Chapter III: Part 3

After many conversations a conclusion was reached that most of these evils might be removed, and others of them might be lessened, if the school were reorganized according to a good system, and then maintained as a thoroughly graded school. A committee was chosen to prepare a plan. Correspondence was held with graded schools, all printed information was carefully studied, a plan was prepared, printed, submitted to the Sunday School Board, discussed, modified, and finally adopted unanimously. The following are the principal features of the plan, for which we make no claim of originality, as each of its elements was already in successful operation in one or more graded Sunday schools:

1. That the school should be arranged in four general departments: The Senior, for all over sixteen years old; the Junior, from ten to sixteen years; the Intermediate, from eight to ten; and the Primary, for the children younger than eight years. These divisions are not arbitrary, but represent the average standard of age, to which exceptions might be made in special cases.

2. In each department the number of classes to be fixed and invariable, except that in the Junior Department there might be some necessary elasticity in the number of classes, owing to the varying number of scholars promoted into the department in different years.

3. Promotions to be made annually, and all at the same time, on the last Sunday of March. Except in special emergencies no changes in classes to be made during the year, either by teachers or scholars. If a teacher accepts a class on "Promotion Day" it is generally to be considered an engagement for the entire year, unless a necessity arise.

4. While in the same department a teacher and his class to be advanced together; that is, from the first year of the Intermediate Grade to the second, from the first year of the Junior Grade to the second, etc. But the promotion from one department to another to be attended with a change of teachers, in order to keep the same number of classes in each department, especially the Senior Department, from year to year.

5. While special supplemental lessons may be provided for each department, the promotions to be made upon general fitness, age, and intelligence, and not upon the result of an examination. No examination upon the plan of the public schools is practicable in the Sunday school, where all the classes are studying the same lesson. All attempt at making an examination the prerequisite of promotion is apt to become a pretense in the actual working of the scheme.

6. It was also decided that the entire school should be reorganized on a certain day, in accordance with the above plan. A careful committee of seven members, including the pastor and superintendent, made a canvass of the school, ascertained the age of each scholar under seventeen, conferred with the teachers, and then prepared a new list of teachers and scholars for all classes in the school, making many changes, both in the teaching staff and the assignment of scholars.

Sunday, March 30, 1890, was a memorable day, being our first "Promotion Sunday." We approached it with some anxiety, for on that day our committee held in its hands the fate of every teacher and every scholar. Old ties were to be broken, new relations were to be entered upon. Ten teachers were to be returned to the ranks as Senior scholars, and the complexion of every class was to be changed. No one could tell what heart-burnings would be engendered and what disappointments would come. The superintendent made a statement of the new plan, and proceeded to read the new roll, beginning with Class No. 1 of the Senior Department. As the names were called the members left their former classes and took their new places in the class room. Eight classes were assigned to the Senior Grade, each having a separate room. These classes were a young men's class, three young ladies' classes, a class of elderly ladies, a lecture class of ladies and gentlemen, a class of reserve teachers, and a normal class to be trained for teachers in the course of the Chautauqua Normal Union.

In the Junior Department sixteen classes were formed. Those of the lowest rank, the first year, took the front row of seats; the second year the second row, etc. Those of the fifth year Junior were in two classes, one for boys and another for girls, each having a room. The teachers of these two classes remain constant, and change their scholars every year; but during the first four years of the grade the teachers advance with their scholars, changing their seats every year, but retaining their classes.

The Intermediate Department consists of two large classes, each in a separate room. One class is of little children just promoted from the Primary Department; the other, of those who have been in the Intermediate Grade a year. The teacher remains with each class for two years, the term of this grade. We are inclined to favor a three-year term in this grade, with a class for each year, thus making the age at admission to the Senior Department seventeen instead of sixteen years.

Our Primary Department formerly consisted of nine or ten small classes under one Primary superintendent. In the reorganization we constituted it as one class, with a teacher and an assistant. This change released a number of teachers for service in the school, and was on the whole an improvement. Whether it would be desirable everywhere depends on circumstances. In many places it might be easier to find ten teachers, each of whom can teach ten scholars, than one who can teach one hundred.

