The Marion daily mirror. (Marion, Ohio) 1892-1912, 1907-12-11

with the Christmas holidays APP
iproaching. Chicago has a new fad
the collection of mother songs. The
time and affection that used to be
lavished by society matrons on old
china and toy terriers is now being
spent to better purpose in rescuing
from oblivion the old familiar lula
bies which were swung to Graded
children by generation of American
mothers in long past winter twilights.
Some of these are known to every
one but many of the most beauti-
full are ~fast being forgotten and
might be lost for ever If they were
not noted down. together with the
melodies. in the dainty notebooks
of the collectors. Foreign songs are
being preserved in the same way,
some of them very rare and beauti-
full but the prime favorites VIII al
ways be the familiar ones, such as
the German
"Schlaf Kirdlein. schlaf,"
Dein Water hut die Schaf.
Dein' Mutter schuttelt's Baumlein,
Da Fallt herab Elm Traumelein,
"Schlar. Kindlain. Schlaf."
or the Swedish, "Rida, Rida Ranka,
Hasten heter Blanka." in which the
boy is told to ride his rocking horse
while he may for when he grows up
the happiness Of youth will have de-
parted. Less known melodies of
Norwegian and Italian and Russian
and Bohemian mothers have found
their way into the collections--even
some of the American Indian cradle
songs--chants that were first heard
in the lodges of the .Algonquins and
Sioux and Dacotahs in the forest
clearings of Michigan and Wisconsin
and along the banks of the Missouri.
An Evanston woman was the first
to open up the new field and she has
made it her life work. If her efforts
bear fruit, future Chicago babies will
owe her debt of gratitude that they
will find hard to repay.
! A revolution in American school
methods may be the resul. of a move
ment set on foot by trustees of the
school board who believe that Chi
cago teachers have strayed too far
from the little old red schoolhouse"
program of "readn', wrtin' and
'rlthmetic. The trouble started
when one of the trustees told of the
failure of pupils in the eighth and
ninth grades to spell such simple
words ~ friend" medium" and
I"riyal. Here are few of the long
er words that were successfully mis-
spelled by the pupils: operation"
language, symptoms, interrupt, at
tempted, exercise, anxiety. experiment.
and In vipcihle. THIS evidence was
corrohorated bv another trustee who
found that not ono of for-v-three
fftper-voa~-o'1 runils whom hc 7ucg-
toned could discount note f0r 800
FOR months and 90 d7vs ~ g rer
cent. "Thev didn't arv Of them
know what I meant" declared the
indlgnant trustee in board meeting.
Il might as we'll have talked Choc-
taw to those bows and girls" This
statement caused sensation and
will result in an official investiga-
purpose of determining whether the
flounces and frills of modern peda-
gugy have not crowded out the essen
tials of spelling. The attitude of the
five hundred thousand fathers and
mothers in the city is well summed
up in the words of one of the pro-
testing trustees: What are we get
ting for our $12 100000 a year? We
hear good deal about making paper
boxes. That may be well enough,
but II is necessary first that our pu-
lpils, leaving our schools at l6, should
be equipped to solve simple ques-
ions in arithmetic"
The reason we have to pay high
prices for the commodities of daily
consumption Is because of the cost
a Npt tat f.NtN AAI