tion of University Teachers of New York State Whitelaw Reid said: "First, we must insist that the common schools teach with thoroughness the 'fundamental three.' Their pupils should learn, learn and learn these until they really know them. Until then let us have fewer frills." Present at least two arguments in favor of his position. Present two against his position. Name a number of the subjects which he might denominate as "frills," placing them in the order which you think the best. Give a reason for adding them to the course. GROUP IV. What is education? education? What is the history of Give your reason why a teacher should be familiar with this history. State briefly the difference between medieval and modern education. Through whose efforts was the common school system established in Pennsylvania? About what time was it established? Name five of the leading educators of the present time in the United States. What has each done that entitles him or her to this distinction? GROUP V. What personal qualities should an ideal teacher possess? What is the most important work of the teacher in the school room? Discuss attention, mentioning: (a) The good qualities of a teacher that secure attention. (b) The chief defects that cause inattention. (c) A good method of reviving the flagging attention of a class. What do you understand by the "art of questioning?" The supervisor of primary grades in Brockton, Mass., says: "Where one man writes a hundred speak. It is the business of the schools to see that the hundred speak well." Write all the thoughts that come to you under the expression to speak well." Tell what think should be the object of you the Teachers' Institute; hence what should be done by the executive committee to accomplish that object. Give at least three reasons why some teachers dislike to attend institutes. Name any lecturer at our city institutes during the past two or three years who, in your opinion, benefited the teachers; tell in what way. Name the local organizations that are educational, pedagogical, or both, in their aim; and tell what you know of each. Suggest any change that you should like to see made in their management or scope. What course do you pursue during the school year to relieve the monotony of your school room work? Give reasons for your selection. Recall one of your summer vacations; tell where and how you spend it, why you made that selection and in what way (or to what extent) you realized your expectation. AMONG THE COLLEGES When Smith College was opened September 21, President Seelye announced that Andrew Carnegie had promised the sum of $125,000 to the college, provided the institution will raise an equal amount, for the erection and maintenance of a biological laboratory. President Seelye also announced that the alumnæ had presented $5,000 for the enlarging and improving of Cobb House, the new hall for students' rest and recreation. The freshmen class numbers 360, the largest in Smith's history. The total number of students is 1,209. Prof. George Loveles Amerman, for many years registrar of the Sheffield Scientific school, Yale, has resigned on account of ill health, and has been succeeded by Arthur Marvin, principal of the high school at Schenectady, N. Y. Supt. Wm. E. Chancellor of Paterson, N. J., has been made a member of the New York University School of Pedagogy, which has the honor of being the pioneer training school for teachers. The new buildings of the College of the City of New York now being erected on the battlemented cliffs of St. Nicholas terrace, at a cost of $5,000,000, are said to be the finest structures of the kind in the world. In architecture they are of the imposing collegiate Gothic style, "Tudor Gothic," it is called by experts, similar to that of the famous university buildings of Oxford and Cambridge in England. President Woodrow Wilson of Princeton University explains in an article written for the Daily Princetonian the workings of the new tutorial system of instruction which goes into effect at the university this fall. The article says in substance that there will be fewer lectures and fewer class room exercises in order to make way for personal conferences between the student and the instructor. The students will be met by their instructors either singly or in groups. When groups are formed they will be made up of men who are found to have substantially the same preliminary training, the same capacity for work and the same tastes and aptitudes in what they undertake. Those who cannot thus be classified or who stand in any special need of individual assistance will be met singly and assisted in the way best suited to them. It is expected that each undergraduate will be assigned, for the work of the department which he