The Calumet news. [volume] (Calumet, Mich.) 1907-1938, 1914-08-18
FAIRGROUNDS

grounds in the neighborhood They
procured "A map of the city, and placed
in the map a pin for each person ar
rested for delinquency FOR a period be-
fore the establishment of the play
grounds and for like period after
! their establishment. over the play
ground area there had been "A decrease
of so per cent. in dealing with delin-
quent children. The city of Chicago
has spent S50O.oOO,O0O this year to
maintain its play system. and the city
is saving more on handling its cases
of delinquent children than il is spend
| ing on its system.
Preventive discipline, as l see it, is
as fundamental principle as proven
tive medicine. We have come To see
there is no effect in dealing with dis
ease i'm hospitals; we do not build
hospitals TO deal with smallpox, but
we vaccinate as a preventive measure
We are coming To see that you cannot
best deal with the question of crime
by punishment. Forty or fifty years
ago one of the worst punishments for
horse stealing in the west was hang
ing, but there was never so much
stealing of horses going on as there
was then. 1t has happened TO be so
everywhere in the relationship between
punishment and crime The only ef-
fective way to deal with crime is to
create conditions out OF which crime
will not arise. You have got To keep
the children busy and happy. The
playground will do this IL it is well SUI
pervsed.
What of play as factor in educa-
ton? | suppose YOU are more or less
familiar with the results of animal
play? You go down the animal scale
and you will find that the animals can
do anything that is found in their
play; their play comes in as a method
OF education. Also YOU take a little
boy; the entire boy runs and plays
hide and seek ,and learns to find the
others, which teaches him to think
quickly 1t is said a child learns more
the first six years than at any time
afterwards and he gets this knowledge
out of his play, not out of books a
child who enters school at three makes
less progress than the child who en-
ters at five or seven. We are not
making very much by crowding i'm the
earlier years, and we all know the lit
tie child has not the capacity to pay
attention for more than fifteen min
utes at "A time. He is not getting more
than an hour "a day out of the school,
and yet we are preventing him from
thinking by keeping him inactive. |
remember how eager used to be, as a
boy, to pass the water, and if there
had been spittoons to clean / would
have done il in order to get out of my
seat. Physical education should be the
first education, and if the child does
not get it in his first years of strength
he is likely to break down later in his
school work, and likely to attempt
things he has not the strength to.
stand. | am perfectly sure the children
will not grow up strong and active
with less than one hour "A day at good
exercise; and if the children are going
to have that, we must put it into the
program of the school. If il is not pre-
scribed, those who need ii worst will
not get 1.-THE anaemic, the weakling,
the tubercular, etc. You leave these
children to themselves and you find
them loafing, and so absolutely the
first requirement is director of ply
steal training i'm the school, and that
director of physical training ought to-
get every boy and girl into some game
get them on some team. We should
have certain games in the program,
and not let girl or boy graduate
games. You may say that is not logi-
cal, but they have required it for years
in England with excellent results.
one of the strongest reasons for the
extension of the play movement came
out of the study of tuberculosis,
where it was early discovered that
there was no cure for the disease
through medicines, and that the only
effective remedy was to keep the child
in the open air and develop its lungs.
The time to begin physical education
is during the first OF physical period of
life. No child can grow up vigorous
and strong unless he is getting one or
two hours OF vigorous physical eXer-
else every day. The establishment of
Il healthy physique is of paramount
importance for little children, and, il |
is far more important that boy Of six |
or seven should have "a vigorous con-
and sturdy muscles than it is |
that he should know arithmetic or
geography.
The baby tends pretty well to his |
own physical development. He lies on
his back and kicks up his feet and |
keeps on pretty constantly, and i'll
YOU don't believe it is "A pretty thor
ough exercise you just try 1t for an
hour and see. / took my boy two and /
"A half years of age to game, and we
sat in the front seat and he climbed
over that railing twenty-five times
while we sat there. And so any little
child runs and jumps and carries on
about as good a system of physical
training as you get in any other way.
But little later, while the whole ami
mai side of him is still craving for ex-