The herald. [microfilm reel] (Los Angeles [Calif.]) 1893-1900, 1895-04-19
TIT GOIINTY TFlcHFD% TDIK
I'LL UUUNll ILlIUllLIlU IIILH
They Tell How Things Must
Be Done
MUSIC AND GYMNASTICS
Mental Pictures as Evolved From
Average Youth
USIC AND GYMNASTICS
Vigorous Defense OF the Text Book Properly
U5ed-The Attempt to Abolish 1t
Criticised

The County Teachers Institute was in
session again yesterday listening to
theories while other people were out in
the fresh air, gathering renewed en-
thusiasm for the remainder of the Fiesta
season, Mrs. Rice was ill and unable to
be present to conduct the work in music,
50 the programme was taken up by Mr..
Cox. He first recommended the use of
the ungraded music reader for the I'M
graded school as being better adapted to
its needs. He then distributed some of
the readers for inspection. The first
thing, he said is to teach the major
scale us a whole. The ability to sing de-
ponds upon the ability to think.
He then gave practical help concerning
the teaching of the scale by naming the
chart His talk was bright, Practical and
interesting. which is more than can be
SAID OF many of the speakers during the
session. He had something to say and
said it.
Proi. Blessings, work ON gymnastics
was aim ost entirely confined to exercises
and drills of different kinds.
The third morning session of Section
was led by Miss Laughlin. She spoke
concerning the use and abuse of color and
forms in education. She advised that il
Illustrations from Harper's and other mag
azines be used for making charts of differ.
ent kinds by the children themselves
The teacher should find out the natural
bent OF the child and make other work
hinge upon that. She compared the
relative difficulty of teaching constructive
drawing. rep sentative drawing and dec
orative drawing, representative drawing
leading the lace. Imaginative draw
ing, she stated, has the place and is of
great interest to the children.
Miss Laughln gave practical demon
STATIONS in drawing ana observing trees
and vegetables. Miss Laughlin is bright
and her talk was of interest and value.
Afternoon Session
In the afternoon the session opened
with few remarks by Superintendent
Riley, and with singing.
Professor Hutton talked of Mental
Pictures, taking for his standard the av-
erage boy and average girl. But few
youths properly understood language or
enjoy a book. They usually like all
studies except grammar and reading.
They. are backward in language and COM
position. Often education is limited to
lew years work. Tie child has to work
early and late for living and loses in
terest. Only a small proportion having
higher education pursue any course OF
study when they are out of school. The
speaker said tnat education is self activ-
ity. The educator formerly considered
it his duty to suppress Imagination,
which is our power to rearrange old
knowledge. Two forces are at WORK upon
the boys through the imagination-the
good and the bad The language of a
child has two values-ethcal and esthetic.
EstheJicism is in view, the ethical is
held back yet it Will be seen. 10 edu-
cate boy is to train him in all his parts.
Every child is an artist and his creation
is work of art to himself. 1t is the in
SEPARATION OF his being. The study of
English is not a training for mere culture.
the supreme object is to create an appe-
lite for good literature and culture
industrial Training. was the subject
handled by A. j. Platt Industrial train
ing, he said, is the training in various
industries. Many persons work by wits
and some are idlers. The question is,
Shall the trades be taught in our public
plements for work. This is impracticable
yet some manual training might be
given, although the state does not pro-
pose to give its children an education in
all departments. The esthetic side of the
industrial training was presented. Its
us see something in nature. The best in
dustrial training that can be given pupils
is by close attention to the studies pre-
scribed by the school law.
Professor Slate of Berkeley began the
work in section four Will. a talk on
ton that exists between physics and
chemistry, and this is the reason why
chemistry is more widely taught in Sec
ondary schools now than it formerly was.
Too much prominence was given to
theory in the early stages of the work.
Facts in chemistry arc valuable only as
they are correlated with other facts. A
text book in chemistry should not be
used as book of recipes, but in such
way as to have some educational value.
Professor John Dickinson followed with
vigorous defense of the text book. prop
erly used and criticised severely the at
tempt of some to abolish the use of text
books. How would we learn to know
anything of astronomy, gravitation. or
anything else that has been learned or
known III the past 200 years if the text
book were entirely discarded? He said.
regarding laboratory work, that accuracy
in experiment is much more important
than the number of the experiments.
The method of acquiring a knowledge of
chemistry should be animation of the
text book, the lecture, the students own
experiments and the experiments of the
teacher. Students should not accept
things as truth in an unsclentitic and
theologic way. He advocated the study
of the history of a subject and showed
how important it is for teacher TO know
ten times as much as he tries to teach.
Mr.. MolyneauX thought Professor Dickin-
son was asking too much of the ordinary
high school teacher. Professors Strine,
Kirk and Meredith added much interest
to the discussion.
The next thing taken up was the sub
ject of literature, by Professor Kirk. He
said that pupils did not read enough.
They should read widely and wisely. He
ventured the opinion that there were
other poems In our language than Snow
Bound, Evangeline and The Lady of the
Lake. and other poets than Whittier,
Longfelow and Scott Our work in liter
allure, he said, was too scrappy and our
range too narrow. He deplored the pre-
vailing ignorance regarding literature.
and told an amusing story of one julius
Caesar Todd, VINO on presenting publicly
a copy of Shakespeare to his pastor on
behalf of the congregation, warmly de-
clared that Mr.. Shakespeare was one of
the smartest men in America. 1t is nee
essary to have bread, but man can not
live by bread alone.
The discussion was continued by Miss
Reid, Mr.. MacCulloch and Mr.. r. M. Fisher,
who said that it was hardly consistent,
particularly for Mr.. Molyneaux, to criti-
else so severely the old methods in teach
ing literature, because he and all of us
must know that the old methods had pro-
duced-a Molyneaux!
The meeting was then adjourned until
this morning at O'Clock.
The Evolution