Chapter 13

A child should have stated exercises and systematic instructions in the art of reading. But quite as much improvement in this important and too much neglected accomplishment may be gained by not allowing children at any time to read in an improper manner. Every demonstration at the blackboard, every text or hymn repeated from memory, every recitation in arithmetic, grammar, or geography, every exercise of every kind in which the voice is used and words are uttered, may be made an incidental lesson in reading. By being never allowed to pronounce words incorrectly, to utter them in a low or drawling manner, or to crowd and overlap them, as it were, one upon the other, the ear becomes accustomed to the correct sounds of the language, and immediately detects any variation from its accustomed standard. By thus insisting, in every vocal exercise, upon the full and correct pronunciation of the elementary sounds of the language, more may be done to make good readers and speakers than by all the pronouncing dictionaries and elocution books in print.

Let a child by all means take lessons in writing. Let him learn plain text, German text, round hand, running hand, back hand, and the flourishes. But if he is to become rapidly master of that truly beautiful and most useful accomplishment, let the teacher insist upon his always attending to his manner of writing, and always writing as well as he can. Whether he writes a composition, a sketch, a letter, whenever for any purpose he puts pen to paper, let him be required to form each letter distinctly, to write it gracefully, and to give to his exercise a neat and elegant appearance. Teach him to think of a crooked line or a blotted page as of an untied shoe, or a dirty face. By thus making every written exercise an exercise in writing, his progress will be increased beyond your expectations, and you will soon see him looking with pleasure at the clean and symmetrical forms which flow so gracefully from his pen, as he goes from line to line over the virgin page, no half-formed or misshapen letters to embarrass, but all in every part as elegantly written as it is easily read.

Grammar should no doubt be taught by text-book and in stated lessons. The parts of speech, the conjugations and declensions, syntax and parsing, must all be systematically conned, the rules and definitions committed to memory, and the judgment exercised upon their application. At the same time every recitation of a child, as well as all his conversation, ought to be made an incidental and unconscious lesson in grammar. Only never allow him to use unchallenged an incorrect or ungrammatical expression, train his ear to detect and revolt at it, as at a discordant note in music, let him if possible hear nothing but sterling, honest English, and he will then learn grammar to some purpose. If, on the contrary, he is allowed to recite and to talk in whatever language comes uppermost, and to hear continually those around him reciting and talking in a similar manner, he may parse till he is blind without learning "to speak and write the English language correctly." Banish from the nursery, the school-room, and the play-ground, incorrect and ungrammatical expressions, and you do more than can be done in all other ways to preserve "the well of English undefiled."

Young persons need systematic instructions in the principles which should govern their conduct. They need not indeed be troubled with the more abstruse questions in the theory of morals. But the great obvious rules of duty should be taught them, in a systematic manner, by a competent instructor. But that man would be thought little acquainted with the influences which go to mould and form the character, who should suppose the matter ended here. The doctrines inculcated in the lesson, must be carried out and applied in all the petty incidents of the day. Not an hour passes in a large family or a school, without an occurrence involving some principle in morals. A boy of moderate talents, notwithstanding all his exertions, is eclipsed by one more gifted, and he is tempted to envy. Imagining himself aggrieved or insulted by his fellows, he burns for revenge. Overtaken in a fault and threatened with punishment, he is tempted to lie. Misled by the opinion of others, or esteeming some rule of his teachers harsh and unnecessary, he is inclined to disobey. These and a hundred other instances which might be named, will suggest to the thoughtful parent or teacher so many opportunities for giving incidentally the most important practical instruction in morals.

In these and the manifold other illustrations which might be given, the essential point is to quicken and keep alive the attention. Whatever be the subject of study, and whether the instructions be direct or incidental, let children be preserved from attending to it in a sluggish, listless, indifferent manner. The subject of study, in the case of young persons, is often of less importance than the manner of study. I have been led sometimes to doubt the value of many of the inventions for facilitating the acquisition of knowledge by children. That knowledge the acquisition of which costs no labor, will not be likely to make a deep impression, or to remain long upon the memory. It is by labor that the mind strengthens and grows: and while care should be taken not to overtask it by exertions beyond its strength, yet let it never be forgotten that mere occupation of the mind, even with useful and proper objects, is not the precise aim of education. The educator aims, not to make learned boys, but able men. To do this, he must tax their powers. He must rouse them to manly exertion. He must teach them to think, to discriminate, to digest what they have received, to work. Every day there must be the glow of hard work,--not the exhaustion and languor which arise from too protracted confinement to study,--which have the same debilitating effect upon the mind that a similar process has upon the body,--but vigorous and hardy labor, such as wakens the mind from its lethargy, summons up the resolution and the will, and puts the whole internal man into a state of determined and positive activity. The boy in such a case feels that he is at work. He feels, too, that he is gaining something more than knowledge. He is gaining power. He is growing in strength. He grapples successfully to-day with a difficulty that would have staggered him yesterday. There is no mistaking this process; and no matter what the subject of study, the intellectual development what it gives, is worth infinitely more than all that vague, floating kind of knowledge sometimes sought after, which seems to be imbibed somehow from the atmosphere of the school-room, as it certainly evaporates the moment a boy enters the atmosphere of men and of active life.

