not concern themselves at all with what students had to say, but chose their topics on the basis of the current interests of educated adults or what seemed to be appropriate topics for literary efforts.

Recent examples of topics from students' interests.-A list of theme topics derived from the present-day interests of highschool students is found in an article entitled "Discovering Human Interests," written in 1913. The author describes a plan which he uses for training in oral composition. Each student is expected to speak for several minutes upon a topic of special interest to himself and upon which he has made special preparation. He may specialize on a single topic or line of topics for several talks. The following are among the topics discussed, as reported by the class secretaries.

SECOND-SEMESTER STUDENTS

"Captains Courageous"; The Necessity of Keeping Children at School as long as Possible; Child Labor; A Strange Cruise; Physical Training; Prevention of Cruelty to Animals; Model Aëroplanes; "With Lafayette at Yorktown"; Divers; The Goingdown of the Titanic; Aëroplanes in War; "Under Lawton at Luzon"; Catching Baboons; Long Words; "Five Thousand Miles Underground"; Compartments for Submarines in Battleships; Motor Boats; The Princeton Meet; "Tom Swift and his Submarine"; The New Moving-Picture Plan; Baseball; The Sinking of the Maine; Rabbit-Hunting; The Two Great Walkers; Choice of Guns; The Coal Strike; The Business Side of a Circus; The Increase in Motor Trucks; Farm Life; The Olympic Games; The New Bandstand in Indianapolis; "Huckleberry Finn."..

SEVENTH-SEMESTER STUDENTS

The Advantage of Having a Profession; The Panama Canal; Girard College; Music and the Piano; What Wide Reading Does for You; Painting; "The Garden of Allah"; A Town in Africa; Pigeons; How to Make Caramels; Charles B. Loomis; BrassCraft; Playgrounds on the Piers; The Baking of a Cake; A Trip

to Pennsylvania; The Manufacture of Brier Pipes; The Delights of Swimming; Cooking Cookies; Examination Questions; Milton, the Classical Student; "Il Trovatore"; Fine Needlework; A Bank that is run by Women; Pyrography; An Excursion of the History Club; Amateur Photography; Baseball; Making Peanut Brittle; Making Panocha; Scootering; My Present Aims in Life; The Preservation of Wood; Are "L'Allegro" and "Il Penseroso" Complements or Opposites? Masques; My Aims in Life; How to make Paper Wistaria; Immigration; "Winning of Barbara Worth"; A Trip to Ellis Island; Trees in Forest Park; Milton; The Arc Light; Two Modern Advertisements. (10: 122-124)

Classification of sources of vital topics. — A rough classification of the fields of interest or sources of theme topics which would probably appeal to high-school students is the following: 1. Topics of general public interest, such as the Panama Canal, tariff reform, public recreation, adequate support for the navy. 2. Topics from vocational interests, plans, and activities. 3. Topics from student activities and leisure activities, such as athletic contests, dances, the theater, automobiles, vacation trips, etc. 4. Topics from subjects other than English, such as science, history, shop, etc.

Vocational topics. The second group, namely, the vocational, presents some of the most vital possibilities. Examples of the development of vocational topics are given in the following quotations from an article entitled "Composition as Training in Thought.”

In a class of the first year the subject "What should I consider besides Pay in accepting a Position" is proposed. A short oral discussion may be necessary in the assignment, to start the ideas of the boys. They will suggest that such considerations as the kind of work, the character of the employer, the chances for advancement, the distance of the office or factory from home, are essential. The pupils are then required to arrange these and any other topics that occur to them so that the item which for them is the weightiest will come at the end. This is the old principle of

climax, but not in its usual Procrustean form. In treating each topic the boy is required to give the reasons why that consideration is for him important. The next morning the results will be various. Some Lilliputian, about four feet five inches in height and weighing nearly seventy-six pounds, will gravely declare that he would prefer not to have too much heavy work, such as piano moving, since it might make him tired before the end of the day. But there is certain to be lively discussion of the reasons for putting any subject last. The opinions will be various, but it will be found that each boy has some reasons of his own to support his arrangement. He has done some thinking.

