Evening bulletin. [volume] (Honolulu [Oahu, Hawaii]) 1895-1912, 1902-01-14

cussiOn at the meeting of the Honolulu
branch of the Territorial Tea, ucrs' AS
ISOLATION in the High School building
last evening. Besides the literary part
Of the program, there were several
musical selections. Miss Ba"na,d Of
KamChameha gave q review Of Jen-
kins' and Kellogs's Nature study Gnl
then came a song by the pupils Of the
High School Prof. y. Thompson
spoke in part as follows, on methods
employed in inst;llinG into the minds
OF the youth, the principles of MT
chanics and useful arts;
Before Offering suggest. us on Ma
ture Study, I wish to offer several sug-
gestions on teaching arithmetic.
Methods Of Teaching.
OF tn emany methods 70 lteachinS
arithmetic | will narlr only two. Tho
first my attention was called to was
the Reason Method. by this method
the teachers were supposed TO develop
the reasoning powers of the child. The
| process began in the kindergarten AMI
/ was continued through the primary.
| the intermediate and the grammar
! grades. II the pupil did not get dea-
perate and leave before.
Pupil Must Reason.
"By this method from one to tw O
| or three examples could ne worked
through in recitation. But the work
was thorough (0. when the pupil
| could go through the formula begin
ming with since" and ending with
therefore" the teacher considered tho
reasoning powers developed for that
grade. | once believed in this method
and practiced 1t. / am now convinced
that it was the most unreasoning
method ever developed. The pupil
! learned to repeat the formula: but he
| did not reason. He simply committed
the words to memory and repeated
| them. This was clearly shown In his
applications Of the various formulas
TO different problems. He could repeat
the formulate but he could not tell
when they fitted. BY the time he had
reached the High School. he was so
sick of the whole subject that he hated
| to reason and really never learned.
And he had had so little practice in
numeral combinations that he was in
accurate in his work and remained so.
Story Method.
THE second method was known AZ
the Story method. 1t went something
| like this; Now children. etc, a ship
was sailing along foreign shore
| cfurcign' means far away they had
had a stormy passage. lpassage'
means going somewhere on ship.
! The air became balmy Cbalmy means
very pleasantly. They spied Il beautiful
| island. lWho can tell me what an
island Isl. They turned the ship and
| sailed towards the island. As they
came near. they saw the naked natives
coming down to meet them. (Since
! the people wore no clothing, what may
we call them.) etc. At last they made
! the people understand they needed food
| and water. So the chief sent some OF
his servants to bring water and others
| 10 bring bananas. Now there were
eight men in the boat and each man
| could drink quart of water. How
many gallons OF water must the ma
! tives bring. Each man could eat six
large bananas or eight small ones, How
many large bananas must the natives
bring. How many small ones.
Combinations Without Thinking.
by this time the period closed, and
| the children had divided s by and
multiplied G by S and by 8. At this
rate how long will it take the chi 'dren
to learn to be quick and accurate in
/ their combinations. The fact Is they
/ never did become so, or not til they
| had got into business and had lost sew
| eral good positions because Of their in
ICcuraCies.
Il do not know what methods you
are using; but here is n suggestion.
Either leave arithmetic out of the
curriculum entirely till the pupils are
at least u years old and want to learn
| It; or begin as late as the 9th or 10th
year and teach only numerical combi-
nations till the pupils are 10 years old.
Whatever or whenever the work in
arithmetic begins it should be purely
mechanical till the pupils max the
combinations as they breathe-with.
out thinking about il, When they can
do this, problems may be taught in