PATER'S CHATS WITH THE BOYS.

Otago Witness, Issue 2430, 10 October 1900, Page 67

PATER'S CHATS WITH THE BOYS.

CHILDREN'S PUBLIC LIBRARIES,

A. great thinker lias said that the greatest Su6cesses of social reform lie in the work for children. If the children of the present generation are taught aright, the result will be beneficial to the children of the future. It is held that nothing creates ideas sooner than books ; hence the necessity for a good supply of healthy uplif/cing .literature. But what systematic attempts are being made to provide children with good literature? One of our school committees gets yearly a supply of sixpennies for me upper standards, and has a good school library, from which the pupils get good reading on very easy terms ; trat, wishing to still further widen the reading range, it ap_plied to our Education Board for a pound lor pound grant towards the purchase of books. The board, however, liad no fund from which it could give a penny, so the application was declined. I -am not so sure that had there been a will, there couldn't have been found a way to do what was asked ; and I think that the board spends a good many pounds less productive- of good than if they were spent in getting standard literature at wholesale rates, and in supplying schools ■with cheap supplies.

In America, the children's library movement has been extending itself ior the past ten years, and with the best results. In Denver, Boston, Omaha, Seattle, San Francisco, Detroit, Buffalo, Pittsburg, and other centres, circulating libraries have been established in connection with the adult libraries, thought often in a room entirely apart from the part ot the building reserved for the seniors. Cannot something be done on similar lines here'/ Our four centres are no smaller than some of the American cities, in which the children's libraries circulate tens oi thousands of volumes a year. In these libraries the furniture, shelves, and books are in keeping with their object.' One has about I^,ooo volumes specially chosen, and is, of course, being added to. Then the librarians are specially selected for their work. Special displays are made and the children Lave their attention drawn to seasonable reading. Arbour Day is approaching, books on botany and Nature study and suitable pictures are placed in the open racks or on the walls ready to catch the eye. In some in&tances the work of a library pure and simple is being extended by the plentiful distribution of drawing cards, Hissected maps, and educational games. The Milwaukee Public Library has one of the finest children's' departments, and, here special means are taken to make the place an attractive one. To encourage familiarity with authors, their birthdays are celebrated by displaying their portraits and pictures illustrative of their works with the books themselves. At Christmastime there is an exhibition of copies of the famous j*ladonnas. During springtime pictures of birds, with books, stories, and poems about the birds are placed in conspicuous places ; and to complete the work, lecturettes are given on them. Every now and again educational exhibitions are held, one of the latest showing the various stages in making wood-cuts and process blocks for illustrating books and periodicals. A special board is kept to display special pictures on current topics. This library has three rooms, one for books, one for papers and periodicals suitable for juniors, and the third for tinier tots, with games and scrapbooks, and miniature chairs and tables to correspond. And mentioning chairs and tables, has it ever struck you what a purgatory little folk often have to live in? Imagine if you can being transported to a land where chairs reach to your middle, and tables are -on a level with your chins, or the tops of your heads. Many a time I have watched the strenuous and ineffectual efforts made by little ones to climb on to a chair or a sofa, and have noticed, too, how often they have to face a "don't do this' 1 or '"don't do that" ; and have tried to put myself in their place. Do we sufficiently consider what their surroundings should be? lam afraid not. But I am on the library question, not the disabilities of little folk apart from books and kindred educational aids. In the library I have specially referred to there are six regular attendants, and the daily issue of books has reached as high as over 1300, though the average is about 425. In some of the libraries, kindergarten teachers are employed, and with the best results. In some there are special arrangements to aid teachers. When special lessons are to be given, special lists are made up by the librarians, showing what books are suitable to the special lessons, and these books are lent to the teacher for his special tise, or for school reading, or are loaned to the ■scholars. Another modification answers its purpose most admirably. Either the library trustees or what corresponds to our educational boards make arrangements to supply schools with various periodicals suitable for school and home use, and a number of 'some particular book, sufficient for sight-reading purposes. Another system, known as the Home Library, has met with success ; £5 covers the cost of a neat bookcase — glass doors and lock — about a •score of bocks, and a year's 'subscription to three periodicals. Then, there is the travelling library. This is worked largely in connection with the schools. Books are issued in given numbers for a given price for a given time, and special attention is paid to the junior classes, where reading and drawing take up so much of the school time. In this Avay sciences books, biographies, novels, histories, books of travel, etc. are read, which otherwise would be read by only a limited number. In one library in 1897, 23,000 books were issued in the aggregate nearly 90,000 times. Can anything on these lines be done here? It isn't a question of population. Schools could be supplied by our education boards ; or some enterprising bookseller could inaugurate a system of lending and exdiang-

ing which, I am sure, would prove advantageous to both sides.

One, writing on these libraries, says that the way to learn to read is "to read," and that whereas it was formerly thought that the chief object of school life was to teach children "how to read,"' it is now at.ked of teachers that they should lead the children into the fields of choice, reading matter, and cultivate in them such a taste and appreciation for a considerable number of the best books ever written, that all their lives will be enriched by Avhat they have read. This is one of the grand but simple ideas of the schoolroom, and lends great dignity to every teacher's work in the common schools.

The most satisfactory reason can be given why this should be done in every schoolroom. These substantial materials of culture belong to eveiy child without exception. They are an indispensable birthright of every boy and girl.

And then is given a list of books which a child of 14 should have read. The list includes, of course, books! specially American ; fer us could be substituted many better known as English classics. How many of us had read the following, or their equivalents before that age? — "Robinson Crusoe," "Hiawatha,"' "Pilgrim's Progress/ "The Stories of Greek Heroes" by Kingaley' and Hawthorne, "The Lays of Ancient Rome," "Paul Reverc's Ride," "Gulliver's Travels," '"The Arabian Nights." "Sleepy Hollow,"' "Rip Van Winkle," ''The Tales of the White Hills," "The Courtship of Miles Siandi^h," Scott's "Tales of a Grandfather," "Marmion," ''The L&dy of the Lake." "The Story of Ulysses and the Trojan War,"' of Siegfried, William-Tell. Alfred, John Smith, Columbus, Washington, and Lincoln.

Such is the syllabus, in addition to ordinary reading and fugitive literature, which is thought to be within the range of a 14-year-old. Not too burdensome a course, yet one certainly not overtaken by the majority of children. iTet "those who have attained tbat age without the chance of reading and enjoying these books have been robbed of a great fundamental right ; a, right which can never be made good by any subsequent privileges or grants." We all ought to ponder what this writer has by way of a parting warning to say on reading. It is not a question of learning how to read — all who go to school learn that. It is the vastly superior question of appreciating and enjoying the best things which are worth reading. If any of you want to read a longer and an illustrated article on what I have been writing, look up the American Review of Reviews for July.