Bulletin Number Twelve 
 
 Price Twenty^ five Cents' 
 
 SCHOOL RECORDS 
 
 AN EXPERIMENT 
 
 by 
 
 MARY S. MAROT 
 
 BUKEAU OF EDUCATIONAL EXPERIMENTS 
 144 West 13th Street, New York 
 * * 1922
 
 IJUN 1 1 
 'MAY 2 4 199f 
 
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 441 
 
 
 Ai* ip^ t1 
 
 LB 
 2846 
 
 M34 
 
 Form L 
 
 Southern Branch 
 of the 
 
 University of California 
 
 Los Angeles 
 
 Form L 1 
 
 LB 
 2846 
 
 M54
 
 School Records-An Experiment 
 
 by 
 MARY S. MAROT 
 
 SOUTHERN BRANCH, 
 
 UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA, 
 
 LIBRARY, 
 
 LOS ANGELES, CALIF, 
 
 This report is the result of three 
 years' research as Recorder of the 
 Bureau of Educational Experiments 
 
 4 87 63 
 
 BUREAU OF EDUCATIONAL EXPERIMENTS 
 
 144 West 13th Street, New York 
 
 1922
 
 SCHOOL RECORDS AN EXPERIMENT 
 
 PURPOSE AND HISTORY 
 
 In March, 1918, the Bureau of Educational Experiments began an 
 experiment in school records. The undertaking arose from a practical 
 need felt by all experimental schools, the need to know what subject 
 matter, equipment, and methods bring promising results. Another de- 
 sire, held in common with most school experiments, was to accumulate 
 material which should in time contribute towards a better knowledge 
 of children's growth in school. To these ends the Bureau felt it neces- 
 sary to work directly on the technique of school recording. 
 
 At the outset of the experiment the old forms of school reports in 
 common use were discarded as inadequate to convey real information 
 concerning school procedure. The question of form and method of 
 keeping new records was left open, the only requirement being that each 
 record should supply educational data in a sufficiently organized form 
 to be readily used by the Bureau and by the school or teacher co-operat- 
 ing in the experiment. 
 
 The active participants in the experiment were the City and Coun- 
 try School (formerly the Play School), the Nursery School, several 
 experimental classes in public elementary schools, and a Recorder. The 
 City and Country School children were from three to nine years old, in 
 groups of eight to fifteen children. The Nursery School children were 
 between one and a half and three years old, in a group of eight children. 
 The public school children were of the First, Fifth, and Sixth Grades. 
 The illustrations in this report are nearly all from notes of these schools, 
 and most of the children were under ten years of age. 
 
 For the last two years, to June, 1921, the experiment was confined 
 to the City and Country School and the Nursery School. In both of 
 these schools the recording was attempted by the teachers and by myself. 
 In the public school classes I undertook the classroom recording alone. 
 
 The teachers of the City and Country School had been working 
 upon notes of their work for several years before the Bureau began its 
 experiment. They had kept notes of individual children and of the 
 teachers' methods, but they were not well satisfied with their material. 
 They had followed the plan of making daily notes. Most of the teachers 
 in the school followed this plan until the last year of our experiment. 
 
 [3]
 
 But it was a burdensome method for the teacher, and it was not practical 
 for general use because it set before the reader too unorganized or too 
 detailed a picture. 
 
 As recorder I made many notes in these schools and classes, but they 
 also were unsatisfactory 7 , though for another reason. My notes of specific 
 subject matter, for example, always missed significant connecting links 
 which only the teacher could supply. When I tried to record the inter- 
 esting first reactions of a group of children to some new experience, I 
 had to go to the teacher to find out what other experiences had led up to 
 this one. Moreover, I did not always know which remarks of the chil- 
 dren were important enough to record. My usefulness was temporary 
 and experimental. I helped to do part of the work of recording while 
 we were all learning how, and I sifted out and generalized into conclu- 
 sions the many differences of opinion and the many ways of taking notes. 
 
 For a limited time we tried continuous literal note-taking every 
 day, to record certain subject matter. A stenographer had to be spe- 
 cially trained for this type of recording. It was expensive and the notes 
 contained much irrelevant matter. Even an expert stenographer loses 
 much of the significance of the byplay because nobody but the teacher 
 understands its implications. Not even the teacher can catch everything 
 that goes on in a class of children, but she can catch more than anyone 
 else even while she is teaching. The verbatim notes did not prove to be 
 of special help to the teachers and we discarded them except where we 
 desired to quote the children exactly, and we decided that these quoted 
 remarks must be chosen by the teacher in order to assure their 
 significance. 
 
 These experiences in recording and the conclusions we drew from 
 them threw the responsibility for making records squarely upon the 
 teachers. The teachers and directors of the City and Country School and 
 the Nursery School accepted this responsibility with my help until June 
 1921. They were ready then to assume all of the work themselves. The 
 plan finally adopted by the teachers, after much experimenting, was that 
 of taking rough notes daily or less often as expedient, and of making an 
 organized summary of these rough notes at the end of a week. The 
 summary was to be the record. Later sections of this report will give 
 illustrations of the teachers' notes. 
 
 The organization of the teachers' summaries was, in each school, 
 the organization which was finally adopted by the school as its guide for 
 procedure as well as for its system of recording. We had experimented 
 with several outlines for organizing the teachers' notes, but no outline 
 proved satisfactory in practice until each school had organized its pro- 
 
 14]
 
 cedure, and had made this organization a basis for reporting the chil- 
 dren's responses. 
 
 The teachers in these two schools recorded primarily for their own 
 use and for their school. When their material developed into organized 
 form a demand for the records began to come from other experimental 
 schools. The City and Country School and the Nursery School then 
 decided to mimeograph or to print from time to time records which were 
 more or less satisfactory. Some of these records are now ready.* They 
 are not sent out as finished products, but are tentative both in form and 
 as statements of educational procedure. They are experimental records 
 of experimental procedures. They are limited to those school activities 
 which the teachers themselves are responsible for; they do not include 
 the physician's and psychologist's records. This report also is limited to 
 a discussion of teachers' records. 
 
 At the beginning of the experiment I formulated several tentative 
 principles of recording which had grown out of past experience in making 
 school records. The teachers of the City and Country School, and later 
 the Nursery School, cooperated in trying out these principles of record- 
 ing and in adding to them as working hypotheses. This cooperation was 
 necessary to the success of the experiment. One teacher in particular 
 made the experiment as a whole possible by her untiring willingness to 
 test out hypotheses, and to experiment with various methods of recording. 
 Our experience showed that it must be the class teacher who makes the 
 record of her own class, although other people may make contributions 
 to it. This decision caused us to drop the public school classes as con- 
 tributors to our study of recording. We could not ask public school 
 teachers to record in our way in addition to making the records required 
 of them by the public school system. 
 
 A discussion of recording finds its logical place in a discussion of 
 teaching. Recording is only one of the necessary factors in an efficient 
 teaching procedure. A treatment of recording by itself is presenting the 
 cart without the horse which makes it function. But this experiment 
 was only concerned with recording. We are thus obliged to confine our 
 present discussion to recording, with references to educational procedures 
 only in their application to recording. 
 
 * See "A Nursery School Experiment," by Harriet M. Johnson, Bulletin XI, 
 Bureau of Educational Experiments, 1922, and "Record of Group VI," by Leila 
 V. Stott, Bulletin of The City and Country School, 1922. Record of several 
 other groups can be obtained in mimeograph from The City and Country School, 
 and a second bulletin, "Record of Group V," is in preparation. 
 
 15]
 
 STANDARDS OF OBSERVATION AND GUIDING 
 PRINCIPLES 
 
 Our experiment required a definition of terms in order that we, the 
 Bureau and the teachers, should understand each other. When we talked 
 about growth, curriculum, environment and experience, what did we 
 mean? We defined these terms and they became our standards for 
 observing children in school. We tried out several principles as guides 
 to our recording and we adopted those which assisted us in gathering 
 the material we desired. 
 
 Standards of Observation 
 
 The teachers in our experiment made records as an aid to their 
 teaching and as a report of the children's progress in school. They were 
 not responsible for the work of the doctor and the psychologist, nor for 
 the parents at home; and, although they cooperated with all of these 
 people, their own records were records of what came under their own 
 observation. When they talked about growth, for example, they did not 
 mean weight and height, they meant progress in school. 
 
 Growth (for teaching purposes) we defined as a child's progress in 
 ability to use his environment. This progress can be indicated only by a 
 continued recording of a child's reactions to an environment. Progress 
 is not continuous in the sense of a constant rate, but it does take place, 
 and how it takes place is what we must observe. For example, a teacher's 
 note in October stated that B.'s attention was held only for a moment by 
 any kind of work. She gave an illustration. In November she reported 
 some progress, "B. steadies now a little better; she is making a more 
 direct connection with the class work ; her interest is always awake, but 
 she guesses rather than thinks." Specific reactions to different types of 
 work were given, and it was shown how B. compared with the other 
 children and how she reacted socially. In the following months these 
 points were all followed up until any reader could see how, and in what 
 respects, B. was progressing in her use of the school environment. 
 
 Environment (for teaching purposes) consists of those parts of a 
 child's surroundings which may provide experience for him. Environ- 
 ment for us includes the material setup, the children, the teacher, the 
 school, the city streets, and the interrelationships of all of these. A child's 
 environment is not static, it is relative and changing. His environment 
 stimulates him, he responds, and an experience gets started. We must ob- 
 serve these experiences and what part of the environment produces them. 
 
 16]
 
 Experience (for teaching purposes) is a child's use of his environ- 
 ment, his participation in it. A school is responsible for supplying to its 
 children opportunities for first hand contacts and for making their own 
 discoveries. The children's progress in ability to get this kind of experi- 
 ence is the measure of their school growth, and the measure of the success 
 of the school environment. The teacher must observe the environment 
 to see that it offers opportunities for this kind of experience. 
 
 Curriculum for us is the school's plan in so far as it is successful in 
 providing children with a succession of experiences. Curriculum in this 
 sense therefore is concerned only with those parts of the school surround- 
 ings which the children make definite use of. Subject matter, materials, 
 the city streets, what the other children and the teacher bring to the 
 group, are the raw material of the curriculum : when they are utilized by 
 the school and actually give experiences to the children, they become cur- 
 riculum. 
 
 The curriculum is not found in the books the children read, nor in 
 what the teacher tells them, until the children begin to get experience 
 from this presented environment. The course in science is not curriculum 
 until the children begin to get from it, or through it, a stimulus to scien- 
 tific inquiry; until they begin to ask spontaneous questions, not directly 
 suggested by the teacher but by their own desire to learn. "What is this 
 button?", "What is that jar for?" may or may not be a beginning of 
 scientific inquiry. "This button is not in the same place as that one, 
 what does // do?" "There's a wire from that jar. Does it go to a bell? 
 I don't see any bell. Where does it go then? What is it for?" Records 
 of such questions as these indicate that children are making use of the 
 school environment, that they are ready for more experience, are using 
 past experience to draw their own inferences in a new situation and to 
 ask for new explanations. 
 
 Guiding Principles 
 
 We decided, then, that records would provide reliable data for 
 school purposes only if we made our observations of children's responses 
 with our school definitions of growth, environment, experience, and cur- 
 riculum clearly in mind. We decided furthermore that our records must 
 contain certain information and must be gathered according to a certain 
 method. This method was supplied by the guiding principles which we 
 adopted. 
 
 Records must provide information for making changes in school pro- 
 cedure. Our school records were planned to help the schools to know 
 
 17]
 
 what they were accomplishing and where to make changes. A school can- 
 not stop satisfied, it must continue to change. A record should help a 
 school to build up standards which it expects to put to use as measures of 
 its efficiency in meeting the needs of its children. For this purpose school 
 records must be under the constant scrutiny of the school staff, who will 
 use them to see that the school environment is successfully providing ex- 
 perience for the children. The various parts of the school curriculum 
 must be subject to change when they no longer effect progress. But the 
 old school methods of recording do not provide specific information which 
 will assist a school in making changes in procedure, either for the benefit 
 of individuals or for the whole class. 
 
