October 17, 1924, 9.30 a. m.

REGENT WILLIAM P. BAKER, presiding

CIVIC EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO CHARACTER BUILDING

OUTLINE OF ADDRESS BY Z. E. SCOTT, SUPERINTENDENT OF SCHOOLS, SPRINGFIELD, MASS.

While it is the peculiar function of the public schools to develop a high degree of general intelligence, the program does not exclude character education. In fact, the proper emphasis upon character education is essential in order that intelligence may be used properly.

In one sense there is no greater need to teach for character development today than formerly. Children as children have not changed greatly. Youth is the same. Two great changes, however, have come about. We, the adults, have materially changed our conception concerning the purposes of education. There is a new note of service in education as well as in business. The second one is a change of environment. The environment of youth today is vastly different from what it was a generation ago. There is the difficulty of being honest today. We must adjust youth to his environment and make it possible to use the new materials around him, in order that he may not be overcome with these materials.

Mere training and experience will not necessarily produce the best type of citizenship; intelligence itself must be guided. An important result of education is secured when boys and girls receive constant training in the (1) right attitudes toward the facts of life, (2) right moral action in the discharge of common duties, and (3) the right attitude toward life itself.

Children must be taught first how to serve themselves — then others, in unselfish service. The later results will be honesty of purpose in business, courage in the discharge of duties, and earnest endeavor in voting right and in acting right on matters of principle. The public school can not do all in this program. It can, however, carry its full share. It must continually provide the situations in which right actions are encouraged and fostered. It must plan to have the children want to do the right thing.

Schools are better toned morally than ever before. The teaching force in our public schools is a sober-minded group of women and men who, on the whole, have deep moral and religious convictions.

The majority of people have strength of character. Most of our energies should be spent on the positive side of life. Nine-tenths of our people are right-actioned. Let us spend our energies with the nine-tenths.

How may greater progress in emphasizing, character be made?

We must know what it takes to constitute a good adult citizen what it takes to constitute a good young citizen. Who are the good adult citizens? Those who put the good of others, the service to community, the love of country, above selfish ends. Who are the good youthful citizens? Those who make a beginning and continue

in the practice of placing the good of others, the service to schoolmates, the love of country, above their individual whims.

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Place a new emphasis upon education by a restatement and a restudying of the large aims and purposes of education. These would include training for worthy citizenship, health, right habit formation, correct use of leisure time, and reverence for the teaching of the spirit. Teachers, supervisors, principals and the "lay adults" must renew their energies in studying and applying these aims of education. Teaching must be positive in its attack. A system of rewards and merits is better than a system of “scolds or punishments. It is easy to scold with the thought that we may nag" boys into right action. It is more difficult to consider the case well and give certain guidance and encouragement, but the results will be much better. Some of our citizenship training in school in discipline cases is done hurriedly, with but little thought of the importance of the character effect. There is a direct potential relation between a visit to the principal's office and a visit to the truancy courts. No richer field presents itself than that of the principal's office. Here is a chance to give lessons in civic training to individual children, which lessons will stay with them as long as they live. In like manner, all teachers have a great opportunity to see the positive side of teaching to prevent wrong action.

Greater

One end and aim of education is to secure good health. emphasis must be placed in all the school work upon a sound health program. Emphasis upon the physically fit and the vigorous in health is necessary. A program of sports, plays and games suitable for all children is essential in true character building. There is no greater teaching for right action than those situations calling for team play," playing the game according to rules, and the right spirit in losing as well as in winning. The program of American sports for our young generation is one of the most important forward steps which civic America has made.

The physically fit, the vigorous in health, are ready for the most arduous civic duties. By placing a premium upon physical education from the kindergarten through the high school, we have increased materially the scope of character education.

The spirit of youth will respond to adult guidance whenever "team play," " group consciousness," is sought for and utilized.

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Use the school buildings, the rooms, the equipment and material as teaching situations showing how they should be cared for. From these situations develop in the characters of boys and girls a pride in the care of materials and a respect for public property.

Bring into use at every possible opportunity the broad principles of educational guidance. Maladjustment in the school program is almost as disastrous as maladjustment in the economic world. When children are properly adjusted, and when they are guided well in the program of education, they are the best advertisements that schools. can have.

Solve the many cases first.

Psychiatry has a place but, we can

do so much ourselves. The teacher who really knows all her children, the principal who has talked with each senior- these have given real first aid in educational guidance.

Use the civic material in the course of study to greater advantage. Continue to emphasize the heroes and heroines of the past. Teach more about the development of these men and women, less about their philosophies of life. Make greater use of the worth while men and women in every community, those who are doing a good day's work for their neighborhood every day in the year.

