Page:American Journal of Sociology Volume 4.djvu/337

 THE MO VEMENT FOR VA CA TION SCHOOLS 3 1 9

tinued with the same numbers this year. Instruction is given in carpentry, sloyd, drawing, natural science, and singing, the girls having two lessons a week in cooking and practical home talks. Differing from other vacation schools, this has two ses- sions a day, of three hours each, one set of children attending in the morning, and another in the afternoon. The children are allowed to choose when they will come. Thirty children at a time are assigned to each of three teachers in wood work, while the other thirty pursue some study together. Each session is divided into two periods of one and one-half hours each.

There is no classification as to ability, the effort being made to give individual instruction as far as possible.

Philadelphia. — This summer of 1898, as the result of a peti- tion from the Civic Club, the Philadelphia board of education determined to open three vacation schools as an experiment, with a principal and three assistants in each. They doubted whether the schools would be filled, but so great was the pressure that in one school twelve teachers were necessary to care for the pupils demanding admittance and filling the school to its utmost capacity. The policy of the committee was an exceptionally enlightened and generous one. The teachers were the best obtainable. Aquaria, palms, and other plants were supplied, and modeling tables which the teachers transformed into miniature landscapes, giving the rooms a delightful appearance. Nature study and manual training were laid down as essential studies, and each principal was allowed to adapt the course to the children under her charge. Each school was working out its own plan, and all seemed good. The one visited, the Beck School, seemed to me almost ideal in its spirit and work. The boys were learn- ing Swedish sloyd, taught by an expert, and gymnastics were an important part of the work. Another class was engaged in simple wood carving, and interested to a degree. Sewing, clay modeling, and drawing; nature study, literature, and civics, with physical culture, completed the course. A happier company of children I have never seen. This district was almost entirely Russian and Jewish, while the other schools drew from an Amer- ican population. One school in a manufacturing district had had