 The old methods of recording attempt to record individual progress, 
 but they do not succeed in this. "Percents," or "poor," "excellent," carry- 
 different meanings to different people. "He has greatly improved in be- 
 havior" is an opinion which may or may not be colored by the teacher's 
 personal attitude toward children's behavior; it carries with it no evi- 
 dence. "Very independent," "good cooperation," "highly original," con- 
 vey no real information. They are subjective terms which merely give 
 the teacher's own feeling in the case ; they supply no basis for comparison, 
 for watching progress. Nobody is independent or original under all cir- 
 cumstances ; people cooperate sometimes but not always. A school report, 
 to be of real use, must answer questions like these: "What were the con- 
 ditions when the child showed independence and who were with him? 
 What part did he play in the group when he cooperated and who were 
 the other children? What kind of activity was going on when he showed 
 originality? Did he differ from the other children in this? Did he gen- 
 erally show originality when working with certain material?" 
 
 Whether a child is progressing satisfactorily or not a teacher must 
 be sure that she has real information about his school growth, that she 
 is not depending upon vague impressions, that she is depending upon 
 concrete evidence. When a child is not growing in originality, inde- 
 pendence, skill, the power to get knowledge for himself, etc., his teacher 
 must know how he shows this, how he is different from the other chil- 
 dren, or like them, and what the environmental conditions are. This 
 information is essential if the teacher's purpose is to find out how to 
 change his environment to fit his needs. 
 
 The old school methods of recording lend themselves no better to 
 the purpose of changing the curriculum. A high percentage of a class 
 average in history, or the words "All showed much interest," may mean 
 merely that the children memorized what was presented, or that the 
 teacher made the lessons interesting. What sort of progress these lessons 
 
 181
 
 brought to the children is not shown at all. A supervisor could not tell 
 from reports of this kind whether these history lessons were educating 
 the children or not. The only kind of records which show this are 
 records which show the spontaneous reactions of the children to the 
 material presented. Few schools supply such records, and they base most 
 of their changes upon wholly inadequate data, or upon no data at all. 
 
 In fact the majority of school records report the child's success or 
 failure; they do not report the success or failure of the environment to 
 fit the children. They ask the children to change; they forget to watch 
 for faults in the curriculum. 
 
 The careful observing and recording, the willingness to modify the 
 environment which this new recording implies, take time. But the alert- 
 ness, initiative and originality which this procedure encourages in teachers 
 when they follow the method should give pause for thought to a super- 
 intendent who finds a lack of these virtues among his staff. 
 
 Concrete illustrations are necessary to a school record in order that 
 the picture may be clear enough to base changes upon. These illustraV 
 tions must show the actual activities of the children, what they do in 
 lesponse to what the environment presents to them. A picture of what, 
 really happens will contain concrete notes of typical or significant occur- 
 rences. For example, a teacher noted what a five-year-old said while 
 playing with his block building. "There is oil in this building. Have to 
 take it up this way." If to this illustration the teacher added, "This 
 dramatic content is characteristic of most of the children's play," or 
 "This play with their building is common to only a few," we should have 
 information to work upon and something to watch for. We should 
 expect future reports to show what changes in building took place, and 
 in what new ways the children played with their structures when built. 
 
 A teacher of a certain class was called upon to report what her chil- 
 dren were actively engaged in, and what they were getting out of their 
 school time. She chose, as her method of reporting, a detailed word 
 picture of the children's experience during one school day. This day, 
 she stated, was a characteristic one with these children at this particular 
 stage. She then noted that such and such changes in the children had 
 been going on since school began, and that she was watching for other 
 changes. This kind of a report is practical. The supervisor, or the 
 teacher herself, can go back to this report and look forward from it when 
 she wishes to know what her children are achieving. 
 
 What the children are achieving is shown only in the responses of \\ 
 the children themselves. What they do is what we wish to know when 
 we ask for a school report. What the teacher gives them makes no dif- 
 
 [91
 
 ierence unless we know what the children do with it. It is only by 
 watching and recording the children's responses that a teacher can give 
 us this information. Only a picture of the children's responses will show 
 whether the school has set up surroundings which bring the desired re- 
 sults and whether the teacher's methods work to the same ends. A report 
 of what subjects and what equipment the school sets up does not show 
 what educational values the children actually get out of these subjects 
 and materials, that is, how they use them. 
 
 Both parents and supervisors wish to know whether the school is a 
 success, a success from the point of view of the children's development. 
 A school may surround the children with everything it can devise as an 
 educational expedient. The children will appropriate and make their 
 own only a part of it. The world as well surrounds children with a 
 varied and complex environment, but much of it makes no impression at 
 all upon them so far as we can see. What we wish to know about a 
 school is what does make an impression and what impressions assist in 
 the children's school growth. The only reports which can give us this 
 information are reports which show the children's developing and chang- 
 ing reactions to the school environment. 
 
 Records which are to show school progress must show processes of 
 growth in the school. It is how a child attacks his work or play which 
 determines his growth. It makes little difference whether he learns the 
 capitals of all the states, but much difference whether he is forming the 
 habit of going after what he wants to know when he wants to know it. 
 He may want to know the chief salt manufacturing city to-day ; he may 
 not need to know the capital of his state until he is a man. It is the 
 habit, the process, which is important. This process of growth is what 
 we must watch and cultivate and record. It is not measured by the 
 quantity of geography or spelling he is accumulating. 
 
 A record of growth processes (for a teacher's purpose) must be a 
 report of what takes place while the children are learning. An exami- 
 nation shows only how much information they have acquired, and a 
 recitation seldom shows more. A school that undertakes to watch proc- 
 esses, and to base its procedure and what it supplies of subject matter 
 upon what it knows about the children's habits of thinking and habits 
 of working, will find little need to worry about how much the children 
 know. A teacher in such a school will be kept busy satisfying the chil- 
 dren's demands for knowledge. A record of processes of growth in school 
 will show that a child's environment acts continuously. He reacts to it 
 continuously and spontaneously, but not with the systematic regularity of 
 the formal school programs and reports. Both the child and the environ- 
 
 [ 101
 
 ment change. We did not make use of the formal school reports, and 
 we also did not use the modern objective tests of the psychologists for our 
 school records nor the standardized measurements of progress in school 
 subjects because they do not show this continuous interaction and change 
 between the children and their environment. We needed to know as 
 much as possible about the children's processes of growth in school in 
 order to teach them, and we could get this information only from records 
 which would show (so far as it practically could be recorded) the chil- 
 dren's continuous interaction with their environment. 
 
 The activity of the group must be observed and recorded. Our pur- 
 pose in recording was to study children's habits of learning in school. A 
 child's habits in the school environment are formed while he is among 
 other children. Other children are an influence in his growth. Conse- 
 quently we based our records upon notes of the group activities which 
 surrounded him and of which he was a part. Children acquire most of 
 their knowledge in company; we teach them together. We must know 
 the group's reaction to the environment if we wish to find out what 
 brings about the growth of habits in school, and what changes in cur- 
 riculum we must make in order that better habits may be formed or that 
 progress may continue. 
 
 Detached reports of individuals, whether percentage ratings or de- 
 scriptive words, do not show what is actually going on. They do not 
 show an individual's progress in experience, and still less do they show 
 the success of subject matter, materials, or the teacher's method. An 
 average percentage of the individual successes or failures in a class gives 
 no real information about a subject that has been studied by the children. 
 It gives no indication of the complete situation, of the influences which, 
 acting together, produce the effect. The only record which will show 
 the curriculum in the sense of our definition, with its effects in growth, 
 is an account of children and teacher working together, a record of 
 group activity. 
 
 The teacher herself must be the recorder. The only person who can 
 approach a telling of the whole story of the children working together in 
 their daily school activities is the teacher. A teacher who accustoms 
 herself to watching the group as a whole, to seeing interrelationships that 
 take place, will appreciate the value of group records. The very neces- 
 sity of observing group reactions in order to report them, will make a 
 teacher more keenly alive to the influences of social contact. She is the 
 only person who is in a position to see the majority of these interrelation- 
 ships and who is able to estimate their value. It is she also who brings 
 
 [ 11 ]
 
 about a continuity of experience, who suggests and supplies new subject 
 matter or materials as they are needed. It is the teacher, then, who must 
 be the recorder of the activities of her own group of children, in order 
 that there may be continuity and accuracy in the recording. 
 
 A teacher should also be a recorder for her own benefit. Recording 
 in some systematic fashion is the only way for a teacher to check up her 
 own procedure, to make sure that she knows what is continuous, what 
 brings interruptions, what is important, what is merely trivial occurrence. 
 A teacher cannot trust her memory, her unsupported opinion. Even a 
 highly skilled teacher needs something to guide her in making changes, 
 and in deciding when these changes should be made. 
 
 The impulse to record by the teachers of the City and Country 
 School and the Nursery School is that of the experimenting scientist. 
 One of these teachers said of recording: "In any scientific experiment 
 notes are necessary. A teacher in an experimental school should keep 
 track of individual children, and also of the steps taken in the class work. 
 She should do this in order to follow up and compare results with dif- 
 ferent procedures. She should include enough of the children's responses 
 to compare one procedure with another," as well as for the purpose of 
 keeping track of individuals. 
 
 The organization of a school's record material will correspond to its 
 organization of procedure if its records are to be of use to the scool. In 
 our experiment no outline or organization proved satisfactory until each 
 school concerned decided in the first place why it was keeping records ; 
 that is, how the school wished to use them, who wished to use them, and 
 what information they should contain. Secondly and obviously this 
 information must be so arranged that it could be readily used. Finally, 
 the headings under which the teachers' notes were organized must be as 
 objective as possible in order to be intelligible and to be unmistakable in 
 their meaning. We experimented with the terms "creative activity" and 
 "cooperation," among others, but they were not concrete enough. They 
 did not mean the same thing to all who used them. 
 
 The teachers of the two schools which were experimenting adopted 
 different outlines for organizing their notes. These outlines may quite 
 fail to meet the needs of other schools who have children of the same 
 age. But whether they do or not is beside the point; the point is that an 
 organization of any kind within a school is more likely to be lived up to 
 in practice when it is made by the people who have the responsibility of 
 carrying it out. 
 
 A record of recording, which this report undertakes to be, must ful- 
 fill its own demand that a record shall provide concrete illustrations. I 
 
 [ 12 1
 
 have divided these illustrations into two heads for practical reasons of 
 reference, Records of Curriculum Functioning, and Records of Indi- 
 vidual Children. This division is made in answer to two common ques- 
 tions from experimental school people: "How can I let a new teacher 
 know what our course of study means and how we use it?" and "How 
 can we make the children's reports give real information to the next 
 teacher?" Our own queries were, what kind of records will best serve 
 our schools, and what information must these records give as a basis for 
 changes in curriculum ? 
 
 The discussion of these two topics, Records of Cuiriculum Func- 
 tioning, and Records of Individual Children, will contain many repeti- 
 tions because they are based upon the same guiding principles and the 
 same standards of observation. But the illustrations have been chosen 
 irom school occurrences which in the one case were weighted with cur- 
 riculum information, and in the other with information about individuals. 
 Often an illustration telling about an individual would also indicate the 
 curriculum just as well. But this only serves to confirm what the discus- 
 sion of our guiding principles implies, and what our experience proved 
 for us, that one and the same record must be used for recording both 
 curriculum and individual progress, and that neither record will be clear 
 li these interrelated topics are kept separate. 
 
