Which Way Is Up

Progressive education last week came in for some finger-wagging from a woman who is nothing if not progressive. Eleanor Roosevelt, onetime teacher and associate principal at Manhattan's Todhunter School for girls, wrote in her syndicated column: "All over this country people are troubled . . . at the way delinquency extends down even to small children.

"I think it is time we re-examined our theories of education. Progressive education is an interesting grouping of words. . . . We do not want it, however, to progress to the point of doing away with some of the tried and true customs and traditions.

"I sometimes wonder if what is commonly called progressive education, in the effort to make children enjoy school and develop their individual personalities, has not done away with some of the essential disciplines. These disciplines made education in the old days . . . seem somewhat harsh at times, but even children came to recognize that . . . they were valuable."

Three days later she backed down a little: her progressive-school friends were "horrified at my using the word progressive lightly." She tried again: "What I was really complaining about is what perhaps could better be described as modern education."

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