Evening star., 1940-03-29
Speech Teachers
.Accenting Diction,
Conference Is Told
Public Speaking Session
Reveals Vigorous Orators
FoII From High Rank

ing audiences, is no longer teach.
er's pet.
Teachers today, or most of the
500-odd speech teachers attending
the Eastern Public Speaking confer
ence at the Mayf1ower Hotel at
any rate. prefer the more quiet
type. Give them a student who
can speak clearly and without af-
fectation any time.
Public speaking and debating still
have important places in the mod
ern school curriculum, but they are
giving way in popularity-with
both students and teachers-to less
ostentatious studies. such as die
ton and voice control
- All this was brought, in one form
or another. by virtually all the
speakers on the program of the
opening session today of the East
ern Public Speaking Conference,
continuing through tomorrow.
Welcomed by Randolph.
In welcoming the visitors. Rep
resentative Randolph, chairman of
the House District Committee, said
he favored establishment of re-
quired speech training courses in
high schools and colleges.
Dr.. Chester w. Holmes, assistant
superintendent. of Washington pub
lie schools, told the teachers one
OF their biggest problems was to
ONSET the bad speech influence of
many radio programs, sound motion
pictures and newspaper comic
strips.
DR.. Ordway Tead, president of
the Board of Higher Education,
New York. told the conference the
vitality of any speech centers
around the questions, What have
you to say? and what good reason
have you to say it?" He outlined
his ideas of what speech training
should consist of in colleges and
universities.
Ethel Sunny of Wilson Teachers
College pointed out that a recent
survey indicated that to 20 per
cent OF all school pupils have no.
ticeable speech defects.
Other speakers at the general
session, over which DR.. w. Hayes
Yeager Of George Washington Uni
versity presided. were Helen K.
Macintosh, senior specialist in ele-
mentary education. United States
Once of Education. and Harold
Benjamin, dean of the college of
education, University of Maryland.
Sectional Meetings.
Thirteen sectional meetings were
scheduled this afternoon on such
subjects as rhetoric, dramatics. in
terpretation and American oratory,
Among tomorrow's sectional ses-
sions that have attracted advance
attention are the conferences on
Putting the News on the Air"
and on measuring Public Opin-
Ion Participants in the first will
be Earl Goodwin, N. B. c. COM
mentator; Albert Warner. C. B. S.
news analyst. and Fulton Lewis,
Jr., Mutual Broadcasting System
commentator. Speakers on the pub
lie opinion program. to be pre-
sided over by Eugene Meyer, pub
Usher of the Washington Post,
will include George H. Gallup,
public opinion statistician, and
Senator Lundeen of Minnesota.
That voice and diction have sup
planted debating and oratory in the
interest of teachers was borne out
last night at meeting of the
Potomac Speech Associs. ion, which
is participating in the general con-
ferences today and tomorrow.
Poll Places Diction High.
DR.. Ray Ehrensberger of the Uni
versity of Maryland said that an
swers to QUESTIONABLE recently
sent out by the university showed
that secondary school principals
rated voice and diction as more
essential in the training of teachers
than instruction in public speaking
and their opinion was expressed by
a margin of more than two to one.
Dramatics was relegated to fifth
place in the esteem of the principals,
tagging behind oral Interpretation,
correct speech and debating
In reporting on speech correction
needs in the District. Mrs. Grace w.
Atherton. head of District public
school correction work, declared that
the local public schools six full-time
speech teachers now have 700 STU
dents under treatment
Mrs. Atherton asserted that
recent survey by the Health De-
partment showed there are now at
least 4,149 cases of defective speech
In local public schools, and that
more are on the speech teachers
waiting lists. She contended that
there should be full day to speech
correction in each school each week,
instead of the half day that is
given with the present staff, and
that larger staff is needed.
Miss Zella Faris of Eastern High
School pointed out that only 687 of
the 1894 students in senior high
schools here are taking speech work
this year. Since the courses are
elective, she said, this means that
the students who have the greatest
needs 60 without help.
DR.. Mary E. Latimer of Mary
Baldwin College, Staunton, Va dis
.cussed trends in speech correction
work in Virginia.
At the conclusion of last night s
meeting, the association passed a
EDUCATIONAL.