Teacher and His Work "; " The Causes of Failure and Success in the Work of the Teacher"; " The Teacher's Ideal." Very often such titles introduced only goody-goody reflections on the personal character of the teacher. In the early days of the Association such essays were more frequent. One is glad to observe their growing rarity, not only in the National Educational Association, but also in State Associations and in educational magazines. Of course these 600 papers, relating to various points of school manage- ment, were only the half of the intellectual pabulum set forth at the annual gatherings. It is safe to say that the impromptu discussions called forth were at least another half. Where the undisciplined mind had flagged and failed to follow the thread of the written discourse, the oral discussion brought out vividly the points of the paper, and by vigorous opposition or defence aroused the powers of the weakling. The vigor- ous oral debate has here its tremendous advantages over the printed paper read in the educational periodicals. We have not mentioned the advantage of personal contact of mind with mind. In these gatherings the young teacher sees those who have grown old in the service and who have acquired reputation for their work. He meets his equals and measures their ideals by his own. He learns to see the details of his profession from many different points of view. The impres- sion derived from the printed page differs from that derived from personal conversation. Each has its advantages. The personal impression is more stimulating and provocative of imitation. The cool study of the printed paper leads to deeper self-activity. Both are useful, — nay, indispensable. 448 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION. It is obvious that for this personal lesson upon the teacher our recent large associations are far more valuable than the small gatherings of the early date ; where three hundred met then, now we have three thousand. The visitor to the Association now sees ten times the number of eminent teachers, and rejoices in a tenfold opportunity for profit. I do not think that I overestimate the value of this feature of the Edu- cational Association when I call it one-half. On this basis I shall call the direct aid received from the essays and papers read one-fourth ; the direct aid from the debates and discussions, one-fourth ; the direct aid from personal conversation with and observation of fellow-members of the con- vention, eminent persons, and otherwise, this, — and the benefit of observa- tion on that section of the country into which the Association takes the visitor, amounts to one-half the direct aid that he gets at the Association. Since 1870 the Association has been in process of forming departments for the further specialization of work. It has done this partly by absorb- ing existing associations devoted to special work, and partly by forming new departments direct. It absorbed the normal school and superintendents' associations, and in after years successively the departments of (a) higher instruction, (b) elementary instruction, (c) industrial education, (d) the National Council of Education, (e) the kindergarten, (/) of art education, (g) music in- struction, and (h) secondary instruction ; thus making ten departments in all. There has been since 1884 an educational exposition, which may be called the eleventh department. Since these departments provide for the much-needed specialization of work, and furnish a counterpoise to the mighty swing of the general meetings of the Association, their influence is salutary. There is no doubt that much more can be done in this direction. There should be a depart- ment that unites those interested in the study of child life ; another that unites the specialists who are at work in the mastery of foreign systems of education ; one for students of the Herbartian educational experiments, — those that make so much of Robinson Crusoe as a centre of school work, and whose great word is " apperception. " Those who have read the educa- tional essay that has made so much noise in England, and which bears the absurd title of "A Pot of Green Feathers, " I need not say, are already interested in this question of apperception, as the very centre of educa- cational psychology. The doctrine of apperception, briefly stated, is this : We not only perceive or see objects, but we recognize or apperceive them. When we apperceive we relate what we see to what we already knew before, — we sometimes call this inward digestion of what we see. Now education, it is evident enough, deals with this matter of recognizing or assimilating (apperceiving) the new material learned by relating it to what we knew before. If a department of psychology were formed that held two meetings at ITS ORGANIZATION AND FUNCTIONS. 449 each annual session, I doubt not that it would soon prepare some work which would gladly be given a place on the program of the General Asso- ciation, and certainly before it secured a place on the general program it would get into the old departments of elementary instruction or normal instruction, or into the superintendents' section or some other. I would lay emphasis on the specializing of work indefinitely. Apart from the National Association such specializing would have its danger ; but in the Association it at once adds strength and gains strength. There could be a department of statistical study, wherein the few specialists who are interested in the science of statistics, in the new sense which is com- ing to be accentuated by sociologists, could confer together round a table. Round-table discussions over specialties is in my opinion what is needed to introduce a new fountain of vitality into the Association. Not that the Association is failing in vitality, for it never had so much at any former period as it has now. But this new element of specialization is a new element of vitality which may make the annual visit twice as valuable as it has been hitherto. I have mentioned by way of examples of these round-table departments, — those that should study child life, foreign sys- tems of education (say French, German, English, Chinese, etc.), or peda- gogical movements like that of the Herbartians, or, again, educational psychology, or statistics. I would add other examples of specialization. Let the specialists in teaching English literature have a round table ; the specialists in teaching ancient history or modern history or the philosophy of history ; the specialists in teaching French or any modern language ; those specially interested in teaching fractions or any other part of arithmetic. These round-table discussions could be called for any year. They could not be expected to discuss the same subject for two consecutive years. Here is just the trouble with our present departments. They have worked over the material ready to hand, and have no new material in the process of making. The Council of Education has formed a list of committees on a variety of subjects and stereotyped it once for all. The members of those cast-iron committees find themselves appointed to report on some subject which has no new fresh interest for them, and they do not see how to begin fresh work. We do not want any more reports on such general topics as high schools, or private schools, or co-education, or moral education, or educational psychology, but we do want specialized reports which focus the whole mind of the sub-committees on some special topic, within those more general topics such as (in the domain of moral education) the free- dom of the will in the light of Ribot's work on " The Diseases of the Will " ; or (in the domain of educational psychology) the effect of committing to memory by the so-called aids or arts of memory ; or on the formation of logical habits of thinking ; or the best method of cultivating a convenient memory for names ; the true remedy for duplicate registration of pupils attending both winter and summer schools, a duplication which is common 450 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION in most of the State school reports ; on a legitimate mode of interesting the people in electing good members to the school board ; on the proper manner of securing the interest of the public press in the good features of the public schools ; on the effect of the private schools in raising or low- ering the standard of respectability in the profession of teaching ; on the best method of securing literary and scientific culture in a corps of teachers. No one of these topics would do for a second report ; no one of them would do for a first report made by members of the council not interested in it. The volunteer system is the only system for round-table work. It would be best generally to concentrate attention, and guide it by having a report made upon some particular book like Lange's work on Apperception, or Mrs. Jacobi's book on Science and Language Study. The general work of the Association, as a whole, should go on in deep ruts, but the special work of the departments should be specialized and always fresh and new. This will take care of itself if there be a sufficiency of these small groups encouraged. Perhaps there are only four persons in the entire nation interested in some special topic. The National Associa- tion, with its facilities for cheap transportation and cheap board, furnishes the best opportunity each year for the meeting of these four persons, or any other similarly interested four persons. Perhaps the attraction of the particular interest would not be sufficient to draw together the four specialists. But the National Association adds a host of other attractions, and in the aggregate these are strong enough to prevail. We wish to produce as many growing teachers as possible, — as many as possible who each year have found fresh leads and have distanced their former selves. It seems to me, therefore, quite doubtful whether the division of the National Association into sectional associations, with which it alternates biennially, would not be rather a step backward. It would perhaps break the continuity which is essential as a kind of background on which the specialization which we have discussed can best take place. It will cer- tainly make the familiar faces that meet us from year to year, coming from a great distance, — as in the present meeting, from Colorado and Texas, — it will make these faces less familiar to us, and different sections of the Union will be in less direct sympathy than formerly. If I have studied aright this problem, it is not the General Association that is in need of reform, but only the departments. These departments, instead of breaking away from the type of the General Association, as they should do, are imitating its organization when they ought to devote them- selves to developing and fostering voluntary sub-committees or round tables devoted to special work. The General Association, with its wide scope, its great masses, its dis- tinguished personalities, its cheap fares, its entertaining tours, and its spec- tacle of great combination, and, lastly, with the great interest and substan- DISCUSSION. 451 tial tributes of respect which it elicits from the business men of all parts of the country, and from the world in general outside the scholastic field, — the General Association, with these reasons for being, should con- tinue as it is. DISCUSSION. [Reported by Supt. S. T. Dutton, op Brookline, Mass.] Supt. Aaron Gove, Denver, Col., spoke of the magnitude of the work of administration, much of which was of an exceedingly delicate and often embarrassing character. A declination to place upon the program the names of aspirants often engenders bitternesses. The insistence of parties that financial remuneration be given for essays and travelling expenses is exceedingly common ; the refusal, which in my judgment is proper, creates antagonisms. The precarious condition of the treasury previous to the Madison meet- ing is well known ; now the Association has in the treasury to exceed $25,000. Whether the possession of these funds is to promote the health and prosperity of the organization, I regard as a question yet to be answered. Great care should be taken in selecting the directory. The burden which is laid on the executive is great at best, but it can be much light- ened by a competent board of directors. It has been intimated that the Association has become so large and un- wieldy that soon it would separate into smaller local societies and cease to exist. The paper just read tells us why it should exist, and the meetings in later years fairly demonstrate that it is yet alive. There is no immediate prospect of a funeral. Mr. J. M. Greenwood, Kansas City, Mo., favored special departments for original investigations. He recommended that the representatives of various sections make their addresses more historical in character and less eulogistic. Dr. William A. Mowry, Boston, Mass., suggested that it were difficult to settle "live questions" ; that if they were settled they would be dead, and no further interest would be manifested in regard to them. The fact that they are alive and not " settled " gives to them their value. More- over, if this body with all its wisdom should attempt to settle any "live question " in which the people are interested, they would turn around and say to you : " Who authorized you to pronounce your ultimate dictum upon this subject ?" and your opinion thus pronounced and questioned would be of as much value as the dictum of a Protestant pope. Let 452 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION the discussions go on. The value of these discussions, as they go out to the people, consists not in a dictum, not in "settling" questions, but in the strength and force of the arguments presented. These arguments, and these alone, have weight with the people in "settling live questions." Hon. John Hancock, Ohio, advocated doing more and talking less. He thought some things were to be regarded as settled. Pres. G. Stanley Hall expressed his appreciation of the views set forth by Dr. Harris. He thought that waste might be avoided were this body to adopt some of the methods pursued by scientific academies in this country and in Europe, and referred in particular to some degree of special- ization in studies of educational subjects, instancing as good examples : Canfield's admirable studies of the Relations between the State and the High School in each State in the Union ; Draper's Study of the Early His- tory of Schools in New York State ; Greenwood's Studies of Children, which had attracted attention in Europe ; Hart well's admirable monograph on Physical Training ; Blackmar on State Aid to Higher Education ; Knight on Land Grants ; Howard's Evolution of the University ; Key's School and Health, etc., etc. There is no reason why, besides the mass meeting element, which is indispensable in the National Association, the sections should not be organized for far more effective work than now. Very much of the energy of this Association is wasted by threshing old straw, by random work, by people who have no conception of the best that has been said and done in their own subject. Nothing is more demoralizing and wasteful than to hear a half-hour paper of this sort. There is no association of teachers in the world so badly organized in this respect as those in this country. Even the French and German method of having one preannounced subject for an entire day and footing up the conclusions of the meeting in the form of a syllabus or resolutions, makes their reports more interesting and more valuable than ours. We should also have, in smaller circles or round tables, little groups of those interested in special topics, like psychology, geography, school hygiene, etc., to work and con- fer at unoccupied hours, and on a special plan, by methods somewhat like those employed in pedagogical seminaries in Europe. Dr. E. E. White, of Ohio, supposed that the purpose of the discussion was to determine what changes, if any, were now needed in the organi- zation and management of the National Educational Association. The changes suggested in the able paper, to which all had listened with so much interest, relate to details of administration. The special lines of inquiry and investigation suggested by Dr. Harris can all be provided for in the several departments now organized, and, if necessary, new departments can be added. The several departments of the Association were originally organized for the consideration of topics of special interest to their mem- DISCUSSION. 453 bership. This has been overlooked in some instances. What is needed is more specialization in these departments. He was pleased to observe that no radical change in the organization of the General Association is recommended in the paper. The changes needed here relate to administration, and the most important of these relate to the program. It is easy to criticise a program when made, but it is not so easy to make a program that is above criticism. All will agree that no man should be asked as a compliment to himself or his locality to read a paper in the Association. The men who have something to say worthy of such a hearing should be sought out and called to this duty. The topics discussed should be vital topics, — topics of special present interest. What is needed is light, not rhetoric or declamation. One of these vital topics is moral training in the public schools, — a topic that needs to be discussed in a philosophic manner. Moral training should be placed on as sure a psychological basis as intellectual training. Hon. J. H. Shinn, of Arkansas, said : That so far as he was qualified to speak upon the paper of the learned Commissioner of Education, he should speak as an indorser and not as a critic. That, the discussion so far had really added nothing to the paper in comprehension and hardly anything by extension. Dr. Harris asks us to continue the general work of the Association as it has been managed from the beginning, and to make the specialization of the departments still more special and possibly more thorough. So far as I have been correct in my diagnosis of the general work of the Association, so far I fully agree with the paper. The great general work of the National Association should go on in the same trend with a certain deepening of the ruts. Deepen the enthusiasm, — deepen the general regard, — deepen the educational ferment. Take the language of the doctor and make it a watchword: "On as we are, only deepen the ruts." As an addition he would suggest that the departments take on the special tint of special work and go deeper into the scientific nature of the great problems underlying the general work. He suggested as an additional work for the N. E. A. the gathering together at the end of each twenty-five years the particular papers upon special questions, and a generalization thereof by a committee specially appointed thereto. That this generalization, with all proper limitations, be published as the work of the Association and sold at the least price to teachers of the country. He thought that this would add to the real power of the Association and make it a surer multiple of good. Mr. W. E. Gaeeett, State Superintendent of Tennessee, and President of the National Association: Mr. President, — I did not expect to address the Department, but I cannot refuse to respond to your invitation. When your program announced that the Commissioner of Education would read a paper upon "The National Association: its Organization 454 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION and Functions/' I looked forward with much interest and some anxiety to the expression of his opinions, for I know the weight which they carry with all our members and with the whole country. I have listened to him to-night with pleasure and satisfaction. The clear and comprehensive view which he has presented of the Asso- ciation and its functions, and the philosophical analysis which he has made of the elements of its usefulness, leave but little to be said by others. In his estimates of the relative value of its several elements, I do not think he has ranked the social features too high. Among the social features I understand him to include the excursion feature. Those who have been regular attendants upon our meetings have now travelled to every portion of the United States, I need not enlarge upon the pleasure of this feature to its members, or the benefit to the cause of education. Why do ten thousand members attend our meetings ? Why has this Association grown to be the largest, the grandest educational body in the world ? It is because the members find in its meetings something which they need. It is because they love the Association. It is because it reaches their hearts as well as their heads. We are fresh from the discussion of "Compulsory Education." Able educators have presented plans which, they tell us, will enforce the com- pulsory attendance of children. None of them, I think, would venture to propose a plan for the compulsory attendance of grown people. If we wish the Association to maintain its present grand proportions, we must not discard those features which reach the heart as well as the head. It must still continue to meet the wants and to please the tastes of its ten thousand members. It is not surprising that objections are urged to different features of the Association, and suggestions are made for changes in its organization. It is sometimes urged that the work is too general in its character ; that it does not possess the definite and specific value of the work of some European societies. There is some force in this objection. I think that we should give heed to it. Our departments are, however, becoming more special and technical in their work. The General Association can never do this sort of work, and ought not to do it. It has a grander purpose. It is a mass meeting. It is the foundation. Upon this foundation the various departments rest. I favor the introduction of special and technical work into the several departments, and the establishment of such other departments as may be needed to provide for more special work. It is also argued that too much repetition is found in the papers read before the Association. Possibly there may be some force in the objection ; yet, if true, it is not fatal. We are not a society of inventors. We are an association for the diffusion of knowledge. It is not necessary that every- thing which is brought before us should be either a fresh theory in phil- osophy, never before presented to the public, or a brand new system of "new education." It is also objected that papers, or addresses, or expressions, sometimes find their way into the proceedings of the Association which are not purely intellectual, but which betray some taint of sentiment or rhetoric. For- tunately this is true. I believe in rhetoric, so far as rhetoric means feeling or sentiment. I do not believe in bombast. I believe the great body of our members agree with me. From the human breast thought and im- pulse spring forth in one mingled ray as inseparably interwoven as the light and heat of the sun. We argue, as teachers, that the whole boy must be sent to school. It is even more true of the man. In voluntary schools the whole man must go to school. He is there with his head and his heart. Let both be addressed. It is sometimes urged that the Association is becoming unwieldy, and will fall to pieces of its own weight. I do not fear its falling to pieces as long as ten thousand members attend its meetings. In the great law of growth and decay, we have not yet reached the period of decay. It has been suggested that the Association should, of its own volition, divide into several sectional bodies, with annual meetings, from which delegates should be sent to a national body. This would convert our great national mass meeting into a body of delegates. I think there should be a national body of delegates, but not at the expense of our mass meeting. I should be willing to see a new department organized, to be known as the Department of Delegates, and which should consist of delegates from the several State Teachers' Associations and from other organized educational bodies, under such regulations as this Association might provide. Such a department could meet with us at the same time as the Council, or could hold separate meetings similar to those of the Department of Superintendence, and could do useful work in reflecting, assimilating, and formulating current educational sentiment. I am not willing to abandon our organization to effect these lesser objects. This Association is a growth. It did not spring full-grown into being. It has grown by successive steps. At one of its early meetings only three members were present. At many of its meetings the attendance was small. Why has it now grown to be the grandest educational body in the world ? It has grown because it has supplied a want ; because it has adapted itself to the tastes of the educational public. It has grown from a teachers' association to be an educational association. It is a national association, and performs a work which no sectional association can perform. I have more confidence in those institutions which have developed by growth than in those which are projected in future from the constructive imagination. In its immense but steady growth the great mass meeting has been the foundation. Upon this foundation the other features of the 450 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION. Association have been built. Let us build what superstructures may be needed, but let us not undermine the foundation. My advice is, do not give up the great mass meeting. ART EDUCATION IN THE PUBLIC SCHOOLS. BY JAMES MACALISTER, LL.D., PRESIDENT DREXEL INSTITUTE OF ART, SCIENCE, AND INDUSTRY. The social development of the last half century shows a steady growth in the recognition of the public school as one of the most important in- stitutions of modern society. To the thoughtful man the future presents a number of social problems of the gravest import. Individual freedom from class and proscriptive tyranny has, in a broad sense, been secured. Public opinion, the aggregate of the majority of individual opinions, has become the sole basis of social order, and hence the binding force in modern society is what the majority of the people think or believe. We need to bring the full significance of this fact before us, and to consider that under this social dispensation all the baser elements of human nature are given as free play as are the higher elements, and that no man is restricted in his personal liberty until he encroaches upon the liberties of others, before we can adequately comprehend the supreme importance of public educa- tion to the modern state. John Fiske made a valuable contribution to education, as well as to the doctrine of evolution, when he pointed out the meaning of infancy. In his suggestive treatment of this subject he asks this question : " What is the meaning of the fact that man is born into the world more helpless than any other creature, and needs, for a much longer season than any other living thing, the tender care and wise counsel of his elders? It is one of the most familiar of facts that man, alone among animals, exhibits a capacity for progress. That man is widely different from other animals in the length of his adolescence, and the utter helplessness of his baby- hood is an equally familiar .thing. Now, between these two commonplace facts, is there no connection ? Is it a mere accident that the creature which is distinguished as progressive should also be distinguished as com- ing slowly to maturity, or is there a reason lying deep down in the nature of things why this should be so? " He then points out the great advantage that has come to the race through what he calls the period of mental plas- ticity; that is, the period of infancy, youth, and adolescence, forming nearly one-third of a human life, during which the individual is trained for his social duties. ART EDUCATION IN THE PUBLIC SCHOOLS. 457 The social condition of man has now reached a high degree of complex- ity. This social condition can be protected and properly developed, only so far as education provides for training the youth of a community for the duties and responsibilities incident thereto. With just as much thorough- ness, with just as much care, we need, at the present time, to train our children to all that makes for high and noble living, — as the Greeks trained for the conditions existing in the Greek state, as the Romans trained for the conditions existing in the Roman state. So, also, we must rec- ognize the supreme importance of training in all that makes for the highest intellectual culture and refinement in human life. With the absence of the militant power in our American state we base our institutions entirely upon the dominance of the moral and spiritual faculties among men. In- deed, our social and political organization rests wholly upon the belief that the majority of men prefer good to evil, virtue to vice, and if we take a broad view of the active forces in the social organism, we see on every hand virtue grappling with vice, justice struggling with injustice, and in these struggles we see that success can be hoped for only as all the higher faculties of man are brought into play upon the side of justice and of vir- tue. To state the problem in a few words : our duty is to so organize the forces that make for right living that they shall always be the domi- nant power in the social organism, and it is only when we come to rec- ognize this condition as fundamental to all growth in human well-being that we can get a proper comprehension of what is involved in public edu- cation at the present time. When the education of the people is looked at from this point of view, it is seen that its greatest power must be exerted where the dangers to the social organism are greatest, — that is, among the poorest classes. There is more need of the refining influences of the best education among the de- based and neglected elements of population in our large cities than among the children of the rich and prosperous ; and hence, the movement of the last few years to carry the most improved forms of our education among the lowest classes is an indication of the growth of public sentiment in the right direction, and is a feeling that will undoubtedly grow in strength as social problems are more carefully studied. We have seen, in many parts of the country, the growth of a very praise- worthy sentiment in favor of raising the national flag over our school- houses. The spirit that prompted this movement was a patriotic one, and marks the growth of a national feeling stronger than that of local inter- ests. To the educator it should stand for more than a mere loyal impulse. The flag should be made to represent more than the sovereign power and unity of the nation. Consider for a moment that in our large cities the great mass of the children see little or nothing of the government or the forces that bind society together, except as presented by the policeman. What better instrumentality is there for inculcating in the minds of the 458 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION. young a respect for government and law than the school-house ? If we can lead the pupils to understand that the school-house is provided by the State, — is provided for all, without distinction of race, condition, or creed ; if we can make the school-house a place of delight, and if we can secure within it the right sort of instruction, the training that shall tend to de- velop the noblest qualities of mind and heart, we shall then be fostering not simply a love of country for its past history and the heroic deeds of our ancestors, but we shall be cultivating a love of country for what the country is doing for the children themselves in preparing them for the highest and best purposes in life. Then will the flag mean something personal to every child. Then will the government be to him not simply an abstraction, but he will come to regard it as his own great helper and sustainer. I welcome, therefore, this nationalization of the school as one of the most important of the educational movements of our time. If, however, we make the school the symbol of the State to the children, we must have taught in it all that the child requires to enable him to become a virtuous and a useful citizen. I do not think there can be any gainsaying this proposition. Indeed, it follows logically from the very establishment of a public school, and in our day, when such important responsibilities are attached to citizenship, the public school and its instru- mentalities must be measured solely by its capacity to realize its complete function. Nearly all the States have limited the instruction that shall be given in public schools, and some confine it within very narrow bounds. But we are gradually outgrowing the restricted ideas of education of fifty years ago, and our more intelligent communities are already anticipating legislative action and are putting into their schools new subjects for study, new exercises which have for their object the development of the higher powers of the pupils, and the bringing them into the closest possible rela- tions to the social needs of the future. Look for a moment at some of the movements that are going forward at the present time for enlarging the scope of public education. First we have the kindergarten, the recog- nition of the child in education, one of the most beneficent reforms that has ever come into the schools. Then we have physical training, the recognition of the fact that the citizen to have a healthy mind must also have a healthy body. Then we have the study of elementary science, which has for its object the bringing of the individual into the closest relations with his physical environment, that he may be able to enrich the world by his conquests over nature ; that he may, to use the words of Bacon, become the "minister and interpreter of nature." Then we have industrial or manual training, which recognizes that labor is one of the conditions of man's existence in the world, and that it is through under- standing labor, and putting thought into labor, that man is brought more ART EDUCATION IN THE PUBLIC SCHOOLS. 459 completely into sympathy with his fellows. Then we have the study of history, not simply as the record of man's military conquests, but rather as showing the steady development of the idea of brotherhood among men. And then, in addition to these, we have the instruction in art, in some respects the most important of all, because its influence tends to enrich the mind as a whole through the development and training of its highest faculties. Now, cavil as we may against these new studies ; argue, as many persons do, upon the limitations which are, or ought to be, imposed upon the State, all these features must come into the public schools, and in no nig- gardly way. They must come in on the broadest possible basis, or there is danger that the present tendencies of social progress will miscarry. That their introduction into the schools will revolutionize much of our existing education cannot be denied ; but that need not give cause for serious regret. We may lay it down as a fundamental and incontestable proposition that existing social conditions demand these two things : First, the highest order of citizenship possible ; and second, that public educa- tion must prepare for such citizenship at whatever cost. I have prefaced these remarks because, in discussing '' Art Education in the Public Schools," it has seemed desirable for the right understanding of the subject that it should be considered, not simply as a specialty in education, but rather in the larger aspect of one of the branches of general education that has become a necessity of our time. It is only by regarding the subject in its broadest relations that we can rightly consider how it should be treated in the schools. It will be understood that in so far as the elementary schools are concerned, I am using the term "art educa- tion" as limited to drawing and color. Of the new studies referred to, art education is the one least understood, and yet it is the one that in 'many respects is the most important. Next to language, there is no branch whose scope and purpose is so far-reaching, or that bears more directly upon all that ministers to the best interests of the individual and of society. I am aware that many will regard this as far too inclusive a statement, and yet the history of civilization shows that the arts which deal with form and color have been at once of the highest value to man's utilitarian necessities and to those desires which nothing but the beautiful in nature and in art can satisfy. As a people, I think it will be admitted that we are deficient in art culture, and I do not think it will be denied that, in consequence, we are losing no small part of our intellectual heritage. This will not always be so. The indications are many that art is to have a new development in America, and on a new basis, — the basis of humanity. The putting of industrial training into the schools is a great step in this direction, and will surely give a higher idea and a nobler purpose to the labor of common life. The putting of art education into the schools, side by side with industrial training, will not 460 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION. only give dignity to labor, but will also permit the human feeling born of labor to find fit and adequate expression. The use of the term "art education" in connection with the public education has long been a great bugbear to many so-called practical people. To such persons the word art, in connection with the public schools, savors of something unpractical, something that is for special pupils, something for the benefit of the few rather than for the many ; and yet a right understanding of the relations of art to daily life shows this to be an entire misconception of the subject. It is a fact apparent to every observing person that the social life of our people is lamentably wanting in an appreciation of the beautiful in nature as the highest truth of nature, and of the beautiful in human life and work as the highest truth of character. This is apparent in the homes, in the amusements, and in the social customs of our people generally. In the scramble for wealth that is going on, people are losing sight of the fundamental ethical prin- ciples that hold society together, and are making a pretence of living. Now, art education, which is the study of beauty as the highest truth in nature and in human life, can be directed powerfully against this social demoralization, and hence we should be prepared to advocate art education in the schools as a potent agency in the uplifting and improvement of the community. Goethe says : " The beautiful is greater than the good, for it includes the good and adds something to it. It is the good made perfect and fitted with all the collateral perfections which make it a perfect thing." This is but a restatement of the old Platonic doctrine which still finds recogni- tion in the most advanced theories of ethics and education. While we are extending our system of education on the utilitarian side, we must not forget that the right enjoyment of life, — that is, the exercise of the higher faculties, — is as much a function of living as earning one's daily bread ; and for our education to be useful, in the true sense of the term, we can- not ignore the training of the aesthetic faculties as much for moral as for practical ends. I have felt constrained to emphasize this aspect of the subject as of supreme importance at the present time, because in the general introduc- tion of form-study and drawing into the schools there seems to prevail an idea that their chief value consists in subserving industrial ends, or as aids to other branches of instruction. The great value of form-study and drawing in industry, as well as their great use in educational training, can hardly be overestimated, but form-study and drawing as the basis of art education need to be considered in much broader relations than their applications in these directions. Now, art in form and color is not an abstraction. It is something very tangible. It is man's creative work with material things ; work in which he expresses himself^ his power, his knowledge, his feelings, his ideas, for ART EDUCATION IN THE PUBLIC SCHOOLS. 461 the use and the enjoyment of others. With every child there is born some degree of this power of individual creation, and closely allied to it is another and complementary power, that of curiosity, or observation ; and it should be a principle in all general education to lay hold of these two great instinctive powers and give them free play in the training of every child. True art education distinctly recognizes these two mental powers as its starting point, and seeks to stimulate and direct them so that they shall act and react on each other, and result in the creation of beautiful things, not so much for the gratification of selfish or individual desires as for giving joy to others. The method of training for this end has a dual aspect. On the one side the child is led, through the exercise of his observing powers, to discover that beauty is the highest truth in all mate- rial things, — in fact, that there can be no beauty devoid of truth ; and, on the other side, he is trained to express his observation of the beautiful in creations that shall minister to the needs and pleasure of man. It has been truly said that sharing in some common enjoyment begets a more friendly feeling toward others than sharing in the same kind of knowledge. Not until art education is viewed in these broader aspects can the sub- ject take its rightful place in public education. For not until the psycho- logical conditions for the training of the child are comprehended can a method of instruction in art suitable to children be devised, and not until its applications in social life are comprehended can the object of art in education be understood. It is not necessary to dwell upon the fact that this view of art education does not present the subject as in any way antagonistic to its applications to industry, or to other branches of education. In fact, the more the subject is studied from this larger point of view the more will it be seen that its practical applications, both in industrial training and in general educational training, are greatly increased, because there is brought to its application in these directions the creative power of the pupils, enriched by the study of the beautiful, which is the life-giving principle in all in- dustrial work, and the most subtle and refining force in all intellectual development and training. With these points in mind, and in view of the wide introduction of drawing into the schools, a pertinent question arises here : Is the study coming into public education on the basis of art, or is it coming in on the basis of utility ? If we look at the history of the movement for intro- ducing drawing into the schools, which began about twenty years ago, we shall see that it started upon a purely utilitarian or industrial basis. The movement, in its inception, was but a reflection, — in many respects a copy, — of the movement which was initiated about a score of years earlier in England, and which has been promoted there almost solely for the benefit of the manufacturing interests of Great Britain. As the movement has developed in this country, however, it is to be observed that it has been 462 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION steadily widening in character under the influences of educational thought and discussion. Experience has long made it apparent that drawing could not be maintained in the schools as a general study simply on the basis of its technical applications in industry. Consequently, the last ten years have shown important modifications of the instruction in the direction of bringing it into harmony with psychological principles. It was an impor- tant step in this direction when form -study, or the study of objects, was made the starting point in the instruction. Then drawing took its place as one of the means of expressing ideas of form, and in many of our prin- cipal cities the method of instruction has been radically changed so as to make the study of form in models and objects the fundamental feature of the work. Under this arrangement the various kinds of drawing, such as free-hand drawing, mechanical drawing, perspective drawing, decorative drawing, are of secondary consideration, and are governed entirely by what the children have studied and by the ideas they have to express resulting therefrom. That this change is in the right direction will not be questioned by any one acquainted with the subject ; but it will be a serious mistake to say that, because the method of teaching drawing has been changed so as to make it the expression of ideas derived from the study of objects, the problem of art education in the schools has been solved. In fact, it may be said that with this change of method the real problem confronts us from a new and a broader aspect than when we were dealing with the subject simply from the standpoint of drawing. Having reached the stage where drawing is regarded as but a means for the expression of form ideas derived from the study of objects, the vital point in the instruction now turns upon this question : What kind of objects shall we give the children to study for the development of the ideas to be expressed ? It is not infrequently claimed that the interest of the child should be the guiding consideration here. That we should have regard for what shall attract and hold the attention of the pupil is not to be questioned ; but it would be a great mistake to assume that this should be the only consideration. If the love of the beautiful and the creation of the beautiful is the aim of the instruction, then it would seem that the objects given the pupils to study should be such as clearly present the characteristics of beauty. Now, some of the objects that most interest a child may be such as possess no distinctive features or" beauty, — may be such as appeal to his selfish instincts or feelings. I am sure we shall all agree that such objects should not be chosen. But it is said that leaves, plants, flowers, fruit, interest children ; and as beauty is found in the study of nature, natural forms should be given as the basis of the instruction. No one will dispute that in this art-training children should be given every possible oppor- tunity to study nature ; but in the choice of natural forms great care should be exercised in selecting only such as present, distinctly, beauty of ART EDUCATION IN THE PUBLIC SCHOOLS. 