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IReport 
 
 . . . ON . . . 
 
 Correlation of Stubiee 
 
 BY 
 
 COMMITTEE Of FIFTEEN 
 
 WITH ANNOTATIONS. 
 
 
ijSSkft. 
 
 CORRELATION OF STUDIES 
 
 KEFOKT OF SUB-COMMITTEE 
 
 on)n)it't'ee of t^ifteen 
 
 Com. WM. T^ HARRIS, Chairman 
 Supt. J. M. GKEENV^OOD 
 Supt. C. B. GILBERT 
 
 Supt. L. H. JONES 
 
 Supt. W. H. MAXWELL 
 
 / '^ WITH 
 
 ANNOTATIONS 
 
 GEO. F.^BROWN. 
 
 ^-\.s^ 
 
 bloomington. ill. : 
 
 Public-School Publishing Co. 
 
 1895. 
 
 h- 
 

 ■JO 
 
COMMITTEE OF FIFTEEN. 
 
 Report of the Sub-Committee on the Correlation 
 OF Studies in Elementary Education. 
 
 The undersigned Committee agrees upon the following re- 
 port, each member reserving for himself the expression of his 
 individual divergence from the opinion of the majority, by a 
 statement appended to his signature, enumerating the points 
 to which exception is taken and the grounds for them. ^ 
 
 I. CORRELATION OF STUDIES. 
 
 Your Committee .understands by correlation of studies: 
 1. Logical order of topics and branches. 
 
 First, the arrangement of topics in proper sequence in the 
 course of study, in such a manner that each branch develops 
 in an order suited to the natural and easy progress of the 
 child, and so that each step is taken at the proper time to 
 help his advance to the next step in the same branch, or to the 
 next steps in other related branches of the course of study. ^ 
 
 1 The author of this report uses the word Correlation in its gen- 
 erally accepted sense of reciprocal relation. The things here related are 
 the studies in the school, and life in the social order. What are the 
 mutual relations between these? Evidently those of "Science to art. 
 The social order is the art of which the school studies are the science. 
 The problem of the school is to so master these sciences that their ap- 
 plication to the art of living shall be easy and natural. The life of the 
 community is these school studies animated by will and touched with 
 feeling. What is the value of each study in preparing for living in the 
 civilization of which the child is a member? The chief purpose of this 
 report is to answer this question. The full discussion of these values 
 demands that some consideration be given to co-ordination of these 
 studies in the school and the method of teaching them, and this is done 
 throughout the report, though very briefly and imperfectly; 
 
 2 This first definition is very imperfect in that it considers only the 
 order of the sequence of topics within the respective groups of like sub- 
 jects; for example. Arithmetic, Algebra, and Geometry in Mathematics. 
 But having determined what studies in each group should go into the 
 
4 Report of Committee of Fifteen. 
 
 2. Symm,etrical whole of studies in the world of human 
 learning. 
 
 Second, the adjustment of the branches of study in such a 
 manner that the whole course at any given time. represents all 
 the great divisions of human learning, as far as is possible at 
 the stage of maturity at which the pupil has arrived, and that 
 each allied group of studies is represented by some one of its 
 branches best adapted for the epoch in question; it being im- 
 plied that there is an equivalence of studies to a greater or 
 less degree within each group, and that each branch of human 
 learning should be represented by some equivalent study; so 
 that, while no great division is left unrepresented, no group 
 shall have superfluous representatives and thereby debar otheij 
 groups from a proper representation. ' 
 
 3. Psychological{jSymmetry — the whole mind. 
 
 Third, the selection and arrangement of the branches and 
 topics within each branch considered pyschologically with a 
 view to afford the best exercise of the faculties of the mind, 
 and to secure the unfolding of those faculties in their natural 
 order, so that no one faculty is so overcultivated or so neg- 
 lected as to produce abnormal or one-sided mental develop- 
 ment. * 
 
 elementary schools, the questions in what order, and at what stage of 
 progress each shall be introduced becomes important as questions of 
 method. 
 
 ^ The second definition considers Correlation on the basis of the 
 co-ordination of the different groups of studies, so that the pupil's view 
 of life may be comprehensive at every step and not limited to the 
 studies of a single group. Let the pupil look through all "of the five 
 windows of the soul" at every stage of his progress. The relative im- 
 portance of the view from each of these five windows is not consideied. 
 That is, the actual value of each study in the art of living is ignored. 
 The same time and energy might be given to the representative study 
 pursued in each group, without disregarding this definition of Correla- 
 tion. 
 
 * The third basis of correlation is taken from the point of view of 
 the mind to be educated. It is therefore purely subjective, the child's 
 relation to the world not being considered. The question here is what 
 studies, and in what order, will best develop the different faculties? 
 It is considered of minor importance what the content of the studies 
 
Correlation of Studies. 5 
 
 Jf. Correlation of pupil's course of study with the world in which 
 he lives — his spiritual and natural environment. 
 
 Fourth and chiefly, your Committee understands by corre- 
 lation of studies the selection and arrangement in orderly 
 sequence of such objects of study as shall give the child an 
 insight into the world that he lives in, and a command over its 
 resources such as is obtained by a helpful co-operation with 
 one's fellows. In a word, the chief consideration to which all 
 others are to be subordinated, in the opinion of your Com- 
 mittee, in this requirement of the civilization into which the 
 child is born, as determining not only what he shall study in 
 school, but what habits and customs he shall be taught in the 
 family before the school age arrives ; as well as that he shall 
 acquire a skilled acquaintance with some one of a definite 
 series of trades, professions, or vocations in the years that fol- 
 low school ; and, furthermore, that this question of the relation 
 of the pupil to his civilization determines what political duties 
 he shall assume and what religious faith or spiritual aspirations 
 shall be adopted for the conduct of his life. 
 
 To make more clear their reasons for the preference here 
 expressed for the objective and practical basis of selection of 
 topics for the course of study, rather than the subjective basis 
 so long favored by educational writers, your Committee would 
 describe the psychological basis, already mentioned, as being 
 merely formal in its character, relating only to the exercise of 
 the so-called mental faculties. 
 
 It would furnish a training of spiritual powers analogous 
 to the gymnastic training of the muscles of the body. Gym- 
 nastics may develop strength and agility without leading to 
 any skill in trades or useful employment. So an abstract 
 psychological training may develop the will, the intellect, the 
 imagination, or the memory, but without leading to an exer- 
 cise (Jf acquired power in the interests of civilization. The 
 
 may be, provided they give the discipline needed at the particular 
 period of growth considered. In this view it is one's theory of the 
 nature and activities of the mind and of their mutual relations that 
 would determine the studies he should select. The purpose of the cor- 
 relation here considered is to form the mind without much regard to 
 furnishing it. It is the reciprocal relation between the studies and the 
 mental faculties that is regarded. 
 
6 Report of Committee of Fifteen. 
 
 game of chess would furnish a good, course of study for the 
 discipline of the powers of attention and calculation of abstract 
 conabinations, but it would give its possessor little or no 
 knowledge of man or nature. The psychological ideal which 
 has prevailed to a large extent in education has in the old 
 phrenology, and in the recent studies in physiological psy- 
 chology, sometimes given place to a biological ideal. Instead 
 of the view of mind as made up of faculties like will, intellect, 
 imagination, and emotion, conceived to be all necessary to the 
 soul if developed in harmony with one another, the concept of 
 nerves or brain-tracts is used as the ultimate regulative prin- 
 ciple to determine the selection and arrangement of studies. 
 Each part of the brain is supposed to have its claim on the 
 attention of the educator, and that study is thought to be the 
 most valuable which employs normally the larger number of 
 brain-tracts. This view reaches c.n extreme in the direction of 
 formal as opposed to objective or practical grounds for select- 
 ing a course of study. While the old psychology with its 
 mental faculties concentrated its attention on the mental pro- 
 cesses and neglected the world of existing objects and relations 
 upon which those processes were directed, physiological psy- 
 chology tends to confine its attention to the physical part of 
 the process, the organic changes in the brain cells and their 
 functions. 
 
 Your Committee is of the opinion that psychology of both 
 kinds, physiological and introspective, can bold only a sub- 
 ordinate place in the settlement of questions relating to the 
 correlation of studies. The branches to be studied, and the 
 extent to which they are studied, will be determined mainly 
 by the demands of one's civilization. These will prescribe 
 what is most useful to make the individual acquainted with 
 physical nature and with human nature so as to fit him as an 
 individual to perform his duties in the several institutions — 
 family, civil society, the state, and the Church. But next' after 
 this, psychology will furnish important considerations that 
 will largely determine the methods of instruction, the order of 
 taking up the several topics so as to adapt the school work to 
 the growth of the pupil's capacity, and the amount of work so 
 as not to overtax his powers by too much or arrest the devel- 
 opment of strength by too little. A vast number of subor- 
 
Correlation of Studies. 7 
 
 dinate details belonging to the pathology of education, such 
 as the hygienic features of school architecture and furniture, 
 programmes, the length of study hours and of class exercises, 
 recreation, and bodily reactions against mental effort, will be 
 finally settled by scientific experiment in the department of 
 physiological psychology. 
 
 Inasmuch as your Committee is limited to the consideration 
 of the correlation of studies in the elementary school, it has 
 considered the question of the course of study in general only 
 in so far as this has been found necessary in discussing the 
 grounds for the selection of studies for the period of school 
 education occupying the eight years from six to fourteen years, 
 or the school period between the kindergarten on the one hand 
 and the secondary school on the other. It has not been pos- 
 sible to avoid some inquiry into the true distinction between 
 secondary and elementary studies, since one of the most impor- 
 tant questions forced upon the attention of your Committee 
 is that of the abridgment of the elementary course of study 
 from eight or more years to seven or even six years, and the 
 corresponding increase of the time devoted to studies usually 
 assigned to the high school and supposed to belong to the sec- 
 ondary course of study for some intrinsic reason.^ 
 
 ^This is a wonderfully clear, though brief, presentation of the func- 
 tion of the school and of psychology in realizing that function. It will 
 be accused of giving too little importance to physiological psychology. 
 The author of this report has elsewhere elaborated more fully the rela- 
 tive values of the old and new psychology. (See article in Puhlic- 
 School Journal, June, 1895.) 
 
 In none of these definitions of correlation has the report considered 
 that use of the word which holds it to mean such an organization of 
 the studies in the practice of teaching as will make one or more centers 
 around which the other studies may be grouped. Some of the Herbart- 
 ans, so-called, would make history and literature the core studies in the 
 curriculum, for example, and teach all the others as, in a measure, 
 subordinate to these. What man has thought and done is held to be 
 the most valuable knowledge-content for education, and the instru- 
 ments that he has used in his thinking and doing are of subordinate 
 value. Others would make the nature studies the important, or, 
 at least, the initial studies, and learn arithmetic, language, literature, 
 etc., as the study of science suggests. Others, still, would make three 
 groups — nature studies, human studies, and mathematics — and tie 
 these groups together where they touch each other. It was the 
 understanding of those who were making a study of correlation in 
 
8 Report of Committee of Fifteen. 
 
 II. THE COURSE OF STUDY — EDUCATIONAL VALUES. 
 
 Your Committee would report that it has discussed in de- 
 tail the several branches of study that have found a place in 
 the curriculum of the elementary school, with a view to dis- 
 cover their educational value for developing and training the 
 faculties of the mind, and more especially for correlating the 
 pupil with his spiritual and natural environment in the world 
 in which he lives. 
 
 A. Layiguage studies. 
 
 There is first to be noted the prominent place of language 
 study that takes the form of reading, penmanship, and gram- 
 mar in the first eight years' work of the school. It is claimed 
 for the partiality shown to these studies that it is justified by 
 the fact that language is the instrument that makes possible 
 human social organization. It enables each person to com- 
 municate his individual experience to his fellows and thus per- 
 
 this sense that the report of this Committee was to discuss chiefly 
 this meaning of correlation. Much of the opposition that followed the 
 presentation of the report to the convention of superintendents at 
 Cleveland arose from this misunderstanding. The report really dis- 
 cusses the function of the studies with occasional reference to the 
 method of realizing their values in the school. The other view would 
 have made the method of realizing these values the subject of the report, 
 with occasional reference to the function of the studies in education. 
 
 It may be well to suggest, in view of some published criticisms on 
 this report, that the author had in mind that the school should prepare 
 for what is ideally involved in our civilization, rather than subjection 
 to its actual limitations. Some seem to have supposed that he would 
 make the school the means of perpetuating the imperfections of 
 the social organism rather than of removing them. (See edi- 
 torial in The New York School-J&urnal of April 6, 1895.) The 
 ideal to which the present civilization points is certainly a fitting 
 aim for the schools to seek to realize. John Stuart Mills' definition of 
 the aim of education, that it should seek to maintain the advancement 
 that has been made and, if possible, improve it, is similar to the 
 one involved in this report. The civilization of any period is an 
 exponent of the average intellectual and moral character of the 
 citizens. This average is to be raised by making the ideals of the 
 civilization, as well as its present established order, subjects of study 
 in the education of the child and in the subsequent education of the 
 adult. 
 
Correlation of Studies, 9 
 
 mits each to profit by the experience of all. The written and 
 printed forms of speech preserve human knowledge and make 
 progress in civilization possible. The conclusion is reached 
 that learning to read and write should be the leading study of 
 the pupil in his first four years of school. ® 
 
 Reading and writing are not so much ends in themselves 
 as means for the acquirement of all other human learning. 
 This consideration alone would be sufficient to justify their 
 actual place in the work of the elementary school. But these 
 branches require of the learner a difficult process of analysis. 
 The pupil must identify the separate words in the sentence he 
 uses, and in the next place must recognize the separate sounds 
 in each word. It requires a considerable effort for the child 
 or the savage to analyze his sentence into its constituent 
 words, and a still greater effort to discriminate its elementary 
 sounds. Reading, writing, and spelling in their most element- 
 ary form, therefore, constitute a severe training in mental 
 analysis for the child of six to ten years of age. We are told 
 that it is far more disciplinary to the mind than any species of 
 observation of differences among material things, because of 
 the fact that the word has a twofold character — addressed to 
 external sense as spoken sound to the ear, or as written and 
 printed words to the eye — but containing a meaning or sense 
 addressed to the understanding and only to be seized by intro- 
 spection. The pupil must call up the corresponding idea by 
 thought, memory, and imagination, or else the word will cease 
 to be a word and remain only a sound or character. 
 
 On the other hand, observation of things and movements 
 does not necessarily involve this twofold act of analysis, intro- 
 spective and objective, but only the latter — the objective 
 
 ^The author's definition of language, which is "a synthesis of thing 
 and thought — of outward sign and inward signification," should be kept 
 prominently in mind in studying this section on language studies. It 
 is in the light of this definition that the author's statement that the 
 leading study of the pupil in the first four years Is reading and writing, 
 must be interpreted. Indeed, the leading purpose of the entire school 
 course is to enable the pupils to read, meaning by that to interpret the 
 printed page. It is because children cannot interpret the printed page, 
 even after they graduate from the high school, that the young people 
 of today find so little interest in reading good books, and find their 
 school course of so little value to them. 
 
10 Report of Committee of Fifteen. 
 
 analysis. It is granted that we all have frequent occasion to 
 condemn poor methods of instruction as teaching words rather 
 than things. But we admit that we mean empty sounds or 
 characters rather than true words. Our suggestions for the 
 correct method of teaching amount in this case simply to lay- 
 ing stress on the meaning of the word, and to setting the 
 teaching process on the road of analysis of content rather than 
 form. In the case of words used to store up external observa- 
 tion the teacher is told to repeat and make alive again the act 
 of observation by which the word obtained its original mean- 
 ing. In the case of a word expressing a relation between facts 
 or events, the pupil is to be taken step by step through the 
 process of reflection by which the idea was built up. Since 
 the word, spoken and written, is the sole instrument by which 
 reason can fix, preserve, and communicate both the data of 
 sense and the relations discovered between them by reflec- 
 tion, no new method in education has been able to supplant in 
 the school the branches, reading and penmanship. But the 
 real improvements in method have led teachers to lay greater 
 and greater stress on the internal factor of the word, on its 
 meaning, and have in manifold ways shown how to repeat the 
 original experiences that gave the meaning to concrete words, 
 and the original comparisons and logical deductions by which 
 the ideas of relations and causal processes arose in the mind 
 and required abstract words to preserve and communicate 
 them. ' 
 
 It has been claimed that it would be better to have first a 
 basis of knowledge of things, and secondarily and subsequently 
 a knowledge of words. But it has been replied to this, that 
 the progress of the child in learning to talk indicates his ascent 
 out of mere impressions into the possession of true knowledge. 
 For he names objects only after he has made some synthesis 
 of his impressions and has formed general ideas. He recog- 
 nizes the same object under different circumstances of time 
 
 'This discussion must not be interpreted as an argument against 
 the observation of external things and movements, but as a defense of 
 language study against the wild assertions and declamations that have 
 been made against it in recent years. These declamations should be 
 directed toward the poor teaching of language. It is not by burning 
 the grammar but by properly teachinqii that our language instruction 
 is to be improved. 
 
Correlation of tStudies. 11 
 
 and place, and also recognizes other objects belonging to the 
 same class by and with names. Hence the use of the word 
 indicates a higher degree of self-activity — the stage of mere 
 impressions without words or signs being a comparatively pas- 
 sive state of mind. What we mean by things first and words 
 afterward, is, therefore, not the apprehension of objects by pas- 
 sive impressions so much as the active investigation and ex- 
 perimenting which come after words are used and the higher 
 forms of analysis are called into being by that invention of rea- 
 son known as language, which, as before said, is a synthesis 
 of thing and thought, of outward sign and inward signification. 
 
 Rational investigation cannot precede the invention of 
 language any more than blacksmithing can precede the inven- 
 tion of hammers, anvils, and pincers. For language is the 
 necessary tool of thought used in the conduct of the analysis 
 and synthesis of investigation.^ 
 
 Your Committee wouldsum up these considerations by say- 
 ing that language rightfully forms the center of instruction in 
 the elementary school, but that progress in methods of teach- 
 ing is to be made, as hitherto, chiefly by laying more stress on 
 the internal side of the word, its meaning; using better graded 
 steps to build up the chain of experience or the train of 
 thought that the word expresses.® 
 
 The first three year's work of the child is occupied mainly 
 with the mastery of the printed and written forms of the 
 words of his colloquial vocabulary; words that he is already 
 familiar enough with as sounds addressed to the ear. He has to 
 become familiar with the new forms addressed to the eye, and it 
 
 ®This criticism on the maxim, "Things before words," is a valid 
 one. The maxim is directed toward a too prevalent practice of the 
 study of words without things, and, like all maxims, it is as false as the 
 thing against which it is directed. What we are really seeking is the 
 meaning and the word. One is of no value without the other in the 
 education of the child. There is no such thing as a valuable observa- 
 tion and investigation of natural objects without language in which to 
 embody the results at every step. 
 
 ®This is substantially the view of the Herbartians, as regards the 
 function of language studies. It contains, however, an implied criticism 
 on the claim, so often set up, that what good teachers have been doing 
 and are doing has no validity. What the language instruction needs 
 Is that greater stress be laid upon the meaning of language. The 
 methods of doing this may differ, but all agree that it must be done. 
 
12 Report of Committee of Fifteen. 
 
 would be an unwise method to require him to learn many new 
 words at the same time that he is learning to recognize his old 
 words and their new shape, But as soon as he has acquired, 
 before three years, some facility in reading what is printed in 
 the colloquial style, he may go on to selections from stand- 
 ard authors.^" 
 
 1 °Most good teachers will enter a strong protest against the first sen- 
 tence of this paragraph. To them it will seem to advocate the dead formal- 
 ism that is blighting so many primary schools. If the statement had been 
 that the first three years' work is occupied mainly with the mastery of 
 printed composition of an interesting and educative content,expressed in 
 words of his colloquial vocabulary, and with the oral and written expres- 
 sion of his own thoughts concerning this and other matters, while empha- 
 sizing the fact that a knowledge of form must keep pace with the knowl- 
 edge of meaning in accordance with the suggestion in the preceeding 
 paragraph, they would have been accepted it without protest. It is such 
 statements as this, which occur occasionally in this report, that give 
 comfort to the mechanical teacher who is satisfied with the mere forms of 
 knowledge, and that make those grieve who are striving to interest the 
 child in both meaning and form from the beginning of his school life. 
 That the early months of the child's school experience must be mainly de- 
 voted to the new sight forms of language which the school is to use is true, 
 but that threeyears are to be spent chiefly in the mastery of the printed 
 and written forms of his colloquial vocabulary is past all believing! 
 It would seem as if the declaration that a child should learn no new 
 words for three years would need no refutation. It is a proposition too 
 absurd for serious consideration. The fact is that with good teaching 
 the child learns many new words, both form and content, that are not 
 in his colloquial vocabulary, in the first year of his school life. 
 
 The commanding purpose of this and the following paragraph is to 
 establish the value of the ordinary text-book in reading. It is an able 
 defense of the prominent place it has held for years among school ma- 
 terial. It will be noted that it bases the value of the reading book upon 
 the fact that the selections in it are literary wholes, as well as upon the 
 artistic excellence of the selections. It has been the argument of those 
 who have opposed the "scrappy reading books" that they did not con- 
 tain complete literary wholes. There seems to be no difference of 
 opinion between this report and those who oppose the reading book as 
 to the desirableness of complete works of literature for use in the read- 
 ing classes. The question raised by the report is whether the selec- 
 tions in the readers are such literary wholes as are best fitted for 
 the purpose for which they are used. 
 
 The foolish practice of substituting the reading of current events 
 for literature in the upper grades of our elementary schools, which pre- 
 vails in some localities, is not thought worthy of mention. It is one of 
 those unwise efforts to counteract poor teaching by introducing worth- 
 less material, because it is supposed to be more interesting to young 
 people. 
 
Correlation of Studies. 13 
 
 The literary selections should be graded, and are graded in 
 almost all series of readers used in our elementary schools, in 
 such a way as to bring those containing the fewest words outside 
 of the colloquial vocabulary into the lower books of the series, 
 and increasing the difficulties step by step as the pupil grows 
 in maturity. The selections are literary works of art possess- 
 ing the required organic unity and a proper reflection of this 
 unity in the details, as good works of art must do. But they 
 portray situations of the soul, or scenes of life, or elaborated 
 reflections, of which the child can obtain some grasp through 
 his capacity to feel and think, although in scope and compass 
 they far surpass his range. They are adapted, therefore, to 
 lead him out of and beyond himself, as spiritual guides. 
 
