The kindergarten and the school, now two distinct,
dissimilar, and sometimes, though of late very seldom, antagonistic
institutions,--how will the one affect, or be affected by the other?
As to the final adoption of the kindergarten there is a preliminary
question which goes straight to the root of the whole matter. At
present the state accepts the responsibility of educating children
after an arbitrarily fixed age has been reached. Ought it not, rather,
if it assumes the responsibility at all, to begin to educate the child
when he _needs education?_
Thoughtful people are now awaking to the fact that this regulation is
an artificial, not a natural one, and that we have been wasting two
precious years which might not only be put to valuable uses, but would
so shape and influence after-teaching that every succeeding step
would be taken with greater ease and profit. We have been discreet in
omitting the beginning, so long as we did not feel sure how to begin.
But we know now that Froebel's method of dealing with four or five
year old babies, when used by a discreet and intelligent person,
justifies us in taking this delicate, debatable ground.
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