The Birmingham age-herald. [volume] (Birmingham, Ala.) 1902-1950, 1912-07-01
COLORED TEACHERS FROM MANY
STATES AT TUSKEGEE INSTITUTE
BY A. S. OWENS

fuskegee, June 29.-( Especial THE sec
ond week of the interstate summer school
for negro teachers, held at Tuskegee in
stitute under the direction of Prof ]. r..
E. Lee, closed today with an enrolment
of over 800 leading teachers from Ala
bama, Mississippi. Louisiana. Texas, Ar
kansas, Florida, Georgia, Tennessee Ken
lucky, North Carolina, South Carolina,
Missouri, Illinois and Kansas. 1t is ex-
pected the enrolment will reach 400, in
GLIDING the number Of ministers attending
the Bible school which opened at Phelps
hall at the same time the summer school
did for teachers and will run the same
length of time, closing July IL.
The marvellous growth of this annual
meeting of colored teachers during the
last three years, the increased interest in
the practical methods of teaching, and
the up to date lectures on education de-
livered daily by leading educators Of
both races are marked features of this
summer school, the largest ever held in
the south, to run four weeks consecu-
lively.
Among the prominent educators who
have addressed the teachers were Booker
IT, Washington, who in one of his lectures
spoke as follows:
Connecting Education With Life
II do not want you to get the idea from
what have said or from what | am go
ing to try to say that l do not appre-
ciate the value of purely mental culture,
mental training of the human being, be-
4 cause education must carry with it the
idea of training and systematizing the
mental processes. Any education that
does not do that is a failure in a large
degree I think it important. however,
that teachers keep in mind that they can
give mental training and impart that
which will mean culture, and at the same
time connect education with life.
IF there is anything that marks the
trend of modern movements in education
more than any other one thing, it is the
idea of connecting education with life, We
are getting away from the old methods
I The educated person in community used
to be rare individual-one that was
pointed out when he passed along the
street as if he were curiosity. When
there was only one educated person in a
community. he could enjoy that distinc-
ton. There was time in the old world
when the priests were the only educated
people. In a country like Germany, only
in German. They used to be given in
Latin.
I'VE are getting away from the old
idea, and We are now giving education
not to the few. but to the many. Growth
In that direction means that education is
no longer confined to the dead things--to
the things that are past, but is being ar
ticulated into life The wise teacher will
make study of the activities of the
parents of his pupils. He will study the
things that most interest them. that most
concern them. And he will find that the
things that most interest and concern them
are the things from which they get their
living Sometimes in the city it is in
mechanical direction; on the farm, 1t is
the growing of crops.
Now, all these things concern the par
ents. and when you study the activities
Of the parents of the pupils. and begin
TO make a connection between these ac-
tivities and your school room, you begin
TO have living school room. You then
have a natural. vital active connection
between school life and home life.
'How often is it true that you see a
schoolhouse that is a little old building