USA > Massachusetts > Norfolk County > Quincy > Inaugural address of the mayor, with the annual report of the officers of the city of Quincy for the year 1907 > Part 16
Note: The text from this book was generated using artificial intelligence so there may be some errors. The full pages can be found on Archive.org (link on the Part 1 page).
Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6 | Part 7 | Part 8 | Part 9 | Part 10 | Part 11 | Part 12 | Part 13 | Part 14 | Part 15 | Part 16 | Part 17 | Part 18 | Part 19
.
16
expected when children are sent prematurely to school, are compelled to be quiet, always to follow directions, and to work constantly with pencil, paper and books; when all their sys- tematic training is on the intellectual side and under sendentary conditions ; when the body receives scant consideration and motor education is left to chance. How does it happen that the country lad with meager schooling so often comes to town and outstrips his better schooled city cousin in practical judgment, business enterprise and executive ability? Obvi- ously the training on the farm is better on the motor side than that in the school. If one inquires into the education of great leaders and of men who do things, who control forces, surmount obstacles and master situations, who handle affairs and keep the machinery of the world moving, he will find that the motor element was prominent in their preparation for work. No one can think in motor terms, act with energy and promptness or meet opposition calmly and master diffi- culties easily, even in the mental or moral world, unless he has been well trained by dealing with physical forces.
All this does not mean that we should do away with the study of books and intellectual education, but that we may greatly improve and enlarge the results of this education by supplementing it with appropriate, systematic and well di- rected physical education which shall include motor, manual and industrial training. Although with the best courses and methods that can be devised all children will not be trans- formed into leaders of men and captains of industry, prodi- gies of force and paragons of wisdom, not possessing the natural conveniences for these parts, such courses and methods should nevertheless be adopted, so that each one may make the most of himself by successfully developing all his re- sources and profitably investing all his capital.
In the first place, we should appreciate the importance of play in the education of children, and should utilize the twenty-five hundred acres of parks and playgrounds in this city in the training of our pupils. There should be a carefully prepared course in plays, games, gymnastics and athletic
17
sports which should provide appropriate and enjoyable physi- cal training for all from the first grade in the primary school to the last year in the high. It should be under the super- vision of an expert, the same as music and drawing, and should be as much a part of the general educational system as are those subjects. Each pupil should take part in such ways and to such a degree as best suits his condition and needs. The aim should be to give every child the best physi- cal development and motor training he can receive, rather than to coach a few for the purpose of defeating a rival team. Such a course would provide the most natural and by far the best kind of physical training, would supply the greatest lack in our present system, would add much to the interest of school work, would furnish wholesome occupation for many out of school hours, and would decidedly improve the general scholarship.
Schiller says, "Man is wholly man only when he plays." Play and motor activity should occupy childhood ; reflection and self-control should characterize manhood. The play of children is to them very serious business. In it they thor- oughly exercise their powers, carefully test material things, investigate the secrets of nature and imitate the doings of men. They acquire practical knowledge, realize their own imaginings and prepare themselves for the demands of later years. They develop and prepare themselves in this way much more rapidly and wisely than any school has yet suc- ceeded in doing. A healthy child cannot long keep still. If compelled to do so, automatic movements of feet, hands, face or other parts of the body, soon appear and increase the longer he is restrained. Children have few mental processes not directly connected with their muscles; therefore their energy must escape through action. But every action gives exercise to some part of the brain. Thus muscular development and brain development go on together. As brain centers function and become associated by connecting fibers, inhibition begins and reflection becomes possible, because brain paths have been established over which nerve force may dissipate itself.
18
Gradually, through motor activity, the brain is organized, inhibition increases, motion diminishes and quiet thinking begins. Play, then, is the child's best teacher for the first six years of his life, at least. If he is allowed to attend her school regularly during this period and to take long and fre- quent lessons from her for several years more, he will have not only a stronger body but a better brain than he other- wise would have. His knowledge will be more accurate and valuable ; his action more intelligent and forceful ; his thought more clear and orderly. It is the duty of parents and teach- ers to learn how to use this wonderful educational agency and to direct the motor activity of the child. They should provide abundant and varied opportunities for him to use his senses and exercise his muscles, and teach him plays and games adapted to his age and needs.
