CHAPTER VII

METHOD IN PRIMARY READING

The problem of primary reading is one of the most complex and difficult in the whole range of school instruction. A large proportion of the finest skill and sympathy of teachers has been expended in efforts to find the appropriate and natural method of teaching children to read. All sorts of methods and devices have been employed, from the most formal and mechanical to the most spirited and realistic.

The first requisite to good reading is something worth reading, something valuable and interesting to the children, and adapted to their minds. We must take it for granted in this discussion that the best literature and the best stories have been selected, and what the teacher has to do is, first, to appreciate these masterpieces for herself, and second, to bring the children in the reading lessons to appreciate and enjoy them. In the primary grades we are not so richly supplied with available materials from good literature as in intermediate and grammar grades. This is due not to difficulty in thought, but to the unfamiliar written and printed forms. The great problem in primary reading is to master these strange forms as quickly as possible, and find entrance to the story-land of books. For several years, however, primary teachers have been selecting and adapting the best stories, and some of the leading publishers have brought out in choice school-book form books which are well adapted to the reading of primary grades.

We should like to assume one other advantage. If the children have been treated orally to "Robinson Crusoe" in the second grade, they will appreciate and read the story much better in the third grade. If some of Grimm's stories are told in first grade, they can be read with ease in the second grade. The teacher's oral presentation of the stories is the right way to bring them close to the life and interest of children. In the first grade, as shown in the chapter on oral lessons, it is the only way, because the children cannot yet read. But even if they could read, the oral treatment is much better. The oral presentation is more lively, natural, and realistic. The teacher can adapt the story and the language to the immediate needs of the class as no author can. She can question, or suggest lines of thought, or call up ideas from the children's experience. The oral manner is the true way to let the children delve into the rich culture-content of stories and to awaken a taste for their beauty and truth. We could well wish that before children read mythical stories in fourth grade, they had been stirred up to enjoy them by oral narration and discussion in the preceding year. In the same way, if the reading bears on interesting science topics previously studied, it will be a distinct advantage to the reading lesson. Children like to read about things that have previously excited their interest, whether in story or science. The difficulties of formal reading will also be partly overcome by familiarity with the harder names and words. Our conclusion is that reading lessons, alone, cannot provide all the conditions favorable to good reading. Some of these can be well supplied by other studies or by preliminary lessons which pave the way for the reading proper. This matter has been so fully discussed in the earlier chapters on oral work that it requires no further treatment here.

FOLK-LORE STORIES AS READING EXERCISES FOR FIRST GRADE

Let it be supposed that a class of first-grade children has learned to tell a certain story orally. It has interested them and stirred up their thought.

Let them next learn to read the same story in a very simple form. This will lead to a series of elementary reading lessons in connection with the story, and the aim should be strictly that of mastering the early difficulties of reading. The teacher recalls the story, and asks for a statement from its beginning. If the sentence furnished by the child is simple and suitable, the teacher writes it on the blackboard in plain large script. Each child reads it through and points out the words. Let there be a lively drill upon the sentence till the picture of each word becomes clear and distinct. During the first lesson, two or three short sentences can be handled with success. As new words are learned, they should be mixed up on the board with those learned before, and a quick and varied drill on the words in sentences or in columns be employed to establish the forms in memory.[8] Speed, variety in device, and watchfulness to keep all busy and attentive are necessary to secure good results.

[8] First-class primary teachers claim that drills are unnecessary if the teacher is skilful in recombining the old words in new sentences.

After a few lessons one or two of the simpler words may be taken for phonetic analysis. The simple sounds are associated with the letters that represent them. These familiar letters are later met and identified in new words, and, as soon as a number of sounds with their symbols have been learned, new words can be constructed and pronounced from these known elements.

The self-activity of the children in recognizing the elementary sounds, already met, in new words as fast as they come up, is one of the chief merits of this early study of words. They thus early learn the power of self-help and of confident reliance upon themselves in acquiring and using knowledge. The chief difficulty is in telling which sound to use, as a letter often has several sounds (as _a_, _e_, _s_, _c_, etc.). But the children are capable of testing the known sounds of a letter upon a new word, and in most cases, of deciding which to use. The thoughtless habit of pronouncing every new word for a child, without effort on his part, checks and spoils his interest and self-activity. It does not seem necessary to use an extensive system of diacritical markings to guide him in these efforts to discriminate sounds. It is better to use the marks as little as possible and learn to interpret words as they usually appear in print. Experience has shown decisively that a lively and vigorous self-activity is manifested by such early efforts in learning to read. It is one of the most encouraging signs in education to see little children in their first efforts to master the formal art of reading, showing this spirited self-reliant energy.

