El Paso herald. (El Paso, Tex.) 1901-1931, 1913-07-22
No Book School Succeeds
Unique Experiment in Rural Eduea-
tiOn Does Away With Study and
Encourages Play by Pupils.
-By Frederic ]. Haskin

, ASHINGTON, D. C., July e.

- "a
w A school without books.
without classes, without
grades, without examinations, without
punishments: a school where the chill
dren may not only whisper, but may
talk aloud, where there is neither read
ing nor writing, nor arithmetic by
such names, where the pupils never
work. but always pIay-such is the
Rural school at Rock Hill, S. c.
To school children it may seem to
be only a bit of heaven by chance
transferred to earth. but to educators
and pedagogs it is intensely interest
ing, because it appears to be a sue
cessful experiment pointing the way
to the solution Of the veXing problem
of how to improve rural schools.
Are Really Learning.
In this school the pupils learn the
three Rs even when they think they
are playing and not studying. What
is more important is that they also
learn how to grow cotton and corn
and beans and tomatoes; how to cook;
to enjoy their lives and how to make
homes happy.
This experimental school was de-
signed as an attempt to remedy the
shortcomings of the ordinary ruraI
school, especially in the south.
Many Poor Country Schools.
Between the Potomac and the Mis-
I sissippi rivers there are, in round num-
bers, $4,000 rural schools. Forty thou
sand of these are of the one room, one
teacher type. Seldom does one Of these
rural schools grow. The trustees gem
orally conservative farmers, usually
employ a young woman teacher-the
cheaper the better. More often than
not she comes from a distant COM
munity. Her interest is but tenn
porary and too often has none but the
money inspiration The school usually
lasts but four, sometimes six months.
Such children as may be spared from
house or field work are sent to the
school Next session a new teacher is
employed, the work is begun as before,
and the school has no chance to grow
Many of these 40, 900 one room schools
are housed in miserable shacks. Most
of them are positively centers of in
lection for hOOkwOrm disease, for tu-
berculOsis, and on occasion, for epi-
demic diseases.
Many of the children who go to
them hope to get away from the coun-
try and into the city as soon as ever
they can grow up; others have no ambi-
ton at all. Only the exceptional child
is content to build hisshOpe upon i'm
proving his condition on the farm. IN
til recently none of these schools so
much as attempted to give any instruc-
ton that would be of practical benefit
on the farm, or in the farm home.
The Rock Hill School.
The dreamers who dreamed Rock
Hill school first endeavored to see
clearly what the farmer must do all
his life long. and what the farmers
wife must do all her life long Then
they resolved to make a school regard
less Of convention or tradition that
would train the farmer children for
their future work, and train them not
only to do that work we'll but to have
joy in it.
As this school experiment was to be
made not to determine a laboratory
theory, but to be of use in practical,
everyday life, the utmost care was tax
en- in the initial steps
First of all, it was evident that the
school trustees would not be willing
or able greatly to increase the amount
or money to be spent on a school SeS-
sion, so it was decided to retain the
one teacher idea The problem then
was how to enable one teacher to make
her school a live and vital factor in
the community life.
Peabody Fund Finances School.
The Peabody board on November .,
1910. appropriated the money for the
project As 1t was new experiment
II was decided that the appropriation
should be liberal, but yet not beyond
the bounds of any school district The
sum OF $500 was set aside to do the
work home was found for the new
school on the edge of the campus Of
Winthrop college at Rock Hill It was
an old farm house. lately used by the
college carpenter. but just such house
as might be found or easily constructed
IN many country districts. The three
rooms Of the ground floor were utilized.
and there was a veranda or gallery
running all around the house val
able part of the plant as it later de-
veloped- With the house was a tract
of land to serve as a garden with
enough yard for a generous playground
On one side was the college on the
other the open country.
Planned by BOurIand
The school was born in the brain of
Or. A P. Bourland, secretary of the
conference for education in the south.
When the time came he received val
Qaple nelp and suggestions from ". K
Tate, the state supervisor of rural
schools for South Carolina They de-
cided to place the experiment school at
winthrop college, where it could have
the friendly care of president D. B
Johnson and others of the faculty
Mrs. Browns Work.
All Of these men recognized that thew
must nave hardy pioneer, and they
searched carefully for a teacher to |
whom to entrust the experiment. Their |
choice happily fell upon Mrs. Hetty B.
Browne, then a teacher in the city
schools of Spartanburs.
They talked with Mrs Browne dis
cussed with her the familiar short
com1ngS Of the rural school went over
their plans IN a general way-a dis
cusslon OF the essentials of teaching by ]
the senses-and left the matter to her
1t was as If they had written on a bit OF 1
paper: There never was before in the
whole world such thing as a school. |
GU nave the first school You have
the pupils. Let them learn"
Radical experiments in education
nave been made before Less than
three score and 10 years ago the ave |
rage student at Oxford and Cambridge |
knew no other meaning to the word /
science" than that|given it by boxers /
Now the sciences have subOrdi1ata5 tT,a I
humanities in the universities. and this |
is the story Of how science came to the |
country school
tomorrow; How the New Rural /
School Was Begun.