463 form. It should also be borne in mind that the study of nature for the purposes of art is a widely different thing from the study of nature for the purposes of science. In the scientific study of nature she is inter- rogated for her facts, and these facts may be found, — indeed, often are found, — in objects devoid of beauty. The facts, however, are none the less interesting from the scientific point of view. The scientific study of nature, therefore, is purely objective, and takes little or no account of the aesthetic elements which are involved in the observation of things from the standpoint of art. In the artistic study of nature, however, the beautiful is the end sought; and the appreciation of the highest beauty in nature is realized only when it is perceived that the various objects in nature are fashioned upon cer- tain type forms which express unity and purpose as the highest truths in nature, — truths that transcend all material manifestations and witness the supreme, eternal power that lies back of, and gives life to, nature. The natural objects are very few that express this truth, this beauty of nature, in all their details. They become beautiful only as they are seen in their typical relations. It is one of the functions of art to present the objects of nature, not in their accidental, but in their typical relations, — in other words, to interpret nature in her highest aspects, not simply to imitate her in her details. Hence the art study of nature becomes largely sub- jective, and is very different from the objective study of nature for the purposes of science. If this principle be conceded, the question arises, What are the typical forms that the study of nature for art purposes reveals as the supreme content of nature ? They are very few and they are very simple forms, namely, — the sphere, the cube, the cylinder, the ellipsoid, the ovoid, the prism, the cone, and the pyramid. The wonderful variety of forms which are observed in nature are but modifications of, or are derived from, these typical forms. These types, therefore, should be regarded as truths of form in nature just as distinctly as gravity is regarded as a truth of power in nature. Now, if it be one of the functions of art to interpret beauty of form in nature, this beauty will be perceived in its highest aspects only as it is seen to be related to the highest truths of form in nature. Hence we are brought to the conclusion that as the typical forms referred to are the abstract embodiment of the highest truths of form in nature, they should be used in our elementary instruction as the best means of leading the children to discover and to realize the highest forms of beauty in the world of nature. But the study of beauty in nature is only one phase of art education. The study of the beautiful in the creative works of man is quite as im- portant a feature. The study of beauty of form in man's art work reveals the fact that it also is based upon the same typical forms that are found to 464 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION be the embodiment of the highest beauty of form in nature, and it is the manner in which man has utilized these types with his creative imagina- tion in the production of works for use and enjoyment that gives to his art works their highest character and significance. Thus we are brought to the final conclusion that for art training, which is to include the study of the beautiful in nature and the beautiful in art, we must adopt the type forms of the sphere, the cube, the cylinder, the ellipsoid, the ovoid, the prism, the cone, the pyramid, as the abstract representatives of all beauty, whether ill nature or in art, growing out of the truths of form. The eternal power that speaks through nature's works, invests these forms with life and gives to them their highest beauty. In art, man's imagina- tion invests these forms with humanity, which is the very culmination of beauty in art. Beauty in nature and beauty in art are therefore in their ultimate analysis one, and rest upon the same unchanging truths of form. If I rightly apprehend the instruction in form-study and drawing that is now finding its way into the schools, it is based upon the distinct rec- ognition of these type forms as the fundamental verities for the training of children to perceive beauty of form in nature and in art ; and it is the aim of the instruction so to connect the study of these typical forms with carefully selected natural forms and fine examples of art forms, that the children may be brought, through the legitimate and happy exercise of their observing and creative powers, under the influence of the beautiful, as the highest truth of nature and of art. This is not the occasion for the presentation of the details involved in carrying out this important work. This task may be left to the many able directors of drawing who in several of our leading cities are endeavoring to give to form-study and draw- ing the broad character here indicated, and who are laboring against great obstacles, arising from the general misconception of the subject which exists in the public mind and in the minds of some who are directing the schools. It seems the proper place, however, for the consideration of a few points whereby the instruction in the schools may be made more efficient. To this end one fact must be distinctly recognized as fundamental to any substantial and permanent success, — that the instruction in the grades below the high school must be given by the regular class teachers. This is so obvious a fact in efficient school management as to need no argument. Following from this, however, are three very important points which I will venture to state. First. A course of study should be prepared in which the orderly devel- opment of the subject through all the grades should be clearly presented. But few of the regular teachers have had any training in art worthy of the name. They need, therefore, to have it so presented that they may be able not only to become acquainted with the features to be taught in their respective grades, but also to see the unfolding of the subject ART EDUCATION IN THE PUBLIC SCHOOLS. 465 through all the grades. Not until the class teachers are able to take this comprehensive view of the work, not until they see that the study must be recognized as an organic feature in the general course, can they be expected to take an interest in it. Second. The instruction in this subject in the schools should be under the direction of special directors of art education. These directors should be broadly educated persons. It is not enough that they have received training in technical art work. They should also be familiar with edu- cational methods ; with the general school conditions that surround the teaching of art in the public schools ; and, above all, they should be able to interpret the work in its principles and methods to the class teachers as well as to criticise and supervise it. Third. The schools need to be supplied with more and better objects for the children to study. The models of the type forms that are now being so generally introduced should be supplemented with casts of natural forms, artistically treated, so that the pupils in their individual study of natural forms may see proper specimens of the art rendering of nature, and also with reproductions of historical ornament, both in relief and in color, in order to afford opportunity for studying good examples of art work applied to the things of common life. In addition to these there should also be provided reproductions of choice vase forms from classic, renais- sance, and oriental art. Man's realization of pure beauty of form and color has found one of its most pleasing modes of expression in fictile art, and as these vase forms can be shown to be developments under the influence of the feeling for beauty from the type forms we have been considering, and as they are full of historic associations, they will greatly interest the pupils, and can, therefore, be studied with much greater profit for pur- poses of object drawing than the miscellaneous objects, possessing no well- defined elements of beauty, that are too frequently placed before them. With well-considered courses of instruction in art education, with the schools supplied with suitable materials and objects of study, with proper directors in charge of the work, we should see, I believe, a real art devel- opment in this country unexampled in the world's history. Reference has already been made to the want of art culture among our people. This is one of the noticeable facts connected with our social life, and yet the student of history sees that man's creations in art are among his highest achievements, and that they are identified with his highest moral and spiritual development. In the perspective of history it is the art creations of Athens and Rome and Florence and Venice, enshrining as they do some of the loftiest conceptions of the human mind, that make these cities immortal in the memory of man. As a people we are ignorant of the uplifting and ennobling influence of art ; and yet we have in our public school system the grandest opportunity that was ever given to carry a love for the beautiful into every homo, — to make it the possession of 466 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION every man and woman in the land. But we may look into the future with hope. With the growth of our national power and the development of our material resources, we are broadening our education, and thereby opening the way for a better, a nobler, a happier existence for the people. We are putting into the schools those studies and methods that will powerfully help in transforming the conditions upon which the progress, the order, and the stability of the State depend. The kindergarten recognizes the humanity of the child. The study of science recognizes the world of nature as a Divine storehouse, filled with exhaustless treasures for minis- tering to the wants of man. The industrial training recognizes labor as fundamental alike to the freedom and independence of the individual, and the power and prosperity of the nation. Art education recognizes the beautiful as not only the supreme truth in the material world, but as a part of the supreme truth in the moral world, and that so far as it enters into the human life it is a Divine influence that purifies the hearts and souls of men. The love of the beautiful, therefore, should be one of the finest results of our public education, and when art instruction shall be so incorporated into the schools that its rich, benign influence shall permeate the life of the whole people, we may then write over the door of every American school-house these inspiring words of Schiller : Create the beautiful, and seeds are sown For God-like flowers to man as yet unknown. DISCUSSION. [Reported by Supt. Eugene Bouton, Bridgeport, Mass.] Dr. Thos. M. Balliet, Springfield, Mass. : Art historically grew out of the useful. Building for shelter preceded and led to architecture ; representations of objects for practical purposes led to sculpture, drawing, and painting ; the mere cries of the human voice developed into music. In education we must follow, in a sense, the order of development of art in the race. The beautiful must not be merely added in an external way, with a sort of plus sign to the other work of the school. It must be an outgrowth of all points of all lines of work, — i.e., all lines of work in the school must have regard to the beautiful, and must be carried on with the beautiful in view. The drawing and sketching done in science work must not stop with the slavish reproduction of details merely which science requires, but it must be done in a way to lead up to the free delineation of objects characteristic of fine art. Manual training must aim at pro- ducing the useful in a way to be at the same time also the beautiful ; history must be taught with literature, and especially the drama, constantly DISCUSSION. 467 in view. Literature, however, must not be made a " parsing exercise," as it has been made quite generally in schools aud colleges. A philological or grammatical study of Hamlet will give you no more of art than would a chemical analysis of the Venus de Milo. Two conditions are necessary to make art education in the public schools successful : I. There must be placed in each school-room good reproductions of some of the best pieces of sculpture, of the best paintings, and of speci- mens of design and of historic ornament. We have not yet fully learned to appreciate the necessity of surrounding the child with beautiful things, so as to educate his aesthetic sense unconsciously. II. There must be teachers placed in our schools who have souls. Unless art can be put into the soul of the teacher, it cannot be made to reach the soul of the child. I see no hope for art education in public schools as long as politics control the appointment of teachers, as is now the case in nearly all cities. Mr. J. H. Hoosb, Cortland, N. Y., said, in substance : I am an earnest advocate of art education, and am persuaded that the more the somber levels of this world are illuminated by beauty and goodness the better and happier will be one's journey through the paths of life. The paper is able, corning from a gentleman who enjoys justly an international reputation as a progressive educator. The very importance of the subject of art education compels critical investigation into the nature and scope of the matter before us. I. In proceeding with this discussion, it should be stated that art proper is an exhibition of forms of spirit. A photograph is an imitation of him who sat ; it lacks the spirit which radiates the personality. A person is said to be homely at first meeting ; a moment's conversation, and the features and form are forgotten in the beauty and goodness of the spirit, soul, that shines out, "A little more than kin and less than kind." A camera never imprisons the sparkle of the eye of the man who is seen "in my mind's eye, Horatio"; nor can it enshrine the delicate richness of charm that circles about the head of "a wife in his eye." Besides, who of all this audience of fine-looking men, testified to yesterday by a mem- ber of the board of education of this city, would dare, under the rules of Grecian sculpture, to allow himself to be turned into cold marble and placed upon a pedestal to be looked at by the admiring gaze of an aston- ished world ? Not one. We are too cadaverous, too rotund, too full in the girth, too short in the neck, too proportionless in the general contour. We seldom, judge the man by the formal rules of art ; we are estimated to be beautiful by standards of spiritual accomplishments and attainments. II. Art connotes properly two ideas : (1) art proper, called sometimes high art; (2) industrial art, or that form which is known as utilitarian 468 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION. art, appearing in the crafts of artisans and artificers. This industrial form of art is the product of conditions in the evolution of civilization ; as population gravitates into centers and becomes more dense, the people must be taught to contribute to a livelihood, — new industries spring up, — imitative and decorative arts come into being. Ruskin did much to create activity in these lines. We in the United States shall emphasize industrial art when our country passes through the stages that evolved it in the his- tory of European civilization. Art proper (1) always has been and always will be, probably, under the special prerogative and patronage of wealth, glaze as we may the history of the race. Industrial art (2) is the preroga- tive or lot of the wage-earner. III. ^Esthetical culture springs primarily out of the cultivation of the emotions and the imagination, — it is subjective ; mental and ethical and industrial culture proceeds from the acquisition of facts and the cultiva- tion of the reason, — it is essentially based upon the outward environment of man. IV. Historically, what has been the effect of art upon the race ? Dr. MacAlister quotes Goethe as saying : "The beautiful is greater than the good." Yet, in Faust, his greatest work of art, Goethe raises the good transcenden tally above beauty as the supreme end of his creation. To subordinate the good to the beautiful is to turn backward the hand on the dial that notes the progress of the ages. The ideals of highest Christian thought are the good ; those of the beautiful were in the ascendency in Greece, in pagan civilization. The doctor says, " No man can truly love and create the beautiful and be base. " Does history teach this ? Base- ness is a moral attribute ; beauty is an sesthetical characteristic of the nature of spirit. Is it true that moral excellence has been peculiarly inspired and guided by conceptions of mere beauty ? Do the artists of the world constitute a galaxy par excellence of people whose conceptions of beauty have inspired and illuminated the deeds of moral grandeur, that have lifted up and ennobled human life as it has groped its way down the ages ? Look at history. Conceptions of the beautiful saved neither Greece nor Rome from moral debasement. Nero was no mean artist, but he was a moral monster ! Architecture reached the wonderful in India ; but is Indian civilization a type of civilization for our enlightened days ? Switz- erland possesses marvels in beautiful environments ; are her people the peculiar models of the highest forms of civilized life ? AVhere is modern Italy standing in the midst of her possessions of the beautiful in art ? Art did not develop in Holland until after she had conceived of the good in civil and religious freedom. Holland stands high in art to-day, but she is great, not for her art, but for her ideas of the good. V. What are the public schools in which this art education is to be pur- sued ? They are the schools of the people ; they follow the conditions which determine centers of population. The school life of children lies DISCUSSION. 469 between the ages of five and fourteen. Pupils enter the army of wage- earners early in life. Youth leave school with their faculties immature ; they cannot pursue successfully the field of art which is a subjective activity of emotion and imagination. Besides, these armies of children leave school to enter occupations that seldom stimulate art. From the best statistics at hand, trades and transportation are entered by 10.41 per cent, of the wage-earners recruited from the public schools ; manufacturing, mining, mechanical industries absorb 22.06 per cent.; professional and personal services take 23.40 per cent.; agriculture, 44.10 per cent. Under all these circumstances of immaturity of mind and of nature of occupations, what are the probabilities, nay, the possibilities, of attainments in art proper in our public schools ? VI. Success in art education in our public schools is put in limbo by other conditions : (1) Systems of art instruction often tend to stifle and ultimately to quench the native freshness and versatility of the child's feel- ing and imagination upon which the soul of art rests. The system keeps the child so long upon artificial forms, straight lines, subdivision of parts, interminable analyses of elements, forced syntheses, that the activities, the artistic promptings, the yearnings of spirit for the beautiful and for the free that characterize normal childhood, become chilled into habits of form, — the child life becomes an ossified spontaniety, — art is dead. Prof. Corson, of Cornell, once said of a student of Anglo-Saxon, "He is so in- tensely analytic that he fails to be sympathetically synthetic." (2) Free- dom of childhood activity is stiffened by other forms in which other sub- jects are taught in school. Take the case of art in language, — freedom of thought and speech. A child is bursting with warmth on some point ; he talks in all the graces of art. Give him a pen ; he drops the point upon his paper to utter the thoughts of his soul. See the workings of his mind, —he is revelling in luxury in subject-matter, but the school has empha- sized so greatly the conventionalities of written forms that the moment his pen touches the paper, it is the signal for the advance of a cordon of rules in his memory : " Every sentence must begin with a capital let- ter " ; "Heavy strokes down, light strokes up " ; " The d and t must oc- cupy two spaces" ; " Small letters occupy one space " ; "Every sentence must end with a period"; "Every word must be correctly spelled, — if you do not know, consult the dictionary"; "The sentences must not be too long, or too short, or too complex " ; " Every statement must be a complete sentence." How much spontaneous freedom of the child's artistic feelings have percolated down through these limiting rules of the pedagogue ? The child is awed by them, and his artistic graces of speech take on stupid and dead forms from the pen. What would Shakespeare have done if he had been obliged to begin his sentences with capital letters and spell words with uniformity and precision ? The Elizabethan age of literature was characterized by freedom in the matter 470 THE NATIONAL EDUCATION AL ASSOCIATION. of conventional forms. General Sherman stood alone among army officers in relieving his soldiers from troublesome dress and luggage and restraints in marching ; he wanted his men at their best when they faced the foe, — this is freedom of spirit.* Good form in the conventionalities of written language is very desirable ; but the spirit should not be quenched while the child is acquiring it. VII. Art education should extend along the entire line of emotional life. Superintendent Balliet is right in desiring art culture in poetry, music, architecture. Art covers all these, and painting, sculpture, and language besides. Art education is grand, but art does not accompany all forms of activity. The mathematical computation or demonstration may be exact or logical ; it cannot be artistic because of the nature of the matter. Accuracy is not art, it is business form. The exterior of the rifle may be made artistically, but the bore must be accurate. Let art flourish ; let our strong Anglo-Saxon tongue be turned by our youth with all the graces of high art. Let art take place beside other subjects of study. But the highest forms of art are not of the beautiful, they are of the good. Home life in the United States should be made beautiful ; but if our beloved country shall endure through the coming ages, its institu- tions must be founded on the Eternal Good. " For the power of beauty will sooner transform honesty from what it is to a bawd- than the force of honesty can translate beauty into his likeness/' — (Hamlet), THE HIGHEST OFFICE OF DRA WING. BY FRANK ABORN, DIRECTOR OF DRAWING, CLEVELAND, OHIO. The fact that idiocy and insanity have been greatly modified, if they have not been entirely cured by cranial surgery, — taken in connection with the frequency with which marked effect in intellectual application is to be observed in the every-day walks of life, and for which there is no tangible cause except change of outward conditions, — justify the educational adop- tion of the theory, which is now accepted among psychologists, that brain is identical in kind, varying only in degree of efficiency in operation. This theory assumes brain and mind to be two very different things, — that are not to be confounded any more than the eye and the sight are to be regarded as in any way similar. The brain and the eye are organs, practi- cally mechanisms, while the mind and the sight are simple results of the activity of the respective organs. An organ in its essential parts is an * General George Crook, the celebrated Indian fighter, traveled in his campaigns in light array, " not carrying enough extra clothing to wad a shotgun." Here was freedom. THE HIGHEST OFFICE OF DRAWING. 471 unalterable inheritance, while a result is an acquisition capable of the widest variation and the highest development. The structure of the brain, no more than that of the eye, is subject to man's creative skill. A nerve wanting, it cannot be supplied ; both brain and eye, however perfect, are useless until, by exercise and employment, the capability to interpret results of brain activity is developed ; and unfavorable tendencies, as slug- gishness or improvidence of brain action, and inconvenient length of sight of the eye are to be avoided, and rendered impossible by the proper adjust- ment of requirements. That such adjustment of requirements is possible is proven by the fact that short-sighted sailors, hotel clerks with poor memo- ries for events, women who are color ignorant, and printers who cannot spell, are as rare as birds with four legs and serpents that walk erect. To adopt this theory of the identity of brain-cells, it is plain, therefore, is not to assume all minds to be alike, for that would be contrary to fact and in no degree would it conform to every-day experiences. Saying that brain is alike in kind is similar to stating that water is water. Every brain-cell, like every molecule of water, contains a certain, definite and equal latent power, that acts exactly similar, with precisely equal force, directness, and impartiality. In adopting this theory I am not unmindful of the fact that water often holds foreign matter in solution. I do not forget for a moment that water is often contaminated; but for all that it still remains water, and each drop will give up its full quota of unadulterated power under certain, unalterable conditions. Neither do I lose sight of the fact that there are imperfections in the constitution, and, therefore, in the complexity of the action of the brain. I do not question that, beyond a doubt, brain is as frequently contaminated as water is. Perhaps it is never entirely perfect. But this in no way conflicts with the fact that brain remains brain while life lasts, or until, like water, it becomes some- thing else, because of chemical change in its constitutional parts. The imperfections of the brain have neither more nor less effect upon the fun- damental principles of education than the impurities of water have upon the undying truths of engineering. Perfection is not to be expected, and imperfections of the brain, no more than deficiencies and deformities of the body, are to be remedied by complaints ; nor is the discovery of the effective means of eliminating brain defects likely to result from experi- ments made in conformity to any set of dogmas. As the size and construction of steam-boilers and the fire-box and the kind of fuel to be consumed determine the volume of steam it is possible to generate in a given case, and the rapidity of the conversion of water into power, so do the anatomy, the temperament, the physical condition, and the nature of the intellectual diet determine the velocity of thought as well as the method and direction of intellectual application ; but in no degree, nor in any way, can they or anything else induce any change in the kind or the quality of the intellectual power generated by the com- 472 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION. bustion of brain-cells. Steam is steam the world over. It is power ; and, because it is power, it is entirely irresponsible for the uses to which it is put. This is a fundamental truth universally accepted as applicable to all forces ; and it is incumbent upon educators to give it the same weight as is everywhere accorded to it by engineers, or produce proof that intel- lectual energy is not power. Both thought and steam lend themselves with equal readiness to good and to bad, or to profitable and to unprofit- able uses, but they themselves remain undefiled. They are unalterably pure. I do not wish to seem to argue, however, that all brains, any more than all steam-boilers, are equal in efficiency, or in capability even. It can- not appear after what precedes that I disregard the fact that the anatomy, and therefore the temperament, is to no small degree a matter of inheri- tance, nor would I seem to undervalue their effect upon mental opera- tions. I would not be understood to say that all temperaments, physical conditions or environments are equally adapted to thought, in any one direction even, much less in all. It cannot be denied, either, as I have before intimated, that there are temperaments and conditions that pre- dispose the thought, and thereby exert a potent influence upon the direc- tion and efficiency of intellectual activity. It is true, also, that there are individual cases in which the bent of mind is so marked, so unlooked for from the breeding and environments, and which manifests itself so early in life, as to make it seem that neither conditions, associations nor inheritance ever had any influence whatever upon its development. In such cases, appearances to the casual observer seem to establish the fact that phenomenal, or special, intellectual development is in no case an acquisition, but is, at least in most cases, an out-and-out gift of nature. Whether it is a gift or an inheritance, or whether it is simply a direct edu- cational result, is, however, a matter of slight moment ; but, as it stands to- day, though as yet not substantiated to a demonstration, the balance of de- fensible evidence points decidedly to education as the cause without which there would be no intellectual development in any case. The popular notion that people are thoughtless is groundless. There is not sufficient evidence that there is anywhere any lack of thought. All men, women and children think incessantly. The difficulty, then, is not thoughtlessness but thought extravagance. The difference in intellectual efficiency is due to the fact that all thought is not equally well managed. Well controlled minds are rare and constitute the truly great. A few minds are efficient in one direction. But most minds, the nine hundred and ninety-nine, effer- vesce. Most people are endowed with such an overplus of animal life that they are profligate in thought and work as well as in manner. Hence, extravagance in all its forms is only a symptom. It is an effect, not a cause, and in education must be so treated. Energy may be directed but it cannot be controlled, except indirectly. Obstruct life, which is only composite energy in one direction, and it takes another ; that other will THE HIGHEST OFFICE OF DRAWIKO. 473 inevitably be the path which is next least obstructed ; and so it will con- tinue to struggle until the broad, unobstructed sunshine of heaven is reached, or effort is relieved by death, life being subdued and conquered by obstructions. A seed falling under a rock and germinating will seek sunlight. Its path may lie wholly or partially horizontal, or, perhaps, vertically down- ward, but invariably the shortest route to the light is taken, and an up- ward vertical growth is established and maintained as soon and as long as the light is the least obstructed in that direction. In reaching the light there may be many twists and turns, and many kinks in the stalk thereby will result which cannot be eradicated ; but, at whatever time in life and with such energy as remains, nature never fails, in above-ground growth, to take the shortest route to heaven's light. Intellectual power is one of the vital human forces. Kept in the path to heaven's true light, and it will grow and thrive and blossom and bear the fairest of nature's fruits. But it is a most precious and sensitive plant, and the strictest economy is demanded in the expenditure of its energies. If it is made a house plant, and we would have it anything more than a trifling ornament, we must be content to have its growth one-sided. For to turn it about each day that we may delight our eyes with the luxuriance of its foliage, and that each side may receive its share of sunlight from the window in turn, is to divest its vital energies from growth to turning itself about, and thereby render blossom and fruit impossible. To place the human plant where the light comes only from one direction, and to turn it about each day in order that each side may receive the light in succession, is to make the plant sym- metrical but unfruitful. And so it is that many minds are sterile, though graceful to look upon. Such minds may be likened to open boilers gener- ating more or less visible vapor. But the mass of minds are like steam- boilers generating more power than is required for the work assigned, and the surplus is improvidently expended in fretting, blowing, straining at the fittings and needlessly and unprofitably wearing the machinery. Mind and water will vaporize, as it were. This is inevitable ; and to so direct this vaporization of human energy that it shall acquire and exercise habitual control of itself, is the first of all educational duties. Individual cases prove nothing. It is more to the purpose to assume, in accordance with the spirit, at least, of the theory of similarity of brain, that genius is invariably an educational product induced by conditions and environ- ments that have conduced to establish habitual, thorough, and genuine economy, than to assign its cause to some mysterious or supernatural agency. Each intellectual phenomenon should be studied with a view to discovering the educational possibilities, and to determining the practical time, form, and conditions of the most effective educational operations. But the accumulation of such data is impossible except as a result of sys- tematic inquiry ; and the first step in this direction is to bring together 474 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION such facts as are accepted, — adopt a definite, tangible aim, select the avail- able means, and devise the appropriate method of procedure. Until there is much better evidence than appearances, or individual, personal feeling and prejudice, produced against the theory of the similarity of brain, it must constitute the prime, fundamental, educational fact, to which all others are subordinate, and upon which all others must depend. To accept this theory is to accord to thought all the attributes of force, and render it amenable to all the laws thereto pertaining. To accept the theory of the similarity of brain, as well as the concomitant one that intellectual energy is force, as primary facts, is to accept also the dependent facts, — that thought invariably follows the line of least resistance, and that since the brain is an essential part of a living organism, possessing the power of rejuvenescence, thought is an organic force analogous to physical strength, the preservation and development of which is dependent upon continued alternation of exercise, restoration and rest. These are simple facts in themselves, but they have the widest educational significance. They establish with unmistakable clearness the exact limits of productive edu- cational activity, — they make it entirely clear that education is confined exclusively to the adjustment of obstructions to intellectual development. They make the similarity between engineering and education strikingly plain ; in that the one directs intellectual energies and overcomes irregu- larities of temperament, while the other directs physical forces and over- comes material obstructions. In the one, iron, stone, wood and cement are employed in the construction of bridges, dams and highways, while in the other thought is employed in the analysis and synthesis of mental images. With this understanding of education, all forms of bribery and compulsion are worse than useless, and all precepts and teaching must be accorded an infinitely less important part in elementary education than has hitherto been given to them. To accept this parallel between educa- tion and engineering renders it no less criminal for an educator to secure an immediate appearance by specific rewards or punishments, than it is for the engineer to secure a similar result in the appearance of a stone in an abutment by propping it with a stick at its back. Both serve equally worthy temporary purposes, and from both ultimate, immeasurable dis- aster is certain ; but, unhappily, however deplorable the giving away of the abutment of a bridge, perhaps at a moment when it is crowded with living souls, might be, in the case of the child's character, aim and pur- pose in life, the calamity inevitably resulting from deception exercised in the building by education, is incomparably greater. And the fact cannot be too often urged, nor too strenuously pressed, that education must first of all be honest. Thought is to be directed. It cannot be controlled. It is to be guided. Nature cannot be deceived, nor will she be outwitted, and she is absolutely indifferent to any and all of our complaints. For the educator to find fault with the material placed in his hands is for him THE HIGHEST OFFICE OF DRA WING. 475 to irritate the dog that bays the moon. The aim of education is plain and the result is predetermined by the means employed. Intellectual energy possesses all the attributes that are common to all forms of organic force. And since intellectual energy is analogous to physical strength, education demands that an apportionment of exercise, restoration and rest shall be adopted in intellectual training, similar to that which would be adapted to the symmetrical development and preservation of the physical facul- ties. The success with which this may be accomplished is predetermined by the nature of the immediate aim and the character of the method em- ployed. For instance, that method is certain to be most successful which pays most regard to the appropriateness of the time, and the quality and the kind of each task and employment, and which makes no attempt to crowd or to urge anything ; while that method is worse than a failure, it is a crime, which tolerates an overloading of the mind. The mind, it is true, similarly to the stomach, throws off what it cannot hold ; neverthe- less, as repeated undue taxing of the stomach tends to destroy its capa- bility to perform its proper functions, so a similar crowding of the mind and teaching out of time is certain to bring on intellectual indigestion ; and this is not the less likely to happen because the diet is so simple that it is insipid and unpalatable. The educator's business is not to force likes nor dislikes, but it is to so manage as to maintain a healthy state of mind. This is to be accomplished only by a proper adjustment of conditions and requirements, and success will be as certainly indicated by the curiosity, as the state of the body is indicated by the appetite. Curiosity is the in- tellectual barometer and is in every way accurate and reliable. There is not a particle of evidence that is entitled to a moment's credence to justify the assumption that there is anything whatever needed in elemen- tary education except to win and to hold the child's hearty co-operation. That this is invariably given to the teacher whenever and wherever he deserves it, is a matter of common observation, and in refutation of this there can be nothing to present except blind bigotry and prejudice. To accept intellectual energy to be an organic force is to determine the immediate aim of all elementary processes, which, under these conditions, can be no other than to secure the undivided application of thought in that direction which is best calculated to lead to the highest ultimate good. This being assured, all else may safely be left to time for its fulfill- ment ; and educational progress is not to be measured by petty, partial products, however excellent, except they are the manifest, legitimate and timely fruit of the tree which bears them. Command of the intellectual faculties can only be a growth induced by the skillful adjustment of con- ditions that render it easier for the thought to habitually employ itself in concentrated form in profitable and well-chosen directions than to do otherwise ; and progress is to be measured and gauged by the evidences of thought, — thrift in doing, than which nothing could be more tangible and 476 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION reliable. In elementary schools, at least, everything should be in a state of development simply, hence in them finished products are anomalous. This renders any exhibit of the legitimate educational work of children misleading and unsatisfactory, and makes it impossible to correctly es- timate elementary school work, except by the local color on the spot, — similarly as one would judge of the condition of a field of growing grain. Educational investigation is no exception. Inquiry in this, no less than in physical and psychical research, demands that the inquirer adopt a de- fensible hypothesis or accept that which is best substantiated, as a basis, and proceed from this to separate the true from the false, and the practi- cable from the impracticable. It is only so that the establishment of an educational economy is possible ; and it is only when there is an economy that elementary education rises above the narrow limits of charlatan em- piricism. The theory of the similarity of brain does the same for education that the experiments of Watt did for engineering. It establishes the fact that intellectual energy is a definite force, and as such it is amenable to law. It lifts intellectual activity out of the realms of the mysterious and the indefinite. It sounds the knell of that most pernicious dogma of special intellectual endowments as an educational factor, both good and bad equally. It leaves no room in education for brutality, bigotry, preju- dices, whims or fancies. It characterizes education as intellect engineer- ing, and makes it incumbent upon the educator to lay out and maintain an unobstructed path leading to a thoroughly justifiable end. Education is control of the faculties. Mastery of the mind is the universal and in- fallible key to success. But the development of mind-masters can only be tardy and extravagant if it is made incidental to knowledge acquisition in the educational scheme, as it invariably is. Knowledge, like prodigality, is primarily an effect, not a cause. The one is the result of judicious and the other of heedless employment of thought. The accumulation of knowl- edge is the direct product of education. Indeed, there can be no education without knowledge, — it and control of faculty are vital parts of the same body ; but the character of the educational accomplishment depends en- tirely upon which is made the prime object of attainment at the outset. It is no more practicable in education than it is in rifle-shooting to have two simultaneous immediate aims ; and to seek knowledge before an appreciation of the economy of faculty control is established, at least in some degree, is to court certain educational disaster. The