study. Such habits improve the efficiency of instruction and form the beginning of character development. All instructors should coöperate in their formation.

11. Every instructor should regard it as his duty to make his course interesting-not easy or amusing. A course is interesting to a student if he feels that the value that he is able to get from it is large in comparison with the effort that it costs. Interest makes the student put forth his best efforts with pleasure, it makes him observant of cases that arise in his daily life where his knowledge gives new insight, and it tends to make him continue to be a student of the subject after he has left the instructor's guidance. With this in view, the instructor should specialize in making explanations in simple language, using concrete illustrations that will be appreciated by every student. Interest may be stimulated by letting the student know in advance how he will use a principle about to be studied, by allowing the student to do a part of the thinking in the development of a principle, and by so arranging the assignments that the student will feel that he has made some definite worth-while acquisition from each assignment.

12. The instructor should seek to develop in the student such mental attitudes as will assist instruction and be of permanent value to the student. The spirit of coöperation should characterize intercourse between instructor and student. The group system in laboratory work and in field. work may be used to develop both coöperation and leadership. Uniformly thorough work coupled with encouragement of the student's initiative will give him confidence in his knowledge and in his ability to apply it. Insistence upon the full performance of every assignment, accompanied with extreme care on the part of the instructor to make appropriate assignments, will tend to develop in the student the feeling that he can and must accomplish every duty set before him. The instructor should understand the relations which an engineer should sustain to the community, to the state, and to civilization, and, when the occasion warrants, he should make his students feel the necessity of assuming these obligations.

13. It is believed that much good may result if the instructor gives due consideration to the following quotation from Thorndike's "Principles of Teaching": "The efficiency of any profession depends in large measure upon the degree to which it becomes scientific. The profession of teaching will improve (1) in proportion as its members direct their daily work by the scientific spirit and methods, that is by honest, open-minded consideration of facts, by freedom from superstitions, fancies or unverified guesses, and (2) in proportion as the leaders in education direct their choices of methods by the results of scientific investigations rather than by general opinion."

SUMMARY.

I. Objectives of Knowledge.

1. Mechanics.-Thorough training in fundamental facts and principles, enabling the student to recognize the mechanical principles and the mathematical treatment appropriate for simple problems for which he takes his own data.

2. Strength of Materials.-Working knowledge of the common theory of elastic action, and its application to the simple members of structures and of machines, paying attention to assumptions in theory and to limitations when conclusions are applied to actual materials.

3. Hydraulics.-Thorough understanding of the principles of hydrostatics and of fluid motion, with simple applications so arranged as to bring out the relations between theory and experiment.

Each course should give a thorough drill in all ground covered, using oral recitations, blackboard demonstrations, informal written quizzes, problems, and laboratory work.

II. Objectives of Habit.

Certain general habits on the part of a student should be encouraged by all his instructors; among these may be mentioned (1) intellectual integrity, (2) good English, (3) economical methods of study, (4) punctuality, (5) completion of

assignments, (6) numerical accuracy, and (7) presentation of work in good form.

III. Objectives of Attitude.

For the purpose of making the student's work more efficient and to make him a better man, every instructor should seek to develop in him certain mental attitudes, such as (1) interest in his work, (2) coöperation with his associates, (3) leadership, (4) self-confidence, and (5) duty.

It is believed that the instructor should be a student of the teaching process.

DISCUSSION.

A. H. Fuller: In concentrating this year's report upon "Main Objectives in Teaching" the committee has given an excellent presentation to which it is easier to agree than to take issue. The impartiality or the neglect to be specific, as the case may be, in the nature of treatment leaves an opportunity for putting the committee on the defensive. The presentation which has been made would apply equally well in working from the abstract to the concrete as to the reverse, or, in other words, to the ordinary textbook methods as to the case system or project method. Which does the committee recommend?

If I may relate a little personal experience, I would say that as a war necessity I picked up a section in mechanics (including mechanics of materials) this last year for the first time in more than ten years. Previous to that time, I taught the subject for about ten years, keeping rather close to textbook and recitation methods, excepting that toward the end of the time one three-hour computation period a week was injected. Wishing to make last year's experience an opportunity for experiment as well as the discharge of a duty, I decided to change the mode of attack as much as the available time would permit and to incorporate some of the features of the project and problem method as developed by Professor More and his

staff at the University of Washington* and followed so effectively at the Engineer School at Camp Humphreys during this past year.t

It was apparent that the new method required more time in preparation and a better general understanding of the subject than when a textbook is closely followed, but the results seemed far superior. While admitting that it is not safe to draw conclusions from a single experiment, it seems probable, from this and from observations made elsewhere (primarily during the development of the course at the University of Washington) that the project or case method will give decidedly better results in the hands of an experienced teacher who believes in the system than other methods regardless of the ability and the view point of the instructor. It seems apparent, too, that this method would not be effective in the hands of a poor or inexperienced instructor, but that it furnishes the means of detecting the ineffective teacher and, with proper administration, should be conducive to better teaching.

I would like also to tie this discussion in with that of Committee No. 15 with the assigned subject, "Methods and Details of Teaching Structural Design." In that report mechanics and mechanics of materials were mentioned as a part of the necessary work in structural design. Therefore this whole discussion is pertinent to the other and could well be considered in connection with it. It is interesting to note that in both discussions attention is given to the principle of teaching, including the training of instructors, and to the necessity for making a distinction between fact and assumption at one time and between strict analysis and legitimate approximations at others.

"Mechanics of Engineering at the University of Washington," by W. E. Duckering," ENGINEERING EDUCATION, Vol. VII, No. 9 (1917). "Comments on the Course in Engineering Mechanics as taught at the Engineer School, U. S. Army," by 1st Lieut. W. E. Duckering. Published by the Engineer School, March 30, 1919.

ADDENDA, COMMITTEE 14-ECONOMICS.

By a vote of three to two, the committee asks to be discharged on the ground of having essentially completed its work and the impracticability of making further studies. Two members of the committee, while having no particular desire to serve further on the committee, believe that there yet remains some work that might be done profitably by a committee on economics.

In the first place, a wide diversity of opinion exists among educators and practicing engineers concerning the proper content of a course in economics to be taught to engineering students. This fact is revealed by a study of the character of courses now offered in various institutions, where one finds practically the entire range of subjects that may be classed as economics, offered in engineering curricula, and also by the variety of conception on the part of practicing engineers indicated by the quotations included in the committee report. A further investigation and discussion of the objectives in teaching economics should bring about a greater uniformity of opinion than now obtains.

If engineering is applied science, it ought to be not only applied physical science, mathematics, physics, chemistry, biology, etc., but it should be applied social science as well. The engineer should be at liberty to apply any specific conclusions, principles or data of the social sciences as well as those of the physical sciences in the solution of his problems of construction and production. Indeed, he ought even to be at liberty to extend such knowledge of social sciences wherein they may apply to his profession by making observations of his own in that realm as he has done in mechanics, heat, electricity, etc. To this end, a committee of the society should be able to formulate a syllabus of economics, comparable to the