I had some rather ridiculous results. I tried the fourth and fifth examples on a second grade the other day and had an almost perfect score, while a ninth-grade class in arithmetic, which had been taught under the old arithmetical curriculum, made a sorry showing. Out of twenty-nine in the class only six gave me the correct answer to problem five. We have already seen results of our new course of study. The old-time diffidence is gone.
Children are no longer tongue-tied and unable to put a new idea into words.
I am not surprised. I had expected a report like this. You will recall the terrible English used in one of our eighth grade rooms, taken down as it was spoken, which I have quoted in the first article. I went into the same room five years afterwards. The same teacher was in charge, and some of the children in the room were younger brothers and sisters of the previous group, but the methods of teaching had radically changed.