The training of teachers in the United States of America

IN making my report of observations in one department of the Educational System of the United States, I am anxious to point out, at the very outset, that the nature of that System (its complexity, its many modifications, and the vast extent it covers) renders the work of drawing general conclusions from the data supplied by the observations of one person a task of extreme difficulty. The difficulty is further increased by the fact that my personal observations were limited to the North-Eastern States of Massachusetts, Connecticut, Rhode Island, New York, Pennsylvania, Michigan, and Illinois. These States, although covering only a small portion of the whole field of observation, differ so greatly as regards conditions and organization that they exhibit results widely opposed, and furnish facts from which it is not easy to generalize.

I had, however, many and valuable opportunities of supplementing personal observations by a further study of educational matters in the exhibit of the Educational Department of the World’s Fair, and by attending the Educational Congresses held in Chicago in July, 1893. The meetings held during the Educational Congress were, in themselves, disappointing. Nevertheless they enabled me to meet educationalists and teachers of all kinds from all parts of the United States, and to learn, by personal interviews, facts which it would have been impossible to gain by merely visiting educational institutions. I found throughout my visit that personal interviews were an important means of supplementing the observation of work actually done in the schools. In some departments, the most valuable information I gained was acquired in this way, this being especially true in connection with the Training of Secondary Teachers in the Eastern States, where the subject, although widely discussed, is only just beginning to have any practical outcome.

In reporting on the Training of Teachers in the United States, I have chiefly confined myself to the work done in:—

It will be seen that I make constant references to methods of Science taught in the training schools, and adopted in their connected model schools. This is due to the fact that my observations were made with especial regard to that branch of training. I have not reported on the training of Kindergarten teachers, for although the question of Kindergarten instruction is one of great interest and importance at present in America, I had little opportunity of seeing and judging the methods employed in the preparation of teachers in that department.

I wish to record my grateful thanks to those who so readily helped me in my work; and to express my appreciation of the great kindness and hospitality shown everywhere throughout my visit. I should also like to take this opportunity of thanking the Gilchrist Trustees, through whose liberality I have been enabled to gain much that will be very valuable to myself, and possibly something that may be of interest or help to other teachers.

STATE NORMAL SCHOOLS.

The State Normal Schools are schools supported wholly by a particular State, to provide trained teachers for the public schools of that State. They are under the management of State Boards of Education, which determine the length of the Normal School Course, and arrange the studies. Much discretionary power is, however, given to the principals or presidents of the respective schools. Instruction is usually free to those who pledge themselves to teach in the State, and, as a further inducement, students attending non-resident schools are allowed to come in by train at reduced fares, or lodge and board in houses near the school at a very low rate. Students of resident schools have rooms and board in the school building, or in separate smaller halls, or “dormitories,” at a rate of 150-180 dollars a year. To very needy students the State makes extra grants. Most of the Normal Schools are co-educational institutions; but a few admit only women. In the co-educational schools, the men and women have classes and meals in common, and reside in different parts of one building, or in adjacent buildings. It is a noticeable fact, however, that in most of the co-educational Normal Schools the women students outnumber the men. In the two Pennsylvanian Schools I visited—those at Westchester and Millersville—the discrepancy between the numbers of men and women students was not so great as in the Normal Schools of Massachusetts, Connecticut, and New York, which devote themselves more strictly to professional training, i.e. to pedagogical instruction and teaching practice. Having enquired as to the cause of the greater number of women students, I was told it was due to the fact that teaching, as a profession, offers few attractions to men in the United States, and that in those few Normal Schools where the attendance of men and women students is almost equal the courses are such as to allow of their being used by the men as preparatory courses for college. Such an explanation seems to be corroborated by the relative numbers of men and women teachers in many of the States. In Massachusetts, the number of teachers is 10,965, and of these only 992 are men. In Illinois, there are 23,033 teachers in the Common Schools, and among them only 7,091 men. In New York, of the 32,161 teachers in the State schools, 26,869 are women.

The first Normal Schools were established in Massachusetts in 1839. The particular needs which these early schools were intended to satisfy, and their early aims, have influenced the courses of instruction and lines of work of most of the Normal Schools since established, whether in Massachusetts, or in other States. The purpose of the early schools at Lexington and Barre was to provide more competent teachers for the lower grades of schools, and their course of training embraced:—

The standard of admission to these early Normal Schools was low, and at that time, opportunities for any thorough study outside universities were few, especially in the case of women. Accordingly their theory of training gave the greatest importance to “a careful review of the branches of knowledge required to be taught in schools.” The first business of a Normal School was said, by Horace Mann, to consist “in reviewing, and thoroughly and critically mastering the rudiments of elementary branches of knowledge.” And although conditions have changed much since 1839, most of the Normal Schools of the United States still pursue the lines of work adopted by Massachusetts. Standards of admission have been raised, courses of study have been correspondingly extended, but the Normal Schools, with a few exceptions, still remain more or less efficient schools for the teaching of ordinary subjects, and devote half the course, and in many cases even more, to academic work. It is thus a distinctive feature of Normal School work to pursue school subjects side by side with professional, or pedagogical subjects. But there seems a general tendency to emphasize the academic part, at the expense of the professional. Examples of the courses of study for Massachusetts and New York, two of the foremost of the Eastern States in educational matters, will indicate this.

