Interpreting the rest of the diagram in the same way, it is seen that there is steady growth from Course (1) through Course (4) and that the difference between the upper and lower quartiles remains approximately the same throughout. The median scores may be used as tentative standards; thus, pupils in Typewriting (1) should acquire a rate of at least 104 strokes per minute, Typewriting (2), at least 178 strokes, Typewriting (3), at least 203 strokes, and Typewriting (4), at least 234 strokes. 100 strokes per minute, while on the other hand, 25 per cent wrote more than 200 strokes per minute. These wide differences of ability hold with regularity in all classes and courses. Such results prove that it is impossible to teach any class in typewriting efficiently by the class method where all pupils are working on a given lesson at the same time. Individual instruction must be used so that each pupil may progress at his own rate. A study of the diagram also shows a tremendous amount of overlapping from course to course. Many pupils of Course (1) write as well as many pupils in Course (2). The upper 25 per cent of the pupils in Course (1) write faster than the lower 25 per cent of pupils in Course (2). The best 10 per cent in Course (1) write as rapidly as the lower 10 per cent of Course (3. The overlapping between Courses (2), (3), and (4) is even more striking. At least 15 per cent of the pupils in Course (2) and 22 per cent of the pupils in Course (3) have attained the median speed, that is, the tentative standard for Course (4). In other words, 15 per cent of the pupils in Course (2) write as fast as those who have taken typewriting twice as long. These results show conclusively that we can set no definite time period for the attainment of satisfactory standards in typewriting. The indications are that some pupils will be able to write as well at the end of two semesters as is necessary. While a large number are able to complete their typewriting course in three semesters, others will require four, five, or possibly six semesters of the same type of work as is now offered in the high schools. CONCLUSIONS 1. The stroke seems to be a satisfactory measure of typewriting ability. 2. Tentative standards in typewriting for Detroit are as follows: TYPEWRITING 4 O- 50- 75-100- 125- 150- 175-200-225- 250 275 300 325 350 Diagram 11-Showing Variation in Abilities of Pupils in Each Type- The diagram should be read as follows: In Typewriting (1), "I J. H. WILSON Supervisor of Visual Instruction SEE," said the man in his busy office, the story. And the reason for this is that as he hung up the receiver. "I see," chattered the aboriginal tree man, as he swung down to his mate on the ground. Both had listened to something that interested them, and both had answered in the most hackneyed, universal expression, "I see," which has come to be mankind's favorite way of saying that he understands things. Visual instruction is one of the oldest methods of teaching, which the human race has developed. It is the most natural way of learning, and it is the easiest method for imparting knowledge. Motion pictures are but a change in the mechanical application or development of what has been a time-honored custom: teaching through the eye. From the time when man first reasoned, in his desire to impart his thought to others, he has used some form of visible expression. The first perfections which man achieved some five hundred years B. C. were through the dexterous. chisels of Phydias and Praxiteles. These told their stories to the eye, while the greatest monuments of all history are but other examples of the same appeal. Present-day applications of visual teaching in the world of business and art are so numerous that one cannot turn without encountering them. Advertising, now developed to one of the highest-paid arts, is but successful teaching through the eye. Other examples are found in the laying out of a large industrial project, the building of an automobile, the making of a watch, or the planning of a military campaign. All are done first in models, models which must work and tell practical man has found that he can most successfully make his appeal through the eye, since it is to the eye that the reasoning ability which man possesses is most closely related, and from the eye receives the greatest number of its impressions. per cent Out of every one hundred impressions 87 which reach the brain of man, are said to come through the eye. This is nearly seven times the amount of impressions which reach us through the other four senses: the ear, the nose, the taste, and the touch, combined. The motion picture, by virtue of its inherent qualities, is one of the most natural ways of visual teaching. Motion is one of the most interesting things in the world. Have you ever noticed while sitting in an audience which was being entertained by the most interesting logic and the most pleasing of personalities, how a single person passing out will attract the greater part of the attention of the room? It is only natural. We like to see things move, and we betray this weakness at all times. This being true, is it not natural then that in teaching we motion should employ the law of vision to its fullest? Can we not show through the 87 per cent avenue, in a great deal less time, many of the simple facts of our courses of study more effectively than through the 13 per cent avenue?