USA > Massachusetts > Plymouth County > Plymouth > Town annual report of Plymouth, MA 1900-1902 > Part 22
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Your committee recently established at the High School building a self-supporting system providing simple and in- expensive luncheons for the pupils and teachers in session there. These are served during the twenty minutes' recess, which comes midway of a five hours continuous session. The purpose is to supply, as near cost as possible, whole- some palatable and nourishing refreshments in attractive variety, under the supervision of the committee, the school to receive and to use as it pleases whatever slight profits may accrue therefrom. The luncheons are prepared by a cap- able matron engaged by the committee, and are served un- der her direction in the basement of the building. Cashiers, waiters, etc., are chosen from among the pupils, and receive their own luncheons free for their services. The following is a sample "Bill of Fare," with the usual charges :
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Milk, glass, two cents
Hot cocoa, mug, two cents.
Ham sandwiches, three cents.
Jelly sandwiches, two cents.
Buns, one cent.
Cookies, assorted, one cent. Graham crackers, two for one cent.
A constant and uniform patronage indicates that the plan is popular, while expressions of approval from many sources bear witness to the wisdom of the arrangement and ac- cord with the committee's judgment as to its hygienic value. The "Refectory" is maintained without expense to the Town.
It was decided after much consideration to concentrate in the High School building all the ninth grade pupils in the Town, excepting the very few now at Chiltonville, and this was done at the opening of the schools in September. The good results already apparent confirm the committee's judg- ment as to the advantage of this change and insure its suc- cess. The pupils of this grade. heretofore in several schools, are now practically a part of the High School in everything but its curriculum. They share in its interests and its gen- eral exercises, and are aided by its teachers It is believed that such constant association in the studious, orderly atmos- phere of this well conducted High School cannot fail to make its work appear so interesting, attractive and desirable to these ninth grade pupils that many of them, who under form- er conditions would advance no farther, will now be eager to continue school life as long as possible, and to make the most of its opportunities. This move, while proving a val- uable educational gain, reduced expenses, and also made available several school rooms without which it would have been difficult, if not impossible, to find room for very many of
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the children added to the rolls, and entitled to admission at the opening of the schools in September.
In the line of a purpose, expressed in previous reports, to remedy as far as possible unsanitary conditions in the old- er school buildings, ventilating flues have been placed in several school rooms, and simple changes made in the method of heating which now insure an ample degree of warmth and a constant supply of fresh air. This has been a simple matter in the single-room buildings thus far reme- died; a more complex and expensive problem, however, forces itself upon the consideration of the committee in the case of the Cornish school house on Russell Street. This building, which now contains five class rooms with more than 200 pupils, is very imperfectly ventilated, and being still heated by the direct radiation of stoves, the result is not only an unavoidable waste of fuel, but also a wide variation in temperature, the thermometer record indicating conditions here which are clearly a menace to health. Although one of the very oldest of our school houses, it is still in good re- pair, and can be put in condition to adequately serve for generations to come. The committee have consulted an expert of experience, and believe that an appropriation of $1,500 would supply this building with a system guaranteed to meet the requirements of the law as to heating and venti- lation. With these facts in view the committee deem it a duty to ask the Town to appropriate $1,500 for the purpose above specified.
The need of a play ground for the pupils at the High School building is obvious; doubly so in view of their re- cent increase in numbers, and the great interest these pupils, boys and girls alike, now take in athletics. The free use of the large field directly opposite the school house has for
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years been allowed them. The late Nathaniel Morton, who owned it, and evidently believed it should belong to the town, stipulated in his will that if the town, within two years after his death, should wish to purchase this field for school purposes or for a play ground, his heirs should not ask the town more than one thousand dollars therefor. It seems to the committee very desirable that the land be se- cured, and they trust the town will take advantage of the low price at which it can now be bought, and appropriate one thousand dollars for its purchase.
The committee have met regularly twice each month, and at special meetings occasionally called. Its sessions have been marked by a spirit of harmony and co-operation, dif- ferences of opinion when arising in no way affecting a mutual desire to deal carefully, considerately and justly with the various problems peculiar to this department; in these matters they have had the assistance of. the superintendent whose admirable report, hereto appended, they cordially in- dorse, commending it to the thoughtful consideration which its interest and importance deserve.
In addition to the amounts for special objects asked for elsewhere in this report, the committee respectfully request an appropriation of thirty-seven thousand five hundred dol- lars for general school purposes for the current year.
Respectfully submitted, WM. S. KYLE. ELIZABETH THURBER, FRANK H. PERKINS, ARTHUR E. LEWIS, J. HOLBROOK SHAW, INCREASE ROBINSON. School Committee.
Plymouth, Mass., Feb. 7, 1903.
REPORT OF THE SUPERINTENDENT.