Normal Schools of Massachusetts.

The order of studies, and the relative lengths of time spent on academic and professional studies, is determined by the president of the school. In the Bridgewater School, pedagogical subjects are not studied systematically until the fourth term or semester, for those who take the Two Years’ Course, and the seventh semester, for those who take the Four Years’ Course. Thus with the exception of a single semester, and a few hours of the first semester given to an introduction of psychology, the whole of the two years or four years is devoted to school subjects. In the Westfield School, the last half-year of the Two Years’ Course is devoted to pedagogical subjects, and the additional work of the Four Years’ Course is entirely academic.

The studies prescribed for the Normal Schools of New York State are in three courses:

The order of subjects, and relative times devoted to academic and professional studies, is approximately the same for all the Normal Schools of New York State. Taking the schools of Oswego and Oneonta as examples, we find:—

Three Years’ Course: Psychology, philosophy, history of education and methods of teaching various subjects, taken up for the first half of the third year, and sometimes made to extend into the second half of the same year.

Four Years’ Course: The same work, chiefly done in the first half of the fourth year.

It is maintained by some, that all the Normal School work is professional, in that throughout the curriculum the aim is to present the subject matter of instruction in the way that the teacher should present it to his or her class of children, and so to make the lessons model lessons. I was present at some excellent lessons of this kind: a geography lesson and a history lesson in the Bridgewater Normal School. But for the most part the needs of the Normal School pupils themselves, and not the needs of imaginary future school children, have to be considered, and the Normal School lessons or “recitations” resolve themselves into ordinary school lessons. Even if we assume, however, that this is not the case, and that great skill is shown on the part of the Normal School teacher, may not such a plan of teaching “Methods” be dangerous, in that it encourages imitation and rigidity. Such appears to me to be the tendency of the generally adopted plan, of giving professional training in “Methods,” by actual lessons in the various subjects given by the Normal School teacher; and the danger of encouraging cut and dried methods is intensified where it is the custom for a Normal School student to give a lesson to children, or her fellow-students in that subject and section of a subject which has just been presented to her by the Normal School teacher. It is maintained by others that apart from any advantage which may accrue to the students from hearing good lessons in the various subjects they will have to teach, it is absolutely necessary that each student should change her standpoint, and review the various branches of knowledge as a teacher, rather than as a pupil. This, it is argued, is secured by such a plan of teaching “Methods.” As a third motive, it is held that direct teaching of ordinary school subjects is necessary before beginning pedagogical instruction, on account of the inadequate and unequal preparation which the future teachers bring to their work. It seems to me that both these necessities might be obviated by more rigid requirements for admission to Normal Schools. The well-equipped High Schools can do the academic work of the Normal Schools with less effort than can the Normal Schools themselves; and were the standards of admission such as to necessitate a thoroughly sound preliminary knowledge in common school subjects, might not the Normal School students be found more capable of themselves reviewing old facts from a new standpoint, and the schools have more time and opportunity to carry out other means of training?

Academic Studies.

It is a marked feature in the academic work of Normal Schools that great importance is given to the teaching of science. Here, as in American Schools in general, a large place in the curriculum is given to what is known as “nature study.” Extensive laboratories, for the different branches of science, are fitted up in most of the schools; books, microscopes, physical, chemical and biological apparatus, specimens for observation and dissection, are supplied free to students; outdoor work is organized, weather-charts are kept daily, and students are encouraged to use the school workshops for making simple physical apparatus for their own use. In all the schools great stress is laid upon practical work by each individual student. The following list shows the number of lesson-hours given to science at the Normal School, Bridgewater, Massachusetts.

