now professor of Education in our own University of Chicago. Papa Rose knows him well and says Charters has done more to bring the principles of productive business into our calling than has any of the other professors of education. Mrs. Charters used to teach in Los Angeles. She, too, has worked out methods of teaching ideals. Although this volume lists six and a half pages of books on the teaching of character and while the creation of the perfect disposition has been the aim of religious writers since the beginning of the world, our volume is obliged to begin with a confession that few of the numerous books studied get down out of the clouds of generalities. Always has the development of character and personality engaged the energies of men and women responsible for educating their fellows. But the methods used have been largely based on untested theories. For years Mr. and Mrs. Charters have been gathering examples of the procedures in various schools. It is amazing how little science and how few objective facts are to be found in the field. It is almost virgin soil. Almost everything in this book the author considers trite. 'It is commonplace because it is fundamental.' But if the material can be collected and organized according to a plan, he says, there will be a contribution for the thousands of earnest educators who realize that there is no purpose higher for teachers than that of delivering to the community an output of citizens of the type our patriotic dreamers have always visioned. The mere description of methods helps us. But when, as in this But when, as in this intensely interesting work, they are criticised and evaluated there is produced an aid of the highest value. As Professor Judd, in his introduction, says, Charters has used the experience of parents, teachers, and school administrators on a scale so comprehensive as to make possible conclusions of the most practical value.

"Whenever any one displays deficiency in some trait it is necessary to make a diagnosis to find out what is the matter. The author runs through a series of common deficiencies which we are always finding in some or

another problem pupil. The procedure to follow is outlined: make your diagnosis clear and complete; create a desire for acquiring the trait which is missing; develop a plan of action for the patient-a desire which does not function is a waste; the real test of character is in conduct, not in desires or plans of action. The desire must be carried over into behavior. Your Chicago principals who were not content with the mere imparting of the knowledge of good citizenship make plans to give every youngster specific practice in maintaining a well ordered community, in caring for their school buildings and grounds, in guarding their fellows against accidents crossing the street near the school property, in resisting a well established tendency to violate courtesy and civic conduct on Halloween.

"Charters quotes the frequent statement that personality cannot be developed and dismisses it as absurd and contrary to experience. No teacher with his eyes open fails to see character growing before his eyes every day of his service, as clearly as Luther Burbank observed the development of variations in plant life, contrary to nature. 'There is no need,' says Charters, 'for our being discouraged at not being able to develop a mushy mentality into that of a Socrates.' Our business is to do our reasonable best five hours a day, 195 days a year and to leave the rest to the Good Father of us all. You don't expect to judge an expert card player by the number of tricks he takes, but by the skill with which he plays his hand. You cannot estimate the value of a school superintendent by the length of time he holds his position against political machinations, but by the honesty, intelligence, and industry with which he plans and follows up the essential duties of supervision.

"One thing I particularly like about the book is the preliminary definition of the terms it uses: trait, ideal, attitude, skill, standard, personality, character, reputation. By this means you are not left in the dark as to what the author is talking about. I like, too, the comparison of codes which have

been devised as guides for the formation of character. Here is Franklin's daily dozen, two hundred years old. Here is William J. Hutchin's Children's Code of Morals for Elementary Schools which won him the Chevy-Chase character-institution prize of $5,000. Here is the Code prepared by Collier's Weekly, the oath of Hippocrates, the Scout law, the Denver list and personnel analyses of teachers and employes of various kinds."

