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Show School Supervisor Views Elementary Grades' Work By Annie Carol Proctor The greatest heritage God gave mankind was the little child. It Is our sacred duty, as educators, to love, guide and protect this great heritage. May we have the wisdom to know what is best to do and the strength to make our vision a reality. real-ity. May our vision never be clouded cloud-ed by little details that we fail to recognize our great and ultimate goal, which is Manhood and Womanhood. Wo-manhood. May we also realize that each day makes up the sum total of the child's life. What great comfort is ours if at the end of each day we are able to say, "This day I have been teaching boys and girls and not subject matter found in books." We know that during the plastic age of youth skills, habits and attitudes are formed. These in turn will form the child's philosophy that is so important im-portant to his future well being. A child's outward behavior is but an externalization of what goes on first in the mind. type of writing a child uses to express ex-press himself, whether it be slant, vertical or backhand." If children come to school left handed we are to discourage any change to right handedness. No reproach re-proach nor disfavor of any sort shall be attached to left handedness. Instead of learning numbers, live them. Attitude comes before ex-pertness. ex-pertness. Since more than nine-tenths nine-tenths of arithmetical calculations of the real world are with numbers under one hundred, the newer courses cour-ses of study in arithmetic emphasize facility and absolute accuracy with small numbers,. A simplification and clarification of quantitative aspects is necessary for us to enjoy the world of realities reali-ties in which we live. We talk in general terms because we know no other terms to express our ideas. When art is really understood and felt, it becomes part of our existence, of daily living. To fit present-day needs, art courses should emphasize both practical and aesthetic phases and unite appreciation, technique and practical application. While only a few are producers of art, we are all consumers of art. The great objective in music is "Music for Everybody". The aesthetic aesthe-tic and social is for the mass, while the technical mastery and knowledge know-ledge of music is for the gifted. Franklin Babbitt says, "Human Life is 100 per cent behavior. Life is doing things. For abundance of human living, we need to do a great number of things. For success in human living, we need to do these things reasonably well. We shall use skills as a means, knowledge as a means, but the end or objective is living itself, successfully, abundant, humanistic, continuous, now, tomorrow, to-morrow, next year, and so on through alloted span of years". Our new trend in thinking is: "What does subject matter do to Johnny? and not, what does Johnny John-ny do to subject matter?" We must realize that the proper study of childhood is the child. Effective learning takes place when there is a need, desire and purpose. To achieve our desired outcomes we must not scrap our present course of study or look lightly upon the contributions of the past. Instead In-stead we must cling to them tenaciously tenac-iously with one hand, letting them act as a firm foundation, while we reach out with our other hand for new ideas, new techniques, new experiences, ex-periences, etc. We realize that "change ,is an outward manifestation manifesta-tion of progress" "Life goes not backward nor tarries with yesterday, and the children's souls dwell in the house of tomorrow, which we cannot can-not visit, not even in our dreams". I have been deeply impressed by the following message by Dr. Fanny W. Dunn, "What I hope every teacher teach-er may increasingly be able to say And so, working and playing together to-gether the children and the teacher created " a singing, happy home where love and work and friendship friend-ship developed: Joy in living, Skill in Doing, Ideals of Serving, Desire for Growing, Appreciation of Beauty Beau-ty and Belief in and Reverence for the Goodness of a Divine, All-giving Power". In the recent years there has been a movement to revise the curriculum to redefine the purposes of education, educa-tion, and to improve the means of achieving these purposes. "Child development now takes precedence over learning of facts from books". We are now concerned with teaching teach-ing the "whole child. "Experience is the only thing that educates, that is, that leaves permanent per-manent changes. Experience is a process. It is living through of actual situations. Educational science recognizes two kinds of experiences, ex-periences, the superficial and the fundamental. We as educators are concerned with the latter. "There is a place for reading instruction in-struction in the program of studies. The fundamentals of reading are most surely and effectively acquired in a systematic course. Reading is not isolated drill, but can and should be related to practically the whole school program." To read is to gather meaning from written or printed symbols. Thus reading is clearly a tool, a skill employed em-ployed as a part of and for the sake of some larger activity. "Instead of children learning to read they should read to learn". Phoneties should always be a means to an end and not an end in itself. First grade reading should resolve itself to thought getting and thought giving but never word calling. call-ing. Spelling is a means of written expression, ex-pression, the chief criteria for determining de-termining what words are most important im-portant for pupils to learn to spell are commoness and frequency of need in writing. Our great aim is to develop an attitude of being "spelling conscious". consc-ious". This is an ardent purpose or desire to spell correctly, and to be satisfied with only the correct spelling spell-ing of a word. Approximately 68 per cent of the errors in spelling are due to incorrect incor-rect pronounciation and only 22 per cent are due to carelessness. Writing is now looked upon primarily pri-marily as a useful tool in expression of thought. The major objective in handwriting is to develop sufficient skill to enable pupils to write easily, legible, and rapidly enough to meet present needs and social requirements. require-ments. It is no longer necessary of all children to write alike as it is for all children to sing or draw, read or do arithmetic alike. Thorndike says, "No one system of handwriting has marked advantage over another." "There should be a uniformity in linement, spacing, slant, letter formation, for-mation, and alinement in whatever |