 Literary style employs, besides words common to the col- 
 loquial vocabulary, words used in a semi-technical sense expres- 
 sive of fine shades of thought and emotion. The literary work 
 of art furnishes a happy expression for some situation of the 
 soul, or some train of reflection hitherto unutterable in an 
 adequate manner. If the pupil learns this literary production, 
 he finds himself powerfully helped to understand both himself 
 and his fellow-men. The most practical knowledge of all, it 
 will be admitted, is a knowledge of human nature — a knowl- 
 edge that enables one to combine with his fellow-men and to 
 share with them the physical and spiritual wealth of the race. 
 Of this high character as humanizing or civilizing, are the 
 favorite works of literature found in the school readers, about 
 one hundred and fifty English and American writers being 
 drawn upon for the material. Such are Shakespeare's speeches 
 of Brutus and Mark Anthony, Hamlet's and Macbeth's solilo- 
 quies, Milton's L' Allegro and II Penseroso, Gray's Elegy, 
 Tennyson's Charge of the Light Brigade and Ode on the Death 
 of the Duke of Wellington, Byron's Waterloo, Irving's Rip 
 Van Winkle, Webster's reply to Hayne, the trial of Knapp, 
 and Bunker Hill oration, Scott's Lochinvar, Marmion, and 
 Roderick Dhu, Bryant's Thanatopsis, Longfellow's Psalm of 
 Life, Paul Revere, and The Bridge, O'Hara's Bivouac of 
 the Dead, Campbell's Hohenlinden, Collins' How Sleep the 
 Brave, Wolfe's Burial of Sir John Moore, and other fine prose 
 and poetry from Addison, Emerson, Franklin, The Bible, 
 Hawthorne, Walter Scott, Goldsmith, Wordsworth, Swift, 
 
14 Report of Committee of Fifteen. 
 
 Milton, Cooper, Whittier, Lowell, and-the rest. The reading 
 and study of fine selections in prose and verse furnish the chief 
 aesthetic training of the elementary school. But this should 
 be re-enforced by some study of photographic or other repro- 
 ductions of the world's great masterpieces of architecture, 
 sculpture, and painting. The frequent sight of these repro- 
 ductions is good ; the attempt to copy or sketch them with 
 the pencil is better ; best of all is an aesthetic lesson on their 
 composition, attempting to describe in words the idea of the 
 whole that gives the work its organic unity, and the devices 
 adopted by the artist to reflect this idea in the details and 
 re-enforce its strength. The aesthetic taste of teacher and 
 pupil can be cultivated by such exercises, and once set on the 
 road of development this taste may improve through life. ^^ 
 
 A third phase of language study in the elementary school 
 is formal grammar. The works of literary art in the readers, 
 re-enforced as they ought to be by supplementary reading at 
 home of the whole works from which the selections for the 
 school readers are made, will educate the child in the use of a 
 
 ^^ The absence of any reference here or elsewhere in this report to 
 the use of that material known as child literature, other than what 
 may be found in the reading books, will be criticised by many. The 
 idea of literature in this discussion seems to be limited to the best that 
 has been thought, clothed in artistic form. It will be considered an 
 error not to recognize the helpfulness in education of the best juvenile 
 literature also. There is, besides, a prevailing idea that there are 
 stages in the child's growth so different as to call for a special kind of 
 literature in each. How much of truth there is in this idea of "culture 
 epochs" is not yet clearly made out, but that there is some truth in it 
 all admit. Whatever may be true of our advanced readers it is cer- 
 tainly true that the primary readers are "scrappy" and have a content 
 of little literary worth. They are too often constructed for the sole 
 purpose of teaching the child "the printed forms of the words in his 
 coloquial vocabulary" and for nothing else. The reading and telling of 
 folk-lore and fairy stories, fables, stories of adventure and the like are 
 an important part of language studies in the lower grades. Then, too, 
 as is pointed out by Mr. Gilbert, a member of this sub-committee, the 
 need of training in oral and written composition in the lower grades is 
 not mentioned. These omissions seem to indicate a want of recognition 
 in this report of recent improvements in methods of teaching language, 
 unless we fill out to include these what is involved in the general state- 
 ment that "progress in methods of teaching is to be made, as hitherto, 
 chiefly by laying more Stress on the internal side of the word, its 
 meaning." 
 
Correlation of Studies. 15 
 
 higher and better English style. Technical grammar never 
 can do this. Only familiarity with fine English works will 
 insure one a good and correct style. But grammar is the 
 science of language, and as the first of the seven liberal arts it 
 has long held sway in school as the disciplinary study par 
 excellence. A survey of its educational value, subjective and 
 objective, usually produces the conviction that it is to retain 
 the first place in the future. Its chief objective advantage is 
 that it shows the structure of language, and the logical forms 
 of subject, predicate, and modifier, thus revealing the essen- 
 tial nature of thought itself, the most important of all objects 
 because it is self-object. On the subjective or psychological 
 side, grammar demonstrates its title to the first place by its 
 use as a discipline in subtle analysis, in logical division and 
 classification, in the art of questioning, and in the mental 
 accomplishment of making exact definitions. Nor is this an 
 empty, formal discipline, for its subject matter, language, is a 
 product of the reason of a people not as individuals but as a 
 social whole, and the vocabulary holds in its store of words 
 the generalized experience of that people, including sensuous 
 observation and reflection, feeling and emotion, instinct and 
 volition. ^2 
 
 12 This statement of the value of grammar, in a scheme of educa- 
 tion, is both able and convincing. The danger of pursuing the tech- 
 nical study of it to the neglect of the more important literary content 
 which these language forms embody is also clearly set forth and is a 
 timely warning. Would it be too much to say that no better defense of 
 grammar in the school curriculum has ever been made? It was evi- 
 dently written in reply to a demand that grammar be enpunged from 
 the common school course, and its influence will be to establish this 
 study firmly in some stage of school instruction. But in what stage? 
 When we examine the programme of daily recitations recommended 
 by this report we discover that the text-book study of formal 
 grammar is to begin in the middle of the fifth year and extend to the 
 end of the seventh. But few will accept this recommendation. Oral 
 grammar with composition lessons to the middle of the fifth year, and 
 text-book study, five lessons per week, till the eighth ! The pupil must 
 bring to this study a maturity that comes from age, and the organiza- 
 tion of a pretty large mass of apperceiving ideas if he is to come into any 
 mastery of it. The report declared, on page 11, that the child must not 
 be asked to read matter containing new words before he is ten years of 
 age because he cannot learn new ideas and. new forms at the same 
 time. But when he is only one year and a half older he is thought able 
 
16 Report of Committee of Fifteen. 
 
 No formal labor on a great objective field is ever lost 
 wholly, since at the very least it has the merit of familiarizing 
 the pupil with the contents of some one extensive province that 
 borders on his life, and with which he must come into correla- 
 tion; but it is easy for any special formal discipline, when con- 
 tinued too long, to paralyze or arrest growth at that stage, 
 the overcultivation of the verbal memory tends to arrest the 
 growth of critical attention and reflection. Memory of acces- 
 sory details too, so much prized in the school, is also cultivated 
 often at the expense of an insight into the organizing principle 
 of the whole and the causal nexus that binds the parts. So 
 too, the study of quantity, if carried to excess, may warp the 
 mind into a habit of neglecting quality in its observation and 
 reflection. As there is no subsumption in the quantitative 
 judgment but only dead equality or inequality (A is equal to or 
 greater or less than B), there is a tendency to atrophy in the 
 faculty of concrete syllogistic reasoning on the part of the per- 
 son devoted exclusively to mathematics. For the normal syllo- 
 gism uses judgments wherein the subject is subsumed under 
 the predicate (This is a rose — the individual rose is subsumed 
 under the class rose; Socrates is a man, etc.) Such reasoning 
 concerns individuals in two aspects, first as concrete wholes 
 and secondly as members of higher totalities or classes — species 
 and genera. Thus, too, grammar, rich as it is in its contents, 
 is only a formal discipline as respects the scientific, historic, or 
 literary contents of language, and is indifferent to them. A 
 
 to enter upon the text-book study of formal grammar, with the view of 
 obtaining from this study the culture described. Of course this recom- 
 mendation was made with a full knowledge of the kind of text-books in 
 grammar that are supplied the schools. It would require a skilled 
 teacher in every case to prevent the dull, mechanical, worthless gram- 
 matical (?) grind that is now a positive curse in so many schools. The 
 formal teacher will shelter himself behind this recommendation, and 
 go on in the same old way, worse than wasting both time and energy. 
 Let it oe borne in mind that this report defines grammar to be the 
 scienoe of language. It is the least concrete of all the school studies, 
 as this discussion shows. Certainly much can be done before the 
 seventh school year, incidentally to the literature and language study 
 adapted to the child's intelligence, to give the pupil a knowledge of the 
 technical vocabulary and of the construction of sentences, but a formal 
 text-book study of English grammar will be of little value in grades 
 below the seventh. 
 
Correlation of Studies. 17 
 
 training for four or five years in parsing and grammatical an- 
 alysis practiced on literary works of art (Milton, Shakspeare, 
 Tennyson, Scott) is a training of the pupil into habits of in- 
 difference toward and neglect of the genius displayed in the 
 literary work of art, and into habits of impertinent and trifling 
 attention to elements employed as material or texture, and a 
 corresponding neglect of the structural form which alone is 
 the work of the artist. A parallel to this would be the mason's 
 habit of noticing only the brick and mortar, or the stone and 
 cement, in his inspection of the architecture, say of Sir Chris- 
 topher Wren. A child overtrained to analyze and classify 
 shades of color — examples of this one finds occasionally in a 
 primary school whose specialty is "objective teaching" — might 
 in later life visit an art gallery and make an inventory of colors 
 without getting even a glimpse of a painting as a work of art. 
 Such overstudy and misuse of grammar as one finds in the 
 elementary school, it is feared, exists to some extent in sec- 
 ondary schools and even in colleges m the work of mastering 
 the classic authors. ^^ 
 
 Your Committee is unanimous in the conviction that formal 
 grammar should not be allowed to usurp the place of a study 
 of the literary work of art in accordance with literary method. 
 The child can be gradually trained to see the technical "mo- 
 tives" of a poem or prose work of art and to enjoy the aesthetic 
 inventions of the artist. The analysis of a work of art should 
 discover the idea that gives it organic unity; the collision 
 and the complication resulting; the solution and denouement. 
 Of course these things must be reached in the elementary 
 school without even a mention of their technical terms. The 
 
 i^Never in the history of pedagogical writing has so clear and con- 
 vincing a statement been made of the disastrous results to the child of 
 formal discipline in paralyzing his powers or arresting his growth when 
 continued too long. It is a new analysis and criticism of the dead for- 
 malism that is blighting elementary education in so many places. This 
 is an application of psychological knowledge not before made that will 
 give this report great influence in improving our educational methods. 
 Every thoughtful teacher can see at once how it is true that a study of 
 the common school branches may be made a curse to the children by 
 making bond slaves of them. Col. Parker has said repeatedly that to 
 limit the teaching in the common schools to the three R's was to en- 
 slave the children and not to liberate them. This paragraph shows why 
 
18 Report of Committee of Fifteen. 
 
 subject of the piece is brought out; its reflection in the condi- 
 tions of the time and place to heighten interest by showing its 
 importance; its second and stronger reflection in the several 
 details of its conflict and struggle ; its reflection in the denoue- 
 ment wherein its struggle ends in victory or defeat and the 
 ethical or rational interests are vindicated — and the results 
 move outward, returning to the environment again in ever- 
 widening circles — something resembling this is to be found in 
 every work of art, and there are salient features which can be 
 briefly but profitably made subject of comment in familiar lan- 
 guage with even the youngest pupils. There is an ethical and 
 an aesthetical content to each work of art. It is profitable to 
 point out both of these in the interest of the child's growing 
 insight into human nature. The ethical should, however, be 
 kept in subordination to the aesthetical, but for the sake of the 
 supreme interests of the ethical itself. Otherwise the study of 
 a work of art degenerates into a goody-goody performance, 
 and its effects on the child are to cause a reaction against the 
 moral. The child protects his inner individuality against 
 effacement through external authority by taking an attitude 
 of rebellion against stories with an appended moral. Herein 
 the superiority of the aesthetical in literary art is to be seen. 
 For the ethical motive is concealed by the poet, and the hero 
 is painted with all his brittle individualism and self-seeking. 
 His passions and his selfishness, gilded by fine traits of bravery 
 and noble manners, interest the youth, interest us all. The es- 
 tablished social and moral order seems to the ambitious hero to 
 be an obstacle to the unfolding of the charms of individuality. 
 The deed of violence gets done, and the Nemesis is aroused. 
 Now his deed comes back on the individual doer, and our sym- 
 pathy turns against him and we rejoice in his fall. Thus the 
 aesthetical unity contains within it the ethical unity. The les- 
 son of the great poet or novelist is taken to heart, whereas 
 the ethical announcement by itself might have failed, especially 
 with the most self-active and aspiring of the pupils. Aristotle 
 pointed out in his Poetics this advantage of the aesthetic unity, 
 which Plato in his Republic seems to have missed. Tragedy 
 purges us of our passions, to use Aristotle's expression, because 
 we identify our own wrong inclinations with those of the hero, 
 
Correlation of Studies. 19 
 
 and by sympathy we suffer with him and see our intended deed 
 returned upon us with tragic effect, and are thereby cured. ^* 
 
 Your committee has dwelt upon the aesthetic side of liter- 
 ature in this explicit manner because they believe that the 
 general tendency in elementary schools is to neglect the liter- 
 ary art for the literary formalities which concern the mechan- 
 ical material rather than the spiritual form. Those formal 
 studies should not be discontinued, but subordinated to the 
 higher study of literature. 
 
 Your Committee reserves the subject of language lessons, 
 composition writing, and what relates to the child's expression 
 of ideas in writing, for consideration under Part 3 of this 
 Report, treating of program. 
 
 B. Arithmetic. 
 
 Side by side with language study is the study of mathe- 
 matics in the schools, claiming the second place in importance 
 of all studies. It has been pointed out that mathematics con- 
 cerns the laws of time and space — their structural form, so to 
 speak — and hence that it formulates the logical conditions of 
 all matter both in rest and in motion. Be this as it may, the 
 
 i^Thls presentation of the way to realize the ethical influence of 
 literature and other art creations through the absorption of the pupil 
 in the aesthetic element in them is worthy of the highest praise. A 
 beautiful thing must be studied for its beauty of form and content and 
 not for the moral lesson it teaches, if it shall teach Its moral lesson 
 effectively. The formula "This fable teaches," is not the way to use 
 art to promote morals. 
 
 There is one omission in this discussion of language studies that 
 will be noticed by many readers, and has been referred to already in 
 these comments. While it urges the early study of classic literature it 
 is silent about child literature. It seems to assume that the former is 
 the only grade of literature worthy of the name. We believe it is a mis- 
 take to ignore the recent movement in education which seeks to interest 
 the children in the "best that has been thought and said" on the plane 
 of child culture and experience. There is a realm of the common-place 
 and another of the higher life quite as real in children as in adults. In 
 other words, there is a child-literature relatively as artistic and 
 inspiring to children as literature proper is to men and women. It is 
 by stimulating and nourishing the immature artistic and moral instincts 
 of the child, that he comes to love the beautiful and the good in later 
 years. The best educational practice in the country has recognized in 
 fairy tales and stories for children a phase of language study which this 
 report seems to have overlooked. 
 
20 Report of Committee of Fijteen. 
 
 high position of mathematics as the- science of all quantity is ij 
 universally acknowledged. The elementary branch of mathe- I, 
 matics is arithmetic, and this is studied in the primary and |! 
 grammar schools from six to eight years, or even longer. The j 
 relation of arithmetic to the whole field of mathematics has |: 
 been stated (by Comte, Howison, and others) to be that of the !■ 
 final step in a process of calculation in which results are stated ji 
 numerically. There are branches that develop or derive quan- j. 
 titative functions: say geometry for spatial forms, and me- ! 
 chanics for movement and rest and the forces producing them, i' 
 Other branches transform these quantitative functions into |; 
 such forms as may be calculated in actual numbers; namely, i; 
 algebra in its common or lower form, and in its higher -form ■; 
 as the differential and integral calculus, and the calculus of |i 
 variations. Arithmetic evaluates or finds the numerical value i, 
 for the functions thus deduced and transformed. The educa- ' 
 tional value of arithmetic is thus indicated both as concerns ■[ 
 its psychological side and its objective practical uses in correl- . 
 ating man with the world of nature. In this latter respect as ■ 
 furnishing the key to the outer world in so far as the objects i; 
 of the latter are a matter of direct enumeration, — capable of j 
 being counted, — it is the first great step in the conquest ot\, 
 nature. ^° | 
 
 It is the first tool of thought that man invents in the work | 
 of emancipating himself, from thraldom to external forces. ■ 
 For by the command of number he learns to divide and con- •'. 
 quer. He can proportion one force to another, and concen- -^ 
 trate against an obstacle precisely what is needed to overcome i 
 it. Number also makes possible all the other sciences of na--| 
 ture which depend on exact measurement and exact record of '^ 
 phenomena as to the following items: order of succession, date, 
 duration, locality, environment, extent of sphere of influence, 
 number of manifestations, number of cases of intermittence. 
 All these can be defined accurately only by means of number. 
 The educational value of a branch of study that furnishes the 
 
 ^5 Arithmetic is the science of the numerical valuation of quantity. 
 As an art it is finding how many times the unit of measure can be ap- 
 plied. The correlation between arithmetic and social life is so evident 
 that, In the past, a large portion of the pupil's time has been spent in 
 mastering it. 
 
Correlation of Studies. 21 
 
 indispensable first step toward all science of nature is obvious. 
 But psychologically its importance further appears in this, 
 that it begins with an important step in analysis; namely, the 
 detachment of the idea of quantity from the concrete whole 
 which includes quality as well as quantity. To count, one 
 drops the qualitative and considers only the quantitative 
 aspect. So long as the individual differences (which are quali- 
 tative in so far as they distinguish one object from another) are 
 considered, the objects cannot be counted together. When 
 counted, the distinctions are dropped out of sight as indiffer- 
 ent. As counting is the fundamental operation of arithme- 
 tic, and all other arithmetical operations are simply devices 
 for speed by using remembered countings instead of going 
 through the detailed work again each time, the hint is furnished 
 the teacher for the first lessons in arithmetic. This hint has 
 been generally followed out and the child set at work at first 
 upon the counting of objects so much alike that the qualitative 
 difference is not suggested to him. He constructs gradually 
 his tables of addition, subtraction, and multiplication, and 
 fixes them in his memory. Then he takes his next higher 
 step; namely, the apprehension of the fraction. This is an ex- 
 pressed ratio of two numbers, and therefore a much more com- 
 plex thought than he has met with in dealing with the simple 
 numbers. In thinking five-sixths he first thinks five and then 
 six, and holding these two in mind thinks the result of the first 
 modified by the second. Here are three steps instead of one, 
 and the result is not a simple number but an inference resting 
 on an unperformed operation. This psychological analysis 
 shows the reason for the embarrassment of the child on his 
 entrance upon the study of fractions and the other operations 
 that imply ratio. The teacher finds all his resources in the 
 way of method drawn upon to invent steps and half-steps to 
 aid the pupil to make continuous progress here. All these 
 devices of method consists in steps by which the pupil de- 
 scends to the simple number and returns to the complex. He 
 turns one of the terms into a qualitative unit and thus is en- 
 abled to use the other as a simple number. The pupil takes 
 the denominator, for example, and makes clear his conception 
 of one-sixth as his qualitative unit, then five-sixths is as clear 
 to him as five oxen. But he has to repeat this return from 
 
22 Report of Committee of Fifteen. 
 
 ratio to simple numbers in each of the .elementary operations — 
 addition, subtraction, multiplication, and division, and in the 
 reduction of fractions — and finds the road long and tedious at 
 best. In the case of decimal fractions the psychological process 
 is more complex still; for the pupil has given him one of the 
 terms, the numerator, from which he must mentally deduce 
 the denominator from the position of the decimal point. This 
 doubles the work of reading and recognizing the fractional 
 number. But it makes addition and subtraction of fractions 
 nearly as easy as that of simple numbers and assists also in 
 multiplication of fractions. But division of decimals is a 
 much more complex operation than that of common fractions. 
 
 The want of a psychological analysis of these processes 
 has led many good teachers to attempt decimal fractions with 
 their pupils before taking up common fractions. In the end 
 they have been forced to make introductory steps to aid the 
 pupil and in these steps to introduce the theory of the com- 
 mon fraction. They have by this refuted their own theory. ^^ 
 
 Besides ia) simple numbers and the four operations with 
 them, {h) fractions common and decimal, there is (c) a third 
 step in number; namely, the theory of powers and roots. It is 
 
 i^This distinction between the qualitative and the quantitative 
 unit is important to the understanding of this discussion of the educa- 
 tional value of arithmetic. A member of this sub-committee, Mr. 
 Greenwood, dissents from the statement here made that a fraction is 
 much more difficult *for the ehild to comprehend than an integer, be- 
 cause in thinking a fraction three steps are involved. He aflSrms that 
 the child gets the idea of half, third, etc., even before entering school. 
 This is true, but the half which he thinks is a qualitative unit and not 
 a fraction. It is one of the two equal parts of some concrete thing. 
 The two units called halves make up the one unit called a whole. A 
 fraction proper is the ratio between two numbers. It is the ratio of 5 
 to 6, and not five of the qualitative units, each call a sixth, that 
 makes a fraction. The teachings of the report are undoubtedly true 
 on this point but we believe that the child does all his thinking of frac- 
 tions for some years by the use of qualitative units. If that be true, 
 Mr. Greenwood's objection to the method suggested in the report is 
 well taken. To apprehend what is involved in the word "ratio" re- 
 quires the maturity of 7th and 8th grade pupils, and by this report, 
 these have finished the study of arithmetic. 
 
 The discussion of the relation of arithmetic to algebra, geometry, 
 and mechanics, in the first part of this section on arithmetic, is of 
 great value and very suggestive, and ought to be understood by every 
 teacher, even if some time and study are required to master it. 
 
Correlation of Studies. 23 
 
 a further step in ratio, namely the relation of a simple num- 
 ber to itself as power and root. The mass of material which 
 fills the arithmetic used in the elementary school consists of 
 two kinds of examples, first, those wherein there is a direct 
 application of simple numbers, fractions, and powers, and sec- 
 ondly the class of examples involving operations in reaching 
 numerical solutions through indirect data and consequently 
 involving more or less transformation of functions. Of this 
 character is most of the so-called higher arithmetic and such 
 problems in the text-book used in the elementary schools as 
 have, not inappropriately, been called (by General Francis A. 
 Walker in his criticism on common-school arithmetic), numeri- 
 cal "conundrums." Their difficulty is not found in the strictly 
 arithmetical part of the process of the solution (the third phase 
 above described), but rather in the transformation of the quan- 
 titative function given into the function that can readily be 
 calculated numerically. The transformation of functions be- 
 longs strictly to algebra. Teachers who love arithmetic, and 
 who have themselves success in working out the so-called 
 numerical conundrums, defend with niuch earnestness the cur- 
 rent practice which uses so much time for arithmetic. They 
 see in it a valuable training for ingenuity and logical analysis, 
 and believe that the industry which discovers arithmetical 
 ways of transforming the functions given in such problems 
 into plain numerical operations of adding, subtracting, multi- 
 plying, or dividing is well bestowed. On the other hand the 
 critics of this practice contend that there should be no merely 
 formal drill in school for its own sake, and that there should 
 be, always, a substantial content to be gained. ^ ^ They contend 
 that the work of the pupil in transforming quantitative func- 
 tions by arithmetical methods is wasted, because the pupil 
 needs a more adequate expression than number for this pur- 
 
 ^''This criticism upon the practice in many good schools of making 
 what is called a "thorough mastery" of one topic or subject before tak- 
 ing up another is convincing and opportune. The psychological effect 
 of overtraining in any field of mental activity is set forth here and else- 
 where in this report with great clearness. A false idea of thorough- 
 ness used to be practiced in certain normal schools where an exhaustive 
 study of addition continuing for weeks was made before subtraction 
 was begun, etc. The psychological principle of apperception is to fur- 
 nish the key for the solution of more than one pedagogical problem, it 
 is plain. 
 