Mr. Judd Post continued, "Our author has listened to many sermons and inspirational addresses. He shows why they are pleasant failures. They create an atmosphere, a glow, an enthusiasm, no more. These notions get down into the subconscious and, unsatisfied, they ferment, acidulate, sozzle, fester, corrupt, spawn, reek, putrefy and rankle until the psychoanalyst pronounces you possessed of a complex. Your Chicago is having an epidemic of this sort. Every Kiwannis, Rotary, woman's or other club is overfed with talk. Your hotels and clubs at every noontime first feed a company so full as to require all surplus energy to devote itself to the affairs of the stomach. As soon as the blood necessary for mental decision and action is drawn out of the brain, a spellbinder stands up and delivers an exhortation. That is one of the reasons why your town has become the laughing stock of the world: too much talk, too much promise, too little performance. "Those who deal,' says Charters, 'with moral instruction have good purposes. purposes. Their intellectual laziness is not intentional. They don't realize that a bright child can memorize the ten commandments in an hour but that it takes a lifetime to make the applications to his personal conduct. Honor thy father and thy mother, is easy to learn by rote, but often the glibbist parrot in a Sunday school hasn't the faintest idea how to put the principle into practice. Children have to be taught trait actions one by one.' It reminds me of the grilling the school superintendents gave to Jim Rice when he proposed that all teaching ought to be tested. 'How would you test a mother's

love?' one of the defiant orators shot at Jim. 'Why,' he answered, 'by the number of unpatched holes in her children's clothes.' Principles are vitally important, but they influence conduct only to the extent that they are applied. Every principle must be buttressed by numerous examples given by the pupils whenever the teacher lays down a general rule. The singing of patriotic songs to develop emotion ought not to satisfy any intelligent teacher. The emotion must not be allowed to evaporate without being put to useful service. A story in biography to provide suggestion and create enthusiasm must be followed by a conduct assignment which seeks to parallel the storied situation with concrete personal experiences. Here is where our educational conventions, our teachers' institutes, miss the mark. We assemble and listen to inspirational addresses. We go back to our classrooms and do as we did before. It is a waste of public money. Let the director of the institute plan addresses based upon the needs of his district. Let his teachers be divided into quiz groups of twenty or thirty. Immediately after the address let them retire, in charge of a leader, to a classroom, and devote an hour to proposing specific situations in which they intend to carry out the principles expounded by the speaker."

"Wow!" exclaimed the General. "I think I see you getting teachers to do that sort of thing without raising a cloud of protest! We go to teachers' institutes to see how other teachers look, to admire their new gowns, to slip away in congenial couples and go to the movies."

"General," sighed the Signpost, "that is atavism, pure and simple. For twenty-one meetings you have been the most severe maintainer of the proposition that we teachers are becoming as serious in our profession as the most progressive physician. Conquer your complex. I was saying that Charters regrets the strong tendency among textbook writers, lecturers, and theorists in moral education to treat the development of character on an abstract and general

level. It is formalism, the curse of religion, of political reforms, of medicine, and of all the professions. It shows itself in the repeated statement that you can't make people good by law, that you can't teach morals and character except by the indirect method. As I see it, the fact of the matter is the reason we haven't taught character is because our method has been indirect. If I want to teach accuracy, reliability, and persistence I can't do it by any indirect method of letting my children fuddle through an arithmetic, even though it were put into the course of study for the teaching of accuracy, reliability, and persistence. I can't teach swimming by the indirect method. The indirect method howlers are in my opinion mere evaders. Charters describes McCormick's La Salle High School experiment and devotes a splendid chapter to direct moral instruction. He describes Lancelot's work in Iowa State College. He recognizes that the majority of teachers are opposed to direct moral instruction, but he believes that it is due to a false belief that direct moral instruction is synonymous with lectures on morals.

