more, a class of applicants who must have the kind of places they have been prepared for, since they are unfitted for anything else. In American universities at present it is difficult to get good men to consider teaching as a career, the transition to industrial life being so easy and its prospective monetary rewards so attractive. That we could successfully impose the German conditions for entrance upon the work of high-school teaching is not to be imagined. Few men would apply, and the public would revolt in the case of women. Furthermore, we have no means for carrying out any general system of cadet teaching, since local autonomy would place this matter at the individual disposition of the various school boards. It remains to be seen whether we could not by some system of benefits to individual and community induce high schools to undertake this much needed work. Candidates would serve for little or no salary, if only they were assured of a reasonable expectation of employment at the close of their cadetship, while school boards would consent. to this arrangement if it were evident that on the whole the schools and the community would thereby be educationally benefitted. XVI (special) THE PRESENT TRAINING OF TEACHERS FOR SECONDARY SCHOOLS EDWIN G. DEXTER, PROFESSOR OF EDUCATION, UNIVERSITY OF ILLINOIS The task assigned to me in the preparation of this general report is one with easily defined limits. It is a study of fact pure and simple, entirely free from speculation with intent to discover the facilities for pedagogical instruction within the colleges and universities of our country. If we are to accept the rapidly growing feeling that these are the only educational institutions adequately equipped in their academic and scientific departments for the preparation of teachers for secondary schools, the study is one of the professional preparation of these teachers. The sources of information are threefold: 1. Recent reports of the United States Commissioner of Education. 2. College and university catalogs as well as special reports of all sorts from those institutions. 3. A considerable mass of correspondence with various college officers, mostly professors of education. From the study of the first of these sources of information it was found that 219 colleges and universities reported (Rep., 1904) students enrolled in courses in pedagogy. The merest inspection of the list convinces one of its inexactness since several having successful departments of education are not included. Such institutions are, however, included within the study. On the other hand, a careful study of the catalogs of the institutions named in the commissioner's report discloses the fact that 21 of the number make no mention of any pedagogical offerings. An attempt was made, thru correspondence when necessary, to secure the catalogs of all the 219 institutions mentioned, tho without success in 50 instances. Of the 169 institutions whose catalogs were studied a limited number (16) offered so-called "teachers' courses" in specific subjects, as Latin, English, or mathematics, which were plainly but rapid reviews, useful as "cramming' courses for teachers' examinations; but since no offerings were made along strictly pedagogical lines, these were omitted from the study. A few institutions mentioned by the Commissioner are special schools for the deaf or blind and were excluded as plainly beyond the scope of this paper. With such substraction and with the addition of institutions known to offer courses in pedagogy, but not mentioned in the list, we have as the basis of this report 148 colleges and universities of widely varying educational merit and elaboration of organization. A considerable number of these institutions, altho classed by the Commissioner as "higher," offer academic and scientific courses scarcely higher in grade than those of the sophomore year of the better universities and perhaps theoretically should be excluded from this study. Practically, however, they must be included since they are the sources of supply for the teaching force of the secondary schools tributary to them. In the statistical study of these institutions immediately following, made for the purpose of showing in a general way the facilities for pedagogical instruction, the following facts are presented: 1. Number of instructors of professional rank offering pedagogical courses. 2. Number of instructors of lesser rank offering such courses. 3. Number of instructors of both these classes who are also officially connected with other departments of instruction. 4. Total number of pedagogical courses offered. 5. A rough classification of such courses. (a) Courses in educational philosophy. (b) History of education. (c) Administration and method. (d) Educational psychology (where these courses are not offered in the department of education or pedagogy but by a separate psychological faculty they are not included). (e) Observation and practice teaching. Seminars. (g) School hygiene. (h) School law. By the term "course" is meant the offering of a single subject for one term. For the purpose of this study it was deemed inadvisable to take into consideration, either the varying lengths of courses (usually either two or three to the college year) or the varying number of exercises per week. To have done so would, in some ways, have increased its value but only at the cost of very greatly increased complication. The question of classification of subjects under a reasonable number of heads was not an easy one to settle. More than one hundred different statements of courses were found. Whether the classification I have used is the best possible I should not wish to say. I am, however, stating it with sufficient detail to make it ful y understood: Class A: All courses of a general philosophical nature. These are frequently under the title "Philosophy of Education." Courses entitled “Principles of Education” are also included when from the description it is plain that the emphasis is on the philosophical side; "Educational Classics" when the emphasis is not on the historical side. Courses in the philosophy of