Provide as many situations as possible so that the young boys and girls may have opportunities to know about horses, dogs, animal life in general and Nature. Even artificial teaching situations about these animals is worth while.

Make constant use of those literary selections that deal with the worth while boys and girls and men and women. Those selections and stories made alive in classroom are essential in civic training.

Make use of pupil leadership as a regular part of the school work. Children can with profit share in the planning or carrying out of the work of the day or the term. Pupil organization in all schools. ought to be a part of the plan. When the children are discharging their obligations, their duties in extracurricular activities, they are taking their first important steps in the discharge of civic duties. the shoulders of school children should be placed as much responsibility as possible. The sharing of this responsibility results in character education.

On

Develop a course in "problems of democracy" as a regular part of history and civics courses for senior high schools.

In the course of study in junior and senior high schools, provide for regular teaching upon topics of present-day importance in the social and civic life of the community and Nation.

In all work in history, both the grades and high school, teach respect and love for our country. Teach also that good will among the school children of the different nations will mean good will among the nations in the future.

Character education should result in a quality of behavior working in and through every human interest and activity. The lesson's in history, civics, biography etc., are mediums through which ideals and character may be built. We, the teachers, must be ready to reconsecrate ourselves to our task in education for better and richer citizenship.

SHOULD THE EDUCATIONAL SYSTEM OF A STATE BE HELD RESPONSIBLE FOR THE MORAL TONE AND CHARACTER OF THE PEOPLE?

JOHN J. COSS, ASSOCIATE PROFESSOR OF PHILOSOPHY, COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY

The moral tone and character of a people are indicated by its acts and the values which it accepts, whether these values be those which are apparent in behavior or those to which customary or intellectual assent is given even when action itself displays a different scale. Each age has an actual code and an ideal code, and both of these have significance in any estimate of the moral tone and character of

a state.

These statements probably hold true for every state, and the subject on which I am to speak is phrased in universal terms. I prefer to consider the matter in particular rather than universal terms, however, and in the nature of the case I shall choose our own country for analysis.

Following the distinctions made a moment ago, let us ask whether the United States has moral tone and character and whether a split may be discovered between actual and ideal values.

As a people I believe that we display certain characteristics and possess a certain moral tone. We are on the whole energetic, aggressive, self-reliant, adaptable, friendly and generous. These are the characteristics of a new, almost a frontier people possessed of a rich land. It is possible to regard these traits as virtues. Indeed, they

are all virtues if properly combined. But we are often energetic in the same fashion as a puppy. We often merely display energy for the sake of being active and with little consideration of the effective application of energy for the accomplishment of a recognized goal. A foreign critic has described us as in love with acceleration. We are aggressive, and this trait carried us from the Atlantic seaboard over the prairies and mountains to the western coast in our internal imperialism, set us against an enormously stronger power in our early youth, and gave many delight when Japan was recently treated with insult rather than with courtesy. We are self-reliant and have faced a bleak coast and rock-filled woods and gained a living from the sea and from the meadows edged round with stones dug from their own soil. We have not hesitated to take up claims in a new and hostile territory nor delayed long in carrying railroads through a wilderness over mountains and through canyons. Many of us, furthermore, have felt quite secure in the adequacy of our own strength and have been unwilling to join other nations in attempts to bring about a better world order by concerted action. We are adaptable, too, so adaptable that we can turn our hand to almost any task, and live under the most varied conditions of life with cheerfulness, and at the same time we can accept beliefs in open conflict one with another and feel neither inconsistency nor concern. We are friendly and generous, quick to help the forlorn when personally encountered, ready to take men at their face value, interested in things other than sharp bargains and the accumulation of wealth. We will even make friends, or try to, with foreigners who despise us, and contribute to almost any cause which is well advertised and sponsored by the socially great and famous. It is pertinent to ask here whether the educational system of our state has given us the traits which have just been named. Are we because of it energetic, aggressive, self-reliant, adaptable, friendly and generous? I think not. It would seem that in spite of our educational system we do not even temper these traits with intelligence.

There are other characteristics which we as a nation seem to possess. They are not without association, perhaps not without causal relation with those already named; but they may be profitably considered separately. We are restless under restraint. There are those among us who believe that this characteristic is becoming more marked. When things or circumstances conspire to make us follow a marked and narrow path, as for example, the conditions of a given profession or the established rhythm of poetry, we change professions or write free verse. We do these things sometimes for better, some