24 Report of Committee of Fijteen. 
 
 pose; that this has been discovered in. algebra, which enables 
 him to perform with ease such quantitative transformations 
 as puzzle the pupil in arithmetic. They hold, therefore, that 
 arithmetic pure and simple should be abridged and elementary 
 algebra introduced after the numerical operations in powers, 
 fractions, and simple numbers have been mastered, together 
 with their applications to the tables of weights and measures 
 and to percentage and interest. In the seventh year of the 
 elementary course there would be taught equations of the first 
 degree and the solution of arithmetical problems that fall 
 under proportion or the so-called "rule of three," together 
 with other problems containing complicated conditions — those 
 in partnership for example. In the eighth year quadratic 
 equations could be learned, and other problems of higher arith- 
 metic solved in a more satisfactory manner than by numerical 
 methods. It is contended that this earlier introduction of 
 algebra, with a sparing use of letters for known quantities, 
 would secure far more mathematical progress than is obtained 
 at present on the part of all pupils, and that it would enable 
 many pupils to goon into secondary and higher education who 
 arenow kept back on the plea of lack of preparation in arith- 
 metic, the real difficulty in many cases being a lack of ability 
 to solve algebraic problems by an inferior method. ^^ 
 
 Your Committee would report that the practice of teaching 
 two lessons daily in arithmetic, one styled "mental" or "Intel- 
 
 ^^The wisdom of the recommendation that algebra take the place 
 of arithmetic in the seventh and eighth grades will be questioned. It 
 is true that the elementary number processes can be mastered below 
 the seventh year, together with the simple applications to weights and 
 measures, percentage, and interest, as the report suggests. It is also 
 true that many of the "numerical conundrums" can be solved more 
 easily by the numerical algebraic method suggested. But is it not a 
 question whether the educational value of the study of arithmetic to 
 the child is exhausted by the time he is twelve or thirteen years of age? 
 The arithmetical problems are something more than "numerical 
 conundrums." It is probable that most, if not all, elementary schools 
 that introduce algebra will postpone it to the eighth year. There are 
 some things in education that can be established only by experience, 
 and it would seem that the experience of the past has confirmed the 
 practice of beginning algebra at a later period than the seventh year. 
 It is probable, however, that the discussion in this report will start ex- 
 periment along a new line, for the purpose of testing the validity of the 
 psychologic theory here set forth. 
 
Correlation of Studies, 25 
 
 lectual" and the other "written" arithmetic (because its exer- 
 cises are written out with pencil or pen) is still continued in 
 many schools. By this device the pupil is made to give twice 
 as much time to arithmetic as to any other branch. It is con- 
 tended by the opponents of this practice, with some show of 
 reason, that two lessons a day in the study of quantity have a 
 tendency to give the mind a bent or set in the direction of 
 thinking quantitatively with a corresponding neglect of the 
 power to observe, and to reflect upon, qualitative and causal 
 aspects. For mathematics does not take account of causes, 
 but only of equality and difference in magnitude. It is fur- 
 ther objected that the attempt to secure what is called thor- 
 oughness in the branches taught in the elementary schools is 
 often carried too far ; in fact, to such an extent as to produce 
 arrested development (a sort of mental paralysis) in the 
 mechanical and formal stages of growth. The mind in that 
 case loses its appetite for higher methods and wider general- 
 izations. The law of apperception, we are told, proves that 
 temporary methods of solving problems should not be so thor- 
 oughly mastered as to be used involuntarily or as a matter of 
 unconscious habit, for the reason that a higher and a more 
 adequate method of solution will then be found more difficult 
 to acquire. The more thoroughly a method is learned, the 
 more it becomes part of the mind and the greater the repug- 
 nance of the mind toward a new method. For this reason 
 parents and teachers discourage young children from the prac- 
 tice of counting on the fingers, believing that it will cause 
 much trouble later to root out this vicious habit and replace 
 it by purely mental processes. Teachers should be careful, 
 especially with precocious children, not to continue too long 
 in the use of a process that is becoming mechanical ; for it is 
 already growing into a second nature, and becoming a part of 
 the unconscious apperceptive process by which the mind reacts 
 against the environment, recognizes its presence, and explains 
 it to itself. The child that has been overtrained in arithmetic 
 reacts apperceptively against his environment chiefly by notic- 
 ing its numerical relations — he counts and adds ; his other 
 apperceptive reactions being feeble, he neglects qualities and 
 causal relations. Another child who has been drilled in recog- 
 nizing colors apperceives the shades of color to the neglect of. 
 
26 Report of Committee of Fifteen. 
 
 all else. A third child, excessively trained in form studies by 
 the constant use of geometric solids and much practice in 
 looking for the fundamental geometric forms lying at the 
 basis of the multifarious objects that exists in the world, will 
 as a matter of course apperceive geometric forms, ignoring 
 the other phases of objects. 
 
 It is, certainly, an advance on ^"^"^ediate sense-perception 
 to be able to separate or analyze the CQ^^rete, whole expres- 
 sion, and consider the quantity apart by itself. But if arrested 
 mental growth takes place here the result is deplorable. That 
 such arrest may be caused by too exclusive training in recog- 
 nizing numerical relations is beyond a doubt. 
 
 Your Committee believes that, with the right methods, 
 and a wise use of time in preparing the arithmetic lesson in 
 and out of school, five years are sufficient for the study of 
 mere arithmetic — the five years beginning with the second 
 school year and ending with the close of the sixth year ; and 
 that the seventh and eighth years should be given to the 
 algebraic method of dealing with those problems that involve 
 difficulties in the transformation of quantitative indirect func- 
 tions into numerical or direct quantitative data. 
 
 Your committee, however, does not wish to be understood 
 as recommending the transfer of algebra, as it is understood 
 and taught in most secondary schools, to the seventh year or 
 even to the eighth year of the elementary school. The algebra 
 course in the secondary school, as taught to pupils in their 
 fifteenth year of age, very properly begins with severe exer- 
 cises with a view to discipline the pupil in analyzing complex 
 literate expressions at sight and to make him able to recognize 
 at once the factors that are contained in such combinations of 
 quantities. The proposed seventh-grade algebra must use 
 letters for the unknown quantities and retain the numerical 
 form of the known quantities, using letters for these very 
 rarely, except to exhibit the general form of solution or what, 
 if stated in words, becomes a so-called ''rule" in arithmetic. 
 This species of algebra has the character of an introduction or 
 transitional step to algebra proper. The latter should be 
 taught thoroughly in the secondary school. Formerly it was 
 a common practice to teach elementary algebra of this sort in 
 the preparatory schools and reserve for the college a study of 
 
Correlation of Studies. 27 
 
 algebra proper. But in this case there was often a neglect of 
 sufficient practice in factoring literate quantities, and as aeon- 
 sequence the pupil suffered embarrassment in his more 
 advanced mathematics, for example in analytical geometry, 
 the differential calculus, and mechanics. The proposition of 
 your Committee is intended to remedy the two evils already 
 named : first to aid the pupils in the elementary school to 
 solve, by a higher method, the more difficult problems that 
 now find place in advanced arithmetic ; and secondly, to pre- 
 pare the pupil for a thorough course in pure algebra in the 
 secondary school. 
 
 Your Committee is of the opinion that the so-called mental 
 arithmetic should be made to alternate with written arithmetic 
 for two years and that there should not be two daily lessons 
 in this subject.^'* 
 
 G. Geography. 
 
 The leading branch of the seven liberal arts was grammar, 
 being the first of the Trivium (grammar, rhetoric, and logic). 
 Arithmetic, however, led the second division, the Quadri- 
 vium (arithmetic, geometry, music, and astronomy). We have 
 glanced at the reasons for the place of grammar as leading 
 the humane studies as well as for the place of arithmetic as 
 leading the nature studies. Following arithmetic as the second 
 study in importance among the branches that correlate man to 
 nature is geography. It is interesting to note that the old 
 quadrivium of the Middle Ages included geography, under the 
 title of geometry, as the branch following arithmetic in the enu- 
 meration ; the subject matter of their so-called ' 'geometry "being 
 chiefly an abridgment of Pliny's geography, to which were 
 added a few definitions of geometric forms, something like the 
 primary course in geometric solids in our elementary schools. 
 So long as there has been elementary education there has been 
 something of geography included. The Greek education laid 
 stress on teaching the second book of Homer containing the 
 
 ^^ The wisdom of this suggestion will not be questioned by any 
 unless it be by those who are specialists in arithmetic. And it is prob- 
 able that the report's suggestion of a distorted apperception which is 
 the result of early education and natural bent, will account for their 
 dissent. 
 
28 Report of Committee of Fifteen. 
 
 Catalogue of the Ships and a brief fnention of the geography 
 and history of all the G-reek tribes that took part in the Trojan 
 War. History remains unseparated from geography and 
 geometry in the Middle Ages. Geography has preserved this 
 comprehensiveness of meaning as a branch of the study in the 
 elementary schools down to the present day. After arith- 
 metic, which treats of the abstract or general conditions of 
 material existence, comes geography with a practical study of 
 man's material habitat and its relations to him. It is not a 
 simple science by itself, like botany or geology or astronomy, 
 but a collection of sciences levied upon to describe the earth as 
 the dwelling-place of man and to explain something of its more 
 prominent features. About one-fourth of the material relates 
 strictly to the geography, about one-half to the inhabitants, j 
 their manners, customs, institutions, industries, productions, j 
 and the remaining one-fourth to items drawn from the sciences j 
 of mineralogy, meteorology, botany, zoology, and astronomy. ; 
 This predominance of the human feature in a study ostensibly ; 
 relating to physical nature, your Committee considers necessary 
 and entirely justifiable. The child commences with what is . 
 nearest to his interests, and proceeds gradually toward what is . 
 remote and to be studied for its own sake. It is, therefore, a 
 mistake to suppose that the first phase of geography presented 
 to the child should be the process of continent formation. He 
 must begin with the natural differences of climate and lands 
 and waters and obstacles that separate peoples, and study the 
 methods by which man strives to equalize or overcome these • 
 differences by industry and commerce, to unite all places and all 
 people, and make it possible for each to share in the productions 
 of all. The industrial and commercial idea is therefore the 
 first central idea in the study of geography in the elenentary 
 schools. It leads directly to the natural elements of difference 
 in climate, soil, and productions, and also to those in race, 
 religion, political status, and occupations of the inhabitants, 
 with a view to explain the grounds and reasons for this 
 counter-process of civilization which struggles to overcome the 
 differences. Next comes the deeper inquiry into the process 
 of continent formation, the physical struggle between the 
 process of upheaving or upbuilding of continents and that of 
 their obliteration by air and water; the explanation of the ' 
 
Correlation of Studies. 29 
 
 mountains, valleys, and plains, the islands, volcanic action, the 
 winds, the rain-distribution. But the study of cities, their 
 location, the purposes they serve as collecting, manufacturing, 
 and distributing centers, leads most directly to the immediate 
 purpose of geography in the elementary school. From this 
 beginning, and holding to it as a permanent interest, the in- 
 quiry into causes and conditions proceeds concentrically to 
 the sources of the raw materials, the methods of their produc- 
 tion and the climatic, geologic, and other reasons that explain 
 their location and their growth. 
 
 In recent years, especially through the scientific study of 
 physical geography, the processes that go to the formation of 
 •climate, soil, and general configuration of land masses have 
 been accurately determined, and the methods of teaching so 
 simplified that it is possible to lead out from the central idea 
 mentioned to the physical explanations of the elements of 
 geographical difference quite early in the course of study. 
 Setting out from the idea of the use made of the earth by 
 civilization, the pupil in the fifth and sixth years of his school- 
 ing (at the age of eleven or twelve) may extend his inquiries 
 quite profitably as far as the physical explanations of land- 
 shapes and climates. In the seventh and eighth year of school 
 much more may be done in this direction. But it is believed 
 that the distinctively human interest connected with geog- 
 raphy in the first years of its study should not yield to the 
 purely scientific one of physical processes until the pupil has 
 taken up the study of history. 
 
 The educational value of geography, as it is and has been 
 in elementary schools, is obviously very great. It makes pos- 
 sible something like accuracy in the picturing of distant places 
 and events and removes a large tract of mere superstition from 
 the mind. In the days of newspaper reading one's stock of 
 geographical information is in constant requisition. A war on 
 the opposite side of the globe is followed with more interest in 
 this year than a war near our own borders before the era of 
 the telegraph. The general knowledge of the locations and 
 boundaries of nations, of their status in civilization and their 
 natural advantages for contributing to the world market, is of 
 great use to the citizen in forming correct ideas from his daily 
 reading. 
 
30 Report of Committee of Fifteen, 
 
 The educational value of geography is even more apparent 
 if we admit the claims of those who argue that the present 
 epoch is the beginning of an era in which public opinion is 
 organized into a ruling force by the agency of periodicals and 
 books. Certainly neither the newspaper nor the book can influ- 
 ence an illiterate people; they can do little to form opinions 
 where the readers have no knowledge of geography. ^^ 
 
 As to the psychological value of geography little need be 
 said. It exercises in manifold ways the memory of forms and 
 the imagination; it brings into exercise the thinking power in 
 tracing back toward unity the various series of causes. What 
 educative value there is in geology, meteorology, zoology, 
 ethnology, economics, history, and politics is to be found in 
 the more profound study of geography, and, to a proportionate 
 extent, in the study of its merest elements. 
 
 Your Committee is of the opinion that there has been a 
 vast improvement in the methods of instruction in this branch 
 in recent years, due in large measure to the geographical soci- 
 eties of this and other countries. At first there prevailed 
 what might be named sailor geography. The pupil was com- 
 pelled to memorize all the capes and headlands, bays and har- 
 bors, mouths of rivers, islands, sounds, and straits around the 
 
 20The doctrine of this section upon the educative value of geogra- 
 phy and its relation to human life will be accepted by most teachers. 
 The elementary school must study the earth as the home of man. This 
 gives emphasis to the industrial and commercial features of the study. 
 The teachings of the report are in substantial accord with those of the 
 Herbartians. We study physical geography that we may know better 
 our fellow men and our relations to them. The relation of this branch 
 to history on the one side and to science on the other is a notable ex- 
 ample of that idea of correlation which would teach each subject in 
 the light of the knowledge of all others to which it is naturally related. 
 The social order combines geography, history, natural science, the in- 
 dustries, and the characteristics of the people into a very close unity. 
 The Herbartians and all good teachers demand that this unity shall be 
 recognized in the school. The demands that some are making to have 
 the emphasis placed upon the nature element rather than upon the 
 human element are not sanctioned by this report. Geography is in part 
 a natural-science study and in part a sociological study. Sociology and 
 nature are so intimately related in it that much of the latter must be 
 known in order to understand the former. The time has certainly 
 come for expunging much of the "sailor geography" from our course of 
 instruction. 
 
Correlation of Studies, 31 
 
 world. He enlivened this to some extent by brief mention of 
 the curiosities and oddities in the way of cataracts, water-gaps, 
 caves, strange animals, public buildings, picturesque costumes, 
 national exaggerations, and such matters as would furnish 
 good themes for sailors' yarns. Little or nothing was taught 
 to give unity to the isolated details furnished in endless num- 
 ber. It was an improvement on this when the method of mem- 
 orizing capital cities and political boundaries succeeded. With 
 this came the era of map drawing. The study of watersheds 
 and commercial routes, of industrial productions and centers 
 of manufacture and commerce, has been adopted in the better 
 class of schools. Instruction in geography is growing better 
 by the constant introduction of new devices to make plain and 
 intelligible the determining influence of physical causes in pro- 
 ducing the elements of difference and the counter-process of 
 industry and commerce by which each difference is rendered 
 of use to the whole world and each locality made a participator 
 in the productions of all.^^ 
 
 2iThe program of studies on a following page, recommends that a 
 text-book in geography be used after the middle of the third year. The 
 wisdom of this suggestion will depend upon the kind of text-book used. 
 The doctrine of the author of this report is that children shall begin the 
 use of text-books early in the study of all subjects, in order that they may 
 acquire ability to interpret the printed page as soon as possible. It is 
 true that a good teacher can lead the pupils to make a profitable use of 
 the book early in their school course. The dead formalism that is 
 blighting the schools throughout the country results from the use of 
 text-books by poor teachers. If these teachers (?) were deprived of the 
 book 1hey would be compelled to invent some other method of teaching 
 than that of giving a certain portion of the text to be learned by rote 
 each day. Any change from this lifeless, memoriter grind would be for 
 the better. Assuming that the teacher knows how to use a book it is 
 not important to set any limit to the time of introducing it. This 
 question is one of method, and the condition must always determine the 
 method. 
 
 One is tempted to call attention again to a seeming inconsistency 
 in this report which puts a text-book in geography into the hands of 
 the pupi4 when he is not able (according to the teachings of it on lan- 
 guage studies), to read any other than a colloquial vocabulary. Every 
 text-book uses words that are technical and many others that do not 
 belong to the child's every day conversation. But during the first three 
 years of school life new words are not to be introduced for the reason 
 that the child cannot learn form and content at the same time. See 
 page 11. 
 
32 Report of Committee of Fifteen^ 
 
 D. History. • 
 
 The next study, ranked in order of value, for the elementary 
 school is History. But, as will be seen, the value of history, 
 both practically and psychologically, is less in the beginning 
 and greater at the end than geography. For it relates to the 
 institutions of men, and especially to the political state audits 
 evolution. While biography narrates the career of the indi- 
 vidual, civil history records the careers of nations. The 
 nation has been compared to the individual by persons inter- 
 ested in the educational value of history. Man has two selves, 
 they say, the individual self, and the collective self of the 
 organized state or union. The study of history is, then, the 
 study of this larger, corporate, social, and civil self. The 
 importance of this idea is thus brought out more clearly in its 
 educational significance. For to learn this civil self is to learn 
 the substantial condition which makes possible the existence 
 of civilized man in all his other social combinations — the 
 family, the Church, and the manifold associated activities of 
 civil society. For the state protects these combinations from 
 destruction by violence. It defines the limits of individual 
 and associated effort, within which each endeavor re-enforces 
 the endeavors of all, and it uses the strength of the whole 
 nation to prevent such actions as pass beyond these safe 
 limits and tend to collision with the normal action of the other 
 individuals and social units. Hobbes called the state a Levi- 
 athan, to emphasize its stupendous individuality and organized 
 self-activity. Without this, he said, man lives in a state of 
 "constant war, fear, poverty, filth, ignorance, and wretched- 
 ness ; within the state dwell peace, security, riches, science, 
 and happiness." The state is the collective man who "makes 
 possible the rational development of the individual man, like 
 a mortal God, subduing his caprice and passion and compelling 
 obedience to law, developing the ideas of justice, virtue, and 
 religion, creating property and ownership, nurture and educa- 
 tion." The education of the child into a knowledge of this 
 higher self begins early within the nurture of the family. 
 The child sees a policeman or some town officer, some public 
 building, a court house or a jail ; he sees or hears of an act of 
 violence, a case of robbery or murder followed by arrest of the 
 guilty. The omnipresent higher self, which has been invisible 
 
Correlation of Studies, 33 
 
 hitherto, now becomes visible to him in its symbols and still 
 more in its acts. 
 
 History in school, it is contended, should be the special 
 branch for education in the duties of citizenship. There is 
 ground for this claim. History gives a sense of belonging to 
 a higher social unity which possesses the right of absolute 
 control over person and property in the interest of the safety 
 of the whole. This, of course, is the basis of citizenship ; the 
 individual must feel this or see this solidarity of the state and 
 recognize its supreme authority. But history shows the col- 
 lisions of nations, and the victory of one political ideal accom- 
 panied by the defeat of another. History reveals an evolution 
 of forms of government that are better and better adapted to 
 permit individual freedom, and the participation of all citizens 
 in the administration of the government itself. 
 
 People who make their own government have a special 
 interest in the spectacle of political evolution as exhibited in 
 history. But it must be admitted that this evolution has not 
 been well presented by popular historians. Take, for instance, 
 the familiar example of old-time pedagogy, wherein the Roman 
 republic was conceived as a freer government than the Roman 
 ^empire that followed it, by persons apparently misled by the 
 ideas of representative self-government associated with the 
 word republic. It was the beginning of a new epoch when this 
 illusion was dispelled, and the college student became aware 
 of the true Roman meaning of republic^ namely, the supremacy 
 of an oligarchy on the Tiber that ruled distant provinces in 
 Spain, Gaul, Asia Minor, Germany, and Africa, for its selfish 
 •ends and with an ever-increasing arrogance. The people at 
 home in Rome, not having a share in the campaigns on the 
 borderland, did not appreciate the qualities of the great leaders 
 who, like Caesar, subdued the nations by forbearance, magna- 
 nimity, trust, and the recognition of a sphere of freedom se- 
 cured to the conquered by the Roman civil laws, which were 
 rigidly enforced by the conqueror, as much as by the violence 
 of arms. The change from republic to empire meant the final 
 subordination of this tyrannical Roman oligarchy, and the 
 recognition of the rights of the provinces to Roman freedom. 
 This illustration shows how easily a poor teaching of history 
 may pervert its good influence or purpose into a bad one. For 
 
M Report of Committee of Fijteen. 
 
 the Roman monarchy under the emp'ire secured a degree of 
 freedom never before attained under the republic, in spite of 
 the election of such tyrants as Nero and Caligula to the imperial 
 purple. The civil service went on as usual administering the 
 affairs of distant countries, educating them in Roman jurispru- 
 dence, and cultivating a love for accumulating private property. 
 Those countries had before lived communistically after the style 
 of the tribe or at best of the village community. Roman pri- 
 vate property in land gave an impulse to the development of 
 free individuality such as had always been impossible under the 
 social stage of development known as the village community. 
 
 To teach history properly is to dispel this shallow illusion 
 which flatters individualism, and to open the eyes of the pupil 
 to the true nature of freedom, namely the freedom through 
 obedience to just laws enforced by a strong government. ^^ 
 
 Your Committee has made this apparent digression for the 
 sake of a more explicit statement of its conviction of the im- 
 portance of teaching history in a different spirit from that of 
 abstract freedom, which sometimes means anarchy, although 
 they admit the possibility of an opposite extreme, the danger 
 of too little stress on the progressive element in the growth of 
 nations and its manifestation in new and better political devices 
 for representing all citizens without weakening the central 
 power. 
 
 That the history of one's own nation is to be taught in the 
 elementary school seems fixed by common consent. United 
 States history includes first a sketch of the epoch of discoveries 
 and next of the epoch of colonization. This fortunately suits 
 the pedagogic requirements. For the child loves to approach 
 the stern realities of a firmly established civilization through 
 its stages of growth by means of individual enterprise. Here 
 is the use of biography as introduction to history. It treats 
 of exceptional individuals whose lives bring them in one way 
 
 2 2 The reader will take note that the studies in the order of their 
 educational values are Language studies, Arithmetic, Geography, and 
 History. Language and Literature introduce to human science and art. 
 Arithmetic to the science of nature, and Geography occupies both 
 fields. We now approach History which is an account of the greatest 
 of human institutions, the state. This able analysis of the idea of the 
 state is valuable to the student for other reasons than that it suggests 
 the true spirit in which history should be taught. 
 
Correlation of Studies, 35 
 
 or another into national or even world-historical relations. 
 They throw light on the nature and necessity of governments, 
 and are in turn illuminated by the light thrown back on them 
 by the institutions which they promote or hinder. The era of 
 semi-private adventure with which American history begins is 
 admirably adapted for study by the pupil in the elementary 
 stage of his education. So too the next epoch, that of coloni- 
 zation. The pioneer is a degree nearer to civilization than is the 
 explorer and discoverer. In the colonial history the pupil in- 
 terests himself in the enterprise of aspiring individualities, in 
 their conquest over obstacles of climate and soil; their conflicts 
 with the aboriginal population; their choice of land for settle- 
 ment; the growth of their cities; above all, their several at- 
 tempts and final success in forming a constitution securing 
 local self-government. An epoch of growing interrelation of 
 the colonies succeeds, a tendency to union on a large scale 
 due to the effect of European wars which involved England, 
 France, and other countries, and affected the relations of their 
 colonies in America. This epoch too abounds in heroic per- 
 sonalities, like Wolfe, Montcalm, and Washington, and perilous 
 adventures, especially in the Indian warfare. ^^ 
 
 The fourth epoch is the Revolution, by which the Colonies 
 through joint effort secured their independence and afterward 
 their union in a nation. The subject grows rapidly more com- 
 plex and tasks severely the powers of the pupils in the eighth 
 year of the elementary school. The formation of the Consti- 
 tution, and a brief study of the salient features of the Con- 
 stitution itself, conclude the study of the portion of the history 
 of the United States that is sufficiently remote to be treated 
 after the manner of an educational classic. Everything up to this 
 
 23The emphasis placed upon pioneer history and the stories of the 
 adventures of the heroes who discovered and explored America, as an 
 introduction to the study of the history of the growth of the American 
 commonwealth, is In harmony with the teaching of history in the best 
 schools at the present time. The new movement in education, in- 
 cluding all the schools of reformers, is in full accord with the doctrine 
 here set forth. The Herbartians carry the thought a step further and 
 urge that when any particular section of the union, as, for instance, 
 the Mississippi valley, or New England, or the gulf region, has an es- 
 pecially rich and interesting pioneer history, the schools should begin 
 with the stories of the heroes of their respective sections and proceed 
 from that as a starting point to the history of other sections. 
 