I see I am taking more than my share of time. So I will tell you that Charters' chapters on rewards and penalties, suggestion and example, the power of reasoning with one's self, personification, conduct, integration, and the teacher's qualifications and program, are the most valuable presentation of the most urgent need of commonschool education that I have yet seen. He is reasonable with us. We must not criticise ourselves too much, if all of our children do not reach perfection in all of their traits. Bless your hearts, you cannot pick your pupils; they come from all sorts of homes. Tremendous influences outside of school are working against us; we have contact with these children only a small portion of their time from year to year. We should not dwell on those discouraging facts. Our business is to so perfect ourselves with the aid of books like this so that during the small periods we have a chance with our children we shall be able to say that our

What Present Practice Is.-"You have often heard Papa Rose here remark," said Peter the Reader, "that the number of professional books put out every month is a good sign that our calling is progressing. Another sign, I think, is the unwillingness of authors to leave their works unrevised. Comes George Freeland, whose 'Elementary School Practice,' coming out eight years ago, was accepted as up to the minute, issuing a new and extended edition,' avoiding theory that has not been tried in practice in the actual work of classroom teachers. Freeland has the opportunity of reporting directly from the field. He is director of education and teacher-training in the State Teachers College, San Jose, California. As director of a practice elementary school he has improved the opportunity to try the usages which he recommends. For instance, he shows how in teaching very young children to observe the curious forms of words a spelling consciousness is developed which, by the persistence of alert teachers, can be turned into that subconscious habit of good spelling which is the proper goal. We have made too much of good spelling and too little of bad spelling. What does that mean? It means that the absurd spelling bees still advocated by circulation managers of newspapers and by publicity-seeking superintendents is a waste of time because of giving the good spellers most of the practice. A boast of having three or four pupils with a record of 100% thoroughout the year is naught. They inherited their talent. The old maxim said, 'reading and writing come by Nature, but spelling is a gift of God.' The tested results of different usages in teaching spelling ought to settle the procedure. It is as much the business of a principal to know the best and to cause it intelligently to be used by the teachers in

'Modern Elementary School Practice.-GEORGE E. FREELAND. The Macmillan Company, New York. 417 pp. $1.60.

his school as it is the duty of an industrial manager to know and to require the use of the method of getting the most steam from a pound of coal. Freeland establishes a creed for the managers of schools. It elaborates its particulars; health, happiness, activity, citizenship, thoroughness, economy of method, coördination with home. His book is a decidedly practical and cheerful application of his creed by problem method, project motive, interest, selection of matter, adaptation to different children, and direction of education to social and civic service. He would have us stop babying our children's minds and knows that we can train boys to think for themselves if we will stop doing all their thinking for them. There should be more 'why-stuff' required of them. He is no wild enthusiast. He has seen the unintelligent striving for good things lead to shallowness, formality, and failure. Teaching has become in the light of experiment and research a process as complex as the work of a physician. So long as so many of the workers in the public schools are young girls with little training in patient observation of results; so long as we have so many older teachers who are set in their ways, the manager of a school can not be content with the outlining of a method at a teachers' meeting, or with the adoption of a usage because it seems founded on common sense. He has to get into the class rooms and help. He has to require teachers to have conscious motives toward definite standards. As a guide for a productive management of a school, as an interesting and acceptable stimulus for a teacher, I find this volume of prime value."

A Last Word on Junior-High Schools.John Falk called our attention to what he described as the latest, most complete work1 on junior high-school management he had seen. "It is, like so many of our later professional works, the work of western people: Frank Taunton, Professor of Educa

'Junior High School Procedure.-TAUNTONSTRUTHERS, Ginn & Company, Boston. 595 pp. $2.60.

tion in the University of Southern California, and Alice Struthers, Principal of the Thomas Starr King Junior High School, Los Angeles. The first junior high school treatises seemed rather cautious, but there is nothing timid nor apologetic in this manual. It starts with the good American doctrine that democracy, the associated living in which we are intelligently coöperating, is the essential consideration of schools supported by the taxes of all the people. Our democracy, it says, depends upon the ability of our citizens to think out their own problems. The junior high school is the threshhold of the thinking life of our youth.

