Изображения страниц
PDF
EPUB

ness for any particular purpose depends upon the materials which have entered into it.

Revising the school program. — One other important question awaits an answer. Will the plan I have proposed tend to simplify the curriculum? My answer is that at least four subjects will be combined into one, and in some elementary schools one teacher will take the place of four. Manual training, fine arts, domestic art, and domestic science will drop out below the seventh grade, and in their place we shall have the one subject of industrial arts, the elements of industries. The term “manual training," if used at all, will cover the forms of motor expression employed in teaching reading, writing and drawing, as well as the manual exercises used in agriculture or weaving or pottery-making or carpentry. There will be no hours set apart in the school program for work exclusively with the hands, and teachers will not be expected to provide manual occupations for every minute of the time assigned to any subject. When manual work is needed it will be demanded as insistently and employed as successfully in the humanities and the sciences as in the industries. In the lower school, manual exercises will be used as a means of self-expression, a method of teaching rather than a subject of instruction or a way of acquiring technical skill. That is, cooking in the lower school enables the child to know what happens when heat is applied to foods, and in what respects foods thereby are made more serviceable; cooking as an art in which a girl should excel belongs to a later period when she is fitting herself for housekeeping. Technical skill is a distinct aim in vocational training, but in the

earlier years of school the purpose is general rather than specific, cultural rather than vocational.

[ocr errors]

Development of the creative instinct. In all industrial processes, wherever man transforms materials into things of greater value, he employs a technic peculiar to the situation, and gives to the product a touch which pleases his aesthetic sense. Earthen bowls might be made, I suppose, without appreciable artistic merit, but the fact is, that the crudest pottery shows an effort to attain some ideal standard. This striving for artistic effect is as instinctive in childhood as in primitive man, and no worker ever loses it until he loses all pride in his handiwork. It is the source of every fine art. It is self-expression, which is at its best when bodied forth in doing things worth doing well. The teacher of art, therefore, finds his best opportunity in that field which offers greatest inducement to constructive design. The art training which belongs in the elementary school is that training which makes for a better appreciation of aesthetic standards and which finds expression in making things more pleasing than they otherwise would be. It adds no burden to the curriculum; on the contrary, it enlivens it and makes its tasks more pleasurable because more gratifying to personal wants.

Revitalizing school subjects. - A systematic course in the industries will have the additional advantage of making it easier to teach everything else in the curriculum. Not only will the study of industrial processes give rise to concrete problems in mathematics and the natural sciences, but the practical character of such problems will incite children to find the surest and most

businesslike way of solving them. Time will be saved for drill in every other line. With fewer subjects and more practical problems, I should confidently expect better results in the three R's and a more thorough discipline resulting from work in every subject. There would be no attempt to cover the whole field of human effort; the standard set in the study of industries whereby only the essential processes should be included in the course would react upon the courses of study in the humanities and the sciences. Let it be agreed that only fundamentals have a place in the elementary curriculum, and it will be comparatively easy to insist upon thorough work. Under such conditions there can be no excuse for not getting it. Those who believe, as I do, in the educational value of work well done, will join hands right here with those who advocate a curriculum which imposes tasks worth doing well.

Education for equality.- - My conclusion is that industrial education is essential to the social and political well-being of a democracy. It is the privilege of all, rather than the duty of a few, to be informed on matters affecting the social welfare of the body politic. A knowledge of how men get a living, the nature of their work, and the value of it, is a prerequisite to intelligent appreciation of the dignity of labor. A sympathetic understanding of the conditions underlying industrial competition will make for civil order and social stability. Training for citizenship may not safely disregard the dominant interests of the great majority of citizens. The public school must teach that which all should know. If only six years can be had for this work, the work must be done

TREND IN ED - 8

in six years. There is no alternative. It must be done in such a way, too, that children will grasp its significance and carry its impressions throughout their lives. It must establish such habits of thought and conduct that all subsequent work will be aided by the discipline. This is the ideal of the elementary school. Joined with the humanities and the sciences, a study of the industries rounds out the education of the citizen and equips him to begin his vocational training. On the threshold of active life it puts him on a par with his fellows. It assures him that kind of equality which is the opportunity of every American.

CHAPTER VII

PROFESSIONAL FACTORS IN THE TRAINING OF

M

[blocks in formation]

Y purpose in this chapter is to discuss what may be properly considered professional in the training of the high-school teacher, as distinguished from the academic or cultural. What constitutes professional training? What light is shed on this problem by the example of other learned professions?

eco

Ethical relationships between mankind. - The nomic law of supply and demand determines the vocations of most men as it controls the products of their labor. In some vocations, however, another factor comes into play. The rights of others in mind, body, and estate have to be reckoned with. In most occupations these human rights are implicit; they are cared for in the common law. But in others they are guarded specifically by statute. Not everyone who has the opportunity and inclination may practice law or medicine. By the law of the State, those who are pledged to see justice done between man and man, those who by the nature of their calling are in a position to imperil the health or lives of their fellows, those upon whom the public depends for protection, or who belong to the civil service, are licensed to pursue their vocations. Putting aside those vocations which are licensed for revenue only, it appears that 1 A revised reprint from the EDUCATIONAL REVIEW, March, 1913, used by courtesy of the publishers.

« ПредыдущаяПродолжить »