The Leavenworth echo. [volume] (Leavenworth, Wash.) 1904-current, 1904-07-08
A FAULTY SYSTEM
Too Many Useless Studies--Our Rdu-
cational System Needs
Revision

apropos. All the parents know
that the present course of study
laid down for the children in the
public schools covers too much
ground, and needs pruning down.
The children get smattering of
some useless studies at the ex.
pense of thoroughness in those
that might be of some benefit to
them in grown-up life. Fewer
studies and better results. Stud
les adapted to future needs
should be the object of public
schools. If a particular scholar
shows a particular aptitude for
certain line or calling, let them
be taught along these lines. The
system is based on the theory
that all children are created
alike-with the same natural in
inclination and ability to study,
and desire for an education, when
in fact and in truth there is moth
ing in this world more dissimilar
than human beings. It is i'm
possible to funnel an education
into child. All of them are not
fitted by nature for college pro-
fessors or artists, and it is time
and energy wasted to teach all
of them ologies and drawing,
when so large proportion of
them can only be hewers of wood
and drawers of water. Time
and energy is wasted in teaching
children drawing and music that
have neither musical talent or
artistic tastes, that might be en-
ployed for the benefit of the child
in teaching it reading, writing
and arithmetic. The whole of
public school teaching is skim
ming along the surface of a lot of
studies and never going very
deep into any of them.
In the trades, arts and indus.
tries the trend is towards spe-
cialization. Men follow those
particular lines that they have a
liking or talent for, and become
proficient in them, but the chill
dren are stood up in rows like so
many bottles, and the same
intellectual mixture is funneled
into all alike, with no regard for
the capacity of the child. 1t has
been prescribed by the board of
education and must be crammed.
The system of education in our
public schools needs reforming,
and made to conform to the
needs of the children.
With the commencement season just
passed parents and students are
planning for further educational train
ing. Attention is again called TO the
need, as many educators view it, of
radical reform in the course of study in
the common schools. The most active
effort to effect such a reform is being
made under the auspices of theParent's
Association, of Philadelphia, an organ
ization formed to secure a reduction OF
the number of studies in the primary
aud grammar schools. The association
which has been working along this line
for several years now proposes to
make an emphatic demand for the adop-
ton of certain reforms before the open
ing OF the next school year in Septem-
Der.
Under the supervision of the Phila-
delphia Association statistics have been
secured from different cities Of the
country, and opinions collected from ed
ucators and physicians as to the effects
of overstudy and overcrowding the
children in the primary grades of the
common schools. All this indicates
that often the brains Of children are ir-
reparably injured in the struggle to
achieve too uch;they get smattering
of many subjects at the expense of thor
oughness in elementary education. The
testimony OF parents and teachers
agree that the home study plan should
be abolished except in special cases.