3^6 Report of Committee of Fifteen. 
 
 point stands out in strong individual outlines and is admirably 
 fitted for that elementary course of study. Beyond this point, 
 the War of 1812 and the War of the Rebellion, together with 
 the political events that led to it, are matters of memory with 
 the present generation of parents and grandparents, and are 
 consequently not so well fitted for intensive study in school as 
 the already classic period of our history. But these later and 
 latest epochs may be and will be read at home not only in the 
 text-book on history used in the schools, but also in the nu- 
 merous sketches that appear in newspapers, magazines, and in 
 more pretentious shapes. In the intensive study which should 
 be undertaken of the classic period of our history, the pupil 
 may be taught the method appropriate to historical investiga- 
 tion, the many points of view from which each event ought to 
 be considered. He should learn to discriminate between the 
 theatrical show of events and the solid influences that move 
 underneath as ethical causes. Although he is too immature 
 for very far-reaching reflections, he must be helped to see the 
 causal processes of history. Armed with this discipline in 
 historic methods, the pupil will do all of his miscellaneous read- 
 ing and thinking in this province with more adequate intellec- 
 tual reaction than was possible before the intensive study 
 carried on in school.^* 
 
 The study of the outlines of the Constitution, for ten or 
 fifteen weeks in the final year of the elementary school, has 
 been found of great educational value. Properly taught, it 
 fixes the idea of the essential threefoldness of the constitution 
 of a free government and the necessary independence of each 
 constituent power, whether legislative, judicial, or executive. 
 
 24This distinction made between the "classic" period in our history 
 and that which has not yet become classic, will be regarded by many as 
 a little overdrawn. But the thorough mastery of this "classic" pe- 
 riod as a cultivation of the historic sense through which our more mod- 
 ern history will be better comprehended, is sound pedagogy. 
 
 This report on the value of history is one of great ability and sug- 
 gestiveness. It touches the field of method very lightly, and for that 
 reason, perhaps, will he generally accepted without protest. Method 
 has not yet become sufficiently "classic" to admit of such treatment as 
 will bring all to one conclusion. It is when this report leaves the dis- 
 -cussion of educational values and enters the realm of method for the 
 realizing of the values in the education of the child that we begin to 
 hear protests against its teachings. 
 
Correlation of Studies, 37 
 
 This and some idea of the manner and mode of filling the offi- 
 cial places in these three departments, and of the character of 
 the duties with which each department is charged, lay founda- 
 tions for an intelligent citizenship. 
 
 Besides this intensive study of the history of the United 
 States in the seventh and eighth years, your committee would 
 recommend oral lessons on thesalient points of general history, 
 taking a full hour of sixty minutes weekly — and preferably all 
 at one time — for the sake of the more systematic treatment of 
 the subject of the lesson and the deeper impression made on 
 the mind. of the pupil. 
 
 E. Other branches. 
 
 Your committee has reviewed the staple branches of the 
 elementary course of study in the light of their educational 
 scope and significance. Grammar, literature, arithmetic, geog- 
 raphy, and history are the five branches upon which the dis- 
 ciplinary work of the elementary school is concentrated. Inas- 
 much as reading is the first of the scholastic arts, it is 
 interesting to note that the whole elementary course may be 
 described as an extension of the process of learning the art of 
 reading. First comes the mastering of the colloquial vocabu- 
 lary in printed and script forms. Next come five incursions 
 into the special vocabularies required {a) in literature to 
 express the fine shades of emotion and the more subtle distinc- 
 tions of thought, {h) the technique of arithmetic, (c) of geog- 
 raphy, {d) of grammar, {e) of history. 
 
 In the serious work of mastering these several technical 
 vocabularies the pupil is assigned daily tasks that he must pre- 
 pare by independent study. The class exercise or recitation 
 is taken up with examining and criticising the pupil's oral 
 statements of what he has learned, especial care being taken 
 to secure the pupil's explanation of it in his own words. This 
 requires paraphrases and definitions of the new words and 
 phrases used in technical and literary senses, with a view to 
 insure the addition to the mind of the new ideas corresponding 
 to the new words. The misunderstandings are corrected and 
 the pupil set on the way to use more critical alertness in the 
 preparation of his succeeding lessons. The pupil learns as 
 
;38 Report of Committee of Fijteen. 
 
 much by the recitations of his fellow-pupils as he learns from 
 the teacher, but not the same things. He sees in the imper- 
 fect statements of his classmates that they apprehended the 
 lesson with different presuppositions and consequently have 
 seen some phases of the subject that escaped his observation, 
 while they in turn have missed points which he had noticed 
 quite readily. These different points of view become more or 
 less his own, and he may be said to grow by adding to his own 
 mind the minds of others. 
 
 It is clear that there areother branches of instruction that 
 may lay claim to a place in the course of stujiy of the elemen- 
 tary school; for example, the various branches of natural 
 science, vocal music, manual training, physical culture, draw- 
 ing, etc. 
 
 Here the question of another method of instruction is sug- 
 gested. There are lessons that require previous preparation 
 by the pupil himself — there are also lessons that may be taken 
 up without such preparation and conducted by the teacher, 
 who leads the exercise and furnishes a large part of the infor- 
 mation to be learned, enlisting the aid of members of the class 
 for the purpose of bringing home the new material to their 
 actual experience. Besides these there are mechanical exer- 
 cises for purposes of training, such as drawing, penmanship, 
 and calisthenics. 
 
 In the first place there is industrial and aesthetic drawing, 
 which should have a place in all elementary school work. By 
 it is secured the training of the hand and eye. Then, too, 
 drawing helps in all the other branches that require illustra- 
 tion. Moreover, if used in the study of the great works of art 
 in the way hereinbefore mentioned, it helps to cultivate the 
 taste and prepares the future workman for a more useful and 
 lucrative career, inasmuch as superior taste commands higher 
 wages in the finishing of all goods. ^^ 
 
 25This report distinguishes between the five disciplinary studies 
 and the other branches that are valuable for the practical information 
 they give. The ground for this distinction may lie in the fact that the 
 five studies (grammar, literature, arithmetic, geography, and history) 
 represent what the author has elsewhere called the five great depart- 
 ments of human knowledge. That is, they represent the five distinct 
 fields of activity in the world, viz: thought, art, inorganic nature, or- 
 ganic nature, and society. The thorough mastery of these branches 
 
Correlation of Studies. 39 
 
 Natural science claims a place in the elementary school 
 not so much as a disciplinary study side by side with grammar, 
 arithmetic, and history, as a training in habits of observation 
 and in the use of the technique by which such sciences are ex- 
 pounded. With a knowledge of the technical terms and some 
 training in the methods of original investigation employed in 
 the sciences, the pupil broadens his views of the world and 
 greatly increases his capacity to acquire new knowledge. For 
 the pupil who is unacquainted with the technique of science 
 has to pass without mental profit the numerous scientific 
 allusions and items of information which more and more 
 abound in all our literature, whether of an ephemeral or a 
 permanent character. In an age whose proudest boast is the 
 progress of science in all domains, there should be in the ele- 
 mentary school, from the first, a course in the elements of the 
 sciences. And this is quite possible; for each science 
 possesses some phases that lie very near to the child's life. 
 
 organizes the individual mind in harmony with human civilization. In 
 the language of the Herbartians the "concept-mass," or the self, be- 
 comes attuned to the movement of the external world of nature and 
 society. This is what we common people mean by the "formation of 
 character." Discipline is the name of the process by which the mind 
 becomes thus organized and tendencies and habits of action estab- 
 lished. The ground upon which the Ave studies named are distin- 
 guished as disciplinary above others seems to be that a larger share of 
 the energies of the pupil are devoted to learning them. In other 
 words, "as the twig is bent the tree's inclined." But it must be true that 
 every knowledge activity that enters into the organization of the self 
 In education must perform its part in building character and thus be 
 disciplinary. That idea which seemed once to prevail, that discipline 
 was for forraing the child's mind, and that it was to be filled subse- 
 quently with a content that should be of practical use in life does not 
 now prevail. It would be a misfortune if any one should interpret this 
 report to mean other than that all of the educative efforts of the school 
 are disciplinary and help in the formation of character. Of course, 
 there is great difference between the disciplinary value of that study 
 in which the pupil solves his own difificuUies and that teaching in 
 which the teacher accompanies the pupil, supplying the needed in- 
 formation or suggestion at every step of his progress. The latter is 
 not worth much for character building, for the reason that it is not apt 
 to become a part of the organized self. There is much of knowledge or 
 information, so-called, that is simply the present possession of the car- 
 rying memory and never becomes assimilated with the self. It may be 
 of temporary use but is not of permanent value. The school cannot 
 afford to expend much energy in acquiring such knowledge. 
 
40 Report of Committee of Fifteen. 
 
 These familiar topics furnish the doors through which the 
 child enters the various special departments. Science, it is 
 claimed, is nothing if not systematic. Indeed, science itself 
 may be defined as the interpretation of each fact through all 
 other facts of a kindred nature. Admitting that this is so, it 
 is no less true that pedagogic method begins with the frag- 
 mentary knowledge possessed by the pupil and proceeds to 
 organize it and build it out systematically in all directions. 
 Hence any science may be taken up best on the side nearest 
 the experience of the pupil and the investigation continued 
 until the other parts are reached. Thus the pedagogical order 
 is not always the logical or scientific order. In this respect it 
 agrees with the order of discovery, which is usually something 
 quite different from the logical order, for that is the last thing 
 discovered. The natural sciences have two general divisions: 
 one relating to inorganic matter, as physics and chemistry, 
 and one relating to organic, as botany and zoology. There 
 should be a spiral course in natural science, commencing each 
 branch with the most interesting phases to the child. A first 
 course should be given in botany, zoology, and physics, so as 
 to treat of the structure and uses of familiar plants and ani- 
 mals, and the explanation of physical phenomena as seen in 
 the child's playthings, domestic machines, etc. A second 
 course covering the same subjects, but laying more stress on 
 classification and functions, will build on to the knowledge 
 already acquired from the former lessons and from his recently 
 acquired experience. A third course of weekly lessons, con- 
 ducted by the teacher as before in a conversational style, with 
 experiments and with a comparison of the facts of observation 
 already in the possession of the children, will go far to help- 
 ing them to an acquisition of the results of natural science. 
 Those of the children specially gifted for observation in some 
 one or more departments of nature will be stimulated and en- 
 couraged to make the most of their gifts. 
 
 In the opinion of your Committee there should be set 
 apart a full hour each week for drawing and the same amount 
 for oral lessons in natural science. 
 
 The oral lessons in history have already been mentioned. 
 The spiral course, found useful in natural science because of 
 the rapid change in capacity of comprehension by the pupil 
 
Correlation of Studies, 41 
 
 from his sixth to his fourteenth year, will also be best for the 
 history course, which will begin with biographical adventures 
 of interest to the child, and possessing an important historical 
 bearing. These will proceed from the native land first to Eng- 
 land, the parent country, and then to the classic civilizations 
 (G-reece and Rome being, so to speak, the grandparent coun- 
 tries of the American colonies). These successive courses of 
 oral lessons adapted respectively to the child's capacity will do 
 much to make the child well informed on this topic. Oral 
 lessons should never be mere lectures, but more like Socratic 
 dialogues, building up a systematic knowledge partly from 
 what is already known, partly by new investigations, and 
 partly by comparison of authorities. 
 
 The best argument in favor of oral weekly lessons in nat- 
 ural science and general history is the actual experiences of 
 teachers who have for some time used the plan. It has been 
 found that the lessons in botany, zoology, and physics give 
 the pupil much aid in learning his geography and other les- 
 sons relating to nature, while the history lessons assist very 
 much his comprehension of literature, and add interest to 
 geography. ^^ 
 
 2 6But most educationists will object to including natural science, 
 vocal music, manual training, physical culture, and drawing in the eph- 
 emeral knowledge described in the preceding paragraph. The educa- 
 tional value of these is stated, or clearly implied, in the text of the report. 
 But there will be not a little dissent from the method suggested for realiz- 
 ing these values in theschool. One exercise per week of sixty minutes dur- 
 ation does not seem to be the best arrangement, even though some have 
 found it to be valuable. (See program.) It is better than nothing, without 
 doubt. But that any discipline, or character, either physical or mental, 
 shall result from these studies, there is need of a more frequent return 
 to them than one oral lesson per week implies. Perhaps sixty minutes 
 per week may be all the school time that the program will permit, but 
 it will be better that this hour shall be broken up into twenty-minute 
 recitations three times per week. Nor will sixty minutes include all of 
 the time during the week which the pupils should devote to such a 
 study as natural science. A teacher that can use, profitably, one hour 
 for a single recitation in a week can use three periods of twenty min- 
 utes each to a much better advantage, in an elementary school. 
 
 It is through frequent return to a subject, and intense activity 
 upon it for short periods, that it "soaks in" and becomes influential in 
 the building of character. Especially is this true if the principles of 
 apperception and concentration are not forgotten by the teacher in 
 working upon the "disciplinary" subjects. 
 
I 
 
 42 Report of Committee of Fifteen. \ 
 
 It is understood by your Committee that the lessons in | 
 physiology and hygiene (with special reference to the effects | 
 of stimulants and narcotics) required by State laws should be ■ 
 included in this oral course in natural science. Manual train- ! 
 ing, so far as the theory and use of the tools for working in i 
 wood and iron are concerned, has just claims on the elementary i 
 school for a reason similar to that which admits natural sci- ; 
 ence. From science have proceeded useful inventions for the \ 
 aid of all manner of manufactures and transportation. The : 
 child of today lives in a world where machinery is constantly ; 
 at his hand. A course of training in wood and iron work, to- \ 
 gether with experimental knowledge of physics or natural phi- j 
 losophy, makes it easy for him to learn the management of such I 
 machines. Sewing and cookery have not the same but stronger 
 claims for a place in school. One-half day in each week for 
 one-half a year each in the seventh and eighth grades will suf- 
 fice for manual training, the sewing and cookery being studied 
 by the girls, and the wood and iron-work by the boys. It 
 should be mentioned, however, that the advocates of manual 
 training in iron and wood-work recommend these branches for 
 secondary schools, because of the greater maturity of body, 
 and the less likelihood to acquire wrong habits of manipulation, 
 in the third period of four years of school. 
 
 Vocal music has long since obtained a well-established 
 place in all elementary schools. The labors of two generations 
 of special teachers have reduced the steps of instruction to 
 such simplicity that whole classes may make as regular prog- 
 ress in reading music as in reading literature. 
 
 In regard to physical culture your Committee is agreed 
 that there should be some form of special daily exercises 
 amounting in the aggregate to one hour each week, the same 
 to include the main features of calisthenics, and G-erman, Swed- 
 ish, or American systems of physical training, but not to be 
 regarded as a substitute for the old-fashioned recess estab- 
 lished to permit the free exercise of the pupils in the open air. 
 Systematic physical training has for its object rather the will 
 training than recreation, and this must not be forgotten. To 
 go from a hard lesson to a series of calisthenic exercises is to 
 go from one kind of will training to another. Exhaustion of 
 the will should be followed by the caprice and wild freedom of' 
 
Correlation of Studies. 43 
 
 the recess. But systematic physical exercise has its sufficient 
 reason in its aid to a graceful use of the limbs, its develop- 
 ment of muscles that are left unused or rudimentary unless 
 called forth by special training, and for the help it gives to the 
 teacher in the way of school discipline. 
 
 Your Committee would mention in this connection instruc- 
 tion in morals and manners, which ought to be given in a brief 
 series of lessons each year with a view to build up in the mind 
 a theory of the conventionalities of polite and pure-minded 
 society. If these lessons are made too long or too numerous, 
 they are apt to become offensive to the child's mind. It is of 
 course understood by your Committee that the substantial 
 moral training of the school is performed by the discipline 
 rather than by the instruction in ethical theory. The child is 
 trained to be regular and punctual, and to restrain his desire 
 to talk and whisper — in these things gaining self-control day 
 by day. The essence of moral behavior is self-control. The 
 school teaches good behavior. The intercourse of a pupil with 
 his fellows without evil words or violent actions is insisted on 
 and secured. The higher moral qualities of truth-telling and 
 sincerity are taught in every class exercise that lays stress on 
 accuracy of statement. 
 
 Your Committee has already discussed the importance of 
 teaching something of algebraic processes in the seventh and 
 eighth grades with the view to obtaining better methods of 
 solving problems in advanced arithmetic; a majority of your 
 Committee are of the opinion that formal English grammar 
 should be discontinued in the eighth year, and the study of 
 some foreign language, preferably that of Latin, substituted. 
 The educational effect on an English-speaking pupil of taking 
 up a language which, like Latin, uses inflections instead of 
 prepositions, and which further differs from English by the 
 order in which its words are arranged in the sentence, is quite 
 marked, and a year of Latin places a pupil by a wide interval 
 out of the range of the pupil who has continued English gram- 
 mar without taking up Latin. But the effect of the year's 
 study of Latin increases the youth's power of apperception in 
 very many directions by reason of the fact that so much of the 
 English vocabulary used in technical vocabularies, like those 
 of geography, grammar, history, and literature, is from a Latin 
 
44 Report of Committee of Fifteen. 
 
 source, and besides there are so many traces m the form and 
 substance of human learning of the hundreds of years when 
 Latin was the only tongue in which observation and reflection 
 could be expressed. ^^ 
 
 Your Committee refers to the program given later in this 
 report for the details of co-ordinating these several branches 
 already recommended. 
 
 The dijference between elementary and secondary studies. 
 
 In recommending the introduction of algebraic processes 
 in the seventh and eighth years — as well as in the recom- 
 mendation just now made to introduce Latin in the eighth 
 
 2'Perhaps the most startling innovation in this report is that which 
 substitutes Latin for English Grammar in the eighth grade. Dr. Har- 
 ris has frequently affirmed that if one hundred young men of equal 
 ability were to start a new colony, fifty of whom had spent six months 
 in the study of Latin, while the others had studied some other subject 
 instead, the fifty who had studied Laiin would soon occupy all the leg- 
 islative, judicial, and executive departments of the government. This 
 seems to most persons to be a very extraordinary statement. Lan- 
 guage forms partake in a measure of the genius of the people who in- 
 vent them, it is true, but will they innoculate another and alien people 
 with that genius simply by a six months' study of them? Ideas, knowl- 
 edge, feeling, are practically the same in all men. Is it not an undue 
 appreciation of the influence of form, which gives to one nation the in- 
 dividual characteristics of another "merely through a six month's 
 study of the other's language?" 
 
 There is a less occult reason for learning the Latin in the fact that 
 the English is so largely composed of Latin words. By learning the 
 concrete meanings of these words in the Latin tongue, the English 
 words cease to be mere abstract dead symbols, and become filled with 
 their original concrete meaning. This is a sufficient reason for one 
 who would know the English to study the Latin, and if he is to make 
 an extended study of science he ought to have some knowledge of the 
 Greek for a similar reason. 
 
 The recommendation of the committee that Latin be substituted 
 for English Grammar in the eighth grade will not be generally ac- 
 cepted in that form. It is probable that the influence of this report 
 will start a line of reflection in the minds of the educational public 
 which will result in giving more prominence to the study of the history 
 and derivation of words and the mastery of Latin roots in the grammar 
 grades. We cannot think that the peculiar /orm of the Latin sentence 
 will do more for the pupil than the form of the German sentence would 
 do, and the influence of either is not great. Would it not be better to 
 advance natural science to a "disciplinary" study than to introduce 
 Latin into the elementary school as such a study? 
 
Correlation of Studies. 45 
 
 year of the elementary course — your Committee has come face 
 to face with the question of the intrinsic difference between 
 elementary and secondary studies. 
 
 Custom has placed algebra, geometry, the history of 
 English literature, and Latin in the rank of secondary studies; 
 also general history, physical geography, and the elements of 
 physics and chemistry. In a secondary course of four years, 
 trigonometry may be added to the mathematics; some of the 
 sciences whose elements are used in physical geography may 
 be taken up separately in special treatises, as geology, botany, 
 and physiology. There may be also a study of whole works of 
 English authors, as Shakspere, Milton, and Scott. Greek is 
 also begun in the second or third year of the secondary course. 
 This is the custom in most public high schools. But in pri- 
 vate secondary schools Latin is begun earlier, and so, too, 
 Greek, algebra, and geometry. Sometimes geometry is taken 
 up before algebra, as is the custom in German schools. These 
 arrangements are based partly on tradition, partly on the 
 requirements of higher institutions for admission, and partly 
 on the ground that the intrinsic difficulties in these studies 
 have fixed their places in the course of study. Of those who 
 claim that there is an intrinsic reason for the selection and 
 order of these studies, some base their conclusions on experi- 
 ence in conducting pupil's through them, others on psycholog- 
 ical grounds. The latter contend, for example, that algebra 
 deals with general forms of calculation, while arithmetic deals 
 with the particular instances of calculation. Whatever deals 
 with the particular instance is relatively elementary, whatever 
 deals with the general form is relatively secondary. In the 
 expression a4-b=c algebra indicates the form of all addition. 
 This arithmetic cannot do, except in the form of a verbal rule 
 describing the steps of the operation; its examples are all 
 special instances falling under the general form given in 
 algebra. If, therefore, arithmetic is an elementary branch, 
 algebra is relatively to it a secondary branch. So, too, geom- 
 etry, though not directly based on arithmetic, has to presup- 
 pose an acquaintance with it when it reduces spatial functions 
 into numerical forms, as, for example, in the measurement of 
 surfaces and solids, and in ascertaining the ratio of the cir- 
 eumference to the radius, and of the hypotenuse to the two 
 
46 Report of Committee of Fifteen. 
 
 other sides of the right-angled triangle. Geometry, more- 
 over, deals with necessary relations; its demonstrations reach 
 universal and necessary conclusions, holding good not merely 
 in such material shapes as we have met with in actual experi- 
 ence, but with all examples possible, past, present, or future. 
 Such knowledge transcending experience is intrinsically sec- 
 ondary as compared with the first acquaintance with geometric 
 shapes in concrete examples. 
 