chooses, to some one preceptor who will be his guide in all the reading and work of the department, so that the course may be drawn together, so far as he is concerned, into a single body and studied as a related group, rather than singly and separately under different masters. The general theory of the system is that college work ought to be radically different in method from school work; that the men ought not to be allowed to get the impression that they are merely getting up tasks, learning the lectures and ideas of particular instructors, or mastering text books, but should feel that they are reading up great subjects for their own sake. In order to enable them to do this reading intelligently they will be directed by their preceptors to the books which will best acquaint them with the chief matters involved in their several studies. THE SCHOOLS OF NEW YORK STATE GREATER NEW YORK During the past year it cost Greater New York $920,624.72 to keep the public schools clean. There are 470 men and women employed as janitors and they employ 1,500 others as firemen and cleaners. So many girls and young women have applied to enter the evening classes in advanced dressmaking and millinery that the board of education will open classes at the Brooklyn Girls' high school and the Williamsburg Evening high school for girls and women. Every evening high school, also, may have such a class if there is sufficient demand. City Superintendent Maxwell has made a number of changes in the standing committees of the board of superintendents. Superintendent Stevens, whose whole time is demanded by the high school committee, has been taken off the committee on course of study and the place given to Superintendent Higgins, who is transferred from the high school committee. Superintendent Walsh leaves the committee on school management to take Superintendent Higgins's place on the high school committee while Superintendent Marble has been assigned to the committee on school management. The university extension classes of the Associate Alumnae of the Normal college reopened this year on the last day of September and the first week in October. The following courses 46 have been arranged: "Concrete Psychology in Its Application to Classroom Teaching," Superintendent Edgar D. Shimer; "Literature The Victorian Poets," Prof. G. C. Odell of Columbia; 'United States History and Civics: Period. Revolution-Madison's Administration," by Prof. J. P. Gordv. N. Y. U.; "Water Color Painting," by Miss Virginia Keith, Normal college. The courses cover thirty weeks, and have been accepted by the Normal college faculty and approved by the regents. The fees for each course, except water painting, are $10 and to non-members $12. In water painting the fees are $13 and $15. Full information can be secured by addressing Miss Anna Hunter, 2079 Fifth avenue, New York city. Superintendent of Schools Maxwell has signed the charter which for the first time makes a Bachelor of Arts student who follows the ninety-hour course prescribed by the new Roman Catholic Pedagogical College for Women eligible to the city examination for a three years' license to teach in the city schools. The school, which is at Madison avenue and Fifty-first street, will be opened for the first time on October 16. The Pedagogical College will be practically the extension course of the educational department of St. Angelus College at New Rochelle, a woman's college which gives the A. B. degree. The institution is designed chiefly for Catholic teachers in the public schools of New York, although women, irrespective of creed, will be welcome. It is estimated that there are more than a thousand Catholic women teaching in the city's public schools. The principals of the public schools of the city have received a circular from the American Museum of Natural History, notifying them that in order to meet the numerous requests from teachers to supply them with nature study material the museum has prepared several small collections of natural history specimens, which will be loaned for short periods to the public schools. These collections are five sets of native birds adapted for grades IA to 4B (owl, blue jay, robin, bluebird and tanager); insects, mollusks, crabs, starfishes and worms, sponges and corals, minerals and rocks and native woods. Each collection is accompanied by a copy of notes, brief, but in the nature of suggestions to teachers, giving facts on the structure, habits and characteristics of the particular species in the collection. To the notes is appended a bibliography of the subject treated. SUPERINTENDENTS' COUNCIL The twenty-third annual meeting of the Council of School Superintendents of New York State will be held at Buffalo, October 18-20. The principal address will be delivered by Miss Julia Richman, district superintendent of schools, New York city. The officers are: Clinton S. Marsh, president; S. B. Howe, vice-president; E. G. Lautman, secretary and treasurer. COUNTIES All readers of American Education are cordially invited to contribute items of interest suitable for publication in this department. Albany.