"Within the memory of people now living it was held that reading and writing were sufficient endowments for the bulk of citizens. If the voter could read and write, the obligations of the state, so the hopeful pioneers thought, would be fully met. Vain hope. We now realize that democracy involves civic, industrial, fiscal, and political aspects of social life, all concerned with group welfare. We used to be content to let higher educational opportunities be given only to children selected on a supposed capacity for leadership. The enormous increase of school attendance in the upper grades has shown that the leadership idea is waning. The authors enumerate the demands which democracy makes on the schools: knowledge of language, oral and written, of health laws, of the problems of government, of the rights of others, of the necessity of productive work by every citizen, of the duties of the electorate to protect us from demagogs, of the need of direction for our industrial, civic, aesthetic, and religious life.

"The junior high school presupposes a control of the simpler tools of knowledge by its pupils. That the boy may use these tools in discovering his own interests, aptitudes, and capacities is the activity which the junior high school must nourish. It is an exploratory field. Its most important offerings, if we remember the American doctrine which has led to the taxing of all citizens for the education of the children of

some, are in the social sciences. Youth must be made aware of what it signifies to live in organized society. It must appreciate how we live together and what our duties are toward our benefactors, the whole people. Awareness, appreciation, and understanding come only when descriptive facts are presented vitally and not as memory exercises. The question is not how to put the social studies into our course, but how to organize our curriculum around social aims.

"The experimental courses that Harold Rugg has published in his social-science pamphlets are endorsed. The way of using them is elaborated. Information relating citizenship is over and again in this book transformed into abilities and disposition. Junior high-school managers will find here those courses worked out in minute detail with reading references galore. The analysis of what a school citizen should be, formed into 'A Junior High School Creed' runs through cleanliness of mind and body, orderliness, industry, self reliance, thrift, cheer, fairness, use, courtesy, etc., to the claims of loyalty and reverence. This creed, in simple form for recitation and guidance, takes the shape of a promise, to be recited and worked out by the children themselves. The list of duties of the principal of a junior high school, ninety-nine in number, shows what percentage of school men and women who were investigated by the North-Central Association of Colleges and Secondary Schools, admit devoting their attention to the duties listed and what per cent. of the principals' time is given to such obligations. "We, in our system, have recently seen a vigorous attack made by schoolboard members upon intelligence tests. Possibly for that reason I find the chapter on 'Adjustments to Varying Needs of Pupils' particularly timely. Our authors are not carried away by unproved assertions, nor are they frightened out of a legitimate aid to children. to be secured by careful diagnosis of the abilities and accomplishments of youngsters. The complete illustrative tables on homogeneous grouping and adjustments to various needs are the best and most helpful I have

seen. The provision for remedial classes, the arrangements for finding the means to hold the attention of uninterested children, the plans for taking care of superior groups, the patient records of case studies, the suggestions for modified courses, all seem to me to represent a tendency to salvage human waste, which is a movement in marked contrast to my school days when 'take it or leave it' seemed to be the policy of the higher grades of the public schools.

"This book has a number of strikingly interesting suggestions for the mastery of various essentials in the courses of study. I was particularly struck with some lessons. in dictionary work, the result of which seems to me certainly to promise a knowledge of the use of the dictionary and the cultivation of an interest in using it as an educated citizen should.

"Of course there is good matter on measuring and recording progress: there are sample examinations of pupils for determining the success of their teacher's instruction. The efficient organization of the junior high-school faculty, provision for pupil guidance, for making adaptive school schedules, for teaching children how to study, for taking care of health, for teaching English, history, civics, mathematics, art, ancient and modern languages, commercial subjects, for the organization and management of clubs, the kind of buildings and grounds best suited for the junior high school, modern system of attendance management, the use of the school exhibits, the business side of the principal's duties, all followed by twelve pages of bibliography on junior high schools, each book given a valuable analysis of contents; and, then, a complete index, make up the volume. I commend it to principals of every kind of school and college for it has apparently left no new proposition untouched."

A Book on the Junior College.-Henry, the humanist, informed us that the juniorcollege movement has reached the point where there is an extensive literature upon it. "Walter Martin Proctor, Professor of