The kindergarten is a very desirable part of a public school system, if it be a real child-garden, a place where chil- dren are cultivated and allowed to develop according to natural laws. But if, by artificial methods and forced pro- cesses, the children are to be taught unnatural sentiment and make-believe play, are given no opportunity for originality and spontaneity, and are deprived of sunlight and open air, the kindergarten should be discouraged as being decidedly detrimental to the physical and mental welfare of children. Many kindergartens are open to three very serious criticisms. First, children are taken from the open air and sunshine and shut up in a room often poorly ventilated and much too small and from which nature is almost entirely excluded. Second, the children not infrequently are required to use small ob- jects to do fine work and to employ their eyes and fingers in an injurious manner. Their fingers and eyes are no better prepared for fine close work than the vocal muscles are for distinct and exact articulation. Muscular development al- ways begins with the large fundamental trunk muscles and gradually passes outward to the small accessory muscles of the fingers and the voice. To reverse the order in training is to render the development of the small muscles, at least,
19
defective. An eminent German nerve specialist, after care- fully studying the chronic nervousness of many pianists and finding six times as many persons afflicted with some nervous malady among those who learned to play the instru- ment under fourteen as among those who learned later, ad- vocated that no child be allowed to play the piano before the age of sixteen. Undoubtedly the trouble was caused by the excessive use of the small and immature muscles of the hand and fingers. Third, many of the plays and songs used have been devised by adults to teach the ways of the animal world or the occupations and virtues of men, and are both in thought and in manner of playing wholly un- natural to children. To them these plays have little meaning or interest in comparison with the natural plays. They seem to feel that it is all make-believe and not real play. There is a great difference between this playing play and the genu- ine spontaneous play of children in which, after observing the acts of men and animals, they extemporize their own means and invent their own methods. In imitation, the chil- dren demand the free exercises of their own imagination. They do not like to have everything all thought out and ready made for them. The games they most enjoy are those prob- ably invented by children and have been played by children for centuries.
The time will come when the kindergarten will be out of doors, when the kindergartner will conduct the children to the best places to observe the birds, the brooks, the flow- ers and the industries of men and will intelligently answer as many of their questions as she can. Or she will take them to the playground to watch them in their play and teach them the old games of childhood. Adult virtues will not be im- posed upon them because it will be clearly seen that childish virtues are best for children. When the weather drives them in doors, they will go to a large, well-ventilated room, fur- nished with a piano, picture books, building blocks and a miscellaneous collection of playthings of sufficiently large dimensions to require both hands in using. There they will
20
dance, sing songs and listen to stories ; build, invent and carry on all the bustling business of a Lilliputian world. How much better such a course would be for children of five years than that of the ordinary kindergarten or primary school.
The methods of the primary school are almost as much in need of modification as those of the kindergarten, if the highest interests of the children are to be served. Other motives than the welfare of the children prevail or we should not treat these little five-year-olds as we do. They should be out of doors and at play. They have no business with books and pens, except to look at pictures and have appropri- ate stories read to them. Their whole being calls for action and we compel them to sit still. Nature calls them to play and we give them a book. Their muscles cry out for exer- cise and we make them sit still and try to train their minds. No wonder the children do not understand what we teach. It seems a great pity that we should adopt a rational method of education with the mentally deficient only. In their case we were driven to it because they could get nothing from the usual method. We tried motor training and it succeeded. In the education of such children motor training is now considered of chief importance and it should be so regarded in the case of normal children up to the age of seven at least.
If children of five years continue to be admitted to the primary school the session for them should be shortened to half-time. Two hours a day of the usual work is enough. The rest of the time should be given to play. Several parents in this city have already requested that such a plan be adopted. The wisdom of this arrangement becomes more apparent when it is known that the average number of children in our first grade rooms is over fifty. It is evident that a teacher with half this number could do more in half the time than she can with all of them on full time. Such an experiment has been tried repeatedly and the work of the grade has been done quite as satisfactorily. The plan has been tried for several years in Ithaca N. Y., which reports that "The school
21
day for certain children in the primary grades has been shortened by half and the results indicate that fully as much is accomplished in one hour under the new regime as in two or three hours in the old-fashioned way." Prof. O'Shea says : "I am thoroughly convinced that fully one-half the time of the average child that should be devoted to exercise is wasted sitting in school seats." And again, "It is certainly not hazardous to say that if we could reduce our classes in the primary schools to one-half the ordinary size, so that a teacher might keep all pupils vigorously at work, and follow carefully each mind under her care, as much could be ac- complished in one hour as in four hours under the ordinary plan, and with far better results to the health and habits of the children." One thing seems certain, if the schoolroom would divide the time equally with the playground, the co- partnership would be unusually profitable to the children of the primary grades.
