III.

THE TRAINING OF TEACHERS IN GERMANY.

In order to understand the German system of training teachers one must keep in mind the fundamental fact that there are two distinct branches of the German school system, one which trains the common people and is known as the Volksschule, and the other which trains the students who are to go forward into the university and into the professions. There is very little relation between these two departments of the German school system; so far as pupils are concerned, there is no relation above the earliest years. It is possible for a student who begins his training in the volksschule to pass into the higher schools after four years of attendance upon the volksschule. Such a student is, however, penalized to the extent of one year by making the change; that is, it is assumed that the three years of training which he would have received in the Vorschule, or primary department of a Gymnasium, is equivalent to four years in the volksschule. With the exception of this one possibility of transfer, it may be stated definitely that the two branches of the German system are, so far as students are concerned, entirely separate from each other. The boys and girls who go forward in the volksschule never have any expectation of entering a secondary school; they never have any expectation of going to the university; and they are not looking forward to entrance upon any one of the professional careers.

As between the position of volksschule teacher and the position of teacher in the higher schools, there is no possibility of transition. Indeed, those who teach in the volksschule have never, for the most part, had the training which would qualify them to become candidates for positions in the higher schools. They are persons who pass through the volksschule itself and afterwards receive the special training which equips them to go back into the schools from which they came. Candidates for positions in the higher schools, on the other hand, have passed through a secondary school and in all except the few cases where foreign study is accepted, have taken a course in a German university. The higher schools are therefore constantly kept in contact with the university. This is appropriate, as most of the students who complete the course in the gymnasium expect to go

on to one of the divisions of the university and there receive their final training for admission to the profession.

The subsequent description of the training of German teachers will therefore fall for the most part into two wholly separate discussions. We shall take up in detail, first, the training of the teachers for the volksschule, since this is by all means the largest group, and shall later report on the training of the teachers who enter the secondary schools. Before turning to details, it may be pointed out in general that in both of these groups there are certain common characteristics. There is no possibility of getting into the teaching profession in Germany without a thoroughgoing equipment which has been carefully supervised by the State. Every teacher must satisfy State requirements of a very high order, and when the appointment is made in either branch of the German school system, it is an appointment for life, and an appointment to a position which is distinctly a Government position. In both branches of the service a teacher who has served to his sixty-fifth year is regularly pensioned, as is any other servant of the Government. The salaries also are comparatively good, with the result that there are in both branches of the profession many applicants above the actual needs of the schools. The results of competition are very satisfactory, in that weak candidates are readily eliminated, and the State has always the opportunity both in its training institutions and in its employment of teachers to make a rigid selection from among available candidates. Everything proceeds in the German system with great definiteness and regularity. The result is that the schools of Germany are supplied with a group of teachers of a very high degree of efficiency. There is also a uniformity in the school system which can be obtained only through the training of all the teachers through a dominant central authority.

The perfection of the system for training teachers is very notable in both branches of the service, but it is perhaps less striking in its treatment of volksschule teachers, because in most civilized countries provision has been made on a large scale for the training of elementary school teachers. The German system is unique, as contrasted with England and the United States, in the fact that there is a highly developed and very successful system for the training of the teachers of secondary schools. In fact, the American observer has his attention constantly turned to the fact that the secondary schools are much more completely organized than are the secondary schools of any other country; and the explanation of this fact is undoubtedly to be found in the training which is given to candidates for the teaching positions in these schools. Of all the unique characteristics of the German system, this special, rigid training of the secondary school teachers stands out as perhaps the most significant.

With these introductory remarks, we turn first to the description of the training of elementary school teachers. The course of study taken by the pupil who gets his education in the volksschule is eight years in length. Pupils enter at 6 years of age and are expected to complete the work, if they pass without interruption through the school, in their fourteenth year. Since most of those who teach in the volksschule come from this institution, this eight-year elementary course is the first stage in the ordinary teacher's training. Those who are to become candidates for the teaching profession must now take six additional years of training. The first three years beyond the volksschule may be taken in various ways. Some students attend certain institutions organized to give training preparatory to the regular normal course. Others study privately for three years before entering upon the regular normal course.

