New Ulm review. (New Ulm, Brown County, Minn.) 1892-1961, 1893-07-12

man were ten times superior to English,
yet unless a man in this country possessed
the faculty of speaking English he could
hardly not earn more than dollar and a
quarter day. Another thing. They not
only learn the language of the land. but
they learn German, learn its grammar,
learn to write it, spell it, get acquainted
with its literature. I may not be a good
judge of German, but when you look
over their written work, it looks fine. It
is methodical, very few corrections, few
crosses few red pencil marks. In our
schools there has been no loss of Ger
man and complete mastery of English.
Now, that is just the ideal condition of
our schools.
Another feature want to call your at
tention to is the remarkable discipline in
our schools. You who have lived in
other towns, know that you have never
seen schools in any locality where there
was such discipline as there is in the
schools of this town. Now, I have a
right to speak of this as I see them twice
a day. Then there is my house standing
within fifty feet from their play ground.
1t stood locked up for two years, not a
person staying in it,not a single window
pane broken. Do you think that would
have happened in any other town? You
don't believe it would. 1 think that
there was never such an argument in ia
vor of the discipline of our children as
that There it stood for two years,every
window-pane in it mark for a boy with
a slingshot, and glaring at every boy, in
viting stones for two long years, and not
one window broken. 1t is a remarkable
instance. 1 say that speaks volumes for
the discipline Of our children. We have
sent our children to oschoolin other towns
and we became perfectly disgusted; the
children were disgusted; they had moth
ing to do. say our children do their
work better, with more accuracy, more
precision than anywhere else. Ore rea-
son why our children do so we'll is be-
cause of the remarkable persistence that
prevails in regard to theil writing. l
used to think it queer for my boy to
come home and ask for more paper,more
pens, more ink. You have all had the
same experience. I used to ask him
l"What in the world do you do with So
much paper" "Oh, get our lessons, -
And thcnJennie wanted more pens, paper
and ink. 1t takes little more money,
but do you know our children are so per
cent. better than the children of other
schools. Not because they are smarter,
but because they are brought up in writ
ing their lessons, combining it with the
studying of the same. In studying you
know how the eye helps the mind. If
you can look at it with the eye, compare
it and then write it, the impression is
lasting. Mr.. Nix cducates on that prin-
ciple. They hear word spoken, see it
printed, write it and know it by sound
and know it by writing it. Ibelieve that
is the principle from the second class all
the way through. think my boy has
two more years before he comes to the
High School, but his written work is neat
he can write letter, note, dunning
note, too, as I saw in some of the letters
the other day. They understand some-
thing about business; they putitto prac-
tical use and execute the work.
i have heard it said, 'why not use text
books?" Well, now. text books are a
pretty good thing, a pretty good excuse
!, for poor teacher, but good teacher
has mighty little use for a text book.
You know the Lord has not had US all
made the same way and really think we
/ differ more mentally than physically
Now you take our chaps, girls and boys,
and say ''here is your lesson and you
have got to learn and to reclte it to-mor-
row." That's all there is to it. Now
do you think that is going to do any
kind of good? Do you think 1T is? The
truth of it Is, think, that that kind of
instruction is dead-letter. Mems
minds are not made by machine; God
made our minds. Educators establish
rules ana systems that they have to con-
form to, but I don't believe God intend
ed the mind should be developed BY rule
or regulation.
Ibelieve our schools have good pecu-
liar characteristics, In the first instance
the pupils have got to develop upon their
own minds: The plan followed by Nix
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