PHILLIPSTON.

(1844-5.) SELECTIONS FROM REPORT. * * However much may be said in praise of "moral suasion" as a powerful restraint upon the minds of children, we are persuaded that its powers are insufficient to quell every outbreaking that annoys our schools. We would place force as the last resort in the management of a school; but when other remedies fail, this may be used to advantage. Few individuals who have never had the charge of a school, are half aware of the difficulties that beset the most experienced teachers. Would parents often reflect upon the vexations with which they themselves meet, at home, in training their tiny circle of children; would they recount the instances of impatience, rashness and mismanagement exhibited at their own firesides,-how often might an eye of charity discover less reason to censure a real or supposed error in the person to whom they entrust the education of their offspring! Were half the pains taken to instruct children in the ways of wisdom, at home, that are spent in searching out the defects of their instructers, many a youth would soon quit the rank he now holds, for a more enlightened one among his school fellows. * * A school must first be governed and then instructed.

* *

Next to tale-bearing, in point of meanness, we would mention the forwarding of sneers and reproof to the teacher, in billets, by the hand of a child, who perhaps has been so unfortunate from parental neglect, as to meet the embraces of the rod at school. We know of nothing more ignoble and dastardly than such a course. * *

66

A good and faithful teacher of the young, must be a pattern worthy the imitation of his pupils. He must be no novice in the science of human nature,—a man of keen discernment, ready invention and skilful to perform. He must be apt to teach," patient, affectionate, firm, persevering, gentle, frank and at the furthest remove from an ostentatious display of himself. A teacher cannot too carefully shun this vice. Much as self-conceit and a love of display are to be detested in a pupil, they argue a narrowness of soul when exhibited by a teacher, at which every feeling of common sense must forever revolt. Children can easily penetrate the mask. * * Such a teacher need not wonder if his pupils assume the government of the school. We say again, a teacher must carefully avoid selfconceit. Cheerfulness and self-command must never leave him. It is vain to think of governing others, if he cannot command himself. * *

SCHOOL COMMITTEE.-Pliny N. Ward, C. Sanderson, Calvin D. Davis.

(1845-6.) SELECTIONS FROM REPORT. ** Take care that you do not permit other towns to get the start of you in the cause of education. We feel at liberty to appeal to your ambition in this matter, holding it right that the example of others should" provoke you to good works."

In nearly all the towns in the State, this cause is receiving increased attention, but we have yet to learn that it has anywhere received too much. The Secretary of the Board of Education has, in the Abstract of School Returns, furnished a Graduated Scale, in which the 308 towns of the State are ranked according to the proportion of money which they raise for each scholar, between the ages of 4 and 16. On this scale Phillipston stands, this year, the 112th. This is better than our average, but if we stand still, others will advance and leave us in the

rear.

* *

Be careful not to do any thing which shall encourage a scholar to resist the discipline of a school, however defective that discipline may be. A teacher may be in fault, but the contest, if there is to be one, should be between him and the parents, not the scholars. If this caution is disregarded, your children are injured and all discipline is at an end.

SCHOOL COMMITTEE.—A. E. P. Perkins, C. D. Davis.

PRINCETON.