From a fourth-year class more can be expected. The subject "My Qualifications for the Profession of Medicine" may be proposed. Coming, as it most profitably will, in a series of vocational themes, it will carry with it suggestions for attacking the problem. At any rate, do not insist on having a paragraph or section each for physical, mental, and moral characteristics or qualifications. Such imposing of adult logic and classification on the growing mind does more harm than good. The boy will probably work his qualifications out in some such manner as this: first, because he has steady nerves and can go without sleep when necessary; second, because in his high-school course he has always been most interested in biology and chemistry and like courses; third, because in his summer camping he has always carried peroxide of hydrogen, court-plaster, and sanitary bandages, and has taken great glee in treating the blisters and bruises among the boys in his house or tent. This may be accompanied by an outline, in which the various ranks of ideas are indicated by the precisely right use of Roman and Arabic numerals, if the teacher wishes to exact such detail. The essential feature is that the student be made to show that each of these is a qualification, and how, and that he be able to defend the order in which he treats the topics; that is, he must be held responsible for the consecutiveness of his ideas. (13: 363-364)

Topics from leisure interests and student activities.The possibilities for theme topics chosen from the leisure interests or activities of students are easily realized. Often students who do not seem to have arrived at any serious

purposes in life will have plenty to say regarding football games, school politics, plays, dances, etc.; in fact, these activities furnish the chief topics concerning which they are spontaneously expressing themselves in their everyday conversations. The chances for serious and skilled writing upon these topics is shown by the amount of material written about them in the current newspapers and magazines.

Topics from other school subjects. — Topics from the various subjects of the high-school curriculum are especially good for many students, because they are already engaged in thinking about them and are regularly expressing themselves concerning them in their class work. Hence these topics meet the first and fundamental need in composition, namely, something to say. Moreover, if the various subjects are so organized as to include subject matter that corresponds to definite social needs, the training which students receive in expressing themselves concerning this subject matter will be just the training which they need in expressing themselves concerning the fundamental issues in daily life. In the past it has often been the practice to emphasize topics chosen from literature. While this subject furnishes vital topics for some students, the other subjects, especially applied science, history, and civics, offer more interesting topics for others.

Topics secured from special projects. — Special enterprises or projects undertaken by the school as a whole or by the classes in composition may occasionally furnish vital topics for themes. This is illustrated by an "Experiment in the Teaching of High-School Composition" described in the School Review. As far as the choice of topics is concerned, the following quoted paragraphs present the essential points.

The pupils were given the task of gathering the pioneer history of the community in the form of reports on specific topics. The particular form in which these reports were to be written was left to the originality and ingenuity of the pupils; however, they were free to consult the teachers for suggestions at any time. The pupils

were encouraged to interview the older citizens of the community, to examine monuments and relics, and to consult the county and city records, newspaper files, and printed matter relating to the early history of that particular section of the state. In every case the source of information was to be acknowledged, and quotations, when used, were to be properly marked.

The reports covered such general topics as The Character of the Earliest Settlers; Their Language; Occupations; Modes of Life; Clothing; Amusements; Social Customs; Institutions; The Development of Leading Industries; Notable Historic Undertakings; and Biographies of the Citizens who had Contributed most to the Development of the Community. Out of these general reports such specific topics as the following were chosen for individual themes: The Nationality of Our Pioneers; A Chat with the Earliest Settler; The Making of a Settlement; Cooking in Pioneer Days; The Spelling Bee; The Husking Bee; The Singing School; Courtship in Pioneer Days; Fashions in Pioneer Times; The District School; The Village Church; A Pioneer Lawsuit; The Digging of the Old Canal; The Building of the First Railroad; Trade Barons of the Early Community, etc. (14: 538-539)

English teacher needs broad experience, training, and point of view. The demand that topics for themes should be chosen from a wide range of everyday interests and activities necessitates broad experience, training, and point of view on the part of the teachers of English. This point is brought out in the following statement by Professor F. T. Baker.

All teachers need to know many things outside their own field, but the teacher of English has special need of a wide range of interests. If his pupils are to learn to use their language, they will do it only through talking interestedly about real things, real ideas, real issues. Mere language is nothing; ideas in language are much. And to a high-school boy or to any man of affairs the only test of language is the effectiveness with which it does its work of conveying ideas to someone else who wants to hear them or who is made willing to hear them by the way they are put. In