Essex County herald. [volume] (Guildhall, Vt.) 1873-1964, 1917-03-30
The Junior High School.


der one of the greatest expert super
visors of the country, Clyde M. Hill.
These schools are trying out in
Vermont. The much talked of mer-
its and advantages of this school
system over the traditional college
preparatory courses. These schools
are proving great success this
year and over thirty towns have
made an appeal for the Junior High
Schol next year.
The following is, in brief, the
Junior or the Junior Senior High
School plan. The so called drill sub
jects, the first fundamentals, are
completed with the sixth grade. The
child is now II or IL years of age.
The interests of the boys are now
more of manly character, those of
the girls womanly. If they can
only, at this period, get an introduce
ton to what the great world of men
and women of affairs are doing,
their instincts would be favored and
their interests met. The driving force
in the lives of these boys and girls
is action, helping somebody, going
ahead with something, seeing some
thing done with their mind and
hand working together in unison.
These boys and girls of this age
are crossing the threshold of life,
their mind is expanding in every
direction; they are building castles;
they are goiLg to pursue some great
calling; they are heroes and hero
ines; they want initiative; they want
motion; they want results, visible
and tangible.
Along comes the Junior High
school; goes back two years into the
elementary grades, where the drop.
ping out of school begins under the
present system, starts with the sew
enth grade, in order to include chill
dren around IL years of age; takes
in the grammar school and the first
two years of high school. We will
call these four grades the seventh
} eighth, ninth, and tenth grades
Where there is senior high schoo
there are two more years of Worl
to fit for college or more extended
study.
This Junior course gives thorough
work in the three Rs and the funda
mentals of the elementary course; il
additional gives the boy agriculture
shopwork and carpentry, and the the
girl domestic science and the arts O
homemaking. The students find in
terest in their work; it has beer
proven i'll city and country tina
pupils do not care to drop out O
school, they remain from two to fou
years longer at their studies. Pupil
are introduced to real productive in
dustry; they are getting in toucI
with the real work of men an,
women.
They study literature, but it's tn,
lives of men and women; it's com
position; it's business letters; it,
literature to develop the Imagination
and the instructive emotions alOn,
right lines. They study science
chemical and physical, not the kin,
within four walls, cold and formal
to meet the dictates of some coleg
$50 miles away. 1t is the science O
the farm, garden, factory, commun
ity, and business world. It's tn
science of current events. What
learned in the text is observed an,
, tried out in the great outdoors
They learn mathematics, but it's tn
practical kind. They learn French
German or Spanish, by the direct o
} conversational method, and they be
gin it two years younger, when tn
| language instincts of the child-yout
are nearest the surface, and hi
, verbal memory strongest.
To sum up. under the Junior higI
school system the whole child is sen
to school and the whole child
trained and developed, the physical
the mental, the emotional, tn
moral. The hygicnic and the SAM
tary sense is developed in the pupil
the athletic and the physical natur
are trained. This system takes tn
youth when the boy scouts and cam
fire girls begin their work. The la
,ol