Omaha daily bee. (Omaha [Neb.]) 187?-1922, 1919-03-27
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London Times.

DR.. c. w. Kmmins, chief Inspector to the
London education committee, addressed the
members of the Child Study society on "The
Significance of Children's Dreams" basing his
remarks upon Investigations which have re-
Gently been carried out among London school
children
Children from five years of age and upwards
were asked to write true and full account OF
the last dream you can remember; state your
age, and also say about how long ago you had
the dream you have described AS result DR..
Kimmins received records of about 5000
dreams. In the infants schools apart from a
few written records by clever children in the
standard, the dreams were told individually to
the head mistress. There were many difficulties
which had to be borne in mind when estmat-
ing the value of the results 1t was found that
young children had great difficulty in separat-
ing the dream from the waking element. Their
powers of description were naturally very limit
ed and their use of words might convey to the
adult mind a very different impression from
that which they wished to convey. The child
would inevitably fill up gaps in the dream and
would reject as absurd some items in the dream
which were contrary to his own experience
Anything in the nature of full analysis OF
young child's dream would, therefore, be value
less. All they could do to classify each
broadly, as fulfilled wish, fear, an air raid,
fairy story, purely domestic dream and so on
Dealing with the dreams of children of FIVE
six and seven years of age, he found that
dreams of Christmas and Santa Claus figured
very largely, especially with the five-year-od
children. With the very young child the fear"
dream is very prominent. No less than - per
cent were of this nature, consisting chiefly OF
the dread of Objectionable men, largely Of Ger
man nationality. At seven years of age children
both boys and girls, dream more about burglars
than at any other age. Curiously enough, the
fear dreams of animals are far more common
among the boys than the girls. School activities
appear very little in the dreams of children OF
any age, while the fact that the essays were
written seven months after the last raid prob
ably accounts for the circumstance that afraid
dreams occurred only to the extent of about
4 per cent. In the girls dreams the influence
of the cinema is felt very little but in those OF
the boys, especially at the age of seven, it is an
important factor. Fairystory dreams are very
common with girls, but are rarely experienced
with boys, and the same thing applies to dreams
of normal domesticc occurrences.
One important fact which energies is that
the ghost has been superseded by the fairy. The
old terror of the dreaming child has disappear
ed There was only one reference to ghost in
all the infant-school dreams. The fairy dream
is generally one OF pure enjoyment, apart from
the comparatively rare intrusion of the witch.
At five years of age the child is the center OF
the dream and is rarely passive observer. For
instance: II dreamt THAT tiger came to our
house and ate mummy and daddy and my
brother and me, and then l woke up and cried
an said, 1T isn't true" Or the dream of girl
of five, after the king and queen had visited
Peckham. "a lady was sitting my bed and
the king and queen were under the bed eating
bread and butter and lot of ladies with them"
Or the tragedy of the child who dreamt, Some
one came and took our white baby and left a
black one" By the age of seven there is great
advance. The family relationship is then fully
realized and the child is not SO much the central
figure. There is less confusion between the
dream and the waking experience.
Young children sometimes imagine that they
take other FORMS like the nervous boy of five,
a bakers son, who dreamt that II was in a loaf
of bread and German cut it into little bits and
saw me-" The boy, however, scored, for he
adds. Il flew away; l had wings on me-" On
another occasion the same boy dreamt, II was
in kettle and drank up all the water. Mother
could not find me; went under the gas pipes"
DR.. Kimmins is convinced that in the infants
schools the careful study of dreams may yield
very valuable results in giving additional in
formation as to the actual normal temperament
of the child, while in the case of children of the
neurotic type it may give important clues to
the basis of the mental instability. Young
children delight in telling their dreams, and
monthly record of the dreams throughout the
year in selected cases by judicous head mis-
tresses might prove to be very useful piece of
research.