USA > Massachusetts > Middlesex County > Reading > Town of Reading Massachusetts annual report 1906 > Part 9
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Mrs. Nesmith has been of much assistance on account of her past experience as a successful teacher, her knowledge of practical school work and her keen interest in the cause of education.
In the annals of the Town or in public service anywhere it would be difficult to find better examples of patriotic citizenship than is shown in the public life and work of these retiring members of the School Board.
APPROPRIATIONS
The Committee recommends the sum of $28,000 for general school expenses and the sum of $5000 for school incidentals.
Adopted in School Committee Feb. 2d, 1907.
WALTER S. PARKER, Chairman. MARY L. NESMITH. E. H. ROBINSON. HENRY C. PARKER.
SUPERINTENDENT'S REPORT
To the School Committee of the Town of Reading, Greeting :
I submit my eighth annual report, which is the fourteenth in the series.
CARE OF BUILDINGS
This year the chief items of repairs on the buildings were the painting and shingling of the Prospect Street School. The leaks in the roof had caused considerable damage to the walls and ceilings in spite of many attempts to prevent. The interior now needs re- finishing and I recommend that this be done at the earliest opportunity.
At the Lowell Street School the platform across the rear of the room was removed and two doors were placed in the center of that side, opening into a covered passage way to the sanitary, an im- provement long needed for this growing school. It is quite prob- able that this building will need painting during the coming summer vacation.
After ten years of service it was found that the Highland School needed repair, especially the granite masonry about the entrances. The hall of this building should be retinted and I recommend that this be considered in the estimates for repairs the coming year.
The other buildings are in good repair excepting the roof of the Center School which should have new shingles next summer.
CHANGE OF GRADES
Center School is the name given to the old High School, and the change in its interior furnishings and occupants is as great as the change in name.
On finding the prospects encouraging for occupying the new
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High School early in September, it was decided to occupy four rooms at the Center School and close the John street building of two rooms.
We see that this gives us two more rooms occupied by the grade pupils than we had a year ago. One used to relieve the over- crowded Highland and the other to provide for the additional fifty pupils found in September by the census enumerator. We thus note how opportune was the erection of the new building.
With so large an enrollment in the Seventh and Eighth Grades it was necessary to take for their use the southeast lower room of the Highland, for years occupied by Fourth Grade pupils. With the relief of the two rooms at Center School the Highland still has an enrollment of 457, which indicates that the John street building is not destined to stand idle very long.
An ideal way to delay its use would be to raise the Prospect St. School building another story, for securing additional room in that locality, and so hold the pupils there till they finish Fifth Grade.
THE HIGH SCHOOL
To appreciate what the Town of Reading has done for the highest development of its youth, step within and experience the satisfaction afforded by the artistic arrangement of the vestibule, the reception room, so homelike in its appointments, with the teachers' study on one side and the principal's office on the other.
These with the spacious corridor leading to the corner class rooms and to the broad stairways on either hand all serve to impress the visitor with the feeling that his own comfort is the first thing thought of in the arrangement of the administrative portion of the school, while the pupils cannot fail to recognize that these conditions indicate the honor conferred by those responsible for the work of our schools, upon those who are from time to time elected to carry on this important work of training them for citizenship.
The spacious assembly hall, the library, the gymnasium, the lunch room, as well as the special rooms for science work and for the
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commercial course show how keenly alive to all modern require- ments for the best High School work were the men who drew these plans and saw them materialize.
By the expenditure of about two hundred dollars ($200), the class room furniture formerly in use was put in condition to com- pare favorably with the two rooms of new furniture that were needed in addition to what we had in the old building.
We have six of the nine class rooms now occupied and a total enrollment for the past four months of 280 pupils, of whom 240 are our own children and who form the large percentage of the entire school enrollment, 1216, of 19.7 per cent.
When compared with Reading's population, census of 1905, 5,682, we find that we have a record of 42.2 per thousand.
Such a record reflects great credit on the corps of teachers who succeed to this extent in holding them up to advanced study.
The course of study now followed in our High School will be found on another page.
