CHAPTER XXIII.

SCHOOL.

Washington State has school laws far above the average. Splendid new school buildings with all modern improvements and usually an efficient corps of teachers. Manual training and domestic science are taught in most of the village and city schools. A school near my property at Lake Stevens has recently adopted the "school-city" plan and has student self-government. Each class in this school organized itself into a "school-city" and elected officers. These officers are pledged to enforce the regulations of the school and these regulations are all based upon the "Golden Rule" which is the best rule for everybody. The

66

school-cities" are formed into a "school state" which body has control of the general order and activities of the school. If any student fails to obey the selfadopted student rules he is tried before a student Judge and Jury and may be sentenced for his wrong conduct. This plan teaches the students to become good citizens and acquaints them with the law, its workings and its enforcement and the punishment meted out to those who

disobey. It is the same plan which has been adopted by many schools in the East and by the United States government for all Indian schools.

Of course, every parent knows their own child best and what is good for one might not suit another one at all. My plan of educating my little boy was right in his case, but might prove a failure with some other child. Always a nervous child and having a tendency to bronchial trouble and with a cough which he had had ever since he had the whooping-cough when four years old, he needed careful attention and plenty of out-door exercise and I always planned to have his time spent in the open air greatly exceed the time spent indoors with his books. On our return to Sandusky from the State of Washington in April, 1910, one Sandusky citizen told me that many had expected to see my child ignorant and untaught and that he entered the Sandusky schools several grades ahead of where they had expected him to enter. In other words he entered the normal grade for a child of his age. They told me then that he was "splendid."

There are two opposite opinions as to the education of the child. At the extreme of one stands Prof. Boris Sidis, of Harvard University who began the education of his boy-child at the age of three, and entered him into Harvard University at the age of thirteen as an advanced student. I do not know whether this boy still lives or what he will become at mature age if he survives. Another famous "child prodigy was

a German boy named Karl Witte whose father began his education very early and taught him by novel methods; at nine and a half years this boy entered the University of Leipzig, but he lived to a good old age and died a normal death.

At the extreme of the other opinion is Dr. Guy Potter Benton, President of the University of Vermont. He thinks that a child taught too early dies an old man twenty-five years before he ought. He believes the playtime of a child should be encouraged until they are twenty-five and that they should not take up their life work until they are twenty-seven years old.

The plan I carried out in teaching "Boyd" was to keep him in the "reader usually read by children of his age so he would not be mortified when with other children, but also to have him know many practical things from the hard lessons of every-day life and to learn many lovely things from Mother Nature. In that country of lumber interests "Boyd was, of course, attracted by the work done in the mills. He always had a tool chest which differed in size according to his age. One summer I bought him "cull lumber and he built himself a very creditable "shack shack" to which we often used to flee when we were frightened. He was much interested in making out the different lengths and sizes of boards required and reckoning up how many shingles he would need. It was my first knowledge, too of "2x4's" and other lumber dimensions and terms.

66

Boyd learned to care for the chickens and cows, to go up in the pasture and get the horse and harness him. He learned how to get the wood down from the forest and to split it into the right size for our stoves; getting down the wood was great fun. We hitched Buck" to a sled and brought the chunks from the wood-lot to the top of the hill just above our bungalow. Here we had a "wood shoot " and putting the chunks in it they ran easily down into our wood-shed. He learned how to fill the crates with luscious small fruits and how much in money each filled one would bring into our meager purse. He learned to fill the apple boxes with assorted sizes of apples, whose prices differed with the size and perfection of the fruit. He learned to know how much the dozens of eggs we took to the mill store would reduce our grocery bill. He learned to keep the boats ready for a customer and how much an hour's rental or a day's lease would bring to us. He gladly caught the "frying chickens" for me for he knew how much they brought when taken into market. Yes, he learned many useful things, but little that was evil while living by Lake Stevens.

The "compulsory education " law is rigidly enforced in Washington State and at last I had to succumb and send my little boy to school. For one year my lawyer had been able to get me an excuse from the county superintendent of schools because my child was not over-strong, had a bronchial cough and at this time they were not running a "school bus" to the school-house

over a mile away. But no favoritism could be shown and "if Mrs. McIntyre keeps her boy out of school, why can not we keep ours." I could not explain to any one why I did not want to send my only child to school. I think country people are very particular about not having any one treated any better than any one else is. Treat all fairly and they acquiesce, but if one is favored there is apt to be trouble. I don't think they object to higher taxes if they know the rate of increase has been evenly apportioned, but if he is assessed more on his barn than his neighbor is on his better one next door, the assessor will probably hear from it because "it is not fair."

So it happened that I received a courteous letter from the county superintendent of schools who was a woman. She said I had better put my little boy in the

66

district school," although she knew I taught him well myself, that we lived too far from the school-house for the little boy to walk and that as yet they had not been able to put on a "school bus."

I have no very great objections to a good public school in a small town, but I would never send my child to one in a city. A child, especially a boy, gets a good all around education there. They must get out into the world sooner or later to receive the kicks and rebuffs awaiting them and they might just as well start in at the public school as anywhere else. Politeness and consideration for others is perhaps given more attention in a private school, for public school-teachers