many instances our best teachers, while reading extensively books interesting to themselves, forget that it is a part of their dutyas it should be of their pleasure—to be readers of books which are of interest to their children. A failure to do this causes the teacher to lose one of the best means of keeping in touch with the sympathies and interests of her boys and girls. In one instance the town clerk brought to one school four books of the same kind in order that he might more easily expend the school's amount of money. In another, the entire sum to be expended for a certain school was used for purchasing books for the higher grade, none being bought for the lower grades. I am glad to be able to add that the picture is not always so dark a one, for one county superintendent says: "Whenever I visit schools I always talk with the teacher and ascertain how she is using the library and what books she wishes to purchase next, and find her suggestions very helpful." Another says: "Teachers make out lists from which my lists are largely compiled." And again: "A part of the program at each teachers' association and local institute is devoted to instructing teachers in the contents of the library books and how to use them." "Teachers abuse the library by giving upper form books to lower form pupils.

2. "To what extent are the books used by pupils and patrons, and with what result?"

"The books are widely read." "Almost universally in a haphazard way, showing lack of interest on the part of the teacher." "Teachers and patrons read all books." "Mostly foreigners and can not read the English, but children read out loud to parents, translating as they read." "Depends largely on the community." "Eagerly read." "Books fairly devoured." "The cry is more, more."

3. "What means do the teachers employ to interest pupils and patrons in reading the books, and with what success do they meet?"

"As a rule teachers do nothing." "Lay out a course in reading in every grade for each pupil." "Read a portion of some interesting book and talking about it, either at opening exercises, at recess time when the weather is story, or at noon time." "Teachers use books in connection with their history and geography work, for example: In connection with the study of Holland, chapter two of 'Hans Brinker,' or the 'Silver Skates,' is read by the pupils." The books may be used for supplementary reading, one pupil reading and the other listening. If desired, a pupil may be asked at the close of the reading exercise to report on what has been read as a language exercise,

or again, the teacher reads some interesting story which is reproduced as a language exercise, or the teacher may stop reading the story at its most interesting part and ask the children to imagine how it turned out, thus affording valuable drill in language and in the use of the imagination. Pupils are permitted to read after their lessons are learned.

4. "What care is taken of the books by the teachers in the school (is there a suitable place in which to keep them; is the teacher the librarian, etc.), and by the teachers and patrons in the home?"

In most counties in the state book cases have been provided and the teacher acts as librarian, but in some counties the board refuses to make any such provision. No systematic record of the books is kept, and thus many books are lost. No classification of the books is attempted; pupils are allowed to help themselves and do not keep the books in place. In very few counties in the state are the books covered. In some counties cases have been made by the teachers from shoe boxes, these being neatly papered or painted and provided with a curtain to keep out the dust.

5. "What is the general sentiment of the community regarding the library?"

"A waste of money." "Pupils have enough to do if they get their lessons." "More favorably than at first." "Many intelligent people consider it an unwise investment." "Many are opposed to it for financial reasons.' "Strong opposition at first but it has all disappeared now." "School officers were slow in distributing the books."

6. "Would it, in your judgment, be desirable to devote a portion of the time in each institute to the subject of the township library?"

From nearly every county comes the answer that at each institute an afternoon or evening should be devoted to consulting with the teachers as to the needs of their schools; the nature of the books in the superintendent's list, and what books they should buy with their next year's share of the money. An evening's talk upon the use and abuse of the library might with profit be given by some one from the state department at Madison, or one of the conductors.

7. "General remarks."

"It is as important to teach pupils to read good books as to teach reading at all." "Is educating our teachers as well as the parents; let the good work go on." "Too much fiction is given in the state list; give us more history, geography and science." "The department should make a district catalogue of subjects

When a youth the writer was much troubled by "weak" eyes and for years was not allowed to read by lamplight as the yellow light of burning oil was found to be very trying. His experience led him to conclude that the ordinary book print is not hygienic. Some years

later he discovered that he had a slight optical defect which defect caused the "weakness" experienced in his case.

In the September number of the Psycological Review, there is an article by Harold Griffing and Shepherd Ivory Franz on "Fatigue in Reading" in which the writers describe a large number of experiments in determining the influence of size, shape, and spacing of type; and the color, and illumination on fatigue in reading. These experimenters found that when vision is normal the least fatiguing print is on pure white paper, in type one and a half millimeters, 1.5mm high, and with lines onethird of a millimeter wide.