(1844-5.) SELECTION FROM REPORT. Before closing our Report, we feel constrained to express our decided conviction that it is the duty of the Legislative authority to pass such enactments as will furnish, annually, every school district in this Commonwealth with a copy of the " Abstract of the Massachusetts School Returns." The selections therein contained, taken, as they are, from the annual "school reports," emanating from the several school committees, inhabiting more than three hundred cities and towns in this Commonwealth, cannot be supposed to contain less than a vast amount of information relative to our Common School system. Yea, they do contain a vast amount of such information. Let every school teacher be furnished with a copy of these Abstracts, and, if they receive an attentive perusal, they will, in their hands, constitute, we had almost said "the only sure guide" to all the important duties devolving upon them. They will find there valuable information and counsel relative to their habitual deportment before their pupils, to the moral and religious, (not sectarian) principles they are bound to teach them; to the arrangement and order of the studies which they are constantly required to teach; to the judicious classification of all the scholars; to the necessity of persuading their pupils to give their constant and punctual attendance. These, all together, with many other important subjects, and much more important information, relative to their imperious duties, if they will but give the Abstracts an attentive perusal, will pass under their notice. They will there learn the importance of teaching their pupils in "the school of good manners," of directing their aspiring infant minds to the supreme Author of all worlds, the Maker of their bodies and the Father of their spirits. They will learn the constant truth, that, if they instil into their minds the sublime and heavenly principle, "Whatsoever ye would that men should do to you, do ye even so to them," their own duties, always arduous, would be materially lessened, and their prospects for future usefulness equally brightened ;—and, above all, they will have the nameless satisfaction of feeling, that they are directing an undying company of immortal minds into that straight and narrow path that leads, not only to science and literature, to virtue and happiness in this world, but, ultimately,-when they shall have done with these houses erected for the diffusion of human learning, and filled their day with duty and usefulness, and closed their earthly career,-to a building of God, a house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens."

66

SCHOOL COMMITTEE.-Alphonso Brooks, John Brooks, D. H. Gregory, Joseph W. Lewis.

(1845-6.) No Selection from Report.Brooks, D. H. Gregory.

-SCHOOL COMMITTEE.Alphonso

ROYALSTON.

(1844-5.) SELECTION FROM Report. * * We again protest against disposing of the office of prudential committee, by rotation, without regard to qualifications. Without any disrespect to any one, we say it is not every man in a district who is qualified to select a teacher of youth. With about as much propriety might each man in the district take his turn in keeping the school.

SCHOOL COMMITTEE.-Ebenezer Perkins, Silas Kenney.

*

(1845-6.) SELECTIONS FROM REPORT. * *The committee would observe, in the first place, that it is their conviction, that at no former period have the schools been in a more prosperous condition. There are about them, all things considered, indications of progress. There is among us, as is believed by the committee, a growing interest in popular education. And here it is pertinent to remark, that the mass of the people are not educated, except in the Common Schools. But for the advantages offered through this medium, the people would be

ignorant, uneducated. Hence their value can scarcely be over estimated. Hence the necessity of qualified teachers, and of the general attendance of children and youth.

*

We would especially remonstrate against the practice, which is, perhaps, becoming more frequent, of the older and more advanced scholars' leaving the schools, because unwilling to submit to the judicious and necessary requirements of the teacher. If the management of the school is reprehensible, let an investigation be made by those authorized so to do, and let grievances, if such actually exist, be removed. But till complaint has been made to those who have authority in the case, let there be no desertion of the pupils.

* *

SCHOOL COMMITTEE.—Samuel D. Cushing, Isaac P. Willis, Silas Kenney.

RUTLAND.

(1844-5.) No SELECTION FROM REPORT.- -SCHOOL COMMITTEE.-Josiah Clark, Charles G. Safford, Edwin Henry.

(1845-6.) SELECTIONS FROM REPORT. ** It may not be improper to remark, that school committees themselves are, (strange to say,) sometimes not altogether faultless; since an unwillingness to wound the feelings and to disappoint the hopes of a candidate for magisterial honors, or to cause disappointment and additional trouble to a district, may sometimes lead them to give a certificate when they feel it really undeserved, or to continue a school which they are conscious is unprofitable.

