The Bridgeport times and evening farmer., 1918-08-09
TEACHERS IN ALASKA HAVE X VERY HAZARDOUS OCCUPATION

CT and family live at the village for stated periods for the benefit of the school on the children. This has met some of the difficulties but not all. The plan has made the families more willing to stay their time at the herd. The markets for the meat are in white settlements and the families and herds are often near those places where the downward tendency on the life and morals of the natives is great"
 Wireless in Schools.
 The Eskimo is not as isolated as the geography would indicate, for at some of the schools wireless stations have been stablished and news Of the world is flashed to them. Con-. corning his enterprise MT. Replo- gle says:
 'The greatest difficulty experienced in teaching the Eskimos is not in teaching them regarding the facts of life, but in getting those facts ap- piled to their everyday living. In- struction has, therefore, been of the most practical kind. The morning exercises are largely taken up with singing and telling the wireless news from all over the world, as received at our wireless station. So eager are the people to get in touch with the world that 1t is common to hava the schoolroom full of adults to hear the news. In order to understand it they must become acquainted with geography and history. These studies have given them a comprehensive viewpoint such as was never possible to obtain through the abstract text book method of teaching. This has had much to do with the change of the customs of the people themseles. To them the United States and its government is no longer a matter of man or two, but is a big tangible reality.
 "The wireless has done more in one winter to awaken the slumbering in- tellect of the native than years of ab- stract bookwork. His education has come to him imperceptibly and has fastened itself upon the consciousness without definite effort on his part. There is no longer any balancing of | the native custom" against the neT 1 knowledge. In room No. 1 a class was organized for the study of cleo tricity and the radio" code. With the very limited general knowledge of the pupils, the progress was neces- sarily slow and very tedious" In the school conducted by H. D. | Reese at Kivalina on the shore of the Arctic Ocean, weekly baths are a part of the school curriculum. Until the school was opened there by the gov ernment bathing in water was un- i known, but the natives have been taught to like it. MT. Reese thus | describes 1t:
 "The bathroom is a source of much enjoyment and help to the pupils i Every Friday afternoon and evening the girls bathe; every Saturday after 1 noon and evening the boys bathe. Tho I other people of the village bathe oc- casionally, but each one can not bathe often. It is impossible to melt snow and ice with our limited facilities to make sufficient water for the whole 1 village to bathe often. Even to get 1 sufficient water for the school chill dren and three or four of the adults each week, we begin to melt snow Monday morning and keep at it all week. A limited amount of laundry work is done each week in the bath room. This work we limit to the young people who are in attendance | at school.
 Some people frequently requested at first to do the family wash there, | but because of the small amount of room, we lent them tubs and told them that the family wash must be done in their homes. Even with the young people we permit them to wash their clothes in the bathroom rather than encourage it. The fact that when they wash clothes in the bath room they usually take bath in the water first may give some idea as to how water is valued here. It | takes much fuel to melt the snow and ice, and fuel is a very valuable and highly prized commodity here. Also our supply of coal directs our
 policy in connection with school
 kitchen and bathroom"