TRAINING TEACHERS: ABSTRACTS OF DISCUSSIONS 



[Editor's Note. In addition to the speakers represented by the fol- 

 lowing abstracts, several others are not recorded because the secretary has 

 not received abstracts in time for this issue of The Review.] 



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By STANLEY COULTER 



Purdue University 



I have been extremely interested in what has been said this 

 afternoon, both in the opening address of Professor Bailey and in 

 the papers concerning the preparation of teachers in nature-study. 

 As regards the valuable suggestion of Professor Bailey, that in 

 order to meet the existing school conditions the subject must be 

 standardized to a certain extent as to materials, method and pur- 

 pose, I have something to say. It is evident from what has been 

 said that standardization cannot be effected along the lines of 

 materials, for we have been told these materials embrace plants 

 and animals, the phenomena of physics and chemistry, the indus- 

 tries and a host of other things. It is evident to me that the 

 standardization, if possible at all, is possible only along pedagogi- 

 cal lines. The gradation of our schools suggests the possibility 

 of developing in an orderly and natural way very definite intellect- 

 ual powers. In the early years of school-life the purpose in view 

 might well be a development of the power of seeing things clearly 

 and sharply, and for the development of this power every school 

 environment furnishes abundant material. In the selection of 

 the material utilized, care should be taken to choose that most 

 closely related to the daily life of the child and therefore the most 

 vitally interesting. Later the purpose might lead by a continued 

 perception of familiar objects up to the power of compelling each 

 object or phenomenon to reveal itself in its completeness. Then 

 we would have the relationship of objects or phenomena to each 

 other, the relationship of objects to their surroundings, the 

 adaptation of parts to the function they perform ; and running 

 through all and vitalizing all, the economic relations. With such 

 purposes in mind, purposes adapted to the developmental stage 

 of the child, the wealth of material is greatly increased, the points 



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