Chicago State University - Emblem Yearbook (Chicago, IL)

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The Kindergarten and the Child As one grows older one wishes the days were very much longer than they really are. I can remember frequent periods of ennui when I had exhausted my childish capacity for play or tasks and didn ' t know what to do with myself on a long summer afternoon. Things seem greatly changed nowadays. So many things crowd in that it seems all one can do is to take as much of a thing as possible while it is in the taking and not to mourn, because things are so but to scramble on to something else which must also be accom- plished. So it is with some favorite occupation — the thing may be our favorite pursuit until we have met and tried something else. ' ery often through enforced study of a character — through studying his works — we may come to admire and know that person very well indeed. And so it is that after we have had our philosophy — Mother Play and frequent references to Froebel ' s other books — we look back on our other work with real enthusiasm and we see things in a very different light. However, we must soon drop that for something else, but finally when the gifts and occupations, our actual experience, songs and music begin to have some connection instead of being entirely separated, we realize that the kindergarten is not a mere waste of time, as so many people think. We find that it is real!} ' an education in itself and that, though it does not teach arithmetic and geography, there is a vast number of other things without which the individual is really not normal. The kindergartner begins here at the very bottom. There is a whole world of ignorance to the little child on which must be brought the light of intelligence. There are so many things to be heard, smelled, said, felt, remem- bered, and enjoyed. The child must have experiences, of course, and the kindergartner may help here. (If she does not, that is another affair which may be spoken of later.) The getting of experiences is a matter of chance, and the child may get the experiences he needs and he may not. Sometimes it is an overdose of one kind of experience and too small a dose of another. There is such a thing as in the case of the child who has no brothers or sisters, as getting every experience but the social one — this is where the kindergarten may help. Perhaps it may not be a lack of social experience from which another child may suffer, but something of a different type which the child needs just as much. There is 17

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edge of language and speech reading, go into the high schools with hearing children. To-day we have several such in the city of Chicago. We are apt to think of deaf children as almost hopeless, but, in spite of this heavy handi- cap, many become skilled in a trade, some enter occupations, and a few take up advanced study, while practically all become self-supporting citizens. Miss McCowen writes in the Bi-AIonthly, December, 1910, Deaf graduates of Uni- versities and Technical Schools are now not at all uncommon, and are filling positions of trust and responsibility in all parts of the country. . . . Under present conditions many of the deaf become expert craftsmen, and rise to positions of authority in their chosen calling. There are deaf printers, deaf chemists, deaf foremen in factories, deaf directors of more or less intricate commercial enterprises, deaf inventors, artists, engravers, sculptors, architects, contractors, lawyers, bankers, etc. Indeed, few occupations are now closed to the deaf except as they are closed to the hearing man who lacks the intelligence necessary for success in those particular lines of work. Who Is It? Have you heard him hem and sigh ' Bout the moral situation. This, his ever daily cry In Education, Education. Pessimist? A lover of beauty, A fanatic on style. With all this and more She is certainly worth while. Have you had her Dickey Bird, Dickey Bird, Busy as a bee. Come into the library And pay your little fee. Have you e ' er don With a smile and a nod And a gay little sally She pins up some notices The classes to rally. Who? Don ' t start a music lesson With a little bit of Lit; Begin with the music And stick right to it. Whose advice?

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scarcely anything which a little child should have that cannot be given him in the kinder- garten. The child to whom may come all sorts of experience and in the right amounts, the kindergartner helps by presenting them in an orderly way and emphasizing and eliminating the ones which need such emphasizing or eliminating. Of course, the child may live and grow up and be healthy without the kindergarten and some of its experiences, but so also may one grow up without other things, as reading and arithmetic. But how much easier the other things are that he learns later on and how much more understanding of the world about him he may be, with his experiences. Even a poor kindergartner may do good by taking children out of unspeakable sur- roundings and showing them the possibilities of life; even the keeping of children off the street when it is most crowded is a service that must not be forgotten. So that now being confident that there is something worth while in our work as we come to the end, let our enthusiasm never die out but win over to our side the help and co-operation of those who really have never given much thought to the matter but had an impression that it was all play and keeping the youngsters amused. A Round-Robin Out of the back door of a beautiful house came a little girl. She had on a pretty pink dress and a very large sunbonnet; and in her hand she carried a small pail and shovel. She was very happy this morning, for had not her mother given her permission to go down to the sea-shore and play in the sand.? Skipping down the garden path, she stopped every once in a while to smile at the hollyhocks or the tiny pansies and tell them of the good time she was going to have at the sea-shore. Just think, dear four-o ' clock, I am going to build a wonderful castle where the sea fairies will come and live, while you are fast asleep here this beautiful morning, and on the happy child skipped, through the garden gate and across the road to a grove of tall trees; then down to a lovely green meadow where the gentle cows were eating their break- fast. Good morning, cows, said Betty. I am coming through your pasture to go to the sea. Do you know I am going to build a beautiful castle where the sea fairies can come and live. ' ' Oh! I am so happy! Tra-La-La! La-La! Happily she sang as she climbed over the pasture bars out on to the sandy road which led straight to the sea. When Betty reached the sea-shore she set down her little pail and began busily to dig up the sand. She kept on digging and digging until she had a high pile of sand and a very large hole on the shore. But a very curious thing about this hole was, that at every shovel- ful she dug up, the hole would fill with water. Soon there was so much water in it that circular ripples began to appear on the top, and from nobody knows where, a tiny shell appeared, just like a little canoe floating towards Betty. Who was holding the paddle of this canoe but a tiny fairy, all dressed in delicate green seaweed, and carrying a pearl wand in her hand. 18