One change in this I would recommend for the following reasons. We find that the college requirements in French are so much greater than they were a few years ago that it is impossible to meet them in a regular two years course in French, and in case of those of our pupils who have planned to offer French as a part of their preparation for college, extra work has been given outside the regular school hours. Our pupils in recent years have passed in this subject, thanks to the loyalty of the teachers concerned to the good name of the school, as well as to their generous attitude toward the earnest student. With requisite teaching force, allowed in part for this very reason, I recommend the extension of the course in French to three years, beginning with next September.
THE HIGH SCHOOL TEACHERS
As usual we are obliged to report a number of changes in the faculty.
During the summer Miss Currier was obliged to ask for leave
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of absence for the first part of the year and Miss Mary Lerner of Cambridge was secured to take her work.
The election of Miss English to a position yielding a much larger salary in Newark, N. J., made it necessary to secure one to carry on her work in mathematics. The choice fell to Miss Flora M. Cotton, of Providence, R. I., who in three months was offered a position in Providence, which she felt she must accept as it would allow of her living at home where her presence was very much needed. Miss Alice M. Grover of Lynn was secured to take this work.
Miss Marion G. Richardson was also called to a larger position with an increase in salary in the New Bedford High School, under the direction of Mr. Wilson R. Butler, formerly principal of the Reading High School. Miss Isabel H. Coombs of Stoneham was secured to take her work in the commercial department.
With these changes in the corps of teachers only a few will be able to appreciate the care devolving upon the master of the school, Mr. Watkins, as they entered the new building Sept. 17th. I wish in this report to you to express my unqualified praise of all con- cerned in that inauguration of the work amid the new surroundings.
In less than five minutes after the pupils had left the assembly hall, where they were first seated, every pupil was located in the seat assigned him and each teacher in charge of a home room learned her enrollment from the room plan in her possession at that time. The regular program was called and the lessons were assigned the first day.
The work of the master was in evidence on every hand while teachers and pupils vied with one another to make the work of those first days a grand success.
He speaks with the highest appreciation of the manner in which the pupils have caught the progressive spirit and their attitude right through the year thus far has shown, better than any words could do, their appreciation for what the Town has done for their education.
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It may be of interest to the general public to know that the corps of High School teachers as now constituted will enable us to carry on the work allowed by the large list of elective studies in a satisfactory manner, and no pupil, who gives the proper time and thought to any line of preparation he may elect, need find anything but a good preparation for the course awaiting him in higher institutions.
With the experience of the past four weeks with this addition to our teaching force, it gives me pleasure to report that I have not seen the Reading High School in so prosperous a condition as it is at the present time.
THE GRADE TEACHERS
The Highland School has suffered as usual from the depreda- tions of superintendents who can offer larger salaries than Reading can afford to give. Miss Mary F. Osborne was elected at Spring- field at a large increase in salary, and Miss Ethel B. Macomber was elected at Winthrop to a position paying a larger salary. Their work was provided for by the election of Miss Annie L. Dolloff of New Sharon, Me., for Grade VII and Miss Mary L. Reed of Wey- mouth for Grade VI, and we feel that the Highland is maintaining its usual high standard of work.
At the Center School Miss Ethel M. Flanders was given one room of Grade IV, and Miss Nellie S. Batchelder of Salem, the other.
Miss Edith A. Wright was placed in charge of one room of Grade III and Miss M. Grace Wakefield in charge of the other. After a few weeks Miss Wright was made principal of the building.
Sickness preventing the taking up of the work at the first of the year by Miss Flanders, Miss Annie M. Anderson of Dorchester was secured as substitute for two months and served with great efficiency.
Miss Florence E. Babcock and Miss Annie P. Reid were given the two rooms of Grade II at the Union Street School and Miss Myra K. Parker and Miss Marion H. Morgan the two rooms of Grade I.
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Miss Duncan and Miss Wright were continued at the Prospect Street School and Miss Bessie M. Parker at the Lowell Street, while Miss Helen R. Flett of Waverly was secured to take the Chestnut Hill School left vacant by the transfer of Miss Flanders to the Center School.
Miss Barclay having decided to give up teaching, Miss Kate Farlin of Hyde Park was secured to take the work in sewing.
Mr. Walter F. Brackett also decided not to stand as candidate for the position of teacher of manual training for another year, and it became necessary to choose his successor. Mr. W. Firth East- wood of Boston was secured for this work.
It is a pleasure to be able to report that all our new and un- tried teachers are proving themselves possessed of all the qualities accredited them at the time of our interviews in vacation.
