The San Francisco call. [volume] (San Francisco [Calif.]) 1895-1913, 1895-04-06

as special teacher to introduce her sys-
tenn and instruct the teachers. She re-
signed her position as agent, and went to
work at the beginning of the present school
year. Drawing at once leaped into promi-
nence. Miss Ball called the teachers of
each grade together regularly after school
hours, laid out the work for the month and
told them what to do. Drawing has been
increased in the schools from the lowest
grade to the highest, and more drawing
paper has been used up since July than in
any three previous years.
But Miss Ball found her Job a hard one.
She tried to get 900 teachers to pull to-
gether all at once and all do the same work.
AT first she was unpopular, because the
teachers said she was dictatorial and arro-
CANT, but lately she has become generally
liked personally. Then they criticized her
system and methods in all sorts of ways.
One month the children all drew spheres,
cubes and cylinders in all sorts of positions.
Then the cat was taken up as an elabo-
rated cylinder and several thousand pic
lures were taken, labeled "cat." In MANY
classes the teachers tried her advice of tax
ing to school very docile cat, that would
sit still on the teachers desk. Leaves,
bugs and other products of nature were
drawn, and the children tried their hands
at illustrating stories.
The old board stood by Miss Ball, but
with the new administration there COM
menced movement to find out anew the
merits of Miss Balls work. A meeting of
the principals was held three weeks ago,
at which the majority Endorsed the sys-
tenn with notifications" That meeting
called for the appointment by the Super
intendent of committee of fifteen to find
out the sense of the teachers of the entire
department and report to another meeting
of principals That committee decided to
II, oil f1ar o,,6 l.
their say about drawing yesterday. The
teachers of the nine primary and grammar
grades met in separate rooms and held
nine separate meetings.
They discussed and voted on several
definite propositions. One question was
sHow Much Time Should the Children
Devote to Drawing?" The time given has
been about a half-hour day. All the
grades voted in favor of one hour a week,
divided into two or three lessons. The
grades were unanimous, too, in favor of
plain drawing-paper, instead of textbooks
with pictures to be copied.
They all voted, too, in favor of new
wrinkle. The teachers want a special,
printed monthly bulletin, illustrating the
work to be done during the month, and
containing explicit instructions to teach
ers. If the teachers get this improvement
Miss Ball viii become an editress.
Another question was, "Do you favor
each teacher instructing her class indiyidu-
ally?' The unanimous verdict was yves"
though one grade adopted a resolution
making it optional for teachers to exchange
work during the drawing hour, where one
was especially skilled in the work.
On the great question of whether the
teachers should gather at the Normal
School to be taught by Miss Ball after their
regular school work was ended or should
be allowed to dismiss their classes earlier
once month the vote was divided. Six
grades voted in favor of going after school
ninth grades carried the vote in
favor of saving this extra tax on the teach
ers' time. This spending the rest of the
afternoon listening to Miss Ball once a
month when their school work is done is
what many of the teachers have been growI-
ing about, and some prominent teachers
said that most of the teachers were little
afraid to vote in their personal favor ON
that point.
A number of recommendations were
made by various grades. One of the criti-
cisms of Miss Balls system that some
teachers have made is that it did not APP
pear to tend to any particular good-artistic |
or industrial.
On motion of Miss Pechin. principal of
the Cooper Primary School, the fourth
grade meeting asked that the aim of the |
instruction in drawing be clearly defined. |
Then graded course of drawing, begin |
ming with the lowest grade and ending
with the highest, was demanded.
This consensus of pedagogical opinion |
about how art should be taught in the |
public schools will be officially considered |
by Superintendent Moulder, and when the |
principals hold another meeting Ire will |
make lot of recommendations to the |
board
The teachers now generally like Miss |
Ball and approve her system, but there is
likely to be pairing of the time that sew |
eral thousand children give to drawing |
and trimming and pulling together Of |
the methods by which the rising genera |
ton is learning to draw pictures.
Miss Ball Is an exceedingly bright and |
talented young woman, who for eight |
years superintendent the drawing work of /
the Omaha public schools. Then she |
spent three successful years as agent for |
Prang. She explained yesterday Just what |
she was trying to do in the field OF art. She |
said:
l am not trying to produce artists. Thou
sands OF children should not be taught draw