s findings, speaks as follows:

"There are evidently many causes of this phenomenal retardation--yet it
seems likely that one of the largest factors ... is physiological, and
that more attention given in our schools to the bodily conditions of our
children will throw new light on our educational problems, and even on
the subject of backward children, and of delinquency itself." "It
appears," he goes on to say, "that the schools have been too exclusively
concerned about the minds of children and too little concerned about
their bodies. Much time and energy and money have been wasted in trying
to make all children equal in mental power, without regard to physical
inequalities, until now waste products are clogging our educational
machinery." And Mr. Heeter's conclusion is that of all who have studied
the matter with any care.

Let me now show the relationship existing between the two, that is,
between retardation and physical defects. I can do it briefly by
referring to the work of Dr. Cronin in New York City. This is but one
instance, but it is typical of conditions. A few years ago, as chief
Medical Inspector of the schools of New York City, Dr. Cronin read a
paper before the School Hygiene Association of America in which he made
the statement that an examination of all children reported as backward
by various teachers revealed 95% of them as physically defective.

Thus, in a hasty way, but I think correctly, I have thrown the chief
burden of backwardness in school, or retardation, upon physical defects.
But our special topic is eye trouble. How much of this burden must be
referred to this specific source? It is difficult to say exactly. But
knowing as we do the great prevalence of eye defects among school
children, from 20% to 71%, you remember, depending somewhat upon
locality and environment; and knowing, too, the close relationship
existing between the eyes of our children and the work of the schools
(this school work, you know, is nearly all done with the eyes. It should
not be, but it is); knowing all this, it is not beside the mark to say
that a very large percentage of the retardation must be laid at its
doors.

And what are we going to do about it? What should be done? The reform is
easily seen to be a many-sided one. It is educational--our teachers
should come to know that the book is only one, and not the chief one, of
the many sources of knowledge open to the child; it is physiological--we
should all kno