XXVII.

GAINING THE ATTENTION.

The teacher who fails to get the attention of his scholars, fails totally. The pupils may perhaps learn something, because they may give the lesson some study at home, under the direction of their parents. But they learn nothing from the teacher. He is really no teacher, though he may occupy the teacher's seat. There is, and there can be, no teaching, where the attention of the scholar is not secured. Gaining the attention is an indispensable condition to the thing called teaching. Not, however, the only indispensable thing. We have seen a class wrought by special tricks and devices to the highest pitch of excited attention,--fairly panting with eagerness, all eyes and ears, on the very tiptoe of aroused mental activity,--yet learning nothing. The teacher had the knack of stirring them up and lashing them into a half frenzy of excited expectation, without having any substantial knowledge wherewith to reward their eagerness. With all his one-sided skill, he was but a mountebank. To real, successful teaching, there must be these two things, namely, the ability to hold the minds of the children, and the ability to pour into the minds thus presented sound and seasonable instruction. Lacking the latter ability, your pupil goes away with his vessel unfilled. Lacking the former, you only pour water upon the ground.

How shall the teacher secure attention?

In the first place, let him make up his mind that he will have it. This is half the battle. Let him settle it with himself, that until he does this, he is doing nothing; that without the attention of his scholars, he is no more a teacher, than is the chair he occupies. If he is not plus, he is zero, if not actually minus. With this truth fully realized, he will come before his class resolved to have a hearing; and this very resolution, written as it will be all over him, will have its effect upon his scholars. Children are quick to discern the mental attitude of a teacher. They know, as if by instinct, whether he is in earnest or not, and in all ordinary cases they yield without dispute to a claim thus resolutely put.

This, then, is the first duty of the teacher in this matter. He must go to his class with the resolute determination of making every scholar feel his presence all the time. The moment any scholar shows that the consciousness of his teacher's presence is not on his mind, as a restraining power, something is wrong. The first step towards producing that consciousness, as an abiding influence on the minds of the scholars, is for the teacher to determine in his own mind and bring it about. Without being arrogant, without being dictatorial, without being or doing anything that is disagreeable or unbecoming, he must yet make up his mind to put forth in the class a distinct power of self-assertion. He must determine to make them feel that he is there, that he is there all the time, that he is there to every one of them.

In the next place, the teacher must not disappoint the attention which his manner has challenged. He must have something valuable to communicate to the expectant minds before him. He must be thoroughly prepared in the lesson, so that the pupils shall feel that they are learning from him. His lips must keep knowledge. The human heart thirsts for knowledge. This is one of its natural instincts. It is indeed often much perverted, and many are to be found who even show aversion to being instructed. Yet the normal condition of things is otherwise, and nothing is more common than to see children hanging with fondness around any one who has something to tell them. Let the teacher then be sure to have something to say, as well as determined to say it.

In the third place, the teacher must have his knowledge perfectly at command. It must be on the tip of his tongue. If he hesitates, and stops to think, or to look in his book for the purpose of hunting up what he has to tell them, he will be very apt to lose his chance. Teaching children, particularly young children, is like shooting birds on the wing. The moment your bird is in sight, you must fire. The moment you have the child's eye, be ready to speak. This readiness of utterance is a matter to be cultivated. The ripest scholars are often sadly deficient in it. The very habit of profound study is apt to induce the opposite quality to readiness. A teacher who is conscious of this defect, must resolutely set himself to resist it and overcome it. He can do so, if he will. But it requires resolution and practice.