 [13]
 
 RECORDS OF FUNCTIONING OF CURRICULUM 
 Formal Curriculum Determined by Tradition or Authority 
 
 The traditional school curriculum only recently has become open to 
 suggestions of fundamental changes. It is difficult for any of us to see 
 clearly enough to break away from the old leading strings. Most of us 
 still keep the old course of study, the subject matter required for culture, 
 even when we add other more practical subjects. We still ask "When?" 
 We ask at what age shall this cultural subject be placed in the course of 
 study. We do not ask, "What is the evidence that this subject is cul- 
 tural?" It may be, but we only have hearsay to prove it. No school can 
 be sure that such and such a subject is good or otherwise unless it has 
 concrete evidence at hand. 
 
 Schools have based their choice of subjects and materials and meth- 
 ods, not upon concrete information showing their own use or need, but 
 upon what has been done before by other schools. When school directors 
 do contemplate making changes, they adopt those a school somewhat like 
 their own has found successful; or they plunge into a haphazard method, 
 first this and then that device or material. When these prove misfits, 
 they look up another authority whose plan they try. 
 
 Superintendents who wish information usually inquire whether the 
 children have learned all that the teacher has been directed to set before 
 them, and what they have been unable to learn in the time allowed. They 
 seldom ask whether the children have acquired the habit of making use 
 of whatever may be about them which contributes to their experience of 
 the subject under discussion ; whether the children themselves have been 
 making spontaneous contributions to the group's progress in learning. If 
 a superintendent should ask such questions his teachers would have no 
 adequate data by which to answer them. Few schools have these data ; 
 they do not have evidence to base their changes upon. Many teachers, 
 when asked for information, advise materials or methods because the 
 children like them, or because the teacher herself is used to them and 
 does not wish to change. This unwillingness to change is not always due 
 to inertia or indifference. Both superintendents and teachers are a hard- 
 working class. They do not wish to change because no convincing 
 reasons are given for the changes proposed, and because no way is sug- 
 gested of finding out whether the new will be any more successful than 
 the old. The usual trial and error method of making changes is discour- 
 aging to a teacher. She has no standards of observation, no organized 
 and continuous method of recording to guide her. 
 
 f 14]
 
 The difference between a school having a flexible curriculum deter- 
 mined by its own conditions and one that is run on traditional lines is 
 simple. The former starts out with the knowledge that we still know 
 very little about what makes children learn and grow. It bases its choice 
 of an environment upon what it knows about the children who will come 
 to the school. It chooses an equipment which can be changed at least in 
 part as changes are needed. The school then watches and records how 
 this environment (including the children themselves) reacts upon the 
 group as a whole, whether it promotes school progress, and how it may 
 be changed in order to bring better results. 
 
 The usual formal school on the contrary provides a course of study 
 which is based upon what the school has decided beforehand that the 
 children should know and how the children should act. This tradi- 
 tional curriculum can be changed at best only at the end of the year. 
 It is widely recognized as inadequate and cumbersome, and in the end 
 expensive of time and energy. Schools unlike in procedure or in enroll- 
 ment adopt the same course of study, tradition or authority decide upon 
 it for them. Schools which make changes as they are needed in their 
 own classes are rare. Still more rare are schools which depend upon their 
 own carefully kept records for suggestions of changes in subject matter, 
 equipment and method. 
 
 Teachers' Records a Basis for Determining Curriculum 
 
 Data showing what experiences the children get out of the environ- 
 ment provided by the school, give a practical basis for making changes in 
 the course of study, in the material equipment, in the teacher's methods. 
 The teacher can best supply these data. Only the teacher can show the 
 steps, the processes of growth in school. The Nursery School says of 
 note-taking, "We set up hypotheses" but without "our own notes" . . . 
 "we cannot make accurate discriminations, . . . We must have evidence 
 in order to prove or disprove and to change." 
 
 Systematic concrete notes are a check to the teachers who write 
 them. They furnish a supervisor with material for judging what it is 
 that is bringing progress or the reverse. A school principal sees "spots" 
 when he sets forth on a tour of inspection. He does not see what pre- 
 ceded nor what will follow the lessons that he observes, he only sees what 
 is going on at the moment. He can gain enlightenment only through 
 continuous records, records which are concrete enough to take the place 
 of his own sight, and which will supplement his isolated Visits. The 
 Director of the City and Country School has such notes to read. From 
 
 115]
 
 one teacher she had notes upon number and drawing which covered a 
 considerable period of time. After reading these notes she made calls 
 during class time, and was able to make helpful practical comments be- 
 cause she had concrete information for a discussion with the teacher of 
 changes in method. 
 
 Records of Special Subjects 
 
 A teacher's systematic concrete notes are the only safe basis for 
 determining the value to children of special subjects of study. A certain 
 subject was adopted in one school because the teacher's plan of work and 
 her materials seemed very attractive and suitable. After months of trial 
 the class teachers expressed varying degrees of satisfaction, and equally 
 varied opinions about the effect upon the children of this subject matter 
 and its presentation. Nobody had notes to back up their opinions; the 
 teachers supplied only isolated, remembered incidents. The school wished 
 to reach a just and reliable conclusion and began careful notes of the 
 children's responses to these lessons. Notes were made of all the lessons 
 in all the classes for some months because the information that had gone 
 before had been confusing. It was contradictory ; it was opinion, not 
 concrete evidence. Summaries were made of this new body of continuous, 
 concrete information, summaries of the responses of the children at dif- 
 ferent ages. 
 
 These summaries gave rise to general conclusions about each class 
 and together they formed an intelligent basis for decisions upon the sub- 
 ject matter as a whole. In a class of three-year olds the children merely 
 looked on. They were either quite passive or were excited ; they showed 
 no initiative towards the material and soon wandered off to some more 
 active occupation. In this class the subject was dropped ; there was no 
 growth for the children, they gained no habit of learning for themselves. 
 In an older class the children were so pleased, so attentive and responsive, 
 that only a continuous record over several months served to show that 
 these children also only looked on. They made exclamations of pleasure; 
 but they took little action on their own account ; they acted upon what 
 the teacher suggested, "Do you want to . . . ?" The subject as presented 
 did not arouse the spontaneous inquiries of these children ; it did not of 
 itself stimulate action. The lessons were an entertainment only ; the 
 children's activities had to be directed by the teacher. Notes of the other 
 classes were equally illuminating, and the school finally gave up the 
 special lessons but kept the subject in an altered form. The teachers 
 kept notes of the changes in procedure which they had made that they 
 might have data for future judgments. 
 
 [ 161
 
 A mere list of subject matter topics is of use neither to a new 
 teacher nor to parents. Catalogues of private schools are obliged to add 
 photographs to show the children's active use of the subject presented. 
 The actual response of the children is needed to tell the tale. Tradi- 
 tional subject matter terms do not describe these reactions. "History: 
 the Revolutionary War" gives no real information. The following notes 
 show what the children did : "The class paid three visits to the ruins of 
 an old fort. They read up local history between visits, and reconstructed 
 the positions of the two armies on the spot, comparing their respective 
 advantages and disadvantages. These comparisons unexpectedly led to 
 the discovery that the course of the stream close by had changed since 
 revolutionary days, and the discussions that followed formed a new topic 
 which required a good deal of research by the children in geography 
 books." 
 
 The teacher of a new class cannot afford to neglect the information 
 about the class contained in the preceding teacher's notes. A teacher of 
 eight-year-old children did not look up what their teacher of the year 
 before had written about them. Her own notes criticised their slowness 
 in arithmetic. She said she had "tried having a match, . . . which 
 the children were not familiar with." In this case it was the teacher who 
 was not familiar with her children. The notes of their previous teacher 
 showed that they had delighted in all sorts of arithmetic games and 
 matches the year before. When, in January, the second teacher read the 
 previous year's notes of these children she frankly admitted that she her- 
 self, had confused and retarded them by not finding out what they had 
 done before. She had asked for quantitative reports, how many, how 
 much of each kind of subject matter, and for some time she was not 
 interested in concrete reports of the children's responses, or how children 
 use material, but only in what she or a preceding teacher had presented. 
 
 Important facts to get into a record are those which tell whether 
 the subject noted has developed spontaneous activity on the part of the 
 children, and what conditions, or what treatment of the subject by the 
 teacher helped to bring spontaneous response from the children. The 
 notes of a teacher of seven-year-old children show their active use of 
 number and the spontaneous drill they gave each other in order to achieve 
 a group response. 
 
 November Summary: The feeling of a need for number has centered 
 largely around the store. The class office of treasurer is a highly es- 
 teemed one, and it was decided by the group that only children passing 
 certain tests could aspire to it. The tests are reading and writing num- 
 bers to 100 by ones, fives and tens. As soon as anyone passed these tests 
 he began helping the others. ... A certain facility in making change 
 
 [ 17]
 
 is also demanded of anyone wishing to sell food (which the children had 
 made) at the sales. Two or three times in a free period the children 
 have played store. On the 8th C. with some help counted to 40, the seven 
 others listening intently. (A free period is undirected by the teacher.) 
 . . . The children feel responsible for slow children on account of 
 the store. 
 
 A class teacher of six-year-olds also reported a spontaneous use of 
 the school environment. Her notes included the children's use of infor- 
 mation brought from home, their contribution to others' use as well as 
 their own use, and her method of organizing their activities and the 
 information made use of during class discussions. Class discussion time 
 was the teacher's opportunity to encourage a habit of inquiry, and to 
 make use of the children's spontaneous inquiries to organize their infor- 
 mation and to connect it with common occurrences in their daily lives. 
 
 Week of February 7. The block scheme this week was entirely 
 spontaneous and well launched before I saw it. It involved an iron mine 
 drawn in chalk on the floor by CI. "An iron factory" . . . "where the 
 iron is melted up and made into things," was built near by. Close to the 
 factory docks were built, and barges pulled by tugs were loaded with 
 iron products, and taken to "N. Y." 
 
 As this play scheme carried over several days and included nearly 
 ail the class, I made it the subject of Thursday's discussion. The interest 
 was chiefly in pursuing the mining end of iron industry and the children 
 introduced the subject of the use of dynamite for breaking up rocks con- 
 taining iron. They were very much interested in the details of dynamite 
 explosion, wanted to know what made the rocks break, how dynamite 
 could be set off without blowing up the man who lighted it. Comparisons 
 were made (by the children) to the push of hot air as seen in their 
 science experiments, and to the familiar push of steam. 
 
 Other notes of the same class show the children's experience in lan- 
 guage and some of the teacher's ways of getting practice and originality. 
 
 Week of February 7. L. for the first time told an original story. I 
 had to suggest the topic, home experiences, and keep out extraneous 
 matter by criticisms, . . . but he enjoyed the effort and produced a 
 pretty good narrative. E. also told several stories which she wanted 
 written into a book she had made, to correspond to the illustrations. 
 M. on Friday dictated a story meant to be dramatized. All were en- 
 thusiastic about the idea and went up to the sun room to prepare for 
 playing it. . . . (They arranged a stage setting of blocks.) . . . The 
 story included a two nights' journey on a ship, which was tossing badly 
 in a storm. . . . M. made a real attempt to picture in words the rolling 
 of the boat on the waves. He began by using gestures to help out, and 
 C. gave him the word "tossing," but the rest was all his own, and he 
 used a sort of refrain to emphasize the roughness of his trip. Proof of 
 his success in this seemed to me to be found in the fact that the other 
 children featured the stormy trip in their dramatization later and did so 
 not in his words, but in motor expressions of their own. 
 
 [ 18]
 
 In L.'s and E.'s stories I put all my effort into centering their atten- 
 tion on unity of thought, as both were much inclined to wander off into 
 irrelevant concerns. 
 
