responses; and the relation of kindergarten training to progress through the grades. These investigations have been a splendid beginning, but they are only a beginning. More studies should be made in these and other fields of childhood education. Investigations can be made more easily now since better records are being kept of actual work done by school children in all grades. Three studies of the effect of kindergarten training upon school progress have been made recently. One, by Coleen Smith, is reported in the Elementary School Journal, Volume XXV, No. 6, February, 1925. Another, an unpublished study by Joephine MacLatchy, was conducted for the Bureau of Educational Research of the Ohio State University. The third, by Willis L. Gard, is published in the Educational Research Bulletin, Volume III, No. 7, April 2, 1924.

A list of topics which need investigation and experimentation would include such things as revision of the supply lists; use of physical apparatus by young children; means for giving children opportunities for intellectual activity as well as physical activity; standards of achievement in physical and mental activity; suitable forms of keeping records of children's development and the best uses to be made of these records, and especially the objectives of kindergarten-primary education; the activities which will lead to these goals and the materials, habits, skills, and information that are necessary for obtaining them.

NEED FOR MORE KINDERGARTENS

There is great need for the establishment of many more kindergartens. Less than one-eighth of the children between 4 and 6 years of age in this country are in the kindergarten. Among the many reasons for establishing kindergartens, two outstanding ones are suggested as sufficiently justifying the extension of kindergartens so that there will be at least one in every elementary school in cities, towns, villages, and consolidated rural districts.

The first reason is that the kindergarten helps children in making adjustments when they go from the individualistic atmosphere of the home to the formal group life of the elementary schools. During the year or two in the kindergarten children are helped to acquire certain habits and attitudes toward school activities which must be mastered before great progress can be made in the grades. As many of these have been given a considerable amount of discussion in this report only a few will be mentioned again for the sake of emphasis. First, habits of fair play and creative thinking can not be built up too early in a child's life. Probably both of these can be more easily acquired through working and playing in a social situation than in any other way. Second, out of the work with materials and in the group experiences all children, native-born children as well as foreign

children, may build up a fund of oral symbols which have a common significance for the members of the group. This basis for understanding the English language must be established before children can profit by the education which comes primarily from the printed page.

The second fundamental reason for establishing kindergartens is that many children must leave school as soon as the compulsory age limit is passed. It is essential that they be given the opportunity for as much education as possible before then, and kindergarten attendance adds one or two years to their school life. Quotations have been given in this study which indicate that kindergarten education not only adds kindergarten experiences to a child's school life but probably also adds some months' work in a grade more advanced than he would probably have made if he had not gone to kindergarten. Late entrance into the school system is quoted as a handicap which many children are not able to overcome. So it is essential that school authorities and the general public be aroused to the necessity of providing the best possible facilities for giving children a kindergarten education and of enrolling in kindergartens every child in the community who can profit by this type of education.

AN EVALUATION OF THE KINDERGARTEN

Kindergarten practice of the country has received an extremely searching examination and appraisal, for it has been forced to square its principles and methods by criteria which have come into our present-day thought as a result of investigations in the field of physiological psychology and of child study and through the contributions made to the discussion by the Herbartians. These criteria have profoundly modified kindergarten theory and practice as set forth by Froebel and interpreted by his followers, but the Froebelian conception that education is a process of development rather than one of instruction; that play is the natural means of development during the first years; that creative activity must be the chief factor in his education; and that his present interests rather than future needs should determine the material and method of instruction, are all conceptions sanctioned by the conclusions reached in the fields of modern educational investigation and research. The fundamental things upon which the kindergarten activities are based are more generally indorsed than ever before, and it can confidently be said that the kindergarten is now so thoroughly established in public confidence and so strongly grounded in accepted theory that its place in our school system will never again be seriously endangered. (Columbia, S. C.)

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PRIVATE COMMERCIAL AND BUSINESS SCHOOLS, 1924-25

This report contains the statistics of 739 private commercial and business schools for 1924-25, and of 20 public commercial and business high schools for the same year.

There has been a considerable decrease since 1920, both in the number of private schools reporting and in the enrollment. For that year 903 institutions had an enrollment of 336,032. For 1925 the 739 schools had an enrollment of 188,363. While data for the two periods are not quite comparable, because of incomplete returns each time, the differences are no doubt representative of the whole group. The reduction in number of day pupils is about 40 per cent and in night pupils 51 per cent. In 1920 the enrollment in 258 schools was 100,682, and in 1925 the same schools enrolled 85,289, a decrease of 15 per cent. At least 275 schools reporting in 1920 have gone out of business since that time. About 375 new schools sent in a report in 1925.

With the decrease in total enrollments, the enrollments in bookkeeping, stenographic, combined bookkeeping and stenographic, accounting, wire telegraphic, and salesmanship courses have decreased also, the rates of decrease ranging from 32 per cent to 61 per cent. The greatest decrease is in the number taking wireless.telegraphy, 67 per cent. There is an increase of 3 per cent since 1920 in the number enrolled in secretarial courses.

The 20 public commercial and business high schools enrolled 35,120 pupils. In bookkeeping courses 12,535 were enrolled; 16,004 in stenographic courses; 10,771 in combined courses; 969 in accounting courses; 1,670 in secretarial courses; 1,015 in salesmanship courses; 284 in courses of business administration; and 1,726 in courses of instruction in the operation of computing and bookkeeping machines. Other public and private high schools offer commercial subjects, and still others have commercial departments. In 1924 a total of 3,742 public high schools had 430,975 enrolled in commercial courses, and 740 private high schools enrolled 11,941 in commercial courses. In 1916 the enrollment in commercial courses in 2,844 public high schools was 243,185, and in 1918 it was 278,275 in 2,953 such schools. The reduction in the number enrolled in private commercial and business schools can be accounted for partly by this increase in enrollment in commercial courses in high schools. Data concerning the 20 public commercial and business high schools are given in Tables 10 and 11 of this bulletin.

An attempt was made to find out what the private commercial and business schools were doing toward the training of teachers for commercial subjects. Of the schools reporting, 85 were offering