Mineral Point tribune. (Mineral Point, Wis.) 1869-1938, 1897-02-11
A GREAT INSTITUTE.

| of the Teachers Institute held III tins
city last Friday and Saturday:
8 a. m.- Geography, :. Y. Gillian;
Language. Duncan McGregor; Arith-
metic, s. Y. Gillian.
1:l5 p. M Reading, Duncan Nc
Gregor; Geography, :. Y. Gillian;
Language, Duncan McGregor.
On Friday evening at 1880 in the
city hall there was lecture by Prof.
Gillian, which he called "The Educa-
tional Progress i'm the Ninteenth
Century" and which had also been
styled Where are We At" We give
the entire program in order that our
readers may know what we are
att Those who have attended many
Of these institutes say that this last
was one of the best. This is certain,
no better leaders in such work can be
found than Profs, McGregor and Gill
Ian. We only wish We could give
| full outline Of their talks on the as
signed subjects, but the desire is
greater than our space. Prof. Gillian
made it clear in his talks that the
Imagination was not out of place IN
the study Of geography and arithme-
tic. What idea can II child have OF
an ocean who has never seen one, un-
less we call to our aid pictures OF the
81 trtr tn IA l. ~
imagine what is represented? AL
though brought up in one OF the most
Hat countries in the world, where
there were no hills or any big body
Of water, yet in this way as boy
Prof. Gillian gained such II conception
of mountains and oceans that when
as an adult he saw them for the first
time they did not fall below nor rise
above his conception. He had very
good idea Of them.
In this way he talked, and when he
got through those subjects, geogra-
ply and arithmetic, which are so dry
and hard in their simple facts and
numbers, seemed to glow with mag
nation. We began to think that
there was good deal OF poetry in
such subjects after all. This all inn
parts interest to them.
Prof. McGregor in his talks stood
up for GRAMMAR against which In
some quarters there was more or less
prejudice, as some could not see the
practical use of it. They argued that
il every one with whom the child
associated talked dramatically the
child would speak correctly without
any rules Of syntaX. But he, the pro-
fessor, said ii one would get at the
real meaning at times OF writer he
must know the relation of words in
his sentences, which came by analy
sis and the principles OF grammar.
In his instructions about reading he
laid great stress upon getting ut the
real meaning of the writer 1t may
be necessary some time to read pas
sage more than once, and the more
one reads it the more its real beauties
come out, He said, pause when You
strike an exceptionally fine passage;
think over it for n moment; have the
pupil read it again and point out its
beauties. In this talk the professor
incouciously showed how well versed
he was in general literature by the
use he made of certain characters to
illustrate his points. 1t was really
refreshing to have some new charac-
ters introduced rs examples. Some
are about worn out by this time, by
being trotted out on all occasions "to
point moral and adorn tale
We cannot linger here. We pass
on to say that Prof. Gillan's lecture
in the city hall was a splendid effort.
He handled his subject well, We
have heard no adverse criticism. He !
showed the great advance we had |
made in this country. First, of the !
things we had left behind; second, Of
the things we had gained. Child !
study was one OF the most marked !
mile-stouos in our progress. The old |
teachers believed IN the rod, and III
the lesson was not learned there was
the rod to know the reason why.
Nowadays the real teachers tried To
find out the cause, and then sought