Evening capital and Maryland gazette. (Annapolis, Md.) 1910-1922, 1918-07-22


The rural teacher in this county
who, by the way, must also act as
janitor, caretaker and fireman, finds
her school plant and equipment some
what as follows: The average room is
about is by 20 feet, built on the order
of box with windows on all sides,
including the front of the room. On
each side of the window in the front
of the room are small pieces of cheap
grade of blackboard, the bottom of
which is from 3I5 to 4 feet from the
floor. The desks, which are most al
ways too large for the children, are
often terribly disfigured, bearing mute
evidence of the industrious seat
work" of the old-fashioned school.
They are arranged along both sides,
close up TO the walls, while the stove
occupies the middle of the room
There is large platform in the front,
furnished with a teachers desk and
chair, from which sanctuary the
teacher is supposed to discipline the
school" and hear the children their
lessons" There is seldom a map or a
globe and in only exceptional cases
are few good pictures found decorat-
ing the whitewashed walls. The
whole affair, in most instances, is typi-
cal of the traditional school, so often
referred to by modern writer's. This
is not very glowing description, but
it is typical of our rural schools, and
il requires a brave teacher, indeed, to
undertake the instruction of twenty
five or thirty children, arranged in
eight grades, under such conditions.
1t is out of the question for the
teacher TO handle the required num-
Der (forty children) with this equip
ment The result is that a little"
room is added and two teachers are
employed, where one could easily do
the work if proper school plant were
provided. 1t is wasteful to employ
two teachers at $500 or 5000 year
to teach from 80 to 80 children (sev-
eral of our two-teacher schools aver
age less) when, with proper equip
ment, one teacher could easily do the
work. In such cases, it would be far
better for the children and certainly
more economical to provide a suitable
building and pay one good teacher a
much higher salary to do the work.
We would then be able to keep our
good teachers and the higher salary
woud be an inducement to bring other
good teachers into our county, as well
as an incentive tempting bright girls
to prepare for the profession.
Not only has there been waste due
ITO the fact that two teachers are ne
cessary when one could do the work
with proper equipment, but chilren
have been making slower progress
than they would have made had the
teacher been provided with proper
means with which to vitalize the in
lstruction. There is no place in such a
room for educational games or dra-
matization that makes school life SO
interesting to little folks. Nor is
there board space or other means of
visualizing instruction The building
was designed for teacher ito discip-
line the school" and hear the chill
.dren their lessons.
In many places, within the last year
the teacher has taken out the tradi-
tional platform upon which she for
merly sat ito hear lessons" and is
using the space TO do real teaching.
Children will always do better when
they are interested, and so we are in
hopes more teachers will get the idea
that instruction to be efficient must be
oral, visual and motor. Learn to do
by doing" means more than learn to
do by reading out of the text book"