Evening times-Republican. [volume] (Marshalltown, Iowa) 1890-1923, 1909-08-23
SPELLING,
before.

Spelling. This is not reformed spell |
ing. Rather it is deformed. We don't |
have TO go so far from home for Illus
trations, but this one comes handy and
We might as we'll use it in the hope
that it will be serviceabie.
William B. Bailey, assistant profess
sor of political economy at Yale Uni
veTsity, made some tests in spelling
recently made with the class in Amer
lean social conditions and municipal
problems. Two hundred and fifty stu
dents in this department submitted to
their professor essays on various sub
jects and in only twenty-five of these
productions was there no misspelled
word; the list of u1isspellings num-
bered four hundred and forty-three;
the average number of mutilated words
per student was five: the average
number of .nisspellings was seven; and
the three words most generally mis-
spelled were "separate' relieve" and
receive Thus two hundred and
twenty-five young men at Yale taking
courses of study in American social
conditions and municipal economy and
competent to prepare essays on topics
connected with these matters We're I'M
able to spell correctly all the words
entering into their compositions, did
not as one commenter says, recognize
a written word that had been mis-
| spelled-a discovery that ordinarily
good and careful spoilers not infre-
quently make-and If in any instance
they were in doubt, they were too in
doient to consult the dictionary. And
Professor Bailey is moved to say:
II Is evident that something should
be done to raise the standard of spell
| college is not the place for such in
struction. II should be part of the ele-
mentary education So many addition
al studies have been crowded into
grammar schools that spelling no longer
I occupies the position of prominence
which it held fifty years ago. The
l
chief intellectual test of the commune
". To be the best speller was a COW
eted honor. So many studies have been
added to the curriculum that the time
devoted to spelling must be curtailed.
Perhaps we have gone too far Ger
tainly college students are deficient in
| this respect and the college authorities
are trying to place the blame where
it belongs by making one of the tests
in English the ability to write gram
| niatical English in words correctly
+, spelled. Doubtless spelling is to a con-
siderable extent a memory test, which
some persons find it extremely difficult
to master. But no one can blame the
colleges of this country if they demand
as one Of the requirements of admis-
sion the ability on the part of the stu
dent to correctly spell words with
which he would express his thoughts.
But one does not have to go to col
lege to find bad spelling. Nor can
anything the colleges may do help the
masses. 1t would be along right lines
for colleges to make spelling an en-
trance requirement, but since it is only
the few who go to college this might
not inspire the needed popular inter-
est and effort Ella Flagg Young, the
new superintendent Of the Chicago
schools, is. said to favor a return to the
three RS. Then she can. hardly be IN
mindful of the need for-more attention
to spelling also. The spelling OF the
average high school pupils as.atrocious
and Il As left so. for who ever heard o.
them wasting high school days study
ing and teaching spellins2- It is to tn,