The Wisconsin tobacco reporter. (Edgerton, Wis.) 1877-1950, 1915-01-08
New School Organization.

day of this week the addition con-
structed during the past year as part
of the Child High School was occupied
by the pupils of the seventh and eighth
grades. The assembly of the building
| as now completed will accommodate
about three hundred and fifty pupils.
At present there are two hundred and
twenty-five pupils enrolled in the six
year high school organization. The
work with the seventh and eighth
grades is conducted upon the depart
mental plan of teaching as in the four
grades of the regular high school, each
teacher teaching those subjects for
which she has made special preparation.
The change which has taken place in
public school organization in Edgerton
is in line with contemporary enlight-
ened practice in other countries and
meets the approval of the leaders of
educational thot and practice in our
own country.
1t is coming to be very generally
recognized that the present plan of or
ganizing secondary education in the
United States is irrational and waste
full It finds no real basis in history,
psychology or logic. The establish
ment of a four year high school course
which is to follow an eight year ele-
mentary course was mere accident of
history. Psychologically the American
practice has been ill-grounded. The
age of twelve is the beginning of the
adOlescent period, when most notable
changes take place in physical form,
structure and function and there are
most decided concomitant psychological
changes. Self-consclousness is born,
the mind is no more satisfied with mere
empirical facts, there is restlessness
and desire for movement, individuality
sert itself, implicit obedience and con-
formity to rules arbitrarily imposed can
no longer be secured. The necessity
and reason for restraint must be intel
ligible. The youths whole nature calls
out for freedom of moI ement.
To enforce upon the adolescent the
restraints imposed upon the
boy or girl of previous period is to
stile his enthusiasm, to make him
rebellioua subject. To use with the
adoleseent the method of instruct n
employed in the first six grades is t.
encourage truancy, evasion of school
work, and to provoke a hatred for
school environment,
! The new organization as arranged in
Edgerton should meet the demands of
the adolescent nature. 1t should pro-
vide for those who are in the seventh
and eighth years of their school life
type and standard Of teaching much
more efficient than that heretofore en-
ployed. 1t should give to our boys and
girls. the opportunity to at least dis.
cover some of their powers, aptitudes
and likes by doing away with the non
chalant Indifference of the average
/ seventh and eighth grade child toward
his work. 1t should better prepare the
pupil for high school work, bridging
also the gap between the grammar and
the high school. 1t should organize,
guide, and wisely develop the social in
stincts of the child at time in his life
when his social instincts are 80 import
ant and in such great need of care and
training.
Logically, the plan is wise in that it
will more nearly meet the demands of
those for whom the schools were in
tended. The problem of the boy who
fails will be simplifed, since the child
will have to go over, the second time,
only that work in which he has made
failure. Wherethe plan has been tried
out it has very markedly held pupils in
school for additional years. The rate
at which pupils have dropped from
school at the conclusion of the eighth
grade has been appalling. Notable re-
suits in having this time postponed
fhave been achieved.
I 1t is to be hoped that the public will
be sufficiently interested in the magni-
.icent building and equipment which: which
has been provided for the educational
advantages of the boys and girls of this
community to visit and determine for
themselves the kind of work attempted
and the results being accomplished by
the local school.