The semi-weekly miner. [volume] (Butte, Mont.) 1882-1886, 1884-03-26
INSTITUTE.
Brief Report Of the First Days
Proceedings.

The Teachers Institute of Silver
Bow county convened in the Central
school building in this city at 10
O'Clock q. m. yesterday, Superintend-
ent Lockley presiding. After the
opening exercises, which consisted
Of music and bible reading, Miss
Mary Layton was appointed secre-
tary, and committees on resolutions
and text books were also appointed.
The names Of seventeen members
were then enrolled, and the enroll
ment was largely increased 10 the af-
ternoon. The superintendent made
brief Introductory remarks setting
forth the object of the institute.
School Principal E. B. Howell gave
an interesting address on text books,
which led to an animated discussion.
In the afternoon, Miss Siebenaler
gave a recitation in language by her
class, which was followed by a reci-
tation In grammar by some of Miss
Hutchins' pupils. The little folks
acquitted themselves very creditably
and were warmly commended.
Miss Emerson read an essay on the
method of teaching geography, In
which she favored the synthetic
method as opposed 10 the analytic.
This was colnbatted by Miss Layton,
who preferred the analytic method.
Quite an interesting discussion grew
out of this controversy, which occu-
pied the rest of the afternoon session.
The evening session was held in
the Presbyterian Church and a large
audience was present. After some
musical exercises, Supt. Lockley read
q paper on Common School Educa-
cion," in which he gave some useful
counsel to teachers, and then dwelt
at length on the methods of teaching
grammar. The following 10 a portion
of his address:
1 visit your school rooms, and find
some of the advanced classes wrestling
as for dear life, on blackboard and
paper, with some analytical process.
The teacher tells me they are diagram
ing sentences. We will suppose the
exercise to he this oft quoted saying
of Pope's:
Man wants but little here below.
Nor wants that little long.
This sufficiently plain statement
will be divided into clauses, and sub.
divided into copulas, attributes and
logical, grammatical and modified
predicates. Now [ will wager a rea
s0nable sum that the poet who wrote
this simple truth. with all his learn
ing and literary a%stuteness, could not
diagram it, according to u modern
methods, Composing he were still in
the fesh,) if his life depended on the
achievement. In one of Moliere's
most amusing French COM
edies, We are introduced to
a retired tradesman, who on sur
rounding himself:with Latin, gram
mar. fencing and dancing masters.
made the astonishing discovery that
he had been talking prose all his life
without knowing it. so the child
rem Of the present generation, I
maintain, can learn to enjoy a good
author and speak their own language
without cudgeling their brains over
the fearful nomenclature that is set
before them to learn. or dissecting
and disemboweling a sentence in
order to arrive at its meaning.
We perform the functions of life
without going into the study of
anatomy. To enable us to walk and
talk, to eat and sleep, to stand up
and lie down, it is not necessary to
know and enumerate all the nerves
and muscles that are brought into
action, and diagram all the parts of
the human BODY as q preparation to
their correct use. This is the mere
extravagance of scholasticism.
The speaker took the position that
as the English language is mainly
derived from the Latin and French,
the study of either of these would be
more profitable than English gram.
mar, because similar grammatical
rules govern the construction of those
tongues, and the study would be
useful. This was discussed
by Principal Howell, Prof. Smith
and Mrs. Owen. The exercises
were quite interesting.
The day session will be held In the
Central school house to-day, begin
ming at $50 and 2 p.m., and in the
evening, in the Presbyterian church,
Howell will discuss evolution.