The Manitowoc tribune. [volume] (Manitowoc, Wis.) 1866-1878, 1876-11-30
EDUCATIONAL.
BY G. F. VIEBAHN.
THE CLASSIFICATION OF A SCHOOL.

THE CLASSIFICATION OF SCHOOL.
One of the most important but at the
same time one of the most difficult du-
ties which teacher, newly appointed to
take charge of mixed country school.
has to perform, is to form the pupils in
to classes. To perform this duty right
| ly requires a knowledge of the condition
and progress of the school, and also
some experience in school work gener-
ally.
It should be the aim of the organizer
to form as many classes as the necessary
and the different grades of the pupils
advancement demand, and no more. Ev-
erybody can comprehend that time is
saved and the teachers work more effec-
tive in school with few classes than in
one of many classes. To understand
this, it is only necessary to contrast i'll
our minds q school of forty pupils, in
which each is taught separately, each
constituting kind of claas by himself,
with school in which this number of
pupils are instructed and recite in eight
or ten classes.
Some of our graded schools may have
too few but one of the great defects Of
our mixed schools is that they generally
have too many classes. One of the
greatest benefits that could accrue to
them would be classification on nor
NAL basis, and this would give us, in
most cases, one class for every two found
at present. The most common complaint
of country teachers is that they have too
little time to hear all the recitations of
One of the great aims in modern pro-
gress has been to save time. We find
this in the various industrial pursuits of
man; and this saving of time has brought
with it an increase of producing power.
So our schools with fewer classes would
save time to accomplish much more than
is now accomplished. 1t is not an easy
task, however, to classify school prop
erly. Too many evils exist and have
existed in them ever since their estab-
Iishment, that are great hindrances to
improvement in this respect. Among
these evils are the irregular attendance
of pupils, the variety of the textbooks
in use, and the multiplicity of studies.
Irregular attendance binders classifi-
cation in this way. A class, let us sup
pose, begins with Decimal Fractions at
the beginning of the year they finish
this subject in about two months and
are permitted to begin the study OF Per-
centage; but large number of the class
were absent most of the time during
these two months, and they have not
mastered the subject pursued; and when
they come again in the winter, they can
not proceed with their former class
mates, and new arithmetic class is
formed for them, unless the classes are
already so numerous that they cannot
fall behind without falling into another
class: There are schools in which there
is an arithmetic class for almost every
chapter in the book.
The great variety of text books has
this to do with classification. In one
school there are seven classes in geogra-
ply, because there are seven kinds of
textbooks treating this branch in use; IN
another school there are seven reading
classes, because an Eastern book house
finds it profitable to furnish with SER
les seven books rather than with q series
of three or four books, which are all that
are reilly necessary. The teachers have
also some of the blame. There are those
who think they can teach only with the
aid of certain books; and when they find
others in use create chaos by introduce
ing their pet series. All the pupils do
not buy the new books, and, as a conse-
quence, we soon find that one class has
developed into taoo, one using the old
and the other the new books.
The multiplicity Of studies also does
much in opposition to systematic clas-
sifcation. Just think, reading, penman-
ship, orthoepy, spelling, grammar, word
analysis, written arithmetic, mental ar
ithmetic, geography, history and constl-
tuition, are often only part of the stud
les separately pursued in our country
schools. Is it wonder that teachers
with all this scattering work to do, ac-
complish little, both by way of instruct
ing their pupils, and by way of improv-
ing and preparing themselves.
The most learned teacher needs to
prepare for his daily work; but he would
prepare himself for every class in coun-
try school he must possess more energy
than is allotted to average mortals. The
work in these schools is necessarily as
inefficient as that of mechanic who Is
continually running from one piece of
work to another, always beginning, but
never begun.
This much of the evil of the remedy
next time.
WONDERFUL Successful is reported
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