for preferring the teacher's judgment to that of an independent examiner or examining board.

If a phrase is needed to describe the principle on which this whole system of division rests, I should formulate it as follows: Divide our requirements into three groups of subjects: (1) prerequisites for power to go on with collegiate study; (2) attainments auxiliary to such power; (3) attainments chiefly useful in the general scheme of education. the tests of power as to what is to follow be in the hands of those who are to have charge of the student in the years which are to follow. Let the tests of attainment on what is behind be in the hands of those who have had charge of the pupil in the years which are behind.

This combination would have the advantage of reducing the number of our college examinations—in itself an extremely desirable thing—of preserving a standard of quality which schools would compete with one another to reach, and of allowing at the same time the utmost possible latitude in the methods employed by different teachers to bring their pupils up to that standard. On the other hand, it would be attended with certain dangers and difficulties. The chief objections which are likely to be thus raised may be stated as follows:

1. The attempt, which has been more than once made, to lay special stress on tests of power rather than on knowledge- for instance, sightreading of Latin and Greek authors, translation of English into Latin, etc. has disappointed the expectation of its advocates.

2. In the inevitable uncertainty attending the results of entrance examinations-due partly to luck, partly to the personal equation of the examiner, and partly to the varying physical condition of the candidates -the substitution of a small number of decisive examinations for the very great number now existing will cause some candidates to be unjustly rejected who, under the present requirements, atone for their deficiencies in some lines by indication of ability in others.

3. The necessary withdrawal from the examination scheme of subjects like history, descriptive botany, or parts of the English papers, will serve to give them an apparently inferior position, and will result in their neglect in those schools which desire to prove their success on the basis of the showing made by their candidates in college examinations. Let us take up these points in order.

The first of these objections is, I believe, historically well founded. It is, however, based on the experience of a time when neither teachers nor examiners knew their business as well as they now do. Latin prose composition, as taught in the schools of a generation ago, was simply a piece of mechanical drill on certain fixed phrases, without any infusion of the spirit of the language. The examiners, themselves trained, for the most part, in these same defective methods, set papers which were not real tests of power, and encouraged cramming of a bad sort. The same thing may

be said of most of the examinations in sight-reading of classical authors. They furnished no measure of that kind of power which is required by the college student in his subsequent use of the Latin or Greek language. Many of these papers depend far more upon the quick command of a vocabulary, at times when the candidate is specially nervous, than upon knowledge of linguistic structure. In the easy Latin or Greek which is generally given, the candidate who can remember the vocabulary can guess at the structure far better than the candidate who knows the structure can extemporize the vocabulary. Nor can this difficulty in the sight paper be wholly avoided by notes which give the meaning of a few words; for those words which help one boy may prove useless to another. The partial failure of sight papers to accomplish their end proves chiefly the defectiveness of the means, and little or nothing as to the unattainability of the end.

Of course, it may be freely admitted that it would require great ability to carry out the proposed plan by right methods instead of wrong ones. It would perhaps be a number of years before we should know what furnished, on the whole, the best means of testing the student's power. But I feel quite confident that nothing which has hitherto been done indicates that the question could not be fairly well solved within a reasonable time. The argument concerning the dangerous fewness of the papers under the proposed plan deserves careful consideration. Anyone who knows the uncertainty attending the results of examinations in general, and of written examinations in particular, will be reluctant to reduce the variety of chances given to the student to prove in different kinds of papers his probable fitness for any course which he desires to undertake. Yet I believe that the dangers which arise in this way would be more than offset by the safety due to an increased care of reading which the substitution of the few papers for the many would render possible. If we should further extend to teachers of proved ability the opportunity to recommend, at the risk of their own reputation, for provisional admission to our freshman classes, pupils to whom the new system seemed to have done injustice, we should have in our hands a check which would not be greatly liable to abuse, and which would help to protect deserving students from the consequences of ill luck.

The objection regarding discrimination between studies is perhaps the one which will be most strongly urged. Yet I believe this objection to be based on what is in the long run not a fault, but a merit.

He

It is natural enough that a master in a secondary school who has special ability in teaching science or history should wish for the opportunity to prove what his pupils can do in collegiate examinations. will urge that, if they are not given this opportunity to be examined, they will neglect the subjects in such a way as to do injustice to him and harm to themselves. It may seem hard to tell him that the apparent force of these arguments is based upon an overvaluation of the usefulness of his

work to boys and girls who are going to college. Yet I believe this to be the truth; and if it is truth, it should be told plainly.

I am not underrating the importance of these things in the scheme of secondary education. For the pupils who are going directly from the high school into practical life study of history and natural science is indispensable. Most of these pupils must get their knowledge of these subjects then, if they are to get it at all. For those who are going to pursue these studies afterward, on the other hand, such preliminary acquaintance with history and with science does not take, in any adequate degree, the place of language or of mathematics. History and natural science are studies which mark the culmination of an educational course, and which, if overdeveloped far before the close, have a tendency to weaken rather than to strengthen the student's powers of application. If by including these things in the examination system we give an artificial stimulus to their pursuit by boys or girls who are afterward going to college, I believe that we delay the advent of a reform in our school system which is of vital importance to us all. That reform will consist in the separation of our classes, both in the grammar schools and in the high schools, into groups that are about to finish their school days and groups that are preparing to advance farther.

