Compare, for example, the old method of teaching geography with the new.
Under the abandoned system, the child began with capes, peninsulas, continents, meridians, trade routes, rivers, boundaries and products.
Under the new system, he begins with the town in which he lives. Each schoolroom in Newark, for example, is provided with a large map of the city. In addition to these complete maps, each child is given a series of small maps, each of which centers about a familiar square, store, or public building. Then, from this simple beginning, the child fills in the surrounding streets and buildings. Newark geography begins in the third grade with a description of the school yard and the surroundings of the school lot. After all, what more simple geography could be conceived than the geography that you already know. Borneo and Beloochistan are abstractions except to the most traveled, but what child has not noted the red bricks and ugly iron fences surrounding his own school yard? Charity and geography both begin logically at home.
When in the later Newark grades the children are taught about Europe and Australasia, they are taught on a background of the geography of yards, alleys, squares, streets and playgrounds with which they are familiar.
Geography thus concretely presented, becomes comprehensible to even the dullest mind.
III Playing at Mathematics
The pa.s.sing system of elementary mathematics took the innocents through addition, subtraction and the abatis of multiplication tables, until every child was fully convinced that
Multiplication is vexation, Division"s twice as bad, The rule of three perplexes me, And practice drives one mad.
To-day arithmetic begins with life. The teachers at Gary organize games in which the children are divided into two sides. Some of the children play the game, while others keep score. Unconsciously, under the stress of the most gripping of impulses--the desire to win--these little scorekeepers learn addition. As they advance in the work, they take up practical problems--measure the room for flooring and measure the school pavement for cementing. At school No. 4, in Indianapolis, one of the teachers wanted a cold-frame and a hot-bed for use in connection with her nature work. The cla.s.s in mathematics made the measurements; the drawing cla.s.s provided the plans; the boys in the seventh and eighth grades dug the pit and constructed the beds.
The higher grade mathematics work in Indianapolis is extremely concrete.
Prices and descriptions of materials are supplied, and the children are asked to compute given problems involving the buying of meats, groceries, and other household articles; the cost of heating and lighting the home; the cost of home furnishing; the construction of buildings; cost-keeping in various factories; the management of the city hospital; the taxation of Indianapolis; the estimation and construction of pavement; and, generally, the mathematical problems involved in the conduct of public and private business.
Mathematics is alive when it is joined to the problem of life. Well taught, it becomes a part of the real experiences of childhood and furnishes a foundation for the knowledge of later life.
IV A Model English Lesson
Of all subjects taught in the schools, English is the most practical, because it is most used in life. We buy with it, sell with it, converse with it, write with it, adore with it, and protest with it. English is the open sesame of life in English-speaking countries. In some cla.s.ses the English period would be fascinating even for adults.
What experience could be more delightful than a visit to a third or fourth grade room in which the children were writing original poems, fables and stories! The monotony of routine English work was completely broken down; the children were enthusiastic,--enthusiastic to such a degree that they had all written poetry.
Just before Halloween the teacher had distributed pictures of a witch on a broomstick, with a cat at her side, riding toward the moon. Each child was called upon for an original poem on this picture. One boy of eight wrote:--
There was an old witch Who flew up in the sky, To visit the moon That was shining so high.
Another child improved somewhat upon the versification--
The witch"s cat was as black as her hat, As black as her hat was he.
He had yellow eyes which looked very wise As he sailed high over the trees.
How many of you mature men and women could have done a better piece of work than Dorothy Hall, nine and a half years old?
THE MOONLIGHT PEOPLE
When the stars are twinkling, And the ground with snow is white, And we are just awaking For to see the morning light; Little moonlight people Are dancing here and there O"er a snow white carpet, Dancing everywhere.
This same cla.s.s of little people, after learning Riley"s "Pixie People,"
were asked to write down what they believed were the circ.u.mstances under which Riley composed the poem. Their reasons varied all the way from a dream of b.u.t.terflies, to cornfields.
Seventh and eighth grade children in this same city (Newton, Ma.s.s.) write books, the t.i.tles of which are selected by the children with the approval of the teacher. "A Boy"s Life in New York," "Fairy Stories,"
"A Book About Airships," "A Story of Boarding School Life," are a few of the t.i.tles. Having chosen his t.i.tle, the child outlines the work and then begins on it, writing it week by week, ill.u.s.trating the text with drawings, illuminating and decorating the margins with water colors, painting a tasty cover, and at last, as the product of a year"s work in English, taking home a book written, hand printed, hand illumined, covered and bound by the author. Could you recognize in this fascinating task the dreaded English composition and spelling of your childhood days?
