NEW SERIES, VOL. XII., No. 2.

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HARVARD COLLEGE LIBRARY

GIFT OF THE

GRADUATE SCHOOL OF EDUCA ION

NOV 7 1923

THE

Connecticut Common School Journal,

AND

ANNALS OF EDUCATION.

VOL. XII. NEW BRITAIN, FEBRUARY, 1864. No. 2.

TOO MANY STUDIES.

As

THERE has been a growing tendency to crowd upon the attention of pupils too many studies at the same time. a result we have, in many schools, a vast amount of superficial knowledge. Pupils get a mere smattering of many branches without any well grounded, methodical and thorough knowledge of any one. But this error is not so much chargeable to teachers as to parents. There seems to be a feeling, quite too prevalent, that youth are not learning much unless they are pursuing several of the higher branches,and too often parents seem to be perfectly satisfied if it can only be said that their childreu are attending to some of the numerous ologies and osophies of the present day. Now while we would not in the least undervalue these, so called higher branches, we would protest against their being substituted for those which are of more practical worth.

VOL. XII.

"Could man be secure

That his days would endure

As of old, for a thousand long years,
3

34

Educ P

V. 19, no. I

But as our years are limited to threescore and ten, and our school years to two score, true wisdom should lead us to limit the range of studies, in our common schools, primarily to those which are most essential to success and usefulness in the common walks and avocations of life. We would not have Chemistry, Philosophy, etc., take the place of Arithmetic or Geography, nor would we have French or Latin take the precedence of reading and spelling.

An eminent teacher was once called upon by a young lady who desired to become connected with his school as a pupil. He soon discovered that she was exceedingly deficient in reading, spelling, grammar and other elementary branches,but on asking what branches she wished to attend to while under his care, she said:" I wish to study chemistry, philosophy, astronomy and French, paint a mourning piece, read Spanish, conjecture a map and learn bigotry." On further examination, he ascertained that it was botany and not bigotry, that the young lady wished to learn. But this anecdote too clearly illustrates a very prevalent tendency,—one against which teachers and parents should guard. To have a knowledge of Latin, French, Spanish, &c., is surely very desirable,— but not if gained at the sacrifice of reading, spelling and other fundamental branches.

Our common schools should aim to impart thorough and accurate instruction in those branches which will be of the highest use in life, and the foundation in these should be broad and deep. Reading, spelling, writing, drawing, arithmetic, geography and grammar, should not be made secondary to other branches, and if these receive proper attention in our schools, teachers, ho have from thirty to fifty pupils u der their care, will find enough to tax their time and their energies, and those teachers who succeed in imparting thorough instruction in these branches, will be instrumental of more real good to their pupils than they would be if they attempted to teach them a dozen of the higher branches while defi

cient in the elementary studies. To parents and teachers, we say, "Be more anxious to have studies thorougly attended to, rather than to have them multitudinous, or of the high. er class. It is better to learn a few things well and clearly, rather than many things imperfectly." The great object of all teaching is to teach the pupil how to learn, and to learn thoroughly whatever he undertakes to learn. Let the motto be not "How many or how much," but" How well.” The question should not be, "What have you studied?" but "What have you learned? What do you know?"

MY FIRST SCHOOL.

My first school was in a newly-settled part of the State of New York. The district was a new one, had just been "sot off," as the Committee told me, from several adjoining ones. There was no school-house in it. What had been a milkroom during the summer, was furnished with rough desks and seats without backs, round three sides of the room, and with a teacher's desk corresponding in material and manufacture, and a low bench, on the fourth side. A square stove of moderate size, whose pipe ran straight up through the roof, completed its furniture. I was in my sixteenth year, wholly inexperienced of course, and having no qualifications that I knew of, except that I did not fear the hard "sums," or the hard words in the parsing lesson. I never knew why the Committee made me an offer to teach their school, but so they did, and it was a magnificent one; six dollars a month, and the range of the district for a boarding place. In the end, I was obliged to collect my wages; but more of this in the sequel. The school was to begin, of course, on the 66 Monday after Thanksgiving."

The first thing was to be examined. So I walked one snowy day five miles through the slosh to the "center," and there in a dirty lawyer's-office, the lawyer himself, and an old teacher-my cousin by the way, who was pleased to remark, so it was reported to me, that if such boys were