 Another record of language teaching in a class of six-year-old chil- 
 dren is a record by a special teacher of English who was making an 
 experiment along new lines. Her report is a statement of her purposes, 
 of how she planned to work them out, and of her success as shown in 
 several of the children's stories. This was not a planned-beforehand- 
 and-put-through so-called experiment. It was an experiment carried 
 out by the special teacher assisted by the class teacher, both of whom 
 watched and recorded the children's responses, and changed the approach, 
 the teacher's suggestions, to fit these responses of the children. It was a 
 scientific experiment. The purpose was the development of an art, but 
 this in no way altered the necessity for a scientific recording of results. 
 The report, part of which follows, was written after a careful study of 
 the concrete notes taken by both teachers. It was accompanied by several 
 of the group stories, only one of which is given here. 
 
 The work in language with the Sixes in the Spring of 1920 was 
 started distinctly as a pre-reading experience. I had two primary aims. 
 The first was to get the children interested in listening to sounds in gen- 
 eral, street sounds, water splashing in the tub, the fire, etc., and so 
 gradually to the sound quality of language, both of individual words and 
 their rhythm when combined into sentences. The second aim was to 
 get the children to give verbal expression to their sense and motor expe- 
 riences. The school felt that listening and verbal expression might be 
 regarded as preliminary techniques to the technique of actual reading. 
 The method used for this pre-reading training was experimental. It in- 
 cluded the reading of much verse and a few stories which had marked 
 rhythmic and sound quality, and the telling by the class of group stories. 
 I tried to have each period include some listening and some expression 
 by the children. 
 
 All the group stories aimed to make vivid some experience common 
 to all. When possible, we chose an experience such as rain on a rainy 
 day in which we could make immediate sense observations instead of 
 relying upon memory. This definitely interested the children and gave 
 them an idea of a story in which plot did not predominate. Sometimes 
 in order to get the whole group to think about the same thing in their 
 group stories I introduced pictures. I chose pictures which had little 
 narrative suggestion. The children discussed how the picture made them 
 feel, as "sleepy" or "cool and quiet" or "happy and dancing." Then 
 they told the story, various children volunteering and I writing down 
 their remarks, frequently reading back the story as far as it was writ- 
 ten. We agreed to put into the stories only the things which made us 
 feel "sleepy" or "cool and quiet" or "happy and dancing." The children 
 quickly became their own critics. Some of the group stories had real 
 literary merit. 
 
 Second group story, told on a rainy day: The rain is falling. It's 
 damp and cold. It's coming down in flocks. It's part cloudy and part 
 
 [19 1
 
 sunny. And it's half and half. It's raining in New York, but maybe 
 not in California. The rain goes pitter-patter on the windows. It falls 
 on the umbrellas. The rain drips off the roofs on the houses. The little 
 wet drops they fall on your face. We all get wet. The rain falls on the 
 ground and our shoes get all wet. The rain falls on people's hats in the 
 street. And the men run when they haven't any umbrellas. The rain 
 falls on your rain hats and falls on your face. Your foot hits a puddle 
 and the water splashes up on your knee. 
 
 Records of Group Methods of Learning 
 
 A teacher's record of curriculum functioning is not complete unless 
 she supplies information which will show how the children are learning 
 together. The children work and play together, and they influence each 
 other as grown people influence other grown people's ideas and actions. 
 Realizing this, schools make provision for social play time. Some schools 
 also make provision for studying and learning together, a social organ- 
 ization not simply allowed because a class is too large to be taught as 
 isolated individuals, but deliberately planned because learning together 
 is part of the experience of living together, which experience we wish all 
 children to be ready to share. 
 
 When the Director of the City and Country School, after visiting 
 class-rooms and reading the teachers' notes, sees a common need for some 
 specific suggestions she sends them out to the teachers in the form of 
 bulletins which help the teachers both in their teaching procedure and in 
 their recording. The bulletin which follows points up this school's 
 emphasis upon group discussions in each class as a method of organizing 
 the children's information and of encouraging the habit of making their 
 own inquiries. 
 
 Bulletin. . . . Perhaps this is a good place to emphasize the fact that 
 what makes for social organization in our school groups is: (1) the com- 
 mon experiences the children have in their past and are still working on; 
 (2) the organized body of information which they have and which is 
 common to the majority of the group. These two things are inseparable 
 and can be separated only for convenience in discussion. What we wish 
 to catch and record is not so much what the children are exposed to as 
 what they get. This may be obtained only by specific recording of discus- 
 sons, activities, and inquiries. 
 
 The use of a group discussion period for teaching language was 
 illustrated in the preceding topic. A discussion period is always a lan- 
 guage period. The following record also illustrates the teacher's use of 
 this opportunity to help the children to organize their information and to 
 plan their activities. 
 
 1201
 
 A Month's Summary: October. Six-year-old children. "Discussions 
 have included the school program, practical needs such as . . . the elec- 
 tion and duties of a class committee, . . . marking the attendance. . . . 
 Other discussions have dealt with different types of farms. . . . All of 
 this has centered very clearly around the children's play schemes. . . . 
 The children's lead has been followed rather than a definite program of 
 information and has led off occasionally from the general subject of farms 
 to specific interests. . . . The general purpose of the discussions has been 
 to encourage language expression in the group, and to find out what in- 
 formation the children have available for use in their play and to help 
 this to function. 
 
 Week of February 21 (Same class.) The last two days of the week 
 the discussions returned to the general subject of geography. On Thurs- 
 day we reviewed the origin of rivers and in particular the source of the 
 Hudson and the way water is brought from the Catskills to supply New 
 York City in connection with (their science teacher's) illustration of 
 this. I read the story of the Singing Water, recapitulating the informa- 
 tional material, and it held their attention well. . . . On Friday morning 
 the picture map of the city and harbor proved very absorbing, and all 
 took turns in very orderly fashion. . . . 
 
 Week of February 28. Children from five to six years old. Enthu- 
 siasm was high on Monday over the new blocks which had been stacked 
 in the room over the week-end. Almost as soon as he was seated (for 
 discussion of the morning's work) . . . B. M. said, "Oh, let's build a 
 town." This fired the group, and one said, "Let's put in a church," an- 
 other . . . Since there was now such deviation from the first suggestion 
 of a town, I remarked, "If we are going to put in all of these things, we'd 
 better build New York City." This was taken up at once, and I sent a 
 child for a map. . . . The buildings had all been on or near Broadway 
 or Fifth Avenue. I pointed out these streets to the children on the map. 
 We found the north and south, then discussed the best arrangement in 
 the room to show uptown and downtown. This came readily, for we 
 have had games of direction in the room. . . . The next day I showed 
 the children pictures of the buildings they had chosen. . . . T. Z. had 
 built Old Trinity the day before. He had put it downtown, but not on 
 Broadway, and the construction was not a creditable one. After seeing 
 the picture he said, "It is going to be different when I take it down and 
 build it on Broadway." 
 
 The scheme was a general one, each child co-operated by making his 
 own contribution of one or more buildings. . . . Occasionally two or 
 more worked on the same building. 
 
 Week of March 7. . . . This (week's) scheme as that of the pre- 
 vious week was initiated very evenly in the group. The suggestions were 
 given rapidly and with excitement. One child did not wait for another 
 to get an idea, but was ready with his own. 
 
 Discussion time may bring opportunity for a group's control of their 
 own behavior as well as of their work during a free (undirected) hour. 
 An observing teacher's notes of such an occasion are given below. The 
 class of nine-year-old children was taught by Miss B. 
 
 Before beginning, Miss B. remarked, "There is a serious thing for 
 just one hour, do you remember it?" Several children replied, "Yes, 
 
 [21 ]
 
 H. and T." Miss B. cautioned, "Don't mention names. . . . You all 
 understand?" . . . The two boys then went into the most secluded cor- 
 ner of each room. Their punishment had been chosen by themselves, at 
 H.'s suggestion. . . . Both were very conscientious. . . . When Miss B. 
 called "Time's up!" both boys went quietly to look at . . . (something 
 which had been going on during their hour of punishment, but which 
 they had not watched). 
 
 A few minutes after the announcement that the hour was up, Miss B. 
 said to the class president, "They are not putting away." Said J. (the 
 president), "They won't put them away." Miss B. laughed at a presi- 
 dent's tolerating this, and made suggestions how to manage. Then they 
 sat down to report "whether you did, during your free period, what you 
 said you were going to do; . . . whether it was something harder and 
 better than before." There was close attention to this brief suggestion 
 of Miss B.'s and to the reports from each child about his satisfaction 
 with the work he had done; close attention from all but P. All the chil- 
 dren made reports that the teacher and children were satisfied with 
 except P. and M. P. said she was satisfied with the work she had done, 
 and when no one commented, Miss B. merely said she did not agree with 
 her. M. said he had nothing to say, and he had to be prodded before 
 he would give any account of his wasted time. 
 
 Records of trips taken by a group in search of information or on 
 
 errands to buy something are very fruitful sources of information to the 
 
 teacher and the school about how and what the children are learning 
 
 together; how they are developing, through their own spontaneous 
 
 inquiries, the habit of going after the information they want when they 
 
 want it, going after it themselves, not waiting until it is handed out to 
 
 them. 
 
 Week of May 9. Four-year-old children. On Monday the children 
 went with me to the butcher's on 8th Street to get meat for the turtles. 
 On the way back they noticed men apparently mending the roadway, and 
 asked to look at it. We crossed the street and found three men making a 
 square hole in the ground. M. said, "Why are you doing that?" A man 
 replied that they were trying to mend electric light wires. One man 
 was holding an iron bar with a sort of tongs while two others hammered 
 on this to break up the stone under the roadway. A. explained to me 
 that the man wasn't holding the bar with his hands for fear he might 
 get hammered. Some stones loosened, the workman leaned over and 
 picked out pieces with his hands. "Why doesn't he use a shovel?" asked 
 M., just before the man did reach out for his shovel. The men were so 
 impressed by this time with the children's intelligence that they told me 
 we could see the wires in a hole farther up the street. . . . T. remarked 
 that some trolley wires are above ground, so we looked at the cable 
 between the tracks on 8th Street. 
 
 Another group of four-year-olds made several trips to see a concrete 
 mixer. The teacher did not point things out, she answered questions. 
 On their second trip, they asked among other questions, "Who makes 
 it turn around, that man over there?" "How does he open it?" The 
 same children on another trip stopped to look at a sewer being cleaned. 
 
 [22]
 
 "Where is the other pail?" some of them asked when only one came up. 
 "How did they make the fire?" in the small iron stove. 
 
 While the extension of Seventh Avenue was being built the five- 
 year-olds were especially interested in watching its construction. The 
 following are my summaries of their teacher's more detailed notes of their 
 many visits. 
 
 November. During the first trip the children noticed the piles of 
 stones, dirt, sand, etc. During their second visit they were too absorbed 
 to raise inquiries about the wonderful mixing machine, the men carting 
 stones, sand and cement to put into it, and others dumping out the mix- 
 ture. Miss M. let them watch the whole show in silence for fully twenty 
 minutes. On the third visit they were again absorbed and asked no ques- 
 tions. They were not asked any until their return to school, when it was 
 found that every child but one had taken in all the processes of the 
 machine and could describe them accurately. 
 
 December. On the fourth visit the children remarked, "Stones and 
 sand and cement all go into the big wheel" . . . "they get mixed up 
 inside the wheel" . . . "The water gets into the wheel through the rub- 
 ber pipe." They were told the name "concrete mixer." On their return 
 to school they gave separate accurate accounts (except one child). While 
 passing by some days later bound for another destination the children 
 called out "There's our friend!" When asked what part of the road the 
 mixer had been on and where concrete had not yet been deposited, they 
 jumped up and down and pointed to show that they could tell by feel as 
 well as by their eyes. 
 
 January. The children pointed out to Miss G. where the mixer 
 had filled in, that they could walk on it, and that where "it was only dirt" 
 the mixer had not been at work. They told her how the concrete was 
 made. On another day they watched the stones laid, the tar and then the 
 sand put on top, and described it all. Miss M. asked what would be the 
 next thing they would see on another trip and some of them shouted 
 "Horses and automobiles." 
 