TEXT BOOKS-IHIGH SCHOOL
MATHEMATICS
Solid Geometry, G. A. Wentworth, Ginn & Co.
College Algebra, Webster Wells, D. C. Heath
Plane. Geometry, Hobbs, P. P. Simmons
Algebra, Exercise Manual, Wentworth & Hill, Ginn & Co.
Essentials of Algebra, Webster Wells, D. C. Heath
SCIENCE
Elementary Physics, Revised, Wentworth & Hill, Ginn & Co. A Text Book of Physics; Revised, Hall & Bergen, Henry Holt Manual of Physics Experiments, Nichols, Smith & Turton,
Descriptive Chemistry, Newell,
Qualitative Analysis, I. W. Irish, Advanced Applied Physiology, Overton, Physical Geography, Ralph S. Tarr, Foundations of Botany, Bergen, School Zoology, Burnett,
Ginn & Co. D. C. Heath American Book Co. American Book Co. MacMillan Co. Ginn & Co. American Book Co
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HISTORY
A History of the American Nation, McLaughlin, D. Appleton & Co. Essentials in English History, Walker & Hart, American Book Co. Rome : Its Rise and Fall, Myers, Ginn & Co.
A History of Greece, Myers,
Ginn & Co.
ENGLISH
Composition & Rhetoric, Lockwood & Emerson, Ginn & Co.
Elements of Rhetoric, Carpenter, MacMillan
Composition & Rhetoric, Scott & Denney, Allyn & Bacon English Composition & Literature, Webster, Houghton, Mifflin Co. All of the college requirements in various editions.
LATIN
Latin Grammar, Allen & Greenough, Ginn & Co. Latin Prose, Jones, S. C. Griggs & Co. Ginn & Co.
Latin Composition, D'Ooge,
Caesar's Gallic War, Greenough,
Ginn & Co.
Orations of Cicero, Greenough & Kittredge, Ginn & Co.
The Lives of Cornelius Nepos, Lindsay, American Book Co.
New Latin Composition, Daniell, Benjamin Sanborn
Greater Poems of Virgil, Greenough & Kittredge, Ginn & Co.
The Bellum Catilinae, Sallust, Benjamin Sanborn
Selections from Ovid, Kelsey, Allyn & Bacon
GREEK
A Greek Grammar, Goodwin, Ginn & Co.
Xenophon's Anabasis, Goodwin & White,
Ginn & Co.
Homer's Iliad, Seymour, Ginn & Co.
Xenophon's Hellenica, Marratt, - Ginn & Co.
Exercises in Greek Composition, Woodruff, Benjamin Sanborn
Exercises in Greek Composition, Jones,
S. C. Briggs & Co.
Greek Grammar, Hadley & Allen, American Book Company
FRENCH
Complete French Course, Chardenal,
Allyn & Bacon D. C. Heath
Primary French Translation Book, Lyon,
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French Verbs, Hennequin,
Easy French, Snow & Lebon,
American Book Company D. C. Heath
GERMAN
Lehrbuch der Deutschen Sprache, Spanhoofd, D. C. Heath Ginn & Co.
German Composition, Bernhardt,
German Method for Beginners, Lange, Allyn & Bacon
COMMERCIAL
Gregg Shorthand, John Gregg, Gregg Publishing Co.
Rational Typewriting, Cutler & SoRelle, Gregg Publishing Co.
Office Routine & Bookkeeping, Williams & Rogers,
American Book Co.
Accounting & Business Practice, Moore & Miner, Ginn & Co.
Business Arithmetic, Williams & Rogers, American Book Co.
A BRIEF OUTLINE OF OUR COURSE OF STUDY READING AND LITERATURE
We continue to find the best results ever attained in our schools in the subject of reading by the use of the Passaic Method of teaching this subject.
This combines the word and the sentence methods and later deals with phonics in a thorough manner.
Perhaps the chief gain lies in the natural expression secured, a logical result of the plan of memorizing choice selections from our best authors, in the early portion of their work and using these as a basis in developing a vocabulary and in forming the habit of taking in the meaning of the entire sentence at once. Correct expression is gained from the teachers as the passages chosen are committed to memory, the sense of hearing being called into exercise as well as sight. The mechanical side is made subordinate to the thought getting and the thought expressing power.
