The Independent. [volume] (Honolulu, H.I.) 1895-1905, 1897-02-11
MakapaIa-by Sea- Teaching
as an Art,
Scientific Tuition Boston Founded
in 1e3o.)
BY ANNIE NJ. PRESCOTT.

have they to undertake the general
work of any grade in the school
room2 Surely no right at all. They
are not in their element. A child
should be taught the rudiments-
the outlines OF true art even before
it can recognize the word "cat,"
spell or write the same. And very
soon in its education it should be
able to do more than to make an o
and an l. A child four years old
can be taught to draw a. house
with doors, windows, chimney, fence
and trees as correctly as theteacher,
and from that it can proceed to
model drawing and soon to map
drawing. But the little child must
be taught to see, to use its eyes,
which it cannot do before it has had
a teacher. And pitiful it is to see
school OF pupils Of all ages not one
OF whom can Seel The boy Of four
teen years making the same blunder
OF the boy Of four.
1t reminds the writer OF this, OF
an advanced class of boys and girls
in reading, in certain city. One
after another in rudest tones, read
an exquisite piece of literature max
ing the same gross blunder in pro-
nounciation and enunciation, the
same coarse, nasal tones with scarce
ly shade of difference. The teach
or (7) remarked that, "she did not
pretend to be an elocutionist; she
did not believe in it much, anyway.
She liked children to read naturalw
And we were convinced that they
would, so long as they had 'nat-
ural born silly fool" for guide, and
no teacher. "Where ignorance is
bliss
We fairly stamped our feet when
we got outside, and shook our fist
in the face Of that "Board Of Edu-
cationp
There are men and women sowing
the politics everywhere as selectors
for schools, who believe not in
drawing, mechanical, industrial, geo.
metrical, architectural, free hand or
any other; and who are as ignorant
in the matter as were their ances.
tors. Neither do they believe that
a teacher needs to know anything
about the quality of tone in the
speaking voice, not to go into the
science of reading aloud as an art.
We were in the Boston schools as
teacher in the happy days of a
Monroe, and Smith OF Kensington,
and that Department has not retro
graded in either art. The to-day
schools of Oratory aud the Techno-
logical Institutes are the outcome
of it all, for Massachusetts, leads the
Union. When the late Mr.. Smith
was brought across and given a
salary of $4,000 and carte-blanche TO
do his own sweet will in those
Boston schools, every bit OF drawing
paper and every implement being as
free to teacher and to pupil as the
air, that man went at it with rush;
he had never, in his widest dreams
Of his beloved art, known anything
that savored OF like generosity
the poorest child to have "art" with
in its reach, for the taking! Ay
But he had made a slight miscalcu-
lation which very soon he hastened
to correct. He went just one STEP
too far, in that immense Depart
ment which swoops in all the sub
urban towns, and numbers as mas
tors hundreds Of college-bred men
not to speak Of the women.
"It takes a strong hand to hold {
full cup steady" In many OF the
higher grades he introduced al
once three drawing books; in nearly
all grammar grades, two at least
The teachers, after few weeks, de-
cided that in order to carry out hil
plans for them Che was allowed tc
choose assistants Of course and there