During the present year the writer with a little assistance from a local optician, made systematic tests of the vision of nearly all students in the normal department of the Oshkosh school. The method employed was to cover one eye and have the student read from Snellens "test types" hung either twenty or thirty-eight feet distant and well illumined. Each eye was tested singly. By the use of lenses the character of the manifest defects was determined, and the results were recorded. In many cases the vision when using both eyes was determined. Before beginning the formal work a number of tests were made to determine the time of day when vision is the best. Persons were examined in the afternoon between four and five o'clock and again in the morning. In nearly every case vision was ound to be best in the morning. The ex

e. Manifest vision normal in one eye, the other manifesting less vision ... 65 f. Manifest vision normal or less in both eyes ...

79

In some cases of class "f" the persons were obliged to stand within ten feet to read print composed of letters three and a half inches high and lines three-fourths of an inch broad. Such persons were practically blind from myopia.

From the above table it will be seen that about twenty per cent. of the students of the normal department have normal vision, that sixty per cent. have slightly defective, and twenty per cent. have very poor vision and probably need lenses.

In many cases of class "c" experiments were made to determine the vision when using both eyes; in nearly all cases the manifest vision was the vision of the better eye; but the almost universal testimony of such was that when very tired vision was indistinct and evidently that of the poorer eye.

Under the most favorable conditions school work is very fatiguing to the visual apparatus, but under other conditions is liable to produce serious nervous disorders. The books used should be planned not for the one-fifth having normal vision but for the three-fifths having slightly defective vision. Such books must therefore have the following qualities of type and paper:

Ist. If the paper be pure white the type must be two millimeters high and have lines four-tenths of a millimeter broad; that is, one-fourth larger than Griffing and Franz found the best for the normal eye; 2nd. If the paper be soft, the type old, or the paper light gray the above dimensions should be increased by a fourth; 3rd. The paper should never be any other color than white or very light gray nor possess highly calendered surface. The most fatiguing colors are those between the spectrum red and spectrum green. It may be argued that such an increase in the size and spacing of type would largely increase the cost of books but the increase would be paper and ink and paper is very cheap and growing cheaper every year.

G. M. BROWNE.

Oshkosh, Wis., Apr., 1897

SCHOOLS IN GERMANY.

The educational system of Germany has many lines of divergence from that which readers of the JOURNAL are used to observing. An educational system is not an artificial construction, but a growth which represents the thought of the people upon whose soil it is produced. This is oftentimes lost sight of by reformers who would transplant this feature or that feature from German soil to our own public school system. The German school system is as similar and as unlike the American system, as the German people are similar to or unlike Americans. Their system has grown and developed with their national thought,— ours likewise. All those characteristics of the typical German stability, tenacity, slowness, thoroughness, are exhibited in the schools. can best, perhaps, give an idea of the system by describing some of the most apparent features a foreign observer notices, confining myself mainly to the common schools.

I

In general there are three classes of educational institutions, primary schools, secondary schools and universities, as in America; but here the divisions between the grades of schools are quite different. In one sense the schools are divided according to a money rank as well as according to scope of instruction. The lowest schools, the volksschulen, include the bezirksschulen, bürgerschulen and the hohere bürgerschulen. The secondary schools include the realschulen, the realgymnasia, the gymnasia, and some others which are modifications of some of these and not necessary to a general description. The secondary institutions do not fit as the second block in a pyramidal system as do our high schools. Their relation to the primary schools and the universities will be shown later on.

The several classes of primary schools in the cities are distributed around somewhat the same as ward schools are in American cities. However, I was much puzzed when I first came to understand why I should find a bezirksschule in such close proximity to a bürgerschule. The former word, I readily translated to mean district school, and the latter into people's or citizen's school. On later inquiry I learned that a money distinction is all that divides them, the instruction being essentially the same and the length of course the same. The pupils who attend the bezirksschule (in Leipzig) pay schulgeld or tuition money of 4 marks ($1.12) yearly, while those who attend the bürgerschule pay 18 marks. In the höhere bürgerschule the schulgeld is 36 marks.

In

all cases outsiders pay from two three times as much as residents. The question undoubtedly comes to you as it did to me: "Why do not all attend the bezirksschulen with the low tuition?" The government, however, looks out for that. People have to pay schulgeld according to the income which the' father earns. All families that earn less than 2,500 marks yearly send their children to the bezirksschulen. When that point is reached the children go to the bürgerschulen. Thus the social class system on a money basis is early indicated to the children in their school relations. In Berlin the lower schools are free to all classes and require no tuition.