In the same way, they recognize old words in sentences and new or changed combinations of old forms, and begin to read new sentences which combine old words in new relations.

In short, the sentence, word, and phonic methods are all used in fitting alternation, while originality and variety of device are necessary in the best exercise of teaching power.

The processes of learning to read by such board-script work are partly analytic and partly synthetic. Children begin with sentences, analyze them into words, and some of the words into their simple sounds. But when these sounds begin to grow familiar, they are identified again in other words, thus combining them into new forms. In the same way, words once learned by the analytic study of sentences are recognized again in new sentences, and thus interpreted in new relations.

The short sentences, derived from a familiar story, when ranged together supply a brief, simple outline of the story. If now this series of sentences be written on the board or printed on slips of paper, the whole story may be reviewed by the class from day to day till the word and sentence forms are well mastered. For making these printed slips, some teachers use a small printing-press, or a typewriter. Eventually several stories may be collected and sewed together, so as to form a little reading-book which is the result of the constructive work of teacher and pupils.

The reading lessons just described are entirely separate from the oral treatment and reproduction of the stories; yet the thought and interest awakened in the oral work are helpful in keeping up a lively effort in the reading class. The thought material in a good story is itself a mental stimulus, and produces a wakefulness which is favorable to imprinting the forms as well as the content of thought. Expression, also, that is, natural and vivid rendering of the thought, is always aimed at in reading, and springs spontaneously from interesting thought studies.

Many teachers use the materials furnished by oral lessons in natural science as a similar introduction to reading in first grade. The science lessons furnish good thought matter for simple sentences, and there is good reason why, in learning to read, children should use sentences drawn both from literature and from natural science.

READING IN THE SECOND GRADE

The oral lessons in good stories, and the later board-use of these materials in learning the elements of formal reading, are an excellent preparation for the fuller and more extended reading of similar matter in the second and third grades.

When the oral work of the first grade has thus kindled the fancy of a child upon these charming pictures, and the later board-work has acquainted him with letter and word symbols which express such thought, the reading of the same and other stories of like character (a year later) will follow as an easy and natural sequence. As a preliminary to all good reading exercises, there should be rich and fruitful thought adapted to the age of children. The realm of classic folk-lore contains abundant thought material peculiar in its fitness to awaken the interest and fancy of children in the first two grades. To bring these choice stories close to the hearts of children should be the aim of much of the work in both these grades. Such an aim, skilfully carried out, not only conduces to the joy of children in first grade, but infuses the reading lessons of second grade with thought and culture of the best quality.

Interest and vigor of thought are certain to help right expression and reading. Reading, like every other study, should be based upon realities. When there is real thought and feeling in the children, a correct expression of them is more easily secured than by formal demands or by intimidation.

The stories to be read in second or third grade may be fuller and longer than the brief outline sentences used for board-work in the first grade. Besides, these tales, being classic and of permanent value, do not lose their charm by repetition.

METHOD

By oral reading, we mean the giving of the thought obtained from a printed page to others through the medium of the voice.

There is first the training of the eye in taking in a number of words at a glance--a mechanical process; then the interpretation of these groups of words--a mental process; next the making known of the ideas thus obtained to others, by means of the voice--also a mechanical process.

The children need special help in each step. We are apt to overdo one at the expense of the others.

1. Eye-training is the foundation of all good reading. Various devices are resorted to in obtaining it. We will suggest a few, not new at all, but useful.

(_a_) A strip of cardboard, on which is a clause or sentence, is held before the class, for a moment only, and then removed. The length of the task is increased as the eye becomes trained to this kind of work.

(_b_) The children open their books at a signal from the teacher, glance through a line, or part of one, indicated by the teacher, close book at once and give the line.

