Improving the Curriculum in M. R. Wood Negro School in Sugar Land, Texas

There is a division of opinion as to merits and the purposes of the village school of the present. Many persons who attended one and two-teacher schools at the beginning of the century are of the opinion that the modern village school is inferior to the village school of thirty years ago. Some think that the curriculum of the small school is inadequate in that it attempts to teach subject matter drawn largely from an urban situation. In many respects the present-day rural school is better than the rural school before 1900.1 The physical plants are better equipped; the teachers are younger and better educated. Dilapidated shacks and unsightly log houses have given way in large measure to well constructed, painted and attractive buildings. Instead of the uncomfortable benches, often without backs, are convenient desks. Instead of the ancient school master, one finds a young person, generally a woman, who has completed on the average two years of work above the high school. There is almost universal effort to adapt the curriculum to the needs and interest of the child in the small town situation. But although rural schools have improved greatly there is a general feeling that this improvement has not been proportionately as great as has been improvement in city schools. Contrasts can easily be drawn in the matter of grounds, sanitary toilets, drinking fountains, heating, and even teachers. The small community will more readily accept services of a teacher who has had no experience whereas the city generally demands experience. Because of these contrasts rural people are beginning to demand for their schools, (1) a better and more efficient organization, (2) closer and more effective supervision, and (3) more competent and better trained teachers. The problem may be stated in terms of the following questions: 1. To what extent can the curriculum of M. R. Wood School be improved? 2. How can we measure the improvement of the community in terms of the school curriculum? 1 Sorokin and Zimmerman, Principles of Rural-Urban Sociology, pages 487 - 490