By this plan our pupils acquire sufficient power in three and four months to read the ordinary first readers, finding the ordinary primers too easy reading for profitable use.
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In the second year they are capable of reading material that takes on a more distinct character as literature and the interest aroused by this kind of material continues to spur them on to fresh endeavor, and so power to read and to understand continues to grow in proportion.
Fables and folk lore here find their place, also the material introducing them to the life of children in other countries, as Around the World, Book I.
A fair supply of material suited to this work is now available, but as ability is gained from the earlier work more will be demanded.
In the Third Grade the interest is maintained by a variety of material adding the history stories and the lives of great men in simple style, to those in use before. Here conversation on the subject matter serves to determine whether the correct ideas are obtained by the pupils and also gives the teacher an opportunity to teach correct expression in case the pupils fail to use grammatical language.
In all these grades the pupils are taught memory gems as a means of creating and developing a taste for the best in thought expressed in the best of language.
In the Fourth, Fifth and Sixth Grades geography and history or biography hold a still more prominent place in the curriculum, for it is the design on the one hand to make the study of geography a real, present life interest, and on the other to lead up to the formal study of history by developing a personal interest in the men who were prominent in our early history.
With the books of Dodge, Frye, Tarr-McMurry, Around the World Book III, Seven Little Sisters, and other material noted in the appended list, it will be seen that the subject may be made to appear to the pupils a subject of wide range and one affecting our life in many ways. If in these grades there seems the lack of definiteness in locating places, we trust a certain power to classify and locate in a reasoning manner in the remainder of the course will remedy any such defect thus far apparent.
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In Sixth, Seventh and Eighth Grades the work of literature becomes more positive, gradually introducing works of the literary masters and securing a liking for these works both by a careful choice of the material and by the skillful treatment of the same by the enthusiastic teacher. In this matter of dealing with the classic productions of our great literary leaders, nothing will prove an efficient substitute for the earnest, enthusiastic, live teacher to lead and direct the thoughts of the pupils engaged in perusing these literary gems.
In the list below will be found the authors read and the selec- tions for memorizing.
GEOGRAPHY
The first introduction of our pupils to information about the world we live in is by means of the readers. They are thus made acquainted with the lives of little people who live in climates widely different from their own.
In the Fourth Grade special effort is made to bring to the pupil's attention the many facts that lie all about him and make him familiar with much that will serve him well in his later study. The Dodge geography is given him to read and study and thus he grows acquainted with the terms and expressions in which he is to think and talk as he goes from his own immediate surroundings to those of distant lands. In the Fifth Grade, Frye's Elementary is used, supplemented by Tarr-McMurry, and all the continents are studied, making use of outline maps for the surer location of the prominent features of each.
In Sixth Grade special study is given to the United States, taking up the work by sections, using outline maps, looking up special industries in other books, and in the last weeks of the year filling in an outline map of the entire country for a review and another comprehensive view of the pupil's own country before leaving school or studying other countries as thoroughly as the use of the large geography implies.
In Seventh Grade the study of North and South America, Europe and Africa or Asia is pursued with the aid of Frye's Gram-
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mar School Geography, supplemented by Tarr-McMurry, Carpenter, Stoddard's Lectures and stereoscopic views.
In the first half of Eighth Grade the remaining portions of the globe are studied and a review of the United States with special reference to its commerce, thus bringing in review many prominent places and natural features of other countries.
Here we find Adams' Elementary Commercial Geography fur- nishes much valuable material to tax the mental powers and prevent the monotony of the typical review.
In all these grades the pupils are stimulated to investigate for themselves and make an orderly display of their work in accord with the mounted cards of the Tiffany Industrial Cabinet. This proves more interesting to pupils than any previous work on the subject.
HISTORY
In the subject of history our aim is to develop a taste for the study by first introducing the pupils to the men who performed heroic deeds and who were conspicuous leaders in the settlement and development of our great nation. As early as Third Grade the pupils read "Great Americans for Little Americans" and so in the Fourth and Fifth Grades a part of the reading material of the year is of the historic character.
In Sixth Grade more attention is paid to the preparation of a lesson in History as a training for the later study of Montgomery's Leading Facts of American History.
