USA > Massachusetts > Middlesex County > Reading > Town of Reading Massachusetts annual report 1933 > Part 8
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Habit, every Tuesday at the High School.
Posture, Second Monday in the month at Grouard House.
Pre-School, at the Town Building every Tuesday p. m., 2 to 4.
Tuberculosis Prevention, by special appointment.
Diphtheria Prevention, by special appointment.
Janitors
High School: John Maguire, Fairview Ave. $1422.20
Mary L. Kennedy, 47 Washington St. 969.80
George Clarkson, 38 Ash St. 969.80
Junior High: Henry W. Bryden, 14 Village St. 1648.40
Walter Smith, 30 Temple St. 1422.20
For1 Month, 4 King St. 1422.20
Hey, 108 Haven St. 969.80
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Highland : James L. Healey, 139 West St.
1422.20
Emma Tibbetts, 9 School St. 743.60
Arthur H. Cook, 1 Weston Rd. 743.60
Center and Union: Edward McBrien, 18 Salem St. 1422.20
Prospect Street : J. Fred Richardson, 17 Prospect St. 969.80
Lowell Street : Sylvanus L. Thompson, 8 Intervale Ter. 969.80
Chestnut Hill: Leander Smith, 170 High St.
517.40
REPORT OF SCHOOL COMMITTEE
To the Citizens of the Town of Reading :
The School Committee herewith submits its report and those of the Superintendent, Principals, and Department heads.
During the past two years the School Department has frankly granted the need of some modifications in school appropriations due to the decrease both in public and private incomes. The reduction of expenditures in 1933 over 1931 was approximately $40,000. Similarly there have been reductions in the whole State, but the savings in Reading have been somewhat larger than those over the State as a whole.
Throughout the year the Department has tried to maintain the most essential elements and this has to a large extent been accom- plished through the loyalty of the administrative and teaching forces. The Department has lived within its budget and has returned unex- pended balances of $4,999.44 at the close of the year.
Generally throughout the state there is evidence that advantage is being taken of the present situation to raise the impression that school costs and programs have been extravagant and must be still further greatly curtailed. As with all public movements, the danger is that the pendulum will swing too far. Reduced appropriations neces- sarily mean enlarged classes and somewhat reduced opportunities. Changing economic and social conditions and the adoption of industrial codes will practically mean the end of child labor and that all children up to sixteen years of age will hereafter be full time pupils in the public schools. As a result, schools generally must expect larger enrollments, particularly in the upper grades, and must provide a curriculum that will care for the needs of the non-academic type of pupil.
This, with the promise of more leisure time, should mean that health, physical education, music, art, home making and shop work will probably be larger factors in the education of the future than they have been in the past.
A crippled and handicapped School Department cannot supply more and better education for more of our population.
The Committee had plans prepared for the building of a twelve room school, with auditorium and play room for the East Side of the Town and alterations in the Highland School, which would have ma-
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terially relieved congestion and improved the housing conditions of the elementary grades. This was following the recommendations of the Davis Report, establishing three elementary school districts. These plans represented an estimated cost of $110,000. The plan was favor- ably voted upon at a special town meeting held August 29. The im- mediate reasons for presenting the program at that time were finan- cial,-to secure the benefit of the amount to be donated by the Federal Government, namely $30,000, as well as to assist in the recovery pro- gram of the National Government. The referendum town meeting fail- ed to approve the vote.
The Committee recommends that the part of the project covering the alterations in the Highland School be carried out this year.
During the year the elementary teaching has been strengthened and unified programs and courses worked out. There is now need of decreasing the teacher load. A building program is the ultimate an- swer. The new building will come when the town realizes the need more acutely.
The Committee vacated its quarters in the Senior High School and moved to the Grouard House on School Street, so that the Senior High School might have that additional space for its needs.
Teachers are employed at fixed rates, advancing by annual in- creases of $100 each until the established maximum salary is reached. Owing to general conditions, these annual step rate increases in salar- ies have been omitted for the past two years. The result is an in- equality, with two teachers doing similar work, but paid at different rates. The Committee recommends the restoration of these automatic step rates beginning as of September 1934. While the total amount required for this during the current year is less than $1000, the restora- tion of the principle is a matter of simple justice. It seems necessary to continue this year the general and uniform reduction in salaries which went into effect January 1, 1933, throughout all of the Town Departments.
The Committee thanks all of the personnel who have helped to make the year successful under trying conditions. It invites the close scrutiny and active interest of both parents and citizens.
The terms of Helen B. Hartshorn and Arthur W. Coolidge expire this year.
Respectfully submitted,
ARTHUR W. COOLIDGE, Chairman. HELEN B. HARTSHORN CHARLES A. HOLCOMB RUTH A. STEMBRIDGE
FRANK D. TANNER CHARLES R. WAKELING
School Committee.
