III. GENERAL PRINCIPLES GOVERNING THE SELECTION OF MATERIAL AND ITS PRESENTATION.

A. Point of view in organizing work.-Science for high-school students has been too largely organized for the purpose of giving information and training in each of the sciences, the material being arranged in accordance with the logical sequence recognized by special students of that science. The theory sought justification in the claim that the secondary course is introductory to more advanced study, and as such should introduce the student to each of the leading phases of the subject; furthermore, since special students in each of the sciences have discovered or developed systems of organizing those materials, it was held that the beginner should be given the fundamentals of this system of organization.

Neither in common life activities nor in research is the artificial stratification of the sciences maintained in solving problems. Not only is science organized and tested knowledge which in the process of testing has become highly classified, but true science includes the process of organizing, testing, and determining the effectiveness of knowledge. The common method of science teaching too often has been that of presenting the so-called essentials with their definitions and classifications and of subordinating or omitting the commonplace manifestations of science in home, community, civic, and industrial situations which make it most easily possible for the learner to practice science.

Introductory science attempts to reverse the traditional method of teaching. It attempts to start with questions of immediate interest to the pupil, ideas which are significant to him by reason of his own experience and which concern his own life to such an extent that he perceives or is easily led to perceive their worthwhileness. With developing experience as a background and interest as a spur, the pupil turns his energies to the solution of a problem which really engages him, regardless of the particular science in which his prob

lem lies.

The most radical teachers of science in secondary schools assert that there is little or no value in recognizing the specialist's system or organization when teaching science in the secondary school; instead, they would discard all organization of this kind. These teachers would adopt the so-called project method of organization for all science in secondary schools.

The less radical of the progressive teachers would adopt unified topics as the basis of organization of introductory science courses, but would retain the differentiated special science courses for the upper high-school years.

This report is based upon the second point of view, that is, the point of view of the less radical of the progressive teachers.

(1) Organization.-Selection and presentation of science work should rest on the following:

a. Self activity is a law of growth.

b. Interest secures attention and makes self activity possible. c. Interest, to be sustained, must rest on the perception of the worthwhileness to the individual of the purpose sought.

d. A usable question, problem, project, or topic involves a purpose, the immediate or future worthwhileness of which is recognized by the individual and by the class.

(a) Centralizing topics.-Questions, problems, and projects are usually related to some centralizing topic, which topic may then constitute a teaching unit. Projects may involve any or all of the following kinds of work: Construction, experiments and the interpretation of experimental data, consultation of reference and textbooks, class discussion, group conferences, individual reports and field trips.

(b) Project defined.-A project is any projected or proposed activity or experience which an individual purposes to enter upon or carry through to the end. It may be to make an electric motor, to understand how a motor works or why it will not work, to repair a broken motor, or to find out what are the origin and nature of any one of the materials of which a motor is constructed; it may be to find out about the structure and proper manipulation of an automobile or of a bicycle; it may be to rid a community of mosquitoes or houseflies, or to find out how some former generation of men dealt or failed to deal with any particular problem of health and disease; it may be to find out how to prepare the meals for a group of guests throughout a summer's vacation. The project may involve any specific thing which the pupil purposes to do, whether this thing is a small piece of work involving a few minutes' effort, or a prolonged piece of work lasting for weeks, the unit depending upon the conception of the piece of work which it is purposed to accomplish.

(c) Relation of project to topics.-In teaching science, however, teachers must consider what pupils do both before and after. Hence teachers need to see the units of work in terms of the aggregates into which these units may be organized. All of a given group of units likely to arise in relation to one line of consideration are readily related by pupils and teachers to one another under one topic. Some of the units might properly arise under any of several topics, and are of course to be grouped so that their purposeful relations are best recognized. A coherence, significant to the pupil, should be sought.

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On account of the difficulties and disagreements which arise when terms rather than point of view are emphasized, the following outline of subjects avoids as far as possible the use of controversial terms. It endeavors instead to use expressions and to outline purposes, content, and procedure which show the point of view.

(2) The natural way of working.-This plan of presenting introductory science possesses the advantage of building on interest and commonplace experience, thus securing more self-activity and selfeducative effort. The problems and projects are unified on the basis of individual experience, class discussions, laboratory work, and the study of textbook and reference material. This plan involves all the elements of a complete cycle of thinking: (1) Perception of a need resulting in a question to be answered or a problem to be solved; (2) the presentation of possible explanations or hypotheses; (3) trial and discussion of possible explanations; (4) adequate verifica tion of the most probable explanations; (5) the relation of the particular study to other phases of the topic to the end that a usable and orderdy arrangement of new attainments may result. This is the natural way of working. It is the way of adults, of research students, of business men and women, of children themselves outside of school when left to themselves. This procedure gives training in ways of working which the pupil must use outside of school both during and following his school days.

