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Show COMMISSIONER OF INDIAN AFFAIRS. 41 More emphasis has been placed on the physical development and health of Indian pupils during the past year than at any other time during the history of Indian education. Outdoor playground appa-ratus has been furnished for man7 of the boarding schools and for even a large number of day schools. The Russell Sage Foundation, in cooperation with the National Recreation and Playground Associa-tion, appointed a committee to cooperate with this bureau in a study of the communal life of Indians, particularly in respect to their social and recreational activities. This committee was headed by Prof. George E. Johnson, of Pittsburgh, Pa., superintendent of the recre-ation and playground association of that city. He has given special attention to these phases of Indian life in their relation to the present educational scheme for Indians, and his interest and assistance in this respect has added new zeal and definiteness to this subject. Prof. Johnson made a two months' visit to the Indian field for the purpose of ascertaining our needs. This is the beginning of a special effort on the part of the Indian Office to deal more effectively with the so-cial and recreational development of Indians through the schools. Of all the sleeping porches constructed at Indian schools prior to June 30, 1912, approximately 90 per cent were constructed or under construction during the year 1912 itself. In this way we have kept pace with our ruling of last year, that the cubic air space for each child in dormitories should be 500 instead of 400 cubic feet; thus producing at once better conditions within the buildings and adding the inestimable advantages of outdoor sleeping at 17 schools during the last year. Indian-school employee's are alive to the necessity of imparting wholesome instructions in all those virtues which are essential inany young life and in the acquisition of which our schools are deeply concerned. This sort of training is accomplished not only by the formal instruction the teachers have been directed to impart and in the preparation of which they have been assisted by being given access to the best literature on the subject, but by their own example in their social life in the school. The human element is one of the most important in the education of the Indians, and the office bas given attention to the matter of improving the e5ciency of its employees. Teachers were requested to prepare theses on subjects related to their work, an& this has resulted in inducing them to do more professional reading than they have been in the habit of doing. They have been encouraged to ally themselves with the educational associations of their community and to adopt the most improved methods used in white schools in their classrmm work. In order to induce better qualified employees to enter our schools, the supervisors have visited educational institutions of a high stand- |