Public Schools, and by no less great authority than the New York police representatives of the Bertillon and finger-print system.

The tenative data, however, afforded by the psycho-physical measurements show that the subnormal condition is quantitative, not qualitative; that subnormality is simply a question of degree. In outlining our educational work, we corroborated these measurements by the pedagogical results obtained, and we found that our children could do the same educational work, but in a less perfect way. In all the educational work of the school we have given these subnormal children exactly the same kind of work as was given in the Dewey School and the University of Chicago School of Education. Some of our children, however, could only approximate the work.

With all this scientific investigation and the necessarily great amount of technical work for overcoming the neural defects of the little patients, the motive side of the child was given pre-eminence. Children think in situations, and in our educational work we aimed to keep paramount the meaning side, the desire side, the feeling side, the social side-the controlling elements of the emotional tones of children.

Notwithstanding that one of the main purposes of the school is the scientific research into the physical defects of children-defects that go toward producing general backwardness and mental infirmities-the most beautiful aspect of the school is from the child's standpoint; for everything that is done has a direct bearing, not only upon the needs, but on the desires and wishes, of the children. It is to the child an ideal world. Every child has his particular talents developed. If he shows a marked talent for music, the efforts of the teacher are concentrated along that line. Great attention has been paid to the effect of music both in the way of mental development and in controlling the emotional tone. Some of the children only six years old have been taught to compose, to read, and to write music, as well as to play. Lessons on the piano, violin, and other instruments were given. If manual work seems to be his particular bent, special attention is paid to a child in that line. If simple problems in physics and chemistry interest him, his scientific tastes are satisfied and directed, and the toy steam engine, so dear to the heart of the small boy, is explained by simple problems in physics, and thus his concept enriched. What a child loves to do, he is encouraged to do, unless his desire partakes too much of the nature of an obsession, in which case his attention is diverted by a counter-attraction. The child's natural sequence in the way of personal interests is followed. When a little invalid enters the school, there is no break between his home life and this new environment. A very careful study is made of the child's likes and dislikes, his preferences and tastes, and there is no new arrest in the child's development by the teacher forcing her arbitrary sequence upon the child's own natural mental sequence. To understand the needs of such a subnormal child, it has been most aptly said by a well-known educator that the teacher must get inside that child and look out upon the world thru his eyes.

Music. In addition to the purely motive side of the work in music, the work is interesting because of the double purpose for which it is given. The speech center and the leg, arm, and finger centers of the brain are adjacent. To assist in developing speech, finger exercises on the piano-finger gymnastics are given to assist in developing the right co-ordinations and to develop the motor area in the brain. Often a child's first knowledge of number and mathematical concept he gets thru the work in music. In fact, every educational phase of the school is correlated with music.

Speech. For developing retarded speech or for developing speech in hearing mutes, or to restore the speech function in young children who thru illness have lost the power of speech, the normal co-ordinations of ear and voice are first set up before the eye and ear co-ordinations, or the eye and voice co-ordinations. The success of this method of developing speech lies in the fact that the children learn their vowelization by the sensation of voice-placing and tone-placing. They are given much technique to free them from technique. Notwithstanding that in the majority of speech cases many technical lessons are necessary both in speech and music, the thought side is given much prominence.

Gymnastics. In the orthopedic gymnastics, which are almost entirely therapeutical in nature, little can be done along this line, but with the introduction of music the exercises become purposeful, and when it is explained to the child that certain treatments will help him to regain the use of his little crippled legs or arms, these exercises become full of interest and meaning to him. And even in these treatments the "why" side of his nature is being satisfied, altho it be by these sometimes painful manipulations upon his own poor little twisted body.

Sometimes it is not the little legs that are twisted. It may be that, because of spinal meningitis, the child has a twisted and twilight mind; for here, in this child's sanitarium with educational provision, children with crooked. little backs, crooked little legs, and crooked little minds are admitted, to find benefit and relief thru these special methods.

One of the most interesting phases of the work is the way some of these little cripples take their work in dancing. Unable to stand on their legs, they are placed on their backs on a mattress on the floor, and the gymnastic teacher puts the legs thru the rhythmic dancing movements in time to music. This is done so that, altho the little patient himself cannot execute the required movements, these exercises will assist to develop the motor area in the brain so that the child will eventually gain motor control over his legs, and it will not take him so long to relearn to walk.

While special attention is given to overcoming speech defects and other neural defects, the majority of children are receiving instruction in cooking, simple physiology, elementary physics and chemistry, reading, writing, music, voice-training, and all kinds of gymnastics. Some of the best work is done in sloyd. Those children who are unable to stand sit while at the bench. All sorts of things are made-boxes, paper knives, doll-houses; anything that

the childish mind conceives is fashioned out in wood. In this work technique is subordinated to motive.

As the special methods evolved and developed from our more purely pedagogical experimentations are soon to be published, I have not gone into detail here. Suffice it to say at this time that the generalizations from the conclusions reached are as follows:

1. That music as a factor in the educational development of all young children, both normal and abnormal, should be given greater emphasis.