In Seventh Grade pupils are expected to take the work as far as the Civil War, while Eighth Grade pupils finish and review the whole, using Gordy's U. S. History.
In both Seventh and Eighth Grades the pupils are required to use the Ivanhoe Historical Note Book, thus putting in enduring form the outlines of the work and many notes of great value to refer to after they have left school. This also combines in a splen- did way the work of geography and history, besides preparing them to follow a similar plan in their later study of history.
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The accompanying list of reference books will indicate the plan pursued to interest the brighter pupils or those who need the EXTRA THING to secure their best efforts.
ARITHMETIC
We plan no definite work in numbers for the first year and in the second year the subject is treated objectively, using the Hobbs Number Stick, the Speer Number Blocks, together with inch cubes and other simple material for illustrating wholes and fractional parts. The usual combinations are carried as far as sixteen in the course of the year and the use of figures and the signs of the fundamental processes are made familiar.
In the third year the objective teaching is continued for the first part of the year, according to the ability of the class, and in three or four months the book is placed in the hands of the pupils for additional material. The Werner Arithmetic has been found very helpful in securing a healthy development of power to use numbers.
By this plan pupils are early made to think of halves, thirds and fourths, and to use these fractions in their oral work. They are trained in the use of the term inch, foot, yard, pint, quart, peck, bushel, gallon, dime, nickel, dollar, triangle, oblong, square, penta- gon, perimeter, area, and are taken over the multiplication tables as far as to yield products from forty to fifty. Emphasis is placed upon having the pupils tell what a stated problem means, also upon requiring them to make problems involving the processes they have indicated in their oral work.
In Fourth Grade the work grows more difficult by gradually introducing the fractions, fifths, tenths, sixths, twelfths, and carry- ing the work on the tables through the usual numbers. Near the close of the year, for two months or more, they are given drill on the decimal tenths, while the plan of requiring them to give prob- lems that call for their use is continued in this grade.
In Fifth Grade the additional fractions used are sevenths, four- teenths, fifteenths, decimal hundredths, decimal thousandths, and
THE LIBRARY
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familiarity with the terms of percentage, also of ratio and propor- tion. Special drill is given on comparing one-half, 50 per cent., one- fourth, 25 per cent., one-third, 33ยง per cent., one-sixth, 163 per cent, one-eighth, 12} per cent. Mental arithmetic exercises with numbers easily carried in mind is the plan used to develop power to think in terms of number, to talk in logical simplicity. The com- pletion of Book I and the first fifty pages of Book II has been found practical in the Reading schools.
In Sixth Grade we take up the terms multiple, common multi- ple and least common multiple and make the pupils familiar with their meaning by a short exercise daily.
Work upon measuring piles of wood, floors, walls, ceilings, roofs, with cost at given price per cord, square yard, etc., develop the power of reasoning from known facts to the desired financial results, while practice with numbers containing decimals of three- and four places will give abundant opportunity to keep in mind the method of performing the four fundamental operations.
In Seventh Grade it has been found practical to finish Book II and work for four or five months in Book III, which gives a good review of arithmetic by the ordinary topical arrangement, and with this continued through Eighth Grade and supplemented by fresh problems under each topic our pupils are found well grounded in the fundamentals of arithmetic.
We do not attempt to make pupils of fourteen years of age experts in partial payments, cube root, partnership, alligation and other topics that demand a more mature mind.
ALGEBRA AND GEOMETRY
In Seventh Grade we have found it advantageous to take up work in constructive geometry, giving one lesson a week to it. In Eighth Grade the pupils are given an introduction to algebra, devot- ing two periods a week to this work. A noticeable result of this introduction of algebra and geometry into the Grammar Grades is the great reduction in the number of failures in the algebra and geometry of the High School. Pupils are given an opportunity to become somewhat familiar with the processes and the terms employed.
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LATIN
In Eighth Grade we also give pupils the opportunity to choose between Latin and English grammar. One interesting experience in this connection is worth remarking. Those taking Latin as it is taught in our Eighth Grade are found to have a better knowledge of the grammatical structure of our own language than those who elect English grammar. I believe it shows clearly how beneficial in educational work is the method that demands frequent comparison of two ideas or thoughts in contrast with the method of attempting to substitute for this a persistent struggle to master certain material by sheer force of memory and an exercise of the will.
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