534 INTERNATIONAL CONGRESS OF EDUCATION. 
position longer than five or ten minutes. Neither should faulty positions, 
tending to scoliosis and other deformities, be permitted. 
Exercises in the sitting position ‘may be alternated with risings and 
‘acings, and marchings at intervals. This rest and recreation for body and 
nind need not be longer than a minute or two, or perhaps five, at a time. 
Standing.— Before children are taught to march they should be taught 
;0 stand in the position of the soldier. (See revised tactics, United States 
army.) Ask the untrained child to sit or stand erect, and you will 
observe the shoulders thrown backward, head tipped back, and abdomen 
orotrnded, in many if not most cases. Considerable training will be 
necessary to properly “set up’ the child. 
Perhaps the next most important point is the control of thoracic mus- 
cles, both for the health of the child and to improve his singing and 
speaking. He should be taught to use the upper and lower thorax and 
Jiaphragm at the same time, and each separately. These ideas and 
habits inculcated into the minds of children might do much to encourage 
ress reform, because the child could see the impossibility of sufficient 
shest expansion while the chest is constricted. There may result more 
muscular strength under restriction, but not so much elasticity and 
sxpansion of the chest. 
Marching.—Many evolutions in accordance with the United States tac- 
sics will prove interesting and beneficial to scholars—an improvement in 
she way of school discipline that would give us better men and women, 
ind better soldiers. 
Calisthenics.—This field is almost unlimited where large, airy rooms 
are at command. In many schoolhouses calisthenics must be limited to 
such as can be done in a classroom with desks. It must be remembered, 
as Dr. Lincoln remarks in his article on school hygiene to Dr. Keating’s 
‘ Cyclopedia”: ¢¢ Above the age of twelve years scholars begin to look down 
on them [referring to free exercises] as childish ; and with good reason, 
for they lack one essential element—they do not call for exertion to over- 
some resistance. For better work scholars should have light dumb-bells, 
wands,” etc. I would note another lacking element, viz. : the recreation 
afforded by the fact that some apparatus is held in the hand and used in 
the exercise. We see this desire for apparatus before the child reaches 
twelve years, and in New York City five primary grades use apparatus. 
Calisthenic exercises may be grouped in drills, for assembly or class- 
room or gymnasium, occupying from one to twenty minutes. The pro- 
gression proposed by Professor Ling (see Keating’s ¢“ Cyclopedia of Dis- 
sases of Children ), the grace and ease of movement as taught by Delsarte, 
and the recreative “rounds” of the Germans, can be made exceedingly 
attractive when adapted to the needs of the scholars. The United States 
setting-up drill, arranged to 4-4 time, has proved very interesting and 
attractive in assembly and classroom drill.