London Normal School - Spectrum Yearbook (London, Ontario Canada)

Page 10 text:

In a museum in England there hangs a very simple but famous cartoon by Sir Max Beerbohm. It depicts a youth walking towards the horizon and on the horizon is a large question mark. The only caption on the cartoon is the simple word Whither? Whither is the younger generation heading? The answer to this question lies of course in the type of education its members are receiving. In these critical times are we being stamped into placing too much stress upon technological information, forgetting the moral and cultural aspects of a liberal education? The late Mrs. Eleanor Roosevelt in her book, The Moral Basis of Democracy, states quite emphatically that one of the greatest assets a young person can have is a proper sense of values. If our leaders of the future are to be our educated members of society it is of utmost importance that their education should not be over-balanced in any one direction. It would be advisable for us to refresh our minds with the principles expressed by the philosopher John Locke, three centuries ago, in which he stated that education should encompass virtue, wisdom and learning, in that order of importance. In other words, of what use is the accumulation of knowledge unless one has the wisdom and character to apply such knowledge in the proper way for the benefit of his fellowmen? May I suggest that you, our graduates, will have a tremendous responsibility to the pupils who will be in your care. May you have the wisdom and character to start them on their way upward and not lead them into an abyss of confusion when determining what is desirable in life. — L. B. Hyde 6

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Next year you will do a number of wonderful things for the children whom you teach. Of all the wonders which teachers work, it sometimes seems to me that the greatest is that three-fold progression — building skills for reading, creating an appetite for reading, and developing a taste for good reading. The artisan teacher accomplishes the first; the craftsman achieves the second; to create the third demands the teaching artist. In my last message to you, let me tell you how a little boy discovered for himself the magical world of books. It is in one of Rudyard Kipling ' s short stories: Baa, Baa, Black Sheep . The hero is a five- year-old called Punch, who is exiled from his parents in India to a harsh preparatory school in England. Here is the first step: Aunty Rosa sat him upon a table and told him that AB meant ab- Why? said Punch. A is a and B is bee. Why does ABmean ab? Because I tell you it does, said Aunty Rosa, and you ' ve got to say it. Aunty Rosa wins, and Punch has to learn his abc ' s till: that week brought a great joy to Punch. He had repeated till he was thrice weary the statement that The Cat lay on the Mat and the Rat Came in. Now I can truly read, said Punch, and now I will never read anything in the world. So Punch was forced to learn something he did not want; and quite sensibly he made up his mind to waste no further time upon it. Yet you see what happens: He throws his loathed brown primer back into the classroom cupboard, and out there tumbles a tattered and coverless book of boys ' stories. Because there is nothing else for him to do, Punch begins to read for himself, and the miracle begins to unfold: This, says Punch, means things, and now I will know about everything in the world. So Punch found out for himself the greatest discovery that a child can make during his schooling, that all fairyland is to be won by the mere opening of a book. Punch had to make this discovery on his own, and in spite of his teacher. But my hope for you, and my parting wish to you, is that you will rise beyond the level of teaching artisan and craftsman to become a teaching artist. Then many of your children, too, will find out for themselves this greatest discovery in their whole education. — F. C. Biehl 5

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Clergymen Instructing Religious Education To be of no church is dangerous. Religion, of which the rewards are distant, and which is ani- mated only by faith and hope, will glide by degrees out of the mind unless it be invigorated and reimpressed by external or- dinances, by stated calls to wor- ship, and the salutary influence of example. Samuel Johnson. Front: Rev. J. G. O FIaherty Rev. J. Fleck Rev. E. A. Currey Rev. G. Brown Rev. R. Cummings Rev. R. J. Berryman Back: Rev. A. F. Loebach Rev. D. W. Johnson Rev. W. C. Parrott Rev. A. E. Eustace Rev. G. D. Darling Rev. A. E. Ongley Rev. L. C. Langlan Rev. W. Mather Rev. R. B. Cumming Inset: C. F. Waite A. E. Duffield 7