the pupils to go from the fifth grade to the sixth, or from the sixth to the seventh, without so much restriction; but when they knock at the door of the high school from the seventh grade, they must have the proper password and sign, or there will be no admission.

Mr. Smith in his book on All the Children of All the People has a chapter on "Sympathetic Vibrations" which illustrates this point as well as anything we have ever read. Those who have studied physics, and many who have not, know what is meant by "sympathetic vibration." If we put a tuning fork firmly on its foot on one end of a table and another of the same pitch on the other end, and cause the first to vibrate briskly, in a few seconds the second will begin to vibrate in sympathy, and even though we may stop the first, the other will continue to vibrate for several seconds. However, if the first fork is an A, and the other a B, we may pound on the A as much as we please and the other will be as mute as death. Its lack of vibration is not due to its not being a good fork. It is just as good as any fork, and all it needs is to have the fork on the other end of the table tuned to the same pitch.

If we place on one end of the table a row of forks of all pitches except an A, and set an A to vibrating on the other end, we shall get no response. We may pound on the A as much as we please, but there will be no response. But when we cease trying to get a response by hammering on the A, set up a C, and give it a gentle tap, the C on the other end of the table will begin to "hum" most beautifully. There is no trouble in getting a response when both forks are keyed to the same pitch; but, otherwise, we may pound until we knock the fork out of place or batter it to pieces and not get a movement from the other end of the table. We may try to make

ourselves think, as Mr. Smith says, that we get a response; we may manipulate in such a way as to make others think that there is a response; but we may be perfectly sure that, if the two forks are not keyed to the same pitch, one will not vibrate with the other. This is an excellent experiment-one that would teach many parents and some teachers we know a valuable lesson if they would try it.

Now most boys and girls are like that row of tuning forks. They have one or more tones missing. In one it is an A, in another a B, in another C, and in still another a B and a C. It is the exceptional boy or girl who has all the tones and is able to respond to all the different vibrations. However, we are conducting our schools as though all the boys and girls were complete with every tone present. The grammar tone, the arithmetic tone, the Latin tone, the ancient history tone, and the algebra tone are all supposed to be in their places. The teacher gets off across the room, strikes the algebra fork, and expects to get a response from all the pupils. If she does not, she feels that there is something wrong with those pupils who do not respond, and she is right about it. The algebra fork in those particular pupils is missing. However, the pupils are not to blame for this. God made them that way, and the clay has no right to say to the potter, Why have you made me thus? Besides, if the teacher will cease pounding the algebra fork, and tap even gently the language fork, she will get a most beautiful "hum," and the "hum" is the thing. There is nothing accomplished without it. You may get a false "hum"; but you cannot get a genuine response, a response that has educational value, unless the subject causes a sympathetic vibration in the soul of the pupil. There is no fact in pedagogy more clearly demonstrated than this;

and the other fact, too, that different children will respond to different subjects is equally well established.

NEEDS OF THE CHILDREN NOT RECOGNIZED

We have failed to adapt the work of the schools to the needs of the child and we have sought by merely pounding to get a response; no one knows better than the teacher how deathlike is the silence in most cases. It is drill, drill, drill, coax, persuade, threaten, and a hundred other things, day after day, until her life is almost worn away, and yet many of her pupils seem totally insensate to her efforts. The pupil stands it as long as he can, this hammering and pounding, until one morning his seat is vacant and he has left school to take his place in the world, unprepared for its problems. The teacher usually rejoices that he is gone, for her burdens will be considerably lighter; but really she should not rejoice. There was nothing wrong with the pupil. The trouble was that she had not struck a responsive chord in his soul. She was too intent upon driving into his consciousness certain textbook information and lost sight of the boy himself. However, the teacher is not to blame. She is laboring under a system that is ruthless in its requirements and tells her that she must do these things just as she does do them. The school board is not to blame, for public opinion makes demands on it in no uncertain terms. Thus it goes on from year to year, and the children are being sacrificed to the Moloch of the traditional classical college.

Of course, there are some fundamentals every child must have. Every child must learn to do the figuring necessary in business; he must learn to speak and write effectively so far as he will find it necessary to do so in everyday life; he must learn to read and acquire a taste

for reading; he must learn to spell the words he uses in his writing; and he must learn to write a legible hand. Every child must meet these minimum requirements whether it suits his fancy or not. But there is little doubt that the minimum requirements in these studies can be met without the difficulties we are having at present. The arithmetic the average person needs in business includes less than one-half the topics we are now trying to teach. Let us teach these necessary topics thoroughly and in connection with subjects in which the child is interested, and not make life a burden to him by trying to make him learn aliquot parts, compound proportion, compound interest, cube root, and a dozen other such topics as should never have been put in an arithmetic for children. The same is true of our language work in the schools. Nine-tenths of the formal grammar we teach in our schools could be eliminated and no one would be any worse off. The child needs practical drill in language and not so much theoretical drill in formal grammar, most of which he forgets as fast as he learns it.

In spelling we drill the child on thousands of words he will never use. The average business man does not use over 2,500 words, and the child could learn to spell these without much trouble. There are 180 days in a school year, and in seven years, by learning to spell two words a day, the child would know how to spell 2,520 words. But, as it is, we give him ten or fifteen words a day, and in many cases more. He spreads his attention over so many words that he does not learn to spell even the common words in the average man's everyday vocabulary.

The same is true of the other fundamental studies. We should strip them of their superfluities and require the child to learn only the minimum essentials. He

could do this in much less time, with much less worry to himself and the teachers, and more thoroughly than at present. Instead of acquiring habits that will militate against his success in his later school and life work, he should be forming those habits without which success is impossible. The minimum essentials in the subjects referred to above should be completed by the end of the sixth grade, and, from there on, the child should be introduced to a rich, differentiated program of work and studies that will find a response in his life. The course of study in the last five grades of our schools should be broad enough to meet the needs and capacities of every child. It should satisfy the book-minded child who wants to prepare for college-either the classical college or the technical school; and it should satisfy the motorminded child who wants to work with his hands. Manual training, including work in wood, metal, stone, concrete, cooking and sewing, agriculture, horticulture, weaving, basket making, etc., should be accessible to the child who "hums" to such things. Let us remember that work of this kind possesses a great educational value in helping the child to bring about a proper coördination between his nerve and muscle centers, and this is a most important phase of education. We must have a broader onception of our work than merely to give the child a little knowledge he will need in practical life, or certain information educated people are supposed to have. We must educate the child, and this means that we must develop his latent resources, whatever they be. But we must not be so foolish as to try to create in him powers he does not possess.

We do not mean by such a program as here suggested to leave the work of the schools to the whims of the child. But we are to study the child, his aptitudes and capacities,