only possible result of the pursuit of knowledge, as a primary, educational means, is pedantic incompetence. The skill and accumulated wisdom of the ages is stored in books and works of art without end, and the secrets of nature reveal themselves with willing frankness to the true searcher after truth. But except there is sufficient appreciation of the value and necessity of brain control, coupled with courage to seek and to face the truth, to induce the habitual employment of both, all the store of noble thought and record THE HIGHEST OFFICE OF DBA WING. 477 of grand achievement, as well as the infallibility of nature itself, avails nothing ; for under any other conditions all efforts cannot fail to be mis- directed, and all findings are sure to be misconstrued. Acquisition is play to him who can control his faculties. If immediate knowledge is the aim, then control of faculty is secondary, incidental, and incomplete. If control of faculty, or mind-masters, is the immediate aim, knowledge-acquisition is inevitable, symmetrical, rapid, and economical. And now the cause of that intellectual phenomenon, commonly called genius, being indetermi- nate, and there being no evidence against the theory of the similarity of brain, and knowing no defensible argument against assuming intellectual energy to be a natural force amenable to the one law of force in invariably following the line of least resistance, in order to make a fair start in edu- cational construction, it is first demanded wherein lies such a path leading to intellectual development. It is required to know by or through the agency of what mental faculty will the employment of the intellectual force be most thorough and undivided. To ascertain this, to determine the line of least resistance to intellectual energy, is not difficult. To dis- cover it, it will be only necessary for me to suggest an exercise. Let each one of us imagine himself at home; and, starting from thence, traverse in his mind, each one for himself, to the place of his daily avocation. Each one will now observe the mental condition required for its doing. I especially desire that it be fully realized that the only condition in which it was possible for us to traverse this well-known and well-worn route in the imagination was one of complete and concentrated application of the entire strength of the intellectual energy. Another similar exercise, going to illustrate the extent of the intellectual concentration demanded by the employment of the imaginative faculties, is this : I will make any figure, an Arabic numeral two, for instance, on the blackboard here and ask you to look at it. Let each one observe the form of this figure. I will now erase it and ask each one to try to see in his imagination the form and position on the board of the figure I have just erased. Let each one recall the character of the mental operation by which it was alone possible to see the contour of this simple, well-known, and familiar form in the imagination. It will be found to be nothing less than complete intellectual appropria- tion. This illustrates completely how exacting the imagination is in its insistence upon appropriating the entire intellectual energy, even in sim- ple, commonplace matters ; how much more uncompromising will be the demand whenever the attempt is made to imagine that which is not known and intricate besides. Such simple illustrations as I have just presented, and innumerable others that each one can supply for himself, make it plain that through the imaginative faculties lies the line of least divisibil- ity, and therefore the line of least resistance to intellectual activity ; because through their employment there is less scattering of thought. Indeed, it 478 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION. is entirely within bounds to say that nothing is understood, except it can be seen clearly, in all its aspects, in the imagination at will ; and no prob- lem can be solved until all the conditions and circumstances involved are seen in all their relations with the mind's eye. This is the key to the educational situation. The amount of time spent with books is of slight moment, and. the profundity of the knowledge possession counts for very little. He alone is educated who practices habitual control of his faculties. He is an educated man who habitually holds his imagination on each problem until all its conditions, relations and requirements are vividly portrayed in a mental image. And primary education fails exactly in pro- portion as it is unsuccessful in accomplishing the firm establishment of a thorough appreciation of this fundamental fact. For to have acquired a thorough appreciation of the inestimable value of practical control of the imaginative faculties is to render all else possible. But even this, great and valuable as it is, and much as it involves as an educational result, it does not by any means constitute the educational sum total. Education cannot stop here. This is but the remotest outpost that guards the fair city of culture. The possession of the ability to concentrate the mental faculties, and added to this, the establishment of habitual exercise of this ability is insufficient. Even the thorough establishment of complete mastery of all the powers of body and mind, with that untouched and undeveloped which is infinitely more to be desired, is worse than useless. It is criminal. A simply educated man, a man having only control of his faculties and possessing all the knowledge which that implies, is a con- stant menace to society. Such a man is capable and liable to do immeas- urable harm. Better a thousand uneducated than one uncultured man. Man is incomplete and education is a failure ; it is a positive and unqual- ified curse to mankind, except together with intellectual power and con- trol or knowledge there is developed, simultaneously, an emotional, a moral and a judicial establishment of intellectual bent of the highest order. There are no limits to the possible educational heights. " If we aim right we can- not go far wrong," writes Mr. Charles H. Moore, of Harvard. Let the im- mediate educational aim invariably be skillful employment of the imagina- tive faculties. Let the themes and the subject-matter be taken from the noblest and the purest literary and art products. Let the schoolmaster constantly direct the line of least resistance to intellectual activity, but let him leave to time the fulfillment. To this point all is clear, — so much is complete. But there still remains one element that as yet is unprovided for, which is essential to render the scheme entirely practicable. It remains to provide some means whereby it may be known to the schoolmaster in how far he is succeeding in directing the imagination. There needs to be some means of materializing the mental images, as it were, in order that it may be determinable at any and all times, with the utmost precision, exactly what is the direction and the degree of the thought exercised by the child. THE HIGHEST OFFICE OF DRA WING. 479 The means to this end is language. Drawing is the language of form, and in its employment in the delineation of imagined form-aspects, from supposed standpoints of observation, it attains its highest office as an edu- cational agent. To illustrate : If I had a class of children before me, I might, perhaps, draw Fig. 1 on the board and name a problem, which would be to describe a simi- lar object from a different standpoint of ob- servation. This problem, in the beginning, would probably be to describe the opposite aspect by a brief memorandum in lines. When the class had had time to do this, and had recorded in a memorandum their mental images of the solution required, I would draw a memorandum of my mental image for their comparison. (Fig. 2.) This being done, Fig. 1. Fig. 2. Fig. 3. Fig. 4. the opposite aspect of something else, as a man pushing a box (Fig. 3) might be required. And after a memorandum in lines of the solution had been recorded by the children, I would record my mental image on the board for their comparison. (Fig. 4.) Instead of the Fig. 5. opposite, the front or back constitute the problem, describe the top view. Or might be the one named. In the beginning the Comprehending the ex- The savage appreciates The child must be taken the grotesque and the ex- Fig. 7. Fig. 6. view (Figs. 5 and 6) might Or it might be required to the aspect from below (Fig. 7.) mind is only capable of treme and the striking, only glaring contrasts, as he is, and if it requires travagant to enlist his 480 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION. desire and to arouse his curiosity at the outset, — the funny, the ridiculous and the crude, if need be, must be employed. It is as idle for the educa- tor to shoot over the heads of his pupils, as it were, as it is for the orator to speak and fail to adapt his language to his hearers' needs and ability ; and it is not impossible that education might have been greatly forwarded beyond its present stage, if children were allowed to exercise the same discretionary power in regard to listening to teachers as is deemed the right of other auditors when he who talks is inconsistent, impractical, puerile, or insipid. The mind uniformly tires of everything except genuine progress. This is as true of children as it is of adults, and however crude the beginning may be, with simply proper direction of the line of least resistance, there can be no failure to progress toward better and thence to best. This is nature's way whenever and wherever the path in this direction is either unobstructed, or is less obstructed than any other. By this process of employing the imagination in drawing, as I have described, all the problems of perspective and orthographic projections may be orderly presented. Presently the child will have passed beyond the rudi- mentary stage, and nothing will avail or satisfy him except the most subtle problems, which can only be presented by great masters and are to be found only in their work. And now, finally, the whole matter of culti- vation, in all its various departments, whether in stock-raising, horti- culture, intellectual development, or what not, is strikingly similar in its essential methods. We may prune, but not incessantly, nor even rarely, and never out of time. We may plant the oak or the vine, and as we sow so shall we reap. We may set the lily in the ground, and, having done so, we may institute blighting conditions, or we may make the way clear for sun and shadow and rain and dew ; and in strict accord, exactly in pro- portion to the relation and quality of the conditions which we establish, will it be blasted, or clothed as man never clothed anything. We may refrain from frustrating nature's perfect fulfillment, but man may not teach even the humblest of pasture weeds how to grow. DISCUSSION. [REPORTED BY SlTPT. EUGENE BoUTON, BRIDGEPORT, CONN.] Supt. Charles E. Gorton, of Yonkers, N. Y., regarded this as insep- arably connected with the theme of President MacAlister, and deemed it important to remember that "you can draw upon the imagination only so far as it has been stored with knowledge. " He had been led by the preceding discussion to the reflection that the regular corps of teachers is so changing, that it is very difficult to have good work carried out. It is, DISCUSSION. 481 therefore, important to have the corps recruited from those capable of carrying out the desired work in art, and for such preparation the profes- sional school should be responsible. In smaller places this is the more desirable on account of the small provision for supervision. The impor- tance of home and school environment as an aid in art education was emphasized. To many of the pupils the school-house should teach better things than their homes can teach. The school-houses of this country ought to be educators in architecture and decoration. Superintendents should do their utmost to bring this about, and the study of drawing should be placed upon a thoroughly educational basis. THE PUBLIC SCHOOL AND CIVIL SERVICE REFORM. BY GEORGE WILLIAM CURTIS. When my friend, the Superintendent of Public Instruction in the State of New York, who is also the President of this Association, asked me to speak to you this evening, I told him that nothing could surpass my will- ingness except my hesitation. I hesitated with the natural reluctance of a man who doubts whether even profound sympathy and interest in a good cause necessarily qualify him to speak to its masters and experts. But again, I felt that his own services to popular education were so valuable and distinguished as to make it the duty of any one whom he thought competent to aid him, however inadequately, in the good work not to de- cline. A good citizen is in this like a good soldier, that he repairs at once to the post of duty to which his superior officer assigns him ; and in the cause of popular education there is no good citizen of New York who does not acknowledge the State Superintendent as his superior officer. Espe- cially when my friend suggested that a subject to which I have given some thought was one which, in its application to our public school system, might not be altogether without interest for you, I was more emboldened to obey, because in addressing this Association, I recall the remark of the old English squire : "I like to talk with my rector, for in talking with him I am speaking to the whole parish." Every man might be proud and glad of the opportunity which you offer me, for he would know that in speaking to the higher officers of the public schools from every part of the Union he is talking to the whole country. If, indeed, the subject of civil service reform be more familiar to you in its connection with politics you will not fear that I may be betrayed into an untimely political address. For it is the happy distinction of this reform that it appeals with absolute impartiality to both the great parties ; while hitherto, both the great 482 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION. parties, like impecunious philanthropists accosted by what the old Eng- lish law called a sturdy beggar, have been fain to reply to Reform : "Good Sir, I know the justice of your demand and I feel the righteousness of your appeal, but unluckily I have left my purse at home." Civil service reform, indeed, is rather a question of polity than of pol- itics. The evil with which it is concerned is the dangerous abuse of a necessary power of government, the power of appointing and removing public officers and employes. This is a power which has always struck at liberty, and no function of the State, therefore, requires more constant, more careful, and more stringent regulation. The story of the abuse is one of the most shameful pages in our history, with which I must assume your familiarity. We have learned by long experience that the evil known as the spoils system necessarily tends to destroy the self-respect of public servants and to brand the public service itself, so far as it involves this system, with a certain discredit. I appeal to your consciousness if this is not so. We shall all, indeed, agree that there are no nobler American gentlemen than many of those, — and we all have friends among them, — who bear the civil commission of the United States. But none know more fully than they that what the Czar of Russia said to Madame de Stael was true: "Sire," said the brilliant Frenchwoman, " surely a despotism may be beneficent." "Aye, madame," replied the emperor, "but 'tis only a happy accident." There is not a midshipman in the navy nor a lieutenant in the army who is not always and everywhere proud of the buttons and the gold lace that show him to be a military or naval officer of the United States, to whose guardianship the glory of the flag and the honor of the national name are entrusted. But in the civil service, under the curse of the spoils system, the words office-seeker and office-holder are terms of reproach, and to u take out of politics " any branch of the civil service has come to mean to take it out of corruption and make it honest and respectable. Yet, surely, the military or naval service is not in itself more honorable than the civil service of the State. The reproach which lurks in the name of office-holder does not spring from the function but from the tenure. In the civil service the incumbent does not hold, as in all other employments, by his own qualities, his merits, his intelligence, his ability, his integrity, and efficiency, but by the humiliating tenure of another man's pleasure, a man whom he may sometimes justly despise. Civil service reform, therefore, is not a question of mere detail except as all administrative methods must necessarily involve details. It contem- plates the greater simplicity, health, and vigor of the whole public service. It aims at the greater strength, dignity, economy, and efficiency of the complete commonwealth. It does not concern some thousands of clerks in executive departments merely, but the character of all public employ- ment, the self-respect, the honor and welfare of the citizen, the true function of party, the true spirit of popular government. It assumes both THE PUBLIC SCHOOL AND CIVIL SERVICE REFORM. 483 the executive desire to discharge the most important public duty from the highest public motives and the impossibility of executive omniscience. It assumes that personal preference and party interest and partisan influ- ence are not aids, but hindrances, to the independent exercise of discretion in the discharge of duties which are not political, and the reform law, therefore, presents to the appointing authority for its final choice, irre- spective of persons or parties and of every illicit and illegitimate consid- eration, only those candidates who have been proved, to be fully fit and qualified for the duties of the place to be filled. This is the reason and the method of civil service reform. Perhaps you have heard that it is the politics of the moon and the Sunday-school. I hope you have answered that although politics are always an alternative, yet that the politics of the moon are preferable to those of the pit, and the leadership of the Sunday-school better than that of the liquor saloon. Even in politics it is wiser to be on the side of the Decalogue and the Golden Rule than on the other side, and infinitely better to aim at the sun than to be afraid of being supercelestial. So pitiful is the condition to which this moral cancer of our political system has reduced political opinion in this country, that it seems often to hold, and, apparently, often honestly to hold, that nobody can speak of public virtue but a hypocrite, or commend political honesty but a knave. If sneers were arguments, the world would have been wind-bound long ago. When Columbus proposed to make the egg stand on end, the contemptuous philosophers sneered that only a fool would try to do it. When he did it, they sneered that any fool could do that. Happily, Jason, who tamed the fire-breathing bulls, did not fear their blasts. The man who, in pursuit of a wise reform, is afraid of the breath of the thing to be reformed, is already defeated. Nothing is more familiar than the fact that the evil for which civil service reform offers a remedy is co-extensive with the whole domain of the public service. What is the fundamental and vital branch of that service ? When one of the national political parties, whose last appeal to the country brought it into control of the administration, declared that the reformed system already established by law should be further extended to all grades of the public service to which it is applicable, the party cer- tainly did not mean to include the public school system. But why not ? To what branch of the public service is it more applicable ? In the large sense of the public service maintained by general taxation for the public benefit, is there any department whose constantly greater efficiency is more vital to the national welfare than that which is represented in this Association ? Are the custom-house and the post-office more important branches of the public service than the public school ? Three centuries ago Martin Luther said that the German who would not send his children to school was a traitor to his country ; and if, to-day, as Mr. James Russell 484 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION Parsons, Jr., Inspector of Academies in New York, tells us in a recent paper, the maintenance of schools is held in the German empire to be the first duty of the State, can it be a secondary duty in a republic ? If I were now addressing a naval or military council, or an assembly of customs collectors or treasury inspectors or postmasters or land or Indian agents, should I be speaking to a more important and influential representative body of public officers than that which I have the honor to address ? If an intelligent American were asked what upon the whole is the true symbol of the American republic, what institution represents most distinctively the force which has been most vital in our marvellous national development, would he not answer at once, the common school ? If we were all asked which of our institutions, after those of religion, we could least spare, whose disappearance would forecast the decay of liberty and the eclipse of civilization, should we not all unhesitatingly and unani- mously reply, the public school ? An ignorant people cannot long remain a free people. Three hundred years ago, in the Netherlands, Count John of Nassau, the brother of the great William the Silent, urging a system of common schools for "children of quality and for poor families," said: "Soldiers and patriots thus educated, with a true knowledge of God and a Christian conscience ; item, churches and schools, good libraries, books and printing-presses, are better than all the armies, arsenals, armories, insti- tutions, alliances, and treaties that can be had or imagined in the wrorld." It was in that spirit and with that conviction that the seeds of our public school system were sown, and with a just instinct, when the suffrage in England was enlarged, twenty years ago, Robert Lowe exclaimed, "and now, gentlemen, let us teach our masters the alphabet/' He knew whereof he affirmed. In 1802 Napoleon said to Pestalozzi that he could not be bothered with questions of A B C. Seventy years later the German army marched out of the school-house and destroyed the Napoleonic empire, while upon its ruins republican France began her national regeneration by reforming and reorganizing her schools. The alphabet is the ally of lib- erty, and in any accurate account of the forces that have made America, the public school must stand first. If any branch of the public service, therefore, should be resolutely secured against every form of the abuse I have described, should be wholly independent of mere personal or partisan influence, and free from the malignant power of patronage or spoils, it is the public school system. But he knows little of the nature of spoils patronage who supposes that it would suffer any official system whatever to escape its ravages. Twenty years after the friends of King William III. declared abuse of patron- age to be one of the reasons for the great English Revolution of 1688, The Tatler, the sparkling satirist of current English life, whose pages still show the very form and pressure of the time, describes little specimen notes addressed to men of influence, soliciting patronage, with the delightful in- THE PUBLIC SCHOOL AND CIVIL SERVICE REFORM. 485 consequence of all such appeals. " Mr. John Taplash, having served all offices and being reduced to poverty, desires your vote for singing clerk of this parish." Another worthy man has ten children, "all of whom his wife has suckled herself — therefore humbly desires to be a schoolmaster. " The Tatler, like its cheery successor The Spectator, chastised folly with a laugh. But has not that old English laugh of a hundred and eighty years ago a little sting for us Americans to-day? In countless American schools would not the laughing Tatler find hosts of masters employed, not for any fitness, but because their children were suckled by their mothers, or for some equally cogent reason ? Is there any doubt that the same patronage which the glorious Revolution of 1688, as it was called, arraigned as sub- versive of English liberty, which the greatest American statesmen of all parties and sections, Washington, Adams, Henry Clay, Calhoun, Webster, and Abraham Lincoln, denounced as fatal to American institutions — the same patronage which, in obedience to public sentiment, Congress passed the reform bill of 1883 to curb and restrain — the patronage at which, speaking for intelligent Europe, Mr. Gladstone courteously expresses his wonder and amazement — the last relic in a free land of monarchial and aristocratic privilege, thrusts its insolent hand into the school-house as into the custom-house and the post-office, and every other public office, making the will of a trustee or member of a school committee or board of education, or some other spoilsmonger, the tenure of the teacher's employment ? If that be a mischievous, wasteful, demoralizing system in other branches of the public service, what is it in the school ? Every other department deals with the public convenience, as the Post-Office ; or with the public finances, as the Treasury ; with the public estate, as the Interior Depart- ment ; with foreign relations, as the State Department ; with the public defense, as the War and Navy Departments ; or with public litigation, as the Department of Justice. But the public school system pervades the whole country, penetrates every district, touches every village and neigh- borhood, and molds the ductile intelligence and character of the citizens of the future. If the fitness of a postmaster, of a customs collector, of a land agent, of an appraiser, is incontestably a public interest, to be ascer- tained with all practicable care and certainty, is the selection and fitness of the public school teacher of less concern to the commonwealth ? We can hardly expect a primary school teacher to say with St. Cyran, the head of the schools of Port Royal, "the charge of the soul of one of these little ones is a higher employment than the government of all the world." But certainly there should be as much care in selecting the teacher as in selecting a fourth-class clerk in a public office. For what is the key of an effective public school system ? It is not the pupil, who is plastic material, but the artificer who shapes the material. It is not the school property, nor the appropriations for maintenance, indispensable as 486 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION they are. Reason, experience, the common consent of all great thinkers and all authorities upon the subject agree that the teacher is the school. All the wealth of India or of California could not provide a great school of any degree unless it could secure great teachers. Noble buildings, storied quadrangles, and ancient groves, munificent endowments, museums, laboratories, gymnasiums, libraries, the profuse accumulation of literary and scientific resource, without the teacher is but Pygmalion's statue un- inspired, the body without the soul. Not only are the teachers so important a body, but they are by far the most numerous body of public servants. Of the great national executive departments, the Post-Office is most generally diffused. Its service is co- extensive with the national domain, and its legend, like that of the ancient Church, is semper, uMque, omnibus. But while there are about 63,000 postmasters in the United States, there are nearly one-half of that number of public school teachers in the State of New York alone, and in the United States there are 350,000 public school teachers. Their salaries amount to $81,000,000, which is probably more than the aggregate salaries of the rest of the civil service. For their own benefit, for the maintenance of free republican institutions, to transmit to their children unimpaired the great heritage of wisely organized civil and religious liberty which they received from their fathers, the citizens of this country tax themselves enormously every year to educate the children in the public schools ; and the only return of this vast outlay for which they look is the intelligence and morality and the material prosperity which inevitably follows public intelligence and morality as the crops follow the quickening sun of April and the soft breath of May. Is not every argument for the appointment of the great body of minis- terial officers of the government by fitness and character wisely ascertained infinitely stronger when applied to the selection of school teachers ? And if the selection of those officers by methods which secure their independ- ence, promote their self-respect, and stimulate their interest and zeal, in- stead of destroying greatly increases the efficiency of the public service, elevates the tone of public employment, and removes a reproach from the national name, is it to be apprehended that similar care would harm the character and efficiency of the public schools ? In other branches of the public service, whatever objections may be urged against the reformed system of appointment, it is undeniably better than the system which it supplants. Whatever foolish questions may be asked, whatever possible frauds practiced in an examination, they are wholly insignificant when compared with the unspeakable folly and the certain fraud of appoint- ment by patronage or mere personal and partisan favor. There could not be a worse system of selection in all the other branches of the public service. Is it the best one for the great department of primary educa- tion ? THE PUBLIC SCHOOL AND CIVIL SERVICE REFORM. 487 Yet is it not substantially the present method ? Teacherships in the schools are not popularly regarded as subjects of patronage. But are they not so practically and is it wise that they should remain so ? What is the present system ? I believe that the requirement of certification or license before appointment is universal in all the States of the Union. The ex- amination upon which the certificate or license issues is, then, the cardinal point. What are the vital, essential conditions of effective examination ? To be properly effective the examinations must be uniform, entirely com- petent, and wholly independent of the appointing power. The examiners must be sincerely interested in education, familiar with the duties of a teacher and with the requirements of the art of teaching, and capable of conducting an examination to ascertain both the scholastic attainments and the specific professional fitness of the candidates. Wherever these conditions do not exist, the public school system, and therefore the whole community, suffers. It is a common wrong, a common injury. The people of this country tax themselves heavily enough for the support of schools and teachers to entitle them to the best, and to the adoption of all means plainly necessary to secure the best. By whom, then, generally speaking, is this examination conducted ? By city boards of education and county commissioners, or trustees or committees, who are appointed by political officers or nominated by party conventions — these are the authorities who examine and certify or license and appoint more than ninety per cent, of the teachers. Is this a reasonable manner of securing public officers qualified for duties so delicate and important as those of teachers in the public schools ? Is it a method which would be likely to secure the most competent service of any kind ? There is indeed an examination, but the examining and certify- ing board is appointed by political officers or named by a party conven- tion. Is a board so appointed likely to be a board peculiarly qualified to conduct such examinations? Is a party caucus generally intent upon such competence in the candidates whom it nominates ? And when the board so nominated not only examines and certifies or licenses teachers but also appoints them, are such appointments generally or often made for fitness alone ? I speak, of course, of a system, not of individuals. I know how many excellent men are selected even under this method, as I know that in other parts of the public service, under a similar system, most honest, industrious, and efficient officers and clerks were selected. But, as the old English judge said to the horse-thief, you are to be hung, not because you have stolen a horse, but that horses may not be stolen, so the spoils system should be abolished, not because fitness is never considered by it, but because fitness is not its object. Slaves were sometimes kindly treated, but kind treatment was not an argument for slavery. The officers who are elected to conduct examinations and license and 488 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION. employ teachers are notoriously often selected without any regard whatever to their special qualifications for a responsibility so great and for duties so vital. There is no limit of eligibility to membership in a board of educa- tion or a school committee, and it is probably true that the great multitude of officers appointed to conduct examinations, however well disposed, are totally unfitted properly to conduct them. Among public officers so nomi- nated and elected the notable want of actual interest in education, of com- prehensive views, of convictions, of actual information and knowledge of teaching are obviously incalculable. The ability to resist personal and political pressure and wrongful influence of every kind and of every degree must be as various as the men. There can be no common standard among them of requirement from a candidate. A candidate who fails in one dis- trict may succeed in the adjoining district. Good-nature, ignorance, indif- ference, and venality will constantly abuse and betray the great public trust committed to such officers. In every State, even in neighboring local communities, a uniform standard of competence will be impossible. Certificates will be granted, not upon proved qualification and merit alone, but often by personal or political influence, or the same insidious force will withhold the certificates. Is it not plain that under such a system in the department of schools, as in every other department where it is toler- ated, the more conscientious and capable an officer may be, the greater will be his peril of exciting enmity and inviting his own dismissal ? A few years ago a committee of investigation into the management of a great public office by its own party friends reported that the number of persons employed was sometimes three times as large as was necessary, and recommended that half of the force should be dismissed. Political places are created as pensions for useless parasites. So in a school system where the evil practice prevails, not only will incompetence be certified, but the list of certification will surpass the demand. Perhaps it is supposed that a large eligible list is not disadvantageous. But what advantage is there in a copious choice of incompetent teachers who, because of incompetence, will cringe more abjectly and accept smaller wages ? That is a strain which necessarily lowers the character, efficiency, and value of the schools. A competition not of merit but of low wages will follow, and not the sal- ary only but the teaching will be cheapened, the standard lowered, and, like the marble statue with the feet of clay, the whole resplendent system of public education must be weakened by incapacity and inefficiency in the primary schools. In a country where the system of spoils is gravely defended by eminent public men and party leaders as indispensable to the public welfare, has the door of the school-house a charm to stay its ravage ? Its fatal results are known everywhere. Will they be unknown here ? However simple and natural under earlier conditions in the country such a system may have been, and however in certain ways it may have answered the purpose, THE PUBLIC SCHOOL AND CIVIL SERVICE REFORM. 480 is it the method which in our present situation, with larger experience and broader views and under radically changed conditions, we should delib- erately adopt ? Even when such a system was doing its best, it was but a yoke of oxen drawing the chariot of the sun. Our public school system in its purpose and scope and general admin- istration is our national pride, if not our glory. But, as Americans, fully comprehending what it is, is it not our first and patriotic duty to repair in it whatever imperfections may appear, that it may more and more effectively subserve its purpose ? You know, gentlemen, undoubtedly better than I, that political patronage and personal interests and partiali- ties, ignorance and indifference, and mercenary and illicit motives of all kinds do in some degree degrade and demoralize the public school system. You know that in the primary schools the seeds of our future America are sown, and you know how deep in that quick soil of childhood all ignoble dispositions may strike their roots, like poisonous weeds, and with what difficulty they are torn up. A teacher cannot cringe to a superior school officer and flatter and fawn for favor without a loss of self-respect which necessarily affects his manhood, destroys his enthusiasm, and unfits him for his duty. Can any patriotic American state one good reason why a system of selection which is entirely applicable and with the happiest re- sults to every other branch of the public service, is unfitted for the most important branch of all, the public school ? It is a simple, reasonable, and perfectly practicable system, and that its principle might be univer- sally adopted for the selection of teachers is a proposition which does not seem to me to admit of debate. Every objection and adverse argument that has been urged in the general discussion of the question of civil service reform in this country was anticipated in the English consideration of the same subject. The chief opposition, what I may call the last ditch of objection, was that no preliminary examination of general or special information could determine satisfactorily the fitness for his duties of a public officer of any degree. The conclusive reply to this objection was twofold : first, that there was simply a choice of alternatives, and that an impartial preliminary inquiry into fitness was better than no care or inquiry at all, which is the spoils system; and, second, that final appointment was to be made only after probation or actual test of capacity and fitness. So I can suppose it to be said that examination in scholarship would not test the more important qualifications of a teacher, which are the ability to awaken interest, to impart knowledge, and to keep order — the first and imperative require- ment in the American school. But probation would test them as in other employments, and probation is a vital condition of the reformed system. The application of what we call the merit system to the schools is long established and familiar elsewhere. The elementary schools of Germany, for instance, are certainly among the best in the world, and every German 490 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION teacher must have had three or four years' training in a normal school, of which the standard is prescribed by the government, and after two years of provisional service he must pass a second practical examination before he is definitely installed in his work. This is the provision also in France and Austria ; and in Ireland, as Mr. Jay, first President of the New York Civil Service Commission, states, the four national examiners of the public schools are selected by competitive examinations. The comment upon such facts, perhaps, will be that America is not Germany, France, Austria, or Ireland, and that we are a law unto our- selves. True, but among the great qualities which have made America is the common sense which appropriates to American advantage whatever in any country in the world seems to be wise or useful. The habeas corpus and trial by jury were not rejected by us because they came from England. Gunpowder we have also found useful, although India, Arabia, Eng- land, or Germany invented it. We do not disdain printing, whether it was the child of Germany or of China ; and the mariner's compass is ours as much as it is Italy's. As Bacon was said to have taken all knowledge for his province, so America takes all the world and all the wit and wisdom of mankind for its teacher. Germany is an empire and America is a republic ; but if an empire has an admirable school system, nothing so well illustrates republican intelligence as careful observation of it and adapta- tion of such parts of it as commend themselves to republican judgment as suitable to republican institutions. We justly hold that teachers should be licensed and appointed upon examination. Then the examinations, the certificates, and the appointments should be absolutely free, so far as pos- sible, from personal prejudice or favor, political and interested pressure, or other illegitimate influence. The teacher should feel and the public should know that his selection is due wholly to his proved fitness — a fitness ascertained by carefully considered, impartial, and impersonal tests. It is at least a dozen years too late to deny the value of such a method of selec- tion. Its simplicity of operation, its effectiveness, and happy results are incontestable. Mr. Commissioner Roosevelt says that the spoils system has been practically extirpated in the department service in Washington, and the late Secretary of the Treasury, Mr. Windom, said of the reformed system : " Having been at the head of the department both before and after its adoption, I am able to judge by comparison of the two systems, and have no hesitation in pronouncing the present condition of affairs as preferable in all respects." The public school system of the United States should not stand upon the shifting sands of the whims and prejudices and politics of the district caucus, but upon the solid rock of experience and reason. In every part of the Union it is essentially a State institution. It is maintained by the State upon the highest considerations for the general welfare. The State creates funds constitutionally inviolable, appropriates their income, and THE PUBLIC SCHOOL AND CIVIL SERVICE REFORM. 491 lays specific taxes upon all the people for the support of the schools. For the same great and common purpose the authority of the State should secure uniformity of training and examination for teachers, and the ex- aminations should be competitive as under the national law for other departments of the public service. In the State of New York great prog- ress in this direction has been made in the voluntary adoption by the school commissioners throughout the State, at the suggestion of the Superintendent of Public Instruction, of uniform simultaneous examina- tions for teachers upon conditions essentially competitive. Three grades of certificates are issued ; those of the lower grade only to candidates who reach a minimum of sixty marks in a possible hundred, in the two higher grades only to those who reach seventy-five marks. The State Super- intendent in his report for this year says that M to this system more than to anything else, and perhaps more than to all other things taken together, is to be attributed the marked increase of interest in the work, the con- stantly advancing qualifications, the added attendance upon the normal schools and training classes which are everywhere manifest." Yet the superintendent concedes that the weakness of the scheme lies in the examination of the papers by the local commissioners, who are often elected without regard to their qualifications for such service, and who, even if qualified, differ greatly in their markings. He therefore recommends to the Legislature the passage of a law providing for the examination and rating of papers by a central board of examiners, as the papers of the academies and secondary schools in New York are examined in the office of the Regents of the University. This recommendation, like that of the National Civil Service Commis- sion, that the papers of the national service examinations should be ex- amined in Washington, is wise, because a comprehensive and truly effective application of the principles of civil service reform to the public school system can be accomplished only by law. A general law of the State con- trolling the action of all school officers will alone avail ; a system which shall provide an open competition of merit and secure a tenure beyond personal pleasure. Already, and with the same purpose as the uniform examinations for teachers' certificates, the Legislature of New York passed last year an act requiring that in no city or village having a Superintendent of Schools should any teacher be appointed who had not completed a high school course and been trained for at least a year in a normal school or a training class. This, too, was aimed at the vital point of certification and employment of proved competency only. The bill passed the Legislature but not the executive chamber. Yet it is a bright sign of that untiring American spirit which is not content with good, but reaches out for the better and presses forward and upward toward the best. This school move- ment in New York is in strict accord with the wise and generous progressive impulse of the time and country. 