The school, which numbers 274 pupils, has five laboratories—viz., chemical, physical, physiological and zoological, geological and industrial, and the equipment of these, and the care with which students kept daily records of laboratory work, were its special features. The chemical laboratory is in two sections: one for elementary, and one for advanced students, and between these is a teachers’ laboratory. The students’ daily records of work are carefully examined by the teacher, and much use is made, by both teachers and students, of the continuous wall slate round the class-rooms and laboratories. Physiology is taught by aid of the skeleton and life-size models, also by the dissection of lower animals, and microscopical examination of tissues. The methods and means adopted for geology and geography teaching at Bridgewater seemed to be particularly good. In the school museum were duplicate collections of rocks and minerals, classified on various bases; and in addition to these, the school possessed two sets of trays of working specimens, one set containing labelled typical class specimens, and the other containing unlabelled specimens for identification by students. Books, giving printed directions for work, interleaved with blank sheets for observations, notes and drawings, were provided for all students. I heard two excellent lessons in geography at this school. One on the Slopes of the United States was well worked out with the students in sand, great care being taken by the teacher to state and compare actual distances, so that the relief-map should not convey an impression of false proportion. The other was a lesson in map-drawing from memory. All students had places at the slate round the room, and two minutes were given to draw the outline of a map previously prepared. Then one minute was given for the drawing of a particularly difficult isolated part of the outline. When this was done, a correct map was uncovered, and students were required to correct their own drawings. After the drawings had been individually criticised by the teacher, faults were generalized, and help was given.

The special features of the science work at the Normal School, Willimantic, Connecticut, is the emphasis placed on manual training, and its practical connection with all science teaching. All students, men and women, are required to invent, or make with their own hands, simple apparatus for teaching the elementary facts of physics. I saw students in the workshops, making relief-maps and models for their lessons. One was constructing a very simple model of a water-wheel, to illustrate lessons on the conservation of energy; another was making a relief-map of paper pulp, on a ground of blue-painted wood.

In this school the students do not, as a rule, follow stated text-books in science. Wide reading is encouraged, and there is an excellent library of standard text-books and works of reference. There is also a model library of children’s literature for the students’ use, and an exhibition of the latest devices for “busy-work.” “Busy-work” is the work done alone by one section of a class, while the other is being directly taught by the teacher. All sorts of occupations are devised by the clever teacher for impressing facts already learnt, and the “busy-work” hour is frequently employed in cutting out outline maps, sorting beads, counting beans, etc. The object of the exhibition of “busy-work” at Willimantic is to encourage examination and criticism of such devices with regard to their educational value. The figures representing the amount granted to this Normal School last year, for “busy-work” exhibits, library books, text-books, periodicals, etc., were kindly given to me by the Principal, and I note them here, as an illustration of the readiness of New England States to furnish school supplies and apparatus. A few details of expenditure for the past year, which was by no means an exceptional year, are:

Thus more than £450 was spent in one year for library materials, in a school numbering less than 150. The abundant supply of apparatus and books for the teaching of science, and the importance given to practical work, are a marked feature in all the schools. At the Albany Normal School for teachers in higher grades and colleges, the students spend most of their free afternoons in making physical apparatus for their own future use. The laboratory here is well equipped, and the work is done with great care, accuracy and finish. I saw a home-made tangent galvanometer, and a Wheatstone’s bridge in constant use for somewhat fine measurements.

At the Normal School, Worcester, Massachusetts, plant study receives special attention. This is not technical botany as usually understood, but is rather a daily observation and record of plant surroundings, the practical study of all stages of plant-life. A feature of the study is the daily exhibit, made by the pupils in turn, of some plant in bud, leaf, flower or fruit, with its common and scientific name, and the place where it was gathered. Directories furnishing information respecting the localities of trees and plants in the neighbourhood are made in the school, and dates of their times of blossoming are noted from year to year on special blank sheets provided for the purpose. Moreover, collections of the woods of different trees, and of leaves of trees growing within the county are made. Work of this kind is usually done in the free hours for independent study, which each student has several times during the day. Practical gardening is also systematically done in free time.

The lessons in science, unless actual laboratory lessons, are usually given in the form of “recitations.” A “recitation” is a lesson in which certain parts of a subject, specially prepared beforehand, are contributed by the pupils. The teacher asks questions and explains difficulties, and generally connects the facts brought forward; but the material of the lesson is wholly supplied by the pupils. This way of working out a subject has at least two distinct advantages over our own method of lesson-giving, in which the chief work devolves upon the teacher. By the recitation method the pupils are taught how to use books, how to gather from many sources material for their recitation. They also learn to rely on their own efforts in class-time, and to be alert in thought and speech. The disadvantages of the plan, however, seem even more apparent. Where one text-book is chiefly used in a subject, or even where several books are referred to, there is a distinct tendency to “recite” in the words of the book. Several times I heard lessons in which such “recitations” were accepted by the teacher. This method, moreover, seems likely to lead to too great a dependence on text-books, and too constant a reference to books, on points where thought and reflection might be better guides. It also encourages digression in class, and a resulting slowness in getting through the subject matter, unless the teacher be very skilful in conducting the “recitation.” The constant raising of points by the students, at all parts of the discussion, leads sometimes to waste of time by debating on questions of merely individual opinion. Such results point to the difficulty of conducting an ordinary recitation. Great skill and much experience are needed, before such a lesson can be made completely satisfactory, and many are the teachers’ temptations to omit careful preparation. As a method to be used constantly, and in all subjects, it seems open to many objections, and to show but few advantages. As resorted to occasionally, and by skilful teachers, and as particularly adapted to subjects such as geography or history, the “recitation” may be made a valuable means of training.

