Physical Education in the Public Schools.
[Health issues]. Morris, R. Anna. Physical Education in the Public Schools. An eclectic system of exercises, including the Delsartean principles of execution and expression. New York…: American Book Company, (1892).
8vo.; green and mustard cloth, stamped in green and gilt.
First edition of this guide prepared by a former supervisor of physical culture and reading in Des Moines, Iowa, for use in public school systems, “where the needs of the children is so varied.” In the final paragraph of her introduction, Morris summarizes her aim in publishing this volume:
In bringing this little book before my fellow-teachers, I crave for it their kind consideration and careful study, and trust it may prove helpful in hastening the introduction of physical culture into all public schools. I hope it may guide in disciplining the children in grace, strength, and trueness of expression, and that its teachings may assist in making them grow up into more perfect types of noble manhood and womanhood.
To achieve this goal she has evolved a system, based both on her training and on her experience, combining the Delsartean principles of “freedom, strength, and expression,” with marching and apparatus drills, designed to “cultiv[ate] strength and precision.” She also provides instruction in manners, hygiene, and social intercourse. “By this system the body first is freed from stiffness, sluggishness, and bad habits, then it is strengthened to control, and made ready to yield itself to the service of the mind and soul in expression.” The text is illustrated throughout, and is followed by a section printing thirty pages of music for marching, drilling, dancing, and exercising. Morris explains, “The exhilaration of a musical accompaniment not only adds a charm to the practice, but is of use in taking the mind of the pupil away from himself, and rendering him less self-conscious.”
Morris credits in her introduction Miss E.L. Burns (now Mrs. A.C.Gunter), Miss Anna Morgan, and Mrs. C.E. Bishop, with inspiring her “to a more thoughtful and practical consideration of the Delsarte Philosophy,” and thanks Dr. W.G. Anderson, President of the Brooklyn Normal School of Physical Culture, her alma mater, for permission to print many of the movements in her apparatus drills.
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