Watertown republican. [volume] (Watertown, Wis.) 1860-1906, 1885-07-22
THE PUBLIC SCHOOLS.
Vicious Practices on the Part of Educators
Forcing Processes.

Forcing Processes.
AT Y&Siic dinners and other gather.
ings we are much given to Boosting Of
our public schools, of the thoroughness
of the instruction which they impart,
and of the brilliant pupils they send
out to dazzle wondering and Devil
dered world. They are indeed idols,
that we worship with a heathen-like
persistency, and we give to them pow-
ers which they do not possess and
virtues which they cannot Justly claim.
AS we bow down to them we are prone
to hug the fattering delusion to
our souls that there are no similar
institutions of learning elsewhere that
produce such benefcent results. This,
100, in the face of the fact that there
are plenty of men and women in our
own city who have never enjoyed the
advantages which our public schools
are supposed to offer, but who are fully
equal, if not superior, in intelligence
and general culture to the graduates of
our much lauded temples of knowledge
The schools are all right in intent and
theory. No one will presume to CUES
ton this, but in practice they fail to
carry out the philanthropic ideas which
led to their foundation.
They are no longer places where the
mind is trained in a healthy manner.
They are forcing houses, SO. to speak,
where young trees are made to bear
premature fruit, where the intellect is
too often dWarfed by over-study. and
where the body, in spite Of systematic.
gymnastic exercises. is robbed of it's
vitality, and made a nervous wreck
upon the shores of life. This may seem
like highly-colored picture, but many
a sorrowing parent can testify to the
truth of these assertions, and many of
their children are living witnesses of
the folly of an educational system
which skaters the mind and ruins the
constitution. The schools of the pres
ent day seem to be conducted for the
glorifcation of the teachers and the
supervisors, and not for the good of the
children, who are stuffed like geese to
make a good showing on promotion
day, but who have little real knowledge
of subjects in which they are supposed
to shine.
Difficult home lessons for pupils of
tender age are the rule and not the ex-
ception i'll our public schools. and it is
not an uncommon thing for children
of nine or ten years of age to sit Up at
night, long after tho time when they
should be in bed, to do fifteen or TWEEN
ty difficult sums to carry to school the
following morning. 1t may seem like
an eXaggeration to those not familiar
with the facts, to say that some small
children have been required by the
system now in vogue in our public
schools to draw seven or eight maps
for home lesson, and that equally
arduous tasks have been set for others
to perform after the regular school
hours.
1t is high time that a good deal of
this kind of work should be stopped by
the Society for the Prevention of Cruel
ty to Children, if there is no other au-
thority to step in and stay the hand of
the destroyer. That there are some
robust children who can stand the
strain put upon them in the public
schools is no reason why those more
delicately organized should be sacri-
feed to an ambition that is as tyran-
nical and cruel in its way as any the
world has ever seen.
All good parents should protest
against these burdensome home les
sons. They do not advance the child
one step in substantial requirements.
They undermine the health by depriv-
ing the cltld of rest and recreation,
and the momentary brilliancy which
they sometimes produce is like heat
lightning, gone as soon as it is seen.
Five hours day is as much as any
child should devote to study and recita-
ton, and many full-grown persons do
not devote any more time to exclusively
mental labor.-BoStoaa Budget.