Bismarck daily tribune. [volume] (Bismarck, Dakota [N.D.]) 1881-1916, 1914-01-02
Chicago Reformer Says City
Children Should Have Spell
ing Matches
Urges 2 Heads for Comp|i,
Gated Metropolitan School
Systems

~J~~
Chicago, Jan. Ia return to some
of the old-fashioned customs Of the
schools was advocated yes
terday by numerous business men
who made statements to the Records
Herald giving their opinions on pub
lie school problems.
Spelling down." reading aloud be-
fore classes and other Of the features
of country school life that have been
discarded by the city schools were
as desirable substitutes for
some of the subjects, now classified
as fads. &c
Industrial training is discussed in
detail in a letter to the Record.Her-
aid from Mrs. T. Vernette Morse, a
teacher who specializes in practical
Mrs. Morse insists that
the principles of every industry may
he impaired to a child before it reach
the age of u years.
Urges Two School Heads.
Her letter reads as follows:
1T is not to be wondered at that
the new demands on the public school
have caused a more or less chaotic
state Of affairs.
"In the first place, there should be
two superintendent of schools in all
large cities-an efficient man and an
efficient woman. These two officials
chou1I uynr), tnOn}hnp Cor n1nn0Ti0n0
correlation.
During the many years that /
have devoted my time to education |
have learned from experience that
fads are, as a rule, some special sys-
tenn of technical exploitation not bas-
ed upon the real principles that they
are supposed to represent. The con-
sequence is that they r popular
until their defects are proved. This
49, - education is no more the rule
in Chicago than i. is in. every city.
."dreds of schools visited it was
found there was a desire to promote
the industries without knowing what
'hoee industries demanded.
"The specialized training required
by the special industries cannot be
given in any school unless we turn
the schools into factories, but the
principles of every industry nay be
given to any ordinary child together
with the three RS before the child
is IL years old and l stand ready to
prove this statement to any group of
people that care to investigate.
"The principles, we'll established in
the child's mind at an age when its
creative powers are at their best, will
give a foundation that will stand for
all time.
Children are Builders.
children are natural builders.
The attention given to the Montessori
system proves what may be accom-
plished with very young cnilren in this
respect. 1t covers but a small portion
of a child's education in the way of
fundamental rinciples. But it helps.
There are many other people who
have solved parts of the problem. 1t
is most natural to put in a few space
filters, or fads, when a problem is thus
solved.
"f We wish to do away with the
fads the most feasible manner of do
ing so is to begin with the child and
the tools that nature has given it.
the small human machine is we'll
equipped with all CT the tools with
which to do the worlds work; it is ev.
en- provided with the necessary motor
power. The wires are all strung and
If we ruin this wonderful ma
chine after it has been placed in our
it is wholly our own fault.
Fixes Age For Foundation.
Every child should be prepared at
IL years of age to build upon the
fundamental principles of language,
arithmetic, geography, nature, study
in all CT its forms and physical ex-
preston.
Vocational education is nothing
but the ordinary occupations of life
systematized SO. that they may be sue
cessfully taught.
Every occupation, when ucces
executed, is founded on certain
laws that are so simple
that they are perfectly clear to a
mind. ~
1.-The confusion of education comes
from certain learned minds who have
their individual solution of
these laws upon the educational
world through various textbooks, no
two of which agree, although in the
end they must arrive at the same con-.
students are constantly striving
to fit these theoretical laws to prac-
teal purposes as oon as they leave
school and Of course the result is
Knows Results.
81 know the results that may be OBJ
tained from a plan of education based
on fundamental principles. I know
hat small children My be taught to
make their own models.
Il know that adults who have grad
lated from college and have a whole
of diplomas are absolutely
to earn a respectable living un.
i'll they have learned to eliminate