To the School Committee of Plymouth :-
The report of the Superintendent of Schools for the year 1902 is herewith respectfully submitted :-
There have been few things to make the work of the year noteworthy. Some changes in organization and in plans of work have been made, and are resulting in better school ser- vice. There has been an increased number of pupils over last year, a larger corps of teachers, and an increased ex- penditure for each pupil in average attendance.
The school census taken during the month of September gave the following returns :
Number of children between the ages of 5 and 15 years :
Boys.
792
Girls, 762
Total, 1,554
Number of children between 7 and 14 years :
Boys,
518
Girls, 512
1,030
The number of pupils enrolled at the present time, Jan- uary 15, is 1,690, who are housed in 25 different school buildings. This is about four per cent more pupils than were enrolled at this time last year, and the number of school houses used is two less. The new school buildings have allowed consolidation to that extent possible. This policy is in the right direction.
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Present number of pupils enrolled, 1,690
Number of school buildings in use, 25
Number of school rooms in use, including high school, 48
Number of teachers regularly employed, 48
High school, 6
Grammar schools,
13
Primary schools. 25
Ungraded schools, 4
Total, 48
Special teachers, one each in
music, drawing and Sloyd, 3
5I
ATTENDANCE.
To meet the requirements of the State Board of Education the following statistics cover the period of the school year from September to July, 1901-1902 :-
Whole number of pupils enrolled for the year, 1,702
Number under 7 years of age. 322
Number between 7 and 14 years, 1,119
Number between 14 and 15 years, 125
Number over 15 years, I36
I702
Average membership of all the schools,
1,538
Average daily attendance,
1,392
Per cent. of attendance,
90.5
Number days absence of pupils.
26,003
Number of cases of tardiness, 6,308
Number of dismissals before close of school session, 1,232
Number of cases of truancy reported by teachers, 81
Number of days of teachers' absence from school, 196
Number of visits made by Superintendent, 949
The whole number enrolled for the year was ninety-about six per cent-more than the number enrolled last year. There
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was also an increase in the average membership; but so small a relative increase in the average attendance that the percentage of attendance, compared with the pre- vious year's figures, has decreased two and one-half per cent. The statistics also show a considerable increase in the num- ber of late marks, and double the number of cases of truancy was reported. These figures indicate a very unsatisfactory condition. They show a tendency in the wrong direction so marked as to require attention. It would seem that we are not meeting the conditions necessary for regular school attendance with that care and firmness which they demand.
The very large majority of children attend school regular- ly and punctually because they like to attend; they are sel- dom absent if they can help it. Teachers are using all rea- sonable means to continue and strengthen the sentiment in favor of regular attendance; and they can count upon the in- fluence and co-operation of the large majority of parents to help them with those pupils who find it hard to form the hab- it of. punctuality. But there are cases which teachers can- not reach. Some parents believe it is their privilege to keep their children from school for any or no excuse; and they act upon their belief. Children who are thus kept from school, or who are permitted to remain away, soon acquire the hab- it of regarding school work and duties lightly, and to avoid them when they can. There are very few children who are out of school or who become truants, except by the active or passive agency of those having them in charge. Such cases are generally beyond the teachers' control; and they refer them to the Committee to be dealt with as the Committee think best.
The law in regard to school attendance imposes a strict duty upon all parents. In no case does it excuse any from obeying it because they believe they have the right to keep their children from school. It also imposes a strict duty up- on school officers to see that in cases where parents are care-
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less or wilful in evading the law, they be speedily obliged to meet its requirements. If school training is worth anything, this law is a salutary one; and if it were not, we have no al- ternative but to obey it. In any case, where the issue is made, we believe in meeting it fairly and squarely; when it becomes necessary to apply the law, to apply it always con- siderately, but always, too, in every proper case, without fear or favor. While it is not often needful to resort to ex- treme measures, there are times when no other course is open. In such cases, teachers have a right to expect on the part of the Committee prompt and vigorous co-operation with them in their efforts to save such children from becoming a menace to the good name of the Community.
FINANCIAL STATEMENT.
The items given below are based upon the expenditure for school purposes during the financial year 1902. The finan- cial and attendance periods are not therefore identical, but since each covers a full year, the one period being only a little in advance of the other, the returns they furnish are fairly reliable.