When the roll of the school had been fully called every teacher and every scholar had been assigned, except one boy, who had joined the school that day, and was left standing in the middle of the room in a bewildered state of mind over the revolution which was going on around him. A view of the newly arranged classes from the platform showed the school looking more orderly than ever before, and gave it the appearance of having twice as many adult scholars as formerly.

One item must not be forgotten. The superintendent announced that each department would hold a "reception" adapted to the age of its members. The Senior reception was appointed for Monday evening of the next week, and was to include upon its program music, addresses, readings, cake, and cream. All the young people were eager to be counted in, and hence willing to leave their old classes for the new ones. A fortnight later the Junior Department held its reception, with a stereopticon entertainment and the refreshments. Even if a boy can obtain a superabundance of cake at home he will be drawn by the prospect of another slice to the Sunday school sociable. Each department held its own reception, all were happy, and the young ladies and gentlemen were not made to feel that they were simply on the fringe of an institution adapted mainly to little children.

The system thus inaugurated has been in operation two years. What have been its results?

There were at first some complaints by teachers, scholars, and parents. But only one teacher left the school; the classes settled down to work and soon became acquainted; a few changes, but only a very few, were made in the assignments of the scholars, as, for example, where a mistake had been made in the age of a pupil; and soon everybody was satisfied with the new arrangement. Among its manifest benefits we may note the following:

1. The Senior Department is maintained with large classes and growing numbers. There is a social feeling, an "esprit de corps," in a large class which is not found in a small one; hence the shrinkage is less. And whatever loss is met is more than supplied from the new blood infused each year on "Promotion Sunday."

2. The scholars in the Junior Department have an aim and a hope before them. They look forward to their promotion with earnest expectation, and are on this account the more loyal to the school.

3. Inasmuch as all changes are made at a given time they are prepared for. For three months the superintendent is planning for "Promotion Sunday." If a teacher can be better fitted with a class, a change is made at that time; and where many changes are made at once the friction of each is reduced to a minimum. Classes are made more nearly uniform in their constituency, and the school is kept up to an evenness of organization which greatly increases its efficiency.

4. There has been a marked increase in the membership of the school. Notwithstanding the organization of a mission school by the church, taking away several workers and some scholars, the school has an attendance from seventy-five to one hundred larger than that of two years ago.

After a trial of two years we are sure that the establishment of a graded system and a faithful adherence to its plans have greatly benefited our Sunday school.

A MODEL SUNDAY SCHOOL ROOM.

THE Sunday school is the door to the Church through which enters the great majority of its members. This fact alone would account for the increasing interest that the Church now manifests toward the school. As the institution which trains the young for the Church, and leads both young and old into the Church, the Sunday school is entitled to the Church's support and care.

The housing of the Sunday school is one of the most important subjects that can come before the Church as the guardian of the school. Too often the work of the school is impeded by unsuitable and inconvenient quarters. Just as the public school building now claims the attention of architects and sanitary engineers, the Sunday school hall is also attracting notice.

It is only twenty-two years since the first building thoroughly adapted for the uses of the Sunday school was erected at Akron, O. This building, the joint conception of the Hon. Lewis Miller, superintendent, and Mr. Jacob Snyder, architect, has furnished most of the ideas peculiar to Sunday school construction, and is therefore entitled to preeminence in the record. Others have improved upon the details of the Akron plan, but its fundamental principles have never been superseded, and can never be. Those principles are only two, and they seem almost incompatible with each other. They have been called "aloneness" and "togetherness;" that is, that each class in certain departments shall be isolated in a separate room, and yet that all the classes may be brought together into one room for general exercises without delay, without confusion, and without the change of seats by the classes.

