Constructive Morals and School Life
- Author:
Herbert F. Clark,
Principal Olive Special School, Los Angeles, Cal. There is a great deal of talk nowadays about teaching morals in the public schools and of connecting in some vital way the work of the school with real life. There is a strong feeling that the school is an isolated factor in the real development of child life. The following incident is an illustration of how recreation, school work, morality and an element of business life all combined to produce a wholesome development in a group of wayward boys.
The group consisted of eighteen boys from the Olive Special School of the City of Los Angeles. The recreation was a two days “hike” to the top of Mount Wilson. The basis for moral teaching was the wayward conduct of three of the boys on that trip. The connection with school work consisted in those days being regular school days, with language lessons based upon the experiences of the trip, together with the geographical knowledge learned and the inspection of the Carnegie Observatory at the top of the mountain. The business element consisted in providing a fund to defray some expense that arose out of the trip, and the purchase of a money order to send away the amount.
Mount Wilson stands about twenty-five miles northeast of Los Angeles. It is necessary to take the interurban car to Sierra Madre at the foot of the mountain and then go by trail a distance of about nine miles to the top.
On the second day of January the boys mentioned above and I decided to make the trip to the top of the mountain and return the following day. These were regular school days, but some of us who are dealing with the cruder material of humanity believe that any activity in which boys may engage that is wholesome in character, and carried on under proper conditions, is as truly educative as the program of the schoolroom. In other words a school is made up of a group of children happily engaged in some wholesome activity directed by a teacher who loses herself, or himself in the spontaneous expression of the pupils. It is no crime in the Special Schools of Los Angeles for a teacher to take his group of boisterous boys and ‘’hike” away to the hills, or to the beach, or even turn out and have a good old fashioned game of ball right in school hours.
But to the trip,?we took the car to Sierra Madre and with our bundles of blankets and “grub” began our long climb. The ascent was highly interesting with the camping-out lunches and the night under the stars about half-way up. An early start enabled us to reach the top about eight o’clock in the morning. It was interesting to note that the boys most addicted to cigarette smoking became most fatigued on the trip. Now it happened that several of the older boys threw aside their luggage and hastened on ahead of some of the smaller and more heavily laden. I, of course, remained in the rear to see that none fell by the wayside. These older boys reached what is called the three-quarter house and exercising some of their criminal tendencies opened a door, entered the house and stole two revolvers and a piece of ham. Before I reached there I was met by one of the proprietors of the place who told me that somebody had broken into their house and taken those things, and that they were holding our boys for investigation. We had met a man early in the morning who had left the hotel at the top without breakfast and hence there was the possibility that he might have committed the burglary. The man from the three-quarter house admitted this, so we were rather chary about accusing our boys. When I and the “rear guard” reached the three-quarter house there was the rest of the group awaiting our arrival. They were somewhat uneasy but denied any knowledge of the burglary. Before long however two boys came to me and told me who the culprits were, and sure enough we found the missing articles where they had been “ditched” on the mountain side. One of the proprietors of the place gave me two dollars and a half to give the boys who had confided me the secret. I protested, but he was insistent and I accepted the money and later gave it to the boys. He was a deputy sheriff and could have arrested the boys and taken them into custody, but he was willing to leave the final disposition of the case to me. I told him I would take charge of it and bring the case up for consideration at school on the following Monday morning. We finished our trip, had a good time during the day and returned to the city that evening.
On the intervening Saturday I took the matter up with the head of our special school department. Aside from suggesting that he thought it best to settle such things outside of court, when possible, he left the matter entirely in my hands. On Monday morning when I arrived at school the guilty boys met me with penitent spirit and tear bedimmed eyes and begged for a chance to recompense the man on the hill for his expense and trouble. They said they would refund the money he paid out, and would pay him for any trouble he had been put to, and promised that they would be good in the future. I took the matter up with the rest of the class and we decided to grant the boys their request provided the penalty of “swats” should be added. This meant that the guilty boys must lean over a desk and allow each of the other boys to give them a hard “swat” with a long paddle. The “swats” were administered immediately to seal the bargain and the boys set about getting the money. This took two or three days. When that was done I put on the board the following letter, and for a language lesson required all the boys to write it with the understanding that the one best written should be signed by each one of us and sent with the money to Mount Wilson.
Los Angeles, Cal., Jan. 0, 1913 Me. Geo. D. Kampiiefnek, Mount Wilson, Cal. Dear Sir: We are enclosing the sum of $2.50 to reimburse you, in a measure, for the financial loss you suffered by virtue of the wayward conduct of some of our boys. We regret very much the trouble and expense to which you were subjected and deplore exceedingly the disgrace such conduct brought upon our school, and each of us individually.
We thank you for your patience and leniency in this matter, and shall hope to enjoy the trip again without such a needless embarrassment. Sincerely yours, (Signed) The Boys. When the best letter was selected and signed by all the boys, we sent the guilty parties to the post office for a money order. This they obtained and returned to the school. The letter and order were then enclosed and the guilty boys sent to the post office with the letter.
The elements of educational interest to me in the experience were these: two of the boys showed their loyalty to the right ideals of citizenship when they came to me and exposed the guilty parties. It took considerable strength of character to break through the gang rules and subject themselves to the cry of “snitch!” One of these is an orphan boy who has sold papers on the streets of Los Angeles since he was big enough to carry them. He has grown up in the environment of the city streets and does not smoke cigarettes. He is an ambitious lad and says he is determined to get a college eduCONSTRUCTIVE MORALS. 255 cation. He is the type of boy which the special schools of this city are saving to lives of usefulness and good citizenship. He has caught the idea already that the best citizen is he who is not afraid to expose wrong doing.
Again, the whole group saw before we were through with the case that whatever one or more of them did affected the reputation and welfare of the whole group. The whole school was disgraced. Their chances for another similar “hike” were jeopardized. Most of them were exposed as being willing to condone wrong doing, even if they did not actually participate in it. That lesson was brought forcibly home to them in the writing and discussing of that letter. The matter of settling the affair among themselves, administering their own punishment, getting together the money needed and closing the case up without throwing it into court, had a great moral weight.
There was also the educational side to the case,?for once at least the boys wrote a letter embodying good English and strong moral worth. The difficult words were discussed and their bearing on this case emphasized. Margins, proper spelling, punctuation and good writing were essential. A wholesome motive underlay the whole process.
The connection with real life lay in the fact that although the whole affair took place outside the schoolroom, and so far as the crime was concerned it came within the jurisdiction of the courts, yet it was all brought home to the school for adjudication. The adjustment involved several days, giving the boys opportunity to earn the money, and time to let the moral lesson of it all “soak in”. In fact it involved quite an element of cooperating in that some of the boys “chipped in” a nickel or a dime; in one case two boys helped another shovel sand for “two bits,” and when it came to a “show down” one of the boys had to borrow a dime to make up his share.
And finally, there is great educational value in the fact that a teacher can so lose himself in a group of children that the problem of discipline is taken from his shoulders and thrown upon the pupils themselves. It removes that nervous strain and burden of responsibility incident to punishing children. The offenses become offenses to the group and not to the teacher. The school becomes their school; its problems become their problems, and best of all they see in the school a type of the world at large where the individuals in the group become subject to the group as a whole, and where the conduct of each citizen bears a direct relation to the welfare of everv other citizen.
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