That Last Waif; or, Social QuarantineFletcher, Horace
History
That Last Waif; or, Social Quarantine
Fletcher, Horace
Child welfare
And also, in answer to a question often asked by those who are not
informed about kindergarten efficiency, relative to securing the
willingness of parents to accept outside care for their children: The
question of voluntary or compulsory compliance on the part of parents
or children need not be feared during the earliest character-forming
age, for until the child is old enough to earn money no selfish
objection can be offered, and the greater the need, as stated
elsewhere, the more easy is the compliance accorded. As this is the
period of present neglect, as well as the time when all students of
child-life agree that the character of the adult is moulded, the
vexing question of parental control need not be raised.
The duty of social quarantine is to seek out the children of the
greatest need first and work back through the strata of misfortune to
those of fortune, in the same way that a process of cleansing should
first use a shovel, then a broom, and finally a wash rag and a
polishing cloth.
The habit-of-thought of a community aiming at quarantine efficiency
will become impregnated with the idea that there _Must-Not-Be_
unwholesome units in their midst as soon as it has been delivered of
the evil suggestion of the necessity of a Have-To-Be-Bad class, for it
is wonderful what the mere change of a point of view will effect.
On the question of the virtue, or merit, of Strict Social Quarantine,
there seems to be no difference of opinion about the desirability of
the aim, and the efficacy of available means to accomplish it has
already been established.
We have heard it said that the kindergarten method is splendidly
adapted to the children of the poor but not to the children of the
rich in America, because rich children are petted beyond endurance,
and have toys in such lavish abundance, that even instructive
amusements and wholesome care are but a burden when added to home
superfluities. This may easily be so, as there is a point of surfeit
in everything, even in the best of nourishment, but it is proof of the
wisdom of a wider distribution of the effort so as to really nourish
instead of causing a surfeit of care.
It is not the rich and the strong and the healthy that need the direct
care of social quarantine, but its rescues from among the presently
neglected and warped defenseless ones would create a wave of average
improvement of ideals that would be felt in the most luxurious homes
to the benefit of the pampered possessors of fortune's birth prizes.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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