In the grammar school, the plays and games naturally change, gradually losing their individual character and be- coming co-operative and competitive. The players begin to unite in team work. Youth delights in contests, in a well matched struggle for supremacy. One investigator finds that "A third or more of all the amusements of boys just entering their teens are games of contest-games in which the end is, in one way or another, to gain an advantage over one's fellows, in which the interest is in the struggle between peers." This is a very important period in the development of boys and girls. It marks the transition from childhood to youth and nature is laying the foundations for manhood and womanhood. There is a rapid increase in heart and lung capacity, and vigorous exercise is necessary to perfect the organization of the body and to co-ordinate the mus- cular system. Confinement for long periods in the school- room and at desk work, tends to compress the chest, inter- fere with digestion, disturb the circulation and to occasion unwholesome nerve excitement. If the development of the body is to be normal, if health is to be preserved and good
22
mental poise maintained, children must have at this age abun- dant physical exercise in the open air. The benefits of games and contests to mind and to morals are as marked as those to the body. The boy becomes more alert, more ambitious, more persevering ; learns to control himself, to respect the rights of others, to play the game fairly ; acquires wholesome interests, develops manly instincts and takes pride in hard- earned success. The favorite games of this period develop the muscles of the lower limbs which receive little exercise in any form of manual training. All school games and sports should receive intelligent and sympathetic supervision in order to remove the objectionable features, to encourage the weak and timid, who most need the training and are most likely to avoid it, and to infuse a clean manly spirit which looks with contempt upon anything mean or vulgar.
In the high school the training would be similar in method and spirit to that in the upper grammar grades, only there would be separate courses for the sexes and it would be carried out in more detail and with greater exactness, requiring greater strength and a higher standard of skill.
There should also be corrective gymnasium courses to meet the needs of individual defects. The director of physical training in the high school should be competent to map out and supervise the work in the elementary schools. It cer- tainly is to be hoped that the time is near at hand when our numerous parks and playgrounds shall be utilized as they ought to be in the education of the children and when the play instinct shall be called in to do its proper part in their motor development and training.
But physical education needs manual training to make it perfect. Manual training provides a different type of motor education. As it gives exercise to few muscles except those of the shoulder, arm and hand, it is not equal to play, games and athletic sports for general motor development, but it possesses many other values which they do not. It trains the pupil in the use of tools and his head and hands in a serious effort to produce something of material value. It
.
23
trains him to work, and to work in the right spirit. Far too many of the boys and girls of this generation have a false and injurious notion about manual labor. Experience in shop-work and in the domestic arts soon changes their atti- tude. If the habit of work is not formed during the teens, it is acquired with difficulty. Manual training not only gives the hand mastery over tools and materials, but it develops the brain and educates the mind. It carries theory into prac- tice, impresses upon the worker the honesty and reliability of inanimate forces, records visibly the exact degree of his success and marks clearly his improvement. It turns sur- plus energy into educational channels, and adds new interest and incentive to study. It teaches the joy of creating, pro- vides pleasant and profitable occupation for free hours, and fosters a spirit of independence and self-respect. It puts trades and professions in sympathetic relations, leads to a respectful attitude toward manual labor, and develops a self- mastery which makes skill in any calling more easy.
If the schools are slow in adjusting themselves to the best educational thought of the times or in adopting the most natural and potent means of training the children, it will be due to the conservatism of public opinion. The ma- jority of persons seem to think that what has been should continue to be, that their ways and the ways of their fathers are necessarily the best ways, a course of reasoning which, when applied to business, leads to failure. Sometimes they complain of results but insist that there shall be no change in the methods. They appear not to know that the education of children is receiving, and for some years has received, more scientific investigation and more careful study by well trained and competent persons than almost any other field of human interest. The natural development of the child and the best means of training his unfolding powers are under- stood today as they never were before. In some quarters, education is a science and teaching an art. There are edu- cators who have arrived at the knowledge and skill of a pro- fession but often the children are deprived of the benefits
24
of this knowledge and skill by public opinion. But, in this city, we believe there are many outside of school circles who appreciate the great value of systematic motor training under competent direction and will encourage by word and influ- ence the beginning of such training in connection with the public schools.
Medical Inspection.
Medical inspection has been on trial in this city some over a year and has repeatedly proved its value. Many chil- dren have received timely and much needed medical attention which they otherwise would not have received and the schools have been kept free from all serious contagion. In one dis- trict the inspector's visits have been quite irregular, having been omitted entirely for several weeks on two or three occa- sions. To be satisfactory the inspection must be regular and careful.
One of the weak places in handling contagious diseases in this city is found in the ineffective quarantine. Repeatedly children excluded from the schools and supposed to be quar- antined have been allowed upon the streets at all hours of the day and to mingle freely with other children. A quaran- tine in name only is small protection to the schools or check to the spread of disease. The community has important rights in these matters which, if disregarded, should be enforced by the proper authorities.
