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SCIENCE 



[N. S. Vol. XLHI. No. 1114 



ciples of the science and previous exercises 

 in applying them to new cases, with the 

 alertness and mental adaptability which 

 such training produces, are the chief fac- 

 tors in success. The training of chemists 

 is therefore a matter well worthy of care- 

 ful study. 



It is not my purpose to discuss the sub- 

 ject as a whole. I desire rather to empha- 

 size four points which, after nearly thirty 

 years' experience as a teacher, I am in- 

 clined to think are of vital importance, yet 

 receive too little consideration, and indeed 

 are often entirely ignored. 



Overlapping Courses. — Take, for exam- 

 ple, the treatment of the freshman who, on 

 entering a college or university, offers chem- 

 istry for admission. In the vast majority 

 of cases he is placed in the same class with 

 those who have never studied the subject 

 before. AH agree that the result is unsatis- 

 factory, but many attribute this result to 

 the wrong cause. They say that the chem- 

 istry of the high school is valueless, and 

 that their pupils would be better off without 

 it. The actual fact is that to such pupils 

 the introductory parts of the course seem 

 trivial and boresome. They become indif- 

 ferent. Later, when matter suited to more 

 mature minds comes up, they do not observe 

 the change. Soon they fall behind the begin- 

 ners, and finally they barely pass in the 

 course, if they pass at all. The result is 

 not the fault of the student or of the high 

 school, however — it is an inevitable result 

 of ignoring the most familiar features of 

 human psychology. Administer the admis- 

 sion requirement with reasonable strictness, 

 place those credited with chemistry in a 

 class or section hy themselves, make them 

 feel from the start that they are getting 

 something that is new to them, and they 

 will respond accordingly. Of course, ele- 

 mentary matters can not be omitted. No 

 two members of the class come from the 



same school, their training is very diverse, 

 and there is hardly one fact, no matter how 

 simple, which is known to every one. The 

 elements must be reviewed at the same time 

 that new matters are introduced. But a 

 pace much more rapid than that of the be- 

 ginners can be maintained. In Chicago, 

 my experience showed that this class 

 secured in two quarters a much better 

 knowledge of chemistry than a class of 

 beginners could obtain, under the same con- 

 ditions in three quarters. 



If the school course is valueless, why give 

 admission credit for it? If it represents a 

 real advance into the science, as experience 

 shows that it does, why ignore it? Why 

 not accept it and start at the higher level? 

 Overlapping of courses is all too common 

 in chemical training, and it often begins by 

 duplicating all the work of the high school, 

 and not taking it for granted and proceed- 

 ing beyond it. 



Overlapping affects many of the later 

 courses in every university. The instructor 

 in qualitative analysis, instead of ascertain- 

 ing exactly what is taught in the inorganic 

 course preceding it, and confining himself 

 to the briefest possible references to what 

 he has a right to assume as known, too often 

 spends many hours repeating such parts of 

 the elementary facts and such elementary 

 principles as are required in his work. I 

 have known of instructors in quantitative 

 analysis who ignored aU the content of the 

 previous instruction — both facts and theory 

 — and reduced the subject to a series of 

 mechanical processes, which could have been 

 performed equally well (or equally badly) 

 by a beginner. The students respond 

 quickly to this situation, just as in other 

 circumstances they would respond to de- 

 mands on their previous training, and soon 

 work with due lack of intelligence. Thus 

 not only may the previous training remain 

 unused, where continuous and most effec- 



