The New Departure in the Common Schools of Quincy: Three Papers on Educational TopicsEstes and Lauriat, 1881 - 74 pages |
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acquired American amusement Archæology arithmetic attempted average better Boston Boston Public Library Burroughs called certainly child Cloth common schools common-school education common-school system condition of affairs course EDITION examinations existing experience fact faculty fiction field geography gilt grade grammar schools Guizot's Popular History hand Harper's Monthly Harvard College History of France History of Russia human idea illustrations impart improvement individual instruction interest Latin language LAURIAT learned least lives mass Massachusetts matter mechanical mechanical organization methods mind morocco natural Norfolk County Norfolk County School organization paper phase practical public schools pupils Quincy committee Quincy schools reading rules scholars school committee school system school-room SCHOOLS OF QUINCY scientific simple speak spell spirit superintendency taught teachers teaching theories thing tion town trustees whole wholly Woolworth word write Young Folks
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Page 56 - ... behindhand in this matter, Massachusetts is rather famous as a nursery of teachers, who are lookt upon as one of the stapl products of the State. The results shown in the WALTON report ar not du then to want of money, or natural aptitude, or suitabl apparatus. To what ar they du? — Mr. WALTON says that his "examinations clearly indicate that more depends upon the supervision of the schools than upon all other causes combined...
Page 33 - In other words, it appeared, as the result of eight years' school-teaching, that the children, as a whole, could neither write with facility nor read fluently. Brought face to face with such a condition of affairs as this, the committee certainly were not guilty of a too strong use of terms when they said in the extract from their report of 1873 which has been quoted, that the pupils of the schools could...
Page 60 - ... branches of instruction before required, be competent to give instruction in the Greek and French languages, astronomy, geology, rhetoric, logic, intellectual and moral science, and political economy.
Page 33 - The fact was that the examinations had shown that in far too many cases they could neither read nor write it at all. To the majority of the committee the reason of this state of things was apparent. The school system had fallen into a rut. A great multiplicity of studies had in one way and another been introduced, and each was taught by itself. The ever-present object in the teacher's mind was to pass a creditable examination; and, to insure this, he unconsciously turned his scholars into parrots,...
Page 38 - So daring an experiment as this can, however, be tested in but one way : — by its practical results, as proven by the experience of a number of years, and testified to by parents and teachers as well as observed in children. The method has now been four years in use in the schools of Quincy and has ceased to be an experiment ; its advantages are questioned by none, least of all by teachers and parents. Among the teachers are those who, having for many years taught class after class in the old way,...
Page 37 - ... dismissed. In place of it the tentative principle was adopted. Experiments were to be cautiously tried and results from time to time noted. The revolution, however, was all-pervading. Nothing escaped its influence ; it began with the alphabet and extended into the last effort of the grammar school course. The most noticeable change, however, and that which has excited the most general interest was at the very beginning, — in the primaries. The old " dame school
Page 7 - ... the process of further self-education is to begin. The great means of selfeducation is through books — through much reading of books. But just here there is in our system of instruction a missing link. In our schools we teach children to read ; — we do not teach them how to read. That, the one all-important thing, — the great connecting link between school-education and self-education, — between means and end, — that one link we make no effort to supply.
Page 39 - A child learns to talk and to walk — the two most difficult things it is called on to learn in its whole life — without any instruction and by simple practice; the process of learning is not painful to it or wearisome to others; on the contrary, it is an amusement to both. Why the same process should not have been pursued in other and less difficult branches of education is not apparent. One thing only is clear: it was not pursued. In place of it an arbitrary system of names and sounds, having...