Promotions

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As the purpose of the primary and elementary schools was considered fitting the pupil for high school, qualifications for attending high school were established. In 1874, Green School students wishing to further their education at Middleborough High School were expected to complete a satisfactory examination in reading, spelling and writing; to complete Common School Written Arithmetic; to complete Greene’s Introduction [to grammar] and to display an “ability to parse and analyze ordinary prose”; and to complete Warren’s Common School Geography and United States History.

Relative to promotions, Green School pupils in the first eight levels would be promoted on the basis of “estimates indicating the teacher’s best judgement of the fidelity and success with which the pupils have done assigned work, and their success in oral and writing tests that have been used as an element of teaching, and the answers to which have not been valued numerically.” Final examinations were dispensed with until the 9th grade as they “do not always determine who is prepared to do successfully the work of the next grade. Frequently they do not test genuine work and power.” Promotions were based upon the yearly average of weekly grades, with students averaging Excellent, Good and Fair being promoted.

While the one-room schoolhouse was generally considered a less effective and more chaotic institution than the graded school, it did have the advantage of encouraging advanced students who unlike their counterparts in graded schools elsewhere were exposed to lessons presented to higher level students. As one local resident described it, “A child who was anxious to learn would ‘listen in’ and often have a wider knowledge than the city students.” Such gifted students were therefore able to acquire a deeper knowledge in their studies and sometimes advance at a more rapid pace. The Middleborough School Committee obliquely recognized this phenomenon when it emphasized that students of special ability could be promoted regardless of age or length of time in a specific level.

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