The tendency to bookishness and slavery to word-forms, which may seem to be encouraged by the recitation method of teaching science in the Normal Schools, is opposed by a greater tendency to emphasize the concrete, to refer in all science teaching directly to the objects themselves, to use laboratory methods wherever possible. Observation and experiment are essentially the methods of many of the American science teachers, and no pains are spared to illustrate all facts and principles by an appeal to the senses. As a result, much of the science teaching is excellent. On the other hand, there seems a possible danger of pursuing these excellent methods too far, of appealing to the senses alone, at stages of development in the child when reason and reflection might be appealed to and trusted, and of generally emphasizing the value of observation at the expense of neglecting the reflective faculties. In the excellent Outlines of Laboratory Work, used by some of the Normal Schools, the danger is to some degree recognised by Questions for Thought and Reference being placed at the end of each lesson-scheme. Assuming, however, that the questions are followed out carefully by the students, it may still be doubted whether this is the best method of arousing thought.

Another feature of the science teaching in the Normal Schools is the taking up of many branches of science. Chemistry, physics, astronomy, geology, mineralogy, zoology, botany, physiology, are studied by all. In order that students may be able to take up all these, the plan usually adopted is to concentrate attention on one science for a short time, and then to pass on to other sciences, until five or six have been taken. It is seldom that even one branch of science is allowed to run through a whole course of two years. The division of science studies for the Normal School at New Britain, Connecticut, where the science work is most carefully done, will illustrate this point.

When it is remembered that no preliminary science is required for admission to the Normal Schools, and that many of the entering students have not done any work in the subject at all, it seems impossible that any very thorough knowledge can be secured in a course of five, ten, or even thirteen weeks. It may be possible for the student to obtain and verify a few scientific facts during a short course such as this; but there is no time or opportunity to realize the extent or bearing of the subject in hand, or to study it adequately in a scientific way. To allow a beginner to feel he has completed a course in geology, botany, or any other science in thirteen weeks is to encourage superficiality, to arouse in him a feeling of satisfaction and attainment, and surely nothing can be more opposed to the true spirit of science. In the New Britain School, physics is carried through fifty-three of the eighty weeks in the Two Years’ Course; and this seems a good plan, even if, during some part of the time, only two or three hours a week can be given to it. When one science, or possibly two, are chiefly taken up, and others considered merely accessory to the main subject of study, a more adequate knowledge of science and scientific method can be gained, especially if the sciences taken up are such as botany, and physics, which illustrate respectively different methods of scientific research.

It may be maintained that the Normal School students must be prepared for their future work in the Primary and Grammar Schools, in most of which the elements of several sciences are taught. This, of course, must be remembered. Nevertheless, the attitude of mind developed by the thorough study of one science is the best possible preparation for the safe study of the elements of others, while a superficial study of the elements of many sciences is fatal to the proper estimation of facts in any one of them.

Professional Work.

The purely professional work of the Normal State Schools consists of:

It is usual for the Normal Schools of the Eastern States to postpone the study of strictly pedagogical subjects until half or more of the course has been completed. School methods are sometimes taught in connection with academic subjects in the early part of the course; but such instruction, coming, as it does, before any principles of the science of education have been considered, or any practical experience has been gained, must be purely empirical. At the Normal School, Millersville, Pennsylvania, school management is taken during the first year, and applied psychology (as distinguished from empirical methods), history of education, and school teaching, are required during the second year. If the student takes up a further scientific or post-graduate course, additional professional studies are required—viz., psychology and the philosophy of education, ethics, logic, and professional reading. In the Westchester Normal School, Pennsylvania, no professional work is taken up until the second year. Then psychology is studied, and history of education; and methods and school practice are taken. The additional pedagogical studies for the advanced courses are the same as at Millersville. At the Normal School, Bridgewater, Massachusetts, the students, after having studied the elements of psychology, during their first semester, leave all technical studies until the fourth semester, when they take up simultaneously, study of the body, study of the mind, principles of education and methods, school organization, school government, history of school laws of Massachusetts. A fifth semester, when it can be given, is devoted entirely to professional work and actual teaching. At the Normal School, New Britain, Connecticut, psychology is given four times a week during most of the two years’ course. Text-books are not used except for reference. No pure psychology is studied, but school subjects are taken up one by one, and their facts and methods of treatment are used to illustrate psychological principles. The history of education is studied side by side with this applied psychology; but not much time is given to this subject in class. The lives and works of the chief educators only are taken, and private reading is much encouraged as accessory to the class work. At the Normal School, Willimantic, Connecticut, psychology is studied one hour a day throughout the last year, and is treated almost entirely from the physiological standpoint. No special text-book is used, but Spencer and Darwin are recommended for reference. The history of education is not taken up systematically in class, but the work and influence of modern educators, such as Arnold, Thring, and Horace Mann, are thoroughly discussed. At the Normal School, Worcester, Massachusetts, class work in psychology is taken almost daily throughout the whole course. The value attributed to the subject, and the unique way in which it is studied, together with other points distinctive of the professional work, give to the Worcester School a foremost place among New England Normal Schools. The method adopted for its study is one which entirely leaves the beaten track of ordinary text-books. It does not, in the earlier stages, trouble the student with the divisions and generalities of pure psychology, but rather fixes his attention solely on the child, and seeks to gain from actual observation and individual and combined experience laws which shall be valuable aids in teaching. “The principal requests the students to observe the conduct of children in all circumstances—at home, at school, in the street, at work, at play, in conversation with one another and with adults, and record what they see and hear as soon as circumstances will permit.” The work thus suggested has been organized as a definite part of the school course, and although optional, is usually taken up by all students. It is intended, not to supplant, but to supplement later systematic instruction in psychology, and is taken up, not for the sake of the facts gained, which may or may not be of intrinsic worth, but for the value of the process of such observation to the teacher. In order to help forward the systematic study of children, a scheme of work is drawn up. Records are to be made whenever convenient, and for these records blank sheets of six different colours are provided. The colours are a means of roughly classifying the records into six groups, thus:

Each record must contain the date of the observation, the observer’s name, age, and post-office address, as well as the name or initials of the child observed, its age, sex, nationality. There must be also a statement of the length of time which has elapsed between the observation and the record. These records are preserved and catalogued under such heads as knowledge, imagination, feeling. Special attention is being directed to the subject of child language, and pupils and old students are supplied with small indexed books for records in this particular department. Further opportunities for daily observation and experiment in certain lines of child-study and in teaching are offered in a newly organized children’s class or kindergarten. The students merely watch the class, the teaching being entirely in the hands of two experienced kindergartners. As the class exists for the acknowledged purpose of experiment, tuition is free, and the teachers in charge have full liberty to follow any course they wish. When I saw the school, a long series of daily experiments were being made, with a view to finding out whether, when left perfectly free, the boys secured places next to girls by preference.

Much time is given to “Methods” in all the Normal Schools. Besides the so-called “Methods” taught by means of academic studies, the subject is usually taken up again in connection with applied psychology. The school subjects, treated one by one in detail, are used to illustrate principles of education, while much reference is made at every stage to the personal experience of teacher and students. Many different plans are adopted in teaching “Methods.” At the Normal School, Westchester, I heard a lesson which was in the form of a modified “recitation.” A certain point had been chosen for discussion. The students had prepared the subject beforehand, and some had written short essays, which they read in turn. Afterwards the whole class was questioned by the teacher. As new ideas were brought forward, they were noted on the blackboard by the students who supplied them, until a complete sketch was made. A discussion on “Noise in Class” was carried on somewhat in the same way. At Westfield, Massachusetts, the lessons on “Didactics” are carried out on a similar plan, the students being called upon in turn to furnish certain parts of the subject, and to build up a sketch on the blackboard.

At the Normal School, Albany, methods are taught thus:—With each of three terms of psychology, certain subjects are chosen for consideration. A syllabus of work in a certain subject is given in by each student. It is carefully discussed in class. Then parts of the detailed syllabus are taken in order, methods of dealing with any particular part discussed, and one method decided upon as best. For the next day, all the students prepare a lesson on the part selected, and any one of them may be called upon to give it to his or her fellow-students. Then follows criticism by teacher and students. The plan of requiring all students to consider detailed methods in all subjects seems not to be altogether a good one. It assumes a knowledge of all the subjects of study on the part of all students, a condition only attainable at the price of superficiality. Even where a general knowledge of subjects can be relied upon, details in method cannot do other than encourage empiricism, in cases where the knowledge of the subject matter is not thorough and complete. It would seem better, especially in the case of training institutions like that at Albany, designed to give purely professional training to teachers of higher grades, to encourage more specialization, and to allow all students some choice of method subjects, so that dead forms of method might be made as few as possible. The system of giving detailed methods to all stimulates, too, a tendency to rigid forms of lesson-giving, and somewhat encourages the idea that there is only one good arrangement of subject matter for a particular lesson, and one good way of giving it. This is, I think, a danger of all method-teaching; but it is much intensified where methods are discussed in great detail.

