A survey of the educational system of the Philippine islands by the Board of educational survey, created under acts 3162 and 3196 of the Philippine Legislature.

ELEMENTARY EDUCATION

227

elementary and high schools. And yet, the agricultural and industrial
development of the Islands depends largely upon the applications of
science in practical life. The tests also showed little knowledge of
historical backgrounds, yet the people are attempting to develop a form
of social and political life at home and trade and cultural relationships
with other countries requiring a knowledge of historic backgrounds.
In arithmetic processes, the children showed very satisfactory results
in the tests although they give slightly less time to the subject than do
the American schools. The content of the arithmetic might well be so
reduced as to require still less time and meet all real needs. Writing
receives more total time than in America and yet the children here could
probably do wholly satisfactory work in less time. They can and do
achieve standards of satisfactory quality long before they are permitted
to discontinue useless drills in writing. To music the schools here give
one-fourth more time than do the schools of America. Probably satisfactory results could be secured in considerably less time. Standards
of technique in music here may be disproportionately high.
There is certainly a possibility of distributing the time to several of
the school subjects in amounts more nearly corresponding to needs and
conditions.
3. Some material in the curriculum is foreign to the experiences of
the children and of a kind which requires a background of experience
which they do not have. Too much material is borrowed from other
school systems without adequate adaptation. The materials in reading,
arithmetic, sanitation, and some phases of food and cookery study especially illustrate this need of adaptation.
4. There is an emphasis upon uniformity that has made the adaptation
of the work of individual schools to the conditions and needs of their
communities very difficult. It is true that general statements in courses
of study are made about "giving latitude to teachers to use individual
judgment and initiative," and that the course is not to be "a task master
but a helpful guide." Without doubt, this is the general spirit with
which the courses of study were made. Nevertheless, instances of attempts to make adaptations, thoroughly sound as we believe, have been
reported as being disapproved by the Bureau of Education, or by supervising teachers, and apparently without any cause other than that they
were not specifically set down in the particular course of study. It was
our observation that many teachers were slavishly literal and detailed
in their teaching of the course of study. A point which was found very
difficult to understand is the fact that, in discussing the work after observing it, so many teachers admitted that they knew the work was not
well adapted but closed the discussion by saying that it was taught as it
is in the course and that they were held responsible for it in that way.