But considerations of this nature should not be suffered for an instant to prevent the honest though it may be painful discharge of duty. It is better to inflict temporary pain than lasting injury. *

*

Upon this subject, your committee would beg leave to say, that some of the schoolhouses are by no means suitable for the purposes designed. They have become old and dilapidated; others are inconvenient and ill arranged. Some have a cheerless, forbidding, dismal appearance, and one can hardly restrain an emotion of pity for their unfortunate inmates. They look, externally at least, like, (what we fear some of them the past winter have not been,) houses of correction. Now these edifices should be light and cheerful. They should be pleasant and attractive. The refining influence upon the taste,—the restraining effect upon the manners, which may in this manner be thrown around our children, we cannot fully estimate. But we know from the laws of the mind that they are great. We should not expect boys to become ill mannered and reckless, in a neat, airy schoolhouse, as in a low, dingy, comfortless one. We talk of the "flowery path of knowledge," but it requires a strong imagination in a child to conceive of many flowers along that portion of the path which lies through most of our district schoolhouses. *

Your committee would further report, that one great and prevailing fault in the instruction of schools, which they observed, is this. The instruction in the different branches is not made, by any means, sufficiently practical. Explanations, showing the application of principles to the affairs of common life, are not enough given. Only the abstract answers of the book, couched in the most general terms, are required to be given, and that often without a clear practical apprehension of their meaning. Now, the operations of business, the processes of the farmer, the mechanic, and the manufacturer, are based upon simple elementary principles, many of which are capable of being explained in the schoolroom. Habits of familiar and frequent illustration cannot be too strongly urged upon teachers, and its want your committee have had abundant reason to deplore. *

SCHOOL COMMITTEE.-Daniel R. Cady, Joseph Davis, 2d, Geo. A. Gates.

SHREWSBURY.

(1844-5.) SELECTIONS FROM REPORT. * * If Private Schools were discountenanced, and those who now support them would turn their attention to the improvement of our Common Schools, the additional funds turned into this channel would be but a small part of the benefit derived from the alteration. *

What this town granted the past year, will enable them, by returning from the select, to the town school, and by employing a larger proportion of female teachers, to offer such a compensation as will procure an adequate supply of well educated teachers.

* *

A boy, kept in a district school in the ordinary way, without any solicitation or care of parents, till he is sixteen, and then sent to an academy two years, is not so well qualified and fitted for active life at twenty-one, as he might be at sixteen, with the cooperation of parents, in such a school as ought to be taught in every district in town.

* *

SCHOOL COMMITTEE.-Adam Harrington, Arunah Harlow, Jr., Ethan Temple, Abijah Nourse.

(1845-6.) SELECTIONS FROM REPORT. * *If the child cannot be won to obedience by gentle means, which, we would recommend, should always be tried faithfully first, let compulsory means be used, but used with discretion. *

*

Here we would express our regret, that so frequently, in some schools in this town, scholars are suffered to absent themselves from school on the day of examination. It is an injury to the feelings of the faithful teacher, which ought not to be inflicted. * *

The great mass of the community are, doubtless, in favor of a wholesome government in school. But it is found to be in the power of a few individuals to nullify, to a great extent, the authority and influence of a judicious and skilful teacher. Scholars are sometimes tolerated in school, whose only influence is to thwart the efforts of the teacher, both for discipline and instruction. One such scholar des

troyeth much good. *

*

SCHOOL COMMITTEE.-Samuel De Witt, Thomas W. Ward, Arunah Harlow, Jr.

SOUTHBOROUGH.

(1844-5.) SELECTION FROM REPORT. * * Vocal music has been practised in some of our schools, and the effect has been good. It cheers up the spirits, and gives a new impulse to the scholars. If the school becomes dull and weary, let them but sing some lively tune, and the effect is as visible as it would be, in a company of fatigued soldiers, to strike up a martial air.

SCHOOL COMMITTEE.-Peter P. Howe, Jonas Fay.

that

* *

(1845-6.) SELECTIONS FROM REPORT. ** Your committee would say, our schools, as a whole, have been very successful during the past year. It has given the committee no small degree of pleasure, to see the schoolhouses so well filled with spectators, at the examinations of the schools. In the six winter schools, no less than 360 spectators were present, making an average of 60 in each school. This is as it ever should be; if parents wish their children to take an interest in schools, they must manifest the same themselves. SCHOOL COMMITTEE.-Peter P. Howe, Jonas Fay.

