isa-normaladvance-1903-00081-Feb

Description:	The Normal Advance,Vol. VIII.TERRE HAUTE, IND., FEBRUARY, 1903.No. 5TKe Rural Training School of TheIndiana tState Normal School[From Report of Frank L. Jones, State Superintendent, on Rural Schools ]From the organization ofthe Indiana StateNormal School there has existed as one of its departments a school for observation and practice.This school is located in the Normal school buildings and constitutes the eleventh district of theTerre Haute city schools. It contains the gradesfrom the kindergarten to the high school, and hasthe organization of the regular grades in the otherdistricts of the city schools.This training school has during all these yearsafforded the students of the State Normal Schoolample opportunity to observe the work in thedifferent grades of a city school system. It hasalso given opportunity for the planning and presentation of lessons in such schools. The observation and practice are of such a nature as to makethe students acquainted with the course of study,programme, mode of discipline, processes in teaching, reports to principals and superintendents,supplementary reading work, examinations, etc.,incident to a city school system. The results obtained from the observation and practice work inthese grades of the city schools have always beenheld to be among the valuable results arising froma course in the State Normal School.Quite a number of graduates have obtained positions in the country schools after graduation, andmany of the undergraduates have taught for aconsiderable period in the country schools aftertaking a portion of the course in the Indiana StateNormal School. In addition to this, almost all ofboth classes have received much of their educationin the rlural schools. They have, therefore, becomeaccustomed to the meager equipments, to the frequent changes of teachers, to the inexpensive papering and painting by unskillful workmen, to thegeneral lack of repairs, and to the neglect as tocoal houses, outbuildings, etc., which are only toocommon in the rural schools of the state. In consequence, it has long been felt that the State Normal School would more adequately fulfill its service to the state by establishing a rural trainingschool, in order to give to the students of theschool an opportunity to observe and to practicesystematically in such schools, and thereby to become acquainted with the peculiar difficulties, aswell as the peculiar advantages, belonging to sucha school, and to make, in addition, a study of therural school problem as a whole.As a result of these considerations, arrangements for such a school were completed duringthe summer of this year (1902), and at the beginning of the school year, in September, a ruraltraining school was organized and is now in successful operation. The school selected is not avillage or town school, but essentially a typicalcountry school, presenting the usual peculiaritiesand difficulties of saich a school. It is school No.6, at Chamberlains Crossing, in Lost Creek township. It is situated six miles east of Terre Haute,on the interurban line between Terre Haute andBrazil. The agreement was entered into betweenthe Board of the Indiana State Normal School, asthe party of the first part, and Joseph Riley, trustee of Lost Creek township, as the party of the second part. It provides that School No. 6, situatedas above noted, shall be used by the students ofthe Indiana State Normal School as an observa-
Source:	http://indstate.contentdm.oclc.org/cdm/ref/collection/isuarchive/id/33838
Collection:	Indiana State University Archives

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