The volksschulen have a course of eight years, with a supplementary course of two hours weekly for two or three years, (varying in the different provinces) in the fortbildungschulen. This course is frequently an evening course and the branches pursued are those of a practical nature, such as book-keeping, business arithmetic and in the case of girls, cookery, sewing and other domestic arts are pursued. All children must begin school at the age of six years and continue until fourteen, or a year longer if the course is not finished. The year begins at Easter and all children. who will be six years of age by June must then enter school. There is no such thing as being admitted at four or five years or waiting until seven years as is too frequently the case in American schools. Moreover, no stragglers a few weeks late are admitted. It would seem better to admit at two different periods of the year, but here the rule is one admission and one promotion yearly. (In some gymnasia the last years of the course are in half year divisions, giving two graduations yearly, but it is not the rule).

Attendance during the schulpflichtige period (6-14) is obligatory. Pupils are seldom allowed to be absent from a lesson under any consideration except cases of sickness. If a pupil is absent from school the teacher must inquire into the cause of the absence, and if the pupil is needlessly absent or unexcused the director of the school may require the school servant to notify the parents to forcibly take the child to school. The police coöperate with the teachers in guarding against truancy. They keep a list of all children of school age and in cities report weekly to the school authorities the arrivals and departures from their respective districts. Attendance at an approved private school, of course, frees from attendance at the public schools. Children who are weak-minded or who are vicious and troublesome in the public schools are com

pelled to attend schools specially prepared for these classes. Thus the pupils and teachers in the public schools are in no way hampered and hindered by those who are incapable or those who would require undue discipline. The result is a steady onward march of the classes with very few drawbacks to hinder the even progress of the pupils. All pupils in each grade throughout the schools are very nearly of the same age.

The realschulen, and gymnasial courses begin with the fourth year of school life. The former institutions have courses of six or seven years and the latter nine years. The realschulen make natural science, mathematics and modern languages, particularly German and French, the most prominent subjects of instruction. In the gymnasia the humanities form the core of all instruction. Latin is pursued for six or seven hours a week throughout the nine years, Greek six hours a week for about seven years; and a large part of the historical work bears upon classic periods. In order to pursue without serious loss of time either a gymnasial or a realschule course they must be begun with the fourth year of school life. To make a change from the volksschule at a later time means that many years of the secondary course must be in part gone over when above the normal age. The result is that few who take the entire course in the people's schools ever enter the secondary schools. Since only gymnasial graduates may enter the universities, it is easily seen that only those who start right may enter the universities. A boy has little chance of determining for himself when he reaches his teens whether he will

go to the university or not. If his parents have means enough to pay the necessary fees in the gymnasia (about II0-120 marks yearly) he is usually sent as a matter of course, while if born under a less lucky star he is sent to the volksschule and his chances of higher education is small. Many of the gymnasia have in connection with them vorschulen or preparatory schools of their own where those who can afford it send their boys to be prepared for the gymnasia.

While only a very small proportion of girls receive secondary and almost none receive higher education all must receive eight years of training in the volksschulen or in other approved institutions. Girls of well-to-do families may then attend a hohere mädchenschule but they are not admitted to the gymnasia or the realschulen. (Within the last two years girls' gymnasia have been established in Berlin, Leipzig, and two other cities). Until very rently the university doors have been entirely

closed against women, but now many of the universities admit women as horerinnen, i. e., they may listen to lectures if the professor is willing but are not eligible to the full privileges nor to receive degrees. Recently Heidelberg and Göttingen have admitted women to full privileges in certain departments and have conferred the doctor's degree upon a few. (Almost without exception those who have received the degree, however, have been American women). A few German women are in the Swiss universities where they are admitted to equal privileges with men.

As a rule boys and girls are educated in separate classes, though sometimes they are kept together in the first two or three grades. In the volksschulen they go to the same building, though above the third grade they are never in the same room. Over one entrance to the school building is usually seen the word "Knaben" and on the other end of the building "Mädchen," and the different parts of the building are so completely separated that they are practically in different schools. Girls never go to the same higher schools as boys. They are entirely separate and have widely different courses of study.

Women teachers are rarely to be seen in the public schools, and then only in the lowest classes. In many visits to all grades of schools I have seen only one woman teacher in the public schools. This one was teaching a second grade. Quite a number are employed in the private higher girls' schools and in private kindergartens. The kindergartens, however, are deemed to play a very unimportant role in the German educational system by most Germans. Here in the land of Froebel public kindergartens are very scarce. The only

kindergarten I have visited,—a private one, was very poorly equipped both as to teaching force and appliances. The latter were very primitive and the building most deplorable.