492 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION. In such a matter the experience of one State will serve all the States. If in New York it be found that the fitness of the teachers and the effi- ciency of the schools are greatly increased by a system of simultaneous and uniform examinations for certificates upon paper prepared by the Depart- ment of Instruction, the same happy result would follow in Maine or in Texas. One of the fortunate consequences of our political union is that each State is an object lesson to all the States. In every chief department of public activity — in education, in charity, in the prison system, in the sanitary system — each State experiments for itself, and the Union is the beneficiary of the common intelligence and the common enterprise. No State wishes its public school system to be inferior to that of its neighbors, and if a neighbor takes a step in advance, the whole line instinctively moves, in military phrase, to dress upon it, and to obey the perpetual Ameri- can order of the day in the old German field-marshal's phrase, "Forward, gentlemen." Gentlemen, I cannot stand here in your presence to avail myself of the opportunity which you have generously offered me to plead for a reform which it seems to me in its wise application would greatly promote the welfare of the public school system, without a keener consciousness of the truth that the American public school is the true temple of the people. In every other branch of activity, in religion, in politics, in society, even in charity, we are all divided into sects and parties and clubs and cliques. But, in the public school, citizens of all sects and all parties, of all social sympathies and associations, meet on a common ground with a common interest and a common purpose. It is the American temple dedicated to Hiat we believe the essential condition of popular government, an edu- cated people. It is not that we suppose that education can take the place of personal honesty or national love of liberty, but that we believe it to be the means of ennobling personal character and strengthening public virtue. The State gives its children knowledge as a two-edged sword, indeed, with which they may either slay themselves or carve their way to the highest human service. The public school merely opens to the child that oppor- tunity of training and developing his powers, his character, and his aims which comes from knowledge of human thought and achievement in all times and countries — an opportunity which he alone can improve for him- self. The dignity, the influence, the power of the teacher's office, there- fore, are incalculable. Like St. Peter, he holds the sacred keys. Is any public duty more transcendent than that of enabling the duties of that office to be discharged more satisfactorily, of constantly elevating it both in the respect of him who fills it and in the confidence and honor of the public for whom he holds it ? Shall we spare any thought, any effort, any cost, to make the public school what we mean it to be, the corner-stone of the ever loftier and more splendid structure of political liberty, and to impress upon the teacher by our sympathy and care the central truth of the UNIVERSITIES AND SCHOOLS. 493 school system that the child is educated by the State, not that he may read and write only, but that the trained power and noble intelligence of the American citizen may tend constantly more and more to purify and perpetuate the American republic ? UNIVERSITIES AND SCHOOLS. BY SUPT. OSCAR H. COOPER, GALVESTON, TEXAS. Mr. President : Universities are the natural leaders of educational progress. Whatever their outward form may be, they are essentially demo- cratic in their character and influence. Sham and shallow pretense cannot long survive where real university life has taken root. The debt of mod- ern civilization to universities, from that of Athens, with its millennial history, to those of our own time, can hardly be overestimated. For the intellectual life of the world was kindled in that noble university of Athens, in which, amid the rise and fall of republic, kingdom, and empire, the aspiring youth of Greece, Rome, Asia, and Africa gathered to listen to Protagoras or Socrates or Plato or Aristotle, or some other of the illus- trious teachers who made the Greek city famous for thirty generations as the seat of the greatest of ancient universities. Learning, science, litera- ture, history have been preserved, perpetuated, and advanced from age to age by the universities which have thus passed on the torch of civilization. Paris and Bologna, Oxford and Cambridge, Berlin and Vienna — what would Europe do without these universities ? This country, too, young as it is, has been profoundly affected by its institutions for higher education. The highest social and political ideals have ever been cherished in the atmosphere of intellectual freedom, which is the vital air of the best university life. "The truth shall make you free" is the legend which should be inscribed over the entrance to every university, for truth is its aim and freedom its code. My subject is not the influence and power of universities, but rather the relation of universities to our system of public education. I shall not enter upon the discussion of the question whether our system of public education is the outgrowth of the university spirit in this country, but I may profess my conviction that but for the universities and colleges we should have had no public school system ; and while it is evident that universities do not depend directly, though they are doubtless directly bene- fited, by the existence of a good system of public schools, it is probably true that no good system of public schools could be developed in the absence of the influence of these higher institutions. Of course, there are universities and universities. There are eight or 494 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION. nine institutions in this country which are already rivaling the best of the Old World ; there are three or four scores of good colleges of which some will doubtless become universities in the future ; and there are some hun- dreds of so-called colleges and universities which run from pretty high grade college work down to poor ungraded common schools, whose claim to being higher institutions is based on the attempts of professors to teach what they do not know, and of students to learn what with such teaching they cannot comprehend. Such institutions need not be considered in this discussion, for I fear that only the evil they do will live after them. I am thinking now only of the true universities in their relation to the general system of public instruction. These universities, whether under State direction or the control of trustees with the power of succession, or wholly or in part under the direction of the alumni, are in reality public institutions, in that they are all sensitive to public opinion, none being more so than those which are directed by self-perpetuating boards of trustees. And so the systems of public education, although they are limited legally to the several States, and although many of the cities are practically independent of the State in their school administrations, are nevertheless based on the same general principle administered in the same general way, and are developing under similar lines in all parts of the country. In education, at least, there is no North, no South, no East, and no West ; no higher caste, no lower, save as it is made by excellence in the work done. It seems to me that one may fairly claim that we have an American system of education. This system has been developed along the lines of freedom and individuality, yet it has been controlled in its development by the same general principles and animated by the same general purposes. Viewed as a whole, it is a ladder reaching from the gutter to the loftiest heights of human knowledge. It is my hope and desire to contribute something to the harmonious co-operation of those who are engaged in the higher, or special, and lower, or more general, work. For may it not be claimed with good reason that there is too wide a separation between the lower and the higher institutions, and that there is too little sympathy and co-operation between the workers in these fields ? Do we not find many who are ready to urge the support and maintenance of the lower schools who have yet no disposition to foster the higher ? And, on the other hand, do we not find many favoring the higher at the expense of the lower when even doubtful of the advantages of universal education ? It has been my experience in a somewhat varied field to meet a good many persons of both classes ; that is, a good many persons who have no sym- pathy with the fostering and support of the higher institutions, who are yet friendly to the lower ; and others who, professing allegiance and giving their service to the higher institutions supported by the State, yet are opposing or maintaining a critical attitude toward the schools of the people. UNIVERSITIES AND SCHOOLS. 495 Our system of public instruction, which has been developed within the last half -century in the United States, has become in large measure inde- pendent of our leading colleges and universities. These institutions, the colleges and universities, with their eyes turned toward the Old World, have been rather building up toward the ideals which have already been realized in the European universities, and have to some extent separated themselves from the great masses of the American people. This separation in sentiment and work bet-ween the universities and the lower schools, slight though it may be as yet, may have serious consequences and requires careful consideration. Is it the fault of the universities ? Is it the fault of the public schools ? Or is the spirit one which is inherent in the laws of development which govern both ? The last, I think, is not the true explanation. The general diffusion of knowledge, universal education, is the object of the public schools, and is the object for which universities originally existed. Time will not permit, nor have I, perhaps, the proper preparation to discuss all the elements involved in this problem. While professing my hearty allegiance to the university ideal and to the university life, yet in the present stage of development of this country I am compelled to believe that the public school is of more importance to the national life, at least in the immediate future, than its universities. I doubt whether many university men adequately realize the supreme importance of universal education, and of maintaining the agencies by which universal education is best secured. In their eager efforts to advance learning and to promote the education of those who come to their halls they have in some measure overlooked the wider movement without, and so have failed to cast their decisive influence in the direction of the improvement of the public school system of the country. More often public schools meet with criticism from men of this type than encouragement. Advice, if it be given, is of the severely critical character which repels rather than attracts those who would be most eager to avail themselves of wise counsel for the improve- ment of the schools. Our programs should be shortened and enriched beyond question, and our methods of administration of the public schools are often far from satisfactory, but superficial criticism and off-hand discussion of these mat- ters will do little beyond exasperating those whom they are intended to aid. For it cannot be denied that our public schools in many places have fallen into the hands of the veritable Philistines. Too often we find the men who are in control of public school administration destitute not only of real culture, but of a consciousness of their need. The work of the schools is made more and more an end in itself, pointing to nothing higher, and routine and mechanical device take the place of wise direction and enthusiastic, earnest, and capable teaching. The time has come, it seems to me, for the colleges and universities of 496 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION. this country to face the question of their responsibility to the system of public instruction of this country. The universities are popular, powerful, growing rich, and growing more and more in ability to influence public opinion. Some superficial university men seem to think that a crusade against the methods and aims to some extent of the public school will meet the need. Nothing could be more mistaken. The public school is too deeply rooted in our social organism and exerts too profound and far- reaching an influence on our national life to-be handled in this flippant, off-hand way. The problem of the improvement of the schools is one which will tax not only the broadest culture, but the highest administrative skill. So far as universities are concerned, then, the improvement of education will not be secured by criticism at public gatherings of the methods pur- sued and the results attained in the public schools. And yet I have no hope of any important advance in the methods, aims, and results of the public schools unless the earnest and active co-operation of our higher in- stitutions can be secured in this work ; for the improvement in the public schools, or in any system of education, will come only in response to a demand from above rather than from below, from man's higher nature rather than from his lower — and this demand must be created and enforced by men and women of liberal education. What have the universities of this country done directly and consciously toward the improvement of our general system of education ? Has this general improvement of the system of education entered into their pro- grams as a part of the conscious purpose for which the university ex- ists ? This is a question of serious import. If my observation be correct, it may be safely asserted that this most important purpose for which a university should exist has been in large measure overlooked in the actual organization and administration even of our best institutions. For the highest institutions may influence and advance general education best by preparation, conscious and intentional, of those who shall direct and ad- minister this general system of education. I find a strange absence of the teaching spirit in many of these institutions. Noble though their work is and healthful though their influence is on the highest life of this nation, and though they are as cities set upon a hill, yet there is a strange lack, in some of them if not all, of what should be the central life of the uni- versity work — the deliberate and conscious preparation of men and women for the work of teaching. It seems to me that the matter has passed beyond the point of inquiry to the point of decision ; that it is a part of the true function — indeed, a most important part of the true function of the university— to prepare those who are to administer systems of education and to teach the coming generation. Schools of pedagogy, schools of instruction in the sciences, that are alive to the art of teaching, should form a legitimate and essen- UNIVERSITIES AND SCHOOLS. 497 tial part of every university curriculum. During the earlier history of our universities, when the population was small and the percentage of college graduates much larger than it is now, schools were largely supplied with teachers from the ranks of college men ; and although there was less sys- tem, I suspect there was more effective teaching done, on the whole, in those days than in these. As the universities have grown in numbers and wealth, the style of living gradually changed and the circumstances of the masses of the people have improved, the number of young men of collegi- ate education who have devoted themselves, even for a brief period, to teaching has been diminishing, until they form at present a small pro- portion of those who are devoted to this calling, and thus the university influence over our general system of education has been growing steadily less as that system has developed in magnitude and importance. The remedy for this state of things is, it seems to me, not far to seek. Let the universities take hold, in an earnest and vigorous way, of the problem of how best to train teachers; let them make the training of teachers an important part of the university's work. The tens of thou- sands of young men and women who flock to the short term, superficial normal schools which dot the West and Northwest show how keen is the desire of many of the brightest and most hopeful young men and women for adequate preparation for this important work. If, as Mr. Gladstone has said, teaching be the most intellectual of the professions, why should not a university, which is itself a teaching body, give attention in the or- ganization of its curriculum to its most vital function? It is true that, so far as the art of teaching is concerned, more may be learned from a good teacher than from a good book on the theory of pedagogy. The same thing is true of chemistry or of physics or of any other science. If the personal presence of the living teacher were not an essential element in a liberal education, a large library would be more effective than Plato or Aristotle teaching in the Academe. The teachers of the United States would, I am sure, greet with proper appreciation and gratitude a move- ment on the part of our universities toward the recognition of their work as one of the leading learned professions — a recognition which will be secured by the establishment in these universities of properly equipped, well-manned schools of pedagogy. Are not pedagogy and its allied sciences proper subjects for university education ? Is history an important subject for university teaching, and is the history of education an unimportant one ? Is not the history of education the art of the history of civilization ? Is psychology a science to be studied in a university and to be taught by the ablest professors, but is such a practical knowledge of psychology as shall treat of its appli- cation to the wonderful and complex phenomena of the growing mind beyond the sphere of a university's work? Perhaps my interest in this subject leads me to see it out of its proper proportions, but if that were 498 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION not true, the universities themselves could do nothing, could take no step which would further their own development, which would deepen the character of the work done in them more than by establishing this central school for the study of the theory and the art of education. It does not seem incredible to me that a movement of this sort — especially if men of the right character, men full of the subject and of the love of teaching, were put in charge — would be followed by a wave of enthusiasm in the teaching profession such as that which gathered tens of thousands of students at the old University of Paris to listen to that marvelous teacher and leader of men, Abelard. Some of the short-term normal schools, so-called, in some of the "Western States gather thousands of students annually, thus showing the demand already existing for inspiration and instruction in this noble work. Teaching is a part of the best work that men do. Universities may prepare men for the law, for medicine, for the ministry, for the many money-making professions and avocations which fill the business world ; may they not also devote some of their energy and funds to the upbuilding of that profession for which the university exists ? The establishment of schools of pedagogy in our leading universities would largely increase the number of men of college and university training who would enter the general school work. They would equip the men whom they send into the general school work so that the number of failures in the work would be small and the average preparation for the work greatly raised. They would close up the breach in feeling and effort which seems to be widening between the higher and lower institutions. They would, indirectly, largely promote their own usefulness by adding to the number of their students, probably doubling them within a few years. And they would, above all, give to our system of general education, whose fairest bloom and noblest fruitage have been developed in the sunlight of freedom, completeness and power which has not yet been seen in the history of the world's education. DISCUSSION. [Reported by Supt. W. H. Maxwell, Brooklyn, N. Y.l Pres. Harrison E. Webster, Union College, Schenectady, N. Y. : I may as well say at the beginning that I agree with the views so admirably set forth by Superintendent Cooper in the paper just read. I do not see that there is any room for criticism. I do see that there may be practical difficulties, for some time to come, in the way of carrying out his ideas. The term "university," as used in the title of this paper, is somewhat misleading. In this country this word is used with great carelessness, one might say recklessness. All kinds of institutions are called universities. DISCUSSION. 499 I know of some cases where this name is used, and legally used, for insti- tutions whose educational work is not above the grade of an ordinary high school. Even business schools make use of the term. In reality there is in this country but very little university education, properly so-called. Union College, over which I have to preside, has in late years been called a university, simply because certain professional schools (law, medicine, etc.) were legally joined to it. But the character of the instruction in each department remained unchanged by the union. It is not a university. The increase in the number of courses, the bringing together of a great number of students, the presence of many instructors, all this does not constitute a university. The work remains for each group of students, no matter how many groups there may be, distinctly undergraduate work. The idea that a college is looking university- wards, if one can use such an expression, because students from the first, or after some time spent in colleges, can choose from a great variety of subjects (courses or hetero- geneous studies, as the case may be), does not change a college into a university. This method may be wise or unwise. For myself I think it unwise for the average student, but that does not matter. The college has its own place and work. The university has its own place and work. Nothing is gained by a misleading nomenclature, and much is lost. Much has been said in depreciation of the small colleges, especially the small western colleges. This, again, is wrong. Certainly, they are not as well equipped as the strong, rich, old colleges of the East. But they are doing an excellent work. Thousands of young men, who by no possibility could attend one of the older and undoubtedly better colleges, can and do attend their local institutions. In many cases the teachers in these colleges are graduates from the best colleges in the country. They do good work. Nothing can be better established than that the colleges are entirely dependent on the secondary schools for their support and success. If the schools are weak, inefficient, the college that draws from them cannot have a high standard. The eastern colleges have been for many years demanding more and more of the preparatory schools. The requirements for admission to college have been increased ; the age of graduation for the average student is much greater than it was in the past. Meantime, competition for places in life has become sharper than ever. And now the cry goes out, college graduates are too old ; the course must be shortened ; men must get into life earlier. And so they ought. But if a change is to be made, let it be in the requirements for admission to college, not in the length of the college course. Any college man will maintain that col- lege life is worth more to a young man than life in a preparatory school, no matter how well conducted. As it seems to me, no greater mistake can be made than to shorten the college course. This, of course, for the average man. Every college course is arranged for the average man. The exceptional man — let him graduate whenever he has done his work. 500 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION. There is one great trouble with the high schools. They are doing much of the work that ought to be done in colleges, and for this they have good grounds. Only a small number of the students in high school expect or intend to enter college. It is well that those who cannot enter any higher institution of learning should receive instruction in many branches which properly belong in the college course. But in every such school there ought to be a course arranged for young men and women who do intend to "go up higher." The time of preparation would then be much shortened, because many subjects would be omitted. This would en- courage students to go on with their education. For many years I was a teacher of natural science in various colleges. I say without hesitation that better work can be done (in colleges) with a student who comes fresh to the subject than with one who through his high school training thinks that he understands the subject. I conclude in this wise : In our high schools the teaching is excellent. All honor to those who give their lives to it. But there ought to be preparatory courses for colleges, including only such subjects as are required for admission to colleges. That if any change is to be made so as to shorten the time for college students, it should be made in the preparatory course. Prof. S. G. Williams, of Cornell University,in continuing the discus- sion, emphasized a statement of the paper, that educational progress had universally received its impulse from above, from whatever higher centres of learning anywhere existed. This was a most important consideration nnd one that ought never to be lost sight of in discussing the questions of higher learning; that the spread of civilization and enlightenment is ever downwards from higher levels ; and that the lower and lowest masses, easily satisfied with small acquirements or absorbed in their material wants, are unconscious of their higher needs, and hence are unlikely to make unaided efforts to rise. This was well illustrated by the old me- diaeval universities, like Bologna, Paris, and Oxford. Meager and barren as what they taught seems to our modern eyes, they were a source of in- tellectual quickening at a time of deep mental darkness. Astonishing numbers of youth flocked to them from widely separated regions, and on their return home became centers of enlightenment to all around them. Thus these institutions began that elevation of the nations that resulted in the sixteenth-century renaissance. It was of interest in this connection to observe that the earliest privilege conferred by the old universities, and the one most coveted, was the " licencia docendi," or the right of teaching anywhere in Christendom. That is, they sent armies of teachers into an ignorant world, and these, though often poorly equipped and far from respectable, like the " Vagants," made it far less difficult to get instruction of some sort than De Nogent DISCUSSION. 501 describes it in the last half of the century which preceded the rise of uni- versities. This interesting function of the universities has been very little improved upon in principle until the present century, when we have become conscious that the art of so presenting knowledge that it shall become to the learner a source of intellectual strength and spiritual eleva- tion, is at least as essential to the teacher as knowledge itself. It is only within the past eighteen years that higher institutions in English-speaking countries have recognized their duty to provide properly equipped teachers in this latter sense ; and it is interesting to note how rapidly the idea has borne fruit in Scotland, in England, and in the United States. Already in this country we see chairs of pedagogy established in three of the foremost institutions of New York, one in Philadelphia, and several in the great and prosperous States of the West, in Iowa first of all. The term higher institutions was designedly used, because the speaker believed it must be conceded that we had yet no university pure and simple, i. e., one in which all subjects offered were opened freely to the choice of students that they might select therefrom what they believed best suited to their intellectual wants or their professional intentions. Our oldest and most richly-endowed institutions are still modeled more or less on the college idea of prescribed courses. Yet there is a notable progress university-wards in not a few of them, — for example, in Harvard, Columbia, Cornell, and some others, in throwing open the higher culture- studies to free selections. Evolution in this direction will doubtless proceed by the sloughing off of the lower reaches of study, and all that is rigidly prescribed, leaving these to the college proper, where they prop- erly belong; and when this process is finished, and complete freedom of higher study is accorded to the student, then will the American university be completely differentiated from the college, and each without rivalry will do its own proper work. The early universities grew up about famous schools of some specialty, — e. g. Bologna from a school of law, and Paris from a school of theology, — to which were added by subsequent accretions, instruction in the other subjects of intellectual interest to those times. Thus arose the four facul- ties of arts, theology, law, and medicine. But the higher needs of later ages are by no means circumscribed within these time-honored limits. The progress of arts and industries has created an imperative need of high professional training, especially in architecture, agriculture, and the several lines of engineering. Provision for these not being made in existing universities, the tendency has been to establish for them special schools. This tendency, the speaker believed, should be discouraged. All professional studies should be placed on an equal footing by the university of the future, — that young men engaged in any specialty might enjoy the inestimable advantage of rubbing their brains against those of men with widely different views, and so gain a truer estimate 502 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION. of the relations of their own calling to all other objects of human in- terest. Prof. Williams did not wish to conclude his remarks without expressing his disagreement with what he thought the too exclusive emphasis laid by a previous speaker on lauguages and mathematics as college studies. Great and worthy departments of study, both of them, but by no means all. We may conveniently assemble school studies and employments into five great groups, viz. : Language, in which the vernacular should be em- phasized, the sciences of nature, history, mathematics, and those employ- ments which call into play the manual capabilities while they cultivate taste. Now, while he was ready to concede that language should receive a larger measure of attention than any of the others on account of its very great importance, he did not believe that subjects from any one of these groups should be absent from any portion of the prescribed curri- culum, from primary grade to college. Thus only could we best train up men who should add all-sided interests to the complete command of all their faculties. The exhaustive study of any group is of course impos- sible, but the method and spirit of all may be sufficiently mastered ; and this mastery is essential both for its spiritual benefits, and for future independent work at the true university. Finally, the speaker believed that, by complete and conscious recogni- tion of its primacy in educational progress, of its duty in the pedagogical preparation of the higher class of teachers, and of the propriety of in- cluding within its scope every high class of human interests, and by encouraging, as they well may, an all-sided culture in all educational estab- lishments below them, — the great American universities towards which we are rapidly growing, would fully meet the not unreasonable demands of the excellent and thoughtful paper under discussion. Me. Nicholas Murray Butler, of Columbia College and the New York College for the Training of Teachers, said that one of the most inter- esting chapters in the history of modern education, when it comes to be written, will be the account of the working out of a system of education, elementary and higher, in the United States, suited to the needs and characteristics of the people. The marked difference at the present time between the general educational organization in this country and in Europe is to be found in the fact that in Europe the elementary school is not as a rule in complete co-ordination with the secondary school and the univer- sity ; while in the United States the connection between the elementary and the secondary school is complete, but that between the secondary school and the university is wanting. Therefore, the specific problem in educational organization that the American people have to deal with at the present time is the co-ordinating of the secondary and the superior instruction. This will be done by the high schools, the academies, and DISCUSSION. 503 the colleges. In this organization the American college will always con- tinue to occupy a prominent place. The American college has no exact counterpart in Europe. It has grown up here as an indigenous institution. Organized originally as a high school, it has grown and developed until it has come in some instances dangerously near being a university. It is this fact, the fact that the college has occupied an uncertain and highly unstable position, that has led to so much confusion in our language and our thought regarding superior instruction. The college should rest upon the high school, and should not raise its requirements for admission to such an extent that high school graduates may not pass easily and natur- ally into it. The contemporary demand for a shortening of the time devoted to obtaining both a college and a professional education is a sound one, and must be heeded. The shortening, however, should not take place at the expense of residence in college. That is in many ways the most valuable feature of American higher education. It cannot be sacri- ficed without gravest loss. The problem can best be met by welding the college and the professional school together, and admitting certain pre- liminary professional studies, as electives, into the course leading to the degree of Bachelor of Arts. The university is a wholly different institution from the college, and while in this country we have scores of nominal universities, the real ones may be counted on the fingers of a single hand. A college, in which the course of study is elective wholly or in part, is not a university. A group of professional or technical schools is not a university. A college and a group of professional and technical schools taken together is not a univer- sity. A university must have for its heart and soul the great philosophical faculty of the Germans ; the faculty which finds its reason for existence in the preservation of the humanities and in a careful and loving study of philosophy, philology, and letters. A university is marked by the time- honored freedom in teaching, and freedom in study ; it knows no tram- mels, no compulsion. It is not a disciplinary institution, but rather a field for research and investigation. At the university the bounds of knowledge will be continually widened, and the leaders of the future generation in science and literature trained to their work. Professional schools or faculties, apart from the philosophical faculty, have always be- come technical and narrow, — it is the philosophical faculty that is the real university centre. Its spirit and insight must regulate and inspire all of the associated faculties. The university owes a duty to the teaching profession. Originally the university did nothing but train teachers. The original examination for graduation, if one may call it such, was nothing but a test to enable the student to pass from the ranks of the scholars discentes to those of the scholars docentes. One of the great struggles in early university history was that concerning granting the privileges of the degree to persons who 504 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION. could pass the examination, but had no desire to teach. This extension of the university privileges was wise, but it has gone so far that the duty to the teaching profession has been forgotten. Now, in this country and within the last decade, attempts are making to have the university, wher- ever it is found, undertake again the inspiration of the teaching profession. At many of our universities chairs of pedagogy are being established. Thought is being devoted to the question. The movement is a great one, and is destined to grow. The great obstacle to its advance is found in the lack of men trained to undertake these high and responsible positions. We need men to devote themselves to the study of education in order to represent it in the universities and make its development complete. When this is done, the university will not only be the apex and crown of the American educational system, but it will be its life and heart. From this highest institution will go out lines of influence and strength to the lower, welding them together into a consistent and coherent whole. Supt. Eugene Bouton, Bridgeport, Conn., claimed that what was left out of the high school was also, as a rale, omitted in college. He had received no instruction in botany in the high school, and the omission had not been supplied in college. Students could receive no instruction in music during the college course. Preparatory schools should teach everything required in practical life. Mr, George H. Martin, Massachusetts, claimed that it is not true that all influence has been from above downwards. The lower institutions have profoundly affected the higher. The establishment of departments of pedagogy in universities has been the result of demands made upon them by the representatives of the public schools. This influence has come from below. Pres. G. Stanley Hall, of Clark University, said that there is a dis- astrous chasm between the university and the schools. On one side of it we find the Philistinism of the common school teacher ; on the other the exclusiveness of the university man. He had asked the leaders of high education in Massachusetts to attend the next meeting of the National As- sociation at Toronto, but many of the replies were not encouraging. He had had to stand some suspicion himself at the hands of his university brethren because he had made a practice of attending teachers' meetings. The chief disease to-day of the educational system of America is the isolation between the higher and the lower elements. There are, however, hopeful signs on both sides that the interregnum of divergence is drawing to a close. He had seen three hundred teachers of the public schools of New York and vicinity receiving admirable instruction in a school of pedagogy in New York. He exhorted his hearers, however, to try to understand the many and great difficulties which the authorities of a university have MEANS AVAILABLE FOR PREPARATION OF TEACHERS. 505 to meet in establishing schools of pedagogy. The great difficulty in Bal- timore, when he was professor of pedagogy in the Johns Hopkins Univer- sity, was to find, young men who would devote themselves to pedagogy. And yet the field is most inviting to any one who will devote himself to it. Never before was there such an opportunity for any young man who will burn his bridges behind him, and devote himself heart and soul to the history and philosophy of education. WHAT PRESENT MEANS ARE AVAILABLE FOR THE PREPARATION OF TEACHERS FOR THEIR WORK. BY STATE SUPERINTENDENT HENRY SABIN, OF IOWA. The purpose of this paper is to deal with real, actual conditions. The past is past. A wise providence has put into the hands of to-morrow the power to care for itself. It is our duty to see that the means of to-day are sufficient for the things of to-day. I propose to confine the scope of this discussion entirely to cities of not over 15,000 population, and to country schools. For the preparation of teachers we are confined to : (1) colleges and universities ; (2) normal schools ; (3) high schools and their graduates ; (4) county institutes. It may be asserted in the beginning that, except only the question of moral training, all other questions sink into insignificance compared with this of supplying the schools in our smaller cities and towns, and in our country districts with competent teachers. The establishment of professional schools of a high order, schools of pedagogy, is very desirable. Only through their instrumentality can we hope to formulate the principles upon which the science of teaching is yet to be built. In fostering a spirit of research and investigation, and in stimulating thought, these schools exert a healthy influence in controlling the educational drift of the times. But this is a country of immense distances. The bright lights which shine along the Atlantic coast are hardly discernible beyond the Allegha- nies. The influence which comes from such schools may eventually prove the leaven which is to pervade the whole mass, but in the meantime the children are eating unleavened bread. The establishment of a chair of pedagogy in the college, which is deser- vedly looked upon with favor, is sometimes a help and sometimes a hind- 506 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION erance. It is a help when it is filled by a man who is the peer in intellec- tual ability and requirements of any man in the faculty ; it is a hinderance when it is simply an annex intended to draw students, or is only an attach- ment to some other chair, to be filled with what spare moments can be given to it. Such chairs have proved a great help to the cause of educa- tion, and they exert a wide influence in many States. But in order that the chair of pedagogy may be a help the course must be made as thorough, as exacting, as exhaustive as any in the catalogue ; it is a hinderance when the course comes to be looked upon as a by-way through which indolence and mediocrity may easily reach the summum bonum of the student's desire — a degree. On the whole, the tendency to establish such chairs in our larger insti- tutions is to be regarded as a subject for congratulation. It has been suggested that institutions like Yale, Harvard, Columbia, Vassar or Wellesley, rich in their endowments, and strong in a history of which they are proud ; or universities depending upon the State, should establish schools of pedagogy equal in standing with the law or the medical school or the school of art ; yet there are numbers of the smaller colleges which cannot support an additional chair. These fresh-water colleges, as some one has called them, have small endowments, inexpensive buildings, meagre libraries and inadequate appa- ratus. Their professors receive but little in the way of compensation, and their classes are small. And yet these same insignificant fresh-water colleges are giving tone and texture to the religious, political and educa- tional character of that great section which is the very heart of the nation. Shall we say to these graduates, as we infer from the tone of our educa- tional journals that some are disposed to say, because they have had little or no professional training, because they have not read certain professional treatises, or have not studied the history of education along certain lines, that we have no place for them in our work ? Possibly at the East the supply so far exceeds the demand that you can fill your schools with teachers who are adepts in psychology and skilled in pedagogy ; but at the West we need these men and women and our wants are imperative and immediate. We cannot always stop to put the raw recruit into the awkward squad to be drilled ; we are compelled to put him into the ranks beside the trained veteran, and he has to learn the trade of the soldier in the face of the enemy. It sometimes happens that we have only five barley loaves and two small fishes, and there is an immense multitude to be fed. The miracle which the Master performed by the Sea of Tiberias has to be performed again and again in some sections of the country. In every State are many small cities and villages in which the principal of the school teaches certain branches in the highest grade, but spends most of his time in supervising. For men and women to fill such places MEANS AVAILABLE FOR PREPARATION OF TEACHERS. 