The Sphere of the National Association By ANDREW J. RICKOFF, Cincinnati. [Abstract] Members of The National Teachers' Association: Ladies and Gentlemen-The example of the gentleman who preceded me in this chair is worthy of my imitation, and I proceed accordingly to lay before you a brief statement of some of those matters which deserve your attention at this meeting. All appropriate papers submitted to an educational association must relate either generally to the interests of education or specifically to the business of the teacher in a word the science of pedagogy. Generally, when they are intended to excite interest in the cause of education; when they refer to the policy of the state in the education of her children; the organization of state, county or town systems of schools, or anything in the whole range of educational jurisprudence; specifically, when they refer to the nicer processes of analyzing and developing the human mind. This distinction ought to be distinctly recognized in the proceedings of this and every other association of its kind. The first class predominates over the second in a ratio hardly to be credited without a careful examination of the great mass of papers submitted and published within the last five or ten years. This has been a just result of our circumstances as a people and the educational status of the times. The attention of our countrymen, and of the members of our profession, have been necessarily engrossed with the appointment of special school officers, the levying of taxes for school and library purposes, the erection of school buildings, the classification of schools, &c; but none of these things are desirable for themselves as an end; all are merely preliminary to the great consummation, the education of the children of the state. We can not divorce our interests as pedagogues from the discussion of the general and outside interests of education, but we are only concerned in them in common with all intelligent men and women. It is only in an association in which the friends of education and teachers are brought together that these preliminary and auxiliary matters can be discussed to advantage. Teachers themselves have a position from which they are apt to have a distorted view of these things; their opinions are likely to be partial and theoretical rather than complete and practical. On the other hand, the man without experience as a practical teacher will fail to take an adequate view of them, unless his judgment is assisted by the schoolmaster's observation. It is in accordance with these views that I would recommend that the Association be divided into two sections, the general and the special. No pains should be spared to obtain the attendance of gentlemen in the several states, who have taken a public spirited and active part in the agitation of questions pertaining to the general interests of education. These gentlemen together with teachers who take an interest in "outside matters," should constitute a section of the Association, entitled, perhaps, the general section. To them should be referred questions of general interest, such as the following: General Educational Statistics. The educational statistics of no two states are so prepared that they afford any basis at all for comparative statements or estimates. This statement applies in an equal degree to the statistics of the school-going population and to reports of receipts and expenditures. By a little interchange of views and experiences of the officers of the respective states, great waste of school funds and loss of precious time might be avoided. In order the more perfectly to disseminate information in regard to educational matters, and to promote the more free interchange of views upon school organization and classification and instruction, we need a journal, to be published monthly or at less intervals, which shall be devoted to these purposes. We need one to become a record of the times in an educational point of view. We must also regret the discontinuance of the Educational Year Book, as a means of spreading information upon these subjects, and I would suggest whether it is not desirable that we should take steps to secure its annual issue. The question of adult education is scarcely less interesting to the friends of education than the question of common school education. How to carry young people safely from the school-going age to the age of conscious responsibility, is a matter of the highest interest, and is earnestly agitated by the states of Europe at this time. This matter seems to me to be of quite as much importance as that they should attend school when children. Through the active exertions of friends of public instruction in Great Britain, a kind of information and training is given in the national and of the "British and Foreign" Societies schools, scarcely thought of in our own country. Instruction in common things-embracing domestic, and something of social and political economy-has been successfully urged as proper and desirable subjects for school instruction. Children are retained longer in the schools than they could be if kept at those primary branches, the necessity of which is not always understood. Whether such instruction is not needed in this country, in the schools which are attended by the children of laboring people, it is useless to deny that in the large manufacturing towns, and even in the rural districts, a class of people is growing up who have not that instruction at home. which is calculated to prepare them for an enlightened performance of the duties that await them as men and women, those every-day and commonplace duties of life. The subject of reformatory education belongs to us to consider. In France an experiment has been tried, and with reputed success, by which a family system of government and training is substituted for the jail-like and machine-like plans adopted at Randall's island, Westboro', and like institutions in different quarters. Boys and girls need to be brought up under the training of mothers and fathers, or, in default of these natural guardians, under the care of those whom they can love. It is mainly through the affections that the young are trained to advantage. I visited only last week the Refuge on Randall's island. There I found at work a machine for turning out from the vagrant boys of New York city, good and honest men. These machines were as perfect as such machines may ever be expected to be, but is it likely that the results will be as uniform as in the case of the machinery at Harper's Ferry and at Springfield? Is the human soul to be dealt with in this way? Distorted and warped as the minds and hearts of the children at this refuge are, or even in their normal condition, can they be thrown into a hopper, and be turned out good members of society? There can be no doubt but that these institutions do good; but in what ratio to that which ought to be expected, is desirable that you consider. The speaker then referred to the appointment of cadets. to the naval schools, and urged that the position should be left open to fair competition, instead of being the gift of the representatives in Congress. It has been proposed again and again that a Bureau of Education should be established in connection with the Department of the Interior. The proposition has met with little favor; if, indeed, it has ever been presented upon the floor of Congress at all. The recommendation should be, reiterated, however, until its claims have reached the ear of government. These matters will interest us, but only in common with all the citizens of this republic. Not so, however, the department of pedagogy. This is the speciality of our business, or perhaps profession. When we come to the considerations of subjects under this head, we tread our way alone. To this point we have had mainly to do with the principles of political and social economy. Beyond this we have mainly to deal with psychologists and metaphysicians. We have now to study the susceptibilities and faculties of the human mind, and inquire into the best processes of developing and training it. We have to make ourselves acquainted with the sciences with reference to their adaption to discipline and nourish it. We must make ourselves intimately acquainted with the subjective microcosm and the objective universe, and upon this basis may be constructed a science of education. We may not succeed in doing so at the meetings of our Association; but the discussions which arise here will probably suggest the direction in which the road to true progress really lies. We have not now a science of education; we have not even |