 In the case of geometry it is claimed by some that what is 
 called "inventional geometry" may be properly introduced into 
 the elementary grades. By this some mean the practice with 
 blocks in the shape of geometric solids and the construction 
 of different figures from the same; others mean the rediscov- 
 ery by the pupil for himself of the necessary relations demon- 
 strated by Euclid. The former — exercises of construction 
 with blocks — are well enough in the kindergarten, where they 
 assist in learning number, as well as in the analysis of ma- 
 terial forms. But its educational value is small for pupils ad- 
 vanced into the use of books. The original discovery of Euclid's 
 demonstrations, on the other hand, belongs more properly to 
 higher education than to elementary. In the geometrical text- 
 books recently introduced into secondary schools, there is so 
 much of original demonstration required that the teacher is 
 greatly embarrassed on account of the differences in native ca- 
 pacity for mathematics that develop among the pupils of the 
 same class in solving the problems of invention. A few gifted 
 pupils delight in the inventions, and develop rapidly in power, 
 while the majority of the class use too much time over them, 
 and thus rob the other branches of the course of study, or else 
 fall into the bad paractice of getting help from others in the 
 preparation of their lessons. A few in every class fall hope- 
 lessly behind and are discouraged. The result is an attempt on 
 the part of the teacher to correct the evil by requiring a more 
 thorough training in the mathematical studies preceding, and 
 the consequent delay of secondary pupils in the lower grades of 
 the course in order to bring up their "inventional geometry." 
 Many, discouraged, fail to go on; many more fail to reach 
 higher studies because unable to get over the barrier unneces- 
 sarily placed before them by teachers who desire that no pu- 
 
Correlation of /Studies. 47 
 
 pils except natural geometricians shall enter into higher 
 studies. ^^ 
 
 Physical geography in its scientific form is very properly 
 made a part of the secondary course of study. The pupil in 
 his ninth year of work can profitably acquire the scientific 
 technique of geology, botany, zoology, meteorology, and eth- 
 nology, and in the following years take up those sciences sep- 
 arately and push them further, using the method of actual 
 investigation. The subject-matter of physical geography is of 
 very high interest to the pupil who has studied geography in 
 the elementary grades after an approved method. It takes up 
 the proximate grounds and causes for the elements of differ- 
 ence on the earth's surface, already become familiar to him 
 through his elementary studies, and pushes them back into 
 deeper, simpler, and more satisfactory principles. This study 
 performs the work also of correlating the sciences that relate 
 to organic nature by showing their respective uses to man. 
 From the glimpses which the pupil gets of mineralogy, geol- 
 ogy, botany zoology, ethnology, and meteorology in their 
 necessary connection as geographic conditions he sees the 
 
 28This paragraph involves a sharp criticism of the idea prevalent 
 in high schools that pupils must reach a "passing" standard m all sub- 
 jects before being allowed to pass on or pass out. A pupil that has no 
 capacity for mathematics, for example, must procure one before he is 
 permitted to graduate, although he may excel in other studies. This 
 is another instance of the dominance of formalism in our education, 
 and of a wrong conception of what is meant by harmonious develop- 
 ment. Why not refuse a man the honors of society in real life merely 
 because he is not a good accountant? 
 
 It is moreover,'a stern rebuke to that educational malpractice which 
 doesnotdistinguish between the elementary and thesecondary phases of 
 knowledge. The elementary phase includes what may be termed the 
 sense-relations of things (the kindergarten stage,) and those simpler 
 and more concrete thought-relations that belong to and makeup the 
 experiences of common life. This is theso-called"practical knowledge," 
 so much in favor with the general public. The elementary text-books 
 are supposed to occupy this field. This is the period for accumulating 
 a mass of "apperceiving ideas," both of things and their relations 
 which make secondary knowledge possible. Secondary knowledge is 
 knowledge of the relations of relations. All knowledge is knowledge 
 of relations. Whether it be elementary or secondary depends upon how 
 far the relations considered are removed from the objective reality 
 known as the world of nature and humanity. 
 
48 Report of Committee of Fifteen. 
 
 scope and grand significance of those, separate inquiries. A 
 thirst is aroused in him to pursue his researches into their do- 
 mains. He sees, too, the borderlands in which new discov- 
 eries may be made by the enterprising explorer. 
 
 Physics, including what was called until recently "natural 
 philosophy," after Newton's Principia {Philosophice naturalis 
 principia mathematica)^ implies more knowledge of mathemat- 
 ics for its thorough discussion than the secondary pupil is 
 likely to possess. In fact, the study of this branch in college 
 thirty years ago was crippled by the same cause. It should 
 follow the completion of analytical geometry. Notwithstand- 
 ing this, a very profitable study of this subject may be made 
 in the second year of the high school or preparatory school, 
 although the formulas can then be understood in so far as they 
 imply elementary algebra only. The pupil does not get the 
 most exact notions of the quantitative laws that rule matter 
 in its states of motion and equilibrium, but he does see the ac- 
 tion of forces as qualitative elements of phenomena, and un- 
 derstand quite well the mechanical inventions by which men 
 subdue them for his use and safety. Even in the elementary 
 grades the pupil can seize very many of these qualitative as- 
 pects and learn the explanation of the mechanical phenomena 
 of nature, and other applications of the same principles in in- 
 vention, as for example, gravitation in falling bodies: its 
 measurement by the scales; the part it plays in the pump, the 
 barometer, the pendulum; cohesion in mud, clay, glue, paste, 
 mortar, cement, etc.; capillary attraction in lamp- wicks, 
 sponges, sugar, the sap in plants; the applications of lifting 
 by the lever, pulley, inclined plane, wedge, and screw; heat 
 in the sun, combustion, friction, steam, thermometer, conduc- 
 tion, clothing, cooking, etc; the phenomena of light, elec- 
 tricity, magnetism, and the explanation of such mechanical 
 devices as spectacles, telescopes, microscopes, prisms, photo- 
 graphic cameras, electric tension in bodies, lightning, mariner's 
 compass, horseshoe magnet, the telegraph, the dynamo. This 
 partially qualitative study of forces and mechanical inventions 
 has the educational effect of enlightening the pupil, and eman- 
 cipating him from the network of superstition that surrounds 
 him in the child world, partly of necessity and partly by reason 
 of the illiterate adults that he sometimes meets with in the 
 
Correlation of Studies. 49 
 
 persons of nurses, servants, and tradespeople, whose occupa- 
 tions have more attraction for him than those of cultured people. 
 The fairy world is a world of magic, of immediate interven- 
 tions of supernatural spirtual beings, and while this is proper 
 enough for the child up to the time of the school, and in a les- 
 sening degree for some time after, it is only negative and harm- 
 ful in adult manhood and womanhood. It produces arrested 
 development of powers of observation and reflection in refer- 
 ence to phenomena, and stops the growth of the soul at the 
 infantine stage of devolpment. Neither is this infantine stage 
 of wonder and magic more religious than the stage of disillu- 
 sion through the study of mathematics and physics. It is the 
 arrest of religious development also, at the stage of fetichism. 
 The highest religion, that of pure Christianity, sees in the 
 world infinite mediations, all for the purpose of developing in- 
 dependent individuality; the perfection of human souls not 
 only in one kind of piety, namely that of the heart, but in the 
 piety of the intellect that beholds truth, the piety of the will 
 that does good deeds wisely, the piety of the senses that sees 
 the beautiful and realizes it in works of art. This is the Chris- 
 tian idea of divine Providence as contrasted with the heathen 
 idea of that Providence, and the study of natural philosophy 
 is an essential educational requisite in its attainment, although 
 a negative means. Of course there is danger of replacing the 
 spiritual idea of the divine by the dynamical or mechanical 
 idea and thus arresting the mind at the stage of pantheism 
 instead of fetichism. But this danger can be avoided by fur- 
 ther education through secondary into higher education, whose 
 entire spirit and method are comparative and philosophical in 
 the best sense of the term. For higher education seems to 
 have as its province the correlation of the several branches of 
 human learning in the unity of the spiritual view furnished by 
 religion to our civilization. By it one learns to see each 
 branch, each science or art or discipline, in the light of all the 
 others. 
 
 This higher or comparative view is essential to any com- 
 pleteness of education, for it alone prevents the one-sidedness 
 of hobbies, or "fads" as they are called in the slang of the 
 day. It prevents also the bad effects that flow from the influ- 
 ence of what are termed "self-educated men," who for the most 
 
50 Report of Committee of Fifteen. 
 
 part carry up with them elementary methods of study, or at 
 best, secondary methods, which accentuate the facts and rela- 
 tions of natural and spiritual phenomena, but do not deal with 
 their higher correlations. The comparative method cannot, in 
 fact, be well introduced until the student is somewhat ad- 
 vanced, and has already completed his elementary course of 
 study dealing with the immediate aspects of the world, and 
 his secondary course dealing with the separate formal and dy- 
 namical aspects that lie next in order behind the facts of first 
 observation. Higher education in a measure unifies these sep- 
 arate formal and dynamic aspects, corrects their one-sidedness, 
 and prevents the danger of what is so often noted in the self- 
 educated men who unduly exaggerate some one of the subordi- 
 nate aspects of the world and make it a sort of first principle. ^^ 
 Here your Committee finds in its way the question of the 
 use of the full scientific method in the teaching of science in 
 the elementary school. The true method has been called the 
 method of investigation, but that method as used by the child 
 is only a sad caricature of the method used by the mature 
 scientific man, who has long since passed through the fragmen- 
 tary observation and reflection that prevail in the period of 
 childhood, as well as the tendencies to exaggeration of the 
 importance of one or another branch of knowledge at the 
 expense of the higher unity that correlates all; an exaggera- 
 tion that manifests itself in the possession and use of a hobby. 
 The ideal scientific man has freed himself from obstacles of 
 this kind, whether psychological or objective. What astro- 
 nomical observers call the subjective coefficient must be ascer- 
 tained and eliminated from the record that shows beginnings, 
 endings, and rates. There is a possibility of perfect speciali- 
 zation in a scientific observer only after the elementary and 
 secondary attitudes of mind have been outgrown. An attempt 
 
 ^^Many students and admirers of this report will regret that it 
 waits to introduce this idea of correlation until the pupil reaches the 
 secondary school. It should be in the mind of the teacher in every 
 grade, and every grade should be taught in the light of it. The sec- 
 ondary school may be the place where the child first comes to a 
 full consciousness of it, but it should be in his sub-consciousness long 
 before. This is the definition of correlation for which the so-called 
 Herbartian movement is contending — the unification of all studies in 
 the life of the individual, and the recognition of this unity in the world 
 
Correlation of Studies. 51 
 
 to force the child into the full scientific method by specializa- 
 tion would cause an arrest of his development in the other 
 branches of human learning outside of his specialty. He could 
 not properly inventory the data of his own special sphere un- 
 less he knew how to recognize the defining limits or boundaries 
 that separate his province from its neighbors. The early days 
 of science abounded in examples of confusion of provinces in 
 the inventories of their data. It is difficult, even now, to decide 
 where physics and chemistry leave off, and biology begins. 
 
 Your Committee does not attempt to state the exact pro- 
 portion in which the child, at his various degrees of advance- 
 ment, may be able to dispense with the guiding influence of 
 teacher and text-book in his investigations, but they protest 
 strongly against the illusion under which certain zealous advo- 
 cates of the early introduction of scientific method seem to labor. 
 They ignore in their zeal the deduction that is to be made for 
 the guiding hand of the teacher, who silently furnishes to the 
 child the experience that he lacks, and quietly directs his 
 special attention to this or to that phase, and prevents him 
 from hasty or false generalization as well as from undue exag- 
 geration of single facts or principles. Here the teacher adds 
 the needed scientific outlook which the child lacks, but which 
 the mature scientist possesses for himself. ^° 
 
 It is contended by some that the scientific frame of mind 
 is adapted only to science, but not to art, literature, and religion, 
 which have something essential that science does not reach; 
 not because of the incompleteness of the sciences themselves, 
 but because of the attitude of the mind assumed in the obser- 
 vation of nature. In analytic investigation there is isolation of 
 parts from one another, with a view to find the sources of the 
 
 3 0The distinction involved in this discussion between the method of 
 discovery and the method of instruction, in teaching elementary sci- 
 ence, is an important one. The child cannot pursue the study of science 
 by the method of discovery with profit until he has accumulated a body 
 of apperceivingscience ideas that will guide him in his attempts at orig- 
 inal discovery. Before this time he must discover (?) under the leadership 
 of teacher or text-book. In other words, he must learn elementary science 
 by the method of instruction which is so applied as to teach him the 
 way by which he shall pursue original discovery later. The organized 
 knowledge of teacher or text-book must guide him in getting ready to 
 pursue the method of investigation in acquiring new knowledge. 
 
52 Report of Committee of Fifteen. 
 
 influences which produce the phenomeoa shown in the object. 
 The mind brings everything to the test of this idea. Every 
 phenomenon that exists comes from beyond itself, and analysis 
 will be able to trace the source. 
 
 Now, this frame of mind, which insists on a foreign origin 
 of all that goes to constitute an object, debars itself in advance 
 from the province of religion, art, and literature as well as of 
 philosophy. For self-determination, personal activity, is the 
 first principle assumed by religion, and it is tacitly assumed by 
 art and literature, Classic and Christian. The very definition 
 of philosophy implies this, for it is the attempt to explain the 
 world by the assumption of a first principle, and to show that 
 all classes of objects imply that principle as ultimate presuppo- 
 sition. According to this view it is important not to attempt 
 to hasten the use of a strictly scientific method on the part of 
 the child. In his first years he is acquiring the results of 
 civilization rather as an outfit of habits, usages, and traditions 
 than as a scientific discovery. He cannot be expected to stand 
 over against the culture of his time, and challenge one and all 
 of its conventionalities to justify themselves before his reason. 
 His reason is too weak. He is rather in the imitation stage 
 of mind than in that of criticism. He will not reach the com- 
 parative or critical method until the era of higher education. 
 
 However this may be, it is clear that the educational 
 value of science and its method is a very important question, 
 and that on it depends the settlement of the question where 
 specialization may begin. To commence the use of the real 
 scientific method would imply a radical change also in methods 
 from the beginning. This may be realized by considering the 
 hold which even the kindergarten retains upon symbolism and 
 upon art and literature. But in the opinion of a majority of 
 your Committee natural science itself should be approached, 
 in the earliest years of the elementary school, rather in the 
 form of results with glimpses into the methods by which these 
 results were reached. In the last two years (the seventh and 
 eighth) there may be some strictness of scientific form and 
 an exhibition of the method of discovery. The pupil, too, 
 may to some extent put this method into practice himself. In 
 the secondary school there should be some laboratory work. 
 But the pupil cannot be expected to acquire for himself fully 
 
Correlation of /Studies. 53 
 
 that the world and its history is a sort of antiphonic hymn in 
 the scientific method of dealing with nature until the second 
 part of higher education — its post-graduate work. Neverthe- 
 less this good should be kept in view from the first year of the 
 elementary school, and there should be a gradual and con- 
 tinual approach to it. ^^ 
 
 In the study of general history appears another branch of 
 the secondary course. History of the native land is assumed 
 to be an elementary study. History of the world is certainly 
 a step further away from the experience of the child. It is 
 held by some teachers to be in accordance with proper method 
 to begin with the foreign relations of one's native land and to 
 work outward to the world-history. The European relations 
 involved in the discovery and colonization of America furnish 
 the only explanation to a multitude of questions that the pupil 
 has started in the elementary school. He should move out- 
 ward from what he has already learned, by the study of a new 
 concentric circle of grounds and reasons, according to this view. 
 This, however, is not the usual course taken. On beginning 
 secondary history the pupil is set back face to face with the 
 period of tradition, just when historic traces first make their 
 appearance. He is by this arrangement broken off from the 
 part of history that he has become acquainted with and made 
 to grapple with that period which has no relation to his pre- 
 vious investigations. It is to be said, however, that general 
 history lays stress on the religious thread of connection, 
 though less now than formerly. The world history is a con- 
 ception of the great Christian thinker, St. Augustine, who held 
 
 ^^This is an interesting discussion of the influence of the study of 
 science upon the young. That a serious study of science In the ele- 
 mentary and high schools debars the mind from the province of relig- 
 ion, art, and literature is a startling conclusion. Is it not Dr. Harris 
 himself who stoutly affirms that one of the direct roads to the insight 
 that the ultimate principle of the universe is a person lies through the 
 study of science? If the study of nature by a logical necessity leads to 
 the conclusion that conscious self-activity is the core and essence of all 
 things, we may well be startled when we are told that the study of 
 science at any age debars the mind from religion. Is it not the faulty 
 teaching of science that does it? Is it not because development is 
 arrested by too little reference to that higher unity to which science 
 points, that the study of science as a discipline in elementary and 
 secondary schools tends to debar the mind from the province of 
 religion? 
 
54- Report of Committee of Fifteen. 
 
 which Grod reads his counsels, and the* earth and man read the 
 responses. He induced Orosius, his pupil, to sketch a general 
 history in the spirit of his view. It was natural that the Old 
 Testament histories, and especially the chapters of Genesis, 
 should furnish the most striking part of its contents. This 
 general history was connected with religion and brought closer 
 to the experience of the individual than the history of his own 
 people. To commence history with the G-arden of Eden, the Fall 
 of Man, and the Noachian Deluge was to begin with what was 
 most familiar to all minds, and most instructive, because it con- 
 cerned most nearly the conduct of life. Thus religion furnished 
 the apperceptive material by which the early portions -of his- 
 tory were recognized, classified, and made a part of experience. 
 Now that studies in archaeology, especially those in the 
 Nile and Euphrates valleys, are changing the chronologies and 
 the records of early times and adding new records of the past, 
 bringing to light national movements and collisions of peoples, 
 together with data by which to determine the status of their 
 industrial civilization, their religious ideas, and the form of 
 their literature and art, the concentric arrangement of all this 
 material around the history of the chosen people as a nucleus 
 is no longer possible. The question has arisen, therefore, 
 whether general history should not be rearranged for the 
 secondary school, and made to connect with American history 
 for apperceptive material rather than with Old Testament 
 history. To this it has been replied with force that the idea 
 of a world history, as St. Augustine conceived it, is the noblest 
 educative ideal ever connected with the subject of history. 
 Future versions of general history will not desert this stand- 
 point, we are told, even if they take as their basis that of 
 ethnology and anthropology, for these, too, will exhibit a plan 
 in human history — an educative principle that leads nations 
 toward freedom and science, because the Creator of nature 
 has made it, in its fundamental constitution, an evolution or 
 progressive development of individuality. Thus the idea of 
 divine Providence is retained, though made more comprehen- 
 sive by bringing the whole content of natural laws within his 
 will as his method of work.^^ 
 
 22The above is a new argument for the beginning of the study of 
 history with the near rather than the remote. In this suggestion the 
 
Correlation of Studies. 55 
 
 These considerations, we are reminded by the partisans of 
 humanity studies, point back to the educative value of history 
 as corrective of the one-sidedness of the method of science. 
 Science seeks explanation in the mechanical conditions of, and 
 impulses received from, the environment, while history keeps 
 its gaze fixed on human purposes, and studies the genesis of 
 national actions through the previous stages of feelings, con- 
 victions, and conscious ideas. In history the pupil has for his 
 object self-activity, reaction against environment, instead of 
 mechanism, or activity through another. 
 
 The history of English literature is another study of the 
 secondary school. It is very properly placed beyond the ele- 
 mentary school, for as taught it consists largely of the 
 biographies of men of letters. The pupils who have not yet 
 learned any great work of literature should not be pestered 
 with literary biography, for at that stage the greatness of the 
 men of letters cannot be seen. Plutarch makes great biogra- 
 phies because he shows heroic struggles and great deeds. The 
 heroism of artists and poets consists in sacrificing all for the 
 sake of their creations. The majority of them come off sadly 
 at the hands of the biographer, for the reason that the very 
 sides of their lives are described which they had slighted and 
 neglected for the sake of the Muses. The prophets of Israel 
 did not live in city palaces, but in caves; they did not wear 
 fine raiment, nor feed sumptuously, nor conform to the codes of 
 polite society. They were no courtiers when they approached 
 
 report is in accord with the teachings of the Herbartlan movement 
 which would begin the study of history with the institutional life that 
 is the child's environment, and proceed to the study of the pioneer life of 
 that environment and from thence to the study of one's own country 
 and so on to the history of ancient times. 
 
 It is interesting to note, also, that this movement tends to begin 
 the study of literature with fairy stories and the legendary tales of 
 ancient times. The fanciful and imaginary, was the stage of develop- 
 ment of literature among the ancients. Hegel calls the Greek period 
 the boyhood of the race. There is something, as has been said before, 
 in this idea of culture epochs that can be made useful in education. 
 How much, it remains yet to be seen. But the idea of this movement 
 seems to be that through acquaintance with ancient myths in childhood 
 the pupil becomes somewhat familiar with one phase of the life of the 
 ancient peoples — the aesthetic and religious— and so is better prepared 
 to understand their institutional life later, when he has attained the 
 age of reason. 
 
5i6 Rejwrt of Committee of Fifteen. 
 
 the king. They neglected all the other institutions — family, 
 productive industry, and state — for the sake of one, the Church, 
 and even that not the established ceremonial of the people, 
 but a higher and more direct communing with Jehovah. So 
 with artists and men of letters it is more or less the case that 
 the institutional side of their lives is neglected, or unsymmet- 
 rical, or if this is not the case it will be found prosaic and 
 uneventful, throwing no light on their matchless produc- 
 tions. 
 
 For these reasons should not the present use of literary 
 biography as it exists in secondary schools, and is gradually 
 making its way into elementary schools, be discouraged, and 
 the time now given to it devoted to the study of literary works 
 of art? It will be admitted that the exposure of the foibles 
 of artists has an immoral tendency on youth: for example, 
 one effects to be a poet, and justifies laxity and self-indulgence 
 through the example of Byron. Those who support this view 
 holdothat we should not dignify the immoral and defective 
 side f life by making it a branch of study in school.^' 
 
 Correlation by synthesis of studies. 
 
 Your Committee would mention another sense in which the 
 expression correlation of studies is sometimes used. It is held 
 by advocates of an artificial center of the course of study. 
 They use, for example, De Foe's Robinson Crusoe for a reading 
 exercise, and connect with it the lessons in geography and 
 arithmetic. It has been pointed out by critics of this method 
 that there is always danger of covering up the literary features 
 of the reading matter under accessories of mathematics and 
 natural science. If the material for other branches is to be 
 sought for in connection with the literary exercise, it will dis- 
 tract the attention from the poetic unity. On the other hand, 
 arithmetic and geography cannot be unfolded freely and com- 
 prehensively if they are to wait on the opportunities afforded 
 in a poem or a novel for their development. A correlation of 
 
 ^^This argument against the serious study of the biographies of 
 authors in connection with the study of their works, is both unique 
 and forcible. They are not to be studied because they are not worth 
 knowing at that stage of the pupil's growth. 
 
Correlation of /Studies. 57 
 
 this kind, instead of being a deeper correlation such as is found 
 in all parts of human learning by the studies of the college and 
 university, is rather a shallow and uninteresting kind of corre- 
 lation that reminds one of the system of mnemonics, or arti- 
 ficial memory, which neglects the association of facts and events 
 with their causes and the history of their evolution, and looks 
 for unessential quips, puns, or accidental suggestions with a 
 view to strengthening the memory. The effect of this is to 
 weaken the power of systematic thinking which deals with 
 essential relations, and substitute for it a chaotic memory 
 that ties together things through false and seeming relations, 
 not of the things and events, but of the words that denote 
 them. 
 
 The correlation of geography and arithmetic and history 
 in and through the unity of a work of fiction is at best an 
 artificial correlation, which will stand in the way of the true 
 objective correlations. It is a temporary scaffolding made for 
 school purposes. Instruction should avoid such temporary 
 structures as much as possible, and when used they should be 
 only used for the day, and not for the year, because of the 
 danger of building up an apperceptive center in the child's 
 mind that will not harmonize with the true apperceptive center 
 required by the civilization. The story of Robinson Crusoe 
 has intense interest to the child as a lesson in sociology, show- 
 ing him the helplessness of isolated man and the re-enforce- 
 ment that comes to him through society. It shows the impor- 
 tance of the division of labor. All children should read this 
 book in the later years of the elementary course, and a few 
 profitable discussions may be had in school regarding its sig- 
 nificence. But De Foe painted in it only the side of adventure 
 that be found in his countrymen in his epoch, England after 
 the defeat of the Armada having taken up a career of con- 
 quest on the seas, ending by colonization and a world com- 
 merce. The liking for adventure continues to this day among 
 all Anglo-Saxon peoples, and beyond other nationalities there 
 is in English-speaking populations a delight in building up 
 civilization from the very foundation. This is only, however, 
 one phase of the Anglo-Saxon mind. Consequently the his- 
 tory of Crusoe is not a proper center for a year's study in 
 school. It omits cities, governments, the world commerce, 
 
58 Report of Committee of Fifteen. 
 
 the international process, the Church,* the newspaper and book 
 from view, and they are not even reflected in it. 
 
