The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1899-07-13
NATIONAL EDUCATORS WORK..
Art in Education the subject of an
Interesting Paper.

Los Angeles. Cal, July Fin the gen
eral session of the National Educational
Association to-day Prof. J. II. Hinemann,
of Pine Bluff, Ark. representing the
Southern Educational Association, deliver
ed an address upon the educational stat
us in the South, which aroused great at
tention
QUO Vadis' was the title of a paper
read by Mrs. Helen Grenfel, state super
intendent of public instruction, Colorado.
She said in part:
Our common schools grew out Of the
home and its necessities In much the same
way as the nation grew out of the family
the graded school system from the
class, and the class from the assembling
of pubhcs who had been individually
taught by a tutor at home.
Some parents have believed that tne
educating or failing to educate their chill
dren was matter for their sole decision,
but the conception of the state seems TO
be that the child does not exist entirely
for the parents good, but for the good
of all. Compulsory education is appar-
entity an infringement of parents rights,
although certainly a necessity at present.
Man thrives best in association. L.iv-
ing alone he meets no thoughts nor wants
higher than himself. The moral law has
little or no app.icat ton for him. He can
not love his neighbor as himself. The
school is a place where the citizen is de
Veioped. Due regard for the rights or
others can hardly be attained without the
daily contact with many fellow creatures.
"A danger is threatening us in the So
oialisdc tendency, i'm the conduct of our
schools and crowded curriculum. If we
are 10 proceed from the step of providing
free text books to that of supplying the
ind gent with all necessaries, the nation
viii awake al some future day 80 the
know edge that all responsibility has been
gradually removed from parents aud every
encouragement is offered for the contin-
ued reproduction of benehciaries of the
government. II should be our aim to edu-
cote children for responsibility. not for
shifting their burdens upon the govern
ment
Art In Education.
The naper that aroused widest comment
AT the evening session of the convention
was The one read by Prof. Elmer H.
Brown, University of California. upon the
subject AR. IN Education Prof. Brown
said in part
The current demand for a larger artis-
tic element in the instruction in the
schools ought not to be aDprehended sim
ply as TIE dam7nd for one thing more in
our crowded school curriculum 1t is
rather to be regarded as a growing recog-
"a ion of one Of the essent al and unver-
sal aspects Of all instruction. Art is the
free expression Of The inner personality.
So the artistic spirit carried into the little
de ais of school life is found to have
everywhere a far reaching .gnificance.
IT is not desirable that a school room
should be so decorated as to seem like
fairy and, when the child first enters il.
Better hat he should not find it bewiFder-
ingly enchanting. Let him find in the
school room things that grow upon him.
as he continues to live with them Let
there be no singing Of cheap and catchy
songs or worse yet, Of excessively emo
tional melodies. Let there be no straining
after elaborate grace Of gesture, or undue
eGpressiveness in reading Let there be no
honeyed sweetness in the intercourse Of
the teacher with his pupils. If art is TO
have any pace at all in our scheme of
education let il have oppor-
tuni,y of teaching it's owner
proper lessons-lessons of quietness
and confidence, of harmony, of proper
ton, of clear-erained truthfulness
"Humor undoubtedly has a very i'm
portant place in purely artistic culture
and also in the more general culture 10
which fine art is minister. The schools
will profit greatly from their associations
with the artist, if they may hereby help
the children to a better appreciation of
what is truly humorous and what is truly
pathetic. The laugh has a large place in
society of all grades, particularly among
the less educated there is great craving
for the things that are laughable Humor
is the great esthetc possession of the
multitude.
May we not say that the end of all
aesthetic culture is to attain unto a true
appreciation Of the beauty of holiness%
Some one remarked of Archbishop Lund
that when he spoke of the beauty of holi-
ness he meant no more than decorum
aF.Ts IL