50? we are forced to look to the graduates of our colleges. They must be persons of growing scholarship ; they must be cultured in the sense in which culture means depth, not polish ; solidity of foundation rather than beauty of exterior. They must have that power of concentration which conies from close application ; that grasp of mind which enables the in- dividual to so comprehend the thoughts and ideas of others as to make them available for his own purpose. In a word, the man who is to direct others in teaching must himself know by what process he acquires, retains, and reproduces knowledge. Practice gives a man skill in many things, the methods and reasons of which he fails clearly to understand. I do not assert by any means that every college graduate is fitted to be a supervisor of city or village schools, nor do I assert that every successful superintendent is per force a college graduate; but I do assert, without hesitation, that the standard college is an excellent preparatory school for those who are to act as supervisors of a considerable number of teachers. The man who is at the head of a system of schools in a city of 10,000 inhabitants ought to be able to form, control, and direct the educational influences of the people of that city. His very presence should be an inspi- ration not only to his pupils and teachers, but to every friend of the schools with whom he comes in contact. Strong in intellect, upright in character, thorough in scholarship, — his emotional nature well developed, the city superintendent has before him an almost unlimited field for usefulness. If I were looking for a man to place at the head of the schools of a city of 5,000 to 15,000 inhabitants, I would look for him among the graduates of some reputable college, — and by a reputable college I mean one in which graduation conies only at the end of four years of patient, intelligent, persistent study. It cannot be disputed that, previous to the civil war, the schools of New England were largely indebted to the students from the colleges, who were accustomed to teach in them during the winter months. There is sex in mind as there is sex in nature. The masculine and the feminine minds are complements each of the other. This annual infusion of the mascu- line mind, together with the fact that these students were accustomed to self-exertion and self-activity, aided in giving manly vigor and intellectual strength to the entire community. Brawny, brainy men, their work was seen in the pre-eminence which New England held so long in the councils of the nation. We need this stimulating, vivifying, impregnating influ- ence in our schools to-day ; and I know not where to find it unless by en- couraging the graduates of our colleges to enter the profession of teaching. Shall we take them without any special training ? Yes, if we can get them in no other way. Until there is a marked change in the wants of our schools, I, for one, will never be guilty of putting up a pedagogical bar for the purpose of keeping them out. Shall we say that special preparation for the teacher's work is not desir- 508 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION able ? Certainly it is very desirable, but it is not indispensable. There are only four indispensable requisites, — knowledge of subject-matter, uprightness of character, a desire to improve, and common sense. With these as a foundation we may build an Arnold, an Agassiz, or a Phil- brick. If any one of these requisites is wanting, no amount of professional study or reading of educational books can supply the deficiency. There has broken out lately a mania for high intellectual development, which the teacher expects to attain by reading a book a month. Teachers some- times become gormandizers of books. Dickens says of one of his school- master characters, after enumerating a long list of his requirements : "Ah, rather overdone, Mr. Choakumchild. If he had only learnt a little less, how infinitely better he might have taught much more ! " However, if these graduates come into our schools, we ought to open to them every possible avenue of growth. If the State board of education, in a State where such a board exists, or the State board of examiners, where there is such a body, or even the associated colleges of the State, would mark out a course of reading and study, covering not less than two years, and at the end of the time would give to those who had carefully read it, and could prove their success in their work, a testimonial of some kind, not a degree, which would entitle the holder to a professional stand- ing among the teachers of the State, it would be a practical step of great value. Such a course should be limited and carefully chosen. It should embrace less of the science and more of the art of education, if these can be separated. It should treat largely of school economy ; the construction of school buildings; scientific methods of lighting, heating, and venti- lating the rooms. School hygiene and sanitation should be made especially strong. In many instances new buildings are defective in most vital respects, not because the school directors are miserly or even indifferent, but because to the stupidity of the architect is added the ignorance of the schoolmaster, upon whose supposed wisdom the authorities depend. Such a course should concern itself very largely with facts connected with the immediate wants of the school. The men and women who are to act as supervisors in the class of cities of which I am speaking need two qualifications : (1) To know the branches taught in the schools ; (2) To know those related things which closely concern the welfare and comfort, as well as the growth, of teachers and pupils under their care. If they have these essentials, we can trust them for what lies beyond. When we attempt to push our inquiries so as to consider the available means for procuring suitable teachers for high schools, the problem becomes complicated by some unfortunate conditions. Chief among these is the large number of branches in which a teacher is expected to instruct. In many cases no attempt is made to even group cognate branches. In a list of high schools before me, one teacher is expected to instruct in MEANS AVAILABLE FOR PREPARATION OF TEACHERS. 509 geometry, civil government, political economy, physics, language, and arithmetic ; another in mathematics, English literature, history, rhetoric, and physical geography ; yet another in English grammar, political econ- omy, astronomy, and the sciences. It is not unusual to find a high school course requiring instruction in five, and in some cases seven, different sciences. I do not know of any available means of providing competent teachers for these schools as long as every man's hobby must find a place in the curriculum, and fourteen weeks is considered ample time to perfect the pupils in any one of the sciences. There are four propositions worthy of consideration : 1. Pedagogical research, educational inquiry, the study of methodology alone, can never constitute a man a teacher. The machine which makes the teacher a mere automaton is already producing alarming results in this direction. In many of our schools we are approaching the danger- line of killing off individuality, of crushing out spontaniety, of dwarfing the teaching ingenuity, by reducing everything to the dead level of certain so-called philosophical methods. We are training the teachers to follow the ruts. 2. There is a failure with teachers, if I may use the expression, to distinguish between an individual method and a representative method ; between an arrangement which is the invention of the person using it, partaking largely of the nature of a device, and a method which is typical in its nature, — which exemplifies the essential characteristics of all related methods. A device is the creation of the teacher, — a method is based upon eternal truths. Our schools of methods are very often only schools of devices. 3. The school which gives its students power of thought, clearness of expression, aptness of illustration, and a desire to grow, is a good fitting school for its teachers, — what branches are taught there is of secondary importance. 4. To build a wall of partition in the normal school, or in the college, and say that the studies on this side are purely academic, and those on that side purely professional, is the concentration of stupidity. The most successful normal school is that which most closely combines in its daily work educational thought and educational practice. The attempt to separate them combines the worst elements of a blunder and a crime. It is a fact that the colleges and normal schools do not realize that it is their province to prepare teachers for high school work. When they reach this point certain results will follow. They will no longer attempt to prepare teachers for their work by reading and studying a few books during the last half of the course. The science and art of education will be taught during every exercise. There will be no less academic work, but it will be of a very different kind. Each lesson will be taught as 510 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION based upon educational principles ; the student will be required to study it with two ends in view, — as he would teach his pupils to study it, and as he himself should study it if he were to teach it. Arithmetic or geog- raphy should be just as much a professional study in the normal school as psychology or the history of education. Every exercise should have a school-room side. A teacher said the other day, "I did not stay at the normal long enough to do me much good. I was there only a year." Such a case argues a deficiency of brains somewhere, either on the part of the teacher or on the part of the instructors in the normal school. The academic and the professional should assume their rightful relations, one being necessary to complete the other. As it is, the academic seems to the ordinary student to be separated from the professional by a gulf almost as unfathomable as that which separated the rich man from the beggar in Abraham's bosom. Such a condition of affairs surrounds the institution with a devitalizing atmosphere which is the sure precursor of death to the teaching spirit. The colleges and the normal schools complain that high schools send them students poorly fitted for advanced work. Did it ever occur to them that such students are the legitimate result of employing the graduates of these very schools as instructors ? The normal school which makes excellency of scholarship a subordinate aim, makes a very grave mistake. On the other hand, the instructor whose only aim is to induce excellency of scholarship, has no place what- ever in a normal school faculty. When these things are understood and practiced there will be a stronger incentive for students to remain and finish their course. In proportion as they have been brought into con- tact with the living teacher, as knowledge has become growth, as instruc- tion has engendered inspiration, they will sooner come into close sympathy with their work, — they will enter more heartily into the spirit of the school, and will exert in a little time a wonderful formative power over the plastic minds of their pupils. In supplying teachers for our primary and grammar school grades, our high schools ought to be more available than they are. It is true that in many places young ladies are induced to remain and graduate in the high school, with the hope of thus securing a position as teacher at home. It sometimes happens that four-fifths of the teachers in a small city are of home manufacture. Such a course frequently, not always, brings about a reign of undiluted imbecility in the schools ; yet so strong are the political and religious environments that it is almost impossible to pre- scribe any adequate remedy. It is one of the weak points in our school system. The course of study, as usually administered in the high school, does not fit pupils to become competent teachers. Both the manner of study and the manner of reciting are faulty. Pupils study to recite ; they recite MEANS AVAILABLE FOR PREPARATION OF TEACHERS. 511 and — forget. Perhaps it may be true of other grades, as well as of the high school, that, in the finer sense of the words, there is in our school work too much education and too little instruction ; too much of an effort to lead out, and not enough to build in. We endeavor to compel developments. As some one has expressed it, the children are forced to climb so fast that they have no time to grow. We can give the plant soil and heat, sunlight and moisture, but the manner of its growth is a mys- tery not given man to solve. The effect of this is felt when the pupils come to the teacher's estate. We do not begin the work of preparing them to be teachers soon enough ; it should commence in the primary room, and continue through each grade. Occasionally we find a high school which is renowned in all the sur- rounding country for sending out successful teachers. In such a school, if we investigate, we always find certain conditions : 1. Pupils are taught how to study with a view of getting the most out of a subject, not simply out of the book. They practice vivisection on every subject they take up. 2. They are taught to exhaust the means at their command. If it is only a dictionary, an encyclopaedia, a few reference books at home or at school, they make the best use possible of them. Superabundance of means is sometimes a source of waste to the student. 3. The pupils are expected to ask questions as well as answer them, and the teachers are expected to answer questions as well as ask them. The independence, which the pupil thus gains, goes with him into his school, and serves him well in the absence of strictly professional training. It enables him to solve, without the aid of a key, the innumerable problems which present themselves almost daily in the school-room. Enthusiasm is the life of good school work. Thus the pupils during four years acquire so great devotion to their work, they become so aglow with the delight of acquiring and imparting knowledge that it becomes an appetite, as it were, and they are not happy except when under its influence. There is not much dependence to be placed upon a normal course con- nected with the high school, unless it can be maintained entirely separate from other courses. Ordinarily it differs from them in no particular ex- cept that, during the last year of the course, the class read certain books, which are supposed in some mysterious way to impart to the learner the art of teaching. A better plan in a city of ten thousand people is to gather the graduates of the high school, who are to teach in the city schools, into a building of four rooms. Put them into active work, but place over them an experi- enced teacher, one whose entire time is taken up in the supervision of the building. Make this training to consist mainly in acquiring the minutiae of school management, at the same time selecting a few books to be read 512 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION. and analyzed, under the care of the principal of the building. In order to induce the best material to enter the school, pay these teachers a small amount from the beginning, increasing it slightly every three months, as success warrants it. At the end of each year there will be a sufficient supply of fairly competent material to fill most vacancies, excepting always a few important rooms, which must be filled by more experienced teachers. This does not form an ideal training school, but I know of no better, or more practical way of utilizing the products of the high school in a small city. The attempt of normal schools to raise the standard, as they term it, is in itself commendable from one standpoint ; but when the growth, instead of reaching out in all directions, is in one only ; where breadth is sacri- ficed to attain height, the wisdom of the step is at best very questionable. I desire not to be misunderstood. The best preparation possible under the circumstances should be demanded of those desiring admission, but every school must be governed by its own environment. There are two ways that suggest themselves, by which we may increase the efficiency of a normal school. We may raise the entrance standard and increase the requirements for graduation, or we may illiminate from time to time all incompetent material, by saying to those who give no evidence of any teaching ability that they must for their own interests, as well as for the interests of the schools, seek some other avocation. This latter course would certainly tend to disabuse the public of the idea that anybody can be manufactured into a teacher. In one respect the standard cannot be too high. Whatever the applicant knows he should know thoroughly. Let him come with a thorough knowl- edge of a few things rather than with a superficial knowledge of a multi- tude of things. The trouble with those who seek admission to the normal school is not that they know so little, but that they claim to know so much. This we ought never for an instant to forget : That the sole purpose for which the normal school was founded and is maintained is the preparation of teachers for the common schools of the State. If we need competent teachers anywhere, we need them in the grades and schools in which four-fifths of the pupils are educated. It is possible for the normal schools to offer the graduates of our high schools, and the best teachers in our country schools, a two years' course, — not an attachment to some other course, but complete in itself. Such a course should comprise : 1. A thorough review of the common English branches, from the teach- ing point of view. Some one has objected that knowing a subject does not always enable one to teach it. Very true, but it is a long stride in that direction. A prolific source of incompetent teachers is not the ina- bility to communicate knowledge but the absolute ignorance of the subject- matter beyond what is contained in the text-book found in the hands of MEANS AVAILABLE FOR PREPARATION OF TEACHERS. 513 both pupils and teacher, and sometimes there is manifest ignorance even of that. 2. Illustrative teaching setting forth the best methods, and giving the students practice in the same. I do not mean wholly the study of methods as laid down in some text-book, but the daily exemplification of such methods as experience has demonstrated are most suitable for use in the common school. 3. A limited course of reading in history and literature, designed to teach the use of books, as available for purposes of investigation and re- search. A small library even will open to them an immense field. 4. So much of school law as bears directly upon the duties of teachers, their powers and their rights ; school hygiene and sanitation ; and some ac- quaintance with the first principles, the practical truths of psychology, measuring the instruction very largely by the comprehension of the indi- vidual members of the class. Three things should be said here regarding this elementary preparation of teachers for their work : 1. Teachers should be carefully trained to know and regard the laws which pertain to sound physical health. The body of the child is of as much consequence to him as his mind, and the teacher has no more right to trifle with the one than he has with the other. 2. The individual peculiarities of each child, his wants and his capaci- ties, demand of the teacher close thought and observation. This is justice ; to fail or neglect to do it, is injustice. This, too, must be part of the teacher's training. 3. In order that the instruction and discipline may, as far as possible, counteract the influences that are fast warping the life of the child out of all comeliness and symmetry, attention to the environment and home-life of the pupils cannot safely be neglected. These things should be empha- sized in training teachers, even if we are forced to neglect other things of more ambitious names. Part of the aim of illustrative teaching should be to enable those who are to teach in village and country schools to construct forms, solids, maps, charts, and simple apparatus at very little expense. I say it with rever- ence akin to awe, as one who may be charged with trifling with sacred things, that no reading of psychology, no depths of pedagogical lore, no study of educational history, no knowledge of methods learned from books, can compensate for a lack of that power which enables the village school- mistress to stand, crayon in hand, before the blackboard and illustrate the lesson, or to construct her apparatus or appliances from the cheap articles she can obtain at the country store, or to use the things of common life to make clear the truths of nature to the minds of her wondering pupils. Dr. Klemm, in his "European Schools," speaks of finding village schools well supplied with home-made apparatus, and he contrasts it with the in- 514 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION describable poverty found in the schools in this country, in some of which not even a blackboard is provided. I would not willingly be guilty of the offense of precipitating a discussion upon manual training at this time, but if the preparation of the teacher included a knowledge of the use of a few tools, a skilled hand, and a trained eye, he would not stand utterly helpless in the absence of some simple appliance, or a piece of apparatus needed in his class work for purposes of instruction or illustration. This skill in handicraft his course in the normal school ought to give him. There are schools which do this, but you can look through a score of catalogues and not find one which gives prominence to instructing teachers in the use of material. I am not speaking of any one State but of a nation of forty-four States, in many of which the need of this elementary training is severely felt, and the means for supplying i t are very inadequate. This brings us to the consideration of a most important factor in the preparation of teachers, the place of the normal institute. Nearly if not quite one-third of our teachers in the country schools have had less than one year's experience. Many of them are young, — not over eighteen years of age, — with immature minds, and with moderate scholastic acquirements. These things ought not to be, — I grant it. It is very easy to say that no one should be allowed to enter the school as a teacher who is not the graduate of a normal school, or of some equiv- alent institution. It looks well in print, it sounds well when read at the educational meeting, but to my knowledge there is not a State in the Union ready for such a law. What ought to be is dumb in the presence of what is. We hope for better schools in the future, but that does not help my boy now, who is suffering to-day from incompetent teachers. The store- house is full of golden grain, but while we are hunting for the lost keys the multitude about us are perishing for lack of sustenance. The mission of the normal institute is largely with the country schools. It furnishes an excellent means of reaching the isolated school teacher who needs not only instruction, but the inspiring influence which comes from close contact with other minds. Isolation means stagnation. The first desideratum is to bring the institute within reach of the teacher's means. Two hundred and fifty dollars will cover all that the average female teacher receives during the year in the country schools in many States. One hundred dollars additional will cover all that she will earn in most village schools. Out of this she must pay her board, buy her clothing, and meet incidental expenses. The amount left for books and professional instruction is not an extravagant sum. While we are urging these girls to buy professional books, to attend long institutes, and to join reading circles, let us be just as well as zealous. The gar- ment cannot exceed in size the cloth out of which it is cut. An institute MEANS AVAILABLE FOR PREPARATION OF TEACHERS. 515 of two weeks in length, if time is rigidly economized, can be made to prove of great benefit to them, sending them home with note-books filled with useful hints, and with inspiration enough to last them a year. There are three points to be considered in the institute question : . 1. The organization. The institute should be at the end of the year's work, not at the beginning. It should be the culmination of so many months' study and preparation. There should be a regular succession of steps or grades, each one of which means a perceptible advance. At the close of the institute each teacher should know in what class he belongs. He should be furnished with a syllabus as a guide, in order that he may more intelligently prepare for the institute of the succeeding year. There should be a carefully prepared course of study arranged with the design of preventing scattering on the part of the instructors. Branches which are of immediate importance should have the greater prominence. No- where should it be indicated in the outlines of the course that the institute is for any other purpose than to enable the teacher to do better and more satisfactory work. No one should be admitted as a member who does not expect to teach in the public schools. With the adoption of suitable regulations and requirements I can see no reason why, after three or four years the teacher may not be excused from further attendance. Under such a system the institute will be something more than an educational spasm, recurring annually, but leaving no permanent effects. 2. The second point concerns the instructors. Some of the poorest work I have ever seen done in an institute has been at the hands of men who are adepts in knowledge, but who are entirely ignorant of the wants of the teachers ; and some of the best work has been done by instructors of somewhat limited knowledge, but who from personal acquaintance with the condition of the schools are able to bring themselves and the class into the closest sympathy. The instructor should be one who from the depths of his own experience can bring forth things worth giving and worth taking. The test of a competent institute instructor is the consciousness that he himself grows with every effort he puts forth to induce growth in others. The choice of instructors should be left to local authorities. Their scholarship and fitness for the position should be passed upon by compe- tent authority before they are allowed to enter upon their work. Their special fitness should consist in a knowledge of the branches which they are to teach ; in an acquaintance with modern methods, and the best edu- cational thought, and in an ability to awaken a lasting enthusiasm in actual school work. It is the easiest thing possible to create an enthusiasm in the latest educational craze, but it is much more difficult to awaken enthusiasm in teaching boys and girls to read, wTrite, and cipher, and that is what they go to school for very largely. 516 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASS0CIA1I0N. 3. The third point is the character of the instruction. Formerly I was wont to complain that there is too much academic work done in the insti- tute. Closer relations to them convinces me that I am mistaken. It is not the amount of academic work of which I now complain but the kind. I am no longer concerned about the quantity but the quality. I listened one day last summer to a recitation in history in a normal institute. At the close of the hour, when the class was dismissed, I asked myself what single thought, or idea, or notion of any kind, have these teachers carried away which will be of use to them in their schools ? And echo answered, what ? In an institute, which is normal in any sense, every academic exercise should have a professional bearing, and every professional branch should be taught as illustrating the best class-room methods. I am a firm believer in the institute, but it needs a thorough rejuvena- tion. Some old things should be brought back ; some new ones should be cast out. The instruction should not be negative, but positive. A young lady went home from the county institute. Some one asked her, " What have you learned at the institute ?" "I don't know/' she answered, with a plaintive sigh. "I suppose everything I am doing in my school is wrong. I do wish some one would tell me what is right." What do we profit the teacher if we banish ignorance and introduce chaos ? The power of the institute would be greatly increased if the in- struction could be kept within the possible comprehension of the teachers. I once heard a lecturer before a large institute say to his audience : "You in your school-rooms ought to make the mind of the child in its every-day dress your constant study. You have there an opportunity of which the philosopher in his thoughtful moods would gladly avail him- self." Afterwards I thought the matter over. " That lecturer actually advised those boys and girls, with callous, undisciplined minds, many of them holding only a second-grade certificate, — and that by the grace of the examiner, — to do that which wise, studious men have attempted for years with only partial success. I think I know country school teachers who could make a more sensible talk than that was." I dismissed the subject, but more mature reflection has convinced me that my conclusions were correct. / was the lecturer. The greatest work which Horace Mann did for Massachusetts, — greatest because most lasting, — was in going before the teachers and people of the State at their educational gatherings, and talking to them in plain, un- mistakable language concerning the privileges of parents, the duties of teachers, and the welfare of the schools. There was no display of rhe- toric, no attempt to philosophize, no reference to schools of thought long since dead and forgotten. His very illustrations were of that strong, homely, rugged kind which reach the hearts and consciences of common people, and leave impressions as enduring as life itself. As, when con- ME AX 8 AVAILABLE FOR PREPARATION OF TEACHERS. 517 templating the character and work of the teacher, he burst out : "What supreme folly to employ bats and moles to teach young eagles to fly ! " The best work done in our institutes to-day is that which instructs both the public and the teacher, which declares the school to be the common property of every citizen of the State ; which touches upon the school- house and its surroundings as regarding health, comfort, and even decency, upon co-operation on the part of parents, and regularity and punctuality on the part of pupils; which considers school government and school discipline ; which treats of the recitation, of the art of questioning, of study, of recreation ; which dwells upon the moral and physical fitness of the teacher even more than the intellectual ; which avails itself of the tenderness of Pestalozzi and the wisdom of Froebel, to set forth the office of the teacher and the worth of the child. This seems to be only plain, old-fashioned talk, but it is the kind which is needed by our country school teachers, and possibly some of our city teachers would be profited by it. I may be rated a heretic ; but I honestly believe that very many of our teachers are wasting their efforts and failing to do their best work, because they are neglecting to regard the things which pertain to the present wants of their schools, in their desire to attain an undefined, intangible, impalpable something, — of the nature and use of which they have no definite idea. I wish we had more institute instruc- tors whose instruction is luminous with the light of common things. After all, I confess that at times I am out of patience, disgusted with very much that is said and written and done concerning the preparatory work demanded of teachers. It is too lofty, too top-heavy, — it lies way upon the upper shelves where teachers of ordinary stature cannot reach it. The things which are most trite and yet most practical, which commend themselves to the good sense of the people ; the things in which our schools are most wanting, and yet which will be of the greatest help to the child in life, of these things we are gradually losing sight in our efforts to ele- vate the profession. If we would throttle crime in its dens, we must make our moral training more effective, — in the kindergarten, in the primary grades, in the dis- trict school, — wherever we can reach the mind of the child in its form- ative state. If we expect to give the child the power to earn an earnest living, we must put him in possession of the multiplication table ; if we would enable him as a citizen to vote intelligently, we must teach the boy the principles of republican government. If we are to reform politics, we must mtike the primer and the spelling-book a power behind the political throne. Our present means for preparing teachers must be made available for these things. President Eliot has lately said that " the quality and sufficiency of pop- ular education are dependent upon influences which proceed from higher 518 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION. institutions of learning." I do not believe that is sound doctrine. It furnishes no ground upon which we may safely rest. I do not under- estimate the influence of these institutions upon the popular mind, but they have no such prevailing power as he claims for them. We cannot thus shake off the duty of the hour. Way down at the foundations where the air is resonant with the sound of the ax, the anvil, and the loom ; in the counting-room where business sits enthroned as the deity ; amid the dust and sweat of daily toil ; wherever men are engaged in a hand-to-hand struggle for bread, is a substratum of society which these influences can never reach. The influences which come from our higher institutions of learning are not sufficient to save this nation from its peril. The common school is a more powerful factor than the university. Here in the schools in which the children of the farmer, the mechanic, the laborer, the miner, receive their -scanty education, we must contrive in some way to place the distinctively, competent American teacher. DISCUSSION. [Reported bt Supt. W. E. Anderson, Milwaukee, Wis.] Supt. Wm. H. Beach, Madison, Wis. : The purpose of this discussion is presumed to be to learn the condition in the different States of the means for the equipment of teachers for their work. The pioneers of Wisconsin had in view the importance of the general education of the people, and they made wise provision for this object. The State is well provided with means for the training of teachers. There are in the State five normal schools, located at Platte ville, Oshkosh, Whitewater, River Falls, and Milwaukee. These are in buildings commodious and convenient, well furnished with all needful appliances, with ample funds, and with able corps of instructors. The attendance at these schools is large, often be- yond the ordinary seating capacity of the buildings, and additions have frequently been necessary. The work done is academic as well as normal. The department of pedagogy in the State University is ably conducted, and its value and efficiency are becoming more and more appreciated. Teachers' institutes, from two days to a week in length, are held in every county in the State. These are conducted by professors in the normal schools assisted by other competent instructors. Lectures on educational reformers and kindred practical topics are a feature of these institutes. Every free high school in the State, and there are 172 of them, is re- quired by law to include in its course of study instruction in the theory and practice of teaching. It has seemed to be the best way to carry out DISCUSSION. 519 this requirement of the law to make the highest class in the school a normal class and to review the elementary branches with a free discussion of the best way of teaching it. There is in connection with the State University a summer school for advanced teachers. The Legislature has made liberal appropriations for the maintenance of this school. A small tuition fee is also charged. Specialists are employed to teach the most important subjects. The school has been largely attended, and its great value is recognized. There have been held in various parts of the State sixteen other summer schools for the training of teachers in the more elementary branches, and these have been well attended. In many cities and counties teachers have established libraries of the most valuable books on educational subjects, and the leading educational periodicals. There is a State association of teachers holding its annual meeting in the winter, and there are four sectional associations holding their annual meetings in the summer. So the State is reasonably well supplied with means for preparing teachers and encouraging them in their work. It sometimes happens that the abundance of means and resources leads to a want of appreciation of them, and possibly many attend normal schools with the idea that the principal thing is to acquire a knowledge of the methods and ways that are taught in these training schools. The methods externally acquired are not of themselves sufficient. Natural tact and the genuine spirit of the teacher are the most essential things after "all. Close self-examination and rigid self-discipline are necessary before one enters on the work of teaching. It is well that those who are passing through our higher institutions of learning, preparing themselves for a professional or business career, should come into contact with others pursuing like courses, and measure themselves with them. But the source of inspiration is within, and it behooves every one to study himself and take his own measure, care- fully to learn his own capabilities and his calling honestly and uninflu- enced by motives of expediency. Those at the head of our schools may well encourage their students to choose this as that calling. And they would be doing an infinite service to our schools if they would discourage those not adapted to the work of teaching, from choosing that profession. A few years since application was made to the president of one of the best normal schools in the Northwest for a teacher to fill the position of assistant in a high school. He replied that in his entire graduating class of fifteen or more there was only one whom he could conscientiously recommend as a teacher, and even that one he could not recommend unqualifiedly. And yet the class had completed the entire course of academic and professional training. But the professional training with- out some natural ability would not make them teachers. We all recognize the value of professional training, and realize that it is 520 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION poor economy for one to acquire the art of teaching slowly and at the expense of the best interests of the school he is endeavoring to conduct. It is also detrimental to the schools that they should be managed by those whose equipments are merely external, formal and mechanical, where natural tact and the true spirit of the teacher are wanting. One having the genuine impulse for teaching, preparing himself by every available means, under difficulties perhaps, will exercise a vitalizing power and influence, that another, though equipped with all the modern, improved methods, will never have. We may all have known teachers unacquainted with educational reformers, who have made use of many of the very things the reformers taught, because they themselves were endowed with the native faculty to see that these were the right things to do. An intuition into the workings of the minds of children, and a sense of responsibility, will make such an one a teacher. Such an one has already a certificate to teach. Let us acquire all the professional training possible, but let us see to it first that we have the right material to begin with. Sitpt. A. P. Marble, Worcester, Mass. : The available means for the preparation of teachers for their work vary with the locality. What is on the whole best on the fertile prairies of Iowa may not be best adapted to the rocky hill-sides of Massachusetts, nor to the conditions of a great metropolis. In educational discussions we often fail to take into ac- count the conditions of the problem. The teacher in a rural district, where school is recreation, and pupils attend school only a few months in the year, has different material to work on from what is found in city schools ; and the preparation for this work is in some respects different from that of a city teacher. Whatever professional training the countrv teacher may have, — and the more the better, — without a certain executive faculty, which has been denominated "the ability to run a hotel," there will be failure. This faculty is not less useful, though it may not be so indispensable, in a graded or city school ; the lack of it in a marked degree may not be so fatal to all success as it is in the country school, because the system, the organization, the help of the principal, and, in extreme cases, of the superintendent or the truant officer, will be an aid. More- over, in the graded school, with a single class, one method of discipline and instruction is applicable to all pupils. In a mixed school, on the other hand, with pupils of widely varying ages, as well as with the diverse capacities of individuals incident to all schools, the executive faculty, as respects both the teaching and the discipline, becomes more important. But there is a common preparation needful for all teachers. The indis- pensable condition for all good teaching is scholarship. The young can- not be well trained by an untaught teacher. It is not merely the prescribed curriculum that the pupil must be made acquainted with. This is the framework, so to speak, the skeleton, upon which must grow the parts DISCUSSION. 521 that make up a symmetrical whole ; and this symmetry is produced out of the well-stored mind of an educated teacher. The daily lessons must be enlivened and vivified by related facts and suggested ideas. This can be best done from the storehouse of a mind running over with knowledge, broad and deep, encompassing the subject-matter of the daily tasks. To such broad culture the teacher should, if possible, by all means add an acquaintance with the science and the art of teaching. But valuable as this professional training is, it can never take the place of the indis- pensable qualification just named. Mr. Marble then described at some length the apprentice system, so-called, in use in one of the Massachusetts State normal schools, — that at Worcester. This takes the place of the school of observation, and is superior to it because the pupil-teacher deals with a real school, and not with a class or classes of pupils practiced upon till they know what to expect from every fresh arrival of normal school pupils. The apprentice spends six months in the schools of the city, generally not more than two. In every way she makes herself useful, and she keeps out of the way ; she observes, she helps, she reports what she sees, — and she is reported on. Thus her theory of teaching is corrected by practice. It becomes practical and not mere theory. Her errors in observation and in practice are cor- rected, both by the normal school teachers and by the teachers with whom she works. She takes a class occasionally, and sometimes she is put in charge of the school. In this way she learns more about teaching in six months than she would learn in two years without this help, and with the care and responsibility of a school. If it is objected that in this way the young teacher copies the errors of the teachers with whom she works, on the other hand she copies the ex- cellencies also, — and it is better to copy something fairly good at first than to do poorly. Later, there is always opportunity to improve upon the copy, — just as in writing. One of the excellencies in the school referred to is the attention given to the midday lunch. This is made a lesson in hygiene, — it has become almost a fine art. There is provided a warm closet, tables, and simple table furniture, and all the pupils sit together and take their food in a cheerful atmosphere. This influence upon the future teacher is far-reaching, much more than at first appears. But better even than mere learning and professional skill is a sincere love for children, and an earnest desire to lift them up. The teacher, filled with love for the little ones, will find a way to help them and improve them, far more than one filled with all knowledge and stuffed to repletion with methods, psychology, and the science of pedagogy, if in attaining all this the juice of human kindness has been squeezed out of her. Children must not be looked upon as specimens upon which to practice the arts of the profes- sion. They are human souls to be developed and made manly and womanly. 