Again, when children are sent home for medical treat- ment, some method should be devised by which to secure for them the needed attention, not only that they may be- relieved of the malady but that they may not be deprived of their schooling for an unnecessarily long period. Some parents are very negligent in these cases, as they are when defects in the sight or hearing of their children are reported to them. Many of the cases of defective sight and hearing reported to parents last year have received no professional
25
attention whatever, and are in as bad or worse condition than they were a year ago. . The children should be pro- tected against such indifference. The physical and educational welfare of the children should not be sacrificed to the care- lessness or penuriousness of parents.
The tests of sight and hearing required by law have been completed by the teachers in all the schools, except the High, with the following results. At the time the tests were made there were 5,182 pupils enrolled in the elementary schools ; 536, or 10.35 per cent., of these were found defective in eye- sight ; 88, or 1.7 per cent., were defective in hearing, and 323 parents were notified. As many of the children had already received or were receiving treatment, notices to parents were unneccessary. Although more children were examined this year than last, the number found defective was considerably less. Everything indicates that most parents take appropriate action after receiving notice and secure for their children the treatment needed.
The High School.
After having been separated and scattered for eight years, the High School pupils were assembled in the new building for the first time at the opening of the new year, Wednesday, January 2, 1907. Although far from being finished and equipped, it provided much better conditions for the work of the school than had been possible for a long time before. At first there were hardly rooms enough available to seat the pupils, but gradually the accomodations improved until a sufficient number of classrooms and laboratories were ready for the usual work of the school. The assembly hall was furnished during the summer vacation. The floor of the gymnasium was laid and part of the school grounds graded during the fall term. The manual training and domestic sci- ence rooms, the gymnasium and the adjoining locker-rooms are still unfurnished, and the very important work of these
26
departments continues to be neglected. When these rooms are fully equipped, the High School will be well housed and well prepared to do all its work in a comfortable and satis- factory manner. The children will then be able to secure the training they have a right not only to expect but to demand under the laws of the commonwealth.
In June, Mr. Charles F. Harper, Head Master of the High School, much to the regret of all, tendered his resig- nation to accept a very important position as Principal of the high school at Syracuse, New York. Mr. Harper had been in Quincy a little over eight years, having come from New Britain, Connecticut, in May, 1899. At that time, our High School had already out-grown its building and it be- came necessary to secure additional accomodations outside. During his term of service, the membership of the school was nearly doubled and the course of study much improved, al- though the work was carried on under such unfavorable condi- tions as to make the administration of the school and the maintenance of satisfactory scholarship increasingly difficult. The wonder is not that the school suffered but that it suf- fered no more from these long-continued adverse conditions. Mr. Harper was always master of the situation, displaying un- usual executive ability, maintaining an effective organization and securing the hearty co-operation of all associated with him. The vacancy occasioned by his resignation was not an easy one to fill.
After looking up very carefully several men who had made excellent records as high school principals, it was de- cided that Mr. Leslie L. Cleveland of Keene, New Hamp- shire, was the best available man for the place and he was unanimously elected. Mr. Cleveland had established an en- viable reputation, not only as a scholar and a teacher, but as a master and a man. The parents, pupils and citizens of Keene spoke of him and his work in the highest and most enthusiastic terms. He entered upon his duties as Head Master of the Quincy High School at the opening of the fall term. The changes he has made in the management of
27
the school have been few but important, and his work thus far indicates the justice of his reputation and the wisdom of our choice. The school was never better organized nor doing better work than it is at the present time.
During the year the courses in drawing and commercial subjects have been much improved. But an additional teacher of drawing will have to be provided before that course can be made satisfactory and adequate to the needs of the school. At present, all pupils who desire to take drawing cannot be accommodated and many of those admitted to the classes cannot give as much time to the subject as they desire.
Last June it was decided to place an expert at the head of the commercial department and to give more attention to penmanship and business practice, in fact, to extend the course and to improve the entire work of the department. A teach- er of thorough training and broad experience was secured. The influence of his ability and energy are already becoming apparent in the interest of the pupils and in the great improve- ment in results.
For further details of the High School work you are referred to the thoughtful and suggestive report of the Head Master herewith submitted.
The New Quincy School.
The new Quincy School at Atlantic was first occupied by the pupils of that district on September 10, although the building has not yet been officially handed over to the School Department. This building is a substantial and attractive brick structure with granite trimmings, containing twelve class- rooms, library, office, teachers' room, book and supply rooms, and an unfinished hall on the third floor. Besides the boiler room, coal pockets and lavatories, there are two large well lighted play-rooms in the basement. It is well arranged for the needs of the school, but the construction and finish are not all that was expected. It is equipped with electric light
Need help finding more records? Try our genealogical records directory which has more than 1 million sources to help you more easily locate the available records.