The Daily Dispatch: November 24, 1860., [Electronic resource]

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A great reform commenced.

--We are pleased to find that the practice of making the scholars learn all their lessons during school hours has been adopted in a portion of our public schools, and it will, doubtless, be extended to them all. We hope that this step is but the beginning of a great reform, and that the whole practice of stuffing the mind with a mass of undigested matter will be abandoned. An eager desire to make a great show for the time or for the money expended is the most pernicious vice of our educational system; it leads to a hasty slurring over of lessons half understood and begets a habit of being satisfied with vague ideas, which is very apt to continue through life. The most rapid mode of teaching is that which requires every lesson to be thoroughly mastered and comprehended before it is passed by. A scholar with this habit of study will soon overtake another who is far in advance with crude and superficial notions of his studies. If parents or teachers are very anxious that a child should learn rapidly, let them insist that the lessons shall be few and short; no more than the child can learn both thoroughly and easily.--Scientific American.