In the fourth place, the teacher must place himself so that every pupil in the class is within the range of his vision. It is not uncommon to see a teacher pressing close up to the scholars in the centre of the class, so that those at the right and left ends are out of his sight; or if he turns his face to those on one side, he at the same time turns his back to those on the other. Always sit or stand where you can all the while see the face of every pupil. I have, hundreds of times, seen the whole character of the instruction and discipline of a class changed by the observance of this simple rule.

Another rule is to use your eyes quite as much as your tongue. If you want your class to look at you, you must look at them. The eye has a magic power. It wins, it fascinates, it guides, it rewards, it punishes, it controls. You must learn how to see every child all the time. Some teachers seem to be able to see only one scholar at a time. This will never do. While you are giving this absorbed, undivided attention to one, all the rest are running wild. Neither will it do for the teacher to be looking about much, to see what is going on among the other classes in the room. Your scholars' eyes will be very apt to follow yours. You are the engineer, they are the passengers. If you run off the track, they must do likewise. Nor must your eye be occupied with the book, hunting up question and answer, nor dropped to the floor in excessive modesty. All the power of seeing that you have is needed for looking earnestly, lovingly, without interruption, into the faces and eyes of your pupils.

But for the observance of this rule, another is indispensable. You must learn to teach without book. Perhaps you cannot do this absolutely. But the nearer you can approach to it, the better. Thorough preparation, of course, is the secret of this power. Some teachers think they have prepared a lesson when they have gone over it once, and studied out all the answers. There could not be a greater mistake. This is only the first step in the preparation. You might as well think that you have learned the Multiplication Table, and are prepared to teach it, when you have gone over it once and seen by actual count that the figures are all right, and you know where to put your finger on them when required. You are prepared to teach a lesson when you have all the facts and ideas in it at your tongue's end, so that you can go through them all, in proper order, without once referring to the book. Any preparation short of this will not do, if you want to command attention. Once prepare a lesson in this way, and it will give you such freedom in the art of teaching, and you will experience such a pleasure in it, that you will never want to relapse into the old indolent habit.

XXVIII.

COUNSELS.

* * * * *

1. _To a Young Teacher._

You are about to assume the charge of a class in the school under my care. Allow me, in a spirit of frankness, to make to you a brief statement of some of the aims of the institution, and of the principles by which we are guided in their prosecution.

1. "Unless the Lord build the house, they labor in vain that build it." I have no professional conviction more fixed and abiding than this, that no persons more need the direct, special, continual guidance of the Holy Spirit than those who undertake to mould and discipline the youthful mind. No preparation for this office is complete which does not include devout prayer for that wisdom which cometh from above. If any one possession, more than another, is the direct gift of the Almighty, it would seem to be that of knowledge. The teacher, therefore, of all men, is called upon to look upwards to a source that is higher than himself. He needs light in his own mind; he should not count it misspent labor to ask for light to be given to the minds of his scholars. There is a Teacher infinitely wiser and more skilful than any human teacher. The instructor must be strangely blind to the resources of his profession, who fails to resort habitually to that great, plenary, unbounded source of light and knowledge. While, therefore, we aim in this school to profit by all subsidiary and subordinate methods and improvements in the art of teaching, we first of all seek the aid of our Heavenly Father; we ask wisdom of Him who "giveth liberally and upbraideth not." This, then, is the first principle that governs us in the work here assigned us. The fear of God is the beginning of knowledge. We who are teachers endeavor to show that we ourselves fear God, and we inculcate the fear of Him as the first and highest duty of our scholars; and in every plan and effort to guide the young minds committed to us, we ourselves look for guidance to the only unerring source of light.

2. In proportion to the implicitness with which we rely upon divine aid, should be the diligence with which we use all the human means within our reach. It should therefore, in the second place, be the aim of the teachers of this school to acquaint themselves diligently with the most approved methods of teaching. No teachers will be retained who do not keep themselves well posted in the literature of their profession, and who are not found continually aiming at self-improvement. In whatever school of whatever country, any branch is taught by better methods than those practised here, it should be the duty of a teacher in this school to search it out, and to profit by the discovery. Improvement comes by comparison. The man, or the institution, that fails to profit by the experience of others, is not wise. I hold it to be the duty of every teacher of this school to be habitually conversant with the educational journals of the day, and with the standard works on the theory of teaching, and to lose no opportunity for personal observation of the methods of others. I have often noticed, with equal pain and commiseration, that young teachers, after having once finished their preliminary studies and obtained a situation, are thereupon apparently quite content, making no further effort at improvement, but settling down for life in an inglorious mediocrity. The best teachers in this school are expected to be better teachers next year than they are now,--with ampler stores of knowledge, and a happier faculty for communicating it. This, then, is our second aim in this school. We aim to have teachers thoroughly posted in regard to the theory and the methods of teaching, prepared to ride upon the advance wave of every real improvement in the art.

