Part 12 (1/2)

Now let us see what changes have been evolved in the book collections in the department under consideration:

At first the proportion of books of the doubtful cla.s.s to those which were standard was considered, and it was seen that this preponderance of the doubtful cla.s.s should be decreased in order that a child's chances for eventually reading the best might be improved. It is obvious that the reading for the younger children should be the more carefully safeguarded, and this was the first point of attack. As a result, two types of books were eliminated:

1. All series for young children, such as Dotty Dimples and Little Colonels.

2. Books for young children dealing with animal life which have neither humane nor scientific value, such as Pierson and Wesselhoeft.

Also stories of child life for young children were restricted to those which were more natural and possible, and on the other hand, stories read by older girls in which adults were made the beneficiaries of a surprisingly wise child hero, such as the Plympton books, were eliminated.

The successful elimination of these books, together with the study of the children's reading as a whole, suggested later, that other books could be eliminated or restricted without loss of readers. In the course of time, the following results were accomplished:

1. The restriction of the stories of the successful poor boy to those within the range of possibility, as are the Otis books, largely.

2. The elimination of stories in which the child character is not within a normal sphere; for instance, the child novel, such as Mrs. Jamison's stories.

3. Lessening the number of t.i.tles by authors who are undeservedly popular, such as restricting the use of Tomlinson to one series only.

4. The restriction of any old and recognized series to its original number of t.i.tles, such as the Pepper series. The disapproval of all new books obviously the first in a series.

5. The elimination of travel, trivial in treatment and in series form, such as the Little Cousins.

6. The elimination of the modern fairy tale, except as it has vitality and individual charm, as have those of George McDonald.

7. The elimination of interpreted folk lore, such as many of the modern kindergarten versions.

8. The elimination of word books for little children, and the basing of their reading upon their inherent love for folk lore and verse.

Without a.n.a.lyzing the weakness of all these types, I wish to say a word about the series. This must be judged not only by content, but by the fact that in the use of such a form of literature the tendency of the child toward independence of book judgment and book selection is lessened and the way paved for a weak form of adult literature.

The later policies developed regarding book selection have been these:

1. Recognizing ”blind alleys” in children's fiction, such as the boarding school story and the covert love story, and buying no new t.i.tles of those types.

2. Lessening the number of t.i.tles of miscellaneous collections of folk-lore in which there are objectionable individual tales, for instance, buying only the Blue, Green and Yellow fairy books.

3. The elimination, or use in small numbers, of a type of history and biography which is not scholarly, or even serious in treatment, such as the Pratt histories.

4. The elimination of such periodical literature for young children, as the Children's Magazine and Little Folks, since their reading can be varied more wholesomely without it.

Reports of reading sequences from each children's room have furnished the basis for further study of children's reading.

These are discussed and compared by the workers, a working outline of reading sequences made and reported back to each room, to be used, amplified and reported on again.

While those books which are no longer used may have been at one time necessary to hold a child from reading something poorer, we did not lose children through raising the standard, and the duplication of doubtful books in the children's room is less heavy now than it was a few years ago. This is shown by the fact that there are more than twice as many children who are reading, and almost three times as many books being read as there were nine years ago, while the number of children of the city has increased but 72 per cent. Furthermore, the proportion of children of environmental limitations has by no means diminished, and the foreign population is much the same--more than 74 per cent.

Of course, the elimination of some books was accomplished because there were better books on the subject, but the general result was largely brought about because in the establishment of these higher standards we did not exceed the ideals and standards of those who were working with the children. The standards which they brought to the work, and which they deduced themselves from their experience, were crystalized through Round Table discussion, where each worker measured her results by those of the others and thereby recognized the need of constant, but careful experimentation.