The Student, Volume 2, Issue 6, March 1890

              IWeBt-1^
Vol. II.
March,  1890.
No. 6.
The Student.
A Monthly Paper, Published by the Students of the Mankato
Normal School-
Managing Editor,
ASSOCIATE   EDITORS
Editorial Department,
Literary Department,   -
Local Department,   -
Exchange Department,
Business Department,   -
D.  R.  STOCKLEY.
Miss Julia Hyland.
Miss Anna Porter.
John K. McBroom.
Miss Hattie Noble.
Frank Dean.
_) Miss Grace Clark.
I Miss Maud Hays.
I Clayton Kennedy.
I Burt Weld
TERMS:—75 cents per year.   Single copy, 10 cents.
Advertising rates made known on application to the
Managing Editor.
(Entered at the Mankato Postoflice as Second-Class
Matter.)
^DlTORIJLIy.
The manifold duties of Normal students are beyond the comprehension of
the teachers and disinterested parties. This
is especially true in the case of self-boarders.
Arising at dawn there is the inevitable
search for clothing, which somehow has a
faculty for being mysteriously misplaced
every night. There are fires to build, breakfast to prepare, dishes to wash, room-work
to be done, and lessons to learn which were
unavoidably (?) left over from the day before.
In the meantime the clock persistently
measures off the time and indicates that the
school hour approaches.
With so many duties staring her in the
face do you wonder that the victim forgets
to make her toilet becomingly, rushes off to
refurbish cooking utensils which, for some
reason, are never in proper condition to use
when wanted, and having hastily swallowed
her half-cooked meal forgets that her lessons
are not properly prepared and consequently
fails to   do   herself  justice   in  recitations?
Only companions in misery   can   truly   appreciate such misfortunes.
At noon a similar process is repeated,
house-hold tasks are finished, and studies
begun.
Shortly a caller is announced and being
unable to avoid it he must be entertained
with a smiling countenance. Bowing his
leisurely presence out with a cordial invita
tion to call again, the well nigh distracted
pupil resumes her studies, only to be aroused
by the recollection that a letter must be
written and sent immediately, that she has
forgotten to attend criticisms, etc., etc.
Supper hour soon comes and a probable
social entertainment following necessitates
the postponement of lessons until the following morning.
We are glad to note that Massachussetts
is expending $300,000 upon two of her
normal schools at the present time to equip
them for training teachers for high school
work.
This is evidence that the good people of
that commonwealth have arrived at the
sensible conclusion that the degree of a
college or university is not enough to constitute its possessor a teacher of youth. They
have discovered that it is expensive to teach
the rudiments of the theory and practice of
imparting knowledge in their class-rooms
at full salary to the learner. They may, too,
have taken into account the wasted time of
pupils while under the experiments of the
novice at this art. There is not the shadow
of a doubt that the normal schools will give
to the higher grades of instruction the same
impetus that their work has given to the
lower  ones.    Nor   will   the   Massachusetts