 Records of Emotion, of Fatigue 
 
 Records of emotional states, of fatigue, are not available in most 
 schools. Sometimes a single incident of a spectacular type is recorded, 
 but no isolated occurrence is valuable as evidence of cause. "I think so 
 and so is very bad for the children," or "A. and B. were very much tired 
 out after ..." are the usual contributions to questions about what 
 brings fatigue or irritability, etc., in school. The concrete data, system- 
 atically recorded over a sufficient period of time are lacking. Keeping 
 notes of many instances of the emotion in question, with the surrounding 
 circumstances, is the only method which will produce evidence upon 
 which we can base our judgements. 
 
 The matter of fatigue is given a good deal of attention in private 
 schools where doctors and psychologists assist the teachers. But specific 
 
 [23 1
 
 data of experiences in school are not often at hand. A teacher, B., said, 
 "Whenever I go into A.'s room I am impressed by the quiet and good 
 order everywhere. My children are so often noisy ; I am sure I let them 
 get too excited." She was asked what she had recorded ; had she notes 
 that showed which activities aroused excitement; whether they always 
 did so; which children were most excited, how they showed it; etc. She 
 had some notes in answer to the last question, but nothing adequate upon 
 any. She had very full notes of individual cases of excitement but the 
 complete conditions were not noted. There was not an accurate follow- 
 ing up to show whether there was repetition under similar conditions, 
 nor how the children in the other teacher's room reacted under similar 
 conditions. 
 
 This question of excitement and fatigue was often brought up by 
 A, B, and other teachers during several years. They questioned their 
 own procedures or criticized the environment; and they made some 
 changes, by guess not by concrete evidence. They asked and accepted 
 advice from the doctor and the psychologist. But no decisions were 
 reached. there were not sufficient data to make sure of anything, there 
 was only vague opinion. The only suggestive contribution was made at 
 a meeting when A. and B. each read her record of the content of her 
 group's activities, the information they used and how they used it. The 
 contrast in richness of content and in productive activity was strong and 
 in favor of B.'s class. The query then narrowed to, "Which is better for 
 children of this age, the rich experience going on in B.'s room, or the 
 much less active but serene and quiet experience in A.'s room?" There 
 was no evidence to answer this question in regard to fatigue. 
 
 An interesting beginning has been made in recording emotional 
 states by the Nursery School. Notes are taken to determine just what 
 produces strain in individuals and in the group, so that changes may be 
 made in the environment as indicated. The following illustrations of 
 their recording are especially admirable in the way points made in a pre- 
 ceding summary are followed up: 
 
 Week of January 24. The children play together with almost no 
 friction or crying, a very different atmosphere without J. (one of the 
 oldest children.) 
 
 Summary at end of January. Integration of group seems still 
 further advanced, that is, the integration of the two groups each within 
 itself. There is a very distinct line dividing the babies from the older 
 children (two or three years). The friendliest relations prevail between 
 groups, and the "Bigs" show great forbearance with the little ones who 
 naturally interfere considerably. . . . 
 
 Summary at end of March. As a whole the group atmosphere is 
 serene moot of the time since I. left. 
 
 I 24 1
 
 Records of Equipment 
 
 A school's equipment is a significant part of the environment which 
 provides experience for the children. It is used by the children ; and a 
 record of how they use it, what experience they get out of it, is necessary 
 if we wish to know whether the equipment we have supplied to the 
 children has contributed to their growth, and whether we shall continue 
 to use it. 
 
 A school cannot afford to guess at the usefulness of its material set- 
 up. Teachers must record what use has been made of the materials pro- 
 vided when they ask for more or when they ask for changes. A teacher 
 of six-year-old children was asked whether she needed more blocks. "Yes," 
 she replied, but when further inquiries were made as to how many more, 
 she did not know. She did not know whether they were used for social 
 play or quite individually. Another teacher said she needed no more 
 blocks, yet a frequent visitor had noticed repeatedly that the same two 
 or three boys used up all the blocks before anyone else had a chance to 
 get at them. A teacher of the same grade in the City and Country 
 School reported specifically that she needed twice as many blocks and 
 gave the sizes she wanted. She had recorded and followed up for weeks 
 to find out which children used the blocks, how many used them at the 
 same time, at what stage in the building the blocks were apt to give out, 
 and how worth while was the activity that the blocks commonly 
 stimulated. 
 
 A teacher of six-year-olds in another school asked for more balls. 
 She had no record of use and was disconcerted when she was asked 
 whether the balls were used individually or in group play. She was 
 further confused by the question whether the same children used them 
 each time. She had never been asked such questions before. "I guess 
 so," was all she could reply. Requests for more equipment are based 
 upon guesswork in many schools. Another teacher noted, "two long 
 chains were added to the yard equipment to-day, and greatly delighted 
 the children. Their first use was . . . Later the chain was attached 
 . . . Still later . . ., etc." This was a promising beginning to work 
 from, to report changes in use. But these chains were not mentioned 
 again in this teacher's notes. If they were never used again, a statement 
 of just this fact would have been adequate for further inquiry at least. 
 
 A systematic recording of the concrete facts, followed up to report 
 changes or nonchanges of use, is the only method of getting reliable data 
 about school materials. The following illustrations are from the notes 
 of teachers in the City and Country School. These notes were not 
 
 [25]
 
 written to report the use of materials only; they were part of each 
 teacher's regular weekly summary. Each summary was a record of 
 how the children had been learning during that week and how the cur- 
 riculum had functioned to stimulate their learning processes. 
 
 Week of March 7. Four-year-olds. Block building. The squares, 
 half squares, prisms and cylinders introduced last week were the only 
 blocks used this week and they brought about entirely new types of con- 
 struction. Towers were made several days of the week. . . . M. was 
 able to place her blocks so accurately that her tower, which was about 
 five inches above my head, remained standing all morning. The upper 
 half was made entirely of the small cylinders. M. A. and A. tried to 
 imitate the towers, but . . . , etc. 
 
 Week of Feb. 7. Six-year-olds. Yard play. Outdoors the play in the 
 morning has been principally with the big slide and knotted rope, and 
 "jumping"' on the swing. D. is now completely a part of the social group. 
 . . . He and C. have played together in a box house every afternoon, 
 using the big blocks for furniture and stairs, and building a roof of 
 boards. M. and S. have found a congenial interest in ... E. and CI. 
 played together on the slide a good deal, inventing games like last 
 week . . . , etc. 
 
 Week of March 7. Six-year-olds. Shop. In the shop most of the 
 children are working on articles wanted for specific purposes, like a box 
 to plant flowers in at home, toy furniture for doll houses . . . , a bird 
 house . . ., and a bread board. 
 
 Week of January 31. Three-year-olds. The slide. A new game 
 developed. J. B. and D started it, P. and J. F. joined: another step in 
 J. F.'s better physical activity. (The game was described in detail here.) 
 They all tumbled off together in gales of laughter. J. F. : "Oh, isn't it 
 fine!" More abandon by him than I have ever seen before. Great aban- 
 don by J. B. going down slide backwards. No other child has done this, 
 though a few have announced that they wanted to and have climbed the 
 steps to the top of the slide for that purpose but have changed their 
 minds when actual time came for letting go their hands. 
 
 Records of the curriculum, of subject matter, materials, etc., kept 
 by one school will be invaluable to other schools having children of the 
 same age. Mistakes and discoveries by one are enlightening to another 
 school. There should be a free interchange of such records between 
 schools. 
 
 [26
 
 RECORDS OF INDIVIDUAL CHILDREN 
 
 Traditional Opinion or Concrete Data as Basis for Changes 
 in Environment 
 
 Our experiment in recording held to the same guiding principles 
 and the same standards for observing individual children that we used in 
 records of the curriculum. The discussion of records of individuals will 
 repeat many of the same arguments, and the illustrations used will often 
 be records of curriculum as well as of individuals. As I have said before, 
 this repetition is necessary for the purpose of answering the question 
 which is so frequently being asked by school people, "How can we make 
 children's reports give real information?" 
 
 Our experience proved for us that the same data are needed for 
 information concerning individual children as for the curriculum, and 
 that neither record will give full and clear information if these two 
 points of view are kept separate. When we wish to take intelligent 
 action, in the case of individuals or to change the environment, we must 
 have concrete data of the children's own activities ; we must observe and 
 record processes of growth in school ; we must report group responses in 
 order to tell the whole story; and the teacher is the only recorder who 
 can approach a recording of the whole environment and can estimate its 
 importance in terms of continuous experience. 
 
 Grown people's judgments are seldom based upon closely observed 
 activities of children. The most well informed of us still judge the 
 behavior or the scholastic achievements of children in school more or less 
 by traditional standards. We are dependent upon what we, in common 
 with most other people, believe a child "should" learn, and how he 
 "should" behave. As in the case of the curriculum, we have only recently 
 begun to doubt, to suspect that our traditional ideas about children may 
 be mistaken. We have only recently begun to watch the responses of 
 the children themselves in order to discover what these responses really 
 mean. We are beginning to find out that they frequently mean some- 
 thing quite different from what we have supposed, and that our action in 
 regard to these responses must be quite different from the action we have 
 been in the habit of taking. 
 
 When we wish to understand a child we must observe not only his 
 responses, but what it is in the environment (so far as we can see) which 
 stimulates these responses, these behaviors and interests and accom- 
 plishments. Perhaps something other than what tradition has taught is 
 the real source of stimulus. Some non-scholastic people go so far as to 
 
 [27]
 
 say that the most valuable training, the most important experiences for 
 living the lives we all have to live, come not from school but from out- 
 side of school. Schools have not looked upon themselves in this light; 
 but if it be true, it is a challenge which the schools must answer. They 
 must find out what share the schools should take in supplying oppor- 
 tunities for these experiences. Psychologists have recently made large 
 contributions to our knowledge of how we learn, of what teaches us. 
 Teachers have contributed little ; in fact engineers and other business 
 men have contributed more by showing their dissatisfaction with the 
 uneducated products which the schools turn out. 
 
 Psychologists are more and more commonly basing their judgments 
 upon concrete data, less and less upon subjective inferences of what is 
 probably the matter. A teacher must follow the same method. She 
 must follow it for herself. She cannot, even in schools where a psychol- 
 ogist is part of the school staff, wait for the psychologist's examinations. 
 She needs to know too often, she needs to know what to do. Moreover 
 it is the teacher alone who has opportunity to see the children's day-after- 
 day behavior, and their influence upon each other. She is responsible for 
 changes in the school environment which shall bring continued progress 
 for each of her children. She must depend upon her concrete data for 
 information that will indicate what changes she should make in the 
 school environment. 
 
 The measure of a child's growth (for a teacher's purposes) is his 
 progress in ability to use his environment to satisfy his own purposes. 
 This was our standard of what we must observe to know whether growth 
 is taking place. It is his own experiences which teach him, it is the satis- 
 faction of his own purposes which brings experiences to him ; it is these 
 experiences which a teacher must watch and record if she wishes to 
 understand him. The environment that a child uses, through which he 
 gets his experiences, consists of people as well as things, and his desires 
 are both social and material. It is the school's business to provide the 
 material and social setting which shall supply each child with an environ- 
 ment which he can use and which the school can change to fit his grow- 
 ing needs. It is the school's business to know whether these needs are 
 being satisfied. It can only know by the help of concrete records of the 
 children's activities. 
 
 The recording of children's activities, of their processes of learning 
 and growing, for the sake of having a reliable basis for making changes 
 in the school environment, is chiefly for the school's own information. 
 These records relieve the home of no responsibility for changes which the 
 home makes. But they form a basis for bringing home and school into 
 
 (28 1
 
 cooperation instead of into conflict, which percentage reports, for ex- 
 ample, so often do just because they convey no real information and in 
 consequence are confusing and misleading. The City and Country School 
 and the Nursery School have been working upon reports to parents and 
 reports from parents. These reports are based upon the teachers' and 
 the parents' concrete notes of the children's responses to the school and 
 the home environments. These schools have worked upon home reports 
 independently of the experiment now being discussed and further dis- 
 cussion of that topic will not be undertaken here. 
 