522 TEE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION. Supt. J. M. Greenwood, Kansas City, Mo.: School boards do not make the schools, but the teacher in the school-room is the school. The child in the school-room is the object of the school. It might be as well to state clearly that all this talk about making good teachers without pro- fessional training is of little value to the schools. There is no equivalent for professional training. The time is coming when none but those profes- sionally trained will be employed to teach in the public schools. Let us understand it, and not beguile ourselves into long-winded discussions in the vain search for temporary substitutes. Mr. Barringer, Newark, N. J. : I think we are all agreed that our teachers should be well qualified to enter upon the work of instruction. The great question is, "How shall this supply of good teachers be multi- plied ? " In my own experiments I usually ask the teachers who come to my school, " What are you here for ?" It reminds them of their great mission. One of the best things to set a teacher right in the work of the common schools is an earnest consideration of such a question. What is the trouble with the normal school work ? It is the low tone of scholar- ship. What is the reason of this low tone ? It is because of the concern of local managers to accommodate those pupils who apply. A great many graduates of country schools will not go into normal schools where they must pursue the same course of study again. We cannot expect all the teachers of a State to come from a normal school. It cannot be done. In our State there are training classes that do very much of this work. We need more normal schools of a higher grade, better equipped, better taught, longer course, with plenty of observation, practice, and criticism. There is too much anxiety to complete the normal course in a short time. Good qualifications for admission, from two to three years' thorough training under able and experienced teachers, and the schools of the country would soon feel the beneficial effects of normal training. H. C. Missimer, Erie, Penn. : Most school boards are indifferent on the subject, and leave the entire responsibility of ways and means to the super- intendent. A special training teacher may be desirable to give unity to the work of preparing our teachers, but a special teacher is not really necessary. The meaus of preparing teachers for their work are at hand in every school district, because in every district there are teachers of special skill in teaching one subject or another. Out of these teachers an excellent train- ing faculty can be organized. A general knowledge of the branches to be taught is, of course, the thing that candidates for teaching must have as a basis to start with. The question of the best methods of teaching these branches, of managing the school, and developing character, should constitute the main work of the training class. Call in the teacher who has been most successful DISCUSSION. 523 in teaching reading. Let her give a dozen lessons, or two dozen lessons, or as many lessons as may be necessary in setting forth fully, in detail, with every simple illustration she herself uses, her way of beginning the little ones in their very first lesson. What does she do first, and how ? What does she do next, and how ? And so on from day to day. Call in the teacher who has been successful in number work, or in the first steps of arithmetic Let her do the same as the teacher of reading. Call in your best teacher of geography, your best teacher of grammar, United States history, writing, drawing, and music. Let the young can- didates be taught how to put lessons on the board properly and neatly. Apportion them among the schools to some particular room for half-day observations, for a month, with daily report of what they have seen. Let them teach for another month, one class a day, under the direction of the skilled teacher in charge of the room, and practical results are sure to follow by the end of the year. How about psychology, the history of education and the special study of methods ? Would you not have our candidates instructed in the science of teaching and the history of education ? No — and yes. No for all and every, until they have had at least two or three years' practice in teaching, and then yes, by all means. Why, in the first instance, no ? First, be- cause the young girls that go into our training classes fresh from the high school are too immature to understand mental philosophy or psychology. It will only befuddle them. The power to analyze, to dissect, to connect mental processes in their proper relations, is the last and highest achieve- ment of the intellect. It is the result of much observation and wide experience. For a young girl to psychologize, to philosophize about the mental process of the child-mind, without knowing anything about children, or coming into actual mental contact with them is, if not the purest nonsense, at least of extremely doubtful value. Again, the abstract study of psychology, as a preparation for teaching, is very apt to send the young teacher into the school with a tendency to impose and practice upon the children a theory instead of a disposition to study actual conditions out of which she ought to develop her own theories and her own methods. Even the discussion of methods, before we are engaged in teaching, is of little value beyond conveying an idea of the nature of the work. The method of somebody else is of no value to me unless it quickens and expands ideas already existing in my own mind. The best psychology for the teacher, — the beginning teacher, — is the psychology of vulgar practice. It is the right kind of psychology to rid our minds of foolish, impracticable, and short-sighted notions. It is the psychology that shows us where we shall probably fail, and where to con- centrate our energies in order to succeed. Professional psychology should come after the teaching is begun, after common sense study of the chil- 524 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION. dren, after the study of actual conditions. Then it will develop, enlarge, and widen the teaching mind. State Supt. Draper, New York, said : He was afraid we were not holding to the question. It was concerning present agencies for the pro- fessional training of teachers, not in the cities but in villages and the rural districts. He was sorry to note a disposition on the part of one or two speakers to disparage professional training altogether. It was too late in the history of educational progress to do this. Such sentiments are outlawed, — are back numbers. It was not worth while to argue with men who had been enjoying a Rip Van Winkle slumber, and were out of touch with the general educational sentiment of the country. We cannot expect that all teachers will be as thoroughly prepared for their work as they may be and ought to be in the cities. Yet experience shows that some special preparation may be exacted even in the country. Candidates will comply with what is required. Send all you can to the regularly established normal schools, but remember that there can never be enough normal schools maintained to supply all the teachers needed in the common schools, and also that all candidates cannot afford to take a com- plete normal course for the sake of the mere chance of being employed at five or six dollars per week, with the likelihood of being turned out at the next turn of the political wheel. We need short-term training classes throughout the rural districts. Enough of these may be established in many States, at small cost, to supply all teachers needed. Where this cannot be done, institute pass examinations. We have turned back six thousand candidates in each of the last three years in the rural districts of the State of New York in this way. The Chairman : Suppose you had a whole Congressional district in which you were short of teachers to supply the schools ? What would you do? Supt. Draper : I would import them from districts having a surplus. We have large sections of country in which the circumstances are as hard as can be in the thrifty and magnificent State of Iowa. When they are short of teachers, we tell them to send to one of the normal schools or to a commissioner in another county, and the result is that some deserv- ing one, who has gone to the trouble and expense in preparing to teach, gets the place. Take this course and you will not only set all hands at work, but you will direct their labor. You will fill up the normal schools and training classes, and stimulate educational activity in more ways than can be specified. It is quite the fashion to discredit examinations. It is a foolish habit. The examination has its legitimate use. We do not use it to determine who shall be certified but who shall not be. We do not say that all who DISCUSSION. 525 pass an examination shall be certified by any means. We say that the local officer may withhold certificates from any candidate, no matter whether he passes the examination or not, and without giving any reason. We only say that he shall not issue a certificate unless the candidate attends upon a prescribed course of professional instruction or passes the prescribed exami- nation. In the next world we may be able to accomplish ends without means, but we cannot in this world. Something has been said about institutes. We would talk more under- standing^ if we first defined the term. Our institutes are agencies for keeping teachers abreast of the times. That is about all that can be expected of a meeting which continues only a week or two. Such a meet- ing will go far to do that, if it is properly organized and managed. But it must be a school, — not a picnic. All must attend and attend regu- larly. This cannot be expected unless attendance is both compulsory and compensated. The work done must be substantial and inviting and progressive. We will continue to talk about innumerable things, but nothing can be of such supreme importance as the institution of efficient agencies for promoting the professional training of teachers and for preventing the certification of such as are not so trained. PROCEEDINGS AND ADDRESSES OF THE KlJ^DERGAKTEN DEPARTMENT KINDERGARTEN DEPARTMENT. SECKETAEY'S MINUTES. FIEST SESSION. Tobonto, Ont., July 15, 1891. The Kindergarten Department was called to order at 3 p.m. by the President, Mrs. E. L. Hailmann, who opened the meeting with prayer. This was followed by the singing of a hymn by the students of the Toronto Training School for Kindergartners. These young ladies also gave a number of very pretty gesture songs during this session. Mrs. L. T. Newcomb of Hamilton, Ontario, welcomed the visiting Kindergartners, and the President made an address. Letters were read by the Secretary from the widow and niece of Fried- erich Froebel, Mrs. Louise Eroebel of Hamburg, and Mrs. Henrietta Schrader of Berlin. Mr. Wm. N. Hailmann read a letter of greeting from Miss Emma Mar- wedel of California. A resolution was adopted notifying the Secretary to make suitable replies to all greetings. Then followed a vocal solo by Miss Burden of Toronto. Papers were read by Mrs. Jas. L. Hughes of Ontario on " Kindergarten Methods in Intellectual Training," by Miss N. Cropsey of Indiana on " The Organic Connection Between the Kindergarten and the Primary School," and by Miss Anna E. Frederickson of Indiana on " Theory Tested by Experience." The following committees were then appointed by the President : Committee on Eesolutions — Mrs. A. H. Putnam of Illinois, Mr. S. B. Sinclair of Ontario, and Miss Nora Smith of California. Committee on Nomination of Officers — Miss E. Bolton of Ontario, Miss N. Cropsey of Indiana, Mrs. Edna Worden of Colorado. The Department then adjourned. 530 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION. SECOND SESSION.— July 16. The Department met at 3 p. m. , the President in the chair. The exercises were opened with the singing of the Teachers' Hymn by the audience. Mr. Wm. T. Harris of Washington, D.C., made an address on " The Kindergarten and the Public School." This was discussed by Mrs. Louise Pollock of Washington, D.C., and others. The last paper of the session was by Mr. Wm. E. Sheldon of Boston, Mass., on " Some Things A Kindergartner Should Know." The Committee on the Nomination of Officers reported as follows: President. — Mrs. J. L. Hughes, Ontario. Vice-President. — Miss Nora Smith, California. Secretary. — Miss Anna E. Frederickson, Indiana. The Secretary was instructed to cast the ballot of the Department for the Nominees. The Committee on Eesolutions made the following report : 1. Resolved, That we gratefully note the continued progress of the kindergarten movement on the American continent, both in the quantity and quality of the work. 2. Resolved, That we extend our gratitude to those who by their exhibits of work have contributed so much to prove its practical value to the people at large and to stimulate further progress. 3. Resolved, That we recognize the desirability of making the kindergarten a part of the public school system, and of extending its educational principles to all the work of elementary education. 4. Resolved, That this Department of the National Educational Association desires to thank most sincerely the members of the Kindergarten Association of Toronto, the Local Executive Committee, represented by Mrs. L. T. Newcomb, and the Ontario Pro- vincial Association, for their great courtesy during the present session of the National Educational Association. 5. Resolved, That kindergartners everywhere should be grateful to the Honorable George W. Ross, the Minister of Education for the Province of Ontario, for the recog- nition of a plan of education whereby the development of the child may be organically continued from the kindergarten to the university ; also, to Mr. and Mrs. James L. Hughes, for their successful introduction of kindergarten work in Toronto, and for their loyal and continued support of its highest interests. 6. Resolved, That we acknowledge with gratitude the alacrity with which the educa- tional press of America has aided the workers in the kindergarten movement in their efforts to diffuse a better knowledge of the principles they represent. 7. Resolved, That this Convention recognizes fully the value of the services which the retiring officers have rendered this Department, both in arrangement of exhibits and in the preparation of the valuable programme. These resolutions were adopted. After a few remarks by the new President, Mrs. J. L. Hughes, and the singing of several songs by the Toronto Kindergarten Training Class, the meeting adjourned. Eliza A. Blakek, Secretary. KINDERGARTEN AND THE PRIMARY S( ADDRESS OF WELCOME. BY MKS. L. T. NEWCOMB OF ONTARIO. With your permission, Mrs. President, I would like to say a few words to the friends here assembled, not in the form of a speech, because I never make speeches, and if I did I would not consume your valuable time now, when so much is in store for us on your excellent programme ; but simply to extend, on behalf of our Canadian kindergartners, a hearty and genuine " Welcome" to all present on this auspicious occasion, when kindergartners meet not on a foreign shore, but on the common ground of unity in aim and progress. In the words of our great teacher, Fred- erick Froebel, " Ever in relation recall the truth that unity exists in all," let me assure you of united hearts and hands in the great work bequeathed to us, and with none will we join Heads, Hearts, and Hands more ear- nestly than with " Our American Cousins." KINDERGARTEN AND THE PRIMARY SCHOOL. W. T. HARRIS, COMMISSIONER OF EDUCATION, U. S. The kindergarten has all the elements of family education, and it takes on, also, something of the formality of a school. One of the duties of a school is to teach what may be called the conventionalities, such as the arts of reading and writing, the knowledge of the meaning of numer- ical symbols, which, preserving among men the steps of progress already made, hand them on to succeeding generations and give the individual access to the literary and scientific products of civilization. Part of this work is done in the kindergarten. It should take the child at four years of age and keep him until he has reached the age of six ; it should take him through the first stage of the development of thought from feeling. Plays and games are only a small part of the work ; they are necessary because the child cannot think quantity without quality, the abstract idea of number being only reached through the notion of the divisibility of a concrete uuity. This step of advancement from the con- 532 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION. crete to the abstract is frequently made by the child himself without assistance. In the kindergarten care must be taken to see that every step of progress is naturally connected with the one before it. This it is which constitutes the organic connection of knowledge. Education is the elevation of the individual into the species. The school teaches the conventionalities of life; it gives the child access to the wisdom of the race, but it often errs in making its experiences to the child too formal. It is too rigid and unsympathetic, and the child is expected to throw off the freedom of the family at once, and all too soon assume the formali- ties of the world. Thus did the great need of a connecting link between the two call for some noble-hearted lover of his kind to suggest a change, and Froebel, whose memory all kindergartners, all true educationalists, reverence, came to the rescue and supplied the need. The kindergarten takes the little one in his tenderest years, and, by placing within his reach symbols and games suited to his comprehension, enables him to natur- ally, and without undue or forced effort, grasp and assimilate the ideas and teachings desired. It makes him notice what is going on in the great world around him, and seeing begets the desire to imitate. It leads him up from the initial stage of feeling to thinking, and from thought to action. But the games and plays are only a portion of the work; there are gifts and occupations. These are less symbolical and more logical, and train the quantitative faculties. A child does not readily realize what it means to think quantity ; it is a hard and awkward step for him to take, and the idea of number, for instance, must be learned not by starting at a unit and adding, but by taking a divisible unit and dividing it ; and thus Froebel, who perceived this point, intro- duced the divisible block. The kindergarten is the great remedy of this century for the formalism of the primary school, and it had been badly needed before it came to the rescue. It is most needed for the children of the suddenly rich and of the very poor. Those who have become sud- denly rich have, in most cases, done so from their strong perceptive and inventive abilities, their power to grasp favorable conditions and use them, and their children, inheriting these qualities, are ofttimes preco- I cious and very restless and troublesome. At school they are pronounced incorrigible and sent home. At eighteen they develop a love of gam- bling and horse-racing, and the paternal property is soon dissipated. Then the children of the very poor need the kindergarten, for they are cribbed, cabined, and confined; no playgrounds and recreations, and liv- ing that stunted, melancholy life, surrounded by vice and crime of all kinds, they become the wolves of society. Send them to the kinder- garten, where one of the first results is to learn self-respect, and learning it, they will teach it to others. The birth of self-respect in any man is the dawn of a new order of things in his being. KINDERGARTEN METHODS IN INTELLECTUAL TRAINING. 533 KINDERGARTEN METHODS IN INTELLECTUAL TRAINING. MRS. J. L. HUGHES, TORONTO, ONT. The kindergarten first won its way into our hearts because of its sym- pathetic nature. As we look into the face of free childhood the eyes that look back to us glow with an appeal for joyous, active living that we can- not resist. As we watch children at their play, so full of life, so easily stirred through their feelings, their joyful activity seems so much more attract- ive and natural than the formal discipline of the school, we instinctively long for some means by which we may preserve the happy spontaneity of childhood and yet avoid the capricious wilfulness of undisciplined growth. The kindergarten offered a solution to our problem, and we opened our hearts and took it in gladly. We revelled in its home atmosphere. We rejoiced in its loving freedom. It came to us first as a luxury to be enjoyed by the favored few as a special culture. Then, because of the loving spirit which pervades it," philanthropy claimed it as a substitute for the mother element which is of necessity lacking in the lives of those little ones who are grouped together in institutions or who are without any home life in the complete ideal of the family circle. Educationalists formerly thought little of the instructive period of childhood. It was deemed best to leave the growth of that period to nature, caring only for the physical well-being. Others again thought any invasion of that period almost sacrilegious. Our faith in the system is a living conviction that when intelligently and reverently applied it is of inestimable value to all childhood, both as a moral and intellectual culture. It is the universal which persists, and we must be able to demonstrate the value of its universal application before we can be certain of its per- sistence as a related practical part of our school system. There are yet economists who claim that it is an unwarrantable expense to add it to the public-school system, because they do not see its value as an intellectual training ; and to these we must appeal with the results of our work, showing it to be a foundation broad and true for all growth, such as no other system of training or learning to nature can lay claim to. We must define our work to the intelligent economist as wholly in line with, and greatly assisting and elevating the intellectual methods of the 534 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION. school, and at the same time hold fast to the claim of especial sympathy with the child nature, showing that we are not arbitrarily formulating the activities of the child, and that by preserving the spontaneity of the child's impulsive action by our fostering care, we are enriching his intel- lectual growth. To be able to do this satisfactorily the kindergartner should combine the executive ability of the teacher, the sympathetic, consecrated spirit of the mother, and the reverent insight of the philosopher. She must be definite and strong, loving and unselfish, full of faith, and hopefully sure. All intellectual development is along the lines of receptivity, reflec- tion, and execution. Upon the activity of the receptive depends the joy of life, and any increase of that power by training increases the conscious pleasure of living. During early childhood the senses are keenly alive to all things in nature. The child sees, hears, smells, tastes, and feels with delight. He is full of questions, and lives in a perpetual delight of every fresh discovery. The training of the receptive power is through the senses, and the kindergarten does more than any other system to cultivate and use them systematically and with constant pleasure. The child's instinctive delights are recognized and fostered by intelli- gent care. Provision is made for healthy stimulant to increase the power by use. He imitates in his games the flying and hopping of birds and insects, and the various activities of nature, or he reproduces the forms of domestic life and the simpler trades. By living the life of other things himself, that life is made clearer to him. He observes more closely and sympathetically because he is one with their life. He has through his action secured to himself the life which attracted him in nature, and his desire for the selfish holding of captivity is lessened in a degree corresponding to his comprehension of that life. His gift and occupation work have always a definite result to be reached. This is through application of his ideas of form, number, size, direction, etc., and the effort to do is of necessity constantly defin- ing through use. He sees with quicker, clearer sight, because he knows his pleasure is shared and understood. His ears are quick to catch the sounds of nature, because in hearing he is made one with others who hear. The social instinct reacts to increase personal power. Sympathy is both soil and sunshine in the growth of the feeling. KINDERGARTEN METHODS IN INTELLECTUAL TRAINING. 535 In games and songs the sense of taste is made to contribute to his intellectual growth by becoming the discriminating power in determin- ing through the qualities the nature of material things, instead of being solely a means of pleasure through the gratification of appetite. We gain on the intellectual side by this use of the sense, and lessen the danger of excess on the physical, and of perversion on the moral. The total result is the spiritualizing of material by lifting the con- scious activity of the sense to the plane of thought. All knowing is discrimination, and all exercise of the faculties on the material plane tends to develop strength of discrimination on the higher plane of intellectual and moral choice. The aim of the kindergarten method is not activity of the senses alone (that would develop only selfishness), but to help the child to organize his sense activity into intellectual forms — to help him make the transition from material holding to intellectual. The law of self-preservation holds good through the conscious as well as the instinctive period of growth, but it is modified and sanctified by the lifting of the ideal of self from a consciousness of being an individ- ual for whom all things were made, to the vision of . self as a being of vital force in living contact with fellow-beings; one who receives, but only that he may have the more to give to others, and whose receiving capacity depends upon the activity of giving. All activity of the senses is defining and separating into the elements which form the essence of material existence, and forms the basis for all definite knowledge. The reflective powers reunite that which has been separated or defined. Isolated facts are seen in connection which suggest as possible the rela- tionships to be discovered. It deepens the joy of life through widening the vision beyond the passing feeling of sense delight and reveals proc- esses of activity which bring the pleasure of the past and the hope of the future into the joy of the moment. All value is relative, and the wider the view of relationships the more power have we to judge of the real worth of that which we hold. The emphasis of the principle of process in the kindergarten methods is based in the thought, Isolation is death, and mankind longs for life, and that more abundantly. In our methods nothing is left in isolation. The moment it is seen as a separate thing it is revealed as a part of a process ; as the senses define, the thought reunites into an organic unity. The joy of discovery be- comes an element in the effort for creation. The child builds with his blocks, and we aim to have the process a sequence of carefully graded steps, so that the principle of growth may be easily comprehended. This is secured by constantly connecting the 536 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION. building with the child's experience. Each thing he makes is at once a link in the process of reflection, which he runs over in the recognition of its likeness to his own surroundings. Material connection in unlike things is suggested by definite changes, which are so simple that the one form is not lost in the change into another, and the logical sequence which ends at the starting-point is a constant revelation of unknown and undreamed-of relations. It is the sympathy of understanding which voiced the call to the mother spirit in the world, " Let us live with our children," that inspires every true kindergartner, and lights up the experience of childhood and reveals while it guides. The songs are related so that his life experience, which he re-lives in them, may be revealed in a process — the song being the mirror in which he sees his life reflected. The songs and occupations are chosen according to the times and sea- sons of his life, that we may respond to and foster the instinctive feeling which the day or circumstances has aroused. In this there has been no arbitrary formula in his training, but the law of organization has prevailed through wise sympathy and fostering care. The law which we formulate to ourselves as " All unused material is wasted" is formulated to the child only through his activity. It is by living in the form of the law that we become a law unto ourselves. Mathematical organization of form and number repeat this process in material. Lines are only elements which are united into forms. Single things or single groups are only parts of other things, and are again united into larger wholes, etc. No truth can be revealed as a complete truth, but must be forever revealing itself under new aspects and in new relations. Who can find out God? We go on from glory to glory. But both the receptive and reflective faculties reveal their true mean- ing in a process which reaches a climax in the executive power. We may be constantly receiving impressions through the senses, and so living a light-hearted, happy existence, but we cannot be sure of any- thing beyond the present moment. We may be able to trace connection in the network of activities around us and yet have no vital connection with it all. To be a link in a proc- ess implies a vital personal activity of will. A link must hold as well as be held. The moment it loses its double activity its life is ended. We may feel deeply and think profoundly, and yet have no real per- sonal power, because we have not the ability to organize our feeling into thought, and no strength to put our thought into execution. The kindergarten helps the child to organize his feeling by its foster- ing care and guiding sympathy, and secures the climax of execution by KINDERGARTEN METHODS IN INTELLECTUAL TRAINING. 537 guiding always to a definite result, which becomes at once a reality by connecting it with his experience in his play. The kindergarten system is the only one that is essentially executive in its methods. Feeling that finds no expression dies. To have insight without attainment is to sow the seeds of moral degen- eracy and to weaken individual power. The starting-point, the process, and the result are seen as a related whole, and the child has the thrill of a creator's delight as the finished work lies before him. He has a conscious sense of individual power through knowing how the work was accomplished. The starting-point in the kindergarten is a natural one ; all the work is based on the child's instinctive forms of activity. His nature is essen- tially creative. He manipulates material with a purpose of making something. He builds, he represents in picture form. He delights in the imitation of the employment of his parents by natural choice. It is these impulsive activities which we guide by our fostering care. We come into his life of feeling with the sympathetic response of recognition and understanding. We formulate no rules of action, but determine the path of his experience by clearing the way for his activity in a logical sequence and meeting the advance of his development with material suited to his larger power. Our sympathy expresses itself in the form of the realities of law. The material defines itself under the definite qualities of form, num- ber, size, proportion, direction, etc. The movement we organize according to the law of all growth — the presentation of opposites and the process of meditation. The more definite our receptive power, the more conscious is our pleasure in recognition, and the greater the sense of personal power, because the creative power is dependent on the definiteness of our com- prehension of the elements which enter into the process. The crude results of the child's first efforts are full of pleasant satis- faction, because his ideas are still crude. But the process of creation reveals more of the ideal nature of the material. His effort has strengthened the power to do, and the result of succeeding action will be the expression of his larger self. So he goes on from strength to strength. The natural law is the divine law. So through the instinctive or impulsive period of early childhood; the child is led by loving insight along paths of activity that formulate law in the child's nature before the age of conscious choice. His form of activity has led him to associate result with process, and as the process has revealed the result, so a result seen as a fact or truth 538 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION. or condition at once implies a past process of creation, a present rela- tionship, and an ever-growing influence. Facts are no longer dead, but living realities, and thus in the school of things he is made ready for the school of facts. THE ORGANIC CONNECTION BETWEEN THE KINDER- GARTEN AND THE PRIMARY SCHOOL. BY MISS N. CROPSEY, INDIANA. Our nineteenth-century poets and scientists teach us that all life, in its unfolding, is a unit, though its forms may be many ; and that " we must account for the world and nature by other principles than those of carpentry and chemistry." No phase of human development can be considered alone ; each implies a relation to every other. " It is pernicious," says Froebel, " to consider the stages of human development — child, boy, or man — as dis- tinct, and not as life shows them — continuous in themselves in unbroken transitions." The same being looks out upon the world from the kindergarten, from the primary school, and from the school of later life. No new fundamental powers have been given to the "soul that rises with him." But self-activity takes other forms expressing advancing stages in con- sciousness, and each transition reveals something in himself which changes his attitude toward the world of man and of things. Self-sepa- ration means progress toward higher self-unification. By becoming conscious of his great inheritance he really possesses it. He moves from the unconscious toward the conscious; from life in things to life in ideas; from life in the body to life in the spirit. The general movement of life in the kindergarten is that of sponta- neous activity, a period which is conscious, when compared with early infancy, and unconscious compared with a later expression of power in the primary school. Yet~even here, where earnest life seems to take such light and airy forms, we trace the thread of conscious work and con- scious action. In the occupations of the kindergarten, work in its ele- mentary form is begun. A very sudden transition to new forms of activity cannot be made without loss. How shall the cheerful activity of the child in play lead gradually to the cheerful activity of man in work, which denies present gratification for future joy in a reasonable result? " Play, that is, activity, not pleas- (ARY SCHOOL. 539 u re, will keep children cheerful," says Richter. "Cheerfulness is at once the ground and flower of virtue, and its crown. Let it not be con- founded with enjoyment, which gives a selfish mien." Proper work, and for a right purpose, will keep man cheerful, because it is the form of activity which, in general, best expresses his degree of consciousness. In play, the activity alone is its purpose and reward ; in work, the product of the activity is its purpose ; but these should not be regarded as wholly separate and unrelated. It is the proper relation of the one to the other which makes each a means of growth. In a modern story we find this description of work in its effect upon man, when there is no creative element in it, and no contrasting activ- ity in recreation : " My body was strong, but my brain was dead. You may work a man's body so that his soul dies. Work is good; I have worked at the old farm from the sun's rising till its setting, but I have had time to think and time to feel. When I first came, I always refused my master's offer of the brandy flask, but now I drank as my oxen did." When all the activity of a complex and highly organized being is turned into one narrow expression of force, whether physical or mental, we have a reaction which is correspondingly violent and savage, or the being may become so deadened that very little reaction takes place. Such results must follow if children are taken from the freedom of home or the all-sided life of the kindergarten, to undertake tasks which do not in any way express their inner life and needs. On the other hand, the child or man who has missed the discipline of work or service for the good of others, finds himself unable to submit to any other necessity than present desire. In"Romola," George Eliot has given us such a character : Tito Melema, with a dark, beautiful face and the brightest smile, the softness of whose nature required that all sorrow should be hidden away from him, came at last to commit the basest deeds, because he tried to slip away from everything that was unpleasant, and that did not answer to his choice of the moment. Work, if performed in the light of ideals which the school should give, is the great instrumentality for teaching the denial of self, for the good of the whole or for a greater self. An education which gives the power to deny the lower self for the higher is a good education ; any kind of education without this power is a failure, no matter what else it may teach. The forms of play, when imposed upon the child by the school, or upon the man by the circumstances of his time and education, are a hindrance to a real and normal growth; while to the child who, by means of play, represents himself earnestly from within, play is purifica- tion of will and aspiration of the whole being; The little child lives as earnestly in play as does the man in real work. 540 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION. His imagination uses these forms of human life to work out to clearness the knowledge of human duties and human .aspirations. Froebel understood better than any one else this inborn desire and capacity of children for all-sided living, and brought in the kinder- garten the full answer to their needs. We sometimes see in the crowded kindergartens of our cities capable children, seven, eight, and even nine years of age, going listlessly through the forms of play. They should be in school learning to read, and in the home should consciously take their small part in the real work of life. To impose upon the primary school the forms of play used in the kindergarten would be only external and far from the real pur- pose and spirit of play, though some have supposed that this would be one means of making the connection between these two grades of pri- mary education. Play will be related to work — or spontaneous activity related to activ- ity imposed by the will for a purpose — according to the plane of devel- opment upon which we find the individual. Man will always play, but the forms of play will change as the forms of work change. The art forms of music, poetry, and the drama, which children seem to use naturally in their plays and in the kindergarten, become differentiated, and each becomes a complete form and method of expres- sion. A real re-creation, because a contrasting activity to the usual work of the school, comes in the school festivals of music and of the seasons, where each contributes song, poem, or sentiment for the enjoyment of all, and all join in expressing their delight in external harmony and beauty by the decoration of the school-room to correspond with the fes- tival of joy within. The free plays of children at the school recess and outside of school hours show a more conscious purpose than those of younger children, and give training in accuracy of sight and skill of hand, as well as opportunity for justice, truthfulness, and good will, and always reflect the training of home and school. The games of older children seem to proposed a definite problem to be worked out by the understanding, rather than the general poetic view of the whole of life, which little children try to represent. The spirit of the kindergarten should control all the activities of the primary school and of all schools. " Each should live for all and all for each." The spirit of competition is selfish, and destructive of the indi- vidual and of society. Constant opportunity should be given for com- bination in work for a common end, and for the exercise of the social feelings and needs. Let us teach children how to have rational and simple pleasures. The school must ask what kind of personal experience is necessary to THE KINDERGARTEN AND THE PRIMARY SCHOOL. 