It would furnish an instructive comparison1 to give these sums to Standard VII. boys in primary schools, and to boys of corresponding age in English secondary schools. Berlin. - Secondary Modern School. - Class II.. Geometry and Algebra. Thirty-four boys present, aged fourteen, fifteen, and sixteen years. This was the recapitulation of an oral lesson on proportionals. Triangles and polygons were drawn on the blackboard. There was a marked contrast in the teacher's manner and style of questioning from that noticeable in the primary schools. A rapid, conversational method of speaking was used in place of the slow, clear-cut sentences of the primary teacher. The questions, moreover, were all of them real questions; they required some effort on the part of the pupil, verbal transmutation of the question was not enough. I thought that the pupils answered with extreme facility. The lesson concluded with some rapid algebraical equivalencies worked orally by the scholars. The teacher wrote the following, marked 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, and selected pupils gave a, b, c, d, e, f, g. 1 In America the comparison in elementary schools should be made with Grade VIII. Hamburg.-Secondary Modern School. Class III.m. Thirty boys present, mostly fourteen and fifteen years of age; two were sixteen, and one was seventeen. The teacher was working a problem on the blackboard and the boys were working with him in their exercise books step by step. The problem, taken from the class book, Arithmetic for Secondary Modern Schools (Realschulen), was as follows A room of 7 metres in length, 5 metres in breadth, and 3.2 metres high, is to be papered. How many rolls of paper, each 24 metres long and 43 metres broad, are required? The following figures were written on the blackboard 38.4 square metres x 2 = 76.8 square metres. The resulting square measures puzzled the boys, nor, as will be seen from the above, was there any verbal statement to make the figures intelligible. I asked if the boys could do the next problem in their books unaided. The teacher said that some, naturally not all, could do it, as the class was at the end of the school year, and the boys were taking the most difficult problems, those at the end of the book. The problem was— A square courtyard whose length was 18 metres was to be paved for a distance of 24 metres from the edges. Each stone was 30 c.m. long and broad. What is the cost, if 100 stones cost 28.20 marks? The teacher preferred to explain the problem and a boy drew the courtyard on the board, and marked it out in four sections. The sum was worked as follows Content 74.88 x 2 = 149.76 3 x 309 metres squared. The boys were not very ready, and the teacher again pointed out how difficult these exercises were. The problem was unfinished, as the time for the interval had arrived. CHAPTER XI READING, SPELLING, WRITING, AND Leipsic.—Primary School. Class VIII.6.-Reading. Girls, six and seven years old. These children had entered school only a few months before, and their reading book contained pictures; this, I was told, was peculiar to Leipsic. The lesson was on the words Die Larve ist von Pappe (The mask is of pasteboard), and Larve was the new word. A picture was drawn on the blackboard which was also in the books. Then cards were produced each having one or more letters on it, thus The letters were sounded, and the cards bearing them placed one before the other, in the way common to all phonic methods. The teachers find the same difficulty as our teachers 99 in trying to sound consonants without vowels, but they get approximations and build up the words as well as they can. Frankfort.-Primary School. Class VII.-Schreiblesen. Mixed method of Reading and Writing. Fifty-four girls, aged six and seven, were present under a woman teacher. Teacher. What is this? The sound name was given. n shown on a card. Teacher. What is this? The sound name was given. |