The Newtown bee., 1895-06-28
AGREES WITH e. W. B.

May 1 put in my little oar and say that so far as have heard, people this way agree with C.. ". B. on the school Ques- tion. Why should poor little children be forced to go long distance to school, be cause some people like to sit at home and plan for othersiwithout much considera- tion for anything but their own cranky hobby horsess The large public schools have their advantages, especially for older scholars, can have better discipline and perhaps better grade of teachers, but consolidation is not practicable in & large township with a scattering popula- tion. Poor people could not afford, eith- CT to carry their children, to dress them nicely enough, or to board them near the school when roads are impossible in winter.
 In my humble opinion district schools are not as good in some respects, as they were 90 years ago. Where now, can nyou find dozen children of II years that are good spoilers, either in 8 public or a dis triet school? Such for instance as used to be in the North Center school, Newtown when the Fairmans, Blakeslees, Black mans, Pecks, and many others attended F or 43 years ago. Those children could spell. We had to learn the Web- ster's spelling book perfectly from preface to finis-and also all the princi- pal rules in old Dsboll's Arithmetic word for word. I shall never forget being kept till dark one cold night after school, to learn the long rule in division. When Reuben Beach taught we had to learn. There WAS no getting away from it, and at the same time there were no unrea- sonable number of lessons or too long ones, that would tend to hurt a child. There were 60 scholars at the North Center that v >er, and what we learned was remember r years.
 The trouble Low with the small schools is this: The employing of young boys or girls just out of school them selves, with no idea of governing either themselves or their scholars. Not one in ten ever make good teacher. In the first place teacher must have a natural gift for teaching. It is not enough to know thing, one must know how to impart that knowledge to others in the most lucid and simple manner suited to the comprehension of the young, and if | they do not know how to properly gov ern school they cannot command the respect of the scholars.
 think when candidates are examined, instead of posing them on some ridicu- lous, unnecessary question as "How l many gallons are in the Pacific ocean?" 1 they should be required to say, "How they would teach and explain" such and such things.-Another thing I will speak of, now 1 have the floor, and that is, the text books that are used. There are too many big words and grandiloquent phrases for small children of II to 15 years to comprehend. School books should be in plain, simple language. It | is a mystery to me that children learn any thing as books are now. Every new book on the same old subjects, Arithme- tic, Geography, History and especially Grammar, is little more abstruse, more blind, more difficult to mem before it. What wonder if child for get what he has learned as soon as he is out of school. Perhaps I have wander ed from the subject I commenced on, but as the old lady said: ''I have said my l