VISUAL EDUCATION in ALBUQUERQUE ELDRED R. HARRINGTON Albuquerque High
0
School, Albuquerque, N e w Mexico
UR city is like many western towns in that it is a long distance from the large manufacturing industries. This is a handicap in the teaching of chemistry and physics since these sciences are made up, in a large part, of fundamental ideas applied to industry. A teacher in Albuquerque cannot refer, off-hand, to the steel industry as can an instructor in Pittsburgh or in Youngstown. Our nearest $eel mill is in Pueblo, Colorado, five hundred miles away, and our closest smelter is almost as far. The large manufacturing companies are represented only by sales offices in our city and thus offer nothing to a visiting class. The writer's experience in civil and mining engineering has led him to the belief that visual methods are far superior to formal book presentation. A description of the lead and silver smelting process was certainly made more effective by the display of a full set of samples showing all steps of the process. The samples, together with a detailed explanation of mining and smelting processes, were obtained from a large smelter in the Pacific Northwest. The use of potash fertilizers was made more interesting and instructive by the showing of large samples of the potash minerals donated by a mining company in this state. A motionpicture trip through a paint factory was supplemented by a lecture and a showing of a display illustrating all steps in the "Old D u t c h process.
These visual aids are, nut expensive. Our school's collection is the most complete one of its kind in the southwest and i t has been obtamed by the writer during the past four years a t a total cost of about three dollars. If we were to purchase the materials on the open market the cost would be over a thousand dollars. The displays are obtained free of charge from large manufacturing concerns. We have sample products of almost every process referred to in our science texts. In addition we have many ores and minerals, machine models, and hooks and bulletins giving detailed information about the industries concerned. The exhibit material comes from every continent of the world. We have -tea and silk from China, rubber from the Malay States, vanadium from South America, dyes from Germany, graphite from Mexico, and garnets from Alaska. We have exhibits of sugar, paper, portland cement, porcelain, glass, dyes, paint, spices, rayon, soap, clays, borax, potash, gypsum, rubber, asbestos, chemicals, wood, steel, dynamite, petroleum, etc. Our ore collection includes products such as gold, silver, copper, lead, zinc, aluminum, tin, nickel, molybdenum, manganese, vanadium, iron, and chromium. Oxides, sulfides, chlorides, carbonates, silicates, and more complicated minerals are all illustrated. All our exhibits are housed in built-in cases along the
walls of the science laboratory. Several years ago a large slate blackboard took up one side of the room. This board was not needed in the laboratory and was needed at another school in the city. When the blackboard was removed, a display case was constructed in the space left vacant. The writer showed that the cost of the case would be only a little more than the value of the blackboard obtained and the work was accordingly done. Some of the exhibits contain as many as seventy pieces. One of the sample cases cost the manufacturing company fourteen dollars to ship here. Incidentally that very display had no trademark on it nor any other means of identifying the company it came from. This would be a very strange procedure to follow if the company had any mercenary ideas about advertising in the schools. As a school administrator in a northern state the writer had some experience with societies seeking to use the schools as advertising media. There were "eatmore-lamb" campaigns, "use-more-dairy-products" week, etc. The articles mentioned were important commodities in the community so the movements went unchallenged even though the "use-more-butter" speaker made a very unscientific attack on oleomargarine. The same community might have objected to an illustrated lecture by a representative of some industrial company but if so they would have had no just right to do so. The writer has encountered less highpressure advertising from reputable industries than he has from local societieswho have "axes to grind." We recently received a sample of gold ore containing considerable wire gold. The old mine from which it came has been a large producer in California for seventy years. They naturally have no trouble in disposing of their product. I t is difficult to see where any advertising is involved. We have a Utah beet-sugar dis-
play placed alongside a cane-sugar display from Louisiana. The descriptive materials accompanying the samples state simple facts of production and distribution without casting any reflections on their competing products. Certain business codes govern the large industries with the result that these industries often have more courtesy for their competitors than certain small local societies do for theirs. In our own city we have been free from mercenary drives. Our museum has grown and students and their parents have coijperated in its increase. Enough attention has been attracted to create a demand for the loan of a number of our samples. Two of the State institutions of higher learning have borrowed some of our materials. Students going on to the university have used our products and books for special reports. Ex-students not attendmg school but workmg in our small industries have come back and obtained information on steam and Diesel engines, armature winding, house wiring, drilling and blasting, mineral flotation, etc. Prospectors have come in to consult us on mining methods. Many of our graduates never attend institutions of higher learning. The courses in science must be able to justify themselves to the person who will go no farther. We wish not only to give an adequate preparation to satisfy college entrance requirements but to give worth-while help to the student who will leave school to till the soil, work in the mines, drive a truck, sell groceries, repair automobiles, or work on the highway. Our sample products, coming from all parts of the world, increase interest in our courses and increase the value of the courses by enlarging their scope. The system is working well here' and the writer recommends it to other science instructors, especially those who teach in schools far from industrial centers.