 A teacher's record of her children takes into account those home con- 
 ditions which may be responsible for each child's methods of attack upon 
 his school environment, for his attitude in general; but her judgment 
 should be formed and her procedure determined chiefly by what she her- 
 self sees and by what she can control. Her record must be critical of the 
 school environment, including herself, before it is critical of the child ; 
 and it should be critical of the child only for the purpose of finding out 
 what she can do in the situation. 
 
 "Elizabeth is lazy and stops before she gets her work finished," is a 
 kind of report that is often sent on to the next teacher or even to a 
 parent. If this is to rise above the level of mere fault finding it must tell 
 a good deal more. What kind of work is it that she avoids doing, is 
 there none she does well? Does she work better when alone or when 
 with other children? How do the other children behave towards her? 
 Does she show her idleness ("lazy" is an inaccurate term to apply to 
 children) by dreaming? Or by doing something else than the work in 
 hand, or by talking? How were the other children behaving in the same 
 situation? What has the teacher done to alter the behavior? Unless a 
 new teacher has answers to these questions, she will have to work them 
 out for herself ; the mere statement as quoted above will convey no real 
 information and would better be left unsaid. If the first teacher has 
 taken notes showing the conditions and how the other children reacted, 
 and if for each child she passes on to another teacher she gives page and 
 paragraph of these notes, she will be giving invaluable information. The 
 new teacher will also be finding out about the other children at the same 
 time, she will be seeing them in contrast with Elizabeth ; and if the first 
 teacher is a good reporter she will see what methods have failed with 
 Elizabeth, and will have some basis for choosing a different procedure. 
 
 A teacher's account of Elizabeth or of John must contain a descrip- 
 tion of how the child works, what he is curious about, in what ways he 
 is like or unlike his companions. The account must be continuous; 
 that is, it must follow up a significant action and state whether it develops 
 
 [29]
 
 and how. This account of John must show how he grows, how he learns 
 among the other children who are also learning, learning in a different 
 way from John perhaps, and at a different pace, with interruptions to 
 their learning which are not the same as John's. Is this too difficult a 
 task to set a teacher? The ordinary markings by percentages, or the 
 newer character studies, take a great deal of time if conscientiously under- 
 taken, and they tell very little to the next teacher when they reach her. 
 The new teacher is obliged to go to the other teacher to obtain more 
 information, when she wishes information which will be full enough to 
 act upon. 
 
 The first essential difference between our records and those in 
 common use is the difference in responsibility. Most reports of children 
 throw the emphasis upon what is the matter with the child ; our reason 
 for making records is to show what is the matter with the environment 
 and to change it. Even if we are satisfied with an environment for the 
 time being, we know it must change, it cannot stay as it is because the 
 children change ; they change enough to call for some different approach 
 or material every week at least. A teacher must be on the lookout for 
 changes in the children and be ready to provide some variation for each 
 child. 
 
 Re-reading her notes will convince any teacher that she cannot trust 
 her memory for each child's learning processes. She must take notes, and 
 keep referring to them ; she must know what his changes of activity or 
 attitude have been and what influences have brought about his changes. 
 A teachers' meeting was called in the middle of a school year to discuss 
 several children. One was reported as very unruly at home but not at all 
 troublesome in school. The home wished advice about managing him. 
 Specific misbehavior at home was mentioned and the class teacher was 
 asked whether he had shown none of this when he entered school in the 
 fall. "None at all," she replied, yet her first notes of the child were of 
 just such conduct. She had not looked up her notes. She had for- 
 gotten the child's early behavior because her action at the time had so 
 readily brought about a changed attitude. She did not remember that 
 he had ever been a problem. Nevertheless this very fact was a valuable 
 one to report to the meeting and to his mother as showing what the 
 teacher's management and the school environment had done for the child. 
 
 Individual Records Must be Records of Group Reactions 
 
 The second essential difference between our records and others is 
 the fact that we do not separate individual records from records of th? 
 group. We claim that they cannot be separated. Individual records 
 
 [301
 
 must be records of the group if they are to give a clear picture of the in- 
 dividual working and playing, learning and growing with the other chil- 
 dren who are associated with him. The other children are part of his 
 environment; their activities have a share in his growth. 
 
 We experimented for a short time with separate individual notes 
 until we realized that separate notes of each child are confusing to the 
 teacher. Notes of the activity of the group as a whole are necessary for 
 an understanding of an individual's reactions to the school environment. 
 It is necessary for the teacher to observe group situations and to record 
 them in concrete form for comparison and reference, if she wishes to have 
 a true picture of the child in school. When she wishes to pass on to the 
 next teacher a report which will suggest how the new teacher shall 
 manage him, she must show how the other children were reacting at the 
 same time under the same circumstances. 
 
 Summary for October. Four-year-old children. There is a good 
 deal of difference in the children's ability in handling their clothing, 
 which ties up with their general facility in using their hands. All can 
 take off their own hats and coats, but some are much slower than others. 
 Marie still retains her pride in the speed with which she accomplishes 
 the operations, and her triumphant "I beat you" has hurried up the slow 
 ones and added interest to the whole proceeding. There has been a spe- 
 cial problem with one little boy who really seemed to suffer from a com- 
 plex in regard to clothes. This was manifested by extreme sulkiness and 
 negativism. His usual behavior was to get into a corner and pretend to 
 be a turtle or lion, instead of going to work as the other children did. A 
 new method of treatment was decided on, i. e., not to mention clothes at 
 all until he had become interested in an occupation . . . (other details 
 and child's responses.) Since then there has been no difficulty at all. I 
 am careful not to ask him directly to take off his things, but usually he 
 does so when the other children do. 
 
 The reports of Marie and the little boy would not be complete with- 
 out the comparison with the other children. A new teacher has the infor- 
 mation that this group of four-year-olds has a certain facility with theii 
 hands, but that they varied very much in their willingness to take care 
 of their own clothes. She also has a clear idea of a method of managing 
 the boy which will be useful if he reverts to old habits while in her class. 
 She sees, as well, the influence of Marie's skill (or perhaps it was her 
 energy) upon the slower children; they learned something from her. 
 
 The social environment determines individual progress, for adults 
 and for children. The race has lived in groups because of the stimulus of 
 social experience; the give and take which follows from social contact, 
 from relating experiences as they are alike or different, and as they are 
 repeated by the group. If this be true of adult life it must be true of 
 children. We wish them to live a socially active life, consequently we 
 
 [31 1
 
 send them to school with other children. A record of an individual's 
 progress must then include environment, must show enough of the gen- 
 eral activity going on in the group to report what sort of stimuli arouses 
 the individual to inquiry and effort and what does not, what contribu- 
 tions he makes to the group activity, how he makes them, and how he is 
 learning to make more inquiries and more contributions. When a teacher 
 studies one child at a time or writes up each child separately, she focuses 
 her attention upon the one child, not upon the child plus the social and 
 material environment within which his behavior took place. 
 
 The Nursery School, with children three years old and younger, 
 makes very careful records of the children's experiences, their learning 
 processes. The contrast between the following children is informing of 
 both. In this case the "group" happened to consist of only the two 
 children. 
 
 Weekly summary, May 23. George made a very complicated three- 
 story construction about two feet long. The big blocks were laid length- 
 wise, short ones were placed across them and triangles. Edward still 
 tends to the helterskelter piling. This week, in his first attempt, he seemed 
 to continue intentional much longer than usual. He announced he would 
 make a train. He laid about 12 blocks in a long track and then George, 
 whose specialty is that type of construction, joined him and they worked 
 together for ten minutes or more laying a wonderful track. In some 
 places it was seven or eight tiers high. ... It was amusing to see 
 George straighten a block put in crooked by the temperamental Edward. 
 Their method of work is very different. George works with absorption 
 and is meticulous over details . . . but his schemes are not likely to be 
 bold. Edward enjoys doing a stunt. His towers were well executed and 
 he showed some skill in devising ways of placing blocks after he could no 
 longer reach the top. On the other hand it took him longer than it did 
 George to discriminate in the size. Experience teaches Edward without 
 his taking much responsibility about it. 
 
 We do not become informed about a child when we study him 
 alone. We may record what he is doing when alone and how he does it, 
 but we do not know him. We may catch some of his characteristics, but 
 we can know his possibilities only when we see him working with his 
 kind with whom he must live. A teacher of a five-year-old class reported 
 many weeks of active block building. The children's play was rich and 
 varied in its informational content and its constructions. Almost even 
 child took part in this building. The exceptions noted were significant; 
 but without the notes of the responses of the group as a whole they would 
 have been of no value except to report that there were exceptions. The 
 first and second paragraphs noted below illustrate this teacher's notes of 
 the building during two weeks. The next paragraphs show the same 
 class at dramatic play in the yard. Different children are emphasized in 
 
 (32 1
 
 the two settings, in these particular weeks because they stood out as react- 
 ing differently. 
 
 Week of March 21. Building. When boats were suggested as the 
 objective in block building for the week . . . one child suggested that the 
 boats go to the West Indies. (The children had seen a West Indian boat 
 during a trip to the docks.) This was agreed upon. ... All kinds of 
 craft were built. . . . Grace modified her boat, however, putting on 
 many passengers and dressing them up. Though she was co-operating in 
 the floor scheme, the dressing of the dolls was, I believe, more her interest 
 than the boat and its destination. 
 
 Week of April 4. Building. Contributions (to the discussion of 
 trains and boats) came from all the children with rapidity and enthusi- 
 asm. . . . My suggestion met with approval and going around the circle 
 each chose what his contribution would be, except Grace who chose to 
 build a house. She seemed utterly outside the spirit of the class. It is 
 difficult to think of any child being able to withstand the enthusiasm of 
 this group. 
 
 Week of April 4. Yard Play. The yard play has been very intent 
 and interesting all week. The constructions of blocks, or boxes and blocks, 
 were made in order that dramatic play could be carried on. Very often 
 the dramatic activity is taking place or being planned during the course 
 of the building. . . . Jervis plays well alone, building with blocks, mak- 
 ing boats or houses. He has a great desire to be included in more social 
 play and appeals to me. I am endeavoring to have him accomplish the 
 social contact himself in so far as it is feasible. However, when he invites 
 other children to play with him he does not make his requests attractive 
 and hence meets with no response. If he wishes to join the play of a 
 group he goes right in it without making any request to be allowed to 
 play. This annoys the others at once. . . . He makes no contributions 
 when he gets in, but I believe this will come since he shows good content 
 in his own play. 
 
 Week of May 9. Jervis built well alone and occasionally has made 
 a satisfactory contact with other children. He is apt to play with the 
 others expecting them to carry out his directions or to allow him to be in 
 the play without contributing ideas or help, consequently he is not in- 
 cluded long and finds it hard to be included at all. 
 
 A teacher of a country school discovered by experience that records 
 of group activities gave her far more information about her children than 
 records of individuals. The teacher was new to the school and began by 
 keeping notes of the character study type (a rather new method in those 
 days, some years ago). She also kept notes of their academic work 
 along the usual lines. All of these notes were separate individual records. 
 She studied these records separately and drew subjective inferences con- 
 cerning each child's behavior, in his school work, on the playground, and 
 what she knew of his home. But she did not find these records helpful. 
 She was confused, she could not keep connections in mind, and she did 
 not get help in making changes which she was sure were needed both 
 indoors and out. This was especially true of the two oldest boys, Leonard 
 
 [33 I
 
 and Randall; she knew something was ineffective but she did not know 
 what it was. 
 