In almost all our previous groupings we have tried to classify pupils on the lines of their different tastes, real or supposed. There is a great deal to be said in favor of a different system, which should classify them on the basis of the probable duration of the studies. It is a false idea to assume that those things which are taught to the students whose courses near their end are thereby cheapened or made inferior in value; and it is a yet worse mistake if, in the effort to avoid such cheapening, we put them into a place where they do not really belong. Our system of secondary education has reached a point of achievement where it can stand on its own merits. Those in charge of it recognize that they have outgrown the stage where their best usefulness was found in being mere preparatory schools. Let us emancipate ourselves from a set of ideas which are but the remnant of a state of things which we have now outgrown. Thus, and thus only, shall we obtain the best preparation for college, and the fullest development of the value and freedom of our secondary education.

A REPORT ON MANUAL TRAINING IN THE DETROIT ELEMENTARY SCHOOLS, WITH A DISCUSSION ON THE DISCIPLINARY VALUE OF MANUAL TRAINING

J. H. TRYBOM, SUPERVISOR OF MANUAL TRAINING, DETROIT, MICH. Among the many definitions of "education" that we find in current educational writings there is none that expresses one phase of the issue

more definitely to my mind than one by Professor James in which he says that "the aim of education is to make useful habits automatic." Habits of action, habits of thought, and habits of feeling are all included in this definition, the highest powers as well as those usually considered on a lower level. In so far as we are able to develop vigorous, useful habits in our pupils, in so far are we able to make them happy, useful citizens. We are molded by our experiences to the extent that the habits formed practically control our whole conscious life; or, to quote Dr. Carpenter :

The importance of rightly directing the habits of thought and feeling during the whole stage of bodily growth comes to be still more apparent when we regard those habits as really shaping that mechanism whose subsequent action mainly determines our intellectual and moral character, and consequently the whole course of conscious life.

The aim of every subject in school is the development of habits of reaction. Any particular bit of knowledge is simply a power to react in the proper manner in the presence of a certain stimulus. How does manual training, as an agent for the formation of these habits of reaction, differ from the more theoretical subjects of the curriculum? This difference lies in the character of the reaction that takes place. There is no mental activity entirely void of the motor element, but the reactions may be of a more or less evident nature, or even entirely below the level of consciousness. It is this fact that will help us to distinguish a difference between manual training and the other studies of the curriculum.

In studies where the object is chiefly the acquisition of particular knowledge the motor reactions are not in evidence. Take history, for instance. The accumulations of historical data imply no necessary reaction for the time being; they prepare the student for possible reactions in the future. In arithmetic the process implies a motor reaction in the solving of the problem, but except in so far as the writing of the figures is concerned, it is a purely mental reaction, a reaction thru processes of association. This fact is characteristic of all the theoretical subjects taught in school. The reaction taking place is principally a purely mental process, anticipating similar reactions in the future. In other words, it is not learning by doing, but a storing-up of ideas by means of sensory impulses accompanied by processes of association.

The group of subjects to which manual training belongs, on the other hand, is characterized by a result in the form of necessary immediate reactions appearing as contractions of various muscles or groups of muscles. These subjects, besides manual training, are physical training, art education, and penmanship. As far as the physical processes are concerned, each of these three latter subjects aims at some special results characterized by the processes involved: gymnastics, the physical training of the organism; art education, the inculcation of ideas pertaining to art, such as form, proportion, beauty, etc., besides the special training of the hand

in the elements of some of the decorative arts; penmanship, the training of the hand in reproducing the letters of the alphabet.

The specific purpose of manual training, on the other hand, is not the inculcation of some special power in using the scissors, the plane, or the saw. Our aim is not the development of technical skill as a preparation for a special trade, but we use these processes of construction with the broader aim of general training. The aim of manual training, expressed in a concise form, is the development of useful habits of a general nature. It is true that every subject has in the same sense a disciplinary value, but as this is the characteristic feature of manual training, it should be particularly emphasized in relation to this subject.

The fact of repetition is admitted to be the cornerstone of all theories of development. Repeated processes in any one particular field are sure to lead to the development of habits.

In every good manual-training lesson the following processes are repeated: (1) objectifying of mental images; (2) muscular activity of the hands and arms; (3) exercises implying order and neatness; (4) attainment of accurate results; (5) prolonged concentration of attention; and (6) final success in accomplishing the task in hand. The repetition of these processes must lead to the development of the following habits: (1) thought-expression, giving unity and definiteness of mental content; (2) muscular control; (3) habits of order and neatness; (4) habits of accuracy or truth; (5) habits of perseverance; and (6) habits of confiAnother result of the lessons in manual training

dence or self-reliance.

is habits of an ethical content.

I have tried to summarize the aims of manual training and the conditions for reaching these aims in the following synopsis:

A SYNOPSIS OF THE AIMS OF MANUAL TRAINING