(3) Dangers to be avoided.-The difficulty of shifting from the accustomed method of teaching, the inexperience of teachers, the failure to find or select topics and problems of the proper sort, while not inherent in the method, are none the less real difficulties.

There is great danger that interest of only a superficial sort will be aroused, and that the class work will degenerate into mere entertainment, amusing or curious, but not essentially educative. The failure to secure sustained and progressive interest means failure to secure progress. Topics chosen must be so treated as to secure clarifying generalizations and logical organization. Some of the generalizations formerly insisted upon will be seen to have little practical significance, and consequently will be omitted. In the present experimental status of this method of selection teachers must guard carefully against the tendency to institute a series of unrelated activities, so that generalization and coherent arrangement are lost. Organization should be achieved as a result of the pupil's work, and not forced upon him as the point of departure. A generalization is valuable only when it represents a unifying idea, by which known facts or processes are related and from which new facts may be surveyed as a step toward a still more complete organization. If these principles are carefully followed there need be no danger of an "easy" or "soft" education, which no science teacher desires. On the con

trary, it should result in a more active and more demanding kind of education because of increased significance and thereby increased recognition of need for real knowledge.

(4) Considerations determining the choice of topics.-These should be chosen on the basis of their fundamental relation to life as indicated by the following:

(a) They should be based on common experience and the needs organically related to them.

(b) They should relate to local industries, community and school activities, and the life of the home. They should extend from these to larger considerations.

(c) They should be graded so as to be hard enough to call for the pupil's best efforts, and should become increasingly difficult as the pupil develops his power of attack through experience.

(d) All pieces of work should be unified under central topics in progressive order, so that whenever possible the results of one piece of work may find use in another. The problem of organization should be made a part of the pupil's work.

(5) The advanced courses in science.-The method of organization outlined above has been successfully tried in the science courses of junior high schools and in the first two years of four-year high schools. In senior high schools and in the upper years of fouryear high schools this method of organization has not been extensively tried. With more mature students and with the gain of one or two years of substantial work in science, organized as suggested above, these later courses may properly cover an amount and rigor of study considerably in excess of that included in former courses. With this background, the commonly accepted plan of organization in the different special sciences may continue to be best, though further readjustment may late: be advisable. These science courses need to be reorganized so as to use and not unnecessarily duplicate the materials and methods of the introductory science courses.

B. Laboratory procedure.—The fact that laboratory work in general has not accomplished the results expected indicates the need for reorganization of the method and content of laboratory work. A few common causes of disappointment are:

(1) Experiments are too frequently devised to check up and prove generalizations or laws the truth of which the pupil already perceives.

(2) Experiments often repeat work described in the text in such a way that the outcome is uninteresting and of little value.

(3) The data collected in many experiments are an end in themselves. There is no further use for them, and hence they have no

significance for the pupil. Such "busy work" serves no worthy

purpose.

(4) Many experiments are too minutely quantitative and call for refinements beyond the need or appreciation of secondary school pupils.

Too frequently the laboratory and classroom, sometimes improperly called "lecture room," are separate not only physically but intellectually.

The laboratory should be a place where the pupil puts questions to nature, observes accurately, and deduces conclusions logically, not a place where directions are followed blindly and meaningless results obtained. The value of individual laboratory work has been seriously injured by requiring each pupil to do exactly the same experiment as every other pupil and do it in as nearly the same time and same way as possible. The spirit of the project method should vitalize the experimental work. There will always be some pupils who should modify the work to meet their special needs or interests. Such differentiation should be encouraged and lists of alternative work should be available to utilize individual interests and inclinations.

Improvement of laboratory practice will result in less cumbersome forms of note taking and of notebook making. The experiment is not designed for the sake of a notebook record. A summary of results which can be used in interpreting the work done should be made and pupils should be allowed much freedom in the precise manner in which the record is made. They should record important and significant facts, and the record should be clear and complete. That is, the laboratory is a "work place," and records should be simple and direct accounts of the real and vital work that has been done.

C. Class-room procedure. The adoption of the problem-projecttopic method of science teaching will lead to a considerable change in the purpose and use of the recitation period. The "hearing of lessons," memoriter repetition of facts and principles gleaned from the textbook, the more or less discontinuous dialogues between teacher and individual pupil should give place to a real class discussion in which all take an active part in contributing, organizing, and using the information dealt with. In such discussions the teacher serves to direct, stimulate, and advise. There should be a maximum opportunity for self-expression in the immediate problem.

In the recitation period the skillful teacher will develop and arouse interest, furnish the necessary background, and direct the class in its search for answers to a vital problem. In the development of such work the demonstration experiment plays an important part. Such experiments need not be spectacular and sensational, but the