A Bit of Individual Instruction. Poor boy, he looked as though he had been indeed kneaded" at home, Miss Ainsworth thought, as she read the note, and watched him shuffle to his seat just three minutes after the tardy bell had struck.

"I must talk with Philip at recess," she thought. "He looks so pale and dispirited that I know something is the matter." But when recess came, after an unusually trying morning, she was so tired that she felt she must throw the cares of school to the four winds of heaven and get out into the fresh air for a few moments. A thought of Philip came to her mind.

"Oh, well," she said to herself, "everything isn't required of me at forty-five dollars a month, I must draw the line somewhere!" Just then Philip passed. Something made her call him back.

Perhaps it was the remembrance of some neglected duty, which never could be quite righted afterwards; perhaps, the thought of some crisis in her own life, when the word in season had changed the entire current of her being.

However that may be, a moment later she was sitting by his side, turning the pages of his books, ostensibly to help him with the lost lessons, and point out the new; but really to smooth the way to that heart-to-heart talk which she felt the boy needed. Even the roughest and most hedged-about lad appreciates and looks back with tenderness upon such a talk, if only the approaches to it are made so smooth and easy that he is wafted along without in the least realizing whither he is drifting!

So it was that in a very few minutes Philip's head was on the desk, and between his sobs he was telling his teacher his hopes, and how they had all come to naught; how he had longed for an education, but how he had given up, for his mother was a widow, and he had to stay out that hard winter to help her a great deal, besides being tardy two days in the week.

That was when he went after the clothes. And sometimes they kept him waiting so long that it seemed as though he could not bear to face the school.

"Besides," he murmured, "Mr. Brown stood at the door when I came in this

morning, and he told me that if I couldn't keep from lowering the record of the school' by making so much tardiness and absence, that I'd better stay home!" There was a little sob as he added, "And so I thought I'd just take my books home this noon." Miss Ainsworth's eyes had flashed when he repeated the principal's words, but she only took both his hands in hers and looked at him steadily and lovingly.

"Philip," she said at last, "I am interested in you--I shall help you-you must have an education! I will speak to Mr. Brown about the tardiness and absences, and henceforth that shall be between you and me. Perhaps I can get a standing excuse for you for those mornings, but any way, you are to come in whenever you come, and come whenever you can, and we'll see about the rest.

Just then, the bell rang, and Miss Ainsworth was forced to go; but she pressed Phillip's hand, and gave him such a look as she said, "I have a plan,—more of this after school," that the whole aspect of the world was changed; and from being a miserable "hanger on" in his class, and detriment to the school at large, he suddenly became a favored being, to whom the portals of paradise were opening in spite of every obstacle, and to whom were extended the fairest and most gracious of hands!

To tell how Miss Ainsworth won her case in her discussion with her principal about Phillip, how she watched that boy with keenest insight and sympathy, to find out his leading talents and capabilities, how she formulated plan after plan for the best employment of those precious minutes when he sat rocking the baby brother at home while his mother washed, and the rest of his class went on with their "regular work," and how, finally, largely through her wisdom and tact, he attained to that education which she had

kept ever before him as a beacon light, and entered upon the special work to which the fostering of the "special talent" had inclined him, would take too long.

Is Philip an exceptional case? Is there a room without him?-Primary Education.

A Victim of Chicago Schools. One of the boys brought home his arithmetic lesson, and his mother, after watching his struggles for a time in silence, offered to help him.

"Oh, no," said he with a look of scorn. "You can't do it to save you.' "" As the mother was a college graduate she naturally felt somewhat nettled at this, and insisted upon her ability to solve the problem. She did so to her own satisfaction, but not to the boy's. He declared that she did not do it right, though he could not tell what was wrong.

"We'll leave it to papa, said she finally. The father, too, was a college graduate and had taken high honors in mathematics. The father said that the mother's method was the right one, and indeed the only one. Unconvinced, the boy went off to school the next morning. At noon he came home triumphant.

"There, I told you so!" he shouted as he entered the house. "You did it wrong.'

"What was the matter?" both parents asked.

"Well, you left out two 'sinces' and a hence,' was the convincing reply.

Mental Arithmetic.

Try the following exercise, taken from The Popular Educator:

Read to pupils the following directions: Each problem will be read but once. Work it mentally. When the teacher calls, "Write answer," put down the answer in ink, and turn your paper over face. side down. Number the answer, but write nothing except the answer and its number. The numbers in the last two problems, however, are to be copied.

PROBLEMS.

1. Add 12, 34, and 56.

2. If 70 crackers cost 20 cents, what will 1 cracker cost?

3. How many gills in two gallons?

4. At 80 cents a gross, what will 36 pencils cost?

5. How many pounds in of of a ton?

6. What will 32 bushels of oats cost at 37 cents a bushel?

7. How many square feet in the four walls of a room 30'x20' and 10' high?

8. Find 1 per cent of $200.

9. Find the interest on $150 for 2 years 6 months, at 6 per cent.

10. Copy and add $14.92, $16.07, $17.76, $17.89, $18.61.

The Old Trouble.