 Your Committee would call attention in this connection to 
 the importance of the pedagogical principle of analysis and isola- 
 tion as preceding synthesis and correlation. There should be 
 rigid isolation of the elements of each branch for the purpose of 
 gettingaclear conception of what is individual and peculiar in a 
 special province of learning. Otherwise one will not gain from 
 each its special contribution to the whole. That there is some 
 danger from the kind of correlation that essays to teach all 
 branches in each will be apparent from this point of view.^* 
 
 III. THE SCHOOL PROGRAM. 
 
 In order to find a place in the elementary school for the 
 several branches recommended in this report, it will be nec- 
 essary to use economically the time allotted for the school 
 
 ^^This section of the report has been thought to assail the principle 
 of concentration which is emphasized so strongly by the Herbartians. 
 It is reported that such an artificial center as Robinson Crusoe has been 
 advocated by some German pedagogues who call themselves Herbar- 
 tians, but was not advocated by Herbart himself. No such doctrine is 
 taught by any Herbartian in this country who has ability enough to 
 gain a hearing and a following. But there is one serious attempt in 
 this country to teach all the common school branches, or a large num- 
 ber of them, with nature ^tudy as the core. The Herbartians choose 
 language, literature, and history as the central studies. It is their doc- 
 trine that each branch is to be mastered as a distinct group of ideas, 
 but their contention is that the differences between the studies is too 
 often emphasized to the exclusion of their unity. In much of our 
 school practice parts of a subject, as arithmetic, or geography, are so 
 separated from other parts of the same study that the pupils fail to see 
 them as parts of one whole. The school studies may be classified not only 
 into groups of kindred studies as the mathematics, the natural sciences, 
 and the like, but some of these groups have a closer kinship than have 
 others; such as language, literature, and history for example. This kin- 
 ship can be recognized in the interest of an organized unity of knowledge 
 even in the lower grades. But the Herbartians should not be forced, even 
 by the misrepresentation of the critics, to go to the other extreme from 
 that which now prevails so generally, and teach either in theory or 
 practice, that a thorough mastery of each study as a distinct body of 
 knowledge and a distinct discipline is not to be insisted upon. The 
 contention is that arithmetic can be better mastered as arithmetic In 
 the elementary grades when it is seen in its concrete relations to life; 
 that is, to the other subjects of study in the school. 
 
Correlation of ^Studies, 59 
 
 term, which is about two hundred days, exclusive of vacations 
 and holidays. Five days per week and five hours of actual 
 school work or a little less per day, after excluding recesses for 
 recreation, give about twenty-five hours per week. There 
 should be, as far as possible, alternation of study-hours and 
 recitations (the word recitation being used in the United 
 States for class exercise or lesson conducted by the teacher 
 and requiring the critical attention of the entire class.) Those 
 studies requiring the clearest thought should be taken up, as a 
 usual thing, in the morning session, say arithmetic the second 
 half hour of the morning and grammar the half-hour next 
 succeeding the morning recess for recreation in the open air. 
 By some who are anxious to prevent study at home, or at least 
 to control its amount, it is thought advisable to place the 
 arithmetic lesson after the grammar lesson, so that the study 
 learned at home will be grammar instead of arithmetic. It is 
 found by experience that if mathematical problems are taken 
 home for solution two bad habits arise, namely, in one case, the 
 pupil gets assistance from his parents or others, and thereby 
 loses to some extent his own power of overcoming difficulties 
 by brave and persistent attacks unaided by others; the other 
 evil is a habit of consuming long hours in the preperation of a 
 lesson that should be prepared in thirty minutes, if all the 
 powers of mind are fresh and at command. An average child 
 may spend three hours in the preparation of an arithmetic 
 lesson. Indeed, in repeated efforts to solve one of the so- 
 called "conundrums," a whole family may spend the entire 
 evening. One of the unpleasant results of the next day is 
 that the teacher who conducts the lesson never knows the 
 exact capacity and rate of progress of his pupils; in the 
 recitation he probes the knowledge and preparation of the 
 pupil, plus an unknown amount of preparatory work borrow- 
 ed from parents and others. He even increases the length of 
 the lessons, and requires more work at home, when the amount 
 already exceeds the unaided capacity of the pupil. 
 
 The lessons should be arranged so as to bring in such exer- 
 cises as furnish relief from intellectual tension between others 
 that make large demands on the thinking powers. Such exer- 
 cises as singing and calisthenics, writing and drawing, also 
 reading, are of the nature of a relief from those recitations 
 
60 Report of Committee of Fifteen. 
 
 that tax the memory, critical alertnesS, and introspection, like 
 arithmetic, grammar, and history. 
 
 Your Committee has not been able to agree on the question 
 whether pupils who leave school early should have a course of 
 study different from the course of those who are to continue 
 on into secondary and higher work. It is contended, on the 
 one hand, that those who leave early should have a more prac- 
 tical course, and that they should dispense with those studies 
 that seem to be in the nature of preparatory work for sec- 
 ondary and higher education. Such studies as algebra and 
 Latin, for example, should not be taken up unless the pupil 
 expects to pursue the same for a sufficient time to complete 
 the secondary course. It is replied on the other hand, that it 
 is best to have one course for all, because any school education 
 is at best but an initiation for the pupil into the art of learn- 
 ing, and that wherever he leaves off in his school course he 
 should continue, by the aid of the public library and home 
 study, in the work of mastering science and literature. It is 
 further contended that a brief course in higher studies, like 
 Latin and algebra, instead of being useless, is of more value 
 than any elementary studies that might replace them. The 
 first ten lessons in algebra give the pupil the fundamental idea 
 of the general expression of arithmetical solutions by means 
 of letters and other symbols. Six months study of it gives 
 him the power to use the method in stating the manifold con- 
 ditions of a problem in partnership, or in ascertaining a value 
 that depends on several transformations of the data given. It 
 is claimed, indeed, that the first few lessons in any branch are 
 relatively of more educational value than an equal number of 
 subsequent lessons, because the fundamental ideas and princi- 
 ples of the new study are placed at the beginning. In Latin, 
 for instance, the pupil learns in his first week's study the to 
 him strange phenomenon of a language that performs by 
 inflections what his own language performs by the use of prep- 
 ositions and auxiliaries. He is still more surprised to find that 
 the order of words in a sentence is altogether different in Ro- 
 man usage from that to which he is accustomed. He further 
 begins to recognize in the Latin words many roots or stems 
 which are employed to denote immediate sensuous objects, 
 while they have been adopted into his English tongue to 
 
Correlation of Studies, 61 
 
 signify fine shades of distinction in thought or feeling. By 
 these three things his powers of observation in matters of lan- 
 guage are armed, as it were, with new faculties. Nothing 
 that he has hitherto learned in grammar is so radical and 
 far reaching as what he learns of his first week's study of Latin. 
 The Latin arrangement of words in a sentence indicates a dif- 
 ferent order of mental arrangement in the process of appre- 
 hension and expression of thought. This arrangement is 
 rendered possible by declensions. This amounts to attaching 
 prepositions to the ends of the words, which they thus convert 
 into adjectival or adverbial modifiers; whereas the separate 
 prepositions of the English must indicate by their position in 
 the sentence their grammatical relation. These observations, 
 and the new insight into the etymology of P^nglish words hav- 
 ing a Latin derivation, are of the nature of mental seeds which 
 will grow and bear fruit throughout life in the better com- 
 mand of one's native tongue. All this will come from a very 
 brief time devoted to Latin in school. 
 
 Amount of time for each branch. 
 
 Your Committee recommends that an hour of sixty min- 
 utes each week be assigned in the program for each of the 
 following subjects throughout the eight years: Physical 
 culture, vocal music, oral lessons in natural science (hygiene 
 to be included among the topics under this head), oral lessons 
 in biography and general history, and that the same amount 
 of time each week shall be devoted to drawing from the second 
 year to the eighth inclusive; to manual training during the 
 seventh and eighth years so as to include sewing and cookery 
 for the girls, and work in wood and iron for the boys. 
 
 Your Committee recommends that reading be given at 
 least one lesson each day for the entire eight years, it being 
 understood, however, that there shall be two or more lessons 
 each day in reading in the first and second years, in which the 
 recitation is necessarily very short, because of the inability of 
 the pupil to give continued close attention, and because he 
 has little power of applying himself to the work of preparing 
 lessons by himself. In the first three years the reading should 
 
62 Report of Committee of Fifteen. 
 
 be limited to pieces in the colloquial style, but selections from 
 the classics of the language in prose and in poetry shall be 
 read to the pupil from time to time, and discussions made of 
 such features of the selections read as may interest the pupils. 
 After the third year, your Committee believes that the reading 
 lesson should be given to selections from classic authors of 
 English, and that the work of the recitation should be divided 
 between {a) the elocution, {b) the grammatical peculiarities of 
 the language, including spelling, definitions, syntactical con- 
 struction, punctuation, and figures of prosody, and (c) the 
 literary contents, including the main and accessory ideas, the 
 emotions painted, the deeds described, the devices of style to 
 produce a strong impression on the reader. Your Committee 
 wishes to lay emphasis on the importance of the last item — 
 that of literary study — which should consume more and more 
 of the time of the recitation from grade to grade in the period 
 from the fourth to the eighth year. In the fourth year and 
 previously the first item — that of elocution, to secure distinct 
 enunciation and correct pronunciation — should be most prom- 
 inent. In the fifth and sixth years the second item — that of 
 spelling, defining, and punctuation — should predominate 
 slightly over the other two items. In the yeais from the fifth 
 to the eig^hth there should be some reading of entire stories, 
 such as G-ulliver's Travels, Robinson Crusoe, Rip Van Winkle, 
 The Lady of the Lake, Hiawatha, and similar stories adapted 
 in style and subject-matter to the capacity of the pupils. An 
 hour should be devoted each week to conversations on the 
 salient points of the story, its literary and ethical bearings. ^^ 
 
 ^^It seems pretty evident that this report regards the text-book in 
 reading as the chief source of material for the study of literature in 
 elementary grades. There is a phase of literature study that is ana- 
 lytic and another in which synthesis is the leading movement. For 
 the former the suggestions in this report are worthy of universal ap- 
 proval. The selections in Appleton's Fourth Reader indicate the grade 
 of literature that the author has in mind. The writer has known a 
 thoughtful teacher to spend six weeks in the study of "The Bare-foot 
 Boy." The author of this report would not approve of that, to be sure, 
 but one can gain from the outlines of study appended to the selections 
 in Appleton's Fourth and Fifth readers the sort of study he has in 
 view. There is a large class of very thoughtful teachers who do not 
 find in this sort of study all or nearly all that the school should do to 
 cultivate a taste for good reading. But they generally stand firm in 
 
Correlation of Studies. 63 
 
 Your Committee agrees in the opinion that in teaching 
 language care should be taken that the pupil practices much 
 in writing exercises and original compositions. At first the 
 pupil will use only his colloquial vocabulary, but as he gains 
 command of the technical vocabularies of geography, arithme- 
 tic, and history, and learns the higher literary vocabulary of 
 his language, he will extend his use of words accordingly. 
 Daily from the first year the child will prepare some lesson or 
 portion of a lesson in writing. Your Committee has included 
 under the head of oral grammar (from the first to the middle 
 of the fifth year) one phase of this written work devoted to the 
 study of the literary form and the technicalities of composition 
 in such exercises as letter writing, written reviews of the 
 several branches studied, reports of the oral lessons in natural 
 science and history, paraphrases of the poems and prose liter- 
 ature of the readers, and finally compositions or written essays 
 on suitable themes assigned by the teacher, but selected from 
 the fields of knowledge studied in school. Care should be 
 taken to criticise all paraphrases of poetry in respect to the 
 good or bad taste shown in the choice of words; parodies 
 should never be permitted.^'' 
 
 It is thought by your Committee that the old style of 
 
 the conviction that the reader should have the most prominent place 
 as material for use in teaching the children language and literature. 
 The pupil must learn how to study masterpieces by an analytic 
 method in which the isolation of parts prepares for their final unity. 
 But too much of this analysis has the general effect of the grammatical 
 analysis and parsing of "The Lady of the Lake." There should be an 
 equal amount of study of literature in which synthesis is the leading 
 process. Here the mastery of the content is the leading purpose and 
 the study of the form is incidental. It is but slowly that a child grows 
 into an appreciation of the form in literary masterpieces. But the 
 ethical and thought content they can master sooner and it is by way of 
 the mastery of these that they eventually come into an appreciation of 
 the beauty of form. The reader is in the schools for all time. It is 
 equally important that other literary masterpieces, and in the lower 
 grades, juvenile literature, be read with only so much analytic study 
 as will make sure of the meaning and leave the beauty of form to pro- 
 duce what effect it may. 
 
 ^^In interpreting this paragraph the reader must be careful to dis- 
 tinguish between 'paraphrase and parody. The latter is never to be en- 
 couraged. The former is of doubtful value except when employed for 
 the purpose named in the report. 
 
64 Report of Committee of Fifteen, 
 
 <;omposition writing was too formal. It was kept too far away 
 from the other work of the pupil. Instead of giving a written 
 account of what he had learned in arithmetic, geography, 
 grammar, history, and natural science, the pupil attempted 
 artificial descriptions and reflections on such subjects as 
 "Spring," "Happiness," "Perseverence, " "Friendship," or 
 something else outside of the line of his school studies. 
 
 Your Committee has already expressed its opinion that 
 a good English style is not to be acquired by the study of 
 grammar so much as by familiarity with great masterpieces 
 of literature. We especially recommend that pupils who 
 have taken up the fourth and fifth readers, containing the 
 selections from great authors, should often be required to 
 make written paraphrases of prose or poetic models of style, 
 using their own vocabulary to express the thoughts so far as 
 possible, and borrowing the recherche words and phrases of 
 the author, where their own resources fail them. In this way 
 the pupil learns to see what the great author has done to en- 
 rich the language and to furnish adequate means of expression 
 for what could not be presented in words before, or at least 
 not in so happy a manner. 
 
 Your Committee believes that every recitation is, in one 
 aspect of it, an attempt to express the thoughts and informa- 
 tion of the lesson in the pupil's own words, and thus an initial 
 exercise in composition. The regular weekly written review 
 of the important topics in the several branches studied is a 
 more elaborate exercise in composition, the pupil endeavoring 
 to collect what he knows and to state it systematically and 
 in proper language. The punctuation, spelling, syntax, pen- 
 manship, choice of words, and style should not, it is true, be 
 made a matter of criticism in connection with the other lessons, 
 but only in the language lesson proper. But the pupil will learn 
 language, all the same, by the written and oral recitations. The 
 oral grammar lessons from the first year to the middle of the 
 fifth year, should deal chiefly with the use of language, gradually 
 introducing the grammatical technique as it is needed to describe 
 accurately the correct forms and the usages violated. 
 
 Your Committee believes that there is some danger of wast- 
 ing the time of the pupil in these oral and written language 
 lessons in the first four years by confining the work of the 
 
Correlation of Studies. 65 
 
 pupil to the expression of ordinary commonplace ideas not 
 related to the subjects of his other lessons, especially when the 
 expression is confined to the colloquial vocabulary. Such 
 training has been severely and justly condemned as teaching 
 what is called prating or gabbling, rather than a noble use of 
 English speech. It is clear that the pupil should have a digni- 
 fied and worthy subject of composition, and what is so good 
 for his purpose as the themes he has tried to master in his 
 regular lessons ? The reading lessons will give matter for 
 literary style, the geography for scientific style, and the arith- 
 metic for a business style; for all styles should be learned. 
 
 Your Committee recommends that selected lists of words 
 difficult to spell be made from the reading lessons and mastered 
 by frequent writing and oral spelling during the fourth, fifth, 
 and sixth years. 
 
 Your Committee recommends that the use of a text-book in 
 grammar begin with the second half of the fifth year, and con- 
 tinue until the beginning of the study of Latin in the eighth 
 grade, and that one daily lesson of twenty-five or thirty min- 
 utes be devoted to it.* 
 
 For Latin we recommend one daily lesson of thirty minutes 
 for the eighth year. For arithmetic we recommend number 
 work from the first year to the eighth, one lesson each day, but 
 the use of the text-book in number should not, in our opinion, 
 begin until the first quarter of the third year. We recommend 
 that the applications of elementary algebra to arithmetic, as 
 hereinbefore explained, be substituted for pure arithmetic in 
 the seventh and eighth years, a daily lesson being given. 
 
 Your committee recommends that penmanship as a separate 
 branch be taught in the first six years at least three lessons per 
 week. ^" 
 
 Geography, in the opinion of your Committee, should begin 
 with oral lessons in the second year, and with a text-book in the 
 
 ^^There is too much time wasted on teaching penmanship in our 
 graded schools. This recommendation that penmanship as a separate 
 branch cease with the sixth grade ought to be adopted. The writer re- 
 cently visited an eighth grade taught by the principal of a large build- 
 ing in one of the prominent smaller cities of the central states. He was 
 a good teacher of long experience and taught penmanship by the ap- 
 proved methods, using a good deal of practice paper, the pupils putting 
 
 * See comment on a preceding page. 
 
66 Report of Committee of Fifteen. 
 
 third quarter of the third year, and be continued to the close of 
 the sixth year with one lesson each day, and in the seventh and 
 eighth years with three lessons per week.* 
 
 History of the United States with the use of a text-book, 
 your Committee recommends for the seventh and the first half 
 of the eighth year, one lesson each day; the Constitution of 
 the United States for the third quarter of the eighth year. 
 
 The following schedule will show the number of lessons per 
 week for each quarter of each year: 
 
 Reading. Eight years, with daily lessons. 
 
 Penmanship. Six years, ten lessons per week for first two years, five 
 for third and fourth, and three for fifth and sixth. 
 
 Spelling Lists. Fourth, fifth, and sixth years, four lessons per week. 
 
 Grammar. Oral, with composition or dictation, first year to middle of 
 fifth year, text-book from middle of fifth year to close of seventh 
 year, five lessons per week. (Composition writing should be included 
 under this head. But the written examinations on the several 
 branches should be counted under the head of composition work.) 
 
 Latin or French or German. Eighth year, five lessons per week. 
 
 Arithmetic. Oral first and second year, text-book third to sixth year, 
 five lessons per week. 
 
 Algebra. Seventh and eighth year, five lessons per week. 
 
 Geography. Oral lessons second year to middle of third year, text- 
 book from middle of third year, five lessons weekly to seventh year, 
 and three lessons to close of eighth. 
 
 Natural Science and Hygien*^. Sixty minutes per week, eight years. 
 
 History of United States. Five hours per week seventh year and first 
 half of eighth year. 
 
 Constitution of United States. Third quarter in the eighth year. 
 
 General History and Biography. Oral lessons, sixty minutes a week, 
 eight years. 
 
 Physical Culture. Sixty minutes a week, eight years. 
 
 Vocal Music. Sixty minutes a week, eight years. 
 
 Drawing. Sixty minutes a week, eight years. 
 
 Manual Training, Sewing, and Cooking. One-half day each week in 
 seventh and eighth years. 
 
 their best efforts on the copy-book — a few lines at each lesson. The 
 school had been doing this for eight months and had that day finished 
 the copy-books. On inspection of the books its was discovered that' in 
 three cases in four, and, probably in five cases in six, the first page 
 written last September was distinctly better in every respect than the 
 last pasres written in the following May. Sixty hours or twelve solid 
 days of the school time of the year had been worse than wasted. 
 The pupils all wrote well enough in September. It is quite probable 
 that they wrote well enough when they finished the sixth grade. Let 
 this excellence be maintained in the written exercises of the school and 
 use the writing hour for something else. 
 
Correlation of Studies. 67 
 
 .Your Committee recommends recitations of fifteen minutes 
 in length in the first and second years, of twenty minutes in 
 length in the third and fourth years, of twenty-five minutes in 
 the fifth and sixth years, and of thirty minutes in the seventh 
 and eighth. 
 
 The results of this program show for the first and second 
 years twenty lessons a week of fifteen minutes each, besides 
 seven other exercises occupying an average of twelve minutes 
 apiece each day; the total amount of time occupied in the con- 
 tinuous attention of the recitation or class exercises being 
 twelve hours, or an average of two hours and twenty-four min- 
 utes per day. 
 
 For the third year twenty lessons a week of twenty min- 
 utes each, and five general exercises taking up five hours a 
 week or an average of one hour per day, giving an average 
 time per day of two hours and twenty minutes for class recita- 
 tions or exercises. 
 
 In the fourth the recitations increase to twenty-four (by 
 reason of four extra lessons in spelling) and the time occupied 
 in recitations and exercises to thirteen hours and an average 
 per day of two hours and thirty-six minutes. 
 
68 
 
 Report of Committee of Fifteen. 
 
 Branches. 
 
 ut year 
 
 •2d year 
 
 3d year 
 
 Uh ye'r 
 
 5th ye'r 
 
 6'/^ ye'r 
 
 7th ye'r 
 
 Sth ye'r 
 
 
 10 lessons a w'k 
 
 lessons a week 
 
 
 
 V.ritiag 
 
 10 lessons a w'k 
 
 5 lessons a week 3 lessons a week 
 
 
 Spelling Lists... 
 
 
 
 4 lessons a week 
 
 
 
 English Oral, with composition lessons 
 Grammar 
 
 5 lessons a week with 
 text-book 
 
 Latin 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 5 les'ns 
 
 
 
 
 Arithmetic 
 
 Oral, eo min- 
 utes a week 
 
 5 lessons a week with text-book 
 
 
 
 Algebra 
 
 
 1 
 
 
 
 
 5 lessons a week 
 
 
 
 Geography 
 
 Oral, 60 min'ts a week *5 lessons a week with text- 
 book 
 
 3 lessons a week 
 
 Natural Science 
 -f Hygiene 
 
 Sixty minutes a week 
 
 U. S. History. . . . 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 5 lessons a 
 week 
 
 
 U. S. Constitut'n 
 
 
 
 
 1 
 
 
 
 
 *5 
 
 les. 
 
 General History. 
 
 Oral, sixty minutes a week 
 
 Physical 
 
 Culture 
 
 Sixty minutes a week 
 
 Vocal Music. 
 
 Sixty minutes a week divided into four lessons 
 
 Drawiug. 
 
 Manual Train. 
 
 or Sewing— 
 
 Cookerv 
 
 Sixty minutes a week 
 
 One-half day ea. 
 
 No. of Lessons.. 
 
 30-T 
 daily 
 exer. 
 
 20-7 
 daily 
 exer. 
 
 20-5 
 
 ally 
 
 exer. 
 
 34-5 
 
 daily 
 exer. 
 
 27 -f 5 
 daily 
 exer. 
 
 27^5 1 23-6 
 daily | daily 
 exer. | exer. 
 
 23-6 
 daily 
 exer. 
 
 Total Hours of 
 Recitations 
 
 13 
 
 18 
 
 lis 
 
 13 
 
 16^^ 
 
 16^4 
 
 174 
 
 174 
 
 "^^"iSiSus"^"' 1^™-- 
 
 15 min. 
 
 20 min. 
 
 30 min. 
 
 25 min 
 
 25 min. 
 
 30 min. 
 
 30 min. 
 