One eighth grade lad, who had always made a rather poor showing in school, decided to write his book on birds. As he worked into the subject it gradually got hold of him. In the early spring he found himself, at half past four, morning after morning, out in the squares, the parks and the fields, watching for the birds. He became absorbed in writing his book, but at the same time the teachers of other subjects found him taking additional interest in them. The whole tone of his school work improved; and when, in May, he delivered an ill.u.s.trated lecture, before one of the teachers" meetings, on the birds of Newton, he was triumphant. In less than a year he had vitalized his whole being with an interest in one study.
"In his talk to the teachers," said Superintendent Spalding, "he showed a deeper knowledge of the subject than most of the teachers present possessed."
Those who remember with a shiver of dread the syntax, parsing, sentence diagramming, paragraph dissecting, machine composition construction of the grammar grades, should have stepped with me into the cla.s.s of an Indianapolis teacher of seventh grade English. The teacher sat in the back of the room. The cla.s.s bent forward, attentively listening while a roughly clad, uncouth boy, slipshod in att.i.tude, stumbled through the broken periods of his ungrammatical sentences.
"And Esau went out after a venison," he was saying, "and Jacob"s mother cooked up some goat"s meat till it smelled like a venison. And then Jacob, he took the venison--I mean the goat"s meat to Isaac, and Isaac couldn"t tell it wasn"t Esau because"--so the story continued for two or three minutes. When it was ended, the boy stood looking gloomily at the cla.s.s.
"Well, cla.s.s?" queried Miss Howes, "has any one any criticism to make?"
Instantly, three-quarters of the cla.s.s was on its feet.
"Well, Edward."
Edward, a manly fellow, spoke quietly to the boy who had told the story.
"Paul, you don"t talk quite loud enough. Then you should raise and lower your voice more."
Several of the cla.s.s (having intended to make the same criticism) sat down with Edward. The teacher turned.
"Yes, Mary."
"Paul, your grammar wasn"t very good. You didn"t make periods."
One by one, in a spirit of kindly helpfulness, criticisms were made.
When the children had finished, Miss Howes said:
"Paul, you did very well. This is your first time in this cla.s.s, isn"t it?"
"Yes"m."
"Yes, Paul, you did very well; but, Paul"--and with care and precision she outlined his mistakes, suggesting in each case ways of avoiding them in the future.
Throughout the grades in Indianapolis the children have some oral English work every day. When they reach the seventh and eighth years this oral work takes on quite pretentious forms. Beginning with Aesop"s Fables, the children tell fairy tales, Bible stories, Greek legends, Norse legends, animal stories, and any other stories that the teacher thinks appropriate. Each child may select in the particular group of stories whatever topic seems most interesting.
Each day has its written English work, too. On Monday, letters are written and criticized; Tuesday is composition day; on Wednesday each scholar writes a description of the day in a Season Journal; Thursday is set aside for the revision and correction of compositions; and on Friday, the letters for the following Monday are written. Wherever possible, the subjects for written work are selected with reference to the other studies which the child is taking.
V An Original Fairy Story
The work is arranged primarily to arouse interest. At Halloween, the theme is timely, and one girl, Dorothy Morrison, selects as her t.i.tle, "How the Witch got the Black Cat for her Prisoner." Read this charming fairy tale--an original piece of work by a girl of twelve:
"Years ago, when the witch rode her broomstick, no snarling black cat accompanied her on her midnight rides. That wicked person was always planning and plotting how to get some nice young girl to go with her.
"At this time there lived a beautiful fairy, who was condemned to death by a cruel magician, who had no reason to do so. This good fairy, Eilene, finally decided to take the shape of a bird and to fly through the tiny window of her prison to her old friend, Mr. Moon.
"She did so, and when she arrived at her friend"s home she a.s.sumed the form of a fairy and entreated him to keep her safe from the cruel clutches of the magician.
"He promised to do his best.
"The next Halloween, the witch, Crono, rode up to the moon and on spying Eilene she exclaimed, "Aha, just what I have been looking for--a nice young maiden."