" Some of the facts for those are not eliminated so early are
still more definitely indicative that something is wrong with the kind
of education given, as the facts of the following section seem to point
out.
3. THE SCHOOL EMPHASIS AND THE SCHOOL FAILURES ARE BOTH CULMINATIVE IN
PARTICULAR SCHOOL SUBJECTS
As soon as we find any subject forced upon all pupils alike as a school
requirement we may be quite sure that it will not meet the demands of
the individual aptitudes and capacities of some portion of those
pupils. As a result an accumulation of failures will tend to mark out
such a uniformly required subject, whether it be mathematics, science
or Latin. It was pointed out in section 4 of Chapter II that Latin and
mathematics, although admittedly in charge of teachers ranking with the
best, have both a high percentage of the total failures and the highest
percentage of failures reckoned on the number taking the subject. In
both regards there is a heaping up of failures for those two subjects,
but furthermore there is an arbitrary emphasis culminating in these two
subjects beyond any others excepting that English is a very generally
required subject. In reference to these two required subjects the
pupils who graduate are not more successful than those who do not. When
the emphasis is on the teaching of the subject rather than on the
teaching of the pupil there is no incongruity in making the subject a
requirement for all, but both are incongruous with what psychology has
more lately recognized and pointed out as to the wide range of
individual differences.
Pages:
116
117
118
119
120
121
122
123
124
125
126
127
128
129
130
131
132
133
134
135
136
137
138
139
140