 ^Begins in second half year 
 
Correlation of Studies. 69 
 
 In the fifth and sixth years the number of recitations in- 
 creases to twenty-seven per week, owing to the addition of 
 formal grammar, and the total number of hours required for 
 all is 16J; per week, or an average of 3^ per day. 
 
 In the seventh and eighth years the number of lessson 
 decreases to twenty-three, history being added, penmanship 
 and special lessons in spelling discontinued, the time devoted 
 to geography reduced to three lessons a week. But the reci- 
 tation is increased to thirty minutes in length. Manual train- 
 ing occupies a half day, or 2^ hours, each week. The total is 
 19 hours per week or 3f per day. 
 
 The foregoing tabular exhibit shows all of these par- 
 ticulars. 
 
 IV. METHODS AND ORGANIZATION. 
 
 Your Committee is agreed that the time devoted to the 
 elementary school work should not be reduced from eight 
 years, but they have reccommended, as hereinbefore stated, 
 that in the seventh and eighth years a modified form of algebra 
 be introduced in place of advanced arithmetic, and that in the 
 eighth year English grammar yield place to Latin. This 
 makes, in their opinion, a proper transition to the studies of 
 the secondary school and is calculated to assist the pupil 
 materially in his preparation for that work. Hitherto, the 
 change from the work of the elementary school has been too 
 abrupt, the pupil beginning three formal studies at once, 
 namely algebra, physical geography, and Latin. 
 
 Your Committee has found it necessary to discuss the ques- 
 tion of methods of teaching in numerous instances, while con- 
 sidering the question of educational values and programs, 
 because the value and time of beginning of the several branches 
 depends so largely on the method of teaching. 
 
 The following recommendations, however, remain for this 
 part of their report: 
 
 They would recommend that the specialization of teacher's 
 work should not be attempted before the seventh or eighth 
 year of the elementary school and in not more than one or two 
 studies then. In the secondary school it is expected that a 
 teacher will teach one or at most two branches. In the ele- 
 
70 Report of Committee of Fifteen. 
 
 men tary school, for at least six years, it is better, on the whole, 
 to have each teacher instruct his pupils in all the branches that 
 they study, for the reason that only in this way can he hold an 
 even pressure on the requirements of work, correlating it in 
 such a manner that no one study absorbs undue attention. 
 In this way the pupils prepare all their lessons under the 
 direct supervision of the same teacher, and by their recitations 
 show what defects of methods of study there have been in the 
 preparation. 
 
 The ethical training is much more successful under this 
 plan, because the personal influence of a teacher is much 
 greater when he or she knows minutely the entire scope of the 
 school work. In the case of the special teacher the responsi- 
 bility is divided and the opportunities of special acquaintance 
 with character and habits diminished. ^^ 
 
 With one teacher who supervises the study and hears all 
 the recitations, there is a much better opportunity to cultivate 
 the two kinds of attention. The teacher divides his pupils 
 into two cUsses and hears one recite while the other class pre- 
 pares for the next lesson. The pupils reciting are required to 
 pay strict attention to the one of their number who is explain- 
 ing the point assigned him by the teacher — they are to be on 
 the alert to notice any mistakes of statement or omissions of 
 important data, they are at the same time to pay close atten- 
 tion to the remarks of the teacher. This is one kind of 
 attention which may be called associated critical attention. 
 The pupils engaged in the preparation of the next lesson are 
 busy, each one by himself, studying the book and mastering 
 its facts and ideas, and comparing them one with another, and 
 making the effort to become oblivious of their fellow-pupils, the 
 recitation going on, and the teacher. This is another kind of 
 attention, which is not associated, but an individual effort to 
 master for one's self without aid a prescribed task and to resist 
 all distracting influences. These two disciplines in attention 
 are the best formal training that the school affords. 39 
 
 ^^This is a brief but very satisfactory disposition of the question of 
 specialization in teaching in the elementary schools. It is not best for 
 either teacher or pupils that specialization shall prevail below the high 
 school. 
 
 ^^This paragraph disposes of the craze for that "individualism" in 
 teaching which discards class exercises. The distinction between indi- 
 
Correlation of Studies. 71 
 
 Your committee has already mentioned a species of faulty 
 correlation wherein the attempt is made to study all branches 
 in each, misapplying Jacotot's maxim, "all is in all" {tout est 
 dans tout). 
 
 A frequent error of this kind is the practice of making 
 every recitation a language lesson, and interrupting the arith- 
 metic, geography, history, literature, or whatever it may be, 
 by calling the pupil's attention abruptly to something in his 
 forms of expression, his pronunciation, or to some faulty use of 
 English; thus turning the entire system of school work into a 
 series of grammar exercises and weakening the power of con- 
 tinuous thought on the objective contents of the several 
 branches, by creating a pernicious habit of self-consciousness 
 in the matter of verbal expression. While your Committee 
 would not venture to say that there should not be some degree 
 of attention to the verbal expression in all lessons, it is of the 
 opinion that it should be limited to criticism of the recitation 
 for its want of technical accuracy. The technical words in 
 each branch should be discussed until the pupil is familiar with 
 their full force. The faulty English should be criticised as 
 showing confusion of thought or memory, and should be cor- 
 rected in this sense. But solecisms of speech should be silently 
 noted by the teacher for discussion in the regular language 
 lesson. *° 
 
 The question of promotion of pupils has occupied from time 
 to time very much attention. Your Commitlee believes that in 
 many systems of elementary schools, there is injury done by 
 too much formality in ascertaining whether the pupils of a 
 
 vidualistic attention and associated attention is here well set forth. 
 Individualism in teaching seems to rest upon the false theory that a 
 person as individual has nothing in common with his fellows. On the 
 contrary, what he has in common with others is the largest and best 
 part of him as individual. The individual is the "undivided" self, and 
 the self is both universal and particular; both many and one; both man 
 and a man. 
 
 ^"No more important suggestion as to method of teaching has been 
 made in this report. The divided attention of the pupil between the 
 thing to be said and the manner of saying it, when the pupil is called 
 upon to do his best thinking, is one of the worst evils in many good 
 schools. When the pupil is merely reciting what he has already in 
 mind he can be held to strict responsibilty for the form in which he ex- 
 presses it. 
 
72 Report of Committee of Fifteen. 
 
 given class have completed the work tip to a given arbitrarily 
 fixed point, and are ready to take up the next apportionment 
 of the work. In the early days of city school systems, when 
 the office of superintendent was first created, it was thought 
 necessary to divide up the graded course of study into years 
 of work, and to hold stated annual examinations to ascertain 
 how many pupils could be promoted to the next grade or 
 year's work. All that failed at this examination were set back 
 at the beginning of the year's work to spend another year in 
 reviewing it. This was to meet the convenience of the super- 
 intendent who, it was said, could not hold examinations to suit 
 the wants of individuals or particular classes. From this ar- 
 rangement there naturally resulted a great deal of what is called 
 ' 'marking time. " Pupils who had nearly completed the work of 
 the year were placed with pupils who had been till now a year's 
 interval below them. Discouragement and demoralization at 
 the thought of taking up again a course of lessons learned 
 once before caused many pupils to leave school permaturely. 
 
 This evil has been remedied in nearly one-half of the cities 
 by promoting pupils whenever they have completed the work 
 of a grade. The constant tendency of classification to become 
 imperfect by reason of the difference in rates of advancement 
 of the several pupils, owing to disparity in ages, degree of 
 maturity, temperament, and health, makes frequent reclassifi- 
 cation necessary. _ This is easily accomplished by promoting 
 the few pupils who distance the majority of their classmates 
 into the next class above, separated as it is or ought to be, by 
 an interval of less than half a year. The bright pupils thus 
 promoted have to struggle to make up the ground covered in 
 the interval between the two classes, but they are nearly 
 always able to accomplish this, and generally will in two year's 
 time need another pro.i otion from class to class. 
 
 The Procrustean character of the old city systems has 
 been removed by this device. 
 
 There remain for mention some other evils besides bad 
 systems of promotion due to defects of organization. The 
 school buildings are often with superstitious care kept apart 
 exclusively for particular grades of pupils. The central build- 
 ing erected for high school purposes, though only half filled, 
 is not made to relieve the neighboring grammar school, 
 
Correlation of Studies. 73 
 
 crowded to such a degree that it cannot receive the classes 
 which ought to be promoted from the primary schools. It 
 has happened in such cases that this superstition prevailed so 
 far that the pupils in the primary school building were kept at 
 work on studies already finished, because they could not be 
 transferred to the grammar school. 
 
 In all good school systems the pupils take up new work 
 when they have completed the old, and the bright pupils are 
 transferred to higher classes when they have so far distanced 
 their fellows that the amount of work fixed for the average 
 ability of the class does not give them enough to do. 
 
 In conclusion your Committee would state, by way of ex- 
 planation, that it has been led into many digressions, in illus- 
 trating the details of its recommendations in this report, 
 through its desire to make clear the grounds on which it has 
 based its conclusions and through the hope that such de- 
 tails will call out a still more thorough-going discussion of the 
 educational values of branches proposed for elementary schools, 
 and of the methods by which those branches may be success- 
 fully taught. 
 
 With a view to increase the interest in this subject your 
 Committee recommends the publication of selected passages 
 from the papers sent in by invited auxiliary committees and 
 by volunteers, many of these containing valuable suggestions 
 not mentioned in this report. ^^ 
 
 William T. Harris, Chairman, 
 United States Commissioner of Education, Washington, D.C. 
 
 I dissent from the majority report of the Committee in 
 regard to the following points: 
 
 Arithmetic. 
 
 1. As to fractions : In teaching arithmetic there does not 
 exist any greater difficulty in getting small children to grasp 
 
 ■^^It is an interesting fact that the chairman is the only member of 
 the committee who signed this report without dissenting from some of 
 its doctrines. It will be observed that the non-concurrence of the other 
 members of the committee is not in the estimate made of the educational 
 values of the studies so much as in the method suggested for realizing 
 these values in the school. 
 
74 Report of Committee of Fifteen. 
 
 the nature of the fraction as such tlian in getting them to 
 grasp the idea of the simpler whole numbers. It is true that 
 the fractions ^, ^, ^, etc., as symbols, are a little more complex 
 than are the single digits; but as to the real meaning, when 
 once the fractional idea has been properly developed by the 
 teacher and the significance of the idea apprehended by the 
 pupil, it is as easily understood as any other simple truth. 
 Children get the idea of half^ third, or quarter of many things 
 long before they enter school, and they will as readily learn to 
 add, subtract, multiply, and divide fractions as they will whole 
 numbers. In using fractions they will draw diagrams and pic- 
 tures representing the processes of work as quickly and easily 
 as they illustrate similar work with integers. It is of course 
 assumed that the teacher knows how to teach arithmetic to 
 children, or rather, how to teach the children how to teach 
 themselves. There is really no valid argument why children 
 in the second, third, and fourth years in school should not 
 master the fundamental operations in fractions. Not only this, 
 they will put the more common fractions into the technique of 
 •percentage, and do this as well in the second and third grades 
 as at any other time in their future progress. There is only 
 one new idea involved in this operation, and that consists in 
 giving an additional term — per cent — to the fractional symbol. 
 When one number is a part of another, it may be regarded as 
 a fractional part or as such a per cent of it. A great deal of 
 percentage is thus learned by the pupils early in the course. 
 Children are not hurt by learning. Standing still and lost 
 motion kill. 
 
 Every recitation should reach the full swing of the learner's 
 mind, including all his acquisitions on any given topic. But 
 if the teaching of fractions be deferred, as it usually is inmost 
 schools, the time may be materially shortened by teaching 
 addition and subtraction of fractions together. This is simple 
 enough if different fractions having common denominators are 
 used at first, such as | + f = ?, and f — f = ? Then the next 
 step, after sufficient drill on this case, is to take two fractions 
 (simple) of different units of value, as t + i = ?, and 
 ^— ^=? Multiplication and division may be treated similarly. 
 
 In decimals, the pupil is really confronted by a simpler 
 form of fractions than the varied forms of common fractions. 
 
Correlation of /Studies. 75 
 
 Devices and illustrations of a material kind are necessary 
 to build up in the pupil's mind at the beginning a clear concept 
 of a tenth, etc., etc., and then to show that one-tenth written 
 as a decimal is only a short handway of writing iV as a com- 
 mon fraction, and so on. He sees very soon that the deci- 
 mal is only a shorthand common fraction, and this notion 
 he must hold to. This is the vital point in decimals. The 
 idea that they can be changed into common fractions and 
 the reverse at will, establishes the fact in the pupil's mmd 
 that they are common fractions and not uncommon ones. 
 Fixing the decimal point will, in a short time, take care of 
 itself. 
 
 In teaching arithmetic the steps are: (1) developing the 
 subject till each pupil gets a clear conception of it; (2) 
 necessary drill to fix the process; (3) connecting the sub- 
 ject with all that has preceded it; (4) its applications; (5) 
 the pupils ability to sum up clearly and concisely what he 
 has learned.* 
 
 2. As to abridgment: Under this head, I hold that a course 
 in arithmetic, including simple numbers, fractions, tables of 
 weights and measures, percentage and interest, and numerical 
 operations in powers, does not fit a pupil to begin the study of 
 algebra. That while he may carry the book under his arm to 
 the schoolroom, he is too poorly equipped to make headway 
 on this subject, and instead of finishing up algebra in a reason- 
 able length of time he is kept too long at it, with a strong 
 probability of his becoming disgusted with it. 
 
 There are subjects, however, in the common school arith- 
 metic that may be dropped out to great advantage, to-wit, 
 all but the simplest exercises in compound interest, foreign 
 exchange, all foreign moneys (except reference tables of 
 values,) annuities, alligation, progression; and the entire sub- 
 jects of percentage and interest should be condensed into 
 about twenty pages. 
 
 Cancellation, factoring, proportion, evolution, and involu- 
 tion should be retained. Cancellation and factoring should be 
 strongly emphasized owing to their immense value in 
 shortening work in arithmetic, algebra, and in more ad- 
 
 * See comment on a preceding page. 
 
76 Report of Committee of Fifteen. 
 
 vanced subjects. Some drill in the Metric System should not 
 be omitted. 
 
 3. As to mental arithmetic: Till the end of the fourth year 
 the pupil does not need a text-book of mental arithmetic. So 
 far his work in arithmetic should be about equally divided 
 between written and mental. At the beginning of the fifth 
 year, in adition to his written arithmetic, he should begin a 
 mental arithmetic and continue it three years, reciting at least 
 four mental arithmetic lessons each week. The length of the 
 recitation should he twenty minutes. A pupil well drilled in 
 mental arithmetic at the end of the seventh year, if the school 
 age begins at six, is far better prepared to study algebra than 
 the one who has not had such a drill. There are a few problems 
 in arithmetic that can be solved more easily by algebra than by 
 the ordinary processes of arithmetic, but there are many num- 
 erical problems in equations of the first degree that can be more 
 easily handled by mental arithmetic than by algebra. To attack 
 arithmetical problems by algebra is very much like using a 
 tremendous lever to lift a feather. Those who have found a 
 great stumbling-block in arithmetical "conundrums," have, if 
 the inside facts were known, been looking in the wrong direc- 
 tion. A deficiency of "number-brain-cells" will afford an 
 adequate explanation. 
 
 4. Rearrangement of subjects: There should be a rearrang- 
 ing of the topics in arithmetic so that one subject naturally 
 leads up to the next. As an illustration, it is easily seen that 
 whole numbers and fractions can be treated together, and 
 that with United States money, when the dime is reached is the 
 proper time to begin decimals, and that when "a square" in 
 surface measure first comes up, the next step is the s^'ware of a 
 number as well as its square root, and that solid measure logic- 
 ally lands the learner among cubes and cube-roots. When he 
 learns that 1728 cubic inches make one cubic foot he is pre- 
 pared to find the edge of the cube. What is meant here is 
 pointing the way to the next above. All depends upon the 
 teacher's ability to lead the pupil to see conditions and rela- 
 tions. My contention is that truth, so far as one is capable of 
 taking hold of it when it is properly presented, is always a 
 simple affair. 
 
Correlation of Studies. 77 
 
 5. As to algebra: If algebra be commenced at the middle of 
 the seventh year, let the pupil go at it in earnest, and keep at 
 it till he has mastered it. Here the best opportunities will be 
 afforded him to connect his algebraic knowlege to his arith- 
 metical knowledge. He builds the one on top of the other. 
 The skillful teacher always insists that the learner shall estab- 
 lish and maintain this relationship between the two subjects. 
 To switch around the other way appears to me to be the same 
 as to omit certain exercises in the common algebra, because 
 they are more briefly and elegantly treated in the calculus. It 
 is admitted that a higher branch of mathematics often throws 
 much light on the lower branches, but these side-lights should 
 be employed for the purpose of leading the learner onward to 
 broader generalizations. Unless one sees the lower clearly, the 
 higher is obscure. Build solidly the foundation on arith- 
 metic — written and mental — and the higher branches will be 
 more easily mastered and time saved. 
 
 History of the United States. 
 
 In teaching this branch in the public schools, there does not 
 appear, so far as I can see, any substantial reason why the 
 pupils should not study and recite the history of the Rebel- 
 lion in the same manner that they do the Revolutionary War. 
 The pupils discuss the late war and the causes that led to it 
 with an impartiality of feeling that speaks more for their good 
 sense and clear judgment than any other way by which their 
 knowledge can be tested. They may not get hold of all 
 the causes involved in that conflict, but they get enough to 
 understand the motives which caused the armies to fight so 
 heroically, and why the people, both North and South, staked 
 everything on the issue. Just as the men who faced each 
 other for four years and met so often in a death grapple will 
 sit down now and quietly talk over their trials, sufferings, and 
 conflicts, so do their children talk over these same stirring 
 scenes. They, too, so far as my experience extends, are 
 singularly free from bitterness and prejudice. It is certainly 
 a period of history that they should study. 
 
78 Report of Committee of Fifteen. 
 
 The spelling-book. 
 
 In addition to the "spelling-lists," I would supplement 
 with a good spelling-book. So far, no "word-list," however 
 well selected, has supplied the place of a spelling-book. 
 All those schools that threw out the spelling-book and 
 undertook to teach spelling incidentally or by word-lists failed, 
 and for the same reason that grammar, arithmetic, geography, 
 and other branches, cannot be taught incidentally as the pupil 
 or the class reads Robinson Crusoe, or any other similar work. 
 It is an independent study and as such should be pursued. 
 
 James M. Greenwood, 
 Superintendent of Schools, Kansas City, Mo. 
 
 Whileaffixing my signature to the report of this Committee 
 as expressing substantial agreement with most of its leading 
 propositions, I beg leave also to indicate my dissent from cer- 
 tain of its recommendations and to suggest certain additions 
 which, in my judgment, the report requires. 
 
 1. There are other forms of true correlation which should 
 be included with the four mentioned in the first part of the 
 report and which should be as clearly and fully treated as are 
 these four. 
 
 The first is that form of correlation which is popularly 
 understood by the name, and which is also called by some 
 writers, concentration, co-ordination, unification, and alludes 
 in general to a division of studies into content and form; by 
 content meaning that upon which it is fitting that the mind of 
 the child should dwell, and by form the means or modes of 
 expression by which thoughts are communicated. Or, it may 
 be thus expressed: The true content of education is, (1), phi- 
 losophy or the knowledge of man as to his motives and hidden 
 springs of action indicated in history and literature, and (2), 
 science, the knowledge of nature and its manifestations and 
 laws. Its form is art, which is the deliberate, purposeful, and 
 effective expression to others of that which has been produced 
 within man by contact with other men and with nature, and is 
 commonly referred to as divided into various arts, such as 
 
Correlation of Studies. 79 
 
 reading, writing, drawing, making, and modeling. The relation 
 of content and form is that of principle and subordinate, the 
 latter receiving its chief value from the former. In a true 
 education they are so presented to the mind of the child that 
 he instinctively and unconsciously grasps this relation and is 
 thereby lifted into a higher plane of thinking and living than 
 if the various arts are taught, as they too commonly are, with- 
 out reference to a noble content. This relation of form to 
 content is vaguely referred to in the report, but nowhere 
 definitely treated. It seems to me that it is a true form of cor- 
 relation, and, as such, deserves special and definite treatment. 
 Moreover, it is at present much in the minds of the teachers 
 of this country, often in forms that are misleading and harm- 
 ful. The fact that it adds the important element of interest 
 to the dry details of common school life makes it especially 
 attractive to progressive and earnest teachers, and this 
 Committee should recognize its importance and make such an 
 utterance upon it as will guide the average teacher to a clear 
 comprehension of its meaning and to a wise use of it in the 
 school-room. 
 
 Second, there is a still higher form of correlation which is 
 definitely referred to later in the report as that "of the several 
 branches of human learning in the unity of the spiritual view 
 furnishe(i by religion to our civilization." This in the report 
 is assigned abolutely to the province of higher education. 
 While I do not wish to dissent wholly from this view, since it 
 is doubtless true that this higher unity cannot be comprehen- 
 sively stated for the use of a child, yet a wise teacher can so 
 present subjects to even a young child that a sense of the unity 
 of all knowledge will, to a certain degree, be unconsciously 
 developed in his mind. In regard to certain of the great divis- 
 ions of human knowledge, this relation is so evident that they 
 cannot be properly presented at all unless the relations be 
 made clear. Such studies are history and geography. 
 
 2. The recommendations upon the subject of language 
 should be broadened to cover the production of good English 
 by the child himself, with the suggestion of suitable topics and 
 proper methods. This report confines itself to the absorptive 
 side of education and ignores that development of power over 
 nature, man, and self, which comes from free exercise of facul- 
 
80 Report of Committee of Fifteen. 
 
 ties and free expression of thought. The study of language as 
 something for the child to use himself, the great means by 
 which he is to assert his place in civilization, and exert his in- 
 fluence for good, is nowhere referred to except in the vaguest 
 way. This statement in regard to language applies almost 
 equally well to drawing, and here is made evident the impor- 
 tance of the form of correlation to which I have just referred. 
 The proper material for the training of the child in expression 
 is that which is furnished by the study of man and nature. 
 His mind being tilled with high themes, he asserts his individu- 
 ality, expresses himself in regard to them, and thereby gains 
 at once both a closer and clearer comprehension of what he 
 has studied, and also the power by which he may become a 
 factor in his generation. 
 
 3. I would wish to omit the word '• weekly" where it occurs 
 in the discussion of the subjects of general history and science, 
 unless it be understood to mean that an amount of time in the 
 school year equivalant to sixty minutes weekly be given to 
 each of these subjects. It is often better to condense these 
 studies into certain portions of the year, giving more time to 
 them each week and using them as the basis, to a certain de- 
 gree, of language work. I believe that, especially with young- 
 children, clearer concepts are produced by such connected 
 study, pursued for fewer weeks, than by lessons seven days 
 apart. 
 
 4. In my judgment manual training should not be limited 
 to the seventh and eighth grades, but should begin in the 
 kindergarten with the simple study of form from objects and 
 the reproduction in paper of the objects presented, and should 
 extend, in a series of carefully graded lessons, through all the 
 grades, leaving, however, the heavier tools, such as the plane, 
 for the seventh and eighth grades. By these means an interest 
 is kept up in the various human industries, sympathy for all 
 labor is created, and a certain degree of skill is developed; 
 moreover the interest of the pupils in their school is greatly 
 enhanced. Manual training has often proved the magnet by 
 which boys at the restless age have been kept in school instead 
 of leaving for some gainful occupation. 
 
 5. I desire to suggest that geometry may be so taught as to 
 be a better mathematical study than algebra to succeed or ac- 
 
Correlation of /Studies. 81 
 
 company arithmetic in the seventh and eighth grades. I do not 
 refer particularly to inventional geometry, to which the Com- 
 mittee accords a slighting attention, but to constructive geom- 
 etry and the simplest propositions in demonstrative geometry, 
 thus involving the comprehension of the elementary geometric 
 forms and their more obvious relations. This study may be 
 made of especial interest in connection with manual training 
 and drawing, while it presents fewer difficulties to the imma- 
 ture mind than the abstractions of algebra, since it connects 
 more directly with the concrete, by which its presentation may 
 often be aided. 
 