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REPORT OF THE SUPERINTENDENT OF SCHOOLS, 1933
To the Honorable, the School Committee of Reading, Massachusetts :
. This is the forty-first annual report of the Superintendent of the Reading Public Schools.
This year has been marked by the most drastic retrenchments in the financial support of the public schools that has occurred in the present generation. While the business depression of 1931-32 seems to be passing, the support of schools has not showed the corresponding recovery. Massachusetts has suffered less than some other parts of the country and Reading has not been as hard hit as many other Massa- chusetts towns and cities. While the services to the children in the schools have been curtailed in some important particulars, the general administrative policies and organization and the supervisory staff have been maintained and, if normal financial conditions are re-established soon, the standards of service to the children in the schools can be promptly restored. The reduction in the budget has been effected in several ways of which the most important are the reduction of each teacher's salary by 13 per cent of the amount of the salary in excess of $500, the increase in the size of the class group taught by one teach- er, and curtailment of the amount of time devoted to Manual Train- ing and Household Arts, which were discontinued entirely in grades five and six and reduced one-half in the Junior High School.
I am informed that twenty-four towns and cities of Massachu- setts have restored already teachers' salaries to the regular schedule without cuts or voluntary contributions, that twelve others have dis- continued a part of the previous cut and that ten others have resumed the annual salary increments formerly withheld. The increase in the size of class-units in the Junior and Senior high schools has been large; a'lso the time allowed teachers for administrative duties and extra-cur- ricula activities has been cut down to a minimum. The dropping of Sewing, Cooking, and Manual Training in the fifth and sixth grades was effected by filling the pupils' time with other regular school work taught by the regular teachers, whose class-units were increased in size and whose free periods were reduced to make places in the pro- gram without increasing the number of teachers, thus saving the sal- aries of teachers of sewing, cooking, and manual training in grades 5 and 6. In fairness to the teachers in the Highland School, Junior High School, and Senior High School, it should be borne in mind that their school day is longer and they teach one more period a day than is the case in many other towns and cities. This enables each teacher in the Junior and Senior High Schools to take care of twenty per cent more class periods than could be done in the five-hour day. In other words, if the school day in Reading were shortened to five hours, a
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corresponding increase of twenty per cent in the number of teachers required or increase in size of class units or cutting down of number of subjects each pupil is allowed to take, or some other serious cur- tailment, would be inevitable.
The teachers are the ones bearing the. brunt of the burdens caused by the retrenchment program. Therefore the restoration of the normal salary schedule should be a primary objective. The restoration of teach- ing the Practical Arts is important. The saving by doing away with them is only nominal because something has to be taught in their place. The increased load for regular classes could have been made without dropping the practical arts, so the real saving is only the difference in cost of the teachers and supplies for practical arts compared with those for the academic subjects. In household arts the difference is negligible; in manual training it is mainly the difference between a man's salary and a' woman's salary.
The cut that hurts and is difficult to set forth in detail is the cut in the direction of extra-curricula activities of the schools such as : assembly hall programs, personal guidance of pupils having difficulties, remedial instruction for pupils falling behind and in danger of failure to be promoted, student council and leadership clubs and other activities too numerous to mention promoting social experiences and good citi- zenship. The prevention of delinquency and crime is a public need if not a necessity at this time. We had during the past year numerous instances in which the school failed to offset other influences that led our pupils to commit various misdemeanors and crimes of a serious na- ture for which in several cases they have been committed to prisons. The teachers should be commissioned to concern themselves with the behavior and social attitudes of the pupils as much as with their know- ledge of the three R's, however indispensable that knowledge may be. Teachers cannot do this if every moment of their school time is crowded with class room instruction. They cannot come to know each pupil's status and personal needs if the size of the classes is too great.
Reading needs a new elementary school to provide more class rooms for grades 1 to 6. Some temporary relief would be given by re- modeling the Highland School, but the elementary grades are bound to suffer until a new building is crected east of Main Street.
Nothwithstanding the discouraging conditions, the morale of the teaching force has been maintained at a high level. A large number of teachers, in spite of reduced salaries, have taken professional courses at Boston University, Harvard, and elsewhere. Several were awarded college degrees. Three new teachers with master's degrees were add- ed to the corps : one in the Senior High School, one in the Junior High School, and one in the elementary school grades. The teaching in every department of the system has been in 1933 on the highest professional
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level that it has been in any year in the past twenty years. This has been particularly true of the primary and intermediate grades (5 and 6). Dr. Wilson of Harvard University in collaboration with Miss Wad- leigh has been carrying on research work in the Social Studies curri- culum for elementary grades four, five, and six and has met with teach- ers and given considerable assistance in organizing the subject-mat- ter of the social studies curriculum into appropriate units of learning.