-Acting upon the recommendation of Mayor Gaus, relative to the congested condition of the High school, the Commissioners of Education directed that work in the sloyd and physical culture departments of the school be suspended for a year in order that the space utilized for this purpose may be used in seating the increased number of pupils that has entered the school this fall. Broome.-H. B. Jones, formerly principal at Alexandria Bay, is now the first vice principal of the high school at Binghamton, where he is teaching Latin and Science. The high school has a faculty of twenty-three. Chenango.-Judge George W. Ray, president of the Board of Education, has been notified of the arrival at the port of New York of the classical library of the late Col. E. Porter Pellet of Baranquilla, Colombia. South America, which the colonel before his death gave to the public schools of Norwich, his native town, to be added to the Guernsey Memorial Library. Col. Pellet went to Baranquilla in 1866, serving as U. S. consul most of the time. Monroe. For the third consecutive year the same faculty began work at the Honeoye Falls in September. The teachers include Principal, W. G. Clarke; preceptress Miss Edith Bronson, Castile; assistant preceptress, Miss Gertrude Stainton, Perry; grammar department, Miss Edith O. Lewis, Johnsonberg; second intermediate, Miss M. Adelle Light, Hilton; first intermediate, Miss Clara G. Steele, East Bloomfield; second primary, Miss Erma B. Hewitt, West Bloomfield; first primary, Miss THE BRAIN WORKERS Mary J. Vallance, Fowlerville.-In preparation for the opening of the public and high schools the Board of Education of Rochester sent out a big batch of postal cards telling students of last year and those expecting to enter this fall where to go. The cards directed the pupils to their proper high school, rooms and teachers, and they were of considerable aid in the work of registration.-Rochester is to have daily medical inspection in the schools. Nassau. The high school building at Oyster Bay "settled" SO perceptibly after the fall term opened, that much excitement was created in the village by the spread of exaggerated reports. It will be necessary to place girders under the upper floors. The building is only three years old and cost over $40,000. Oneida. The new members of the high school faculty at Utica are Archer Faxon, teacher of Latin; Miss Grace Spencer, teacher of history; Miss Jessie Pease, teacher of English, and Miss Jessie Prentis, teacher of mathematics.-The Utica papers speak highly of Supt. Martin G. Benedict and comment favorably on his first report to the school commissioners. Orange. By a vote of 47 to 6 the annual meeting at Cornwall-on-Hudson acquired the two-acre lot opposite the present building at a cost of $2,000. This will furnish an ideal site for a new building to relieve the present crowded one. The salaries of the principal, preceptress, academic assistant, eighth grade and primary teachers have been substantially increased. The new laboratory, 24x28 ft., just completed, makes the science courses especially strong, and is not surpassed by any school in the county. Miss Teresa G. Murray, of Middletown, is the new sixth grade teacher. Otsego.-Principal Derrick, who has been at the head of the Morris high school for several years, has received the appointment of instructor in Auburn prison, winning the appointment over sixty-four contestants. Prof. H. W. Scott of Milford has become principal of the Morris school. He left a fine record at Milford, both as teacher, and citizen. Mrs. Helen B. Bridge has resigned as teacher of music and criticism at the Oneonta normal school, to accept a position at Potsdam.