The composition or expression most to be recommended consists of reports on
the supplementary reading in connection with history, geography, industrial
studies, civics, sanitation, etc.; and reports of observations on related matters in
the community. Topics of interest and of value are practically numberless. Such
reports will usually be oral; but often they will be written. Expression occurs
naturally and normally only where there is something to be discussed. The
present manual suggests compositions based upon "changes in trees,
dissemination of seeds, migration of birds, snow, ice, clouds, trees, leaves, and
flowers." This type of composition program under present conditions cannot be a
vital one. Elementary science is not taught in the schools of Cleveland; and so
the subject matter of these topics is not developed. Further, it is the world of
human action, revealed in history, geography, travels, accounts of industry,
commerce, manufacture, transportation, etc., that possesses the greater value for
the purposes of education, as well as far greater interest for the student.
Probably little time should be set apart on the program for composition. The
expression side of all the school work, both in the elementary school and in the
high school, should be used to give the necessary practice. The technical matters
needed can be taught in occasional periods set aside for that specific purpose.
The isolation of the composition work continues through the academic high
schools and in considerable degree through the technical high schools also. In
the high schools the expression work probably needs to be developed chiefly in
the classes in science, history, industrial studies, commercial and industrial
geography, physics, etc., where the students have an abundance of things to
discuss. Probably four-fifths of all of the training in English expression in the
high schools should be accomplished in connection with the oral and written
work of the other subjects.