An Introduction to Teaching by WILLIAM C. BAGLEY and JOHN A. H. KEITH These authors. pre-eminent in the teacher-training field, have played a leading part in showing the need for a broad preliminary survey of educationits significance, its problems, its technique-as the first step in mastering the art of teaching. This is the textbook for such a course. It orients the prospective teacher at the beginning of his professional studies. It unifies his curriculum. It gives him the breadth of view that he must have if his work is to be truly professional. Without partisanship, it acquaints him with both sides of controverted issues and shows him that education, like all phenomena, is in a state of flux. It helps him to choose the particular phase of educational work for which he is best suited; and it shows him the relation of that work to the great educational and social scheme. $1.80 Fitting the School to the Child by ELISABETH A. IRWIN and LOUIS A. MARKS As a record of one of the most significant of recent educational experiments, this book is a distinct contribution to educational literature. The mechanizing of educational organization has resulted in an attempt to fit the child to the school rather than the school to the child, and progressive school administrators are trying to reverse the process. In this book, school administrators and teachers may read how a steady and unquestionable improvement in the morale and effectiveness of a great public school has been brought about as a differentiation of their instruction. The figures and tables included in the book are so fitted into the story that their significance is easily understood. It is a simply written, entertaining story of a remarkable and valuable experiment. NEW YORK THE MACMILLAN COMPANY BOSTON $2.00 DALLAS SAN FRANCISCO EDUCATION Devoted to the Science, Art, Philosophy and Literature The Junior High School RANSOM A. MACKIE, M.A., STATE NORMAL COLLEGE, Ꭰ AI No. I URING the last decade much progress has been made in reorganizing education. In recent years almost all school systems throughout the United States have been reorganized, and the great majority of cities have, or are intending to have, junior high schools established. A large and increasing number of smaller cities are building junior high schools, but the idea especially appeals to the larger places. Of the sixty largest cities in the United States, twenty-six have junior high schools and twenty more are planning to adopt the new plan of organization.2 Nearly all of these cities have accepted the "6-3-3 plan" of organization. Instead of the usual eight years for elementary and four years for high school work, the twelve grades are divided into elementary education, comprising the first six grades, and secondary education, comprising grades seven to 1 W. S. Deffenbaugh, Secondary Education in 1921 and 1922, Bulletin No. 12, 2 O. C. Pratt, Status of the Junior High School in Larger Cities. School Review, Nov. 1922, Vol. 30, pages 663-670. twelve inclusive. In order to understand just why the high school should be extended downward to include the seventh and eighth grades, we must speak of elementary as well as secondary school work. We must consider the whole system.s The question naturally suggests itself: What is the reason for so radical a change from the ordinary divisions of the curriculum? Why do some educators believe in devoting just six years to elementary education? To answer this question it is necessary to consider the aim of the first six years of schooling. The fundamental aim is to teach the use of the tools of learning-to prepare the pupil for further school work— and to inculcate attitudes and habits of mind that will enable the individual to secure farther knowledge and live a better life. Six years is certainly long enough to teach the use of the tools of learning-to prepare the pupil for further school work. To spend more time than six years on elementary education exaggerates its importance and leads to the belief that it is education itself instead of preparation for an education.1 3 R. A. Mackie, Education During Adolescence, Chapter II-Six-Year High School Curricula. E. P. Dutton & Company, New York. 4 C. O. Davis, Reorganization of Secondary Education, Educational Review, Oct. 1911, Vol. 42, pages 270-300. |