Mass. laid on hygiene. The subjects of food, clothing, bathing and rest are considered, as well as the effect of muscular action upon the organism as a whole and upon the special organs. At intervals the pupils prepare lessons suitable for the grammar and primary grades, and conduct them in class. Miss Warren requires constant examples of application to the needs of children and to the formation of good habits; and she told me she is already, after five or six years, able to perceive results which prove that her efforts are productive of good. Graduates from her classes, now employed in primary or granunar schools, are noticeable for the hygienic influence and practice they have brought with them to their work. In conjunction with other members of the staff, Miss Warren exerts herself to secure, so far as possible, correlation between the various branches of study, and to adhere throughout to true pedagogical lines. At Salem, as at Framingham, I was impressed with the pains taken to form a just estimate of the personal fitness of each student for the selected vocation; in both colleges, a similar sentiment obtains, viz., that intellectual acquirements constitute but a part of the capacity to act as a teacher, for which each certificate granted acts as a guarantee. (b) Hyannis, Very similar methods for the study of physiology and hygiene are employed at the State Normal School at Hyannis, (Mass.), where these subjects are included in the science group both of the two and the four years' course; the good provision of biological, physical, and chemical laboratories permits of eminently satisfactory work. The natural science course includes geology and geography in addition to chemistry, physics, biology, and hygiene, and is supplemented by a study of psychology, pedagogy, school organisation, and methods of teaching English, mathematics, drawing, and vocal music. Six months in the first year are devoted to chemistry and physics respectively; zoology precedes physiology in a similar way in the second year; four hours a week, of which two hours are laboratory work, are devoted in turn to each of these subjects. The laboratory equipment includes a drawer with instruments for each student, also a glazed stoneware sink and a bunsen and batswing gas burner; eight or nine compound microscopes are provided. Each student makes any models he desires to employ in practical work for himself as part of the manual training. Nearly all specimens are worked at individually. The Professor of Biology and Mathematics, Miss Bertha M. Brown, a graduate of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, is unusually interested in the hygienic treatment of physiology in schools of all grades, and encourages a very free introduction of experimental and practical illustrations by her students in the Elementary Hygiene which they teach in the Practice School. The outline of each lesson is submitted to her before it is given, and the proposed method of handling the topic is discussed. Six weeks' observation work, and fifteen weeks of teaching are required of each student in the regular two-year course. She told me that most gratifying results follow the methods she has adopted with her students as regards influence on the character of the young people, the perception by them of personal possibilities and responsibilities in respect of health promotion, and the awakening of a desire on their part to impart such hygienic information to their own little pupils, as shall in turn arouse the children's interest, and stimulate them to right action. See Table VI., p. 59 above. I was informed on reliable authority that the Boards of Attitude of Education in some of the most prominent cities are no Boards of Education longer satisfied with proofs of a theoretical acquaintance towards with hygiene from the members of their teaching staff, but hold Training of them severally responsible for the maintenance of wholesome Teachers in conditions in their class-rooms, require of them intelligent co- Hygiene. operation with the medical inspectors in safeguarding the health of the children, and call upon them to inculcate good habits in those committed to their daily charge; when with these duties is combined that of the definite instruction of their pupils in hygiene and physiology, it is readily conceivable that facilities must be afforded to Normal students for a thorough practical grounding in these subjects. Hence the few theoretical lectures on School Hygiene hitherto provided in most Normal schools no longer suffice to meet the demands on teachers which arise from this broader conception of the significance of that hard worked, much-misunderstood word Education. I received repeated assurances that the admirable courses and methods for training teachers in hygiene and physiology which I visited and observed in different centres in Massachusetts and Ohio, were not confined. to certain favoured cities, but may be truthfully considered typical of a perceptible movement towards the general introduction of similar practical teaching into all Normal colleges. For this indication of progress various reasons are advanced; perhaps the two of most weight are: (1) that the training is rendered compulsory by that wider view of the scope of school education to which I have just referred; and (2) a keener realisation of the fact that the State owes it to her children that they shall grow up to maturity sound and well developed in body as well as in mind. Besides these I may also mention the gradual development of a more intimate popular interest in school conditions, evidenced by the attractive and valuable co-operation which exists in some cities between parents and teachers; the perception by authorities that precious time and money are lost when, owing to the teacher being ignorant or hampered in the exercise of his discretion, children carry on their studies under insanitary conditions; and a growing appreciation of the educational advantages offered to pupils of all ages by the study of practical hygiene which constitute it one of the most, if not the most, generally valuable subject in the time-table. The profound belief in education which permeates the great Conclusion American people must be witnessed to be realised. It is to to Part I. education that they look to weld their many millions into one coherent whole, of which the units shall be sturdy, resourceful, well-balanced citizens, to whose hands the honour and prestige of a great nation can be safely confided. In this ambition to be in the forefront of the world's nations may be found, in my opinion, one powerful motive for the initiation of the whole movement recorded in these pages. The well-being of a nation hinges on the physical, mental, and moral status of its people; while to each state and city is entrusted the responsibility of protecting its inhabitants from moral or physical ills, and of developing their mental powers. It is a commonplace to add that, unless State efforts be aided and supplemented by individual support, they are futile. Authorities recognise, therefore, that in educational institutions for all ages, provision must be made to train children in an intelligent and practical knowledge of health rules, to be applied in private and in public duties, i.e., in every relation of life. It will have been noted that the obligation to