 For a different purpose, that of making a special study of play, the 
 teacher took concrete notes of the whole group while they were on the 
 playground. The fact that small groups remained constant over a period 
 of many days became evident, and the teacher discovered that the in- 
 dividual composition of these groups, and the relationships of the groups 
 to each other, were of great value in judging the character of each child. 
 
 The two big boys, thirteen and fourteen, when studied as isolated 
 individuals, had not shown the teacher what was the matter with them, 
 nor what she could do to bring about changes in attitude. She had also 
 kept trying to see them in the light of outside public opinion, and the 
 reports preceding teachers had left. These opinions were that Leonard 
 was a trustworthy leader and a good student, while Randall was the 
 village bad boy who came to school only because his father forced him. 
 The teacher's individual studies had thrown doubt upon these opinions, 
 but they gave little information except that the bad boy had done nothing 
 bad so far, and that the good boy took no interest in his studies. The 
 teacher got no clue to understanding and handling the situation ade- 
 quately until she studied her continuous notes of a group activity. Here 
 there were noted enough interrelationships between varying situations 
 and personalities to show up both boys in considerable relief. Leonard 
 was mean; he got the younger children to run after his balls and he 
 usurped all the desired positions. Randall was generous towards the 
 younger children, taught them the games, comforted them when their 
 feelings were hurt and encouraged them to be good sports. Randall and 
 Leonard were not particularly good friends on the playground. 
 
 The teacher began to observe these two boys, and the other children, 
 as groups, at work together. She did not allow herself to form judg- 
 ments about individual occurrences nor individual children until she had 
 observed them working together repeatedly under similar conditions. 
 That is, she observed and recorded continuous group activities. She was 
 able therefore to draw positive instead of negative conclusions, conclu- 
 sions which were based upon a series of concrete related facts, evidence, 
 not opinion. She found Leonard, for example, expert in devices for 
 deceiving her about the work he had done. Randall would cover up 
 nothing from a teacher he liked. The teacher had sensed this before, but 
 she had not taken the right way to get the evidence. Her action, follow- 
 ing these positive leads, was direct and in time brought results she had 
 not been able to get before. 
 
 A teacher of nine-year-old children, after overcoming several diffi- 
 
 (34 1
 
 culties in her children's play in the yard, read over her rough notes and 
 summarized the situation at that date in regard to each child. This sum- 
 mary forms an excellent basis for a continued following up and reporting 
 upon the progress of each one. 
 
 November-December. Tom was then the best athlete, Martha and 
 Ellen entered into the games with most abandon. James, Violet and 
 Frank were good sportsmen. Edmund played at this time with great zest 
 but had not much muscular control. . . . Jack, who at first was often 
 accidentally hurt, and who liked to play alone, had become quite one of 
 the group. . . . Edwin still had a tendency to take it easy, giving up a 
 chase if he saw near the start he hadn't much of a show. Henry enjoyed 
 play but wanted to be "it" most of the time. . . . Mary and John fitted 
 in nicely with no outstanding characteristics. 
 
 A final summary at the end of the year by the same teacher contains 
 the following partial report of the children's drawing and painting. This 
 report would be complete only when accompanied by the actual paintings 
 made by the children, and when preceded by an account of their begin- 
 nings, their progress and what teaching or help they had had. 
 
 Judging from the hundreds of drawings, I think we have succeeded 
 in getting free expression, and in the case of A., B., C, D., and E. I 
 think I can say that the majority of their drawings and paintings have 
 been real art expressions. F., G., H., I., and J. have also produced some 
 pictures worthy of mention. 
 
 One interesting characteristic of the drawings produced this year has 
 been the type of subject chosen. With the exception of Violet, whose 
 paintings have been of an imaginative order, all the drawings and paint- 
 ings have been the outcome of observations and feelings with respect to 
 the real world surrounding the child. . . . Certain of the children have 
 developed a decided style, in particular . . . (seven children including 
 Violet). 
 
 Whether or no it be argued that our method of recording can be 
 used in the standard, the usual public school, it can be shown that even 
 a large class may be given opportunities to study socially, to work out 
 their problems together. It can be shown that, while giving her class 
 these opportunities and while observing the individual responses within 
 the group activity, a teacher will understand her individuals more thor- 
 oughly and may thereby record achievement and behavior with more 
 accuracy and justice, even though she may be obliged to report each 
 child's performance in formal terms. A visiting-teacher, who had been 
 trying to persuade the teachers of a public school to adjust the school 
 procedure more nearly to the needs of several girls in an eighth grade, 
 offered one day to take the class in geography, in order to show the class 
 teacher how these girls would act when thrown upon their own initiative, 
 
 [35]
 
 with opportunity to discuss and compare notes with other girls, and with 
 opportunity also to use the knowledge of the subject which they had 
 acquired outside of school. 
 
 The teacher had complained of the lack of interest in their study of 
 Central Europe. All these girls were of Central European descent, and 
 the war had recently begun. The teacher of geography knew of their 
 descent, but she did not take it into account. The visiting-teacher took 
 it into account, and when she assumed charge of the class (as a demon- 
 stration to the teacher) she talked this fact over with the girls and sug- 
 gested that many would have a good deal of information from home to 
 contribute. She then divided the girls into groups as they sat, from four 
 to six in a group, and gave them a common problem to work out. Each 
 group was directed to discuss, confer and pool their information, whether 
 gained from the text-book or from home. 
 
 There was no confusion in the classroom ; the geography teacher 
 moved about and watched individuals who had given her trouble with 
 especial interest. She had time to do this because she was not conducting 
 a recitation; she was not engaged as usual in discipling idly listening 
 girls while only one was reciting. Very few out of the forty-five girls 
 were idle, and these few disturbed nobody because the others were too 
 busy. When the groups were called upon to report, the formerly trouble- 
 some girls showed up remarkably well. "I thought of them as so trou- 
 blesome that I never found out what they really knew," said their 
 teacher. 
 
 This teacher realized that she had learned more about her girls when 
 she had given them an opportunity to work together. She herself had 
 had a new experience in observing. She had seen what an entirely prac- 
 ticable change in the classroom environment would do, to produce in 
 certain girls a greatly accelerated process of learning what she wished 
 them to learn. She would probably have no time to make concrete 
 records of such lessons, but if she could keep up this method of observing 
 the girls while they were working in groups she would have a much more 
 accurate basis for estimating which of the required A, B, C, or D marks 
 for scholarship she should enter in their monthly reports. And she would 
 also have a more accurate basis for answering that common and very 
 puzzling question, "Should Anna's greater willingness to do her work 
 make her conduct mark higher this month, or should it add to the schol- 
 arship mark?" 
 
 [361
 
 TECHNIQUE OF RECORDING 
 
 Our method of recording calls for a new habit of observing children. 
 New methods of teaching will follow these new ways of considering 
 children ; but this report is a record of an experiment in recording and 
 must not discuss methods of teaching, except in relation to the observa- 
 tion and recording of children's activities. The last illustration in the 
 preceding section showed a class studying with more than their usual 
 interest. This energy did not arise merely because the girls were set 
 "free" of their habitual classroom restraint of passive listening. Their 
 interest and energy were aroused by the stimulus of sharing in a group 
 activity. A teacher who gives her children opportunities to be "free" in 
 their reactions to the environment, has far more to do and far more to 
 observe than the teacher who carries out a predetermined recitation. She 
 must be ready to act at any moment, to divert, to direct, to suggest, in 
 order that the environment shall function adequately; she must be ready 
 to change or to add to the environment when need is shown. 
 
 A teacher who wishes to record by our method must develop the 
 habit of observing children working together. She must learn to recog- 
 nize what sort of contribution each child makes to the group and how 
 he makes it. She cannot record everything, nor can she always tell what 
 is of most significance, but she can make tentative notes for her own use, 
 leaving the sifting of evidence to a summary later. A teacher will find 
 that the making of summaries will help to point up her observing. One 
 teacher wrote, "A new feature in block building this week has been the 
 fine cooperation displayed. * * * Marion was the only child to 
 build alone." This teacher had been observing group activities; Marion 
 had not changed with the group, and the teacher's note emphasized this 
 fact in her weekly summary. There it will stand as a point needing 
 attention, further observation and perhaps action. 
 
 The director of the City and Country School visited a class of five- 
 year-olds and handed the teacher the following notes about their yard- 
 play with the big blocks: 
 
 The best contributions during their construction (of a "fire engine") 
 were from O., A., B. and Tim. Tim had most information but he could 
 not get it over to the others . . . seemed more interested in what he 
 knew than in ways of carrying it out. . . . 
 
 These notes are valuable to a teacher only as points of departure. 
 If she includes them in her summary (at the end of the week or other 
 length of time) she does so in order to follow up with further observing 
 and action until she has progress or the lack of it to record. 
 
 [37 1 
 
 4 87 f > 3
 
 Skill in our method of recording depends upon how well a teacher 
 follows our standards of observing children's activities. She must observe 
 the children's progress in ability to use their environment; she must ob- 
 serve this environment to see whether each child uses it, whether it 
 actually functions in experience for him. She observes the children's 
 growth, and their school experiences, in order to criticize the school en- 
 vironment, to test the curriculum. She records these observations so 
 that she may have concrete evidence of each child's processes of growth 
 in order that her criticisms may have a reliable basis for making changes 
 in the environment to fit the children as they grow and change. 
 
 Many teachers have to teach themselves to give up the habit of 
 criticizing the children and asking them to change, before they can de- 
 velop the habit of criticizing and changing the environment. A teacher 
 made long detailed notes of a little girl's dominating personality and her 
 influence in the group. She affected the environment, but the notes did 
 not indicate that the environment, including the teacher, had made much 
 change in her. Was this due to the teacher's method of observing or 
 was her recording at fault? The next teacher's record was clear. It 
 showed that changes in the environment were followed by changes in the 
 child. This record noted that specific action by the teacher diverted and 
 controlled Nancy through the daily group activities. The child was 
 much less frequently mentioned in the notes of the group, and though 
 still a problem, the notes clearly indicated her wider efficiency, her nar- 
 rowed and more natural dominance, and how this had been accomplished. 
 This was a record which will be of great value to her next teacher. It 
 was also reported that the child recognized her need of discipline and 
 enjoyed her own greater productiveness under it. 
 
 March 7. Shop. . . . Nancy was sent out for misbehavior on Tues- 
 day and has not been allowed to go back to shop since, but has worked 
 at the classroom bench. For one whole hour she stuck to the self-chosen 
 task of cutting out a round table top with a circular saw and finished 
 the table next day to her great satisfaction. "If I had been in the shop 
 I wouldn't have got it done so quick. I would have been thowing shav- 
 ings instead of working." Nevertheless she is eager to go back and is 
 trying to prove to me that she can be trusted. . . . 
 
 Reports of this kind need take no more time when teachers become 
 skillful than the ordinary percentages do in the hands of conscientious 
 teachers who vainly struggle to calculate justly. Our recording takes 
 less time than the elaborate character studies which some schools are 
 substituting for percentages. "Percents" do not indicate what should be 
 done and personal character studies omit much of the environmental 
 
 (38 1
 
 situations or are too elaborate for practical use. Records which are not 
 used are a serious waste of a teacher's energy. 
 
 Teachers who expect to share in making changes in the school en- 
 vironment will have to keep systematic concrete notes if their share is to 
 be effective, if it is to carry weight and avoid the confusion of confer- 
 ences where discussion is based upon uncoordinated, vaguely remembered 
 or inaccurate facts. Beginnings of new activities must be clearly stated, 
 enough notes kept to show continuity and progress, and these must be 
 looked over and organized into summaries upon which the teacher will 
 base her judgments and make her recommendations. We cannot declare 
 that a teacher who takes poor notes or no notes is a poor teacher; but 
 we do say that a teacher who is aware of what she is doing and of the 
 significance of what the children are doing, makes a good recorder of 
 material which will be useful to herself, to her school and to other 
 schools ; and we also say that a good recorder makes a better teacher than 
 if she took no notes. 
 
