It is still possible to find here and there in the Thirty Schools the traditional practice of textbook lesson assignment and hearing of recitation. In such cases the pupil's problem is how to learn the lesson and recite it to the teacher's satisfaction. The "problem" may have no other meaning for him. It has been set by the teacher. The student has had no part in choosing it, and it may not touch his real purposes or concerns in any way. However, in most of the classes to be found in the Thirty Schools there is a fundamentally different relationship between teacher and pupil.

To one accustomed to the traditional classroom scene, many procedures in the participating schools may seem strange and without order or organization. Upon entering a room, one may find the teacher lecturing to the class, but this does not happen often. One is more likely to see students working singly or in groups, moving about as the work in hand requires. The teacher may be at his desk holding one brief conference after another with individuals or with small groups. The chances are that he is going from person to person or from group to group as their work calls for his assistance or guidance. It is possible that the teacher is not in the room at all. He and some members of the group may be making an investigation in the library, laboratory, shop, or even downtown, but the work goes on in his absence.

It goes on because the students are working, not for the teacher or the grades he could give, but for purposes which they think important. The purposes are theirs as well as the teacher's. They have shared with him in selecting the goals and in planning the steps to be taken. They have taken time to consider together what to do and how to do it. This wise teacher has learned how to share honestly with his boys and girls in planning their work together. He has made the difficult change from authoritarianism to democracy, not only because more and better work is done by students, but chiefly because he knows that they should learn how to share responsibility and to co-operate in achieving objectives which they and he have set tip. This is the way of democracy.

The teacher and class have been through some unhappy days and trying times together. In the beginning they "mulled around." Neither teacher nor pupils knew very well how to move ahead together. This was a new experience for all. Of one thing they are now sure-they talked too much. There was endless discussion of topics of without the knowledge necessary to make discussion profitable. Students wanted to discuss these topics which were of such vital concern. They had ideas and questions which they were eager to express. However, they began to realize after much talk that their ideas were "half-baked" and that some of their questions were unimportant, some could easily be answered by a little reading, and some could be answered by no one.

Gradually everyone, even the most talkative, came to realize that discussion may be boring and certainly futile unless facts are obtained, assumptions examined, opinion thoughtfully "arrived at," or conclusion clearly established. If the stranger should sit in on a group discussion now, he would find insistence on the part of the members of the class that the speaker should have something to contribute, that he should stick to the point, cite the sources of his data, and draw only such conclusions as the facts may warrant.

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