acquire an elementary knowledge of personal and public hygiene is at present laid upon both sexes in all State schools and in most State colleges, while for girls the opportunities of gaining a useful working knowledge of domestic science promise to become abundant. But what seem to me of equal, if not of greater, promise in this connection, are the educationally organised courses in the public High schools and the recognition of the social and national importance of Household Economics by its installation among other subjects of university rank in State universities. By the High school courses the young people are imbued at a most impressionable age with a conception, hitherto often absent, of the dignity and worth of Home, and will, it is believed learn to appreciate its claims; they are intelligently familiarised with the world in which they must shortly play a part of greater or less influence, and their scientific, artistic, literary and manual training studies are usefully and attractively associated with daily duties and social interests. By means of the college courses it is anticipated that, in addition to the general advantages just enumerated, the resources of modern science and art will in future be more utilised for the improvement of home life; trained intelligences will be brought to bear upon vexed domestic problems, upon diet, expenditure, and service, so that in years to come a complete and harmonious system will be evolved from the present faulty and discordant methods. It has been well said by Dr. Mary E. Green, late President of the National Household Economic Association, that "Household Economics once properly understood by the women of the country will make possible to each individual the health, happiness and development which are his due." The United States now offers to its women of all ages, free of charge, the opportunities essential to the gaining of this understanding. 141 PART II. PRIVATE INSTITUTIONS. Side by side with the State system of education in the United Introductory. States there exists a parallel system of schools and of institutions for higher education; these are supported entirely from pri vate sources (fees and endowments), unrestricted by State legal regulations. The governors or directors of these private institutions are thus independent of any popular or outside control; free to initiate new departures and at liberty to test original theories by practical experiment. As a rule, this power and independence are not abused; the standard of instruction is such that graduates from private High Schools or Colleges take equal rank with those under State control; while it suffices to mention the names of Columbia University or of some of the best-known Technical Schools, such as Pratt, Drexel, Armour or Lewis, to indicate the leading position occupied by institutions which owe their existence to the lavish generosity of individuals. The vast sums with which many of these private schools and colleges are endowed enable them, indeed, to set a desirable standard in respect of buildings, equipment, and staff; the freedom to express many new ideas in practice serves as an outlet for the rapid flow of original conceptions characteristic of the present stage of national development; and, though it may be permitted to question the immediate result to the juvenile subjects of some few scholastic experiments, the cause of education will probably derive eventual benefit from efforts which are invariably well intentioned, though occasionally eccentric in expression. This is not the place in which to attempt to detail the causes which have led to the gradual growth of this dual system of schools in the United States, it must suffice to say that both are complete throughout, from Kindergarten, Primary and Grammar Grades to High School, Technical Institute, College and University. In a large number of instances, the curriculum of the private Grade and High schools is identical with that sanctioned by the official Boards of Education in the various States and cities; but, as has been stated, certain others are prominent in the public eye on account of the originality of their practice and the suggestiveness or efficiency of their methods. Deviations from accepted canons are less obvious in private Colleges; on the contrary, these and the great Technical Schools often "set the pace" for State-aided institutions by the high standard they attain in systems tested by experience. The several grades of these private institutions and their recognition and treatment of the various subjects upon which I was commissioned to inquire will now be dealt with in practically the Growth of Connection of Domestic Science with Home and Social Interests. same order as in Part I., with a view to facilitate reference and to (A.) Kindergartens, Primary, and Grammar Schools. (C.) Technical Institutes. (D.) Women's Colleges. A.-KINDERGARTENS, PRIMARY, AND GRAMMAR SCHOOLS. No allusion was made to Kindergartens in Part I. of this Report because, so far as I could learn, the methods of teaching Domestic Science subjects which obtain in certain experimental school kindergartens, with the primary object of strengthening home affections while training social instincts, have not yet been introduced into those under State Boards of Education; it is to the former I now propose to refer. The Monograph on "Kindergarten Education," by Miss Susan E. Blow* records the growth of the movement in favour of their establishment, with all it owes to Dr. W. T. Harris, National Commissioner of Education; and reveals the existence of fullydeveloped systems of public kindergartens in 189 prominent cities and 15 States. "The history of the Kindergarten in America," writes Miss Blow, "is the record of four sharply-defined movements; the pioneer movement whose point of departure was the city of Boston; the philanthropic movement, whose initial effort was made in the village of Florence, Massachusetts; the national movement which emanated from St. Louis; and the great maternal movement which, radiating from Chicago, is now spreading throughout the United States, evolving a more enlightened and consecrated motherhood, and thereby strengthening the foundations and elevating the ideals of American family life." In these concluding words are found the key-notes with which those in charge of the Kindergarten and Primary classes at the two experimental schools attached to Chicago University endeavour to harmonise the methods they advocate. They believe that by taking advantage of a little child's strong affections and instinctively personal standpoint he may, through his social interests, be made intelligently acquainted with the world in which he lives; family ties may be strengthened in the process, and home life dignified: while such a desire to know the "reason why reason why" for daily facts is awakened, that, in its gratification, real scientific habits of mind are acquired. Thirty years ago Dr. W. T. Harris drew attention to the fact that "at the age of three years the child begins to emerge from the circumscribed life of the family and to acquire an interest in the life of society and a proclivity to form relationship with it. This increases until the school life period begins at his seventh * No. 2, Monographs on Education in the United States," edited by Professor N. Murray Butler. |