The Washington times., 1913-10-28
TEACHER KEEPS TAB
ON SELF BY CHART
Bureau of Municipal Research
Issues Book for Instructors
Aid in Learning Herself.

Under the hea ading. ITO Help Teach
ers Discover Their Own Strength and
Weakness" the Bureau of Municipal
Research has issued little chart de-
signed to enable a teacher to gauge her
own success. This chart was designed
for the Ohio State School Survey Com
! mission, and is being used in the State
wide Wisconsin studies. 1t is fairly easy
for any one to keep account OF so sim
pie a thing as personal expenditure. 1t
is not so easy for one unframed in anal
ysis to sum up progress made in so
complex a task as the teaching OF
public school class. This chart is de-
signed to help in this analysis.
This "self-help' card is as wide as
letter sheet and half as long. Printed
or both sides are the questions about
the progress of a class which a super
visor may ask and which the teacher
herself may ask of herself if she wishes
TO check her work as she goes along.
The questions appear under two main
headings. the personality of the teacher
and the recitation. AS to the teacher,
does she appear TO be vigorous or weak,
poised or nervous, neat or slovenly, at
ease or EMBARRASSED? Is her voice
pleasant or harsh, clear OF. indistinct,
low or high? In her personal relations
with her pupils does she appear to
stimulate or suppress, to win cordial CO.
operation or to antagonfze, to be SYM
pathetic or harsh strict or lax, even
tempered or irritable, reasonable or un-
reasonable, tolerant or intolerant, dig
nified or undignified, courteous or rude,
encouraging or nagSing, firm or weak,
tactful or blundering, enthusiastic or
diffident, quick or slow to react. quiet
or noisy, systematic, disorderly. re-
sourceful or Independent?
Would Know Herself.
These are searching questions, yetN
teacher who conscientiously filled out
this much of the card by checking off
the yes or mo" she felt she merited
would have gone far in the self-analysis
now considered so important in a
teachers work.
Passing on to the recitation, the can
did teacher must write down how many
how many Indifferent. She must divide
them, however roughly, into energetic
or lazy, Independent or dependent She
must write down how many give fluent
topical recitatioEs. how many give word
or phrase responses, how many are in |
coherent, how many fail to answer at |
all. |
She must classify her class as to its |
incidence and industry, and indicate on |
her chart those who mind their own |
business anu muse WHO lultTltIt Will
others. How many ask pertinent ques- |
tons Of fact? How many ask relevant
thought-provoking questions?
Does the teacher lose time in calling |
or dismissing class in unnecessary talk
ing either by herself or her pupils. in
distributing materials or in falling to
have devices ready or in using ILL
adapted devices? Does she lose time by |
talking indistinctly or by permitting in
distinct speech by others? And If so,
how many minutes?
To Test Ability.
Here are many questions designed to
test teachers teaching ability:
To what extent are her questions
thought provoking. vague, or irrelevant?
To what extent can they be answered
by yes or no? How often do
they suggest the answer?
AS to the material of the recitation,
to what extent is 1t confined to the
text, within the pupils comprehension,
related TO their lives and experiences or
adapted to their present or future
needs? And as to the teaching itself. /
is II rambling, formal. mechanical? Il
Does 1t stimulate the initiative of the
pupils, require Independent thinking, de-
velop the pupils resourcefulness. re-
quire cooperation Of pupils, and utilize
their experience?
Then, considering the pupils them
selves. to what extent did they have a
clear idea of the purposes of the lesson
under inspection, were they self-reIiant,
did they act and think on their own ac-
count? To what extent did they CO.
operate with their teacher and their
To what extent did they
persist in getting the desired results?
Did they differentiate between essen
tials and non-essentials? How we'll
grounded did they seem in their pre-
Yious work
1t might be agoniZing for teacher to
push this inquiry into her own work to
such ruthless self-revelation as such a
chart is designed to encourage, but she
would know then where she stood, her
advisers say, and that Is half the
battle