2. That technical drill on speech—the physiological alphabet-should be given young children, in order to free them from technique.

3. That young children, both normal and abnormal, should be given more dancing. Dancing movements are a prerequisite in developing other motor co-ordination-speech in particular.

Also as a result of these conclusions, the following questions have been raised, calling for further investigations:

I. To what extent is the general nervous condition of children at the age of nine to eleven due to an insufficient quantity of water and of sugars, rather than to that particular period of growth, as is generally conceded?

2. Are not insufficient sleep, and unwise distribution and insufficient number of meals, influential, tho ignored, factors in causing the physical and nervous breakdown of children at that age?

The sanitarium was organized in the fall of 1899. With the opening came more applications than the building could possibly hold. Twelve children were admitted on probation, and from that time to the end of the present school year in May, a period of less than five years, over four hundred children have been examined and tested. Of this number about fifty have been admitted for treatment. With the limited accommodation of house capacity, and the assisting staff, but few children could be cared for. However, the results obtained by the laboratory method, which we were thus better able to work out in minute detail, have made it possible for us to formulate such generalizations from our data obtained as may be applied to the care of both normal and abnormal children. In our investigations we have not sought to be able to establish glittering generalizations, but we have worked for a few fruitful results upon which pedagogical procedure may be based. We lay no claim to originality of method. We have simply brought together in one method of investigation the empirical, the analytical, the experimental, and, merely for corroboration, the statistical method.

The new era in child study is marked by laboratory methods. We are leaving behind us the methods of statistical evidence; the new child study, as does the study of medicine at the present day, demands laboratory methods and experimental evidence.

While we might have obtained much from tradition and hearsay knowledge in the handling of such children, we wanted a first-hand knowledge, and, for this reason, in our child study laboratory we have spent a great deal of time upon recording in minute detail the daily life-history of the child.

We need more laboratory schools for the scientific investigation of subnormal children. An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure, and who knows but what many of the four hundred children we have examined would not have needed special care had their mothers been properly instructed?

Would not a national child-study laboratory, under the auspices of the Department of Special Education of the National Educational Association, be one means of extending the ideals and aims of this section, and also of promulgating the cause of all abnormal children?

DEPARTMENT OF INDIAN EDUCATION

SECRETARY'S MINUTES

The opening meeting of the Department of Indian Education was called to order in the Hall of Congresses, Administration Building, at 9:30 A. M., by the president, R. A. Cochran, superintendent of the Rice Station Indian School, Arizona.

The Oklahoma Indian school band furnished the music.

The opening prayer was offered by Most Rev. John J. Glennon, archbishop of St. Louis, after which was sung a song entitled "This is the Indian's Home," written by Mr. A. O. Wright, supervisor of Indian schools.

Addresses of welcome were delivered by Hon. A. M. Dockery, governor of Missouri; Hon. D. R. Francis, president of the Louisiana Purchase Exposition; Dr. Howard J. Rogers, chief of the Department of Education and director of congresses, Louisiana Purchase Exposition; Dr. Calvin M. Woodward, director of Manual Training School, Washington University, St. Louis, Mo.; Dr. F. Louis Soldan, superintendent of instruction, St. Louis, Mo.; Miss Amelia C. Fruchte, of the City Normal and High School, St. Louis, Mo.; and Most Rev. John J. Glennon, archbishop of St. Louis.

Addresses in response, and touching upon matters of interest to Indian teachers and workers, were made by Dr. W J McGee, chief of the Department of Anthropology, Louisiana Purchase Exposition; Dr. John T. Doyle, secretary of the United States Civil Service Commission, Washington, D. C.; Hon. Levi Chubbuck, special inspector, Department of the Interior, Washington, D. C.; Superintendent S. M. McCowan, Chilocco Indian Agricultural School, Chilocco, Okla.; Superintendent R. A. Cochran, Rice Station Indian School, Talklai, Ariz.; and Superintendent of Indian Schools, Miss Estelle Reel, Washington, D. C.

MONDAY, JUNE 27, 7:30 P. M.

An entertainment was given in Festival Hall by the Indian students, under the direction of S. M. McCowan, superintendent of the Chilocco Agricultural School, Chilocco, Okla.

TUESDAY, JUNE 28, 2:30 P. M.

The department was called to order in the Indian Building by Superintendent R. A. Cochran, president of the department.

Dr. John T. Doyle, secretary of the United States Civil Service Commission, Washington, D. C., delivered an address on "Efficiency in the Indian Service."

Miss Natalie Curtis, New York city, delivered an address on "Indian Music and Indian Education."

TUESDAY, JUNE 28, 8 P. M.

A reception was given to Indian teachers and workers in the Indian Building.

WEDNESDAY, JUNE 29, 2:30 P. M.

The department met in Agricultural Hall in joint session with the Department of Manual Training.

For the program of this session see Minutes of the Department of Manual Training.