*

SOUTHBRIDGE.

(1844-5.) SELECTIONS FROM REPORT. ** The order of this school was not good. The conduct of a very few of the older scholars, appeared to be unhappy in its influence upon the school generally.

No. 5. This school was suspended about five weeks in July and August, for the convenience of the district; but the committee are constrained to believe that this recess was detrimental to the school, as, by means of it, many scholars lost their interest in study.

No. 6.

* *

The committee were happy to see the descendants of down-trodden Africa admitted to privileges of education, on an equality with children of European ancestry.

* *

The amount raised last year, in this town, by taxes, for the support of schools, was $800. It is evident that, in most of the districts, this sum is not regarded by the people as fully adequate to the object in view. * * The average sum raised by the towns in this Commonwealth for the support of schools, is nearly $2 90 to each scholar. If this town should do as well, the sum raised would be about $1700. Of the 308 towns in the Commonwealth, 289 raise a larger, and only 18 a smaller, sum, in proportion to the number of scholars, than this town has appropriated. This places us, with all our enterprise, quite too near the latter end of the list. Your committee, therefore, recommend that the town raise not less than $1000, for the support of Common Schools the coming year.

* *

Reading can never be good where the mind does not enter into the sense.That teachers should ever acquiesce in their pupils' pronouncing sentences like parrots, missing a large proportion of the information and improvement, which it was the intention of the author to convey, is really surprising.

"On entering a Moravian schoolroom," says a writer, "I saw, amidst some appropriate inscriptions on the wall, intended as mementoes to the children, the following one, put up by the teacher for her own use: 'NEVER CORRECT IN ANGER.'" The teacher was so conscious of the importance of strict watchfulness over herself, as to record, in the face of her scholars, her own condemnation, if she should ever suffer herself, by a want of temper, to abuse her authority. Such self-attention could not be confined to a single point, but, having entered the system, would pervade its different parts. "A more estimable teacher,” adds the writer, "and better taught, better principled, more affectionate, more orderly and more happy scholars, I think I never saw."

*

In looking over the schools, your committee by no means find that the good order discoverable in them, bears any proportion to the quantity of correction applied. Correction more sparingly administered is found most effectual. Blows and stripes appeal to mere corporeal feeling, without that mixture of reflection and moral sensibility which most other modes of correction tend to excite. We think that motives of a higher kind ought, as much as possible, to be adopted.

* *

SCHOOL COMMITTEE.-Eben. Carpenter, Linus Child, Moses Plimpton, Admiral P. Stone.

* *

* *

(1845-6.) SELECTIONS FROM REPORT. ** When a book, however excellent, has been in a school a few years, the scholars become familiar with all in it that is calculated to arrest their attention, or excite thought; and, when this is the case, the exercise of reading becomes purely mechanical, and is found to improve the style but little. We would express our gratitude, that the change we recommended was so readily and so universally effected. While your committee have considered the present as an age characterized by improvement; while we see every thing pertaining to the arts and sciences, moving with rapidity in the onward course toward perfection; we are grieved in being compelled to regard the Common School system,-that best and most enduring monument of our Puritan fathers, as being, to a great extent, an exception to the general state of things. In respect to these schools, it may be said with much propriety, all things continue as they were, since the fathers fell asleep.The school-houses, their location, their structure,-their accommodations, and the manner of conducting the schools, have undergone but little alteration. The reason for this, we think, cannot be found in the perfection of the system, for every reflecting person can but deeply feel that our schools are not what they might and should be; and we are led to wonder that the public mind has not, long ere this, declared that they are not what they must be. That our Public Schools do not keep up with the wants of the age, is abundantly evident, from the rising up among us of so many Private and Select Schools and Academies; not that