particular educators, as Herbart, Rousseau, Froebel, etc. Class B: All general courses in the history of education. All special studies of the schools of particular periods or countries except those in present organization and methods. Educational classics when the emphasis is historical. Class C: A very wide range of courses is covered by this group. Roughly, they may be divided into two divisions: (1) courses in organization and administration; (2) courses in methods of teaching, either general or in the teaching of particular subjects. Under the first division are the following: School organization, general pedagogy (not theoretical), school administration, the present organization of foreign school systems, etc. Under the second division comes general method and all courses in the teaching of special subjects, as Latin, mathematics, etc. These courses are frequently offered by instructors in other departments than that of education. Class D: No courses in psychology were included which had not plainly a pedagogical application. Among those covered are the following: Educational psychology, genetic psychology, child-study. Class E: These courses are fully discussed later in this report. Class F: This group of courses were plainly for advanced students. Educational philosophy, history, and administration are included tho the latter predominates. The titles of the other two divisions are sufficiently expressive and need no explanation. In the tabulation of data everything is excluded which applies specifically to the work of the elementary schools. Whatever applies to school in general or to secondary schools is retained. The University of Chicago and Columbia University offer many courses in elementary-school training, and many of the smaller colleges offer some work that must be excluded for the same reason. Such subjects as manual training, music, drawing, household science, physical education are not included because adequate data are obtainable from very few institutions. The facts disclosed by the study of the 148 colleges and universities are as follows: Within them 357 different instructors offer courses of a pedagogical character. Of that number of instructors 278 are of professional rank. That so large a number are of this rank is due to the fact that within the smaller institutions, which predominate in the list, there are but comparatively few officers of a lower grade. Of the entire number of instructors (357) 278 are officially connected with other departments in which they also give instruction. This fact is also largely due to conditions in the smaller institutions in which the pedagogical instruction is frequently given by the professor of philosophy. The custom too, even in the larger institutions, of having the courses in special methods given by instructors in the academic and scientific departments, is of influence here. The total number of courses of the nature covered by the classification already given was found to be 935. The classification of these courses is as follows: The exact nature of the work done in the particular subjects covered by this classification it is not easy to determine, either by the printed catalogs or correspondence. In the smaller institutions it is almost entirely thru the use of the textbook, and in the larger ones mainly so. In the former the single course offered is usually designated as "pedagogy" or "school management." The number of institutions offering courses in class A is largely augmented by a requirement of the Kansas law to the effect that all candidates for the teacher's certificate must be proficient in the philosophy of education. That being the case, all of the colleges of the state offer that subject. For class E (observation and practice) it was impossible to determine even the number of courses offered since the work is so often done in connection with other definite offerings. The following institutions, however, profess to offer some facilities for the work. Just what is done in some of these institutions is shown later in this report. Berea College Brown University Howard University Iowa Wesleyan University University of Nashville University of Nevada Ohio State University Throop Polytechnic Institute University of Washington Nebraska Wesleyan University The following table shows with some detail the conditions of pedagogical instruction for a selected list of colleges and universities taken from the larger list of 148. Only those institutions were included for which conditions could be fairly well determined. Any inaccuracies may be ascribed to the difficulty of classifying the offerings. OBSERVATION AND PRACTICE TEACHING The normal schools of the country have, from their inception, been centered very largely in the practice school. On the other hand, university departments of education have developed the instructional and theoretical sides first and are only just now beginning to give adequate attention to the practice school. It is probably truer than many of us would wish to acknowledge that it is as yet largely on paper. The following pages, setting forth with some detail the observation and practice facilities in a considerable number of institutions, were taken, in some part, from their printed announcements but more largely from correspondence with officers of the various departments of education. The University of California and Leland Stanford Jr. University are required by state law to give training in observation and practice to matriculants for the state certificate; "at least one-third of the prescribed work in education shall consist of actual teaching in a well-equipped training-school of secondary grade directed by the department of education." This law went into effect June, 1906. The University of California has been doing this for some years, using the city schools as a medium. So far the work has been chiefly in the grades. The university will soon maintain a high school of its own. Temporarily the Leland Stanford Jr. University will arrange for practice work in the San José Normal School. Brown University possesses excellent facilities for the practical training of |