541 furnish the knowledge upon which thought and rational action can be based; how much of the theory of life, which we communicate in words, can be understood and acted upon. We have often made the mistake of supposing that experience could be given by words alone. Expression by means of language begins very early, and we know that expression by means of more material forms continues very late, as the art of civilized man shows. The actual education of man is said to begin when the child represents himself by means of language : for this is the utterance of spirit which is truly human and marks him as man. The little child seems to turn as readily to one form of expression as another. The tendency is toward clear and full expression of a more complex and internal life by means of language. Can all the experience which a child in the primary school needs to prepare him for the higher schools and for life be obtained by means of expression through language? Those who are born a hundred years in advance of the century in which they live, and into a very abstract and spiritual life, can hardly conceive how it is possible that there are so many minds requiring hand expression of the most elementary kind. Young men who are still in the childish stage of thinking are sent to the university, which is not a place where everything is taught, but where men are to begin to explain the world and to act upon it by means of universal ideas. The consequence is that they can only engage in physical sports. Their natural tendency to physical expression was not regarded in childhood, nor idealized, and perhaps no environment fos- tered the germs of spiritual life. It was said that Jefferson, coming to William and Mary College in 1760, found a true university, whatever it may have been to others, because coming into contact with a few uni- versal minds he was capable of being instructed by them. We believe that the value of hand expression in primary schools is every day better understood, and that our thoughtful workers are bring- ing better theories to our aid. When this work helps the child to take the next higher step in thinking and acting, it is valuable ; it is a nec- essary contrasting activity to a mental tension upon what is abstract and theoretical, which children cannot sustain for long periods. It has its value, not in what the child produces, nor in preparing for industrial life — though it may do this — but in the child himself. There is danger that the employment of the hand may be merely auto- matic, in order to keep children quiet in over-crowded schools. A child or a man may repeat the forms of hand work and learn very little, just as he may repeat words in 'an automatic way which represent no living thought. Drawing has great value when we consider that it gives man- ual skill, inventive power, and ideals of the beautiful, and that the material comes so easily within the reach of all. 542 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION If, in changing nature into forms of his own will, the child himself is changed; if he learns patience, industry, and common sense; learns that " good thoughts are no better than good dreams unless they be exe- cuted;" if the " laws of physics translate to him the laws of ethics," then is this instruction truly valuable. It should be a means of leading up to a stage of development in which we are able to reflect upon and choose between motives and processes beyond the realm of hand representation. To make the connection between a period of growth which requires sense-representation — in order to give dim and vague perceptions and relations, reality and permanence — and the stage which holds these rela- tions in thought, requires great insight upon the part of the teacher. Very early the child compares his view of things with the things them- selves, and soon he holds mentally the terms with which he works, com- pares and chooses his processes, and arrives at a result in theory. We must also keep in view the fact that the higher or later forms of think- ing and living have their beginnings in, and rest upon, the earlier ele- mentary forms ; that the new impressions are explained by the old. It is the gradual ascent into complex and abstract mental processes which we fail to remember. The little child makes clear to himself the fundamental notions of form, size, and number by concrete representation. The same method is continued in the primary school; he represents externally, in space, the terms of his problem, lest they slip away from his mental grasp. By this means he helps his feeble powers of concentration and abstrac- tion. This is good so long as it is necessary, but we must remember that our aim is to get him beyond the necessity for sense-representation. He will never learn "to use his mental powers unless by their exercise. We must train our powers of sympathy and insight to be able to know what he is thinking, and give him only enough help to enable him to help himself. This is difficult work, and means more than the manipu- lation of blocks and sticks. The child compares, generalizes, reasons, on his own plane of develop- ment, and delights in it. We may weaken his powers by requiring sense-representation when it is not necessary to clearness of thought. We may confuse, discourage, and make him dishonest by requiring him to go through forms of thinking beyond his power of comprehension. It is commonly understood that school begins for the child when he is old enough to be taught to read. It is a period in his growth which must have great significance. He sees language in a form which is entirely separate from his individual experience. This, Froebel says, marks the transition from childhood to boyhood. Before this he has had no true representation of his oral speech, for the picture of the par- ticular bird which he recognized when less than a year old has by no THE KINDERGARTEN AND THE PRIMARY SCHOOL. 543 means the significance of the written word. He has no experience by which he can interpret these signs. He must learn at the school their meaning as they are universally understood. Here the wise teacher will remember that no sudden transitions can be made, and will use the picture and sign language, to explain to him the new, strange forms, and will give time to find points of connection with the knowledge already The word and sentence method of teaching reading recognizes the fact that there is a gain, in time and power, in keeping the whole nature of the child alive, instead of allowing him for a long period to use forms, which express very little of his world of life and thought. He gets early into the habit of reading to gain ideas, and to communicate them to others, which gives true pleasure, and is as real an expression of his nature as are the occupations of the kindergarten to the younger child. These dead forms of reading and writing should not separate between him and the great worlds of nature and human nature, but give a means of higher interpretation, thus making a living connection with his early experiences. A vast amount of time is wasted by presenting the com- mon and the crude in reading and literature, because we fail to under- stand the poetic spirit in which the child interprets the world. It is not necessary to know the exact meaning of each word in a poem in order to be instructed and inspired by its general sentiment. The world comes to us first as a general impression ; it may be dim and obscure ; its diversity is interpreted in relation to this whole. Our primary schools ought to teach the best that literature has to offer — not the most complex or the most obscure in meaning, but some expression of other than the literal and disconnected view of things. The analytic processes may entirely absorb the time of the child in school, and completely obscure his poetic view of the whole which he brought to us out of the land of early childhood, leaving him on a bar- ren plain of facts, cut off from the living springs of imagination and reason. The eye of the poet integrates the parts and feels the living spirit which animates and unifies nature, though he may not be able to give a scientific classification of its forms. The close observation of the facts of form, color, and size has its great value if, in the mind of the teacher, there is an aim to unify this knowl- edge with the experience of the child, and with the world of truth, of which it is a part. Time is wasted in "observation lessons," in repro- ducing the disconnected facts of nature study, giving no sense of unity in nature, or in the life of the child. The poem and the story give him his first and best explanation of nature in its unity and in its relations of beauty and use to his life. What is well understood in the kindergarten is often ignored in the 544 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION primary school, and we hasten to make a sudden transition to the exter- nal scientific classification of facts, in which we cannot enlist the interest of our pupils. When each study of the primary school supports and explains all others we shall have that inner relation among subjects which will bring a clearer understanding of each. When form study and science lessons help to interpret reading, language, and arithmetic ; when reading, lan- guage, and art give not only the external facts of nature and human life, but use them to explain the higher life of thought and conduct, we shall have made progress toward a living connection between the school and the method of growth which precedes it. Reading, writing, and arithmetic, when we consider all that their teaching implies in language, literature, and art, are the important sub- jects in the primary school. They carry farther what the kindergarten has begun, and give increased power to solve the world theoretically. Arithmetic brings the external world under our control, first in thought, and then in practical results. Literature, entered from the little world of songs, games, and stories by the gateway of reading and books, gives us the law of the inner world of man. By the imagination and the rea- son we see the far-oif result of a process or a deed, and choose it rather than an immediate and temporary good. If nations can solve their problems theoretically — have the conflict mentally — it means peaceful and reasonable arbitration. There is a long step in civilization between parliament and the hand-to-hand physical conflict. As individuals we must be able to use the experience of others in order to make progress : our conflict must take place on the heights ; it must be by " the sword of the spirit" — " science against fate." Can man live among machines and mathematical instruments and chemical products, during the best growing, formative, and enthusiastic years of his life, without being in any way in touch with the ideals of humanity, and learning to solve the problems of life? Our best polytech- nic and manual-training schools have answered in the negative by mak- ing literature a part of the course of study. Failure in life, we say, results from the lack of will-training; but to make the will pure and strong requires not only action, but intelligence — the power to find one's way through complex conditions, to hold in mind, compare, contrast, and draw conclusions before making a choice. We may do this instan- taneously, but it must be done, and in the light of ideals. Froebel's thought of " human culture for all-sided unification of life " must be carried up into every school. This does not mean that the pupil should study everything at once, but that what he does should result in culture. Unity of life means harmony, which can only be attained by moving forward in accordance with the divine ideal implicit in human THEORY TESTED BY EXPERIENCE. 545 nature and expressed in institutions. Nothing is begun in the kinder- garten which does not in some form enter into life ; nothing is in life which was not in the child. He moves through the whole circle of rela- tions, and ever widens its sweep, as by self-activity; with the aid of the surrounding world he learns to know himself. The machine, and dexterity in its use, the external scientific view of things, fills the eye of our time. Perhaps this is a necessary reaction from a one-sided theoretical course of life and study in the schools. The worker in steel has made a very delicate instrument which is fitted for the most wonderful surgical work. The chemist has distilled and compounded the most refined results of mineral and herb. There is no lack of mechanical appliances. Is the intelligence in the theory of their use developing in a corresponding degree? Do we know when nature is doing her normal work, and have we so much knowledge of her method as to give time for growth and repair, and to lend only necessary aid? The machinery of the school, the material and methods furnished, are helps to those who understand their purpose. Froebel could take children into the fields and help them to expand in the light of God, of Nature, and of humanity. Many of us would lose our occupation if we should lose its mechanism. Whatever aid is given to the child in interpreting his impressions of the world, in connecting the new knowledge with the old, in strength- ening and purifying his will, and in helping him to move toward his destiny with cheerfulness and power, must be given by those who can "discern the things of the spirit." An " organic connection " is a living and necessary connection which cannot be changed for an external and temporary relation without dis- turbing or destroying the orderly movement of the whole; it is best understood in its details of subjects and forms by those who have the deepest comprehension of the aim of all education. THEORY TESTED BY EXPERIENCE. -MISS ANNA E. FREDERICKSON, INDIANA. From the earliest times, when the Hebrew mother taught her child at her knee until he was old enough to be instructed by the scribes, the great problem of the education of man has engaged the best thought and the most active work of the wise in all ages. 546 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION. .Recognizing the great importance of correct education, and desiring to benefit the many who, coming after them, should study this same great question, they have given to us, as a result of their experience, their educational theories. An educational theory is more than a mere notion of some one as to how the mind is to be developed or how instruction may be imparted. If it is in the true sense of the word an educational theory, it is a real thing based upon the discovery of a continuity of facts ascertained by an observation of the development of mind, the means employed, and the manner in which they were presented for the accomplishment of that aim. This observation must be extensive, and carefully made by one who is indeed a searcher for truth. Each theory so developed has in it grains of truth which attract to it investigating thought, and lead to its being tested by application in actual practice, which will prove to what extent the observations upon which it is based have been correctly made. The results of the experience of one must not be accepted as conclu- sive, because of the possible inability of that one to grasp and skilfully apply the principles of the theory ; or, if this be not the case, the condi- tions under which he has labored may not have been the best. It is only from a comparison of the experiences of the many who have conscientiously applied the principles of a theory under various condi- tions that we may obtain a result acceptable as giving a conclusive proof of the extent in which the theory is a law. A retrospect of the plan of educational history reveals to us not only the theories which the geniuses of the various nations have produced, but also the many tests to which they have been subjected. Viewed in this light, there is brought clearly to our view the truth in each which has lived in all succeeding theories. To these truths other and greater truths have been added until we have the theory which as kindergart- ners we are now testing in our children gardens. Frederich Froebel, the father of the kindergarten, was a man of rare talent and broad culture. He embodies in his theory the results of the growth of educational thought for centuries. A study of his idea leads us to a study of Nature, her ways, and her laws. It also leads deeply into the lives of his contemporaries, and many of the earliest educators, who, by their experience and experiment, opened the way for his broader view involving the eternal destiny of man. It was his work to bring the beautiful purposes and the educational principles of others to a point of actual achievement, and give to them greater breadth, depth, and practicability. THEORY TESTED BY EXPERIENCE. 547 He was intensely religious, and based his system upon his conviction that " all education not founded on religion is unproductive." He recog- nized the inner unity of all with God, from whom all proceed. He saw the destiny of all things in the revelation of God in outward form. Man and nature, having one origin and being under the same universal laws, he looked to nature, and observing the laws which controlled the development of plant and animal life and minerals, he applied them to the principles of human education — hence, his watchwords — harmonious development by continuous growth from within outward, involving the self-activity. As he saw the plant drew from the soil in which it is planted its nour- ishment, so he saw that the child drew from its environments the means of its growth ; if they failed to supply this means of growth the nature was dwarfed and blighted. He would surround the child with that which is pure, that the germs of the good tendencies might fully develop and bear fruitage in the development of the soul, so that evil, which is a fun- gus growth, might find no place for lodgment. In his first work with children he was aware that many of the difficul- ties which had to be overcome were due to neglect or lack of intelli- gent, conscious training on the part of the mother. This led him to see the necessity of training women for their highest and holiest callings — motherhood and teaching. He would have them know by observation and experience the laws of organic development and the needs of child- hood. He would have them to be able to consciously lead the child so that all his faculties might be aroused and exercised in such a way that the result would be complete development. He would constantly keep in view the ideal, the harmonious development of the physical, mental, and spiritual nature, thus bringing the whole being in unity with self, with humanity, and with God. For the answer as to how this high aim in life was to be accomplished, Froebel looked to life. As he recognized that all education should begin with the youngest children, he observed young children and the manner in which true mothers by their intuitions and motherly instincts amused and satisfied them. He also observed older children, preferring to observe them at play, that he might see the needs and bent of their nature as manifested in spontaneous play. The result of this observation, supplemented by his knowledge and philosophic thought, was a graduated series of gifts, occupations, and social games. These comprise the child's world, reducing it to its sim- plest elements, and at the same time opening to the child countless ave- nues in all directions to higher thought and wider influence. The kindergarten material leads by analysis and synthesis to a knowl- edge of the inner constitution of form. It develops the reason, imagi- 548 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION nation, memory, the aesthetic taste and manual skill. It satisfies the child's desire for construction and invention. The child, by judicious instruction and proper guidance, is enabled to transform the simple material into a great variety of forms of cogni- tion, life, and beauty, thus gaining power through practice. It fur- nishes a means whereby all acquired knowledge and skill may be employed in new productions, which will be compared to and combined with all previous productions. It thus becomes a true test of knowl- edge, for it is a giving back in an individualized way what the child has received. The child not only gains knowledge by the habit of applying it. It is only valuable to him in the proportion in which he can apply it in life. Knowledge so gained increases conscious power, and the child becomes self-helpful and self-reliant ; hence the need of greater living, practical knowledge gained for a definite purpose in life. Action proceeding from inner impulse is necessary to true culture. Important as is the individ- ual development, the social phase is equally important. The ideal man- ner in which two little children meet, and the whole-souled manner in which they enter into the notions and purposes of each other, together with the earnestness displayed in endeavors to accomplish a mutual pur- pose, show the demands of the child for the society of equals, and the happiness and profit to each derived therefrom. The organized social games of the kindergarten supply this need, giv- ing what cannot be gained in any other way — the development of the social side of the child's nature. All the children in the kindergarten take a more or less important part in the games. Each game has a definite purpose, and all are gov- erned by the same laws that control the use of the material law of oppo- sites, connection of contrasts, analysis and synthesis, continuity and self-activity. They are so arranged as to enable the child to reproduce the scenes of life by which he is surrounded, develop the senses, give new ideas and opportunities to apply them. The symmetrical arrange- ments accompanied by music, aside from the physical culture, develop the rythmic sense and tend to harmonize the whole being. The child loses his self-consciousness j he sees the relative power of the little society as compared with his individual power. All the children combine in the accomplishment of some purpose in which each heartily enters. All the powers, both formative and expres- sive, are awaked and strengthened in proportion to the efforts made to assist others in the achievement of the aim. By this means the child is led to respect the rights of others, and to become conscious of his power to give joy. In all the exercises with the gifts, occupations, social group work and THEORY TESTED BY EXPERIENCE. 549 games, the true kindergartner never loses sight of the fact that they are but means, and their real value lies in the influence which they have upon the whole child in all its relations to life. He is led to do that he may be. The theory avoids dogmatism, pedantry, and prejudice. It is affirma- tive and progressive, and recognizes inner freedom as the chief objective aim. It is not confined to one place or people. It meets the needs of humanity. Born in Germany, where many obstacles met it that for a time it seemed would overcome it, it could not be suppressed. It rose above all obstacles, broke all fetters, and extended like a mighty wave, modifying all systems with which it came in contact, and it is destined to modify all phases of education. The growth of the work in Germany was watched with intense interest by the surrounding countries, and upon its success there depended to a great extent its introduction into the other countries. Through the influence of those whom Froebel gathered around him and instructed so that they were in sympathy with him and saw the truth of his theory, the work gained in popularity and favor. Among this group of early pioneers no one is more prominent than Baroness Marenholtz Von Biilow — Froebel's clearest interpreter — a most enthusi- astic disciple and a power in the cause, to whom is due, probably above all others, the recognition of its worth at this early period. The work soon spread into Belgium, Holland, and France, and after a time it reached England. Here many difficulties met it- — its foreign origin, lack of properly trained teachers, a misunderstanding of its char- acter, and many other things; but these were overcome, and England has reason to-day to be proud of the flourishing condition of her many kin- dergartens. In like manner it has found its way into Norway, Sweden, Eussia, and Italy. In all of these countries it is growing, but in no country has the kindergarten work made equal progress in the same time that it has in the United States, due largely to the freedom and independence of American women, their keen perceptions and their enthusiasm. Introduced about thirty years ago, it was enthusiastically received by a few who considered it their mission to make known the gospel of the kindergarten. German publications were translated, various books were published, training schools established, and Froebel associations and unions formed. The experience in establishing the work has been similar in all coun- tries— in many respects discouraging, in many more respects encourag- ing. So from hands that shrank from no task, prompted by a desire to lift humanity to a higher plane of living, the seeds have been sown, and the harvest shows a yield of many fold. 550 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION. It has everywhere enlisted the support of the churches, philanthro- pists, and the "Women's Christian Temperance Union." They have established charity kindergartens in the large cities, into which have been gathered the truly needy, and in many instances these little ones have there received the first ray of sunshine which has entered their lives. These organizations are by this means endeavoring to lift human- ity through the children, putting it in possession of the faculties which God has bestowed upon each. As we compare the experiences coming from all the countries where the work haj been employed in all its degrees of perfection and imper- fection, we gather as facts in regard to the Froebel theory that it meets the needs of humanity. Because of its broad, logical foundation it can be modified to meet the needs and national characteristics of all children, normal and abnor- mal, and remain in aim and achievement the same. But you say in many places it has been unsuccessful, and the attempt to carry it forward given up. Yes, but a close examination into the particulars in these instances reveals to us that there was little in con- nection with it that was truly kindergarten. Rooms were overcrowded so that the kindergartner could not give attention to the development of individual tendencies ; or, where this was not the case, those who had the work in charge (can they be called kindergartners?) mistook the let- ter for the spirit and the means for the end, and reduced the system to mechanism. Something more is necessary to make a kindergartner than a knowl- edge of the material and the manual application of it. The true kin- dergartner sees beneath the surface to the soul of the material, and has reverence for the life it contains and the life it brings to the growing child. She is animated by the spirit of Froebel in all that she does. Where this is the case, experience positively proves that the kindergar- ten training enables the child to see for himself and express what he sees and conceives in simple, concise language, either by means of words or things. He knows the properties of things, their practical use, and their relations. It develops conscience, will, and moral sense. The child is obedient ; he obeys spontaneously from a sentiment of obedience to that which is right because of the development of righteousness within him. It inculcates a love of work by developing the instrument of labor — the hand. It equally educates the head and the heart, making them both servants of the hand. It develops the whole body to be strong and supple. In the games and various social exercises there grows in the heart a love for others, the first germ of love to God, and the foundation of all religious feeling. MAGICIANS AND A CHILD'S LIFE. 551 Again, experience proves that the theory is eminently practical, systematic, and effective, and that the kindergarten is a place where parents may send their children day after day and know that the influence there received will uplift, and that they will there find what the home cannot give — a little community where, under en- lightened direction, they will learn how to live with others and for others. The influences of this rational education will continue through years of study, and always make itself felt in all that appeals to that which is essentially high in man. It has effectually modified all systems by bringing people to see that education has a broad scientific basis and real human purpose. Experience also proves that as the kindergarten training is necessary for the complete education of children, the kindergarten training is equally necessary to women. It broadens the mind, enlarges the heart, makes skilful the hand, and assists and forms her for her educational mission. The work is but in its beginning; we but partly see into the depth of our theory ; but because of its inherent truth it will continue to grow and develop, revealing to us much greater depth and richer resources than we now know it to contain. It is a humanitarian and a social work. The good which it has done is great ; but when compared with what the indications for the future say with unmistakable signs that it will do, the good which it has done is but as the first rays of dawning day which indicate the full glory of the noontide. MAGICIANS THAT MAKE A CHILD'S LIFE HAPPY OR MISERABLE. MRS. LOUISE POLLOCK, WASHINGTON, D. C. A very different state of things is now existing from that in 1863 when I climbed up the stairs of the Boston State House to urge upon the Hon. Mr. Philbrick the advantage of having kindergartens given to the children of the public schools. "My dear madam," he said, "we have hardly space in our school-rooms to accommodate the children ; we could not think of giving them gardens." Very few people at that time understood the term kindergarten, 552 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION which means that the children are the flowers, and the teacher the care- ful, conscientious gardener. Well, even now the purposes of the kindergarten are not very well understood, for when we pleaded last winter in the Senate chamber at the United States Capitol with Senator Plumb to make an appropria- tion for free kindergartens to be located in the poorest districts of Washington City, he said that he would not be instrumental in taking young children from their mothers, whose duty it was to train their children at home. "Homes!" cried out one of the ladies who was with me. "Slums! Those children we wish to benefit are under the horses' feet, while the poor mother is busy earning their daily bread. Why do you not shut up the public schools? Mothers cannot do everything. Their homes are not like yours." To be sure, and even with an educated, wealthy mother, Senator Plumb's child enjoyed kindergarten training some years ago in our kindergarten. But the women's council was holding its meeting in Washington at that time, and the worthy senator thought we were work- ing to give leisure to mothers and have them travelling around the coun- try to plead for woman's suffrage. No ! Mothers who have not studied into the kindergarten philosophy are not at this age able to do justice to their children. Everything now has to be done by specialists to be done as it ought to be. The mother of the future will not be obliged to send for the doctor for every little ailment. She will have studied hygiene and physical culture, rather than astronomy or trigonometry. She will prefer to amuse her child in the manner indicated by Froebel, who would have a philosophical reason for everything that is done with or for the child, rather than to have impulse or the caprice of the moment dictate what actions to pursue with or for the child. If mothers would only take the trouble to find out what is meant by the kindergarten in the nursery, they would never excuse their lack of knowledge on the plea of lack of time ; on the con- trary, they will find that they have more time than they had before. Whenever I see a baby I think what possibilities of good or evil are hidden there under that smiling face, and parents, teachers, are the magicians to make his a happy or unhappy life, a curse or a blessing to humanity. We need not feel oppressed with this responsibility. If we do the best we can, in accordance with the light which is abundantly shed upon our pathway at the present time, we may leave the rest with God. Every young ladies' school must sooner or later prepare their pupils, not only for the salon but for the nursery as well. The kindergarten in the nursery, beginning with the child four months old, should be one of the studies that are indispensable in every woman's education. In all MAGICIANS AND A CHILD'S LIFE. 553 charitable institutions for girls and women a course of lessons should be given in infant training. It seems strange to me that it should be harder to interest people in this subject than, for instance, in dress or bonnet making. Probably the idea prevails yet that babies, like dogs or cats, will take care of themselves, and that the natural mother-love and instinct is sufficient. But a human mother has been endowed with royal reason, and has not the instinct of the animal mother. The human babe has a mind and a soul from the very beginning, and while he may be even over-fed in body, his affections, his spiritual nat- ure, may be famishing. I know there have been mothers, and fathers too in times past, and also at the present time, who devoted their best efforts for the home education of their children ; but times are different ; we live in an age that makes greater demands upon the time of the parent. The kindergartner is simply to take the mother's place for a few hours each day. I said to Senator Plumb : " If you were a poor work- ingman, would you not be glad to have your child in the care of a lovely young woman like these you see before you, rather than with the bad companions of the street, or in the way of the over-worked, worried mother?" It has been conceded by our best educators that the most important time for laying the right foundation of virtuous citizenship is the ear- liest years of the child (unless we mention antenatal influences). How important it is, therefore, that the kindergartner should have the right qualifications and preparation ! Mme. Carpenter says : " To educate chil- dren properly ought to be for the teacher the second part of his under- taking. The first part, which is to study their own motives of action and perfect themselves, is far the most difficult." Still there are so many who undervalue the kindergarten and call it a play-school, attach no significance to the plays of children, and think that no special preparation is needful to become the playmates and guides of early childhood. The plays of the child, Froebel says, are, as it were, the germ of the whole life which is to follow; for the whole man develops and manifests himself in it ; in it he reveals his noblest aptitudes and the deepest ele- ments of his being. Robert was a sturdy little fellow, five years of age, when a pupil in our National kindergarten. In the ring plays he took pleasure in trying to trip the children over with his feet. Complaint being made, I told him that he must control his little horses better (his feet) or they would have to be tied up. As soon as it occurred again I seated him in a chair and tied his feet to the legs of it. 554 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION. As the other children turned around laughing at him his face turned scarlet with anger and mortification. "You must not look around this way," I said, and stood in front of him to hide him from view. Soon I felt him pulling my dress. " What is it, Robbie?" "Mrs. Pollock, Mrs. Pollock," he said in an earnest tone; "the string is itndone!" I was greatly delighted and proudly I stood one side. "Look at Robbie now, children; you see how honorable he is. lie told me that he was not tied; was it not brave? Kow he shall come and play with us again." We have a right to expect from the school-teacher a good intellectual education and high moral nature, but much more is required of one who would become an efficient and successful kindergartner, worthy of the high calling, which, next to the mother, is the highest there is on earth. The whole life of man having its source in that epoch of existence, and whether that life be serene or sad, tranquil or agitated, fruitful or sterile, whether it brings peace or war, that depends on the care given to the beginning of existence. This care is placed in the hands of woman, because nature has spe- cially endowed her with love, patience, and spiritual power of endurance, and thus designed that she should be the supervisor over the earlier years of life. She should be the cheerful playmate of innocent child- hood, while at the same time she controls and guides the child by means of her mental superiority, her insight into their nature, and the con- sciousness of the noble ends to be reached by means of education and development attainable through the kindergarten system. Like the radiant sun she is to enlighten and animate the spirit of the children by her unvarying patience and love and the refinement that naturally per- tains to a pure and truthful woman. She is to become, in fact, a spir- itual mother, who has to take the pure and innocent babe fresh from the hand of God, and train him, that he may return through a world of conflict to His paternal arms. Her attainment of success in this work will insure to her the quiet of a heavenly life. SOME THINGS A KINDERGARTNER SHOULD KNOW. BY AVILLIAM E. SHELDON, A.M., BOSTON, MASS. The kindergarten, as founded by Friedrich Froebel, represents a well-defined system of child-education which was designed to precede the ordinary school-training and prepare for it by developing the powers SOME THINGS A KINDERGARTNER SHOULD KNOW. 555 and capacities of the child so as to render him more or less self-active. This culture should be begun at the very dawn of the child's life, and cultivated under appropriate guidance during the first period of child- hood, which by common consent extends from infancy to the sixth or seventh year. This portion of the child's life is of supreme importance to the physical development, to the incipient intellectual unfolding, and especially to the training of the sense-perceptions as well as of the moral and spiritual intuitions and aspirations. This is the epoch in the child's life when he is most susceptible to impressions and is most influ- enced by his environments. In suggesting a few things a kindergartner should know, from my stand-point of view, the department will pardon me, I trust, if I depart from the usual eulogy pronounced upon Froebel and his work, and call attention to some points that are indispensable in our American elemen- tary training. My first suggestion relates to the adaptation and training of the kin- dergartner herself. But one young woman in twenty possesses naturally the peculiar characteristics that are absolutely essential in developing the complete philosophical system of training discovered and taught by Froebel, and even this one, unless specially trained and particularly gifted by nature, is liable to fail in the highest success of her mission as a true kindergartner. Thus my first suggestion is, Kindergartner, Know Thyself. The true kindergartner must know the elementary principles of mental science. This knowledge cannot be gained by reading works on psychology, how- ever valuable they may be. The best and the only perfectly satisfactory treatise on psychology adapted to the field of the kindergartner is the real, living child. No two children are exactly alike in temperament or capacity for development. The kindergartner, if she would have a broad and com- prehensive knowledge of childhood, must carefully study the growth and unfolding of many types of mentality observed and actually existing in different children. Her work demands that she not only comprehend the natural and scientific principles of growth, but that she should be able to adapt her methods of unfolding to the capacity of varying ages. There is another consideration to be taken into account, and that is the influence of envi- ronment in connection with the characteristics of the different minds. She must be on the alert to ward off danger arising from over-stimu- lation in some cases, and be able to prevent others from being atrophied. She is confronted with questions which all the philosophers of the past and present have not been able to answer satisfactorily, like : " How can I best train the senses harmoniously?" "How can I bring them under 556 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION. the control of the will?" " How can I make them best guide the judg- ment?" " How stimulate the imagination ?" " How strengthen the will- power?" "How develop the moral nature?" These are questions ever before the kindergartner, which she is forced to have under constant consideration. From this will be seen that the kindergartner must be familiar with the theoretical principles of the science of education. These are essential as guides in her original investigations in regard to the capabilities of each individual child. Not only must she be an original investigator, but she must know about and keep abreast of the latest discoveries in physiology and ]3sy- chology. In her methods she must be able to incorporate these results and connect them with her own processes in practical work from day to day. THE FACULTY OF ATTENTION. The faculty of attention is absolutely essential to progress in child development. Special efforts should be made to direct the activities of young children and to concentrate their minds upon a single topic long enough for them to understand its real significance and assimilate its practical lessons. Edmund Burke once said that " the method of teaching which approaches most nearly to the methods of investigation is incomparably the best, since the teacher should not be content with serving up a few barren and lifeless truths." While this is unquestionably true, the kindergartner must, by her method, concentrate the minds of children upon a few well-defined and specific points of interest. It demands the best tact and the highest skill, often, to bring the wandering and rest- less minds of children to give proper attention to a given subject which may not be at first of special interest to them. In many cases all direct attempts to accomplish this will fail. Flank movements must be made to enlist their minds and hearts, or both, for the time, in something quite foreign in character, until the attention is fixed. It is not always easy to make the transition from one subject to another. Eibot says: " There are two distinct forms of attention : one is spontaneous and the other voluntary and artificial." The first is the primitive form, the sec- ond is the result of education, of training, and of habit. As attention is a fixed condition of mind in the young child, it should not be continued for any undue length of time. Attention, unduly prolonged, experi- ment and experience both prove, will weary the mind and cloud the mental operations. Great discretion must be exercised in this matter in the training of young children whose natural tendency is to constant action. In spontaneous attention the whole being converges toward one subject, and all physical and mental operations are stayed, while in SOME THINGS A KINDERGARTNER SHOULD KNOW. 557 involuntary attention these activities are simply arrested for a time, and the child's mind only intermittently fixed. Voluntary attention is really grafted on spontaneous or natural attention by processes of training and education. Preyer declares that a very young child is not capable of anything but spontaneous attention, and thinks that the will-power is never found in exercise until the fifth or sixth month of the child's being, and that the power to restrain or regulate voluntary attention does not appear until a much later period. The leading motives that awaken voluntary atten- tion are self-interest, ambition, and emulation. There is a time in the life of every child when habit comes to control and take the place of applied motives. The infant, in common with the lower animals, has a faculty of spontaneous attention. The kitten instinctively watches by a hole ready to spring upon its prey. Even wild animals are often found so absorbed as to be easily approached. Animals like the monkey differ in the readiness in which they can be trained for expert performances, and children show the same characteristics. The kindergartner should know something of the law of heredity in the training of children. It is true that the tendencies are not the same during all the stages of a child's life. The characteristics of a very young child are usually less like the parental type than they are at a more mature age. An infant is at first, mainly, an engaging ani- mal. Its world of observation is all before it. It is true that it has instinctive wants and appetites, but it has no conceptions of right or wrong, no experience upon which to exercise its consciousness. Its physical, mental, and spiritual moulding is largely in the hands of the mother or nurse. Inherited tendencies generally begin to manifest themselves during the latter period of the kindergarten training. The kindergartner can perform a service of untold value by her efforts to eradicate or modify propensities to evil as they begin to appear. THE SENSES. The organs of the senses are the portals through which all knowledge of the natural world makes its entry into the mind. All real knowledge of actual things takes its rise from the exercise of the senses, which supply the materials for intellectual work. These manifestations, known as sensations or impressions, come to the mind by means of the eye, in color, light, etc.; by sound, through the ear; and the sensations of smelling, tasting, and feeling, through their special physical organs. Seeing and hearing belong to the higher and more refined order of senses, and rank superior as a source of pleasure and of garnering knowledge, while taste and smell are considered as being of 558 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION. a lower order. The sense of feeling and touch produces sensations by contact of pressure and temperature, and may be either active or passive in character. Active touch enables one, even though blind, to gain impressions in rapid succession and to discriminate between them. This exercise is known as the muscular sense, and is of vast importance as the source and means of gaining knowledge. By muscular sense the child determines the characteristic properties of things, such as hardness, density, etc. To estimate iveight, the mus- cular sense is called in to aid the judgment, for in deciding the weight of a body accurately it must be lifted, and the degree of force expended determines its weight. The sense of sight is by common consent assigned the first place, and the eye surpasses all other sense organs in the number and delivery of its "impressions. The sensations which form the mental conceptions of music, pitch, rhythm, melody, etc., which are among the most agreeable