Dr. Durrell of Boston University has carried on in the Reading Schools a research study into causes for pupil-failures in reading, spell- ing, and penmanship. During the summer with Miss Wadleigh's co- operation a clinic was carried on and over forty pupils that had de- veloped reading difficulties were given tests by Dr. Durrell and a staff of helpers recruited from advanced students. The results of these tests together with remedial procedures were compiled and given to the teachers of each of the children tested. Dr. Durrell has made visits of inspection at intervals since the summer. All this work has been done without expense to Reading or to the parents. Many ex- aminations have been given gratuitously for which Dr. Durrell would receive twenty-five dollars each if given at his private office. Miss Helen Donnelly, who received her master's degree at Boston Uni- versity and has worked with Dr. Durrell as an assistant in research and in the clinic, is a teacher in the Center School and assisting in the remedial work carried on there. Several other Reading teachers are now taking courses with Dr. Durrell in Boston University and applying the results of their instruction in their classes under Miss Wadleigh's supervision.
The State Teachers College at Salem is sending regularly groups of cadet teachers for nine-week terms of observation and practice in the Reading elementary schools. These cadets assist the teachers in various ways and occasionally substitute without pay if needed. Sev- eral normal school graduates who have been unable to secure salaried positions have given assistance in primary grades for the experience and for recommendation in their application for regular appointments.
This is the twenty-first annual report that I have had the privilege of submitting as Superintendent of the Reading Public Schools. Dur- ing these two decades a policy of progressive development of educa- tional service for Reading children has been followed without serious interruption or radical departures from the original plans which were in accord with the fundamental principles and practices of leading school systems throughout the United States. The organization of the Reading school system has been expanded and integrated conser- vatively as funds have become available. What has been accomplished has been done at much less expense than has been incurred by most other towns or cities to get equally good results. The school pro-
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cedures have been modified from year to year to keep pace with the best developments of educational practice of which we could learn.
My third annual report (1915) states: "During this year there have been undertaken numerous modifications of the public schools of Reading." In the report these changes are summarized in seventeen paragraphs which I will not take the space to quote in full, but will mention in brief with a few comments in explanation.
1 Salary schedule for teachers. Previously there had been no fixed minimum, maximum or yearly rate of increase for the three class- es of service : elementary school, Junior High School, and Senior High School.
2 Organization of a State-aided Agricultural Department.
3 Organization of grades seven and eight as a Junior High School. This was modelled after the Platoon Schools of Gary, Indiana.
4 Inaugurated regular Quarterly Comprehensive Examinations. 5 Establishment of a School of Household Arts in the Grouard House for girls in Senior and Junior High Schools.
6 Increase in time for Practical Arts for boys in Junior High School including wood work, gardening, painting, and printing.
7 A longer school day of six hours for Junior and Senior High Schools.
8 Publication of new courses of study for Junior High and Senior High Schools.
9 Introduction of Community Civics in Senior High School and re-arrangement of history courses.
10 Introduction of typewriting as an elective in grades 7, 8, and 9.
11 Separation of Commercial English from College Preparatory English in the last two years of the Senior High School.
12 Introduction of "direct method" of teaching French, German, and Spanish.
13 Introduction of debating: "The Reading High School Forum."
14 Teaching Musical Appreciation in Senior High School.
15 Improved methods of teaching primary reading and number.
16 Skilled instruction in physical education in Junior High School. 17 Five teachers added to the staff. Various improvements to grounds and addition to equipment, including fire alarm boxes in the several buildings, installation of a telephone in each school, and equip- ment of a workshop for farm carpentry.
Subsequent developments of the Reading School system have been consistent expansions of these beginnings.
In my fourth report (1916) an account is given of an addition of two rooms to the Prospect Street School, finishing of two rooms in the second story of the Lowell Street School, and the re-opening of a second room at the Chestnut Hill School, thus adding five rooms which
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were utilized by organizing classes for pupils of 5th and 6th grades previously sent to the Highland School as these buildings had grades 1 to 4 only.
During the next eleven years, until 1927, no new schoolrooms were provided for the Reading schools except the Channel house, bought about 1925 to make room for proposed additions to the Highland School to accommodate the Junior High School. Since the plan for locating the Junior High School elsewhere was adopted, the Chan- nel house has been used as an "Opportunity School" for pupils re- tarded or having special learning difficulties. When the new Junior High building was occupied in September 1927, there was a redistri- bution of pupils affecting every school in the town. The basis of this new arrangement was an approximation to the 6-3-3 organization adopted by the National Superintendents' Association as standard prac- tice throughout the nation and as the basis of the studies of curriculum revision and administrative policies embodied in its official year books for the past ten years. Under the new distribution of pupils the senior high school which was badly overcrowded was relieved by transferring the first year pupils (the ninth grade) to the new Junior High School building thus establishing the 3-3 plan for these two schools. Into the rooms in the Highland School, vacated by the Junior High School, were brought all the fifth and sixth grade pupils from the other ele- mentary schools combining them with pupils of these grades already located in the Highland School and forming a platoon school with departmentalized teaching and one session daily from 8.30 a. m. to 2.30 p.m. This left grades 1-4 only in the several primary buildings and relieved their crowded condition materially.
