esting itself with the formation of right habits of action, with
the development of character, in a word, so handling the child and his
environment as to bring about both the normal development of his inner
life and the adequate shaping and preparing of that life to satisfy the
demands that will later be met. Not at all.
But great changes have arisen. Education has become a science, and its
activities, its processes, are being based upon definite scientific
principles. We are to-day demanding a professional preparation of all
our teachers. We require them to know something about the child mind and
the laws of its development. We expect them to know why they teach this
subject and that, that is, the educational values of the various
subjects, and the best manner of administering this educational food.
Education, I say, is now looked upon as a _science_, closely allied to
and continually assisted by its sister science of sociology, definitely
based upon and springing out of the sciences of psychology and
physiology, and even having its roots deep down in the sub-soil of
biology.
Together with this change of thought as to the function and work of the
school, there has been a corresponding change as to the superintendent
and his work. While we are not completely emancipated from the old rule
of cut and try, from the old mechanical routine, the country as a whole
has taken some long strides in advance. While some boards of education
still look upon their superintendent as a chore boy, that idea has, on
the whole, long since been abandoned. And the best educational thought
of the country to-day regards the superintendent primarily as an
educator, having to do with the inner, rather than the outer, phases of
the school's activities. And our most progressive centers are looking
upon him as a specialist, an educational expert, and demanding in him an
educational and a professional equipment commensurate with the larger,
more difficult, and most important work. He must be intimately
acquainted with the sciences most closely related to his own and capable
of drawing upon all the others for contributory assistance. And then, in
carrying out the thought of this larger view and so shaping matters of
detail as to profit by the superb equipment provided in the new
superintendent, he has been freed from the routine work formerly done by
him, thus giving the opportunity of studying the local problems and
planning their solution.
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