ress of the class as a whole is very satisfactory. The advanced class has had lessons in perspective and in drawing from life." 1 1 New Bedford.-"A systematic course has been mapped out and the scholars [of the evening drawing school], as far as their education will permit, are following it. "In this connection we would repeat a former suggestion that somewhere, either in the last year of the grammar school or in the early part of the high school course, the elements of geometry be so pursued as to enable boys wishing to become mechanics to make a better use of their time in the evening drawing school than they can now do."2 Average attendance, 21. Bo ton hastened to comply with the requirement of the statute by opening, in the autumn of 1870, an evening school for industrial drawing, in spacious and commodious rooms, which were soon filled to their utmost capacity with earnest pupils. About a thousand applicants registered their names, a large proportion of whom could not be admitted for want of room. Upwards of five hundred pupils received instruction for a longer or shorter period. The total cost for the term was a little upwards of $5,000. The school was a success from the beginning. "It is by no means a contrivance for teaching at the public expense an unimportant accomplishment to a few idlers and drones. It is a wise provision for furnishing the young artisans and skilled laborers in various crafts the technical instruction which they need, and which they cannot get except by means of schools of this description. Such an educational improvement as this, once introduced into this city, can never be abandoned, because it meets an immediate and pressing want of the times; the more it is known the more highly it will be appreciated." 3 Fourteen years' experience has justified this assertion. The evening drawing schools have constantly grown in public favor and efficiency. According to the latest report there were 5 schools, 13 teachers, and an average membership of about four hundred. As the result of an examination of these schools in 1883, 17 partial certificates and 121 full certificates were awarded to students in the first year class, and 49 diplomas to members of the second and third year classes. "The awards made at the annual exhibition of evening school drawings were as follows: Whole number, 77; of these 13 excellent and 18 honorable mention were given for first year drawings and 22 excellent and 24 honorable mention for second and third year drawings. The exhibition at which these awards were made was held early in June, at the drill hall of the new high school building, which proved to be an admirable place for the purpose; and the public distribution of the cer 1 Report of superintendent, Dr. A. P. Marble, 1880. Report of superintendent, 1871. tificates and diplomas, which took place in the English high school hall, at the close of the exhibition, was a very interesting occasion. "The late important changes in the program of drawing for the evening schools has made the whole course more practical in character, the subjects of freehand and instrumental drawing being taught separately in two schools and the subjects of study in all of them made elective as far as possible. These changes, which were carried out during the past winter, have worked admirably well in practice, resulting in a better average attendance than hitherto, for the reason that students, finding the different courses of drawing better adapted to their actual needs as individuals, have attended more regularly and in much larger number through both terms." 1 The question of the continuance of these schools seems to have been settled beyond a doubt. Appropriations for their support are as much a matter of course as appropriations for the support of primary and grammar schools. The great system of public instruction in the city of New York, so vast in its proportions and so excellent in very many of its features, does not, as yet, comprise independent evening schools for industrial drawing. This regrettable deficiency is, however, to some extent, though all too limited, supplied by the evening drawing classes taught in the Cooper Institute and by the provision for classes in architectural, mechanical, and freehand drawing in the admirable evening high school. If we look to the systems in the great cities of Brooklyn, Philadelphia, and Baltimore and those of the great western cities, we find a similar or, perhaps, even greater deficiency in this respect. We have no standard at home by which to measure this deficiency. What has been done in Boston is something real, but I regard it as only a good beginning and by no means a finality. One must go to Paris or Vienna for an example of what can and should be provided in a great city in this department of industrial education. In the latter city there are eight or ten large Realschulen and Realgymnasien conveniently located in the different sections of the city. In most if not all of these great institutions evening classes, numerously attended, are taught industrial drawing by accomplished masters. The instruction thus given leads up to the great industrial art school in connection with the magnificent museum of industrial art which was established some fifteen years ago at the expense of the government. I see no reason why New York or Philadelphia should be behind Vienna in public provision for instruction of any grade or description. Why should not the compulsory act of Massachusetts, in respect to this branch of technical education, be adopted by other States, especially those having important manufacturing interests? 1 Report for 1883 of Mr. Henry Hitchings, director of drawing. NORMAL SCHOOLS. There is a constantly increasing demand for trained teachers. This demand is more marked in the cities than in the country. A very large proportion of the graduates of State normal schools find employment in the city schools; but the supply from this source is inadequate. Hence the city boards of a considerable number of the larger cities have made provision, more or less extensive, for the professional training of teachers for the schools under their charge. The supplementing of the supply from the State normal schools has not been the sole motive of making this provision. Another argument in its favor is found in the fact of the increased facility thus afforded to home talent for professional preparation. And, besides, it is generally believed that home-trained teachers may be better adapted for the service to which they are destined. The establishment of city normal schools is by no means a new idea in our educational economy. It appears that the legal provision for the first city normal school antedates by about twenty years the establishment of the first State normal school. The city of Philadelphia took the lead in this matter. In the "Act to provide for the education of children at the public expense, within the city and county of Philadelphia," passed in 1818, it was made the duty of the controllers, who were intrusted with the administration of the schools, "to establish a model school, in order to qualify teachers for the sectional schools and for schools in other parts of the State." A model school was organized in accordance with this provision and placed in charge of Joseph Lancaster, the principal promoter of the system of organization and instruction which bears his name. This was not only a pattern school, but it was, to some