(_c_) The teacher places on the board clauses or sentences bearing on the lesson, and covers with a map. The map is rolled up to show one of these, which is almost immediately erased. The children are then asked to give it. The map is then rolled up higher, exposing another, which also is speedily erased--and so on until all have been given to the children and erased.

2. The child needs not only to be able to recognize groups of words, but he must be able to get thought from them. The following are some devices to that end:--

(_a_) Suggestive pictures can be made use of to advantage all through the primary grades. If the child reads part of the story in the picture, and finds it interesting, he will want to read from the printed page the part not given in the picture.

(_b_) Where there is no picture--or even where there is one--an aim may be useful to arouse interest in the thought, _i.e._ a thoughtful question may be put by the teacher, which the children can answer only by reading the story; _e.g._ in the supplementary reader, "Easy Steps for Little Feet," is found the story of "The Pin and Needle." There is no picture. The teacher says, as the class are seated: "Now we have a story about a big quarrel between a pin and a needle over the question, 'Which one is the better fellow?' Of what could the needle boast? Of what the pin? Let us see which won."

(_c_) Let all the pupils look through one or more paragraphs, reading silently, to get the thought, before any one is called upon to read aloud. If a child comes to a word that he does not know, during the silent reading, the teacher helps him to get it--from the context if possible--if not, by the sounds of the letters which compose it.

As each child finishes the task assigned, he raises his eyes from the book, showing by this act that he is ready to tell what he has just read. The thought may be given by the child in his own language to assure the teacher that he has it. Usually, however, in the lower grades, this is unnecessary, the language of the book being nearly as simple as his own.

The advantage of having all the pupils kept busy, instead of one alone who might be called upon to read the paragraph, is evident. Every child reads silently all of the lesson. Time would not permit that this be done orally, were it advisable to do so. When the child gets up to read, he is not likely to stumble, for he has both the thought and the expression for it, at the start.

While aiming to have the children comprehend the thought, the teacher should not forget, on the other hand, that this is the reading hour, and not the time for much oral instruction and reproduction. There are other recitations in which the child is trained to free oral expression of thought, as in science and literature. Such offhand oral expression of his own ideas is not the primary aim of the reading lesson. Its purpose is to lend life to the recitation.

3. Steps 1 and 2 deal with preparation for the reading. Up to this time, no oral reading has been done. Now we are ready to begin.

Children will generally express the thought with the proper emphasis if they not only see its meaning but also feel it. Suppose the children are interested in the thought of the piece, they still fail, sometimes, to give the proper emphasis. How can the teacher, by questioning, get them to realize the more important part of the thought?

(_a_) The teacher has gone deeper into the meaning than have the children. Her questions should be such as to make real to the children the more emphatic part of the thought; _e.g._ in the Riverside Primer we have, "Poor Bun, good dog, did you think I meant to hit you?" John reads, "Do you think I meant to _hit_ you?" The teacher says, "I will be Bun, John. What is it that you do not want Bun to think?" ("That I _meant_ to hit him.") "But you did mean to hit something. What was it you did not mean to hit? Tell Bun." ("I did not _mean_ to hit _you_.") Now ask him if he thought that you did. ("Did you think I _meant_ to hit _you_?")

(_b_) When the story is in the form of a dialogue, the children may personate the characters in the story. Thus, getting into the real spirit of the piece, their emphasis will naturally fall where it properly belongs.

(_c_) Sometimes the teacher will find it necessary to show the child how to read a passage properly, by reading it himself. It is seldom best to do this--certainly not if the correct expression can be reached through questioning.

Many a teacher makes a practice of giving the proper emphasis to the child, he copying it from her voice. Frequently, children taught in this way can read one piece after another in their readers with excellent expression, but, when questioned, show that their minds are a blank as to the meaning of what they are reading.

In working for expression, a great many teachers waste the time and energy of the pupils by indefinite directions. The emphasis is not correctly placed, so the teacher says, "I do not like that; try it again, May." Now, May has no idea in what particular she has failed, so she gives it again, very likely as she gave it before, or she may put the emphasis on some other word, hoping by so doing to please the teacher. "Why, no, May, you surely can do better than that," says the teacher. So May makes another fruitless attempt, when the teacher, disgusted, calls on another pupil to show her how to read. May has gained no clearer insight into the thought than she started out with, no power to grapple more successfully with a similar difficulty another time, and has lost, partly at least, her interest in the piece. She has been bothered and discouraged, and the class wearied.

