Moving Picture Age (Jan-Dec 1922)

12 MOVING PICTURE AGE April, 1922 the appointment. But there were plenty on hand to help clean off the automobile and set up the equipment, and their enjoyment of the program was unmistakably genuine. The shouts of the youngsters while "America at Play — A Visit to Coney Island" (Ford) and "Distant Cousins,'' a Famous Players comedy, were being shown, and the interest displayed by young and old in the three reels "How Life Begins," made the trouble of transportation seem trivial and well worth while. During the six months that followed before heavy snows made auto travel impractical, I put on forty-two entertainments at twenty different schools. The machine has been used at farmers' club meetings, community fairs, social gatherings, and for classroom showings. I have to record one failure out of the forty-two, due to dampness having caused certain fiber pulleys of the projector to swell and bind, combined with a little oil getting into the friction takeup mechanism. Part of the time pictures have been shown free. At some showings a collection was taken up, while at others a small admission was charged. The fourteen entertainments at which a collection was taken averaged $5.73 each, while the sixteen paid admission programs averaged $11.05 each. I feel that the machine has proved itself to be practical, and I know that my work among the rural schools has been strengthened by its use. I believe that if the machine could be put upon a full-time. schedule, and receive the financial backing that it deserves, it would reach more people and do more good teaching than the expenditure of a like sum in any other way. SMALL-TOWN PROBLEMS James N. Emery Supervising Principal, Potter District, Pawtucket, R. I. I "T'S all very well for you people in the big cities to talk about what you can do with visual education, with motionpicture projectors, and lantern slides by the thousand, and plenty of money to work with. Come down to brass tacks and suggest something that a small town can do with a hundred dollars or so. Money doesn't come easy in small towns like this." Thus, in a nutshell, a superintendent friend of mine in one of the small towns put the problem squarely up to me last summer. Just what can the small-town school do in the way of visual instruction, with limited funds and equipment? Before coming to Pawtucket the writer was superintendent of a small Maine country district — two towns with a population of about 2,000 each — and for five years a member of the school board of a somewhat larger town. It is with the problems of towns of this size that this article deals ; communities where funds must be handled cautiously, and every dollar's worth of equipment must yield a full dollar's worth of return. Substantial space has been devoted recently by magazines and papers to work in the rural communities with portable projectors and generators, in "the little red schoolhouse" of fiction and poetry. Midway between the isolated country village and the large city stands the small town : the town with a Main Street and one or two grade-school buildings and a moderate-sized high school. These towns have problems quite different from those of the rural village or the city. Money for anything like extras is hard to secure. An appropriation of three or four hundred dollars looms large in the town budget, and if it is to be discussed in the annual town meeting its path is no rosy one. The small-town voter is not easy to convince regarding any new project that requires money. "Let 'em teach the three Rs, same's they did in the good old days !" — this argument never fails to bring out vociferous applause from certain elements. Under such circumstances the purchase of a stereopticon and a set of slides, which will total $300 or more, runs against considerable opposition. Yet the obstacle is not insuperable. The proper idea is to start with a small beginning and work up gradually. A good portable stereopticon may be purchased for somewhere in the vicinity of $50 and for school work this will fill the need very satisfactorily in all but the largest auditoriums. The superintendent frequently may have left from some appropriation a little money that will partially finance this item, and the rest can be raised by subscription, school entertainments, the sale of chocolate or soap, or any one of the well-known devices for raising money. With the lantern and screen secured, the slide collection can be built up gradually, or slides rented at first. If it seems out of the question to put in the entire stock at once, certain countries can be selected for a start. In the Keystone collection there are about two hundred slides on the United States. These might be taken as a nucleus. Another year, as funds warrant, those on Europe or South America or Asia could be added, until the complete set is secured. In building up any slide collection the wiser plan is to start with some standard set that is cross-indexed and worked out for more than one purpose. The average novice with the lantern slide has rather a hazy idea at first as to just what he wants. With one of these sets much of the perplexity and uncertainty is cleared up for him. Accompanying the Keystone set is an admirable volume entitled "Visual Education," which suggests uses for the slides from almost every conceivable angle. I find it one of the most useful texts on my desk. A notable assembly of well-known educators prepared this work, and, although occasionally the connection of certain slides is a bit far-fetched, it will supply ideas for the school man in wide variety. For the small school or group of schools the most practical arrangement will be for the visual work to be handled from the superintendent's office. In a good many if not in the majority of states the district-superintendency plan is in force, under which two or more towns are grouped for school-administration purposes under the general direction of one superintendent, who apportions his time among the several towns served. The towns that join for this purpose can also unite to finance visual apparatus. A small appropriation from each town for two or three years, and such assistance as private donations or school entertainments can add, would easily result in the purchase of one or more good lanterns, a portable screen, a slide case, and a collection of lantern slides of respectable quantity. These could be routed on a weekto-week schedule among the' various schools, much as, at the present time, traveling libraries are circulated. For ordinary presentation in the schoolroom no very elaborate preparations are necessary. A set of ordinary dark window shades — black, dark green, or dark blue — will darken the average schoolroom sufficiently under most conditions. A portable screen, one that can be rolled up and taken along on various trips, is not expensive. A plain muslin curtain on a roller will do, or in emergencies the reverse side of a large wall map serves fairly well. Projection is even possible on the whitewashed wall of the schoolroom, if a suitable spot can be found. You do not have to have a large picture ; indeed, the smaller the picture, the brighter and better defined it will be. It will suffice that it be large enough for all the pupils to see it at the same time. To get the most good from the slides, synopses and outlines should be sent along with them. The superintendent or principal may find it desirable for a while to give demonstration lessons until his teachers get the idea of what is to be taught, and the way to handle it ; or this may be taken up and methods shown at general teachers' meetings. This plan may take some time, but I have found it well worth the effort in getting into touch with the individual classes and pupils. A year or two of continued and constructive effort should result in the acquisition of the full collection, or others, for you may wish to extend those available beyond the regular set. In a later article I plan to deal with some of the problems that arise while adding to the stock collection. Thus far I have dealt entirely with the permanent ownership of slides. Many superintendents who do not wish to incur large expense may prefer to rent sets of slides for temporary use. In some ways this is a fairly satisfactory solution, although it is not always possible to get just what you want, and on the dates when you want them. It is the same problem as owning your own books or getting them from the public library — owning your own home or paying rent. The church worker will probably find it preferable to rent his slides almost entirely. His problems are somewhat different from those of the school man. The church worker will rarely want to use a set of slides the second time, unless his field is widely scattered and made up of a number of congregations. Once his audience has seen a particular set of slides this set's usefulness in that special field is usually ended. It would hardly pay him to own a large collection of slides solely for the purposes of his church. His problem must be concerned mainly with the renting of suitable slides and lectures. But the school worker's program of instruction is well marked out, and cast in much the same mold year after year. At a certain (Continued on page 38)