Los Angeles herald., 1909-07-04
Progress of Education
By Frederic j. Haskin


TIME National Education association
meets In Denver today, and in
4 many ways II will be the most In
teresting convention the association has
held. Never before. in the history OF
education on the North American con-
tinent has there been such develop
ment of educational ideas as IN tne past
five years, and the twelve months now
ending represent the climax Oh tnie
movement The head and the nearl
and the hand are all being educated IN
unison today. The storing of knoWl-
edge in the mind of the child has De,
come a byproduct of the higher luetu
of training all his faculties to increase
his usefulness TO himself and his lei
bowman. -, +.
The hauling of children to school IN
the country districts has passed the
exnertmental stage and Is now re-
garded as offering a solution TO the
country school problem. In years past
a graded school was possible ohly III
thiclxly settled rural communities, pc
cause enough pupils could not pe Sus
together within a reasonable radlus o VI
the school to fill it. Under the new
method it does not matter IL schools
are as much as four or hVe
miles apart. BY consolidating schools,
and employing farmers teams TO maui
tbe children to and from them, IL mas
been possible to secure graded school
advantages even in the more thlhly
populated rural districts. In many
states the little red schoolhouse oil @ @tlle
hin that has long furnished a phrase
for the stump speakers, Is now pelns
torn down and hauled away TO FORM
part of a modern graded school,
Manual and vocational training are
still holding their place with the eau-
Gators OF the day. Statlstlcs SHOW tnaS ,ao
benefit of manual and vocational tram
ing 90 to prison than those VINO nave
not This is taken by educators as pe-
ing one of the best requirements
In favor of teaching children prac-
tIcal instead of theoretical thinSs'
Also the statistics so far gathered moi
cate that the earning powers or the No-
cationaIlv trained young man are su-
nerior to the boy with classical tram
ing There are hundreds of college-preei
men to be found in the bread lines ana
other charitable places In New YORK.
but the vocationally trained are con-
spicuous by their absence. -, =,
Germany is now leading the Woriu ~ II,
the matter of Industrial and vocational
trai,,ine THE secret of her success in
meeting the competition of Great
Rritain and the United states Is to be
fo,,,,d IN her system of training the
| hands of her young people. Great
| Britain, to whose existence large lot
eighn trade is as essential as the ar
its people breathe, has sent coIllllls-
sions 10 Germany to study her schools'
and their methods are being adopted In
England even more rapidly than In the
United States.
There is iust now a sort of reVolu-
ton against the study of classics IN ihe ne
schools of the country An assoclatloll
for the promotion OF classical stuu,eo o,,s
has been formed for meeting this reVo-
| luton. but it is fighting against strong
| odds. One of its members recently sent
ont a hundred letters to scientific men
| In various parts of the United states
| asking their opinion as to the nnpor-
tance of studying Greek ana batin'
| Thirty-five answered, and OF the thlr-
ty-five seventeen expressed the oplnloi
| that Greek and Latin are not essen
tiaI while only fourteen declared them
selves favorable to the Inclusion OF
those languages as necessary parts OF
| n scientific course. Even the uhlVer-
stiles of oxford and Cambridge are IN
clined to break away from Greek ana
| Latin. A.
This same spirit finds echo in the
| common schools. James B. Forgan'
nresident of the First National bank
of Chicago, said recently that he had
trouble to find young men who could
write a good business letter. lie opined
that more attention paid to the three
RS and less to what he regards as the
| frills would result in young men better
fitted for the duties Of life. HIS theory
| seems to be that at best the average
bow can get only smattering of these
| frills. hence the extra time devoted TO
! the three RS is spent to much better
purpose. Another prominent business
man of Chicago expresses the same
view. He shays that In employing
hundreds of young men he has found
that the boy who halls from the coun-
try school, where the three RS consul
| tute the curriculum, Is better ftted Tor
business than the city-bred boy VINO
has dipped into more than dozen diff
ferent subjects
Feeding school children is another
/ new departure In the United states. IL
is held by the teaching profession that
| a half-starved stomach cannot Keep
company with a well-nurtured brain
| and that there are thousands of chill
dren who are backward just because
they are defciently nurtured. Inc
time has not arrived when the whole