extent, a school of prac tice for the training of teachers in the organization and management of schools on the monitorial or Lancasterian plan. It was not until 1848, however, that this school was reorganized as a normal school according to the present idea of such an institution. Such were the ability and devotion of the first principal (Dr. A. T. W. Wright) and the sympathetic coöperation afforded him by the controllers that this institution took rank, almost from the beginning, as a model normal school. In respect to its course of study, its plan of training pupils in the school of practice, and its methods of instruction, it was little, if any, inferior to the best normal schools of to-day. When this was the only city normal school in the country Dr. Barnard, in giving an account of it, expressed the opinion that the reading of the admirable report of the principal, by city school officials, would lead to the establishment of similar schools in all the large cities. Since that time the number of city normal schools has been steadily increasing. In no city where the experiment has been tried to any considerable extent has it been abandoned, except in the city of Chicago. We find among these schools not only a difference in name, but also a wide difference in character. They may, however, be classed, with sufficient accuracy for our purpose, under four types of organization : (1) The great City Normal College of New York, which performs the twofold function of a girls' high school and a normal school, without any recognized distinction of general and special courses in the curriculum. Its pupils are received directly from the grammar school. The course comprises four years and is mostly devoted to general studies. The Philadelphia school, as at present conducted, belongs to this type. (2) The City Normal School, St. Louis, which is a purely professional school, with a course of training comprising two years. The pupils must be graduates of the high school or must possess equivalent qualifications. To this class belong the schools of Cincinnati, Boston, and Washington, D. C., and perhaps those of Indianapolis and Cleveland. In the schools of this class, except that of St. Louis, the course is limited to one year. This is the most completely developed type of normal school in the country, it being that in which specialization is carried furthest. (3) The organization commonly designated as training school for teachers, comprising a practice school of several classes, taught by pupil teachers, under the direction of a training principal. These pupil teachers are usually selected from the most promising candidates for the position of teacher who are waiting for an appointment. The following account of the training school in Portland, Me., from the principal,' will sufficiently illustrate the organization and operation of this class of institutions: The school [of practice] has numbered about 200 pupils during the past year and is divided into six grades. The work done in each grade is the same as in similar grades in the other primary schools in the city. There are eight [pupil] teachers assigned to the practice school at the beginning of cach year, and when a vacancy occurs by the removal of a teacher to another of our public schools a new teacher is appointed to fill the place. There are four rooms; in each room two teachers, one acting as principal and the other as assistant. When a change of classes is made, which is done every three months, the teachers who have acted as principals become assistants. Each teacher, during the year, gets practice in three grades. To give practice in more grades would be detrimental to the school. The work of the practice class has combined theory and practice, or the study of methods of teaching and training in the practice school. Instruction has been given in the various subjects taught in the schools and in the principles of teaching. To avoid as much as possible the laborious task of note taking, Brooks's Manual has been used as a text book. The last part of the year was devoted to school economy. The class have remained an hour after school, at the close of the afternoon sessions, for these lessons. In training schools of this class the pupil teachers receive little or no salary for their services. The cost, therefore, of carrying on the training school in connection with the school of practice is even less than the cost of carrying on the school used for practice in the ordinary way. 1 Miss Sarah M. Taylor, roport of 1881. This fact renders the establishment of a training school a comparatively easy matter. Considering the cheapness and the great practical utility of this provision for the professional training of teachers, it is surprising that it has not been more generally adopted. There are probably less than a score of cities where this sort of a training school is to be found. (4) District normal departments of high schools. Perhaps the most important department of this sort is that connected with the girls' high school of San Francisco. This department is composed of post graduates of the school. In some years the number of pupils in this department has been as high as 150. In consequence of the large number of high school graduates desiring to enter the normal department, the board, in 1882, limited the number to 56, admitting only those that ranked, at graduation, 80 per cent. or over. In 1883 the board continued a similar provision, limiting the attendance to 60. The course of instruction is one year. This department was established in 1876 for the purpose "of organizing a department which shall afford its members the means of preparation for the University of California and for the occupation of teaching." From 1876 to 1880 the normal class maintained a precarious existence, opposed, as was to be expected, by the conservatives that oppose any new thing because it is not old and by untrained teachers that have an instinctive antipathy to skilled labor. In the high school of Pittsburgh there is a normal department, though of quite an elementary grade. The pupils come directly from the grammar schools and pursue a two-year course differing not materially from the academic course, except in the substitution of instruction in the theory and practice of teaching in place of one or two branches in the latter course. The diploma of this department is given by the city superintendent to such as make, at his examination, an average of 85 per cent. in each study of the second year. This diploma, by the law of the State, is equivalent to a professional certificate.2 In a number of important cities there are State normal schools which render the establishment of city normal schools unnecessary. The largest of these cities are the following: Baltimore, Providence, Tren ton, Albany, Buffalo, Oswego, Salem, Mass., and Worcester. In some other cities there are normal departments in universities and colleges, which to some extent supply the place of city normal schools. In some instances these departments have scarcely more than a nominal existence, differing from the other departments of the institutions to which they belong simply by the omission of a portion of the regular course and the substitution of a course of lectures on education.3 The New York board of education is required by law to establish a 1 Report of Hon. John Swett, principal, 1883. 2 Report for 1880 of the principal of the high school, Dr. C. B. Wood. |