many of the people of the district have spoken to me about it during the year. I will, in passing, refer you to the school reports of Boston, Chicago, Cincinnati, and St. Louis, where the subject is more fully discussed, and to our sister cities of Grand Rapids and Ft. Wayne, near points, where may be seen the practical workings of the study in relatively small places.

DUTIES OF SUPERINTENDENT.

The duties of Superintendent are numerous and varied. The classification and grading of the schools, and arranging the details of a course of study; examination and promotion of classes; becoming acquainted with the best methods of instruction, and learning what is going on in the educational world; the selection of proper teachers, and the filling of sudden vacancies, etc., etc., are all important offices, and demand no slight attention. But probably the most delicate and important work which the Superintendent has to perform is the training of teachers to a proper knowledge and appreciation of their work. This is of especial moment in view of the number of new teachers who each year join our corps. If we were called upon to employ only those who had received a course of professional instruction in our Normal schools, the case would be somewhat different, though even then their methods would have to be revised and harmonized. But from necessity we are constantly engaging those who are new to the work, and the Superintendent must not only train them in correct methods of teaching, but ward off from the schools the consequences of their inexperience:

TRAINING SCHOOLS.

To secure a constant supply of trained instructors, the school systems of our large cities include provision for Normal schools, whose graduates are given positions as teachers in the city schools. For the same purpose smaller cities are establishing what are called Training schools.

These schools are in charge of a principal, and embrace three or four rooms which are taught by pupil-teachers, two or three taking charge of one room, and relieving each other in the management of the room and the hearing of recitations. These pupil-teachers constitute a class under the instruction and criticism of the principal and Superintendent. They also freely criticise each other's methods.

I would ask your body to give this subject careful examination during the coming year, and determine whether it is not advisable to open such a depart

ment.

TEACHERS' SALARIES.

As a rule, a teacher of experience in any grade is worth more than an inexperienced one. Being worth more, it follows that she should receive more. Your present schedule of salaries gives the same compensation to the teacher just entering upon the work as to one who has been with you through years of service. One of your number recently remarked to me that he thought a teacher reached her best the third year. There is enough truth in this idea to warrant a revision of your plan of compensation. For instance, in the Primary department, instead of placing all teachers on a dead level of $360 per year, would it not be better to name $340 the first year, $360 the second, and $400 the third and thereafter. This would tend to secure teachers for a term of years, than which, since our present system of examinations, and the introduction of drawing, nothing can be more conducive to the general welfare of the schools.

GENERAL REMARKS.

It is a hard fact, that nearly half of the young men named for Cadets at "West Point, fail to pass the light examination required of them in the common branches. If this shows anything, it is that the great want of the country is thorough education, as much as broad education. Thorough knowledge in the elementary branches is of vastly more importance to the people at large than a mere smattering of what are called the higher branches. Says the editor of Old and New for last month, in commenting on the above: "It is not West Point alone which rejects half the people who apply for admission. There is not a bank that wants a new teller, there is not an importer who wants a new clerk for correspondence, there is not a clergyman who wants a new amanuensis, there is not a merchant who wants a new book-keeper, who does not reject nine applications out of ten, for the very reasons for which West Point has rejected these boys,-because they cannot spell, they cannot write, and because they do not know what the rule of three means."

The tendency in the schools for some years back has been to undertake too much, to try to teach too many things. This tendency results from various causes largely from the progressive spirit of the American people, and their desire to do the best thing possible. And so, in our haste to imitate and excel the countries of Europe, their methods are adopted and enlarged upon, without harmonizing them with existing methods, or considering their fitness to our circumstances, and the untrained condition of our teachers.

Just now the Kindergarten is attracting attention. Should the verdict of educators be favorable to its introduction into public schools, there will need be wise conservatism on the part of school authorities, and careful training for the work on the part of teachers, or the system will rapidly have its day. From the study I have been able to give it, I doubt the utility and practicability of its introduction into the public schools of any but the older American communities. Centralized governments like Austria and Prussia may order Froebel's methods into their primary schools, and the results be undoubtedly beneficial, but in this country independent municipal organizations render such procedure impossible, and our relative youth and consequent unsettledness render it undesirable. When our society has settled and crystallized, the time for the general adoption of this system may arrive; meantime, efforts in that direction should be in the line of natural growth, and not a forcing pro

cess.

