The furnishing of a school has undergone characteristic development. The hard bench, upon which our forefathers sat, has in a large measure disappeared, and in its place has come a variety of desks patterned with chairs fitted to each curve of the back, etc. Blackboards came into general use about the middle of the century. In certain studies, maps, charts, models, etc., seem indispensable, and the modern schoolroom contains all these. Moreover, as soon as science teaching had won a place in the curriculum, the cry went up for laboratories, that a higher grade of work might be done with the more advanced pupil. It is rather a singular fact that in many places the public high school led in this demand, rather than the more conservative college. To-day no high school would count itself able to do its work without one or more laboratories where each pupil might work for himself. In the new high school of Philadelphia there are physical, chemical, and biological laboratories, as well as a completely equipped astronomical observatory.
Text-books were just coming into use at the close of the eighteenth century. The “Child’s Guide” was being superseded by such works as Noah Webster’s Spelling Book, Grammar, and Reader (1792). Within a few years came Lindley Murray’s “English Grammar,” the work of a Quaker merchant who wrote his famous text-book primarily for a young ladies’ school in his immediate neighborhood. The instant success of these books demonstrated what a need there was for such a class of literature. The writing and publication of text-books has become one of the most flourishing industries of the country. On account of hard usage, a text-book does not last more than a few years, and this gives continual opportunity for a new book more nearly up to date than its predecessor.
Within recent years, less stress has been laid on the text-book, and its influence is being minimized. In the elementary schools the teacher explains the lesson, and in the higher schools the professor lectures upon his subject. Consequently, the text-book is relatively less important. This does not mean that less reading is being done, but it does mean that the reading covers a wider ground. Particularly is this true where libraries have been established. The public library system is a most valuable auxiliary to the school system, and is fast becoming indispensable. This is one of the great advantages which city pupils have over those whose home is in the country, and it will lead in the end to district libraries. In some States, as in New York, a successful effort has been made to inaugurate a system of traveling libraries, whereby a case of fifty or one hundred volumes, relating to a particular topic, will be lent for a time to any circle of readers. Massachusetts has best developed a library system, since there are but nine towns in the State that have not free libraries. The growth of the universities has led to the accumulation of great collections for special research and study. In 1800 there were but eleven college libraries in America worth mentioning; to-day there are almost five hundred, of which the largest, Harvard, contains a half million volumes. Libraries are of use, not only for pupils, but also for adults as well. They have aided materially in solving the great question of adult education.
THE NEW HIGH SCHOOL, PHILADELPHIA.
In the New England towns of the middle part of the century, the lyceum lecture was exceedingly popular. University extension has recently come to the front as the latest form of the lyceum system. The idea of lectures to the people by university teachers came from England, where it was suggested just after an extension of the suffrage had attached a new value to the education of adults. Societies for the extension of university teaching have been formed in Oxford, Cambridge, and London. Their methods are on the whole identical,—university men are sent to town or village centres to give a course of lectures upon some general topic; after each lecture a voluntary class is held where questions may be asked and answered; at the conclusion of the course an examination based upon the course and collateral reading is given to those who care to take it; and sometimes a certificate or testimonial may be given. The method has been transplanted to America and generally adopted by the universities, with greatest success, perhaps, in the Middle States, where the American Society for the Extension of University Teaching has organized the field. During the period 1890–99, 862 courses of lectures were given under the auspices of the American Society to audiences aggregating 952,068. Another movement of equal importance is that done by the Chatauqua Literary and Scientific Circle, which prepares lists of books for home reading, with a view to encouraging system in one’s use of spare time. Perhaps the most interesting public work for adults is being done in New York city, where a lecture department has been organized by the Board of Education, by which free lectures are given in schoolhouses to the people. In 1898, 1866 lectures were given to 698,200 people, and the president of New York’s School Board has declared that “these lectures have contributed more than any other agency to the distribution of general intelligence among the masses.” These forces have supplemented very well the work that is being done by the public night schools, which are established in most large cities, with a view to providing elementary, and sometimes technical, instruction to those adults who care for it.
DR. WM. H. MAXWELL, SUPERINTENDENT “GREATER NEW YORK” SCHOOLS.
(Courtesy of The School Journal, New York.)
No educational question has aroused more interest in business circles than the problem how to train best those who will devote themselves to a commercial life. This has become a live question recently to the American people. With improved processes in manufacture, the power of production has grown far beyond the consumption of our own people. Consequently America is competing with the great industrial nations of Europe for a control of the markets of the world. As soon as this competition became evident, the need for a better trained class of commercial leaders was felt. The example of Germany has had a great influence upon other countries. There is a general conviction that the leading position among commercial nations which Germany has won for itself is due in large measure to the technical education given to German artisans and the commercial education provided for business men. For illustration, the German government has recently established in Berlin a school where young men, preparing for business careers in Asia, can learn Chinese, Japanese, Arabic, and Turkish. German youths have been supplanting English young men, to an appreciable degree, in the great commercial houses of London. As a consequence, there has been a strong demand in America for the establishment of commercial high schools,—public institutions in which German, French, and Spanish will be taught, together with economics, industrial history, commercial geography, public finance, social science, etc. These institutions differ entirely from the business colleges, of which there were 342 in the United States in 1897, in that they are broader in scope and content. The latter qualify a man to be a good clerk by teaching him stenography, typewriting, bookkeeping, etc., but the former aim to give him a broad, liberal education, enabling him to have an intelligent comprehension of all matters which interest him in active business. This movement is too recent to have borne much fruit, but in many of the larger cities of America, as New York, Philadelphia, Boston, Brooklyn, and Cleveland, commercial courses have been established in connection with the regular high-school course; and in some of the larger universities, as Pennsylvania, Chicago, Columbia, schools in economics and politics have been created,—all with a view to equipping a young man for an active business career. In view of the present interest in this movement, more may be expected in the near future.