Belmont chronicle. [volume] (St. Clairsville, Ohio) 1855-1973, 1877-11-15

co paper quotes some remarks OF Mr..
George Howell, an English writer,
who has devoted much attention tOthe
uatter, and which are eminently prac-
tical. 1.-The one great lesson," he says,
''to Re learned is this, that technical
education can at its best only be sup
Elementary to something that has
gone before, that something being
knowledge of the practical details of
the trade, which can only he obtained
in the workshop" The boy, he ar
CUES, before beginning his trade shonld
he sent to the public school, SO that he
may receive mental training, which
will enable him sooner to master the
details of his trade, and when he has
once gone into the workshop ''it is
now," says Mr..HoWell, "that the real
work of technical education must be-
gin; the youth can only be taught the
special scientific principles which ap-
pertain to his craft and their applica-
tion in the workshop after he has be-
gun to learn his trade. and his instruc-
tion should be continued side by side
with the experience gained from time
to time in his daily labor. Appren-
ticeship, in some form or other, will be
htCtVu, III ~
a trade. as nothing Can supersede this"
This probably gets to the root of the
matter better than the idea of turning
the school into a workshop, and yet
we do not know but that the latter
plan would be eneficial in many ways.
The journal from which We have al
ready quoted says: "There is little
hope that skilled mechanics would he
turned out by proposed combination
of public school and workshop. The
pupils would soon regard the work rs
work indeed, with no satisfaction of
pav on Saturday night, or they would
see no use in studying bopks TO teach
them how to plane board" But
books would teach them more than the
purely mechanical par of a handicraft.
At one time knowledge Of chemistry
WAS looked up as being useful only
TO the man of science. Now we find
1t entering the domain of agriculture,
and those who till the soil have dis
covered the bennfits which result from
an acquaintance with It's laws. A
know ledge of mathematics, of the laws
of weight and force will help the car
penter or the stone mason as much as
the astronomer. And since science has
become pOpularized its economic value |
in all the walks of business life has
been conceded. But independent of
this, a technical education would have |
other advantages. We may grant that |
the students at college would see no |
use i'm studying books to teach them |
how to plane board. But often the
same study seems tC teach them moth !
ing higher than how to pull an oar.
With many of them that arquirement |
is considered to be one of the most i'm |
pOrtant of all branches Of learning, and !
everything else pales into insignif1cance |
before it. If a system OF industrial |
education had been in force at Rut- |
gers College we would have been spa |
red the exhibition of faculty and stu |
dents arrayed against each other, OF !
fights with policemen, of that OppOsi-
ton to and disregard of constituted au
thnrity which has provoked criticism |
throughout the whole country. The |
of saw buck and the /
exercise required to get |
knotty block of hard wood
have often bad a salut,ry effect on re- /
fractory youngsters. And ifsOne such
rudiments of wOodcraft had been dig
nified by the title OF industrial educa-
tion and taught in the college in queS-
ton the rebellion which at present ex-
lists there would long before have died
out.
Probably when education embodies
in il not only abstruse mental studies,
but facts, the knowledge of which is
necessary in the workshop as well rs
in the pulpit and in the factory, equal
Iy a. well as at the bench and the bar,
the true dignity Of labor will be better
understood, and the young will be
more truly fitted to fill the vocation
into which they may be called.-Bslt.
w