Part 18 (1/2)
FORENOON
Ti Exercises All 8:40 Reading Pri Third 9:00 Reading Sixth 9:10 Grammar Fourth 9:20 Grammar Fifth 9:30 Grahth 10:00 Reading Fourth 10:10 Reading Seventh 10:20 Recess All 10:30 Reading Pri First 10:50 Numbers Second 11:00 Numbers Third 11:05 Arithmetic Fourth 11:15 Arithhth 11:50 Reading Fifth Noon Noon All
Appalling, do you say? What other word describes it adequately? There are twenty-one teaching periods in the ; twenty-four in the afternoon Forty-five times each day that teacher e professor is ”overloaded” with fourteen classes a week This woman had two hundred and twenty-five Will any one be so absurd as to suppose that she can do the its es, reduces the number of classes per day, and increases the time which the teacher may devote to each class Note the contrast between that schedule of a one-roo schedule of a consolidated school teacher in the same county:
TEACHER'S DAILY PROGRAM
FORENOON
Ti Exercises All 8:45 Desk 1-B 8:50 Phonetics 1-A 9:00 Phonetics 1-B 9:15 Reading 1-A 9:30 Reading Second 9:45 Rest Exercise All 10:00 Nature All 10:15 Rest All 10:30 Words 1-B 10:50 Words 1-A 11:10 Numbers Second 11:30 History 1-A
The ”district,” or one-rooomery County, Indiana, have twenty-three pupils per teacher, scattered over six grades The consolidated schools in the sarades While the teacher in the district school averages twenty-seven recitations a day, the teacher in the consolidated school has eleven; but the time per recitation is: district, thirteen minutes; consolidated, twenty-nine minutes The nurade is fifty minutes; the consolidated teacher has one hundred and seventeen ures as that stateives so in the consolidated school No teacher can do justice to twenty-seven classes per day, and an average recitation period of thirteen minutes is so short as to be almost unworthy of mention
Most consolidated schools, in addition to the ordinary rooms, have an assembly roos, and far as a center for community life, the consolidated school takes a real place in the instruction of the co, well constructed and surrounded, as it usually is, by well-kept grounds, furnishes the same kind of local monument that the court house supplies in the county seat
People point proudly to it as ”their” public building It is an experience of note in traveling across an open far country to come suddenly upon a splendidly-equipped, two-story school, set down, at a point of vantage, several miles away from the nearest railroad
The consolidated school at Linden, Montgomery County, Indiana, for example, situated in a town of scarcely three hundred inhabitants, is equipped with gas froas-plant; with steam heat; ample toilet accommodations; an assembly room; and halls so broad that the priames there in bad weather
One of theconsolidated schools is the John Swaney Consolidated School, of Putnam County, Illinois[22] The John Swaney School occupies a twenty-four acre cae, and ten itation for consolidation in Putnaive twenty-four acres as a campus for a local consolidated school Hence the name and much of the success which has attended the work of the school
The school cost 15,000, equipped It is of brick with four class-roo shop, a domestic science kitchen, and a basehted, heated, and ventilated in the most modern fashi+on The John Swaney School thus came into existence with an equipment adequate for any school and elaborate for a school situated far from the channels of trade and industry
The course of study organized includes all of the modern specialized hich the effective city school is able to do Securing good teachers and possessing unique facilities, the school carries boys and girls through a series of years, in which intellectual, experimental, manual, recreational, and social activities combine to make the school the center of community life and community influence
The school caround The trees provide subject matter for a course in horticulture The fertile land is turned to agricultural use, and the broad expanse of twenty-four acres furnishes additional space for games and sports
The social life of this school is no less effective than is its location and equip converted for this purpose, furnishes a center for the life of the teaching staff, and round for the social life of the entire school There are two strong literary societies, including all of the pupils in the school Each year plays are presented on the school stage There are anizations, parents' conferences, entertains of all descriptions In every sense, the John Swaney School is a community center
Prosperity has followed in the wake of this educational development The John Swaney School is known far and wide, and consequently farm renters and farm buyers alike seek the locality because of the educational opportunities which the school affords for their children, and because of the social opportunities which the community around the school affords for them
The ood inated in Massachusetts From that state it has spread extensively to Indiana, Minnesota, Iowa, Kansas, Idaho, Washi+ngton, and a nuressive rural community, wherever prosperous farmers and comfortable far discussed, agitated, or operated
The move the past few years in the South The Southern States are, for the ricultural communities The rural population far outnumbers the urban population, and it is in these districts, therefore, that the consolidated school can have its greatest influence
By 1912, the state of Louisiana alone was able to report over 250 consolidated county schools Georgia, Florida, and North Carolina show theenerally accepted progressive educational movement
The difficulties involved in consolidation may be summed up under two heads There is, first of all, the conservatiss which were good enough for their fathers, are still good enough for them Secondly, there are the technical difficulties involved in transporting pupils from distant localities to the school center Roads are bad at certain tions are costly Desirable drivers are difficult to secure
These factors, taken together, make the adreater than those of the old-ti to overcome these difficulties are destined ultiricultural education that followed upon the work of experih schools, has convinced even the roup that there are, at least, certain things in the new generation which surpass, in their econos of the old The inroads of scientific agriculture have played havoc with agricultural tradition and conservatism The obvious merits of the new sche continuance of the old scheme created
The technical difficulties of transportation are being on builders in various parts of the country are devoting theons which will be cheap and effective State and local authorities are actively engaged in the improvement of roads The near future promises a standard of transportation facilities that will far surpass any that the consolidation movement has thus far enjoyed The details of transportation ad worked out variously in different communities, and alith a view to the particular needs of the coes of consolidation lieof prejudice and the solution of ades of consolidation seem to be primarily educational and social The consolidated school is the only h school privileges under adequately paid teachers to the inhabitants of rural coain the consolidated school is the only e to provide the incentive arising froe Further out as the most distinctive feature of a rural landscape, is readily converted into a center of rural life and activity where young folks and old folks alike find a coes of the rural school are thus su solution of the probleeneral reconstruction and redirection of country life, the consolidated country school is the best agency thus far devised” The reasons for this statement are summed up under seven heads In the first place, the consolidated school is a democratic, public school, directly in the hands of the people who support it