I. Assessed valuation of real and personal property in Plymouth, May I, 1902, $8,693,334.00
2. Percentage of valuation expended for current expenses of schools in 1902, .00406
3. Expense per pupil on average membership, $22.97
4. Expense per pupil on same for schools of State, 1900-190I, 26.49
5. Expense per pupil on average member- ship on total expenditure for schools in 1901-1902, 24.54
6. State average on same basis, 1901, 29.65
7. Average monthly wages of men teach- ers in Plymouth in 1902,
$112.50
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8. Average monthly paid men teachers of the State, 140.94
9. Average monthly wages of women teachers in Plymouth in 1902, 41.02
IO. Same paid women teachers in the State, 1900-1901, 52.75
In this statement the items are based upon the average membership of the schools. Items 2 and 3 are based upon the whole amount ($37.752.09) which the Committee have spent, less the cost of repairs ($2,422.56). The items which make up this amount are payments for salaries, transporta- tion, fuel and care of schoolhouses, text-books and supplies, incidentals. The sum thus expended ($35,329.53) is by act of the Legislature, to be regarded as the current expense of the schools, and is the sum to be certified to the State au- thorities has having been raised by taxation and expended "for the support of the public schools." This sum shows an average expense of $22.97 for each child in the average membership of the schools,-an increase of about 4 per cent. compared with the expense for the same purpose last year.
SCHOOL ACCOMMODATIONS.
In most schools at the present time the accommodations for all pupils in attendance are ample. When the Knapp school at the North was completed it was hoped that the old Hedge School building might be abandoned. It was found necessary to continue its use, however, and the number of pupils in attendance there has increased so fast that a few weeks ago it became necessary to form another school with the pupils who could no longer be accommodated there, and incidentally to relieve one or two other schools in that vicin- ity. Every school room at the North is again occupied, and some rooms are crowded, leaving little opportunity to ac- commodate the natural increase in the number of pupils which another year will bring.
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The opening of the new school on Oak St. has given op- portunity to send there all children who naturally belong in that district. This has relieved somewhat the crowded con- dition which existed at the Burton school at the beginning of the school year. Every desk in the lower grades at the Bur- to school is occupied, and some children have had to be sent to other schools because they could find no room here. The new building on Oak St. has more pupils than it can well ac- commodate. Before the rooms there were finished it was found necessary to place in each one, five or six more desks than the rooms were built to hold. One of the schools has had to send pupils elsewhere because it had no room, and the other has only one or two desks unoccupied.
All the rooms of the Cornish School are well filled, not- withstanding the fact that a whole class was transferred from there to the High School building. The Cornish building needs renovation. It is old, dilapidated, cold and draughty in winter, and generally unfit in its present condition, for the number of pupils and teachers who work there. While some interior alterations and a suitable heating apparatus would make it more habitable, it is difficult and expensive to make a building such as this meet the requirements of a modern school house. More than two years ago the State Inspector recommended that a ventilating and heating apparatus be placed in the Cornish school, because of the poor conditions he found to exist there. Some minor changes in the interior would be necessary to accommodate such a plant; yet it ought to be done at once if we are to continue to use the building for school purposes. It is a question, however, whether it would not be more economical in the end, to entirely re- model and enlarge the building, and so provide for the ad- ditional room that will soon be needed there or in its immediate neighborhood.
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PRIMARY SCHOOLS.
Children five years old, or who will reach that age be- fore the end of the fourth week of school, are admitted to the primary schools during the first four weeks of the fall term only, if they have never before attended school. Children competent to enter existing classes are admitted at any time in the district where they live, if there is room; otherwise, they are sent to the nearest school where there is room.
The whole number enrolled in all the schools at present is 1,690. Of this number 955, a little over 56 per cent, are in the primary schools, grades one to four inclusive, distributed in twenty-five school rooms, making an average of about thirty-eight to each teacher. The smallest number en- rolled in any primary school the past year was twelve at Wel- lingsley, and the largest number fifty-seven at the Hedge School. It is somewhat difficult to keep some of these schools with a reasonable number of pupils to a teacher, be- cause of the strong preference or aversion which some par- ents have for certain schools, and the strenuous way in which they express their preference. Sometimes their feel- ing in the matter is based on good reason; but more often it is not. It would be pleasant to please all parties were that possible and compatible with the best interests of the schools. Since it is not, we see no other way than to use our best judgment in sending children to schools where, with due consideration for the rights and interests of others, they can best be accommodated.
There is a very general feeling among the primary school teachers that we are admitting children to school too young; that many of them, when they enter, are not able to meet the conditions of school life, or to do the work of the school as at present arranged. I think the feeling is a just one, and that there is reason for it. It has been our custom to admit to school during the first few weeks of the fall term all chil- dren who were five years old or who would be five before the
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fall term closed. Under this arrangement some children who enter are very immature and would be better at home. It would be well. I am sure, to admit only those who will be five during the first month of the fall term. But to increase the age of entrance materially is not necessary; to do so would be unfortunate. The remedy for the difficulty of which teachers rightly complain lies not in bringing children to school when they are older, but in changing the conditions of the school. and in modifying its work to more nearly suit the needs of the children when they enter.