The actual methods taught in the Normal Schools, and followed out in the connected Model Schools, vary so much as regards both principles and details, that it is almost impossible to report on them as a whole. It is a feature of many of the Normal Schools to cling to old methods, and lines of work of twenty, thirty or forty years ago; while, on the other hand, a few of the Normal Schools I saw—those of Connecticut, the Oswego Normal School, and Colonel Parker’s School, at Englewood, Chicago—seem to be leaders in a campaign which is beginning to revolutionize “Methods” in America.

The educational principle which is effecting this reform is the connection or correlation of studies, a theory the most fully expressed and applied at the Cook County Normal School, Illinois. As a result of this theory, the hard and fast lines between the so-called subjects of study are being broken down. Reading is taught in all the grades through nature study, history and literature; e.g., natural objects studied by the children in different grades, or poems in the selected literature for the year, serve as subjects for reading lessons. The children are encouraged to express their ideas orally on these subjects, and the teacher writes their statements on the blackboard, and takes care that the statement is really the expression of an idea in the child’s mind. When various sentences, given by the children, have been connected and arranged, the class reads from the board, and afterwards from printed or type-written copies of what has been written. Thus the children make their own reading books, and need no ordinary reading primers. This method, as adapted to the earliest stages of reading, necessarily implies the learning of script before printed characters, also the learning of words and sentences as wholes, and their necessary association with the thought which they express. So, too, writing and drawing, as modes of expressing thought, are taught in close connection with all other subjects. At New Britain, the teacher of drawing in the Model School is present at all literature lessons, and children are encouraged to illustrate their literature by drawings or paintings. In papers on the “Spontaneous Drawings of Children,” read at the Chicago Educational Conference by Professor Earl Barnes, of Leland Stanford University, California, he showed how much of this illustrative work of children was being used by himself and others in the cause of experimental psychology.

At the Model School connected with the Oswego Normal School, natural history is made the central subject, and reading, writing, and drawing are made to bear upon it. The natural history course, including both plants and animals, is most carefully planned to suit the seasons of the year. As each plant or animal is studied, it is drawn by the children, stories are told about it, the children write about it, read about it, and make it a general object of study for some time. The work is carefully graded for different ages, but the subject or topic of study is the same throughout the school at the same time.

At the Cook County Normal School, Illinois, all the teaching is made to group itself round three subjects—science, geography, history; and these subjects are made to include everything forming the environment of the child. The study of form and number, instead of being followed as separate subjects in themselves, are considered merely as means of studying these three comprehensive subjects—as modes of thinking in fact. Hearing, observing, and reading are regarded as different ways of gaining ideas, and as such, silent reading is encouraged, and many devices are used for helping the child to get quickly and clearly the ideas from the printed or written page. Writing, music, modelling, painting, drawing, speaking, are considered as means of expressing ideas about objects studied—the act of expression making the ideas clearer. Thus, number or arithmetic is taught, not, as is usual, by means of problems specially made and arranged in books of arithmetical examples; but in close connection with any class subject. I heard part of a course of excellent laboratory lessons in Science, given to Summer School Students at this school, and as the methods employed were those of the ordinary Normal School Course, I may mention them here. At the end of each lesson the teacher used the numerical results obtained by individual students, and worked them into arithmetical problems. For example, the subjects used for successive number lessons were as follows:

Conductivity of heat in metals.

Expansion of metals by heat.

Determination of boiling-point of fresh and salt water.

Such a treatment of subjects is a strong protest against routine work and rigid method. It allows great scope to the teacher by concentrating attention on the child and its needs, rather than on the artificial divisions into so-called subjects, and their methods. On the other hand, it puts great responsibility upon the teacher, and taxes his skill to the utmost. There are many difficulties in adopting the plan, one of the chief being the construction of the school time-table. In any case, the practical application of such a system can only be partial, until all teachers are enthusiasts and experts; but the lines of work seem to be true lines, and may be suggestive of much that shall reform some of our own old methods.

Practice in Teaching.

It is usual for each Normal School to have attached to it a Model School, which serves the double purpose of model and practising school for students. The head of the Model School and her assistants are experienced teachers, known as the critic teachers, and to the care and supervision of these the students are submitted during their training in practical teaching. All the Normal Schools I saw had such a Model School except the one at Providence, Rhode Island.

The amount of time actually devoted to teaching by each student is different in different States, and the plans by which the required amount is secured for all vary in the different schools.

