EDUCATION 



1941 



EDUCATION 



curriculum of the elementary school a century 

 ago reading, writing and arithmetic are no 

 less important to-day than they have been in 

 the past. It is probable, indeed, that they were 

 never so important as they are to-day, and it 

 is also probable that these basic subjects are 

 being far more effectively taught in the modern 

 school than they were in the schools of the 

 past. 



In so far as school education is concerned, in- 

 deed, these subjects will doubtless always have 

 a fundamental place. And the reason is simple- 

 enough; when people live and work in close 

 cooperation as they do under modern condi- 

 tions, and as they must continue to do in 

 increasing measure as civilization progresses, 

 the arts of communication (the language arts) 

 and the* arts of computation (the simpler forms 

 6f which we call arithmetic) become of prime 

 importance. Children readily learn to speak 

 without the kind of training that the school 

 provides; but few children can acquire a mas- 

 tery of reading, writing and the essentials of 

 arithmetic without careful instruction and 

 training. Facility in these arts must be given, 

 not merely to some children, but to al^ chil- 

 dren; othenvise those who remained "unlet- 

 tered" would be at a great disadvantage in life, 

 so important are these arts under our complex 

 social conditions. 



Compulsory Education. During the past cen- 

 tury, the principal countries of the world have 

 made this basic or fundamental schooling com- 

 pulsory upon all children between certain ages. 

 Thus education is said to be "universal" in 

 these countries, although it should be remem- 

 bered that it is only this very elementary edu- 

 cation in reading, writing and arithmetic (and 

 usually in geography and the history of one's 

 own country) that is really "universal." Not- 

 withstanding this limitation, however, what 

 this has come to mean to the lives of millions 

 of people constitutes one of the great triumphs 

 of .modern civilization. "Universal" education, 

 even in this limited sense, was practically un- 

 known at the beginning of the nineteenth cen- 

 tury. At that time, schooling of any. sort was, 

 generally speaking, the privilege of only a 

 small proportion of the total population. 



And there are, of course, many nations to-day 

 that have done very little for the education of 

 "all the children of all the people." How far 

 a nation has carried the ideal of "universal 

 education" is roughly measured by the per 

 cent of illiterate adults in its total population. 

 This per cent is lowest in the countries of 



Northern Europe (particularly in Germany. 

 Holland, Switzerland and the Scandinavian 

 countries) ; in the British Isles (and particularly 

 in England and Scotland); in the Northern, 

 Central, and Far-Western states of the Amer- 

 ican Union ; in certain of the British possessions 



10 20 30 40 50 60 70 



Per cent of 

 Illiteracy in Europe 



Russia 



Spain 



Italy 



Hungary 



Austria 



France 



Belgium 



Ireland 



England 



Scotland 



Hoi land 



Sweden 



Germany 



These statistics are significant only In ;i gen- 

 eral way, because of the different ways in whiHi 

 they are compiled. For Russia, Spain and Krano- 

 they represent the population over ten years <>f 

 age unable to write: for Italy, those over t- n 

 unable to read; for Hungary, those over six un- 

 able to read and write; for Austria, thosr i.v.-i 

 eleven unable to write; for Belgium, those over 

 ten unable to read or write; for Ireland, t host- 

 over nine unable to read; for England and S-.t- 

 land, marrying persons unable to write : fur s\v-- 

 den, army recruits unable to write, and for Ger- 

 many recruits without schooling; Holland, re- 

 cruits unable either to read or write. 



(and particularly in Canada and New Zealand, 

 but not in India) ; and in Japan. Another 

 rough measure of the care which a nation 

 exercises in matters educational is the per 

 cent of its total population that is enrolled in 

 its elementary schools, that is, in what corre- 

 sponds to the first six, seven or eight years of 

 our "common" schools. In a country where 

 education is fairly general, the elementary 

 schools at any one time will enroll between 

 fourteen and twenty per cent of the total 

 population. Thus England and Germany have 

 each about seventeen per cent of the total 

 population in these schools; the United States, 

 about eighteen per cent ; Canada, about four- 

 teen per cent; Italy, only about nine per rent ; 

 Mexico (prior to the year 1913), about five per 

 cent; Russia, less than thn r per cent. 



Elementary and Secondary Education. "Ele- 

 mentary" education in the United States and 

 Canada is usually thought of as covering tho 

 first eight years of the child's school life (the 

 first eight "grades" of the common school). 

 In general, elementary education in the two 

 countries named comprises the particular kinds 

 of knowledge and skill a mastery of which is 

 believed to be essential to all. There is at the 