VINCENT CHAPEL]

Among the dozen or more Sunday school buildings on the Akron plan one of the most convenient and most complete, yet not one of the most expensive, is that connected with the Methodist Episcopal Church in Plainfield, N. J. As this was for twenty years the church home of the Rev. Bishop John H. Vincent, the Sunday school bears the appropriate name of "Vincent Chapel." The plans were drawn by Mr. Oscar S. Teale, architect. Mr. Teale was at that time the efficient secretary of the school, and added to an architect's knowledge a worker's practical acquaintance with the needs of the Sunday school. The chapel, as may be seen by the diagrams, embraces a large room, with eighteen smaller class rooms around it, nine upon each floor. The partitions of the class rooms are so arranged as to offer no obstruction to the line of vision from any seat in the building to the superintendent's desk and the blackboard fastened to the wall back of it. Thus the superintendent can see and be seen by every pupil and teacher in the building. He can also be heard with perfect ease in every class room, as the acoustic properties of the building are excellent.

The main room is used by the Junior Department, in which the scholars are from eleven to sixteen years of age. The classes are seated according to grade, the "first year Juniors" on the front row of classes; the "second year Juniors" on the second row, etc., for four rows, the boys on the superintendent's right, the girls on his left. Each year, on "Promotion Sunday," the classes move one row farther from the desk, and the new classes formed from the Intermediate Department take the front row of seats.

The nine class rooms on the ground floor are used as follows: In the left-hand corner, just where the most of the scholars pass in entering and leaving, is the secretary's room. Next is the "fifth year Junior," into which all the girls enter after four years in the Junior Grade, leaving their former teachers for a new one. In this class they stay either one or two years, according to age and acquirements, and from it are promoted to the Senior Department. The third room is that of the "Ladies' Bible Class;" the fourth, the "Reserve Class." Next comes the church parlor, seating a hundred people, and used by a large Senior Class. The next room is for the "first year Intermediate," that is, those just advanced from the Primary Department; the seventh, the "second year Intermediate;" the eighth, a "young men's Senior Class;" the ninth, and last, the boys' section of the "fifth year Junior," the largest class of boys in the Junior Department.

On the ground floor are four entrances, one at each corner. As the chapel stands at the rear of the church it was necessary to have the principal entrance on each side of the room facing the school. This is a slight drawback, as a rear entrance would be preferable, in order not to distract attention to the late comers.

The partitions between the class rooms are windows of ground glass of amber color. They are movable, so that classes can be united whenever desirable. Those between class rooms and the main room are double doors of ground glass, so hung that they may be swung aside easily, and arranged when open not to interfere with the line of vision. All the rooms are well lighted and well ventilated; and the main room, when all the rooms are closed, has abundant light and air from a clear story above, with movable windows.

To the gallery and its classes there are three entrances. The one from without the building leads exclusively to the Primary Class, which, by having its own exit, can adjourn earlier than the rest of the school. The two other stairs are interior and lead to the gallery corridor, on which all the class rooms of the upper floor open. These are separated from each other and from the main room by sliding doors of amber glass, so that they may be united or isolated at will, and in a moment. The seats in these classes rise in tiers so that those in the rear as well as in the front can see the platform and the blackboard. There are nine class rooms, of which the central one is for the Primary Department, and all the others are for the Senior classes. All the Senior classes are large, and are kept full by promotion every year from the Junior Grade.

VINCENT CHAPEL]

The library room is at the main entrance, so that books may be delivered by the pupils while passing into the school, and might be given to them while passing out, though in fact they are brought by the librarian to the classes. On the opposite side of the building, in the rear of the entrance, is a kitchen, which is used at entertainments and social gatherings. For these two or three of the class rooms are thrown together as a refreshment room adjoining the kitchen.

One advantage of such a chapel is its expandable character. When all the rooms are closed there is seating capacity for two hundred and fifty chairs in the main room, which generally suffices for the prayer meeting, while room after room may be opened as the congregation increases. This form of building is equally adapted for the Sunday school, the prayer meeting, and the social gatherings of the Church.

THE END.

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Transcriber's Notes:

Obvious punctuation errors repaired.

Page 51, repeated word "The" removed from text (The scholars never seemed)