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UR PRIMARY object in teaching chemistry would seem tobe the advancement of civilization and man's well being. To this end we may, through popular lectures, acquaint the layman with the growing importance of our science, while we are preparing the sons and daughters of America for teaching; laboratory and plant control; the practice of pharmacy, dentistry, medicine, the engineering, mining, and other professions; and finally for the real field of accomplishment, research. "What we teach"
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depends on the individual's goal. Curricula constitute an everlasting topic of discussion. "How we teach" would seem to be a topic that might well engage our attention during a part of this session. Here are a few thoughts for your consideration. It would seem desirable to have small laboratories so that students in undergraduate courses might be grouped and allowed to progress according to their ability. With this in mind a laboratory should hardly accommodate more than twenty-four students. The student is a t present generally scheduled for a number of lectures and recitations each week and can devote but a limited amount of time to laboratory practice. Under the new plan, only laboratory practice would be scheduled and the student could from time to time confer with the instructor in charge of his laboratory. A small library of suitable books near the laboratory should facilitate reading and a search of the literature, and the student would be encouraged to seek information for himself, thus developing self-reliance. The policy of having one task satisfactorily completed before another is begun would enable us to send thoroughly reliable men into public and industrial service. Grades based on the quality of a man's work would be abolished. He would receive credit for the quantity satisfactorily completed and could be sent into the world of affairs a thoroughly reliable worker, slow, average, rapid, alert, as the position might require. Having a number of small lahoratories for undergraduate courses, in which there is a heavy enrolment, would enable the instructor to sectionize students according to their ability. At present students have lectures, recitations, and laboratory practice, and it is possible to use a laboratory for a good many sections each week. Fewer can be scheduled by confining work entirely to the laboratory, but the advantages accruing to the students would justify such a step. It is more criminal to waste human energy than other natural resources. By sectionizing on the basis of ability, and giving the slow student an opportunity to go his pace, perhaps gradually developing him into a more rapid worker, we can materially reduce the size of the educational "scrap pile." The superior student, who now has his ambition curbed in a class with average or inferior students, would be encouraged and inspired to go on. It seems unfair to flunk a man because he is too slow and to hold a good man back. These are the faults of our present educational system which are in d i e need of correction. It would also seem desirable to have a student carry fewer subjects, and apply himself more intensively to those scheduled. Our experience during the summer, when a student completes a full-year course in eight weeks by spending five hours with us on each of six days per week, has demonstrated very clearly that the plan has merit. There are few if any failures under this system, because the student is thinking of chemistry
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all the time. He doesn't have to jump from a chemistry thought to a German thought, and thence to zoology or history. He can work and think in an orderly fashion. By extending the term from eight weeks to twelve weeks (the quarter system) he might carry a second subject and at most a third. One educator has recently suggested the idea of permitting a student to select any subject in which he is interested, pursuing it to his heart's content and taking up related subjects, or others which serve as important tools or adjuncts, as he realizes their value. Occasionally we encounter a young man who is earnest and dependable and who is so deeply interested in chemistty and related sciences, that he can progress independently, almost without instruction. It would seem better to direct the undergraduate for several years, seeing that he learned to use the accessory tools as well as his chosen subject. He would he better off with a knowledge of physics, mathematics, and German when he had to use them during the course of chemical progress. Having passed a certain stage and secured sufficient breadth of training, he could safely proceed in the chosen field as his ambition prompted, and confer with his instructors from time to time. In other words, after the foundation is laid, we might resort to merely directing his self-education, This is, in a sense, the present procedure in our care of students engaged in graduate research. Occasional special lectures of an inspirational type might be given. One might even give a full lecture course, making attendance voluntary. However, points which are now illustrated experimentally in lectures, either because of the cost or the dangerous nature of experiments performed, can be demonstrated by a laboratory instructor when his particular group is capable of properly interpreting them. In other words, special experiments are performed before groups which understand them, while a t present all students in a large class attend a given lecture at one time, many perhaps failing to get the purpose of an experiment through inability to progress as rapidly as their fellows. Courses of fully illustrated popular lectures for students and others who merely want an introduction to chemistry for its broadening or cultural value can be offered. Nor is it planned to abolish lectures for some upper classes and graduate students. The general recitation seems unnecessary. Some claim that it produces a competitive spirit. I t is a wasted hour for one who knows his subject. Why not question the student occasionally in his small laboratory group and find out what he is doing and why? A comprehensive examination might be given from time to time, but even this would hardly be required in small classes where an instructor should know every student and his ability. Will the general plan proposed above kill ambition and the spirit of competition? Hardly. Nothing so stimulates ambition as a task well
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accomplished, and satisfaction and happiness constitute the student's reward. With numerical or letter grades abolished and credit granted only for the amount of work satisfactorily completed, the student gets a "pay-check," which in its appraisal of him in the college community, is a sufficient stimulus and urge to go on and on. When colleges and universities graduate such men and women, they can furnish a guarantee with each. It is self-evident that a larger and perhaps more mature instructional force is required to insure the success of this plan. It is said that "The mills of the gods grind slowly." Our educational mills have been geared for rapid and uniform grinding and the human raw material is not suitable for these machines. Let us stop and realize that the individual should receive attention; Solemn contemplation will convince us that many failures might have been successes, had we but modified our methods of instruction to suit some boy or girl instead of following a "rigid system." The "yesterdays" have gone, and we are too late for them, but the "tomorrows" are still to come.