/However, the teaching of facts is not the final objective for classroom activity. It is to teach facts applied to life processes for which we strive. And herein visual instruction, especially the motion picture, comes most logically into its own. Direct contact with things and situations is, no doubt, the quickest way to learn about them. However, since it is cnly a small per cent who are permitted to have these direct experiences, the next best approach is through the motion picture. To some, this even surpasses a personal contact, since the camera can be made to look into things and through them, showing the processes and the laws involved which are often hidden to the untrained observer. By diagrammatical sketches and X-Ray pictures one is able to look through living tissue and see the capillary action of the blood, the mending of a fracture, the digestion of food, the inside working of an engine, or the crystallization of a snowflake. By means of the telephoto lens the beaver builds his dam with uninterrupted industry three feet from any observer, and intimate studies of the shy est of our bird and animal friends can be made. By means of the "speed camera" the athlete's precision of stroke and technique of movement can be reviewed as models in physical culture, while the "slow camera," photographing a few "frames" each day, shows the bursting of a growing seed or bulb, the emerging of a caterpillar into a beautiful butterfly, or the unfolding of a bud into a flower as nature actually directs it. Health habits and their good results can be indelibly stamped on the mind, as can care of the teeth, proper food, clothing, rest, and recreation. All these can pass rapidly before the class, not as the average teacher would interpret them, but as she would explain them when instructed by the nationally known specialist who produced the picture. These are mere suggestions of many features which will force themselves into the classrooms of the public schools shortly. In the more formal academic subjects the situation is very much the same. In the study of geography and history and civics and natural sciences, the child is able to see in a few moments' time a tremendous array of facts and their resultant influences on mankind. Selected in stances which have most directed history, what caused them and why they affected society as they did, can be graphically and pointedly illustrated by means of the motion picture. In geography the work of rivers, tides, glaciers, volcanoes, coral reefs, and all the natural features and their influences can be explained simply and directly. Even the smallest child may know the phenomena which build the "stern and rock-bound coast." Visual instruction by means of the motion picture is young. There are many possibilities which have not as yet been suggested. However, the idea is gaining rapidly throughout the entire United States. We believe that the movement will be a permanent one, and that the further this work is developed the greater its justification will appear. Organizations, including schools, churches, and welfare and social centers, are springing up throughout the entire country in an effort to develop and coordinate the work on a national basis. Producers are spending vast sums, anticipating the school market for films, and we are beginning to SEE the way through. THE DETROIT JOURNAL OF EDUCATION The Detroit Journal of Education, which makes its initial appearance with this number, is published by the Board of Education in the interest of intermediate and secondary-school teachers. While While the circulation of the magazine must of necessity be limited, it is hoped that its outlook may be broad and progressive and that it shall stand for a forward-looking policy in education. It will undertake to reflect the views of leaders in education throughout the country, and each number will contain contributions by educators of national prominence. It will aim to stimulate and encourage teachers to apply the principles of research to all educational problems, and to this end will open its columns to meritorious contributions based upon scientific studies. The great social objectives are held to constitute the aims of all educational endeaver, and this magazine will promote a realization of these aims throughout the Detroit school system. It is expected that this periodical will exert an important influence in the development of a constructive educational policy in the intermediate and secondary schools of this city. C. L. S. A CLEARING-HOUSE OF IDEAS FOR DETROIT TEACHERS The Detroit Journal of Education is not an innovation so far as the educational press is concerned. Journals of this kind are being published in several of the largest and most progressive cities. in the United States. State universities and normal schools throughout the country make use of publications of this character, too, in building their influence in the field of education. Moreover, the practical importance of official publications of this kind is widely recognized by business organizations. In Detroit, the Board of Commerce, the Athletic Club, and various other organizations of a similar nature, as well as many manufactur ing companies, such as the Ford Factory and the Burroughs Adding Machine Company, depend upon such publications in the development of their business enterprises. The Detroit school system is dealing with business problems as difficult and as complicated as any dealt with in the great business institutions of the city, and, furthermore, is concerned with intricate problems of educational readjustment. The need for the reorganization of public-school education, which is felt throughout the United States, exists in an intensified form in Detroit, where during the past decade the city has risen from a position of ninth in importance to that of the fourth largest city in the country. The annual report of the superintendent of schools, recently issued, shows that the Detroit population increased from 465,766 in 1910 to more than 993,000 in 1920, with an increase in school registration from 61,961 to 139,604-an increase in city population of 113% and in school registration of 125%. The increase in the value of school property leaped from $7,080,167.00 in 1912 to $40,000,000.00 in June, 1921-a growth of 457%. The number of teachers employed has increased 146% since 1910. Under such rapidly changing conditions, involving numbers of such large magnitude, in these times of economic stress, it would be practically impossible for this staff of teachers, 3,922 in all, to work together with a sense of common purpose and with a consciousness of high professional ideals without some such medium of communication as the Detroit Journal of Education. The Journal will serve the teachers as a clearing-house of ideas. It will give them the opportunity to pool their experiences, to come out of the tread-mill of individual isolation, in fine, to do real team work with the greatest amount of satisfaction to themselves and to others. C. C. C. |