The significant position of textbooks in the program of American education is so generally recognized that the Society seems to be fully justified in sponsoring a yearbook on the theme "The Textbook." It is the textbook that in thousands of classrooms determines the content of instruction as well as the teaching procedures. This statement may not be in accord with the usual theory, but it is supported by the facts reported by supervisors and state inspectors of schools. In view, therefore, of the important place of the textbook in our educational practice, the preparation and the selection of textbooks is a problem of major importance.

The Committee found in the prefaces and advertising materials for textbooks in various elementary-school subjects the claim that scientific techniques had been systematically applied in creating the textbooks. It seemed desirable to gather information about the methods and procedures which authors of textbooks in spelling, mathematics, reading, and the social studies designate as scientific.

There is persistent criticism of some of the practices employed in selecting textbooks for the schools. Is this criticism valid? To secure opinions on this phase of the textbook problem, the writer submitted questions about certain practices to a representative list of persons interested in the selecting of textbooks, namely, to a few representatives of leading textbook companies, to a few superintendents of schools in all the states, and to a small number of persons selected from the membership of this Society.