Democratic Sentinel, Volume 10, Number 22, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 2 July 1886 — EDUCATIONAL. [ARTICLE]

EDUCATIONAL.

Permanent Tenure of Office for Tenehert —Current Public Opinion on Educational Topics. TENURE OF OFFICE OF TEACHERS. The most important reform in school administration that is now demanded in this country is a more stable tenure oi office for teachers. Nothing but a permanent tenure of office during efficiency and good behavior will secure the services for life of the men and women bast able to improve our children in head and heart Security in office is essential to procuring the best talent for teaching. The duties are so laborious and the compensation so small that the ablest men must have at least the poor boon of security in the faithful discharge of their duty if they are to be turned to a life-work in the schools.

In building up her splendid public school system, Prussia started out with this doctrine, as a fundamental principle. There the tenure is for life, provided efficient service is rendered. Indeed, the Prussian law has long since expressly prohibited the appointment oi any regular teacher for a determinate period. The result is a noble set of men in schools, of whom Horace Mann wrote: “As a body of men their character is more enviable than that of any of the three so-called ‘professions. 1 ” In Saxony, while the cities are allowed to elect teachers from properly presented and certificated candidates, a teacher can be removed only with the concurrence of the governmental authority, after governmental examination. So in Bavaria. Every safeguard is employed to prevent the appointment oi unworthy teachers, and a proper probationary period is required; but, when the teacher is once confirmed in his place, he is secure so long as he does his duty. Says an eminent authority: “The precarious tenure has not been found necessary in any other enlightened country on the face of the globe; and, in our own country, the annual election is unknown in universities, colleges, and higher educational institutions, generally, outside of the public school; so that this odious annual election has no place in the civilized world except the public schools of the United States.” Now I submit that the facts just stated make it highly probable that we are wrong in this country. Where the pub-lic-school problem has been studied longer and with better results than with us, it is likely that -the treatment of teachers in this respect is preferable to our own. It is certainly for the interest of European governments to obtain the best teachers at the lowest price, and a stable tenure of oSice is there universally regarded as one of the first conditions.

JPUBLIC OPINION. Some wide-awake, observant children, ready at the age of five or six to look at anything but books, will catch the idea of spelling by sound, while their eyes wander. Probably it would be better not to give them this idea early, but hold them closely to learning-one or two words at a time by sight perfectly, so as to be able to recognize them instantly. A good perception of form outfit to help in learning to read and spell.— ’Student. The teacher wh© will succeed must not fall into the error of dealing with his school as if it were simply an aggregation of little people, each dike the other, and all of whom may be (taught and developed in the same genera? manner. A school is a community off individuals, no two of whom are alike, and no two of whom can be most successfully taught, governed, or developed in exactly the same way.— West Virginia School Journal. What children require to be taught more than anything else is, to spell correctly, to read intelligently, to write a good, plain hand, and to know arithmetic, grammar, and geography. If children can be taught these thoroughly, even if they get no more schooling, they will do well; and if they possess average intelligence, combined with perseverance and a desire for knowledge, they will be able to improve them

selves as they go through life. What they need first is a solid foundation to build upon. —Salem Gazette. When the teacher is easily provoked and falls to scolding to remedy existing evils, it may be set down at once that she knows little of the doctrine of discipline. It is the delight of a oertain class of boys to tease the very life out of such a teacher, and we don’t say their dispositions are very perverse either. Tell one of these quick, nervous, fun-lov-ing boys to do a thing, and impress its importance with a scowl and a menacing threat, and if he has any snap about him he will do the opposite. The reason is that the request eomes as a stern demand—as a “I dare you not to do it.” — Miss. School Journal. The best teachers do a work unknown and unseen. Whoever says to a class of boys and girls that which strengthens the weak, improves the ignorant, encourages the down-hearted, gives new hope to the discouraged, sof(< • s and cultures the rude and foolish, does a work equal to that which the angels of heaven undertake. The labor, may seem to be nothing in the eyes of those who simply look to see the results that business brings forth—houses, land, money, and fame. Yet it is just such work that is urgently needed to vitalize conscience and to infuse noble ideas. A country is rich if it has many such men and women at work —poor, indeed, if it has but few.— Penn. School Journal It is possible to provide machinery on a great scale, and yet to accomplish little. In the last century it was remarked how little good came of the rieh endowments of our universities and bow they

were surpassed uy muon puoiei umresides in other countries. Machinery thrown away! In this century we have tried machinery of a different kind. Have we always had success? We set up the examination system; we extended it over the whole country; and what do we think of the result? Is this machine so decidedly better than the other? I think a few persons will say so. Emulation turns out to be a rude and coarse motive, competition proves to be ah exhausting, unhealthy process. It is complained that those who have been trained under this system imbibe low views of culture; that this sort of education has disappointed results and can scarcely be called liberal.— J. R. Seeley, in Nineteenth Century.