To try to teach the elements only "incidentally" as they are applied is to fail to see them in their relations, and therefore to fail in understanding them. Intensive studies by way of filling in the details may well be in part incidental. But systematic superficial introductory work is needed by way of giving pupils their bearings in the various fields of science. The term "superficial" is used advisedly. There is an introductory stage in the teaching of every such subject when the work should be superficial and extensive. This stage paves the way for depth and intensity, which must be reached before education is accomplished.
HIGH SCHOOL SCIENCE
Having no elementary science in the grades, one naturally expects to find in the high school a good introductory course in general science, similar in organization to that suggested for the elementary stage. But nowhere is there anything that even remotely suggests such a course. Students who take the classical course get their first glimpse of modern science in the third or fourth high school year, when they have an opportunity to elect a course in physics or chemistry of the usual traditional stamp. No opportunity is given them for so much as a glimpse of the world's biological background. Those who take the scientific or English course have access to physical geography and to an anemic biological course entitled, "Physiology and Botany," which few take. Students of the High School of Commerce have their first contacts with modern science in a required course in chemistry in the third year, and elective physics in the fourth year. In the technical high schools the first science for the boys is systematic chemistry in the second year and physics in the third. They have no opportunity of contact with any biological science. The girls have "botany and physiology" in their first year.
The city needs to organize preliminary work in general science for the purpose of paving the way to the more intensive science work of the later years. A portion of this should be found in the elementary school and taught by departmental science teachers; and a portion in the first year of the high school. As junior high schools are developed, most of this work should be included in their courses.
As to the later organization of the work, the two technical high schools clearly indicate the modern trend of relating the science teaching to practical labors. What is needed is a wider expansion of this phase of the work without losing sight of the need at the same time for a systematic and general teaching of the sciences. It is a difficult task to make the science teaching vital and modern for the academic high schools, since they have so few contacts with the practical labors of the world. Cleveland needs to see its schools more as a part of the world of affairs, and not so much as a hothouse nursery isolated from the world and its vital interests.
PHYSIOLOGY AND HYGIENE
Teaching in matters pertaining to health is given but a meagre amount of time in the elementary schools. While the school program shows one 15-minute period each week in the first four grades, and one 30-minute period each week in the four upper grades, it appears that in actual practice the subject receives even less time than this. In the attempt to observe the class work in physiology and hygiene, a member of the Survey staff went on one day to four different classrooms at the hour scheduled on the program. In two cases the time was given over to grammar, in one to arithmetic, and in one to music. This represents practice that is not unusual. The subject gets pushed off the program by one of the so-called "essentials." It is difficult to see why health-training is not an essential. In a letter to the School Board, February 8, 1915, Superintendent Frederick wrote:
"The teaching of physiology and hygiene should become a matter of serious moment in our course of study. At present it is not systematically presented in the elementary schools: and in the high schools it is an elective study only in the senior year. My judgment is that it should become a definite part of the program, as a required study in the seventh and eighth grades."
The small nominal amount of time as compared with the time usually expended is partially shown in Table 12. Professor Holmes' figures for the 50 cities include elementary science along with the physiology and hygiene.
TABLE 12.—TIME GIVEN TO SCIENCE, PHYSIOLOGY, HYGIENE
======+=======================+========================
| Hours per year | Per cent of grade time
Grade +—————-+—————-+—————-+——————
| Cleveland | 50 cities | Cleveland | 50 cities
———+—————-+—————-+—————-+——————
1 | 10 | 37 | 1.3 | 4.3
2 | 10 | 41 | 1.1 | 4.5
3 | 10 | 40 | 1.1 | 4.4
4 | 10 | 37 | 1.1 | 3.8
5 | 19 | 34 | 2.1 | 3.5
6 | 19 | 40 | 2.1 | 4.2
7 | 19 | 45 | 2.1 | 4.5
8 | 19 | 57 | 2.1 | 5.7
———+—————-+—————-+—————-+——————
Total | 116 | 331 | 1.7 | 4.4
———+—————-+—————-+—————-+——————