The division of our common school course into numerous grades, has afforded convenient forms,-lay figures, so to speak,-to hang things on. Some one remarks that it would be nice for children to know something of the vegetable kingdom, and forthwith Mrs. Lincoln's, or some other elementary botany goes into the schools, and the children begin to prattle of petal, calyx, and peduncle, palmate, lanceolate, etc. Pleasant enough, no doubt; but, in view of the superficial character of the knowledge gained, hardly worth the time taken from other branches.

Again, a teacher making a speciality of some department of science, finds that he can present it to children in an attractive way, and prepares a manual on the subject, which some enterprising publishing house puts forth through wide-awake agents, and numerous schools are induced to give it a place in their course of study. And so the process goes on until each grade, whatever the original time allowed, is stuffed and padded to the proportions of a full

school year, the regular studies are more and more cramped for time, and the course more and more lengthened.

In my judgment, the aim of our primary school culture should be thoroughness in a few things. This becomes of especial importance, when we consider that the majority of children are in school but from three to five years. Boys and girls who have reasonable proficiency in the "three Rs," are well grounded, and if possessed of good natural parts, may make their way to positions of usefulness and honor.

The study of Natural science should not, I think, be put into any grade below the high school, except as it is taught in oral lessons, from half an hour to an hour in length, according to the grade, given by the teacher, say once a week, no text-book being at any time made use of by the pupils. The aim should be to impart accurate knowledge of some of the more obvious facts and principles, and by skillful questions on the part of the teacher, to develop the pupil's powers of expression, and so make the exercise a language lesson at the same time.

At the beginning of the year I prepared a syllabus of a course in natural science to be taught in this way, embracing, in an elementary manner, animals, plants, minerals, earth, air, water, etc., but it was not given to the schools for several reasons. The teachers were not prepared for it. Then the change from twelve grades to eight, resulting, to some extent, in mixed grades; the great increase in the number of pupils; the opening, during the year, of several new rooms with new teachers; and the introduction of drawing, all combined to tax the time and energies of teacher and pupil to their full extent.

The present arrangement of the course of study, giving eight grades of one year each, below the High School, and a high school course of three years, probably meets all the requirements.

The policy of the schools during the year has been simplicity and thoroughness, and this aim will continue to characterize them under my administration. With your hearty co-operation in the future, as in the past, I have no doubt the schools will work nearer and nearer to this ideal.

Respectfully submitted.

Kalamazoo, Mich., August 21, 1874.

AUSTIN GEORGE,

Superintendent.

MARSHALL.

DESCRIPTION.

[See Cut of Marshall Union School on preceding page.]

The Central School building of Marshal, an engraving of which appears on the preceding page, was erected in 1868, and occupied in April, 1869. Its cost, including the grading and improvement of the site, was about seventy thousand dollars. Its location is in the heart of the city, occupying an entire block, which is inclosed by a combination wood and iron fence, of a neat and tasteful pattern, erected at a cost of two thousand dollars. The size of the building, outside of the walls, is one hundred and ten by seventy-five feet. It is brick, stained and penciled, and of cut stone; is three stories in height above the basement, with a Mansard roof of slate and tin. The main tower stands on the northwest corner, the ventilating tower and shaft on the northeast. The building has three entrances, one at each end for pupils, and one, the main entrance, in front. The entrances at the ends are from the respective playgrounds, and from the streets at each end of the block.

On the first floor are four school rooms, twenty-seven by thirty-three feet, and have, altogether, three hundred and eight sittings. Connected with each room is a large wardrobe belonging exclusively to it, furnished with hooks, numbered to correspond with the pupil's number in the register. Through these wardrobes all scholars pass into and from their respective rooms. Each school-room has also another door from the hall, so that at opening or dismissal, every scholar is under the eye of the teacher while passing to and from the room and through the halls. On the same floor are also two rooms formed by the towers. The one in the main tower is the Superintendent's office, that formed by the other is used as a recitation room.

On the second floor are also four school-rooms, similar in size and general arrangement to those on the first. Scholars of the Grammar and Second Intermediate Departments occupy these rooms, which have sittings for two hundred and fifty-six students. On each of these floors the seating is double, and the sexes, except in the Grammar School, are taught separately. There are on this floor three other rooms, two formed by the towers, and one, the library, directly above the main hall on the first floor.

The third floor is occupied by the High School Department. The study room is sixty-five by forty-two feet, and will accommodate, in single seats, one hundred and twenty-six students. Adjoining this room are three recitation