The State of Pennsylvania requires of its Normal School students actual practice in teaching for one hour a day during three-fourths of the last year of the Course; but students generally do more than this. At Westchester, Pennsylvania, the students go into the Model School in sections of six each morning after 10.30. A new section is chiefly engaged in observing the children, and hearing lessons given by the critic teachers or other students. Later, the students teach, but always under supervision. The subject matter of their lessons is definitely mapped out for them by the critic teacher, and they discuss with her the best ways of treating it. There are no written notes of lessons, and no public criticism of lessons, either by teachers or students. Each week, meetings of teachers and students are held, for the purpose of taking up any points noted during the students’ work of the week. These are really talks supplementary to the ordinary method lectures. At Millersville, Pennsylvania, each student gives two or three lessons every day for a year. She teaches in different grades, and takes lessons in different subjects, and has also practice in managing simultaneously several divisions of one class.

At the Oswego Normal School, under the regulations of the New York State, the student is in the schools only twenty weeks, but during this time she has much responsibility. She spends ten weeks in a primary or elementary grade, and ten weeks in a more advanced grade, and during the whole time is practically responsible for her class. Each afternoon, after the school is dismissed, the teaching class remains for an hour to discuss any points of difficulty with the Head of the Model School.

At Willimantic, Connecticut, the teaching class spends its first four weeks in general observation of children, and hearing lessons. Then each student is placed under the supervision of one special critic teacher, and she continues some of the courses of work already begun by the critic teacher. At least four weeks are spent by each student in every grade in the school, first in observing, then in teaching under the criticism of the class teacher.

The Model School at New Britain, Connecticut, is preserved strictly as a Model School. After observing teacher and class for some time, the student usually gives one trial lesson in the school, but there is no systematic teaching by the student. For the actual independent practice, the student must go to a practising school outside New Britain, and be entirely responsible for a class for four months. At the large practising school in connection with the New Britain Normal School, at South Manchester, I saw students dealing with the actual difficulties of discipline and class-management. Each student was in charge of a large class with different divisions or grades. There were four responsible, experienced teachers for reference in cases of emergency, and for criticism; but each student had her own class, and the school of 700 children was practically managed by students. Such is the general plan of practice-work in the Normal Schools.

Much care is given to the Model Schools. The class-rooms are supplied with all necessary apparatus, and they are bright and airy, and well supplied with flowers and children’s books. It is quite customary in some of the schools to give short periods in school hours for private reading, or to allow one child to read to the other children while they are doing some kind of mechanical work. Much importance is laid upon the observation of the teaching in Model Schools. It is possible, however, that this is insisted on too early in the course; indeed, the hearing of lessons is usually the students’ first work in the school. It would be much more profitable, and there would be less danger of blind imitation, if the student had herself previously gained experience in teaching. As it is, the danger of imitation, and one-sided and narrow lines of teaching is increased by the fact that one student is chiefly under the supervision of one teacher.

At the Worcester Normal School there is no Model or practising School, but the students teach in the public schools of the city. For the first six months of her last year at the Normal School, the student acts as an apprentice or pupil-teacher, serving in at least three grades during this time. Each teacher has the direction of only one student, who may be left in sole charge of the class for hours or days. One day in the week the apprentice-student attends the Normal School, where she shows her class diary for the week, and discusses any difficulties that may have arisen. On that day, too, she takes part in the “Platform Exercises” of the Normal School—viz., exercises in which students speak, read or draw, on the platform, in presence of the whole school. The apprentice-students usually give an account to their fellow-students of anything interesting or helpful in their practical work of the past week.

Examinations.

At the end of the Normal School Course, State examinations are held in most of the States. In Pennsylvania each school examines its own students, who, when they have satisfactorily completed the required course of study, and passed the final examination, receive a certificate, and are said “to graduate.” After graduation, they are recommended to the State Examiner, who awards a State-Teaching Certificate valid for two years. At the end of this period, the teacher is required to present to the State Board a certificate of good work from the county Superintendent under whom he or she has taught, and also a certificate from his own school board. He is then entitled to teach in his own State for life. The Normal School students of Connecticut are submitted to State Examination, but in Massachusetts no outside examination is required. Students who work satisfactorily through the course, and pass the final examination, “graduate” at the discretion of the President, or according to results of an examination set by the School Board of the city. The State examination of teachers and most of the final examinations of the Normal Schools are usually in academic subjects only. It is not attempted to test by actual examination the degree of skill in teaching or governing.

Supply of Teachers.

