SCHOOL ORGANIZATION AND INSTRUCTION 127 



1 all ages delight in cooking and textiles, while the girls are equally 

 interested in woodwork and other forms of heavier manual training. 

 The reason, however, is clear. It is not that there is anything inherent 

 in either the dough, or the cloth, or the wood, or the iron, but rather 

 because the work under all these heads is largely creative. It is because 

 an aim is set up that is unique; it is somewhat new because it is per- 

 sonal — it is because the ages-old materials must be combined to fit new 

 occasions that the interest is enlisted and the best original efforts, and 

 consequently the highest educational results, are obtained. 



Every creative activity will have its artistic aspect; for when the 

 soul enters a creation, then and there art is born. Art-forms are now 

 rarely creative. They do little more than tickle the sense with the 

 pleasures of a fleeting hour — and they are worth all they cost for that ! 

 But when the lives of the children are properly enriched, music, paint- 

 ing, drawing, sculpture, and the rest will come forth as creations — the 

 radiant allies of speech. In language growing fluent and supple, the 

 pupils will learn to wreathe in descriptive, dramatic and poetic forms 

 the subtlest creations of which the human mind is capable. 



Creative work transforms the individual. Through it, alone, he 

 grows and maintains a personality that makes him different from 

 others. Through it, alone, his generation rises above all that have pre- 

 ceded. Imitation is a training in conformity. It holds the creative 

 instincts in abeyance until at maturity it is the exceptional man or 

 woman who is not hopelessly bound by the shackles of convention. If 

 he would ever create, he must override the prejudices ground into 

 him by the schools, and, even then, the daring freedom of childhood 

 but rarely comes again. The gospel of conformity teaches that the 

 best has been done — that naught remains for us but imitation. This, 

 too, in face of the practical fact that the discoveries of to-day have sent 

 to the scrap-heap the brilliant inventions of yesterday! The effect 

 is not less marked in the realm of morals. Generally speaking, the 

 ethical code of the school has been copied from that which once served 

 the purpose of the generation that developed it, but it is far below what, 

 under present conditions, the pupils can create for themselves. 



The final test as to the value of any piece of educational work in 

 the development of children of whatever intellectual capacity is de- 

 termined by their appreciation of its worth in meeting a natural de- 

 mand. Unless their energies are constantly directed toward filling a 

 recognized want, the pupils put forth their efforts in vain, and the 

 routine of the school becomes merely the rattle and grind of empty 

 machinery. Upon one trait in his pupils the teacher may forever 

 reckon : they will always respond to a need which they can really feel 

 and understand. A study of our city parks showed how impossible it 

 was for certain useful and beautiful birds to find suitable nesting- 