Here is a capital illustration of the way not to do it. It shows the beauties of the machine formula, admirably:

By selling a lot for $450 I lost 25 per cent. What per cent would I have gained had I sold it for $750?

100% C cost.

25% C loss.

75% C selling price. 75% C=450.

C=450=600.

$750 pro. selling price. 600=cost.

$150 gain. Gain=RXcost. 150 RX600.

R=188=25%.—Ans.

What bright child cannot be made to see in two minutes that $450 is threefourths of the cost, which must be $600; and that, if the lot is sold for $750, onefourth of the cost, or 25 per cent, is gained?

CHILD-STUDY.

C. C. VAN LIEW, EDITOR.

Sensation and Action.

Probably no phase of child-study has received greater emphasis or more extensive exposition in recent years than that which deals with the child's physical organism and well being. We are conscious of a new and pronounced emphasis of the physical basis of education. If we accept the most reliable information that recent researches furnish, we are impressed more and more strongly with the evidence that body growth and mind-growth are in no sense independent phenomena, and that accordingly whatever we endeavor to accomplish for the one must be undertaken also for, and with the cooperation of, the other. dently the new emphasis now being given to the physical basis and conditions of education is in no sense materialistic, but rests upon psychological grounds more completely than ever before. Let us here approach this question of the child's bodily development for the purpose of learning somewhat of its psychological, and hence educational significance.

Evi

An appropriate view-point from which to study the problems of coordinate growth in mind and body may be found

in the two functions that furnish the avenues of communication with the teacher, sensation and action.

From birth every impression the child receives from the outer world tends to return to us in the form of some motion or action. In fact, the sensory impression, which is the receptive phase of the child's first mental awakening, seems never to be a complete process in itself, but always to pass on into some form of physical activity, which we may term action in the broadest and freest sense. Thus the finger placed across the infant's palm, becomes thereby not only the stimulus of a sensation of touch, but also of a motor discharge that causes the child's hand to close and grasp the experimenter's finger. The light that reaches the child's eye from a window at his side tends ultimately to stimulate a movement of the head and eye-balls so that the impression is more direct. A great variety of stimuli affecting different parts of the body usually secures some kind of a motor response, which may be for some time more or less aimless, inconstant, and of varying intensity. A little later, when sounds have by experience become associated with definite objects and directions, a certain sound suggests not only ideas as to its source, but also the associated movements of the head necessary to bring the sounding object before the eyes, even though the act of seeing contributes nothing essential to the recognition, or the child's satisfaction. But the motor suggestion does not stop here; we may also observe in the very young child a strong tendency not only to glance in the direction of the sounding object, but also to respond with the voice. Distant voices calling on the street, or the peculiar cries of animals, prompt the child to make what we may term responsive cries. At first the act is performed quite involuntarily, and may or may not be imitative. Again, strange sights elicit in the child half articulate expressions, as of wonder or fear, or often vigorous movements of body and limbs. The sight of some (to the very young child) very desirable object is sufficient to provoke a violent discharge of more or less aimless movements. At almost any time, under almost any circumstances, we shall find the child doing somethin in response to the sensations he is receiving giving expression (as in the above

examples) to inner activity arising from some impression, re-living in his own bodily self-activity what the activity of external objects has suggested.

The entire process involved in the simple illustrations above, including both the sensory impression from without and the associated returning movements, may be known as the sensori motor or reflex arc.

Recurring to the illustrations already cited above, we note that in many instances the motor response to the sensory stimulus is fitting; a definite end is reached even before the child has learned consciously to recognize it. The hand closes upon the finger, the eye follows the light; crying, sucking, and many other of the child's first acts come under this category of fitting reflex acts. Evidently these fitting reflex movements, that always bring about some desirable end in response to a definite stimulus, as in breathing and sucking, are the gifts of heredity; they are necessary for the perservation of the race, and operate, at first at least, entirely without will-direction. It is impossible to say fully just what and how many of the child's early movements are inherited. Many other movements are evidently executed quite at random: nature seemes to have fixed no particular path for them to take. To this class belong the random movements of the limbs that accompany the infant's early desires, and feelings of wonder, fear, etc. another class of movements seem to be

Still

suggested by persistent local stimuli; drooling and teething, for example, are accompanied by certain sensations in in the gums and lips which give rise to movements and positions of these organs that, for a time at least, are more or less persistent and cause the child to produce certain sounds. Thus the writer has observed in his own children during dentition, for example, the production of sounds similar to the sounds p, t, th, ph, pth, which had not appeared before and were dropped later, and which were closely associated with the play of the lips, tongue, and saliva about the sensitive gums.