As regards the number of teachers who have been trained in Normal Schools relatively to the number who teach in the Common Schools of the State without previous training, statistics are apt to be misleading, because, in many cases, Normal Students do not take the entire course or “graduate.” Out of 372 students enrolled at New Britain in 1889-1890, only 77 completed the entire course; in 1890-1891, only 61 out of 401 graduated; and in 1891-1892, out of 444 students, only 91 were graduates. For 1888-1889 Framingham shows 30 graduates out of 205 present in the school; Salem shows 129 out of 292; and Bridgewater, 69 out of 232. In all these schools the courses are two, three or four years, and if all the students completed the course, the number of graduates each year would be ½, ⅓, or ¼ respectively of the number of students enrolled. The Report of School Commissioners for 1888-1889 shows that among 75,529 teachers in the Common Schools of Massachusetts, Rhode Island, Connecticut, New York, New Jersey and Pennsylvania, there were only 1,461 students who completed the Normal School Course in these States. In all the States, arrangements are made for teachers who do not go through the Normal Schools. Certificates of license to teach in the State for a shorter or longer time are granted according to results of the State Certificate Examination. A third-grade certificate, entitling its owner to teach for a short time, may be exchanged for a second-grade certificate, when further proficiency is shown by re-examination. So a second-grade certificate may be exchanged for a life-certificate in many of the States. It should be borne in mind that these examinations are only in school subjects.

The fact that in a State such as Massachusetts the qualifications of teachers in the High and Latin Schools of Boston is stated merely as “Education at some respectable college of good standing,” shows that the necessity for the professional training of teachers for higher or secondary schools is not at present fully recognised. Until the last few years, no Institution especially devoted to the training of secondary teachers existed in the eastern States, and those who wished to prepare themselves for the teaching of the higher branches of subjects had no other means of training than that offered in the Normal Schools. At Worcester and Bridgewater, College and University graduates may take the pedagogical course as special students, and so prepare for teaching in the higher schools. At the Indiana and Illinois Normal Schools, and in other places, there are courses of study chiefly or entirely professional, for college or university graduates, if such present themselves. At Albany, too, where the standard of admission is high, many of the students prepare for work in the secondary schools. On the whole, however, the number of special students preparing for higher work in the Normal Schools is very small. In 1891-1892, the Southern Illinois Normal University had only six special students, the Terre-Haute Normal School, Indiana, only four; and we find in the eastern States generally that the Normal Schools take very little part in the training of secondary teachers. For the most part Normal School students are found only in the lower grades of public schools; and college graduates, even though untrained, are preferred as teachers in High Schools, good private schools and academies.

The reason for this is probably to be found in the nature of the Normal School itself. It, perhaps more than any other educational institution in America, has adhered to its old traditions. It was designed to train teachers for the lower grades of Elementary Schools, and in the early days was prepared to accept the only material at hand—would-be teachers, many of whom possessed few intellectual qualifications, and almost all were inadequately prepared for training. But with rising standards of work, and increased facilities for good preliminary preparation, the Normal School has not yet closed its doors to students whose general attainments do not qualify them to profit by courses in the Science and Art of Teaching. In one or two cases only is the standard of college graduation insisted upon, and in many cases the admission standard is lower than that required to complete the course in a city High School. Hence it results that most of the teaching in High Schools and academies is given into the hands of professionally untrained teachers—college graduates, whose scholarship can be relied upon, but who have no previous technical training, rather than to trained teachers, whose knowledge of the actual subject matter of studies may or may not be thorough. The choice, open to heads of Secondary Schools when appointing assistants, is, moreover, not between good scholarship and good training. Without adequate preparation the training must be inadequate, and in many cases cramping and injurious. On the other hand, it is only after the preliminary preparation has been sound and complete that the work of training can be carried out in the best possible way.

CITY NORMAL AND TRAINING SCHOOLS.

The existence of State Normal Schools and City Training Schools side by side suggests at once a fact which has an important bearing on educational questions in the United States—viz., the absolute distinction, as regards jurisdiction, between schools outside the limits of a town or city, under the supervision of a State Board and State Superintendent, and schools within the city radius, and under the supervision of a Town or City Superintendent. In educational matters, the city areas are completely exempt from State control. Their schools and training schools are managed by local authorities, and supplied for the most part by local funds. Hence it follows that City Normal and Training Schools show even greater diversity of methods and arrangement than is found in State Normal Schools, for their lines of work and efficiency are entirely dependent upon the respective City Boards of Education. One effect of local school administration is distinctly undesirable. The appointment of the principal of the school by the Educational Board, and the election of that Board by local vote, produces, in many cities, a tendency to display, in order to cull popular favour. The “graduation exercises,” yearly public ceremonies, held in connection with almost all American schools and colleges, consist, in the case of training schools, of various kinds of students’ and children’s exercises, to which the public are invited. Much valuable time is taken by the students in preparing essays to be read and lessons to be given in public; and in some cases the student or teacher conducts an examination of her class in the presence of parents and friends. Several such public exercises I heard, but in all cases it was evident that true results of training, or honest results of teaching, were not demonstrated. The endeavour to impress the audience, besides involving great waste of time, seems likely to create an unconscious dishonesty on the part of teachers, students, and children.

City Normal Schools.

The City Normal Schools are the local training schools, maintained by the larger cities for the preparation of their own teachers.

They require as conditions of admission:—