Manchester Democrat. [volume] (Manchester, Iowa) 1875-1930, 1910-03-02
SUPERINTENDENT ON
UNIFORMITY OE BOOKS.
GIVES REASONS WHY A COUNTY
UNIFORMITY OF TEXT BOOKS
WOULD BE BETTER.
BOOKS WOtLD Be CHEAPER
Teachers Would have No Trouble il
Grading Pupils Removing From
One Part Of County to other.

On March 14th the peopieel Living, In
rural districts will haye an opportuni
ty to vote on the County Uniformity
text book proposition. Since writing
the articles that appeared in last
weeks issue Of the County papers
there have been rumber of inquir-
les regarding the method whereby
this plan is submitted to the people.
AS many do not have copies of the
Iowa School Law will give briefly
the chief legal facts governing such
matters.
The Iowa Code prescribes that wher
one third of all rural directors shall
have filed petitions with the County
Superintendent asking that the prop
osition of County Uniformity of Text
books be submitted to the people, the
I, County Superintendent shall CAL "a
I. melting of the County Educational
Board-cmoposed of the County Audi
tor, Board Of Supervisors, and County
Superintendent-to arrange for sub
n,itting the proposition4at the annual
school election--the second Monday
in March. This is the dste for the
township meeting and the meeting ii
rural Independent districts. Should
the proposition receive a favorable
Svote the County Board Of Education
Swonld then sselect the books and
make arrangements for handling the
same under, county supervision The
County Superintendent WOULD have
the matter in charge.
Realizing the many advantages o.
County Uniformity sent out blank:
early in January to secure an expires
sion from school officers regarding
the adv!sability of submitting it to
tie people. A large percentage ex-
pressed themselves favorably where
upon petitions were sent out with tht
E rscult that over seventy per cent.
came in signed,
In my article last week attempt
led to show that County Uniformit.
would give US cheaper books, woulc
be, better, for poor men and work nj
injury to anyone; would alsorbe help ],
-ful to those who ere compelled to
move to another place in the county
!. This believe to be true. There arr
yet more essential and urgent ret
sons why the SAND books should b.
used IN all the schools. II a cheap
er price were the only advantage t,
be gained hardly think the propos.
tion would be worth all the effort
necessary to get the proposition be
fore the people and would not un
dertake it. The chief benefit comes
from better school conditions ant
more efficient work: better classif
cation and graduation in our schools
One serious drawback in our school
at present is the failure to grade pu
pills properly, This is practically due
to two things-too great variety of
text books and lack of knowledge OF
how much ground to cover properly.
Where there are several text books
no teacher, be she ever so good, car
properly grade her pupils because she
must have SO many classes that
working to standard is impossible.
The lack of Knowledge of just the
right amount of ground to cover is 9
serious matter, especially to young
teachers. We frequently receive
letters from excellent young teachers
asking how much they should cover
in certain subjects. Others attempt tc
do more than the class can work out
successfully with the result that pu.
pills are soon pushed out beyond their
depth and before long become dis
couraged and wish to leave school
Even good swimmer when out be
yond the limit of his powers with no
apparent show of relief soon gives up
and school children are no exception
A course of study would do much
remedy this evil Our teachers. need
this as pattern to work by. To
make course of study for use in
schools where there lis a variety of
: text books would be time thrown
away<and to attempt arranging a
course for each individual school
would be shear folly. A far better
and reasonable plan would be to use
the same books in all the, schools.
The teachers would know just how
much to cover in q given time, what
to teach and how much. At Institute
all work could be based on the text
books used in the county; for teach
ing a text is like using cradle it
cannot be handled to the best advant-
age till 1t, has been used diligently.
With uniform books there would be
prepared in, this office an outline
showing the work to be done through
the year and the pages to be covered.
tary work would be prescribed which
would be extremely helpful in bring
ing all our schools to certain stan.
dard. ] do not know of any reason
why children in all schools should no
be covering the same ground and in
the same effective manner, SO that
when they have completed the rura
school course each has reached the
highest state Of efficiency possible
for him.
The matter Of classification o
schools is often impossible because
pupils are misfits. That is. they dt
not take work that would go witt
any grade. So many times children
moving about have been in severa
teri books till they have Host theil