The Portland daily press. [volume] (Portland, Me.) 1862-1921, 1897-12-30
Maine Teachers Assemble to Discuss
Question.
MANUAL TRAINING THE CHIEF
TOPIC yesterday.
Interesting Remarks BY Principal Babb of
Portland-various Amendments to
Constitution of State society-Recep-
tion in Evening-Goy. Powers Address
es Instructors.
ESPECIAL TO THE rREss.l

es Instructors.
ESPECIAL TO THE PREssl
Augusta, December 29.-About 100 Of
the Maine men and women who teach the
young idea to shoot gathered in the
House of Representatives this afternoon.
The meeting was composed mostly Of
women, making the hall look very much
as it does on the biennial occasions when
the women come in force to tell the
lawmakers why the right of suffrage
should be accorded them. As the woman
suffragist of today Is not the woman
suffrage of the fancy of the humorist, so
there is nothing austere and forbidding in
the school teacher of today She is most
likely to be found young and charming.
As represented in this gathering OF the
Maine Pedagogical society she is living
up to that Ireputation.at all events. Why
1t was not called the Maine Teachers As
ISOLATION is an unanswered conumdrum.
1t WAS and is the Pedagogical society,
and its members are here to hold the
annual meeting which began this after
AOOht aiANt WIZ SohtiauO bheAi AooI Oh
Friday. In the gathering are some of
the leading educators of the state, and
more will be here. tomorrow.
Today's session of the society was
opened with prayer by.Rev. G. A. Hay
den Of this city latter which Mayor Choate
told the teachers how cordial was the well
come extended them by the Capital City.
Mayor Choate is good speaker, and the
teachers evidently appreciated his kindly
greeting to which President H. K. White
of Bangor made an appropriate response.
After these opening exercises, the teachers
listened to symposium on the benefits
of manual training, land then held bust
ness session during which there was an
| Interpretation of the constitution of the
| society which has set some of the men,
| bers wondering whether it was as legal
as it was undeniably pedagogical. The
afternoon session closed with two inter
esting addresses on the private school and
| then an adjournment was token until
| evening. Ti.4- gave t..o teachers enance
to. listen to the booksellers and the agents
of the publishers of various school publi-
cations The gentlemen here as the repre-
sentatives of the publishing houses are
leaders in the business and they have
standard works to SELL
MANUAL TRAINING.
| The first paper of the afternoon was by
Mr.. j. S. Locke. of Saco, who told about
the manual training department of the
schools Of that city, but spoke more par
ticularly of the general subject, advocat-
ing the teaching of manual training art
as means Of counteracting some of the
times. Mr.. Locke told how in these
days of modern machinery the manual
training which boys frequently received
in the shops and fields OF their fathers
was no longer possible. He said that
character was built in the home, the
school and the church. and he attribu
some at least of the troubles of the times
to the faults of the schools. As Mr.. Locke
expressed it, the city streets are crowded
with lazy 1oafers, the country roads are
| thronged with troublesome tramps, the
poor houses are full of paupers and the
jails hold criminals nine-tenths o1
whom received an education sufficient
to fit them for positions of trust, but who
are incapable of earning a livlihood with
their hands Mr. Locke asked the teachers
it they had ever thought. while cramming
the minds of their pupils with the doings
of dad nations told In dead languages
of the possibilities of knowledge to be de
rived from the fields and the forests o.
Maine
Principal George Fl. Babb of the Port
land School for Manual Training, fol
lowed, speaking of the manual training
as an aid to the mental and moral de
velopment of the pupil. 1t was in regard
4 to manual training as an adjunct to tn,
moral development of the pupil tina
Mr.. Babb told the teachers much tha
interested them. He described the scene
in tho Portland Manual Training schoo
when late in the afternoon, the boys VIII
might. otherwise be on the streets, gathe
to do work which they have themselve
planned and which is, Of course, not in
cluded in the regular course. In thi
way, d great many Of the boys have mad
|
tiers. Mr.. Babbs paper was an admira
BILE presentation of this and other phase
of the subject Two of the many pith
statements which is contained were these
A school is not workshop. 1t may in
clude workshops, but they must contrib
ute to the mental and moral trainin
of tho pupil to justify their presence.
My experience has taught me tina
manual training is one of the stronges
factors in intoxicating moral principles
The third speaking on tho subject o
manual training was W. Franklin Smith
the principal of the Lewiston school, VIII
described the system adopted in tha
city which is similar to the Portlan,
plan.
THE BUSINESS SESSION.
Then came the business session and i
developed marked similarity between
gathering of teachers and religious con
vention in that the great topic of tn