River Falls journal. [volume] (River Falls, Pierce County, Wis.) 1872-2019, 1888-03-29

FRED. rNABNrr, OF PLUM CITY, WIS.

The Science of Arithmetic is the
knowledge of its laws, principles, def
nitions, and relations. Art applies this
knowledge to the practical affairs of life.
In order to get any practical benefit
from arithmetic, the pupil must under
stand the principles and rules of science
How shall the pupil acquire this under
standing? IS there any other way but
to lead him to find these out himself?
of coarse we are obliged to give him
such numbers of objects to compare and
sea, and such problems to solve, that he
may most quickly and easily find out the
principles and rules.
Let the pupil memorize rules verbatim
from the text book and work by them
mechanically, the greater part of his
school days at least, will be past before
he really. finds out what he is doing. He
may possibly see few little truths but
that is all. Take for instance Longitude
and Time; let a person memorize every
word of the rules work all the examples
given by the text book, and then drop
the subject for few months; if you give
him such problem then, he is altogeth-
er at loss how to solve it, His memory
fails to tell him for certainty whether
he should multiply or divide. In com
putting the difference of time or of longi-
tude, he does not remember whether he
should add or subtract
Such things tell us to lead a pupil to
comprehend rule if we wish to do him
any good.
How shall we teach arithmetic to begin
ners? The Course of Study tells us to
teach by Grube's Method or some equiv
alent. What equivalent have we unless
it is another method just like it? CRUDE
says keep them year in learning the
numbers to nine" understand that he
means more than six months school,
and the recitations to be more than of
five or ten minutes duration.
According to CRUDE, we are to illustrate
everything possible by objects; this is a
great point in favor of the method He
is not merely taught to say that two As
make eight, but he can see it and knows
it. CRUDE tells us to give the child mum
erous problems in applied numbers. If
he is early and thoroughly trained in
these, he will find to his great benefit
afterwards, that knowing how to work an
example bothers him but little more
than the work itself, and he is not afraid
to meet problem, of which the process
of computation is not stated at the head
of the page.
Since arithmetic is studied for life; and
in life there are none but applied num-
bers, we act well to givethem many such.
Since most of our text books give too few
of these examples, WI" ran supply the de-
ficiency by examples placed upon the
blackboard, arithmetcal tablets or by
some other way To make these of the
proper degree of difficulty is matter of
no small importance.
By Grubes Method, common denom-
mate numbers are taught as the child
progresses with his numbers; that is.
when he reaches such numbers as 8, 6, 7,
10, r. Ia, Is, etc This will greatly lessen
the difficulty OF LEI rning the tables, when
he comes to them, and generally he will
see some reality in reduction of COM
pound numbers. This method (Grube's)
requires the learner to review every
thing previous to taking up new num-
Der. Since by reviewing alone a thing
is fastened securely in the memory, this
is not an item to be deprecated.
CRUDE teaches fractions effectively,
and in what other way can they be learnt?
If he has beginning of learning fractions
as taught by CRUDE, half of the difficulties
are overcome. | know that by mere
rules pupil can work every example Civ
en- in Robinson's Rudiments of Arithme-
tic and then not know how many fourths
there are in three whole things.
| think that fractions, at least in the
Upper Form, should be taught thorough
ly before going step farther. In solv-
ing examples in the different forms of
Percentage, if the pupil is puzzled how to
perform the operation, can not the cause
be traced down to an incomplete knowl-
edge of fractions?
Again the mental work Grube's Meth
Cd affords is worthy of consideration. l
think that we can not teach arithmetic
too much mentally.
If we solve any problem by figures, is
it not by our mental work to great ex-
tent by which we obtain the result? Is
person buying goods, or farmer sell
ing his produce, supplied with pencil and
paper with which to make his calcula-
tons? AS a general thing he is not.
This mental ability to compute is more
often acquired after school life than dur
ing it.
Let us give the pupils many mental
drills, not hindered by too much oral
work, that is, have as much thinking and
as little talking as possible. An OCCASION
al analysis of problem is good so far as
it tells the teacher that the learner is COM
putting by correct methods.
In conclusion l will state, let us give
Grube's Method a fair trial ourselves,
and very likely we will be convinced that
it has no equal.