APPENDIX 369 



are measured and sold, and what is the actual seUing-price 

 from day to day. He should find out about butter, and eggs, 

 and wool. Let him discover which would be fairer, to sell 

 eggs by the dozen or by the pound. Let him find out how 

 much corn the soil in his school district will produce to the 

 acre, how many acres were in corn last year, and how much 

 corn was produced. 



Nor is it a boy's problem alone. There are quarts of milk 

 and pounds of butter, and yards of goods, and curtains and 

 carpets and scores of things for the practical housekeeper to 

 know about. These actual numbers that the children have 

 counted and collected and experienced are alive to them, 

 and can be used in every step in arithmetic. As the work 

 advances it should be made more and more constructive. 

 Every principle should have concrete application. Actual 

 fields should be measured by actual chains and plotted accu- 

 rately to a definite scale. Actual fields of wheat and oats and 

 corn should be estimated, and actual bins should be meas- 

 ured to determine their capacity. At every step of the way 

 the pupil should be led to construct his problem and to look at 

 actual conditions. The things at hand in every community, 

 the occupations that are dominant, the interests that are 

 prominent, — these are the means of education. 



It is not a question of teaching arithmetic in the abstract, 

 but of teaching particular children arithmetic in the concrete. 

 The problem is not to instruct in arithmetic; it is to teach 

 children with this setting to think number accurately and 

 rapidly, and to apply principles under actual conditions. 

 With this idea the text with its pages and problems disap- 

 pears and in its stead come fundamental arithmetical prin- 

 ciples which the teacher is to lead the children to master. 



