Burlington weekly free press. [volume] (Burlington, Vt.) 1866-1928, 1869-04-16
EDUCATIONAL.
v hat shall Children Study /,

i professor in one Of the prominent colleges Of
New York has lately remarked that the peculiar
defects Of the students under his charge relate to
the primary branches Of education. He says
that students who come well fitted for college in
the studies observation-disclosures much at home
IN the dead languages and the mathematics
cannot write good English, and find it impossi-
be 10 spell what they write correctly. II Is not
month since letter was shown 10 us from a
New England college, written by the represcn-
tatiye man Of a literary society, which revealed
a lamentable lack Of spelling-bo0k And to
come nearer home-to the children among whom
We move daily-we know a little girl, quick TO
learn, who has attended the best schools that
could be procured for her all her life. girl who
can play Nozart's sonatas with good taste and
effect, who has been through Colburn's First
Lessons and understood them, who has studied
geography, history, and grammar, yet who, in
the writing Of letter occupying page and
quarter Of note paper, made fifteen blunders in
her orthograPhy. Now who is to blame for this
state Of things?
The matter is become a serious one, alike with
parents and children, and it will be well to in
quire into it by the aid of the lights of exper-
lence There are very few persons in the world
who can recall what they learned Of history, and
geography, and philosophy, and astronomy, be-
fore the age Of thirteen, as anything Of positive
value to them. We would like to have every
man and woman who takes interest enough in
this article to read it, try to recall and survey
the actual practical benefits resulting from the
early pursuit Of these studies How much do
you know about them now, that you learned
then Do you remember a single valuable fact
of history, or geography, or philosophy, that
you acquired them Are you not painfully con-
scious that the months and years which you de-
voted in your childhood to the acquisition of dry
rules and facts, of whose value and relations
you knew nothing, were thrown awayl Do you
not feel that if, during those years, you had
been taught to write the English language in
legible hand and in n presentabe style of COM
position, you would have gained something that
would be of incalculable value now?
1t is notorious that though our people in gen
eral are better educated than any other people
on the earth, the rarest accomplishments are
those of good reading and good writing. Men
and women are coming every day into the active
work Of life with an absolute hatred Of the pen.
They come out Of the common schools, the SEM
inaries and the colleges, with decided aversion
to the writing Of their mother tongue, and a
marked inability to do it creditably. Indeed,
the cause of this dislike of writing abdes in the
consciousness Of inability to write well. Men
get into the business routine Of letter writing af-
ter a stupid, formal sort, but are all afoat when
asked TO write petition TO the City Council, or
when they undertake to write letter to a news
paper, or even to a friend. Women upon whose
education thousands of dollars have been expend-
ed, write the merest baby-talk to their CORES
pondents, and write no more frequently than
they are obliged to write. Nothing scares them