 A teacher does not need to note all the detailed variations of each 
 child's progress each day. This is not only an impossible task but it 
 obscures the teacher's vision ; she is not seeing the tree, she is only count- 
 ing the leaves. She would better take no notes at all, but take time to 
 watch for significant relationships, for processes of learning. When a 
 teacher gets into the habit of watching how the children gain from day 
 to day, what brings about this progress, not the quantity they memo- 
 rize but the way of their growth, she will not be willing to work with- 
 out taking notes, because she will know that only so will she catch what 
 takes place, will she see how irregularly continuous the process of growth 
 is, and with the help of her notes be able to make use of what she sees 
 to control the children's environment. 
 
 Teachers should have some experience in recording children's activi- 
 ties before they are given the entire responsibility of a class of children. 
 Experience in recording is experience in seeing; it is experience in recog- 
 nizing originality and initiative ; in distinguishing between what is 
 directly suggested by the teacher and what spontaneous responses and 
 inquiries the environment has called forth. Whether a student expects 
 to teach in a formal or an informal school, systematic note-taking of a 
 practical kind (which she or a teacher expects to use) is training which 
 she is unlikely to acquire in any other way, it is laboratory work in 
 pedagogy. 
 
 Skill, and consequently practice, is called for in the making of rec- 
 ords which undertake to give the school, and the next teacher of a class, 
 a clear idea of what and how the children have been learning. Notes 
 
 [39]
 
 must be brief and to the point or they will be too much of a burden to 
 the writer and not useful to the reader. Until teachers acquire skill in 
 recording, they need supervision and following up to see that each teacher 
 pulls her notes together, that each record of the year's work shows con- 
 tinuity within itself and also shows relationship and progress from the 
 year before. The organization of notes adopted by a school must be 
 determined, as has been said before, by the organization of that school's 
 procedure, and by what use the school expects to make of its record. 
 An outline proposed for one school might quite fail to be useful to 
 another school. 
 
 There are however two essentials without which no school report is 
 worth making. First, a teacher who makes an observation which she 
 believes is important enough to enter in her record must follow up this 
 statement by further observations and notes. An isolated observation is 
 of no account until it is continued by further observations. It may be 
 crossed out of her rough notes and left out of her permanent summary 
 entirely, but if put in it must be followed up. Second, a teacher must 
 be able to distinguish between what is, and what is not, evidence in regard 
 to her conclusions concerning her children, and the environment she pro- 
 vides for them. Opinions are not evidence, nor are phrases characteriz- 
 ing the children, unless they are supported by concrete illustrations. 
 These illustrations, in order to be good evidence, must illustrate the point 
 at issue. This has the sound of truism, but teachers and parents, in fact 
 everybody concerned with children, have a traditional habit of judging 
 children not by the concrete evidence but by what they think children 
 ought to do and be. 
 
 Fol low-Up 
 
 Following up is a habit it is necessary for a teacher to learn if her 
 notes are kept for practical use. Following up a subject that has been 
 mentioned, or a statement that has been made tentatively, requires a re- 
 reading of old notes. But no teacher can afford for the sake of her teach- 
 ing to do anything else. She cannot trust to her memory, and she is 
 teaching thoughtlessly if she lets each day's procedure depend upon what 
 conies up or upon what she remembers of the past. If she wishes to 
 share in making changes, if she wishes to be responsible for her own pro- 
 cedure, she must take some sort of continuous notes. Two teachers using 
 the same yard and equipment made a full report of the children's use of 
 some new heavy blocks. A third teacher did not mention these blocks 
 at all in her notes, yet it was of just as much importance to the school 
 to know how her children used this new material as to know how the 
 other classes did. 
 
 (401
 
 When a teacher takes notes of what she wishes to remember and 
 use, she is likely to give information which another teacher will find 
 useful. When note-taking is perfunctory, it is of no use to others. A 
 teacher wrote, "The children evolved a self-directing system * * * 
 for going downstairs at lunch time." She did not mention what this 
 system was, nor how the children carried it out; she did not mention it 
 again at all. Why did she note it in the first place? If it was worth 
 mentioning at all it was worth explanation ; if it did not function, this 
 was worth mentioning. On the other hand, specific questions concerning 
 an absence of functioning, even if the teacher never discovers a satisfac- 
 tory answer, are of great value. "My children use the sandbox so little. 
 Is it worth while to have it at all?" was a question of practical value to 
 the school and to the next teacher. 
 
 A teacher's failures, and the children's, are often more illuminating 
 than successes and call for as full reporting. They are even more im- 
 portant to follow up with statements of outcome and of changes which 
 brought success. But it is neither success nor failure which are of them- 
 selves important, they are parts of the process of learning, incidents. 
 It is the flow of progress, with its ups and downs, its variations, which 
 tell the story. 
 
 Week of May 2. Four-year-old group. Block building. Marion was 
 the only child to build alone, but when Henry began a track on Thurs- 
 day, he said, "I want somebody to build with me," and Marion, putting 
 away her own blocks, joined him. . . . 
 
 This summary would have been worth nothing by itself. Preceding 
 notes indicated a different social activity, and the weeks that followed 
 showed variations. This teacher reported progress in building together, 
 week by week, and how she herself helped. 
 
 Week of May 9. Interest in building together strong this week. 
 Henry and Marion began a track on Monday, and were soon joined by 
 Thomas. . . . The two boys were better able to cooperate than Marion. 
 ... I did not want her to be discouraged, so I suggested that . . . 
 
 It is during the re-reading of her rough notes to make a summary, 
 such as the above, that a teacher organizes, readjusts her previous evalua- 
 tions and makes plans anew. It is this summarizing which is of educa- 
 tional value to her, which helps to make clear to her how the environment 
 has functioned, and what experiences she should encourage. 
 
 Evidence 
 
 The mental notes which a teacher makes will be endless in quantity ; 
 her written notes may be few or many according to need and skill. These 
 
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 notes will be valuable just in so far as she has taught herself to discrimi- 
 nate between an opinion she wishes to hold and the actual evidence. She 
 takes notes because she wishes to use them ; she wishes to have something 
 other than remembered facts as a basis for making her more important 
 changes in curriculum or in her procedure. Her decisions to make 
 changes or to take specific action must be based upon an accumulated 
 body of occurrences of the same kind. She makes decisions because, "B. 
 has acted thus every time so and so has occurred," or, "It is only when 
 I arrange such and such a situation that the children respond as I want 
 them to." The writer of these notes may be mistaken in what she wishes 
 to bring about, but at any rate she will be learning to know what she is 
 doing, because she is collecting real evidence concerning the effect of the 
 environment. "The children ought to . . .," or "Anne should feel 
 sorry but . . ." are not evidence. "R. seems listless part of the 
 time and at others is inclined to be mischievous. He still has a bad cold 
 and this may be partly the cause." As rough notes to be followed up 
 by more specific evidence these may be good enough. But "seems" and 
 "may be" are terms a teacher should avoid. Listlessness is a visible 
 manifestation, and she could use "is listless" with accuracy. The second 
 sentence would be much stronger if asked as a question, "Is his bad cold 
 the cause?" and would imply an intention of following up. "Evidently" 
 is another word that is worthless unless the teacher is in possession of the 
 facts. The following is good evidence because it was a summary of many 
 observed incidents of the same kind : 
 
 January 14 was cold and windy. This kind of weather evidently 
 affects the type of yard play; either it is of the monkey-shine type, tossing 
 each other's hats and chasing each other, or else the activity slows down 
 and complaints of being cold are made, and I have to enter in with sug- 
 gestions, a thing I have not had to do for many weeks. 
 
 Another teacher's notes upon two children are in strong contrast 
 with each other as evidence. Her first note is valueless because it gives 
 no evidence for her conjectures. The second is a statement of the facts 
 in the case, and no inference is drawn unless one is implied by the last 
 sentence. 
 
 Albert was willing to try this today, although the other day he re- 
 fused to; but either his circulation is not so easily started, or else his 
 spirits are too easily depressed. 
 
 The children were very quiet and interest was sustained in their 
 own plans for activity without suggestions from me up to 11:45, with the 
 possible exception of Max, who was inclined to be pugnacious and fretful. 
 Me has a cold. 
 
 [421
 
 A mother who was also a teacher, a specialist in a science, told 
 another teacher, "Baby sees a long distance. She really recognizes that 
 church on the hill. Whenever I ask 'Where is the church?' she points 
 to it." A few days later at the dinner table, the mother asked, "Baby, 
 where is . . .?" The mother mentioned this person and that and 
 the baby pointed until one was named whom she refused to point to. 
 "Ah, little baby, that is too far away, isn't it?" This mother had no 
 real evidence that the baby recognized or was pointing to the distant 
 church, nor had she any ground for making the contradictory statement 
 that the baby could not see far enough to recognize some one across the 
 table. Although an accredited specialist in a science, this teacher had 
 no sense of what constitutes evidence. Her statements about her pupils 
 in school were as inaccurate as about her baby at home, they were col- 
 ored by the requirements of the moment, they could never be relied upon 
 as evidence. 
 
 A teacher who was a keen observer of children's activities, made so 
 few notes of her own share in promoting these activities that her weekly 
 summaries were very incomplete as histories. After giving weeks of dis- 
 criminating assistance and encouragement to the one child of her three- 
 year-old group who was still afraid of the slide, she succeeded in over- 
 coming his fear, and he let himself go down. She had noted his reactions, 
 but her own way of meeting them, without which the child would have 
 done nothing, was not mentioned. Her note of his victory, in which 
 she played an active though unmentioned part, was: 
 
 On Friday John for the first time went down the slide alone. He 
 was beside himself with ecstacy, jumped around like a clown on the 
 pebbles, telling everyone to watch him, and he proudly repeated his per- 
 formance many times for his mother when she came for him at noon. 
 
 The December summary of a teacher of eight-year-old children, on 
 the contrary, stated her own purpose and efforts, but not what the chil- 
 dren got out of the environment which she set up. She set up standards, 
 but she did not tell whether they were effective; she did not follow up 
 her statement of purpose with any responses of the children. This is a 
 type of report which many superintendents feel obliged to be satisfied 
 with, yet it tells nothing at all. 
 
 The general work so far has been standardizing, that is giving the 
 children something to measure themselves by. In behavior the ideals 
 have been set of moving quietly . . ., leaving other children alone except 
 when help is possible and deserved. . . . 
 
 A teacher's record of school functioning must report the essential 
 related facts of functioning, the interaction of environment and chil- 
 
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 dren. Teachers who are content to follow a dictated course of study are 
 not the teachers who are in question here. This discussion of our experi- 
 ment in recording is meant for those teachers who wish to share in the 
 changes in curriculum which any progressive school finds necessary to 
 make from time to time. It is meant for teachers who are willing to 
 take the time to record those concrete facts which are necessary as evi- 
 dence of the changes that should be made, in order that their curriculum 
 shall continue to function adequately for their pupils' growth. When a 
 school manages its record-making with skill, when it uses an organization 
 of material appropriate to its purposes, when it gives its teachers time 
 to re-read and summarize, the records so made will be invaluable to the 
 school itself. They will be valuable to other schools also. 
 
 A year's record of a group of six-year-old children has recently been 
 published by the City and Country School.* This record was made by 
 the class teacher, Miss Leila Stott, to show "the school as it functioned 
 through the children." Many such records of actual experiences in many 
 schools may some day provide us with a body of reliable evidence con- 
 cerning the functioning of different kinds of school environment. At 
 present we are uninformed concerning school functioning; we are still 
 guessing when we sit down to plan a school curriculum. 
 
 Mary S. Marot. 
 
 SOUTHERN BRANCH, 
 
 UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA, 
 
 LIBRARY, 
 i-OS ANGELES, CALIF. 
 
 Op. cit. p. 5. 
 
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