Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 58.djvu/598

590 industry and commerce, together with the elements of civics treated historically, that the pupil may see the interdependence of material prosperity and social stability, and learn to look upon contemporary social and economic problems in the light of their historical evolution; one year of elementary algebra and geometry that may open his mind to one of the most useful, the most profound, and to some minds most fascinating systems of thought which man has developed—a result which can never be expected to follow from what the pupil has learned in the narrow field covered by arithmetic; one year of drawing and manual training that will introduce the pupil, on the one hand, to the elements of the fine arts, the decorative arts and the mechanic arts, and on the other, lead him to a just appreciation of the importance of all three in ministering to the æsthetic and the material interests of men, and help him to adjust his own relation to them in thought and deed.

That is to say, under existing conditions, I mean with the existing unsatisfactory pre-high-school education, still unsatisfactory in spite of the well-nigh universal and decidedly creditable recent attempts to improve it, it seems to me wise to prescribe for every high school pupil at least one year of the language and literature of his mother tongue; one year of American or English history (chiefly political); one year of English-and American economic history and civics; or, when possible, one year of elementary political economy, one year of a modern foreign language; one year of science (physical geography, or botany and zoology); one year of algebra and geometry (together); one year of drawing and manual training; each of these subjects with a time allotment of from three to four periods a week. This prescribed work includes subject matter comprising about one-third of all the work a pupil of ordinary capacity should be required to do during four years of the ordinary high-school program, chosen from each of the great divisions of human culture. It thus affords a reasonably satisfactory basis for the guidance of pupils, teachers and parents, in the choices which they make or advise in harmony with the pupil's real tastes and capacities. It seems to me, therefore, a safe basis for the administration of the elective system in our secondary schools.