Sometimes when the expression is otherwise good, the children pitch their voices too high or too low. Natural tones must be insisted upon. A good aid to the children in this respect is the habitual example of quiet, clear tones in the teacher.

Another fault of otherwise good reading is a failure to enunciate distinctly. Children are inclined to slight many sounds, especially at the end of the words, and the teacher is apt to think: "That doesn't make so very much difference, since they are only children. When they are older they will see that their pronunciation is babyish, and adopt a correct form." This is unsound reasoning. Every time the child says _las_ for _last_ he is establishing more firmly a habit, to overcome which will give him much difficulty.

In the pronunciation of words as well as in the reading of a sentence, much time is wasted through failure to point out the exact word, and the syllable in the word, in which the mistake has been made. The child cannot improve unless he knows in what particular there is room for improvement.

Children in primary grades should be supplied with a good variety of primers, readers, and simple story books. In the course of their work they should read through a number of first, second, and third readers. Much of this reading should be simple and easy, so that they can move rapidly through a book, and gain confidence and satisfaction from it. In each grade there should be several sets of readers, which can be turned to as the occasion may demand. It is much better to read a new reader, involving in the main the same vocabulary, than to reread an old book. This use of several books in each grade adds to the interest and reduces to a minimum the mere drills, which are to be avoided as much as possible.

SUMMARY

1. Let children read under the impulse of strong and interesting thought.

(_a_) The previous oral treatment of the stories now used as reading lessons will help this thought impulse.

(_b_) An aim concretely stated, and touching an interesting thought in the lesson, will give impetus to the work.

(_c_) Let children pass judgment on the truth, worth, or beauty of what they read.

(_d_) Clear mental pictures of people, actions, places, etc., conduce to vigor of thought. To this end the teacher should use good pictures, make sketches, and give descriptions or explanations. Children should also be allowed to sketch freely at the board.

2. Children should be encouraged constantly to help themselves in interpreting new words and sentences in reading.

(_a_) By looking through the new sentence and making it out, if possible, for themselves before any one reads it aloud.

(_b_) By analyzing a new word into its sounds, and then combining them to get its pronunciation.

(_c_) By interpreting a new word from its context, or by the first sound or syllable.

(_d_) By using the new powers of the letters as fast as they are learned in interpreting new words.

(_e_) By trying the different sounds of a letter to a new word to see which seems to fit best.

(_f_) By recognizing familiar words in new sentences with a different context.

(_g_) See that every child reads the sentences in the new lesson for himself.

3. There should be a gradual introduction to the elementary sounds (powers of the letters).

The first words analyzed should be simple and phonetic in spelling, as _dog_, _hen_, _cat_, etc.

New sounds of letters are taught as the children need them in studying out new words.

Very little attention needs to be given to learning the names of the letters.

There need be little use of diacritical markings in early reading.

4. Many of the new words will occur in connection with the picture at the head of the lesson. Place these on the board as they come up.

If the teacher will weave these words into her conversation, they will give the children little future trouble.

5. All the different phases of the phonic, word, and sentence method should be woven together by a skilful teacher.

6. The close attention of all the members of the class, so that each reads through the whole lesson, should be an ever-present aim of the teacher.

7. Children should be trained to grasp several words at a glance:--

(_a_) By quick writing and erasure of words and sentences at the board.

(_b_) By exposing for an instant sentences covered by a screen.

(_c_) By the use of phrases or short sentences on cardboard.

(_d_) By questions for group thought.

These tests should increase in difficulty with growing skill.

8. Spend but little time in the oral reproduction of stories. Practice in good reading and interpretation is the main thing.

9. Children, from the first, should be encouraged to articulate distinctly in oral reading. Let the teacher begin at home.

10. Let the teacher cultivate a pleasing tone of voice, not loud or harsh. This will help the children to the same.

11. Vigorous and forcible expression is secured:--

(_a_) By having interesting stories.

(_b_) By apt questions to bring out the emphatic thought.

(_c_) By dramatizing the scenes of the story.

(_d_) By occasional examples of lively reading by the teacher.

(_e_) By definiteness in questioning.