The Spanish has
but a small literature; and while Germany has excelled in many things,
belles-lettres is not one of them. Another question relates to the
placing of these electives. If one is to study a foreign language at
all, it is usually thought best to begin earlier than the third year
of the high school, so as to finish these simple matters that can
be done by children and gain time in the later years for the more
complicated matters that require mature judgment.
DIFFERENTIATION OF COURSES
Courses of training based upon human needs should be diversified where
conditions are diversified. Uniform courses of study for all schools
within a city were justifiable in a former simpler age, when the
schools were caring only for needs that were common to all classes.
But as needs have differentiated in our large industrial cities,
courses of training must also become differentiated. In Cleveland this
principle has been recognized in organizing the work of the special
schools and classes. For all the regular elementary schools,
however, a uniform course of study has been used. Under the present
administration, principals and teachers are nominally permitted wide
latitude in its administration.
A large part of this freedom is taken away by two things. One is the
use by the city of the plan of leaving textbooks to private purchase.
For perfectly obvious reasons, so long as textbooks are privately
purchased, a uniform series of textbooks must be definitely prescribed
for the entire city.
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