Just in so far as any one of these movements is repeated and habit established, is a basis laid for further development. Ultimately, all random movements (as well as many of the inherited acts) are brought under the direction of the will

and transformed into fitting habits. The purposeless movements of the limbs give place to habitually controlled movements, which are executed with ease and exactness.

As a result of the well-established law that every sensation or incoming process tends to stimulate some outgoing process or action, we have the corollary that sensation and action are complementary factors. The one can become more and more perfect only in so far as the other is perfected. The touch of the hand has but a meager content so long as the muscles of the hand are passive; let the latter be brought into activity, let the hand explore the object, and the impressions of touch are at once more numerous, definite, varied, and delicate. Every addition to the manual skill of the hand, is equally an enhancement of its power and versatility as a receiving organ of sensations. The more exact, delicate, and varied the movements that control the body as a whole, the richer and more abundant are the accompanying sensory impressions of position, locality, of general bodily power and facility. The muscular control, the poise of every sense organ conditions the character of its sensations. Only in so far as the eye can be deftly controlled, is it possible for us to have exact and reliable sight impressions, impressions upon which we could safely base judgments of outline, form, distance, size. Growth in the power and variety of movement, therefore, may be accompanied by increased. definiteness and variety of sensation.

Conversely, as sensations become more and more definite they can furnish more definite ends of action. For instance: One hears another pronounce a difficult word; he makes the effort himself, and now hears his own voice, feels his vocal organs in the act of articulation. He does not stop to analyze his feelings, of course, but seeks to reproduce the desired effect again. With every improving effort his senses report a better copy, which thus becomes, in a measure, a guide to more delicate and accurate movements. Thus, also, growth in the definiteness and variety of sensations may be accompanied by growth in the power to move. Sensation and action are natural complements in growth.

Let us sum up the thought thus far: 1. All sense-impressions (and we may add here, the activities of thought growing out of them,) tend to reflect in some action or expression. The complete process is naturally sensation plus action.

2. Sensation and action, or impression and expression, are natural complements are mutually dependent. The cultivation of the one is necessary to the development of the other; the neglect of either is a check to the development of both.

The child enters school bringing with him these complementary forces in full activity. Still there seems to be little power of damming up the incoming flood of sensations and of interposing thought and reflection before action. If all spontaneity be not crushed out of him, before the age of six he fairly bubbles over with expressiveness, with action. Eyes and ears are acute and active; the new and interesting things he sees and hears suggest a thousand movements. Physical actions in some form, speech, gesture, play, are the natural outlet of the actively stimulated child mind. It is impossible at this time for the child to interpose between sensation and action a long series of ideas or prolonged thought, as can the adult. The latter may reflect a long time between the suggestion of the act and its consummation. Rather is action in the young child a helpful accompaniment of thought. The kindergarten seeks to ap ply this truth in making play the constant and expressive companion of thought.

From the time the child enters school the functions of sensation and action become the foundation of the teacher's work. What the child sees, hears, touches must be made to furnish valuable materials for thought, to awaken and exercise the activities of mind. Expressive physical action must accompany and support this development of the senses and the mental powers. Facial character, gesture, demeanor, carriage, play, speech, handwork, and art in the broadest sense are all both the outgrowth and aid of mental activity.

We propose to trace in the future some of the simple relations that obtain between the growth of mind and the development of action or expression.

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Bingham has known Tacoma from the day of small things. He is in every way worthy the confidence of the people who elected him to this high office. The Pacific coast cities have been tried in the fire of the long continued financial depression, but the day of the revival of their prosperity is at hand, provided some unexpected financial disaster does not befall us. With revival in business there will be a new awakening in other forms of social life, and education, which has never languished on the coast, will be the first to respond to the spirit of hopefulness. Mr. Bingham's many friends in the East will be pleased to know of his advancement in his chosen profession, in which he has done royal service for so many years.

A Committee of Sixty has been organized by Chicago teachers for the promotion of field work in nature study in the city schools. This committee is divided into nine different sub-committees. Wilbur S. Jackman is president; John H. Tear, first vice-president; William H. Chamberlain, second vice president; Mrs. M. L. T. Baker, secretary. "To-day, Chicago lays the whole earth under tribute; her stores of educational material are as limitless as her resources are boundless; her natural environs abound in features of great scientific interest. It is the purpose of the Committee of Sixty to bring these treasures, by organized effort, within easy reach of all the city teachers and pupils."

This is not simply a paper committee. It is organized for work, and it will work. President Jackman is an educational host in his department. Chicago, the greatest city on the continent, is as fully imbued with the spirit of progress in her schools as she is in other departments. Such activity, with such utter disregard