to take up books, supplemented by much blackboard reading. The children of this school were at once initiated into the primer, "The Overall Boys", by Eulalie Osgood Grover, a continued story about Jack, Joe, Tim and Ted, four lively little overall boys who lived on a farm, there are splendid colored illustrations arousing interest at once. There are other books which are good to start out with from the point of view of content, size of type, uniformity of lines, etc., such as Aldine First Readers and Aldine. Supplementary Readers, "The Folk-Lore Readers," Book One, and "The Sunbonnet Primer", by Grover, the "Reading Literature” Primer, by Treadwell. These may be followed by "Reading Literature", Book One, by Treadwell, "The Art Literature Readers", Primer, by Grover, the "Eugene Field Readers", by Alice L. Harris.

We must not lose sight of the fact that there must still be training in power to identify word-forms, which is an important adjunct to the reading process. There should be a gradual introduction of phonic analysis without the use of diacritical marks, and an acquaintance with word families that give power of quickly analyzing the word. No experimental tests so far discredit the work of training children in readiness in making out new words for themselves; the amount of time justifiable for such work, however, is yet to be determined in the laboratory.

In conclusion I would say that the process of reading in the primary grades is the same as that in the higher grades, namely, that of thot-getting and thot-giving. The children should assume from the beginning the responsibility of silent and thot reading. Not a single series of books should be demanded, but many readers, with rich content selected as far as we can from the books available, to conform to the best results obtained in the psychological laboratory thus far, in regard to uniformity and length of lines, size of type, and spacing of letters and words if the reading process is to take place under the best hygienic requirements, and promote mental economy and efficiency in reading.

The Mistakes of Pedagogy

BY PRESIDENT W. A. HARPER, ELON COLLEGE, N. C.

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WENTY-FIVE years ago, or thereabouts, a new science was brought into the curriculum of our colleges. It has grown to such importance now that every respectable college maintains its Department of Pedagogy or Education. And the text books developing the science constitute a large and increasing library, under such headings as the Science of Teaching, the Art of Teaching, Principles of Education, Principles of Teaching, Principles of School Management, Psychology of Teaching, etc., etc.

This science has wrought wonders in giving dignity to the teacher's function and art. The pedagogue has risen from being the object of ridicule to a position of leadership in professional standing. Children can talk more learnedly and profoundly now of the laws of the mind governing teaching and its associated arts than Plato or Socrates could, and for this good result our science of Pedagogy is entitled to be praised.

There are three weaknesses, however, in the application of this science and in the standards it upholds and the ideals it defends. It lays entirely too much stress on method, calling old processes by new higher sounding names, and does not give sufficient prominence to the personality of the teacher. Teachers, like poets, are born, not made, and no amount of pedagogical principles or methods will make him a teacher who is not born so. This is simply saying that men are called to teach by their Creator, just as surely as men are called to sell merchandise or practice medicine or preach the gospel. It is not saying that Pedagogy will not make a called teacher a better one. It undoubtedly will; but neither Pedagogy nor any other science can make him a teacher who is not naturally endowed for that function. This the writers on Pedagogy need to recognize and emphasize.

A second fault of Pedagogy, found in its accentuated form in the normal schools, is that correct methods in the hands of a

called or naturally disposed teacher will make him a successful instructor. These schools construct their curricula in such a way. that their pupils review carefully all they have gone over in the high school, while they study Pedagogy in its many branches, and do experimental teaching in the practice school, but make no advances in general knowledge or culture. This is a serious fault, and one of these days our people will realize the folly of fastening upon themselves a perpetual burden to support institutions that give their pupils only methods of work and do not add to their scholarship, and when they do realize it, as they surely will, there will be a rattling of dried bones and a newness of life in the educational world. These normal schools need to get out of the business of education or to get into it. They need to realize that breadth of scholarship is the only thing that can make a teacher of power, that lack of method can be compensated for by experience, but lack of scholarship is a fatal defect in any teacher. And the writers on Pedagogy need to see this and, seeing it, to insist on it:

The third fault of Pedagogy is its failure to demand spiritual training for teachers and for pupils. One of the most popular among recent treatises on this science sees no place for Christian schools at all. It sees no need for the Sunday school for the present, but when "science has fully rationalized religion" there will be no necessity for it as an educational force, but it will become an agency for "worship and the development of the social nature," as the same writer so authoritatively states that the church has already become. These writers forget that the greatest asset of life is character and that the highest type of character is the Christian, and that without Christian schools to develop, foster, nourish to fruitage the Christian character of our youth, this land would soon cease to be Christian and become a land of infidels, agnostics, deists, theists, to the eternal undermining of the national character and the permanent impoverishment of the individual soul. Let the Christian world see that Christian education is given due recognition, by the writers on Pedagogy, or let them expect the loss of the power of the Church over the generations to come.

Three Popular High School Fallacies

BY JAMES L. MCCONAUGHTY, PROFESSOR OF EDUCATION AT BOWDOIN COLLEGE.

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MERICA is the land of the fad. No country turns so energetically after this or that will-of-the-wisp, adopts this or that new thing, apes this or that foreign innovation. We give the freedom of our city to Dr. Cook one day, and hound him with detectives the next; yesterday's Dewey and Hobson will be forgotten tomorrow. When rightly directed this impetuosity and ardor are splendid, but too often our goals are worthless. It is an American trait to do things to extremes, to swing the pendulum too far, to get a half instead of a whole truth. Naturally, then, our fads soon lead to fallacies, against which we must warn ourselves.

Fads and fallacies are nowhere more seen today than in education. Any innovation with a germ of truth in it soon occupies the whole stage, and the older, time-worn and true tested favorites are often shoved far in the background. Look at our educational history: the fad of local regulation of school matters resulted in the fallacy of the district school system, which, said Horace Mann, "was the most pernicious thing in Massachusetts school history." Our colleges had narrow, limited curricula; result, the fad of free election and the fallacious uncontrolled elective system. President Hall applies the "recapitulation" fad to education; methods must be reshaped upon the basis of this new theory; today we have to tear down and begin over again, since Thorndike and others have disproved the truth of this fad. A clever American magazine editor exploits the work of a quiet Italian teacher; the Montessori fad swamps us, and the fallacy of making teaching spineless, attractive and pleasant results. May I generalize, and say that most educational fads soon become educational fallacies. We have grave need of an educational law of gravity to check the swing of the educational pendulum.

Public secondary education has just escaped one peril, is now

dallying with a second, and is headed towards a third. The three popular fallacies in our high schools our high schools are (1) that the public high school is merely a college preparatory school; (2) that all high school studies must be made interesting and attractive to the pupils, and (3) that the high school must teach many subjects that will prepare students to "make a living." In each case, the fallacy, to the writer's mind, consists in overdoing, swinging too far. These fallacies may be cured by giving more consideration to the needs and interests of the 85% of our high school pupils who never enter college, by not sugar-coating all high school education, and by realizing the value of the course that does not add to one's salary check, nor prepare one to make a living, but to live a life.

Historically, the high school was but a preparatory school for college. Originally no one entered it unless he had college aspirations. The college, naturally, dominated the high school, dictated the course of study, the aim, and method of teaching. It has taken some years to escape this fallacy, and germs of it may yet be seen. Our New England organization of colleges and secondary schools is still called "New England Association of Colleges and Preparatory schools." Are the colleges interested only in the schools that aim first to feed them with college material? No wonder we daily hear the colleges denounced by the secondary school men. I believe that the day will come when a "free margin" of admission credits must be accepted by the college. The sloth of the college, and the radical insurgent spirit of so many secondary school men is postponing united action by college and school to solve this problem. But is our responsibility over when we lay the blame on the college? Between a quarter and a tenth of the high school pupils will enter college—what are we trying to do for the neglected horde that will enter at once on life? What of culture and refinement and preparation for the enjoyment of leisure are we giving them? What are we doing for every second pupil in our school, the one who will be eliminated and never graduate? Is he getting from his one, two or three years any complete training along one line, any full grasp of one little subject or do we offer him year by year sections of subjects upon which, in the case of those few other students who study further, the college will finally try to build brains and mould

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