Pittsburg dispatch. [volume] (Pittsburg [Pa.]) 1880-1923, 1889-04-14
EDUCATIONAL ERROR.
How Earnest Reformers Can Help the
Young Ideas Of the Nation.
FAULTS OF OUR SCHOOL SYSTEM.
Why Some of the Text Books Should be
Consigned to Oblivion.
SPELLING SEEMINGLY A LOST ART
WRITTEN roR THE DrsrArcH. !

school training might be better than it is:
If you do not like the word common" you
may style it 'public," democratic, "tht
bulwark of liberty" ''the conservator o.
civilization" or whatever else may please
your fancy, but please do not fall into the
demsgogIc style of praise that hides mul.
titude of sins. 1t isn't necessary to call at
tention at this time to the chalk-and-watel
stuff that is put out by publishing houses as
nutriment for the infantile brain, such as
"John has dog. Did you see his dog?
John is good boy and loves his dog. Oul
Heavenly Father made dogs, and it is oul
duty to treat them kindly" etc. Any
teacher of experience and sense knows that
such twaddle is an insult to the intelligence
of 7-year-old boy or girl, unless such girl
or boy be feeble-minded.
The trouble is that waste effort does not
end here. The memory is taxed in the
learning of many things which do not tend
to awaken thought or stimulate the reason
ing powers, and the process is not only con-
tinued through the public school course,
but runs in a measure through high schools
and colleges, and people are frequently
turned out OF college who cannot spell cor
rectly one-half of the words which form the
basis of our language, and in practice trans
gress in composition the simplest rules in its
grammar. And thisis largely because studies
mainly ornamental are forced on pupils,
taking time that should be devoted to essen
tials. If child be born rich and have 20
years in which to complete course, it is all
well enough, perhaps, if he have the inclina-
ton, to study the fine arts and three or four
dead languages, but when parents are poor
and the education of their children is only
accomplished at a sacrifice of comfort, not to
say health, the object of common school
training should be to equip children for
future struggles, and this is generally OBJ
tained without the knowledge of many
ologies now specifically taught If any
thing more be necessary
LET THE STATE TAKE CHARGE,
as some Socialists urge, and not only pro-
vide the school, but the books, clothing and
food of the child also. Edward Everett,
who rated as q ripe scholar, is quoted as
saying that a liberal education consisted in
the ability to read English understandingly,
to know arithmetic, to spell we'll and to be
able to write English grammatically and
forcibly. He admitted that to be an en-
gineer. or chemist, or a theologian, or "a
lawyer, etc., additional special training
would be necessary, but the child that had
the rudiments first named could, if pos
sessed of the force requisite to success, soon
acquire the needed extra training.
A short time ago 1 heard two BOYS cate
chising each other on their history lesson,
so as to assure themselves that they would
be able to recite. The first question was,
"On what day did Columbus discover
America?" The answer was given with
year, day of the week and date OF the month";
and then the interrogation wanted to know
what had happened the next day and the
next and SO on, and after I had listened half
an hour wondered how the poor, little
heads could contain such mass of rubbish.
Right here Lwould like to ask what par
ticular bearing the exact day of the week
and month, or even whether it were sum-
mer, autumn, winter or spring when Colum-
bus got here has on the future welfare of the
child or his relations to the country. It
strikes me that too much attention is paid
to the opinions of scholiasts, no
While the value of real edu-
cation cannot be over-estimated, examining
is not always education. Educated me-
diocrity may excel in finish in the pulpit or
forum, just as it does in the case of the
mechanical arts, but sometimes the vigor of
invention will be found on the side of
those who have not been trained to think by
arbitrary rules. 1t has been asserted so
frequently that one cannot be a correct
reasoner unless he be a mathematician, and
yet have known acute reasoners who were
not even arithmeticians; and have know n
eminent mathematicians who in any other
sphere were very ordinary reasoners L
have also known Iairly good logicians who
could not define the word "logic." Asser-
tions are frequently received as automatic
eli Ifrrhf avid
ing cannot be made too broad, if the pupil
have time and brain for its reception, but
in schools for the masses the essentials
should come first, and if the cornice never
be erected or the frescoing be done, the re-
cipient may nevertheless get through life
quite respectfully and proftably, and if his
penetrative powers be stimulated his or her
conversation in the evening of life NAV be
more entertaining than would be bythe DOS
session of what are termed the accomplish
ments.
A NEGLECTED STUDY,
Suppose that, in our public schools, as
much time were spent in the study of poiiti-
cal economy, unbiased by the political
views of any party, as is now spent on
and other nou-essentials, would
the people continue to be willing to be fed
on the wind pudding that the candidates for
Congress now pass off for argument? 1t is
fact that considerable number of
men sent to Congress do not even know the
rudiments of political economy, and when
they must deliver themselves for the benefit
of their constituents are either forced to
or get newspaper correspondents
or doctrinaires to write their speeches for
them. Is it any wonder thato1r legislation is
striped, speckled and griz-
zled, and that Jacob gets all the benefit and
Lahan the ofal? Instances might be given
of alleged argument delivered on the hust-
ings which otherwise intelligent people re-
ceive as the sincere milk of the word and
yet so ridiculous that the late Mr.. Crowley.
of the New York Zoo, might have detected
their fallacies.
But leaving out of sight the weightier
matters of the law, justice. Judgment, mercy
and truth, it is humiliating to confess that
our elementary schools tail to give us much
more than English as she is spoke" in the
ordinary business OF life. Leaving out of
question the solocisms heard from morn
until night in promiscuous discourses, the
great majority of people (not the illiterate)
cannot spell correctly words in every-
day use. AS to grammatical con-
struction the child is generally handicapped
by learning to talk from parents who have |
only speaking acquaintance with Lindiey |
Murray and his descendants. 1t should be |
the Office of teachers in primary schools to
correct bad usages of this kind, and some of |
them exercise it, but for some reason sub |
and verbs, as rule, can no more
agree in person, number and case than can |
Mills and Mckinley on the tariff question.
Let philologists rave and the people i'm
agine vain thing as long as they please,
but 1t stands to reason that to require a |
child to spend more time and labor learning
to spell the thousands of words in necessary |
use than is renuired to get a tnlera hle ac. |