These preparatory and normal institutions constitute practically the only avenue for further academic training open to those who have passed through the volksschule. A boy who has completed the common-school course can not go on into any professional line of work, and he is not prepared to take training for secretaryships or other occupations that call for literary training. The boy may go into one of the lower technical schools where he becomes a craftsman, but the whole world of professional activity is practically closed to him, with the one exception of the teaching profession. Preparation for the teaching profession, as we shall see when we become acquainted with the details of the organization of the Lehrerseminar, as the normal school is called, is sufficiently subsidized by the Government, so that it is attractive to boys who are not well off financially, and it is open to those who have completed the course of the volksschule. The result is that there is a great crowding into the lehrerseminar. Every boy of the lower classes of society who feels himself capable of pursuing an intelluctual career aims to become a teacher, and he makes application after his three years of preparatory training to a lehrerseminar, with the result that he finds himself in competition with more people than can be received into the profession. In all of the States, therefore, there is a high degree of selection possible at the very beginning of the normal training. Indeed, there are more candidates applying for admission to the Präparendenanstalten, or preparatory schools, than can there be accommodated.

A recent investigation of the degree to which this selective process is going on is reported by the Bund für Schul Reform in its report1 for 1912. Thus, in Saxony, 30 places being vacant in any given lehrerseminar, there are usually 80 candidates applying for these places. In Saxe-Weimar 75 per cent of the candidates are accepted.

1 Vorbericht, published by Teubner, Leipzig, 1912, p. 50.

In Prussia as low as one-third of the candidates are accepted in many of the lehrerseminare. In general it may be said that approximately 50 per cent of the candidates who present themselves at the lehrerseminar are excluded. In the Province of Oldenburg it is customary to admit all of the candidates who apply and eliminate those who are unsatisfactory during the early years of the training. This device has certain advantages in that it gives the institutions a larger opportunity to become acquainted with the characteristics of the applicant. The elimination is therefore, on the whole, somewhat more rational and the resulting body of students more satisfactory to the institution.

The social status of the families from which candidates for the teaching profession in the volksschule are drawn is represented in the following study, which was made in preparation for the Brussels exposition. An investigation was made of 21,943 typical students in the Präparendenanstalten,1 and it was found that the fathers of 1,335 of these preparatory students were laborers. The fathers of 2,610 were shopkeepers and restaurant keepers. Students to the number of 2,917 were the sons of teachers; 4,613 were the sons of small landowners; 5,084 were the sons of city and State officials of the lower grades, such as police officers, car conductors, etc.; and 5,384 were sons of factory workers. These figures show to what extent the humbler classes find in the teaching profession an opportunity for an intellectual career for the boys who are superior in mental ability to the common run of students in the volksschule.

The preparatory institutions are of two classes. They are either independent of the lehrerseminar or organized in connection with the normal institution. The largest of the German States, Prussia, has only meager provision of a preparatory sort for the training of candidates who are to enter the lehrerseminar. Very frequently the preparatory department is located within a lehrerseminar, but is not conducted by the State. The director of the lehrerseminar may conduct a Präparendenanstalt, but the State does not pay the expenses or undertake the responsibility of its maintenance.

The following table indicates the number of Präparendenanstalten belonging to Prussia and the number that exist within the State but are not conducted by the State itself:

Incidentally, it will be noted in this table that a division is made between the Protestant students and the Catholic students. This sort of denominational division runs through the entire German common-school system from volksschule to teacher-training institutions. This is due to the fact that in all of the German schools religion is a regular subject of instruction, and the various religious bodies hold themselves aloof from each other and insist upon a separate type of instruction for their students.

These Präparendenanstalten administer a course which in kind is not fundamentally different from the course given in the later normal years. Indeed, in some of the States, as, for example, in Saxony, it has been found advantageous to increase the length of the total period of training of the teacher to seven years instead of the six now to be found in most of the States. The seventh year in Saxony is a year at the beginning of the student's training; that is, the student may have the last year of his ordinary training not in the volksschule itself, but rather in a preparatory department of a lehrerseminar. He will then receive some normal training at a period earlier than is common in the other States. On the other hand, in Bavaria the total period of normal training is five years. This indicates a general level of school organization which is somewhat lower than that of the northern German States.

Assuming Prussia as the typical State, the following table gives the course of study prescribed for the preparatory department and for the lehrerseminar itself:

Time table of preparatory institutions and normal schools in hours per week.1

1 Bestimmung vom 1. Juli, 1901, betreffend, etc., p. 23, or Von Bremen, p. 214. 2 Included in hours set down for subject matter.

8 One hour for method.

• Method.