Many volumes have been written by some of our foremost educators explaining the purposes of the three year Junior High School and advo- cating its establishment in place of the old Grammar School which had become an unwieldy expansion of the colonial dame school, poorly adapted to laying the foundations for higher levels of learning. The Junior High School was the result of a reorganization and redirection of the curriculum for the seventh, eighth and ninth years of school life to correct the inadequacies and the superfluities of the grammar school. Many educators contributed to this result: some by theoretical discussion and others by practical demonstrations in the schools. The famous "Report of the Committee of Ten" of which Charles W. Eliot, then President of Harvard University was Chairman, set forth the need for "enrichment" of the grammar school and gave impetus to the movement culminating in the establishment of the Junior High School as the approved form of organization for these three years of school work. The development of the child in the twelve years of public school attendance divides itself quite naturally into four epochs of
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about three years each marking distinctive stages in the child's growth physically, emotionally, intellectually and socially : at each of the four levels .There are likewise two three-year periods of development preced- ing school life. In the first three years of infancy the child is inti- mately and strongly attached to its mother and satisfies its instinctive craving in contact with her. During this period the infant should gradually become less dependent, impulsive and self-centered in its behavior. In the second three year period the child begins to build up (1) some self-direction and ability to attend to his own wants, (2) some measure of self-control and dependability and (3) a degree of regard for others that prompts observance of proper habits of behavior in group action. The nursery school, the Montessori House of Child- hood, and the Kindergarten have been organized to promote the de- velopment of these attitudes and abilities. There is always grave danger of the fixation of some attitude or habit at an infantile level and thus carrying it forward into adult life. Psychiatrists assert that every nervous breakdown in adult life has an element that may be traced back to a failure to transcend some childish attitude or misconception of social behavior.
In this pre-primary school period the normal child begins to build up more strongly the consciousness of himself in his relations with other persons and to form habits of social behavior with other children and adults outside of the family circle. In school systems not maintaining nursery schools or kindergartens much of this pre-primary school development is automatically passed on to the primary schools which constitute the first three-year epoch of the public school system. The transition from one stage to the next is a gradual development, not one marked by a sudden change. Yet each epoch has distinctive characteristics, having biological and social significance and origin. Moreover the rate of development of the different aspects of the personality varies with each individual so that the chronological age, the mental age, the educational age, and the social age of an indivi- dual seldom agree. In a distribution of pupils based on chronological age and grade in school we find about five different chronological ages in each grade and at least seven chronological ages in a primary school of three grades. Children do not mix well or play together happily or integrate socially if the differences in their chronological ages are too great. It has been found therefore that the organization of the school with three years in each department is advantageous . If a school has more than three grades it should be administered in sections for purposes of assemblies, choruses, play and other large group ac- tivities . This principle of organization would result in a three-year primary school, grades 1, 2, 3, a three-year intermediate school, grades 4, 5, 6, a three-year junior high school, grades 7, 8, 9, and a three-year senior high school, grades 10, 11, 12. Our present set up of primary
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schools having four grades and an intermediate school of only two grades is due to the inadequacy of our school houses. Professor Davis' plan for three buildings containing grades 1-6 contemplates a primary section and an intermediate section organized separately in each school making a 3-3-3-3 plan for the whole system. The special function of the Primary School is to expand the child's social contacts and be- havior patterns or habits beyond the limits of the social life of the family. This is perhaps the most indispensable service rendered by the schools. The three R's might be taught successfully in the home under favorable conditions, but wholesome habits of social behavior either in creative activities or in defensive mechanisms cannot be es- tablished successfully without participation in the activities of social groups outside of the family. Parents thinking of teaching their child at home for fear of contamination of the child in school should realize that it one time or another social contacts with the world are inevitable and can be best undertaken while the child is amenable to parental guidance and discipline.
The unduly sheltered child confronted with a dangerous social situation does not know how to take care of himself. He should learn those things while he is growing up.
Besides activities that give the child insight into his experiences and the social and community life of which he is a part, the primary school should teach him the art of reading and the rudiments of self-expres- sion by writing and drawing. These are the tools that will enable him to learn from books as well as from experience and observation and give him the power to understand the meaning of what he reads in books.
In the next epoch of learning, grades four, five and six, the In- termediate School, the pupil acquires the fundamentals of the three R's and the ability to gain knowledge from books dealing with geo- graphy, history, arithmetic, English language and literature, hygiene and many other subjects all of which contribute to his understanding of the community life about him and enable him more and more ade- quately to take his part in it.
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