The great difference existing between the Gymnasia and the Realgymnasia is still that of the respective emphasis on the classics. A much greater time is given to the study of Latin in the Gymnasia and to science in the Realgymnasia. Both French and mathematics receive greater attention in the Realgymnasia. In the Gymnasia French begins in the third year (Quarto.) with four hours a week; later, three; then only two. Little time can be spared for practice in speak ing; grammar and reading form the chief parts of the instruction. The reading embraces the classical and the most important of other poets and prose writers. German is given four to three hours with the following course: In the lower classes. mythology, grammar, and ex planation of poetical works: in the middle classes, rhetoric, poetics, and the reading of easy plays and larger poems; in the Prima, the history of German literature, reading of the Nibelungenlied and Walther von der Vogelweide, with the most important works of the classical period, especially Lessing, Schiller, and Goethe, and some introduction of Shakespeare. Hebrew and English are elective and are given two hours a week. The recent change has given much more time to English. Mathematics has four hours throughout, except in Tertia, where it has only three, and includes geometry, mensuration. plane and spherical trigonometry, stereometry, and the elements of analytical geometry; in arithmetic, the fundamental operations, equations of the first and second degree, arithmetical and geo metrical computations, compound interest and stocks, combinations, the theory of probability, and the binomial theorem. The natural sciences have throughout two hours, and embrace descrip tive natural history, zotilogy and anthropology, botany and mineralogy, physics, mathematical geography, and an introduction to astronomy and chemistry. History receives two hours in the lower middle classes, and three in the. upper. The matter is so divided that the whole passes twice before the pupil; in the Quarta, ancient history; in the Tertia, medieval and modern; in the Secunda, the history of Greece and Rome for the second time; and in the Prima, general his tory, from the migrations of the nations to the present time, with special reference to German history. Geography has two hours in each of the lower classes, one in the Tertia. with a re view of the subject in the upper classes in con nection with history. The Sexta has two hours of penmanship. Religion (separately, according to creed) has four hours. Gymnastics. singing. and drawing have each two hours; the last branch is not pursued in the four upper classes.
The number of hours of teaching averages 30 to 34 per week. The instruction is given from 8 to 12 A.m. (intermission at 10 o'clock), and from 2 to 4 or 5 r.m.; the afternoons of Wednes day and Saturday are free. For home prepara tion one to two hours are required from the lower classes, two to three hours for the upper. Vaca tions occur at Christmas, Easter, sometimes at Whitsuntide, and the longest in the autumn, altogether eleven weeks. At the end of the school year (generally at Easter) formal public closing exercises are held, with the announce ment of promotions and distribution of prizes to the best scholars. A pupil who has in no report the note 'unsatisfactory' is transferred to the next higher class. If two branches are unsatis factory he is required to pass through the same class again, in Prussia even with one 'unsatis factory.' In Southern Germany in such a ease a reexamination in the study after vacation deter mines his remaining or advancement.
As the Gymnasia are only very seldom board ing schools (Internafa), the maintenance of dis cipline outside of school is accomplished by cer tain regulations, which, however, allow scholars of the Prima somewhat greater freedom. The punishment for transgressions is arrest, impris onment, or the consilium abeundi, which is fol lowed at the next offense by expulsion. Each class is in general limited to forty students, and when that number is exceeded parallel divisions are formed. Since many Gymnasia have 700-800 pupils, all their classes contain two, sometimes even three, divisions. Each class is under the special supervision of a class teacher or 'ordi narius,' who teaches the chief branches in that class. At the head of the Gymnasium is a `director.' The directors are themselves respon sible to an 'Oberschulrat' or 'Oberstudienrat' (Board of Education), in Prussia the Provin zialsehulkollegium,' and the latter to the Min istry of Religion and Instruction. Conferences of
the directors and higher school officials act. on questions of instruction, and determine changes in method, conditional upon the Imperial sanction.
The higher schools are primarily State institu tions; some are also municipal. The State super vises the schools by inspections, appoints and pays the teachers, who bear in the south the title of 'professor.' in the north that of 'Oberlehrer'; but specially deserving teachers in Prussia also receive the title of professor. Younger teachers, from their State examinations to their definite appointment, bear' the title of `Lehramtsprakti kant' or 'Probeeandidat' (probationary instruct or). Teachers without academic education are employed only for arithmetic, natural history, penmanship, and the special branches, drawing wind gymnastics. The instruction is not free; the State receives a tuition fee of 60•120 marks, ac cording to the class. At the completion of the gynmasial course the examination for graduation (Arhiturienten- or Maturitiltsprilfung) is held under the direction of a State commissioner and is judged very severely. The successful candi dates receive the certificate of fitness for the university. The privilege of granting this cer tificate belonged formerly to the Gymnasium alone, but graduates of the Realgymnasium may now enter law, medicine, and n11 studies of the philosophical faculty, save classical languages. The certificates of the Oberrealschule admit to university study of mathematics and natural sciences. The other higher schools fit for the great technical schools. A privilege quite as highly prized as that of fitness for the university, and one that is to a great degree responsible for the large attendance and public support of the Gymnasia, is the exemption from one year of the required two years' military service on successful completion of the six-year gymnasial course. Nearly one-half of all secondary pupils in Prus sia leave school at the end of six years after securing this privilege. This privilege also ex plains the formation of the Progymnasium, which offers simply the first six years of the gymnasial course. The Realgymnasium differs from the Gymnasium in the stronger emphasis on the non-classical subjects, as is seen in the greater number of hours given to mathematics and the sciences, and the fewer hours given to Latin, in the omission of Greek, and in the requirement of English as well as French. The Realschulen (q.v.) and the Oberrealschulen are altogether non-classical. Every higher school has a well endowed school library and a teachers' library, and publishes at the end of each school year a `Program,' which is, first, a handbook of school information records, vacations, and lists of stu dents, and, second, contains a scientific treatise written by a teacher of the school.
In essential unity of method and in the equal supervision of the State, the higher schools as a whole stand on the same plane of excellence, although one or another institution may occa sionally enjoy a position of preeminence through the influence of a specially gifted director, or a happily constituted faculty. So in Prussia the `Landes- und Ftirstenschule' Pforta (Foundation school), in Saxony the 'Landes- and Ffirsten schule' at Meissen, all founded previous to the middle of the sixteenth century, in Wiirttemberg the `elite' schools of the upper Gymnasia (with out lower classes), in which only pupils of marked excellence are received—e.g. at Maul bronn. Some of these most noted institutions are boarding-schools. At the present time there are in all Germany more than 1200 approved higher schools, of which about 450 are Gymnasia. Con sult: Matthew Arnold, Higher Schools and Uni versities in Germany (2d ed., London, 1882) ; Schrader, Erziehungs- und Unterrichtslehre fiir Gymnasien und Realschulen (5th ed., Berlin, 1893) ;. Paulsen, Geschichte des gelehrten Unter riehts auf den deutschen Schuljn and Universi titten (2d ed., Leipzig, 1895-07) ; Russell, Ger man Higher Schools (New York, 1899) ; Bolton, Secondary School System of Germany (New York, 1900) ; Special Reports on Educational Subjects by the Board of Education of Great llritain. vols. i., iii., and ix. See NATIONAL EDUCATION, SYSTEMS OF; REALSCIIULEN.