The branches of instruction in the volksschulen are much the same as are to be found in American schools. One important differance is made, however, in that religious instruction is an integral part of every course of study. Throughout the entire primary and secondary courses about two hours weekly are devoted to Bible study and religious instruction. Every session of school is opened with prayer, also. The object of the volksschule as defined in the Sachsen school laws is "to prepare through instruction, exercise and education in the fundamental principles of moral and religious training and to impart the general knowledge necessary in the Bürgerliche life." The branches deemed necessary as aids

in accomplishing these ends are religious and moral teaching, German language, including reading and writing, arithmetic, form teaching, history, geography, natural history, singing, drawing, turning, and for girls" weiblichethandarbeiten" (household arts).

It is well known that all teachers in Germany are thoroughly trained for their work. Only after thorough study and long probationary periods are teachers able to secure a permanent position. Besides having received thorough instruction in all branches which they are expected to teach, all must have good grounding in underlying principles of pedagogics. Probably in no other country can be found so large a proportion of thoroughly trained teachers as in Germany, also, few countries where they are so poorly paid. Notwithstanding the thorough scholastic training of the teachers there appears to me (also to many Americans) to be something pedantic about the German schoolmaster. There does not appear to be enough flexibility of method, -too much according to one fixed rule. Throughout there seems to be too little of what we Americans are pleased to term "practical insight." (The Germans think us too practical and not "wissenschuftlich" enough). For example all the schoolrooms have the high teacher's platform and a standard type of desk, behind which the teacher remains almost invariably. He does not get down among his boys, "touch elbows with them," and work with them. He is literally and figuratively above them. In all my visits I have never heard a pupil ask a single question. The questioning attitude we deem most important. Here pupils "speak when spoken to," and never otherwise. The discipline is most perfect from an orderly point of view. Teachers seem to make little effort to maintain discipline, though on occasion they are very severe, and sarcasm and words of reproof for failure in recitation are frequent. From the German ideal of education the system must be admitted to be most perfect. They have an aim in view standing out clear and distinct, and by faithfulness and unswerving perseverance they approach their ideals as probably no other nation does. They certainly "correlate the pupils with the age, time and place in which they live." As to whether those ideals would fit American needs at present, I shall not attempt to discuss in this paper already too long. I would just briefly mention that most of us would not concur in their ideals regarding education of women, the practical exclusion of the poorer classes from the benefits of higher training, their views concerning kindergartens and the practical equipment of schoolrooms.

In their strivings after trained, enthusiastic, earnest teachers, and the exclusion of all others by rearing up more trained educators, we ought all to say to America, "Go thou and do likewise."

As a rule the school buildings are dreary, unattractive looking structures. They present to the eye a square unsymmetrical appearance. While in the United States the school buildings generally are the most lavishly constructed buildings in the towns and villages, here the buildings bear no comparison with the court houses and other public buildings. Usually the brick work is entirely plastered over in the prevailing style of the country, giving a most monotonous appearance. Almost invariably they are poorly lighted and poorly ventilated. It is a common remark among Americans here that Germans have no idea what good ventilation is. Defective eyesight is well known to be exceedingly prevalent among students in the secondary schools and universities. This the Germans attribute in part to the use of black slates and to the use of German print. To the last there is probably much that justifies the supposition, but my firm belief is that much more is due to the illy lighted rooms in which they are obliged to do all their studying. Especially in winter when a light is necessary until nine in the morning and as early as half past three in the afternoon the rooms are exceedingly dim. (Consult Dr. Klemm's article in Bu. of Ed. Rep., 1891-2 on these points.)

I am afraid that if American boys who are used to luxurious patent desks and seats were asked to sit for a term on a German school seat they would make strong objections. They are hand made and somewhat similar to the type some of us used to sit on in the country schools. However, in all my country school experiences I never sat in any so awkward looking or so uncomfortable. A straight board about eight inches wide forms the back of the seat. The desks are, however, made for two. The desks and seats are made heavy enough not to need fastening to the floor. A piece of timber from three to four inches high forms the base, and over this the pupil must step every time he gets in or out of his seat or stands up to recite, for neither the desks nor seats are hinged. Frequently the recitation benches are "back-less." When we consider that recitations are from 45 to 55 minutes in length it seems heroic treatment to subject small boys to, or even larger ones.

Our boys and girls would also consider it a hardship to start for school as early in the morning as German children do. ter schools begin at 8:00 o'clock

In the winand in sum