The Monroe journal., 1922-12-22
HAMILTON LIKES NEW
IDEAS IN EDUCATION
Former Union County Man Just Back
From Teachers College i'm y. y.
Will Teach Only Useful subjects

most efficient and progressive school
men in the State. has recently re-
turned from New York City where he
has been making a study of the new
est ideas in education. Mr.. Hamil-
ton is superintendent of the Goldsbo-
TO schools and has been on leave of
absence this fall The following in
terview from the Goldsboro News is
of interest
Old ideas Of education in the late
generation that mastering a giyen
subject such as mathematics, algebra,
Latin or Green train ones mind so
that he can do something else better
or asSimilate some other training bet
ter is vanishing. in the opinion Of
Oscar A. Hamilton, superintendent
Of the public schools of the city. who
returned ea.e,day morning from
Teachers Training School in New
York City. where he has been study
ing teaching from a scientific stand
point for the past three or four
months. Time should not be wasted
teaching useless things, he says.
1T is the opinion of educators
now. said Mr.. Hamilton, that
training in one line cannot be trans
ferred TO some other line except in
very inapprecable degree. For in
stance. | might BE- able to manipulate
the keys Of that typewriter there,
but to say that il would help me TO
better solve i problem in mathemat-
les, or to say that because can solve
a given problem or know certain
facts about language that | can ma
nipulate the keys OF a typewriter is
now regarded as foolishness. For
that reason education is all being APP
preached in a different way. School
books are being written in differ
ent way Take this arithmetic.
There is nothing in there about
apothecary weights. about partial
payments squareroot, longitude, and
latitude, and other things we spent
our time trying so hard to master in
school and which we have forgotten
about and never have had any reason
to use since.
All that has been done away with.
You will find only the things in
there student viii! have need for.
OF course we were told that II we
mastered those things we would bet
ter be able 10 master something else.
Educators don't believe that any
more. Those things though, have
driven many good student out of
school. They would have driven me
out of school, If it had not been for
the fact that my father was teacher
and the element of pride compelled
him to keep me in school.
"NO More Fear Teachers
Another thing being changed"
went on Mr.. Hamilton. lis the mat
ter of school discipline and the way
of getting a child to learn. The old
way was TO scare II into him. The
best teacher who could come along
with the recommendation that every
body was afraid of him and that a
student didn't dare bat an eye. Now
when teacher comes TO me with any
such recommendation as that | won't
even consider him. For, when we get
students to do the things that are
right because they want TO then they
are getting the sort of training that
will make a real citizenNout of them.
Of course enc knows that the kind
of citizen that does what is right be-
cause he wants to and because he
thinks it is the thing TO do and not
because he Is afraid of the policeman
is better citizen than the one who
just obeys the law because he is
afraid OF IT,
"All those ideas of fear are getting
out of education just as they are get
ting out OF religion. In religion, you
know, they used to think that the
greater a persons contribution and
trials and the more they mortified
the flesh the greater would be their
reward, and they used to think that
the way to make a man good was to
scare him about hell"
All that's going now. Mr.. Hamilton
believes. He said that education was
being treated scientifically He call
ed attention to the proposal to put
geography. history and civics all in
one book because of their similarity
History, anyway" he said lis an
economic problem. Trace any war
and you will find that there was an
economic reason. Who cares any
thing any more about the date' of q
great battle or how il was fought?
What We are interested in is the rea-
son and the result. That's the way
We are trying to teach students now.
There are books being tried out and
experimental with. They have not
been put in the schools yet. but when
they are we will know in advance
Just how students will react to them.
At the teachers college he explain.
ed they were teaching teachers f.
nance so that they would understand
just how a schools money was being
spent. The average teacher in his
opinion know little about his own f.
nance. and much less about the f.
nance of the school. These courses
would enable a teacher to COM
pare his own schools method of eN-
penditure with ideal methods so he
could know in a moment whether he
was spending too big percentage of
the budget on one thing and too lit
tie on another. For instance" he
said. 1--WE might be spending two per
cent for a janitor. or one per cent.
That might be too much or II might
he too little The average teach n