-J. P. Kinney, ex-principal of the Cooperstown high school, who resigned to go into business, has taken the position at Milford_temporarily.The Gilbertsville Board of Education has elected Mr. Fred C. Miller of Walton, principal of the Gilbertsville high school to take the place of Prof. H. W. Rockwell, who recently resigned to go to Oneonta. Mr. Miller is a graduate of Princeton, class of 1902, and comes to the board with very strong recommendations. Rensselaer. The school commissioners of Troy have passed the following resolutions concerning the appointment of teachers in the city schools: Resolved, That on and after October 1, 1905, applicants for positions as teachers in the elementary schools of the city of Troy, must possess the following qualifications, viz: A. Graduation from the training school or an institution for the professional training of teachers of equal or higher grade. B. Graduation from the Troy High school or from some institution of equal or higher grade. C. A standing of at least 70 per cent. in an examination in the history and principles of education, in the methods of teaching and in school management. Such examination to be given by a board of examiners appointed by this board and to be both oral and written. Resolved, That on and after October 1, 1905, applicants for positions as teachers in the Troy High school must possess the following qualifications: A. Graduation from a college or university or successful experience in teaching academic subjects. B. A standing of at least 70 per cent. in an examination which shall include the history and principles of education, English and the special subject the applicant desires to teach. St. Lawrence.-Gouverneur held an old home week the last of August, one of the features of which was "educational day." Former students of the old Gouverneur Wesleyan Seminary and high school gathered by hundreds, and participated in the exercises of the day. Schenectady-Sixteen teachers have been added to the teaching force of the Schenectady grade schools to relieve the congested conditions. In some of the rooms as many as 60 pupils were under one teacher, and in the first grade, there were 101 pupils in charge of one teacher, who held two half-day sessions. Superintendent Freeman does not like the method of teaching arithmetic in the local schools. He says the system is too abstract. When he took charge of the schools he found that in many cases children of the higher grades were attending only half-day sessions, while those of the lower grades were kept all day, a condition of affairs which he immediately reversed. The high school is so crowded that an annex is necessary and one of the city churches is being used for a kindergarten room. Wayne. We have received the annual announcement of the Lyons Union School for 1905-6. The principal is William H. Kinney. The school possesses the best public library in Wayne county, having nearly 5,000 well selected volumes and three large rooms equipped for library purposes. Manual training is one of the features of the school, under a special teacher. WITH THE PUBLISHERS. Ginn and Company's Medial Writing Books have been adopted at Ithaca, N. Y. A new book by William J. Long is sure to be eagerly received. Ginn & Company announce the publication on September 21 of "Northern Trails," a collection of entirely new stories dealing with animal life in the far North. Smith's "Primary," "Intermediate," and "Advanced" Arithmetics have been adopted for use in the schools of New Haven, Conn. The Mississippi Text-Book Commission has recently adopted for exclusive use for five years Frye's Geographies, "Mother Tongue, Book I," and "Agriculture for Beginners," all published by Ginn & Company. Miss Sara Cone Bryant's "How to Tell Stories to Children" is an attractive handysized book which will be very interesting to all teachers and mothers. Miss Bryant is uncommonly well qualified to explain this art to others by virtue of her long experience as a teller of stories to audiences of young people, and as a lecturer upon methods to their elders. THE UNDERWOOD TYPEWRITER Visible Writing Simplest Most Complete Strongest . How Miss Bryant appeals to her hearers is evidenced by one rather unusual experience. Her first professional engagement was with a large club in the suburbs of Boston, by whom she was very happily received. The next season she was engaged again-and also the following. Finally, the club made a practice of voting, at the annual meeting "to have Miss Bryant next year." Other engagements of a similar sort have been in many places in Massachusetts, Rhode Island, Connecticut, New York, and Maryland. In most of these states, too, Miss Bryant has spoken before State Institutes, and Teachers' Clubs. Chandler & Barber, Boston, Mass., the well known manual training outfitters, have issued recently a catalogue devoted to hammered and enameled metal work. There are also descriptions of engraving and embossing, and leather working tools. Burges Johnson, author of "Rhymes of Little Boys," announced by T. Y. Crowell & Co. for September publication, was born in Rutland, Vt., in 1877. Since his graduation from Amherst College he has been engaged in editorial work in New York city. His child rhymes have appeared in several of the leading magazines, and readers will doubtless be glad to know that the collection is now made into book form. He deals with such fruitful boy themes as, "Goin' Barefoot," "Ketchin' Rides," and "Bein' Sick," and he catches and reflects boy nature admirably. The November table of contents of the FourTrack News gives indication that that number will contain a variety of strong, interesting articles which will make it fully as attractive as its predecessors. The leading article, "Deepsea Fishing," by Bertha H. Smith, will cause the reader to take mental inventory of the time at his disposal, for he will be fired by ambition to become one of the anglers written about; "In Far Australia," by Lida A. Churchill, describes the great island continent; and "The Pearl of the Black Forest," by Grace Isabel Colbron, pictures Baden-Baden, the famous German spa, past and present; the history, utility and scenic beauty of the Government arsenal on Rock Island, are set forth by M. L. Oliver, in "Preparing for War;" and Lawrence H. Tasker takes the reader, in imagination, up through the beautiful Muskoka region of Canada in his "Highlands of Ontario;" "New York's Backbone," by Emma Archer Osborne, tells the story of Broadway's fascination; "Camera Cameos," by Frank Yeigh, shows the contrasts of life in England, and points the way to many attractive. but almost unknown corners of the "little isle;" "The Harlem in History," by L. K. Becker, goes back to the days when steam navigation was undreamed of in New York Harbor; and "The Great American" is the story of Lincoln's rise to fame, by Austin Cook. All these and many more articles go to make up the November number of that valuable magazine of travel and education, the Four-Track News. Little, Brown, & Co. are bringing out this fall a series of books called, Holiday Art Sets, which include masterpieces of literature and choicely illustrated works in sets of two volumes, handy in size and moderate in price, beautifully bound in cloth, gilt, and neatly boxed. These two volume sets are especially desirable for Christmas, wedding, and birthday gifts. The series comprises the following attractive titles: "The Poems of Dante Gabriel Rosetti," with 16 full-page pictures reproduced in half-tone from famous paintings by the author; "Famous Actors and Actresses and Their Homes," by Gustav Kobbé, with over 70 half-tone illustrations; "Little Masterpieces," by Alphonse, Daudet, comprising "Letters From My Mill" and "Monday Tales,' with 8 photogravure plates; "Old Colonial Scenes and Homes," comprising "Romance and Reality of the Puritan Coast," and "The Pilgrim Shore," with a colored frontispiece and nearly 200 full-page illustrations and vignettes, by Edmund H. Garrett; "Ramona," by Helen Hunt Jackson, with a portrait and 16 full-page half-tone pictures and numerous chapter headings and tail-pieces by Henry Sandham; "Quo Vadis," by Henryk Sienkiewicz, with photogravure frontispieces and 12 full-page pictures in half-tone; "Elizabethan and Victorian Songs," illustrated with photogravure frontispieces, 12 full-page pictures, and numerous vignettes and head and tail-pieces, by Edmund H. Garrett; and "French Painters and Painting," by Philip Gilbert Hamerton, comprising "Contemporary French Painters," and "Painting in France After the Decline of Classicism," with 30 full-page photogravure plates. Messrs. Maynard, Merrill, & Co., of New York, have just published the first five volumes of Graded Poetry Readers. Two more volumes are to be issued and the completed series of seven volumes will be carefully graded to the first eight years of school work. The first volume includes work for the first two years and each of the succeeding volumes contains work for one year. The selections have been made by Miss Katherine D. Blake, principal Girls' Department, Public School No. 6, New York city, and Miss Georgia Alexander, supervising principal, Indianapolis, Ind. The volumes are uniform in size, ninety-six pages, bound in boards with cloth back, and will be sold separately at 20 cents each. This plah of publication makes it possible to secure at a nominal price a wealth of supplementary reading in poetry for a single grade without the necessity of purchasing at the same time a large amount of matter for other grades. Every year the mysterious Orient is coming nearer to the Occident. What can the two civilizations learn from each other? Recent events in Manchuria make this question of world-wide interest, particularly to Americans. The Chautauqua course, which as a leading feature always presents some live present-day subject will offer a notable series of articles on "The Spirit of the Orient." The author, Dr. George William Knox, is a gifted scholar (member of the Asiatic Society). Supplementing these articles the Chautauquan will publish "A Reading Journey in China" which will add this curious and puzzling country to the famous Chautauqua Reading Journey series. While |