 6. While agreeing fully with a majority of the Committee 
 that the full scientific method should not be applied to the 
 study of elementary science by young children, yet I am com- 
 pelled to favor more of experimentation and observation by 
 the child, and less of telling by the teacher than the report 
 would seem to favor. 
 
 7. I would go farther than the majority of the Committee, 
 and insist that, except in rare cases, there should be no special- 
 ization of the teaching force below the High School, and that 
 even in the first years of the High School, so far as possible, 
 specialization should be subordinated to a general care of the 
 child's welfare and oversight of his methods of study, which 
 are impossible when a corps of teachers give instruction, each 
 in one subject, and see the student only during the hour of 
 recitation. 
 
 8. Whilein the main I agree with the bald statements under 
 the head "Correlation by synthesis of studies," since reference 
 is made to only a very artificial mode of synthesis not at all in 
 vogue in this country, I must dissent emphatically from this 
 portion of the report as by inference condemning a most im- 
 portant department of correlation, to which I have referred 
 earlier. The doctrine of concentration is not necessarily arti- 
 ficial; rather it refers to the higher unity, of which this Com- 
 mittee has spoken in glowing terms as belonging to the prov- 
 ince of higher education. It also includes the division of the 
 school curriculum into content and form, which this Committee 
 inferentially adopts in its treatment of language. I do not 
 believe, any more than do the majority of the Committee, 
 that the entire course of study can be literally and exactly 
 
82 Report of Committee of Fifteen. 
 
 centered about a single subject, nor do I believe in any arti- 
 ficial correlation; but there is a natural relation of all knowl- 
 edges, which this Committee admits in various places, and 
 which is the basis of a proper synthesis of studies, according 
 to the psychological principal of apperception. 
 
 9. If by the term ' 'oral, " as applied to lessons in biography 
 and in natural science, the Committee means, as the word would 
 imply, that the instruction is to be given in the form of lec- 
 tures by the teacher, I cannot in full agree with the Commit- 
 tee's conclusions. As I have already stated, in natural science 
 the work should be largely that of observation, and in history 
 and biography, while in the very lowest grades the teachers 
 should tell the children stories, as soon as it is possible the 
 desired information should be obtained by the student through 
 reading. To this end the reading lesson in school should be 
 properly correlated with his other studies, and he should be 
 advised as to his home reading. The information thus 
 obtained should be the subject of conversation in the class, 
 and should furnish the material for much of the written lan- 
 guage work of the children. 
 
 10. I must dissent emphatically and entirely from that por- 
 tion of the report which recommends that a text-book in 
 grammar be introduced into the fifth year of the child's school 
 life. It is a question in my mind whether it would not be 
 better if the text-book were not introduced into the grades 
 below the High School at all. Certainly it should not appear 
 before the seventh year. Such knowledge of grammar as will 
 familiarize the child with the structure of the sentence, the 
 basis of all language, and as will enable him to use correctly 
 forms of speech which the necessities of expression require, 
 should be given orally by the teacher in connection with the 
 child's written work, when needed ; but against the introduction 
 of a text-book upon grammar, the most abstruse of all the sub- 
 jects of the school curriculum, when the pupil is not more than 
 ten years old, I must protest. Instead of that the child 
 should devote much time, some every day, to writing upon 
 proper themes in the best English he can command, furnish- 
 ing occasion to the teacher to correct such errors as he may 
 make, and acquiring by use acquaintance with the correct 
 forms of grammar. If, as will doubtless be the case in most 
 
Correlation of Studies, 83 
 
 cities, local conditioQS render the introduction of Latin into 
 the eighth grade inadvisable, this study of grammar may be 
 made in that grade somewhat more intensive. 
 
 11. If by a text-book in geography is meant that which is 
 commonly understood by the term, and not simply geographi- 
 cal reading matter, in my judgment, it should not be intro- 
 duced earlier than the fifth year. 
 
 These suggestions and expressions of dissent, if approved 
 by the Committee, would necessitate some change in the pro- 
 gram submitted, the most important of which would be the 
 making room for the production of English in the grades. 
 This could be provided in the first and second grades by tak- 
 ing some of the time devoted to penmanship and doing the 
 work partly in connection with the reading classes. In the 
 third and fourth grades it should take some of the time 
 devoted to penmanship and should be studied also in connec- 
 tion with geography and reading, and in the fifth and sixth 
 grades it should take all of the time given to grammar. 
 
 I regret to be compelled to express dissent upon so many 
 points, but as most of them appear to me vital and as the 
 differences appear to be not merely superficial but funda- 
 mental, affecting and affected by one's entire educational creed, 
 I cannot do otherwise. To most of the report I most gladly 
 give my assent and approval. 
 
 Charles B. Gilbert, 
 Superintendent of Schools, St. Paul, Minn. 
 
 I agree most heartily with the main features of the fore- 
 going report of the subcommittee on correlation of studies. 
 It is so admirable in its analysis of subjects and in its state- 
 ment of comparative education values, and so suggestive in its 
 practical applications to teaching, that I regret to find myself 
 appearing in any way to dissent from its conclusions. Indeed 
 my principal objection is not against anything contained in the 
 report (unless it be against a possible inference which might 
 be drawn at one point), but it refers rather to what seems to 
 me to be an omission. 
 
84 Report of Committee of Fifteen. 
 
 In addition to all the forms of correlation recommended in 
 the report, it seems to me possible to make a correlation of 
 subjects in a program in such way that the selection of sub- 
 ject-matter may be to some extent from all tields of knowledge. 
 These selections should be such as are related to one another 
 so as to be mutually helpful in acquisition. They should be 
 the main features of knowledge in the different departments. 
 
 These different departments from which the chosen sub- 
 jects should be taken must be fundamental ones and must be 
 sufficiently numerous to represent universal culture. The 
 report itself indicates conclusively what these are. 
 
 Reference is made in the report to various attempts that 
 have been made to correlate subjects of study. 
 
 A very just criticism is made upon that attempt at correla- 
 tion by the use of the story of Robinson Crusoe as a center of 
 correlation. It is distinctly pointed out in the report that the 
 experiences of Robinson Crusoe are lacking in many of the 
 elements of universal culture, and in many elements of educa- 
 tion needed to adjust the individual properly to the civiliza- 
 tion of our time and country. It is equally evident that the 
 attempt to make this story the center of correlation leads 
 directly to trivial exercises in other subjects in order to make 
 them '^correlate" with Robinson Crusoe. It is also shown in 
 the report that it naturally leads to fragmentary knowledge 
 of many subjects very much inferior to that clear, logically 
 connected knowledge of a subject which may be had by pur- 
 suing it without reference to correlating it with all others. 
 
 It is at this point that in my judgment a wrong inference 
 is permitted by the report. 
 
 It does not, as it seems to me, follow that, because correla- 
 tion based on Robinson Crusoe is a failure, all correlations 
 havingthe same general purpose will necessarily prove failures. 
 For my own part I do not believe that correlation needs any 
 "center." outside the child and its natural activities. If, 
 however, it seems wiser to give special prominence to any 
 given tield of acquisition, it should, in my judgment, be ac- 
 corded to language and its closely related subjects — reading, 
 spelling, writing, composing, study of literature, etc.. etc. 
 Indeed language as a mode of expression is organically re- 
 lated to thinkincr. in all tields of knowledge, as form is re- 
 
Correlation of Studies. 85 
 
 lated to content. A "system" or "program" of correla- 
 tion on this basis would seek for fundamental ideas in all the 
 leading branches and make them themes of thought and 
 occasions of language exercises. The selections would omit 
 all trivialities in all subjects, and would not attempt to 
 correlate for the mere sake of correlation; but would seek to 
 correlate wherever by such correlation kindred themes may be 
 made to illuminate one another. To illustrate, concrete prob- 
 lems in arithmetic would be sought that would clearly 
 develop amd illustrate mathematical ideas and their applica- 
 tion; but in a secondary way these problems would be sought 
 for in the various departments of concrete knowledge — 
 geography, history, physics, chemistry, astronomy, meteor- 
 ology, political, industrial, or domestic economy. But none of 
 these themes would be so relied upon for problems as to com- 
 pel one to choose unreasonable or trivial relations on which 
 to base them. The problems themselves should represent 
 true and important facts and relations of the other subjects 
 as surely and rigidly as they should involve correct mathe- 
 matical principles; and all such exercises should be rightly 
 related to the child's education in language. 
 
 In like manner, when a child is engaged in nature study of 
 any kind, some valuable problems in mathematics may be 
 found rightly related both to the subject directly in hand and 
 the child's natural progress in arithmetic. Also many of the 
 lessons in nature study are directly related to some of the 
 finest literature ever produced, in which analogies of nature 
 are made the means of expression for the finest and most 
 delicate of the human experiences. When the child has 
 mastered the physical facts on which the literary inspiration is 
 based is the true time to give him the advantage of the study 
 of such literature. These ideas are not only rightly related 
 to one another, but to the mind itself. It is, so to speak, the 
 nascent moment when the mind can easily and fully master 
 what might else remain an impenetrable mystery; and all be- 
 cause subjects and occasion have come into happy conjunction. 
 
 This is not the place in which to attempt any elaboration 
 of such a system of correlation. But I feel that its absence 
 from the report may make many persons feel that the latter, 
 is so far incomplete. L. H. Jones, 
 
 Superintendent of Schools, Cleveland, O. 
 
86 Report of Committee of Fijteen. 
 
 With the main lines of thought in this report I find myself 
 in agreement. With many of its details, however, I am not in 
 accord. I regret to have to express my dissent from its con- 
 clusions in the following particulars; 
 
 1. The report makes too little of the uses of grammar as 
 supplying canons of criticism which enable the pupil to cor- 
 rect his own English, and as furnishing a key (grammatical 
 analysis) that gives him the power to see the meaning of ob- 
 scure or involved sentences. 
 
 2. For the study of literature; complete works are to be 
 preferred to the selections found in school readers. 
 
 3. That species of language exercise known as paraphras- 
 ing I regard as harmful. 
 
 4. The study of number should not be omitted from the 
 first year in school. Practice in the primary operations of 
 arithmetic should not be omitted from the seventh and eighth 
 years. The quadratic equation should be reserved for the 
 High School. 
 
 5. The foreign language introduced into the elementary 
 school course should be a modern language — French or 
 German. Latin should be reserved for those who have time 
 and opportunity to master its literature. 
 
 6. In the general programme of studies, the school day is 
 cut up into too many short periods. The tendency of such a 
 programme as that in the text would be to destroy repose of 
 mind and render reflection almost an impossibility. 
 
 7. I desire to express my agreement with the opinions 
 stated in Sections 2, 3, 6, and 9 of Mr. Gilbert's dissenting 
 opinion; and, in the main, with what Mr. Jones says on the 
 correlation of studies. 
 
 William H. Maxwell, 
 Superintendent of Schools, Brooklyn, N. Y. 
 
 EDITORIAL NOTE. 
 By permission of Dr. Harris, we have published his paper 
 on "The Old Psychology vs. The New," as an appendix to this 
 report. It will help the reader to understand better not only 
 the discussion on psychology, but many other things pertaining 
 to both theory and practice which the report contains. 
 
APPENDIX, 
 
 THE OLD PSYCHOLOGY vs. THE NEW. 
 
 I understand that this question includes under the term 
 "new psychology" only two classes of investigation, namely, 
 what is known as "physiological psychology" dating from the 
 discovery of Broca in 18(31, and what is known as child-study, 
 including the researches of Professor Preyer and of Dr. 
 Stanley Hall, their co-workers and disciples. 
 
 All other studies of mind from ancient times to the pres- 
 ent time, whether based on induction or deduction, whether 
 a priori as rational psychology, or a posteriori as empirical 
 psychology, should be called the "old psychology." It seems 
 to me that both of these psychologies are of immense impor- 
 tance — that neither is a substitute for the other, or to be neg- 
 lected by the teacher who wishes to know scientifically the 
 mind that he is supposed to educate. 
 
 For I must hold that there is a constitution of the mind 
 common to all rational beings — a rational nature which may 
 be discovered by introspection and distinguished from the 
 transient and variable characteristics which are determined 
 in large manner by environment and conditions of develop- 
 ment. 
 
 I would name as by far the most important knowledge 
 from this source, the distinction of the soul into several stages 
 as that manifested in plant life — called by Aristotle the 
 nutritive or vegetable soul; the soul as active in sensation and 
 locomotion, or the animal soul; the rational soul manifested in 
 imagination, memory, reflection, and in pure thought. The 
 distinction of active and passive reason made by Aristotle in 
 his famous treatise on the soul and so often re-discovered or 
 verified by profound thinkers in the history of philosophy — is 
 the principle of this classification of soul-activities. On it 
 is founded the philosophical doctrine of the immortality of the 
 soul. In fact, not only the doctrine of immortality but also 
 the doctrines of theism and the freedom of the will are based 
 on this rock of the old psychology developed by Aristotle, out 
 
88 Appendix. 
 
 of the hints of Plato or Socrates. God, freedom, and immor- 
 tality are the three good gifts of philosophy according to 
 Novalis; they are all derived from the insight that finds in 
 pure thought the independent self-activity of the soul and sees 
 in it the only possible type of being for a first principle of the 
 world — a Creator. The idea of self-activity is moreover the 
 basal idea of free will. 
 
 The very concept of will is impossible on the basis of em- 
 pirical thinking. For the understanding as Coleridge defined 
 it deals with relations between objects, and finds causal rela- 
 tions everywhere but not self-activity or will. It tries to ex- 
 plain each thing through its environment — and it never rests 
 until it has traced the phenomena of an object to a ground in 
 something else outside. 
 
 That the fundamental condition of introspection is the ad- 
 mission of this idea of self activity is evident, if we consider 
 that the world of self consciousness contains only feelings, vo- 
 litions, and ideas. Each one of these is two-fold, implying 
 subject and object. There are two poles to each; feeling is 
 nothing unless it have a subject that feels, and unless the self 
 that feels is the object of the feeling. So volition implies a 
 self that acts, and moreover a determination or limitation of 
 the subject issuing in an objective deed — a volition has the 
 twofold aspect of subject and object. So, too, an idea is al- 
 ways thought as a determination of the self which thinks it — 
 or defines it — it is conceived by the mind — it, too, involves 
 subject and object. 
 
 Now, by no possibility can external observation discover 
 any such twofold objects in space and time. All objects are 
 dead results, or in a process of becoming through some external 
 cause. 
 
 If we discriminate dead objects from living objects and 
 recognize plants, animals, and men before us, we do it because 
 we interpret the forms, shapes, and movements before us as 
 indicative of a self-determining soul within the object. We 
 transfer to the object by an act of inference, an internality of 
 life, feeling, volition, or thought such as we know directly only 
 by introspection, and can only know thus. 
 
 To expand this theme one would show the importance of 
 these distinctions of Aristotle, Aquinas, and Leibnitz, in mak- 
 
Appendix. 89 
 
 ing an account of the spiritual life of man — an inventorying 
 the principles of his civilization, and making clear and con- 
 sistent his views of the world. 
 
 To live is one thing, but to give a rational and consistent 
 account of one's life is a different and difficult matter. The old 
 psychology succeeded in doing this by these fundamental dis- 
 tinctions, and all new attempts at psychology either prove 
 abortive or else soon fall into line with the old psychology, so 
 far as these essentials are concerned — they end in affirming 
 self-activity as more substantial than material things, and in 
 the admission of various grades of realization of this self-activ- 
 ity or soul. 
 
 Another very important step in this recognition of the 
 contents of self-consciousness which the German thinkers have 
 added to the old psychology is the recognition of the charac- 
 teristic of universality and necessity as the criterion of what 
 is in the constitution of mind itself as contra distinguished 
 from experience or empirical content. By this time and space, 
 the categories of quality and quanity, the laws of causality, 
 identity and included middle, the ideas of self-activity, moral 
 responsibility and religion, all transcend experience and are 
 formed by introspection. 
 
 It is their application which constitutes experience, and 
 experience would be impossible unless the mind had in itself 
 these powers a priori, for these powers make experience pos- 
 sible. If we could not furnish the intuitions of infinite space 
 and time, we could not perceive objects of experience— nor un- 
 less we could furnish the category of causality could we refer 
 our sensations to objects as causes. 
 
 Universal and necessary ideas are furnished by the mind 
 itself, and not derived from experience, although our con- 
 sciousness of them may date from our application of them to 
 the content of experience. 
 
 Formal logic, with its judgments and syllogisms, its 
 figures and moods, should be regarded also as a part of 
 rational psychology in so far as it reveals to us the forms of 
 action of the thinking reason. 
 
 All these contributions of the old psychology are of price- 
 less value as giving us the means to understand the place we 
 occupy in the universe with our ideals of civilization. They 
 
90 Appendix. 
 
 furnish us directive power, they give us the regulative ideals 
 of education, religion, jurisprudence, politics, and the general 
 conduct of life. 
 
 But if the old psychology has furnished these substantial 
 things, it has not furnished all that is desirable. 
 
 There is a realm of conditions which must be understood 
 before man can be made to realize his ideals. 
 
 The product of nature is an animal, and not a civilized 
 man. How can man react upon nature; how can he ascend out 
 of his own natural conditions — how can he rise from the stage 
 of sense-perception to that of reflection — how from mere reflec- 
 tion to mere thought — how can he put off his state of slavery 
 to the category of thing and environment, and rise to the 
 category of self- activity? This is to ask how can he ascend 
 from a mechanical view of the world to an ethical view of it? 
 Certainly he must know the bodily conditions that limit or en- 
 thrall the soul. He must be able to recognize what activity 
 tends to fix the soul in a lower order of thought and action, 
 and what exercise will tend to lift it to a higher order. 
 
 To enumerate some of these enthralling conditions 
 through which the soul passes necessarily if it ever comes to 
 the highest culture, we must name the influences and attrac- 
 tions of one's habitat, its climate and soil, its outlook, its 
 means of connection with the rest of the world. Then next 
 there is the race and stock of which one comes — black, red, 
 yellow, or white; northern or southern-European, inheriting 
 all the evil tendencies and all the good aspirations. Then the 
 temperament and idiosincracy of the individual, as his natural 
 talents or his genius; how deep these all lie as predetermining 
 causes in his career! If he is alone the efficient cause or the 
 free will — at least these conditions of habitat, race, and stock 
 furnish the material that he is to quarry and build into the 
 temple of his life — a Parthenon, a Pantheon, or only a mud 
 hut or a snow house. 
 
 Then come other natural elements to be regarded — those 
 of sex — the seven ages from infancy to senility — the physical 
 conditions that belong to sleep and dreams and the waking 
 state — the health and disease of the body — the insane ten- 
 dencies — the results of habits in hardening and fixing the life 
 of the individual in some lower round of activity. 
 
Appendix. 91 
 
 Of all these, the laws of growth from infancy to mature 
 age, especially concern the educator. 
 
 There is for man, as contrasted with lower animals, along 
 period of helpless infancy. Prof. John Fiske has shown the 
 importance of this fact to the theory of evolution as applied to 
 man. Basing his theory on some hints of Wallace and Spen- 
 cer, he has explained how the differentiation of the primitive 
 savage man from the animal groups must have been accom- 
 plished. Where psychical life is complex there is not time for 
 all capacities to become organized before birth. The pro- 
 longation of helpless infancy is required for the development of 
 man's adaptations to the spiritual environment implied in the 
 habits and arts and modes of behavior of the social community 
 into which man is born. He is born first as an infant body — 
 he must be born second as an ethical soul or else he cannot be- 
 come human. The conditions are of extreme complexity. 
 This is the most important contribution of the doctrine of 
 evolution to education. Doctor Nicholas Murray Butler has 
 pointed out that the Greek philosopher Anaximander more 
 than two thousand years ago spoke of the prolonged period of 
 infancy as a reason for believing that in the beginnin>g, man 
 had an origin from animals of a different species from himself. 
 The Greek did not perceive the relation of this prolonged in- 
 fancy to the adjustment of the complex physical and spiritual 
 activities of the child to his environment. 
 
 In the light of this discovery, we may see what an im- 
 portant bearing the results of child-study and physiological 
 psychology will have on education. For is it not evident, that 
 if the child is at any epoch of his long period of helplessness 
 inured into any habit or fixed form of activity belonging to a 
 lower stage of development, the tendency will be to arrest 
 growth at that standpoint and make it difficult or next to im- 
 possible to continue the growth of the child into higher and 
 more civilized forms of soul-activity. 
 
 A severe drill in mechanical habits of memorizing or cal- 
 culating — any over cultivation of sense-perception in tender 
 years, may so arrest the development of the soul at a mechan- 
 ical method of thinking, and prevent the further growth into 
 spiritual insight. 
 
 Especially on the second plane of thought, that which fol- 
 
92 Appendix. 
 
 lows sense-perception and the mechanical stage of thinking, 
 namely the stage of noticing mere relations and of classifying 
 by mere likeness or difference, or even the search for causal 
 relations, there is most danger of this arrested development. 
 The absorption of the gaze upon adjustments within the ma- 
 chine prevents us from seeing the machine as a whole. The 
 attention to details of coloring and drawing may prevent one 
 from seeing the significance of the great work of art. 
 
 The habit of parsing every sentence that one sees may 
 prevent one from enjoying a sonnet of Wordsworth. Too 
 much counting and calculating may at a tender age set the 
 mind in a mechanical habit of looking for mere numerical re- 
 lations in whatever it sees. Certainly the young savage who 
 is taught to see in nature only the traces that mark the pas- 
 sage of a wild animal or perhaps of a warrior foe. has stopped 
 his growth of observation at a point not very much above that 
 of the hound that hunts by scent. 
 
 And yet all of these mechanical studies are necessary in 
 the course of study — they can not be replaced except by 
 others equally objectionable in the same aspect. 
 
 The question is then where to stop and change to other 
 and higher branches in time to preserve the full momentum of 
 progress that the child has made. 
 
 Professor Woodward has pointed out that the education 
 effect of manual training is destroyed by having the pupils 
 work for the market. It turns the attention towards the 
 training in skill and the education effect which comes of first 
 insight is afterwards neglected. The first machine made is an 
 education to its maker — the second and subsequent machines 
 made are only a matter of habit. To keep the intellect out of 
 the abyss of habit and to make the ethical behavior more and 
 more a matter of unquestioning habit seems to be the de- 
 sideratum. 
 
 Child study will perhaps find its most profitable field of 
 investigation in this matter of arrested development. If it 
 can tell the teacher how far to push thoroughness to the 
 borders of mechanical perfection and when to stop just before 
 induration and arrest sets in, it will reform all our methods of 
 teaching, and it can and will do this. The new psychology 
 in its two phases of direct physiological study of brain and 
 
Appendix. 93 
 
 nerves, and its observation of child development will show us 
 how to realize by education the ideals of the highest civiliza- 
 tion. The prolonged infancy of man will be in less danger 
 of curtailment through vicious school methods. 
 
 The orphaned and outcast child becomes precociously 
 world-wise. But the school can scarcely reclaim the gamin 
 from the streets of Paris or New York. He has become as 
 cunning and self-helpful as the water rat, but not in ethical or 
 spiritual methods. He should have been held back from the 
 bitter lessons of life by the shielding hand of the family. He 
 would then have become a positive influence for civilization in 
 its height and depth. As a gamin, he can live a life only a 
 little above that of the water rats, and is good only to feed the 
 fires of revolution. 
 
 Dr. W. T. Harris, 
 
 Commissioner of Education. 
 
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