The Birmingham age-herald., 1915-07-18
The Social Task of Education
By EDWARD T. DIVINE

Education may be taken as a very broad term for the entire conscious process of passing on from one generation to another the accumulated treasures, the acquired capacities of the race. So conceived. 1t touches every age, but childhood is its special province-the period marked by na- ture as peculiarly adapted to this process.
 If, unlike the beasts that perish, man has a social heritage. handed on from ono generation to another so that we are not dependent upon our biological inheri- tance alone 1t is to childhood that this debt is paid, by the children that the new credit is acquired in trust for the years ahead. in which they are to be the living link between the past with it's achievements and the future with its pos abilities
 Childhood Must Have Its Chance
 Ii therefore the social structure is to be sound and suitable, childhood must have it's chance. must have time enough to per form its function, must not be cheated of It's debt, expected to yield a harvest of figs from sowing of thistles.
 If we analyze this social ask of educa- NsS@' part of it undoubtedly consists in the mere preservation of actual information. We need not concern ourselves very much about that. The printing press has solved it.
 True. there Is information which can be preserved and imparted only In other ways, for example. through art. Paint ings, sculpture, architecture, music, all tell their own story in way that descriptions of them, even critical studies of them, do not The hand which can conceive which can see and appreciate them, are essential to the preservation of our social .ssr.tage. Actual and valuable informa- ton perishes from the world if as an incident of warfare works of art are de- stroyed, or if. through the failure of ed ucation, we cease to know their value. Arts of skill might disappear in the same way. But, speaking largely, the next generation is not in serious danger of dearth of information.
 A second task of education in a policy of social construction is to teach the use of the mind and body It is of little avail to have a body unless one knows how to use it, Most of us misuse and fall to use our eyes. our ears, our hands, our back, our tongues and teeth. our lungs and diaphragms, our legs our skin.
 From Four Legs to Two
 For l0o0,c00 years or so. no doubt, we travelled on all fours as babies still do and now nature fails us sometimes when we try to stand upright. For ,000, 900 years or so salvation on earth depended on abil- ity to distinguish friend from foe at a great distance. Now. when the ob jects of our interest and solicitude are nearly always at IS inches from the eye instead of mile, we find ourselves han dicapped by an optical instrument fit ted for the distant but not for the near visiou. We subject ourselves to eye strain, and have headaches, curved spines, and i'll temper in consequence
 No other mechanism in the world. we are often assured Is so continuously and fagrantly abused-.from ignorance. from obstinacy, from carelessness, from para sitic enemies, from indulgence of it's own eccentricities, as the human body. Edu- cation for efficiency implies instruction as to these elementary things; not an atomy and physiology, though those are useful: but cleanliness respect for bodily functions, coordination of muscles, re- pose of nerves. Hygiene in all it's branches is the first element in social educa tion
 But the mind also is useless save as we have learned how to use It. To impart in- forma ton is no more to give the mastery of the mind than to impart food Is to give the ma stery of the body. Certain drills are necessary to make the mind rapid and accurate. Certain processes are necessary to develop observation and the critical faculty. Other exercises are use ful in cultivating the memory and the i'm aginatio
 Choosing Things Worth While
 But, above all, In q policy of social construction, the educat onal system must be successful in plantlng watering and securing increase in the power of form ing economic judgments, in the power of estimating values as higher and lower, of comparing rightly future pleasures with those of the present, the permanent with the f1eeting, the spiritual with the ma- terial. Rifht reasoning about what can be attained by a given effort, and what the satisfaction thus attained is really worth compared with other possible results from the same effect-this, I