VI The Abolition of “Mass Play”
Thus the dark narrow passage-way from the elementary to the higher schools is being widened, lighted, paved and sign-posted. In some school systems it has disappeared altogether, leaving the promotion from the eighth year to the first year high school as easy as the step from the seventh to the eighth grade. After the children have reached the high school, however, the task is only begun. First they must be individualized, second socialized, and third taught.
“The trouble with the girls,” complained Wm. McAndrew, in discussing his four thousand Washington Irvingites, “is that they have always been taught mass play. Take singing, for instance. A class started off will sing beautifully all together, but get one girl on her feet and she is afraid to utter a note. The grade instruction has taught them group acting and group thinking. I step into a class of Freshmen with a ‘Good morning, girls’.
“‘Good morning,’ they chorus.
“‘Are you glad to see me, girls?’
“‘Yes sir,’ again in chorus.
“‘Do you wished I was hanged?’
“‘Yes sir,’ generally,—
“‘Oh, no sir,’ cries one girl who has begun to cerebrate. The idea catches all over the class, and again the chorus comes,—
“‘Oh, no sir, no sir.’