The daily Gate City. [volume] (Keokuk, Iowa) 1855-1916, 1916-03-10

FRIDAY, l left Detroit soon after the
night session Thursday night, and ar
rived at Gary, Indiana, sometime be-
| fore breakfast and spent the day in
visiting the Gary schools.
The Gary Schools.
The Gary schools have been more
widely advertised than any other
school system in America. They cain
! to take care of more pupils per day,
per school house space, and to take
care of them for more hours a day
and furnish more ample equipment
than most other systems, but they
do not claim to do this at less cost,
as their plan is to use money saved
in houses to procure more and bet
ter equipment. Many things in con-
nection with the Gary school system
are certainly excellent. There were
| classes developing designs for wall
decoration, making their own stem
ellis. and putting them to actual use
in decorating their own rooms in the
school. There was a wonderful
amount of freedom of discipline and
very little appearance Of insubordina-
ton. The children were given an
eight hour day under supervision
from S:15 a. m. to AIS p. m. All
playground work and gymnasium
work, and in fact all work from SIS
a. m. to AIS p. m. was supervised.
We feel that we are largely handi-
capped by a lack Of supervision of
our children during their play-time;
some of which, under our present
system is on the school Fairgrounds
and much Of which, am sorry to
say, is down the alley. On the other
hand there was wonderful amount
Of what seemed to be looseness of
discipline and training. or course |
realize that in an eight hour day the
same amount of work may be &C.
complished that is ordinarily done in
five hours and not crowd so hard,
on the other hand the habit Of work
ing or loafing according to ones in
clination must necessarily cultivate
some undesirable habits.
In the Froebel building with eigh-
teen hundred children present out of
an enrolment Of two thousand chill
dren, building that had forty rooms
and fifty teachers did not appear to
me to be any great economy Of space.
While I was there, there was no time
during which children were not walk
ing through halls, up and down stairs,
in and out rooms, etc.
| spent about ten minutes near the
beginning of a class period in klnl-
srgarten room. There were children
struggling in during the entire time.
In one room, during school time, I
saw practically all the girls standing
around the teacher, who I learned
was not regular teacher; while the
boys were sitting on the floor shoot
ing marbles back and forth to each
other.
Some Criticism Of Work.
/ saw some really fine work during
one or two periods in the auditorium,
but ON the whole l could not feel
wonderfully enthused over the Gary
plan. There is much more opportun-
ity for handwork for all grades than
most schools provide. While the
school day began at 8:15 a. m, the
children need not come till 9:15, and
although they may stay all day they
may go home at noon if they wish
for an hour Two or three teachers
assured us that they had a checking
system which showed where each
pupil was all day long and if they
succeeded there certainly is wonderful
organization.
One thing that did not look good
to me was class Of primary chill
dren in the music room with feet
dangling from the seats which We're
large enough for the high school
pupils. The same thing was true in
a number of other rooms. 1t seems
to be frequently the case that pri-
mary children use the same seats at
different times during the day that
the high school pupils use. They
claimed that no school desks are real
" well adapted to children and that
children sitting a short time in one
seat, then short time in another.
keeping this up all day long, escape
the ill effects of sitting in any one
seat all the time.
They claimed about one-third Of the
regular enrolment for Saturday and
summer work The typical program
for pupils below fifth grade work was
two hours work on regular school
subjects, one hour follow-up work;
for instance, the work which followed
a number lesson might be game
involving numbers; then one hour
special work, nature, music, drawing,
etc, one hour assembly with lee
lures, moving picture or possibly a
class drill which was being used to
entertain and instruct the other peo
pie who were in the assembly room,
and two hours Of play. This makes
the seven hour day. The eighth hour
was for luncheon at the buildings, |
together with more or less freedom |
of play, or the hour to be spent going !
home for their dinner.
The Cost Of Schooling.
Their cost per pupil was $4,000 per |
annum in one school, but they claim |
ed for the city as a whole $4,000 per !
annum.
The city Of Gary is elaine to have |
As, 900 inhabitants, and has only about !!
500 pupils in their high school, just |
one hundred more than we have in !
our high school. This seems like a |
small number for the high school, but /
it is only fair to remember that Gary |
is made I'D very largely of foreign /