3. I should, however, fail entirely to convey my meaning, were I to lead you to suppose that we expect to accomplish our ends mainly by fine-spun theories. I have no faith in any theory of education, which does not include, as one of its leading elements, _hard work_. The teachers of this school expect to work hard, and we expect the scholars to work hard. We have no royal road to learning. Any knowledge, the acquisition of which costs nothing, is usually worth nothing. The mind, equally with the body, grows by labor. If some stuffing process could be invented, by which knowledge could be forced into a mind perfectly passive, the knowledge so acquired would be worthless to its possessor, and would soon pass away, leaving the mind as blank as it was before. Knowledge, to be of any value, must be assimilated, as bodily food is. Teaching is essentially a co-operative act. The mind of the teacher and the mind of the scholar must both act, and must act together, in intellectual co-operation and sympathy, if there is to be any true mental growth. Teaching is not merely hearing lessons. It is not mere talking. It is something more than mere telling. It is causing a child to know. It is awakening attention, and then satisfying it. It is an out-and-out live process. The moment the mind of the teacher or the mind of the scholar flags, real teaching ceases. This, then, is our third aim. We aim in this school to accomplish results, not by fanciful theories, but by _bona fide_ hard work,--by keeping teachers and scholars, while at their studies, wide awake and full of life; not by exhausting drudgery, nor by fitful, irregular, spasmodic exertions, but by steady, persevering, animated, straight-forward work.

4. A fourth aim which we have steadily before us, is to make _thorough_ work of whatever acquisition we attempt. A little knowledge, well learned and truly digested, and made a part of the pupil's own intellectual stores, is worth more to him than any amount of facts loosely and indiscriminately brought together. In intellectual, as in other tillage, the true secret of thrift is to plough deep, not to skim over a large surface. The prevailing tendency at this time, in systems of education, is unduly to multiply studies. So many new sciences are being brought within the pale of popular knowledge, that it is no longer possible, in a school like this, to embrace within its course of study all the subjects which it is practicable and desirable for people generally to know. Through the whole encyclopædia of arts and sciences, there is hardly one which has not its advocates, and which has not strong claims to recognition. The teacher is simply infatuated who attempts to embrace them all in his curriculum. He thereby puts himself under an absolute necessity of being superficial, and he generates in his scholars pretension and conceit. Old James Ross, the grammarian, famous as a teacher in Philadelphia more than half a century ago, had on his sign simply these words, "Greek and Latin taught here." Assuredly I would not advocate quite so rigid an exclusion as that, nor, if limited to only two studies, would it be those. But I have often thought Mr. Ross's advertisement suggestive. Better even that extreme than the encyclopædic system which figures so largely on some circulars. Mr. Ross indeed taught nothing but Latin and Greek. But he taught these languages better probably than they have ever been taught on this continent; and any two branches thoroughly mastered are of more service to the pupil than twenty branches known imperfectly and superficially. A limited field, then, and thorough work. This is our fourth aim.

5. As a fifth aim, we endeavor, in the selection of subjects of study, not to allow the common English branches, as they are called, to be shoved aside. To read well, to write a good hand, to be expert in arithmetic, to have such a knowledge of geography and history as to read intelligently what is going on and the world, to have such a knowledge of one's own language as to use it correctly and purely in speaking and composition,--these are attainments to be postponed to no others. These are points of primary importance, to be aimed at by every one, whatever else he may omit.

6. We aim, in the sixth place, to mark the successive parts of the course of study by well defined limits. There are in the course of study successive stages of progress, and these stages are made as clear and precise as it is possible to make them; and no pupil is allowed to go forward until the ground behind is thoroughly mastered. At the same time, these stages in study should be kept all the while before the minds of the pupils as goals to be aimed at. There are, for this purpose, at briefly recurring intervals, examinations for promotion. While no pupil is permitted to go forward, except as the result of a rigorous examination, the idea of an advance should, if possible, never be allowed to be absent from his thoughts. That scholar should be counted worthy of highest honor, not who stands highest in a particular room, but who by successful examinations can pass most rapidly from room to room. That teacher is considered most successful, not who retains most pupils, but who in a given time pushes most pupils forward into a higher room. We want no scholar to stand still for a single week. Motion, progress, definite achievement, must be the order of the day.