Southern standard. (McMinnville, Tenn.) 1879-current, 1890-01-04
SCHOOL GOVERNMENT.
A Correspondent Refutes a Silly
Assertion.
Vervilla, Tenn, Dec. 81, 1889.

your town a few days ago my ear
caught sentence something similar
to this, "For years there has been no
improvement in school government,
modes of teaching, etc" Now, Mr..
Editor, if it will not be too much
trouble and will not take too much of
your valuable space, would like to
unload portion of my mind on this
important question.
l take exceptions to the above quo
ted remark. / have been pupil and
teacher in the country schools for
fifty years, and / know whereof af-
firm when Isay that neither retro
grade nor stagnant condition exists
therein. There is such q decided im>
provement that no man in the pos
session of his faculties, and at all con-
versant with school work for the past
decade, can fail 10 perceive it. Look
about you and tell me where is the
pupil holding out at arms length a
billet of wood for punishment, as l
have seen; where upon the slightest
preteXt, the furious blows inflicted
upon arms and back every hour of the
day, as you have beheld; where the
tears falling as profusely and fire.
quently as showers on an April day,
as all have witnessed; where the
wicked assault, with a board, upon
tender young palms, the crushing of
slate over mischievOus head, or
the humping of that same head
against the door, as has befallen my
self? These are a few of the relics of
barbarism which have disappeared
from the school-room within the
memory of persons still young: yet
we are told that there has been no
progrcss-that there is retrograde in
school government To be sure,
there remains in practice some cruel
absurdities, such as obliging a juvenile
offender to stand on one foot, OF
binding the eyes with a handker.
chief; for some of the old tyrants are
still in the work, and some of the
younger ones try to ape the old ones
But public sentiment is counter tC
such resorts, and this fact is, in itself
an undeniable sign of progress. But
a few years ago popular opinion sane
toned corporal punishment to almost
any degree that did not kill or Grip
: pie.
In claiming improvement of books
furniture, apparatus and appliances
it would be folly to multiply words
The fact is too apparent to be gain
said; and in these improvements W,
2 find advancemenes in modes of teach
ing. Instead of putting child
finger on a combination of blacl
marks and telling him to "say A,
or "say b." we lead the mind to as
sociate characters with ideas. In
stead of straining the memory t
forms, as such, we teach the relation
: of signs to sounds, and of signs an,
sounds to objects and actions. We n
I longer teach the multiplication AM
4 other tables as mechanical formulas
U but as living, Interchangeable realitie;
n -Four times five are twenty, not be
d cause Ray or Robinson say so, but be
= cause it is a physical fact and cannC
Il be otherwise. Sixteen ounces are on
}, pound, not in mere language-in
IL frame work for mental gymnastics
but in sugar, coffee and tea as we pu
IS chase them. We no longer produC
y reading machines to run to mark
IS ratchet-of given shape, stop Ion
& enough to count so many, and the
81 run on again. History is no longer
: collection of dead mems dry bones
Is be parceled and labeled; but the an
/: mated mirror of former days an
deeds, rejecting inspiration, infl
Ie ence, and warning. And so wit
IT other studies we are every day flu
W ther out of book and deeper in
IL science. Time has laid a reformir
hand upon our nations pet, and a fe
of the changes produced l have poin
Ii ed out. Progress might have bee
greater; but with better books, be
ter apparatus, better school building
e. the position that there is no improv
f. ment is certainly untenable.
as Why the assertion, "rhere h
r. been no Improvement? 2"
"a Respectfully, II. H. TATE.
n. Ringing Noises