of sense experiences, have their sources in the sense of hearing. This sense enables the child to distinguish non-musical sounds, such as noises of external things, as the bark of a dog, the groan of one in pain, the rat- tle of a wagon on a stony street, the roar of the sea, the rustle of the leaves, etc. Hearing has comparatively little local discrimination, and gives no direct knowledge of the properties of objects, their size or shape. All the senses can be vastly improved by proper use and training. The child has the same sense organs as the man, and the same funda- mental modes of sensibility, but they are crude and vaguely defined. The senses become acute in distinguishing impressions, or quick and keen in identifying them, only by systematic training or cultivation. This alone makes them efficient instruments of observation and discov- ery. The methods of training the senses require constant attention in different ways by the kindergartner. In the infant and young child the senses are set wide open through the agency of spontaneous or voluntary attention, and the development of the faculties is very rapid before the age of six or seven years. The old systems of juvenile education stifled and checked the process by the senseless methods pursued, which were largely due to ignorance of the child's nature. It is not enough that the senses should be brought into active exercise. They must be used aright. To observe well is not an easy thing to do. Observation must not be too hasty. Glance impres- sions often give imperfect and incorrect notions. Again, sense percep- tion may be taken too slowly by spending over-much time on details; the child thus losing sight of the general plan and symmetrical com- SOME THINGS A KINDERGARTNER SHOULD KNOW. 559 pleteness of the numberless objects which the study of nature brings to his notice. This fact explains the origin of many false theories in the training of the perceptive faculties that have prevailed from time to time in the different epochs of educational activity. A correct under- standing and a proper application of the principles of Froebel will rem- edy these pernicious tendencies and habits of teaching. Young children should be guided to make such investigations in regard to objects in nature as will give them power not only to observe accurately, but to compare and verify their sense perceptions. One danger which the kin- dergartner must guard against is in attempting to awaken interest and fix the attention by resort to a fictitious or too highly-colored presenta- tion of subjects under consideration. What should be sought is the plain, simple truth. Impressions that are secured by a glance of the eye or an echo from the hills are from casual exercises of the senses, and cannot be relied upon to give children the completed results of investi- gation. The young kindergartner needs not only principles and facts for her guidance, but inspiration that can come to her only from a close and sympathetic relation with the child's yearnings and desires. She must take a pedagogical survey of her field of operations, which will vary with every new theme of instruction in its application to the individual development of the child. MEANS OF AWAKENING AND STIMULATING SENSE PERCEPTIONS. Play. — As conscious sense perceptions are only produced through action, according to Eibot, who says that " to perceive with the eyes, ears, feet, tongue, or nostrils there must always be movement," thus, voluntary attention must always be accompanied by an exercise of the physical powers. Froebel's investigations of little children led him not only to discover the natural instinct of activity, but to recognize also that growth and development could only be secured by fostering and guiding the natural playfulness of children. He also discovered that the strong instincts of imitation and invention could be guided and trained so as to form a philosophic and scientific basis of instruction. Froebel's fundamental idea in arranging his system of gifts was based upon the natural exercise of the child's observing faculties in connection with his plays and games, thus creating in him an interest in learning through the channel of his amusements. "Play," says Sully, "is the highest phase of child development. It gives joy, freedom, contentment." It is the self-active representation of the inner nature of the child, and typical of human life. The impor- tance and value of play has been recognized by educators of all time. Plato said that during the first three years the soul of the nursling 560 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION should be made cheerful and kind. Aristotle believed that children should be taught nothing until they were five years old, except to use their activities with others in play, and praises the rattle of Archytas as a useful contrivance for amusement. Quintilian looked upon play as " in itself a mark of activity of mind." Locke demanded that " all play- ing and child-like actions should be left perfectly free and unrestrained;" but to Froebel belongs the credit of discovering the true nature and function of play, and of regulating it in such a way as to lead the child gradually and naturally into work. He designed and invented " Gifts" and " Occupations, " now known and grouped into sets numbered from 1 to 20, although only the first seven were originated by him. The apparatus and material were not made for the use of the teacher, as some seem to suppose, but for the children. The six soft balls, the sphere, cube, and cylinder, and their divisions, were designed to teach form, number, and ideas of fractions, and were to be placed in the hands of the children for interesting and instructive occupation. The work of the kindergarten was that of direction and guidance in regard to the order and time of their use. By their manipulation the faculties of the children might be exercised and unfolded in accordance with the true developing method. The twenty gifts and occupations represent every kind of educational activity, including design and work in plastic art. They address the physical, intellectual, and emotional nature, and develop the inventive and constructive powers by their countless combinations of color, form, position, etc. By their use children work out for themselves results that give them confidence and ability to surmount obstacles. Self-reliance is one of the great lessons to be taught young children. The kindergart- ner should know that these playthings and games have their special adaptation to mental and physical growth, and thus furnish a complete philosophical system of culture. No one characteristic of the kindergarten work has been so generally misunderstood as that relating to " play." By " play" is not meant aim- less and undirected games and amusements, which would certainly make a pandemonium of the kindergarten. The amusements indulged in by children should be constantly under the intelligent direction of the kindergartner, who should be qualified to guide and utilize the activi- ties of children with reference to their development. All plays and games should furnish opportunities for awakening the interest, fixing the attention, and broadening the powers of observation. No seri-es of routine amusements can be arranged as a set programme for daily work. The current incidents and events will constantly supply something new and inspiring, which the intelligent kindergartner can utilize in this department of her training. One of the best features of the Froebelian SOME THINGS A KINDERGARTNER SHOULD KNOW. 561 system is its many-sidedness and the application of a wide variety of means adapted to secure the desired ends. In their plays children nat- urally represent the life around them ; what they have observed and absorbed is thus expressed. Thus plays and actions are consequently to them as full of meaning as are the occupations and recreations of more mature minds. The early gain becomes the earnest of later years. Miss Elizabeth P. Peabody, the highest living American authority on the kindergarten, says that the important intellectual exercises (in- volved in the play), when faithfully attended to by the kindergart- ner, must lead the children into habits of accurate and orderly thinking (though they think that they are playing only), and will bring out the harmonious development of their threefold nature from the very begin- ning. Hitherto education has been one-sided and piecemeal. It was Froebel's discovery that it might keep the balance of beauty as the child grows, that every stage of life may have a characteristic perfection; viz., that of childhood, of youth, of maturity, and of old age. THE FREEDOM OF THE KINDERGARTEN. In every well-ordered kindergarten there is freedom.. The children should be allowed to individually express themselves. Control should be effected by gaining intelligent interest. Kestraint should only be used to prevent interference with the rights of others. Habits of order, habits of obedience, respect, unselfishness, and usefulness, should be incorporated into their lives through the free agency of the child, which will become a basis for a life of happiness and a preparation for good citizenship. The aim of this freedom of action and expression is to put the child into such relation to the outer world as will lead him to form habits untrammelled by artificial rules and regulations, that belong, very properly, to the well-ordered common school. Schoolish- ness in the kindergarten is to be avoided, and individual freedom is to be made prominent, during the early period of development. EDUCATION OF THE MORAL NATURE. Important as is the proper training of the physical and intellectual growth of children, there is a still higher sphere of action ; one with loftier aims and nobler purposes than those affecting either body or mind. The soul of the child is of supreme importance. The true kin- dergartner must understand the processes of unfolding and strengthening the moral nature. Conceptions of right and duty must be awakened. Whatever is true and beautiful in character must be developed. The conscience, known as " the voice of God" in the child, must be made alert and potential in directing his thought and action. Willing obedience must also be taught. The new education demands that this 562 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION. should be secured through sympathetic kindness. In weak natures, the moral sentiments must be cultivated and guided into the paths of right and justice. Sympathy is the strongest element of power in this world. To secure proper conduct on the part of children, the will must be brought into subjection and made the means of controlling every act, however insignificant in character. Mean actions, insincere and doubt- ful motives that tend to selfishness, must be presented to the child in their true light. He must be led to practise truthfulness, frankness, and honesty, not only from their abstract ethical value, but for their practical application in life. The soil of a pure heart is the best ground in which to cultivate the cardinal virtues, whose fruits are habitual right conduct and sound moral character. Compayre says : " Moral instruction must touch the soul to the quick." The true kindergartner must herself possess such a character, and be a living example of the value of kindness, truthfulness, self-control, courtesy, and reverence. The value of high moral instruction cannot be over-estimated. Daniel Webster once said: " If we work upon mar- ble, it will perish; if we work upon brass, time will efface it; if we rear temples, they will crumble into dust; but if we work upon immortal minds, if we imbue them with principles, with the just fear of God and love of our fellow-men, we engrave upon these tablets something which will brighten to all eternity." Another eminent statesman and philoso- pher says: " It is the high mission of the kindergarten to take the child at the earliest practicable age, to train its eye to see, its ear to hear, its tongue to speak, its hands to do. Such teaching will call forth and train the sense for beauty, for color, for rhythm, for order, both in the material and moral world. It will develop the sense of duty and justice, thus helping into right relations toward the surroundings of the home and of society — all things of fundamental importance to every one of us, rich and poor, laborer and capitalist, ignorant and wise — and, more- over, all things which can be best started in those very years, and should be started under proper guidance. A wrong bent in this period, a neglect at this time, can never be made good by any amount of after- training." We would fain emphasize the vital truths embodied in these testimonies, and insist upon the "study of the child" as an indispensable requisite. Such study will have a powerful reflex and transforming influence upon the teacher herself. The child-heart is the fortress that must first be taken, and the teacher must combine both mother and friend if she would gain access to its inmost citadel. Intimately associated with character-building is the companionship of childhood. This must be regulated and guided to some extent by the teacher. This influence can only be gained by securing the child's entire confidence and love. This branch of her work touches our civil- SOME THINGS A KINDERGARTNER SHOULD KNOW. 563 ization at every point. For upon the foundations of individual char- acter are reared the grandest superstructures of the nation's greatness. As an element of high civilization these principles of moral instruction have been recognized as worthy subjects for thought by the great philos- ophers of the past. Do not leave this education as a philosophy to the philosophers. Claim it as in a special sense your business, and let it become your inspiration and highest incentive in your art. Such con- siderations will place the kindergartner in harmony with the Great Teacher's recognition of childhood when He said, " Except ye become as little children ye shall in no wise enter the kingdom of heaven;" and also with Froebel, who chose for his motto, " Come, let us live for our children." MANNERS OF THE KINDERGARTEN. Good manners are so important in connection with the training of childhood that they may be properly regarded as foundation-stones upon which to build for the future. A courteous bearing in personal inter- course implies genuine respect and a graceful exercise of the approved amenities of refined society. In this respect the kindergartner should realize that she teaches by example no less than by precept. Form and etiquette have a place within her sphere of work. Good breeding and winning manners are as essential as intellectual culture. Rudeness and awkwardness in children are unmistakable characteristics of lack of training in these respects. Coarse and unrefined manners necessarily impair the happiness and usefulness of the child's future. The best rules of etiquette for social intercourse demand not merely correct motives and right conduct, but agreeable and graceful forms of repre- sentation and expression. . These things the kindergartner must not only thoroughly comprehend, but habitually illustrate by her personal life and example. PREPARATORY WORK OP THE KINDERGARTEN. Enough has probably been said to make it obvious that the demands upon the kindergartner are far-reaching and of the most exacting char- acter. In what way can a young woman gain the requisite knowledge and prepare herself to meet successfully these varied claims? How can she determine that she possesses personal fitness for guiding and instruct- ing in a system so philosophic and so vital as that presented by the " New Education?" How can she attain and make available the basic princi- ples of attention, sense-culture, application, and good manners? We answer, by careful preliminary preparation in a good kindergarten train- ing-school. Such a school, of course, must be conducted by trainers well versed in Froebelian philosophy, and who have enjoyed a wide expe> 564 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION rience in the field of practical kindergarten work. Fortunately such schools are now to be found in almost every section of the country. It is unreasonable to expect a high measure of success without this preliminary training. It is universally conceded that the training of the normal school or its equivalent is essential for the proper qualifica- tion of a teacher in an ordinary public school. We believe and confi- dently affirm that the peculiar nature of the work required for the kindergarten imperatively demands not only a comprehensive general education combined with natural aptitude, but special professional cult- ure, which will unfold definitely and clearly the aims and purposes of Froebel's system. Much of the distrust that has existed, and still exists, among educa- tors has arisen from the fact that many untrained persons have under- taken the work who had no adequate conception, theoretically or practically, of a real kindergarten. A sham kindergartner will always produce a sham kindergarten. Maternal instincts and a real love of children are not of themselves sufficient to insure success. Added to these essentials, there must be thorough technical and professional train- ing. Sentiment and feeling have their place in following the divine command, "Feed my lambs," but the instincts and yearnings of child- hood cannot be exclusively nourished on the mere effervescence of even the noblest aspirations. Impulsive and hap-hazard work will never har- moniously train the bodies, minds, or souls of young children. Both the letter and the spirit of the Froebel system demand that the whole child be recognized in the kindergarten. Wherever results have fully met the requirements of this system, there we have found not only the American educator, but the American public, ready to award honor and respect. With Dr. W. T. Harris, we believe that " the kindergarten should be a part of the public-school system of every city in the United States. The ideal kindergarten should take children at the age of four years and retain them for two years. The character of its work is such as to humanize the children in a way that is impossible for the primary school, conducted according to its methods. The great interest in our management of education in the cities of the country is to reach the children of the poorer classes of people, those who have insufficient dwell- ing accommodation and no yards for the children to play in. The children of the great tenement-houses are obliged to play on the street, and the influence upon them is anything but humanizing. But one of the strong grounds for the general introduction of the kindergarten into all systems of schools is that the kindergarten reaches not only the poor- est class of the people and meets their wants, but it reaches also the children of the wealthy people. In this country the wealthy class is SOME THINGS A KINDERGARTNER SHOULD KNOW. 565 rapidly increasing in numbers. The children of the newly rich people are generally intrusted to governesses or servants. Their parents, absorbed in the management of property and readjusting themselves in the new social environment into which they rise, have but little time to give to the proper training of their children. These children are pre- cocious and inherit the extraordinary directive power of their parents, and are not easily managed by servants to whom they are intrusted. Hence, at an early age they become wilful and self-indulgent. The waste of this most precious element in our population is something frightful in the United States. When old enough to enter the pri- mary school, they are beyond cure. They will not submit themselves to the school rules, and hence they are often eliminated from well-regula- ted schools. In early manhood, the boys of this class destroy themselves by fast living. " The kindergarten furnishes activity for these precocious minds and trains them gently into rational habits. Although the kindergarten is not essential to the middle class of people, who associate a great deal with their children and throw about them a good home influence, yet even here the kindergarten is of great service in developing the skilful hand and eye, in nourishing the child's mind, through the symbolism of the plays and games, and in furnishing a rudimentary mathematical training. Unless the children of the proletariat and the children of the other extreme, the wealthy class, are brought into school early, they cannot be civilized by its influence. The kindergarten is the most essential adjunct now required to perfect our system of city schools." Be of good courage, then, kindergartners, who have toiled long and faithfully through the pioneer days of the work in America. Remem- ber, and be cheered by the reflection, that it is through your fidelity and devotion that the public has come to a juster appreciation of the value of this work. Remember that even in the recent past, childhood, as a rule, did not command the attention of the world as a prominent sub- ject of thought. Among old masters of art, Murillo alone made child- hood a subject for his canvas. His painting of " St. John" gives an almost ideal conception of childhood, and is one of the loveliest pictures in art. Since his day the exhibits of the world's great expositions by the best artists with brush or chisel have been illustrative of the various stages of childhood. The plays, studies, and prayers embody striking characteristics of child-life, and reflect the fact that the trend of our age, in this respect, has also a strong hold upon the thought and senti- ment of culture. Public opinion, at present, not only recognizes true kindergarten-training as an all-important factor in the education of young children, but seems to us almost ripe for the universal adoption of the free kindergarten as a part of the American school system. 566 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION THE EIGHTS OF CHILDBED. The kindergartner should understand that children have rights that must be recognized, although at their tender age they are unable to enforce them. A child's first right is to have his individuality respected and his natural and hereditary traits taken into account in his training. Second, that his inquisitiveness should be directed in lines of respectful questioning, for questions are the openings of the child's mind which will enable the teacher to turn the channels of activity toward the reser- voirs of truth. Thirdly, the child has a right to demand that his cult- ure should be laid upon broad foundations, free from narrowness and bigotry of mind or heart. Fourth, he has a right to claim a preparation which shall fit him to become a useful and worthy citizen of the State and nation. He has a right to demand that his imaginative powers shall be so developed as to enable him to appreciate the aesthetic beauties of nature and art. And lastly, he has the right to assistance in attain- ing the lofty heights of wisdom, from whose summits he may enjoy a wider vision of the sweetest and best things of this life and become bet- ter fitted for the celestial joys beyond. KINDERGARTEN LITERATURE. We have already insisted on special professional preparation in a good training-school, but in addition to this, the kindergartner should be familiar with the best literature relating to the history, philosophy, and methods of elementary education. The kindergartner needs a library containing books which treat directly and broadly of the principles and devices of her work. This library should contain such indispensable books as Froebel's " Education of Man" (Hailmann's edition) ; " Kin- dergarten Guide," by Maria Kraus-Boelte and John Kraus; Sully's " Ele- ments of Psychology;" Baker's " Elementary Psychology;" Spencer's "Education;" Preyer's " Study of Children" and " Soul of the Child;" "Child Culture" (Lectures and Essays), by Miss Elizabeth P. Peabody; "Unconscious Motherhood," by Miss Emma Marvadel; "The Kinder- garten and School," by Mrs. Putnam, Mrs. Peabody, and Miss Brooks; Henry Barnard's " Kindergarten Papers;" Mrs. Horace Mann's " Rem- iniscences of Froebel;" Von Billow's " Hand- work and Head-work;" "Paradise of Childhood," by Wiebe; Steiger's " Kindergarten Tracts," etc. Besides these and many others of kindred character, the library should contain a choice collection of song and story books prepared by eminent and experienced kindergartners, such as Mrs. Eudora L. Hail- mann, Mrs. Pollock, Mrs. Kate D. Wiggin, Miss Nora Smith, Mrs. Van Kirk, Misses Emerson and Brown, and others. One class of literature hitherto but little recognized, and of special SOME THINGS A KINDEROARTNER SHOULD KNOW. 507 value to the kindergartner, has not, in our judgment, been adequately appreciated. We refer to the study of the individual characteristics of representative men and women of the past and present, as revealed in their early years, which will furnish material for comparison, contrast, and imitation. Such books as Rideing's " Boyhoods of Living Authors " and Mrs. Sarah K. Bolton's admirable series are well suited to this purpose. We recognize the fact that such constant demands are made on the time and attention of the teacher as to permit of little systematic read- ing ; but if teachers would adopt the plan of reading a few paragraphs each day from the works of the best authors on education, their minds would be refreshed and strengthened. The theories and methods found in books can be tested in connection with their daily work with profit to both teacher and pupil. But if either the reading of books or the study of the child must be neglected, let it be the books, for, we reiter- ate, the real, living child is the best volume in the kindergartner's library for study and meditation. If we would teach, we must ourselves learn; if we would vitalize others, we must grow strong and vigorous ourselves; if we would be blessed in our preparation and work, we must be filled with its spirit and be loyal to its principles. MUSIC IN THE KINDERGARTEN. Among many other things which might be mentioned, did time per- mit, as essential for the kindergartner to know, is the right use and influence of music. Music has been defined as " the mother of sympathy and the handmaid of spiritual emotion." It charms and touches the heart ; it is a source of universal joy, for the better the ear and voice are trained, the more the harmonies of nature are enjoyed. Musical exer- cises break in upon the routine of the class-room and reveal and express the tenderest feelings of childhood. They should voice the natural ex- uberance of young life, be full of sprightliness and enthusiasm, and make rhythmic the activities. They should blend with plays and games and bring teacher and children into the most intimate social relations. The active child needs the aesthetic influence of the good-cheer that is inspired by appropriate songs and melodious voice expression. GYMNASTICS. We cannot commend the formal gymnastic exercises that are being introduced into the kindergarten in some quarters. The form of exer- cise that comes nearest to the natural training of the body is play. Every living being is prone to exercise his bodily functions spontaneously when he feels the stress of inaction. This may be properly called natural 568 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION exercise, for we see the young of every species of animals playing with one another, and may even observe their parents inciting them to it. Play, in the progress of civilization, has been subject to methods that tend to introduce an artificial element. This is wrong, and should have no place in the culture of the kindergarten. CONCLUSION. We would suggest that there is a very intimate connection between Tcnoiving and doing. Comenius said, " Let those things which should be done be learned by doing them." Every lesson ought to be made more potential in action than in mere speech. Children forget readily what has been simply told them, but remember what they have actually done themselves. Were we asked to name in a few words the leading characteristics of a true kindergartner, we should say that they are self-reliance, work, faith, hope, sympathy, and love. The exercise of these attributes requires patience. The products of good work cannot be fully realized in a week, a month, or a year. The gift of patience enables one to keep a tight grip upon the work in hand and to act serenely in the midst of the most trying circumstances. It is an old but true saying that " the horse that frets is the horse that sweats." Impatience destroys vitality and weakens the power for useful- ness. Placidity of mind enabled Emerson to keep calm and serene when his valuable library at Concord, containing the garnered treasures of many years' toil, was reduced to ashes. Putting out his hands, he said, good-naturedly, to his daughter, " Let us warm ourselves by this literary fire." They live wisely who can calmly wait. Finally, it is a good thing to strive for success — to know the things that make for it and to learn its secrets. This world in which we work is indeed a very pleasant one. In it the birds sing their sweetest notes, the air is perfumed with the fragrance of flowers, and the toilers work, rest, and recreate. To find the " Open Sesame" to life's highest and purest joys there must be no half-heartedness, no shrinking from its duties, no halting by the way. There must be a living faith, an untir- ing diligence, and a persistent perseverance. Kemember that what the world sometimes calls failure may be true success after all. It is, as the poet sings, " the virtue lies In the struggle, not in the prize." PROCEEDINGS ADDRESSES Elementary Department DEPARTMENT OF ELEMENTARY INSTRUCTION. SECRETARY'S MINUTES. FIRST SESSION. Pavilion, Toronto, July 16, 1891. The Department of Elementary Instruction was called to order at 3 p.m. by the President, H. S. Jones. Session opened with prayer, fol- lowed by music. F. B. Gault, of Tacoma, Washington, read a paper on " Primary Reading." " Natural Science for the Common Schools" was the title of a paper by W. S. Jackman, of the Cook County, 111., Normal School. This paper was discussed by C. W. Carman, of Michigan, and Gustave Gutenberg, of Pennsylvania. The President appointed the usual Committees on Nomination. Adjourned. SECOND SESSION.— July 17. The Department met in the Pavilion at 3 p.m., President Jones in the chair. The first paper was by Miss Abbie Low, of Erie, Pa. , on " The Educa- tional Burden upon the Lower Grades." The second paper was upon "Voice Culture," by Zalmon Richards, Washington, D. C. The Committee on Nominations submitted the following report, which was adopted: President, Miss Julia S. Tutwiler, Livingston, Alabama; Vice-President, Frank B. Gault, Tacoma, Washington; Secretary, Miss Lucia Stickney, Cincinnati, Ohio. Adjourned. 572 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION PAPERS. THE SYNTHETIC SOUND SYSTEM OF TEACHING READING. SUPT. F. B. GAULT, TACOMA, WASH. The studious teacher finds extreme difficulty, these times, in distin- guishing with certainty between evolution and revolution; between dogmatism and science; between reformation and "fad;" between what is effete in the " old education" and what is useless in the new. " Our little systems have their day ; They have their day, and cease to be." Methods of instruction are ephemeral. This is particularly true of methods of teaching reading. In the other branches a few things have been settled, in a general way at least, to the satisfaction of most people. But within twenty years we have had four distinct systems of teaching reading — the alphabet, the phonic, the word, and the sentence systems. To-day we find firm adherents of each of these methods — save the first — and also many intelligent and zealous teachers that combine them all in various ways and with varying success. The devices and expedients for adjusting these methods to each other and to the intelligence of chil- dren are ingenious and numerous. The author of a popular series of readers was shrewd enough and frank enough to say in his preface to the first reader : " Children have been taught to read by every method and by no method;" and it would puzzle the wisest to tell exactly how a child does learn to read our anomalous mother-tongue, and that the " merit of any system of teaching primary reading must be judged not by its conformity with this or that theory, but by the Baconian test of its 'fruits. ' " Doubtless these authoritative statements express the ultimate conviction of most teachers that there is no method of teaching primary reading that is logical in theory and sat- isfactory in practice. Learning to read, therefore, is a difficult process. There is no philosophy for the teacher to follow. Try anything or everything. If the child learns to read, the method is all right ; if he does not learn to read, the teacher must seek something new. But we are given the inspiring (?) assurance that there is little hope for anything more satisfactory, as the anomalies of our language will defeat any system. Here are two assumptions to which I object. First, that reading is the result of chance, of hap-hazard effort. That it has been so I admit, SYNTHETIC SOUND SYSTEM OF TEACHING READING. 573 that it ought not to be so all will agree. The child, as he begins his intellectual march, should have a plain, easy way; the processes he acquires should be simple, and these should direct and sustain him in his subsequent efforts. There should be no confusion, no uncertainty, no struggling to grasp the unattainable. Pupils should be so instructed in the art of reading that one step leads to another, the first and second steps making plain and possible the third, and so on in a progressive series. To grant otherwise, to admit that no one knows just how a child learns to read, is to make the science of education but an idle boast. Secondly, I object to calling our language anomalous, destitute of law, of analogy, of regularity. Not so very long ago we had educators who affected to ignore English grammar as a science, claiming that English could be acquired only through the Latin. True, our language is com- posite. Seemingly it is full of inconsistencies, of anomalies, of fragments of other languages — why? Because it is spoken by a dominant race; though eclectic, it is also the electric language of progress, and as such, appropriating from other tongues such terms as ever-changing necessities require. But there is, after all, in all this selection and adaptation, a wonderful conformity to law. This commercial, this cosmopolitan, language has been found to afford as clear classifications and as concise a grammar as those tongues de- veloped under more exclusive conditions. I take the time to refer to this exploded theory of a "grammarless speech" on account of its bearings. We are told that the words of our mother-tongue admit of no classifica- tions as to orthography and pronunciation. Some other Lindley Murray will yet enter the fields of orthography and orthoepy and develop the laws by which our words are spelled and pronounced. Is spelling purely arbitrary and conventional? Is pronunciation a matter wholly of fash- ion? Does each word of our language have a law of its own, to which it alone yields obedience? Opposed to the assertion that the little in our methods of teaching reading that is definite and positive is baffled, in large measure, by the anomalous character of our language, is the synthetic sound system of teaching reading. This system (Pillard) I shall endeavor to discuss, not exhaustively, but suggestively, and of course without any attempt to exemplify the method. My main proposition is this: The synthetic sound system has a plain, comprehensive theory that accords fully with scientific principles; that the development is easy, natural, and inspiring; that the results are just what the theory leads us to expect, and are, moreover, of the most gratifying character. 574 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION 1. The synthetic sound system begins with the sound, which is the unit of the language. For, says an authority, " Language in its proper nature consists, not of strokes made by the pen, nor of marks made in any other way, but of sounds uttered by the voice and organs of articulation " (Welsh). These sounds are learned and named by as- sociating them with familiar sounds, as of the lamb, or insect, or household pet. The imitative faculty in childhood is strong, so also is the imagination. Almost every vowel and consonant sound is taken directly from nature, and is easily within the range of the observation of each child. The elementary sounds of the language are first taken from the lips of the child in answer to the questions, " What does the rooster say?" " What is the cross dog's growl?" " What is the dove's talk?" " What is the bee's sound?" etc. The sound thus taken from nature, produced, or reproduced, by the child, is then represented by the letter with its appropriate diacritical mark. But the sound name, not the letter name, is applied to this character — the letter with its marking. Short a is the lamb's cry, and is written a (a) with the breve above it. Short a is the starting-point, and no other vowel is taken until short a is mastered. Certain conso- nant sounds are now developed from nature in the same manner. Two familiar consonants form a "key," and we have front-door keys and back-door keys. A single consonant or key joined to a vowel makes a "family," as the at, ag, am, and families. Lastly, the word is formed by combining perfectly familiar keys with perfectly familiar families; e.g., in the word black, ack is the family; 1)1 is the key; key and fam- ily compose the word. But it must be borne in mind that this is not the order of development. Words are not taken and torn to pieces — sounds are taken and built into words. Thus take at; by changing the key — i.e., the initial consonant — we have bat, cat, fat, gat, hat, mat, Nat, pat, sat, rat, vat; the whole list of monosyllabic words ending in at being built up by the pupil and acquired as readily as the stock word cat by the old methods of development. It will be observed that in securing these sounds the laws of association are utilized. As presented these sounds are not abstractions; they are typical sounds furnished by nature, and the little learner is thus provided with rich material for those mental operations so dominant in childhood — imitation and imag- ination. The sound of familiar animals, the pleasing conceit of family and door-key — these are a few of the happy features that appeal so responsively to childhood. After the sounds are secured and fixed, the analogies existing among words are employed. Thus, the only thing the child is required to remember is the sound and its sign, both easily acquired and readily SYNTHETIC SOUND SYSTEM OF TEACHING READING. 575 recalled by association. This, then, is my first point, that no arbitrary and exacting memorizing is demanded of the child. 2. The synthetic method does not depend upon the memory for a ready recognition of words. The child does not remember cat, bat, fat or vat as distinct word- forms. Having by synthesis put sounds together, the pupil readily reverses the process when the written word is placed before him. Or, rather, having composed words from sound units, he sees at once the units of sound that enter into the word, just as he sees five ones in five. He sees the sounds represented by families and keys. He calls his word as a result of what he knows. With the elementary sounds and the dia- critical marking as a system of notation, he can call any word that obeys the rules or analogies at his command. Of course, the less obvious conformities and all exceptions are with- held until the little beginner is fully grounded in the sounds under consideration. It is worthy of remark that when short a is mastered, the child has the key to the entire situation. Thereafter, through all the modifications of the vowel sounds, and in the blending of these with the various consonants, the analogies are so complete and certain that he can hardly err. I want this idea kept clearly in mind, that the synthetic method is founded upon analogy, upon law, upon association. It is well to distinguish between written and spoken language. We are advised that we must teach the word as a whole, as the " sign of an idea," this being the way in which a child learns the names of things as he begins to talk. "Follow nature," we are told. We forget that only the " articulate word, addressed to the ear, is the sign of an idea. A written word, merely exhibiting the same thing to the eye, is but the sign of this sign, an artificial dress." To the child on my knee I say dog, cow, kitty; he listens and imitates, essaying to repeat the whole word. He does this under the stimulus of an object present. When he attempts to acquire the written word, the process is essentially different. When I say cow, horse, ball, the child thinks at once of the object named. The written word suggests nothing to him. How shall he get that written word? Shall I name the written word, the sign that stands for the spoken word, which is itself the sign of the object, and thus get him to associate the real object with the sign of the sign? Thus, he has absolutely no clue whatever to the written word until some one, by some sort of process, impresses the word-form upon his memory, as representative of something. By the synthetic process, given this nota- tion, the sound elements of the word are taken, each is sounded aloud and the word pronounced; having now the sign, he may look for the thing signified. All this the pupil does for himself, no help whatever being given. Thus it will be seen we do not give the pupil any word; 576 THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION. we give him the means by which he gains the word by his own efforts. It is, therefore, a process of word-getting, of word-recognition, and memory is not the mental action most involved. Having thus acquired a typical or key word, every word of the entire group, analogous in orthography and pronunciation, is at his command. He is not " Hauled through a language's perplexing maze " one word at a time, building up his vocabulary of written words from single, detached, disconnected word-forms. Classification, system, law, guide his efforts and gauge high his results. I am easily sceptical as to the doctrine that a child must learn words as the "sign of an idea;" that it is nature's plan for the child to learn the object and then inquire for its written designation ; that the move- ment of mental action is always from object to name ; that the movement of formal instruction necessarily proceeds from object to picture, and from picture to written word — object cat, picture cat, word cat. It seems almost certain that in infancy the first attempts at articulate speech are merely mechanical, without any idea of signification. His first utterances may be intelligible, but they are not intelligent. After he gets the word, he gradually gets the purport. We know that the babe opens his eyes and sees not ; that his ears do not catch sounds ; that he cries without intelligence back of his wail; without doubt his first utterances are without knowledge of what is uttered. There comes a time when he learns the name from the object itself. But even then the two processes are used interchangeably — that is unquestionable. He passes from word to purport as well as from idea to term. We have here two processes in nature. So, then, I can see no possible objection to a child learning written words in advance of the purport, the thing signified. By our method the word comes first. Of course, the word is either understood or it is not. I have repeatedly observed that when a pupil comes to a word which upon sounding aloud he recognizes, his face brightens up as his ears catch from his lips a word familiar to his ear. The written word becomes to him the spoken word, and the spoken word reminds him of the familiar object or idea. In case of words wholly unfamiliar, he must wait for time and opportunity to disclose to him the purport. By the old methods pupils are unable to pronounce readily at sight simple words whose meaning is perfectly clear; by this method the pupil promptly calls difficult words of which he may never have heard, and has not the faintest idea of the purport. This states extreme cases — I prefer the latter condition. 3. The synthetic method gives certainty and independence in the recognition of words. That which a pupil secures for himself he is most apt to retain. That SYNTHETIC SOUND SYSTEM OF TEACHING READING. 577 which ho secures through a logical process is more reliable than any bare a