For the youngest children the school day is too long. The continued confinement and needful restraint of the school room are often irksome. and are not conducive to the natural physical development of the children. The conviction is steadily growing that children in the first primary grade should not be held to the ordinary school tasks for more than three hours daily. It is a fair question whether it would not be much better that each of these schools should have only one session of three hours each day, and that the first year's work should be modified to suit such an arrangement. The present organization of our schools would allow us very con- veniently to make this experiment. We should need two teachers in each room. who would take care of two classes, one in the morning and another in the afternoon session, both teachers to be present at each session. As long as the classes remain each with a reasonable number of pupils, the work for each teacher would be no greater than at present.
Such an arangement would render it possible to make de- sirable changes in the outline of work for the primary classes, and in some of the methods of doing the work. We could to advantage omit all number work; make less formal and more effective the reading exercises; use to better purpose nature study and busy work in its various forms; introduce certain lines of Kindergarten employment; provide for more frequent changes of occupation; give each child more person-
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al care and provide more nearly for his peculiar needs, and direct more intelligently his individual activities. There should result a closer oversight on the part of the teacher, and less waste of energy on the part of the pupil ;- an equal amount of work done in less time and in a more reasonable way.
This arrangement would help us in another way. When a teacher has to be absent from school for any reason, we find it difficult to supply her place at once and for a short time by a substitute teacher who is at all familiar with the children or the work the school is doing. In any case, when the teacher is absent there is very likely to be a serious break in the work and considerable loss of time to the children; but with one teacher left in the school, this loss could in the main be avoided. She could continue the school, direct the sub- stitute, and see that the unity, continuity and efficiency of the work were not seriously interfered with.
There would be no increase in the cost of conducting the first grade schools in this way; but it would give opportunity for two classes to occupy the same room, one in the morn- ing and another in the afternoon. When school room is at a premium, such a plan is worth consideration.
GRAMMAR SCHOOLS.
The Grammar schools include grades 5 to 9. The num- ber enrolled in these schools at present is 542, about 32 per cent. of the total school enrollment. They occupy 13 school rooms, making an average number of 42 pupils to each teacher.
Promotions are made in each school by the regular teacher at the end of the school year in June. In doubtful cases the Superintendent is consulted. These promotions are based on the estimate of the pupil's daily work made by the teach- er, and recorded at the end of each month, in the Grammar schools, on report cards sent to the parents. When condi-
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tions seem to justify it, a pupil may be promoted on trial for a month. In such a case, the parent is notified by written form of the intended conditional promotion, and the pro- motion in this form is made only in case the parent gives written consent thereto. If, at the end of the probationary period, the pupil's work warrants it, the promotion is made for the rest of the year, but no pupil is expected to be re- tained in any class when his interests are best served by his going back to a lower one.
The work of the Grammar schools has been kept mainly on the lines of previous years. No material change has been made. The outline of study has been revised, making the subject matter to be used and the amount of work to be done somewhat more definite; but the quantity of work required to be accomplished has not been increased. As was stated in last year's report we are doing work in only one or two subjects above what are required by statute to be taught in schools. And yet it is thought that we are attempting too much, that teachers and pupils are overburdened. This is the feeling in regard to most schools. The criticism is more just, perhaps, if we put it in a little different form, and say that we are attempting more than we do well. This leaves us the opportunity of adding that it is not more than we can do well.
It is not probable, however, that the present number of sub- jects in the curriculum of the common schools will be de- creased. A broad course of study is like a well laden table; we are to make a wise selection from each, and not attempt to appropriate and digest all we find there. We cannot to advantage leave out any subect from the course of study; we have no need to do so. Relief from an over-expanded course and for the burdensome work it occasions, can be sought in another direction and in various ways :--
We shall find relief by modifying our work in several of the subjects of study. We ought to leave out all that is use-
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less for our purpose in every subject, and then rigidly exclude what is unimportant. If we do this, we shall cut out a large part of our work in Arithmetic, Geography and History as it is usually taught, and relieve ourselves and the children of much burdensome work from which there is no adequate re- turn in the development of character in the pupils.
Relief is to be found, too, in a more rational ideal of what school work should accomplish: We do not need to be in- fluenced much by the popular idea that it is the first and main purpose of the school to make of the pupil a repository of exhaustive or extended knowledge, but to fully believe that the success of the school is justly measured by what the pupil becomes and what he is able to do through its train- ing. The child, not the curriculum, is always the center of in- terest. The course of study is for the child, not the child for it. It is not a question how much mental food we can give to the child, but what part of it, if any, will best serve his growth and development. There is no reason in the work which makes of children mere adding machines, or automata which can give out an alarming array of facts in Geography and History without any thought or conception of their meaning or bearing. Such work has little of value in it. The school can do its legitimate service only when it sees the child in his right relation to the work assigned him; when the primary purpose of this work is development, not infor- mation; when it trains the child to find in the events and facts within his grasp the reason and explanation of the life about and appreciation of his environment, and accustoms him to him; when it becomes a real help to a better understanding use the knowledge and power his training has given him for his own development and advancement through the service he renders others.
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