For the Common School Journal.

SUGGESTIONS.-COMPOSITION.

lr would seem that to no teacher can a suggestion be more valuable than to the teacher of the ungraded or mixed school. Some general exercise in which all the scholars may be interested, or in which all except the youngest class may join, and which may be adapted to every one, seems a desideratum.

Let us take an exercise in composition; we have a half hour to spend. Let the scholars take slates and pencils, and let each have before him a picture, which is readily found in the reader or geography. They are directed to write each a story about his picture. Some begin at once. Others do not know how to begin, but a few words from the teacher give to them, one by one, the necessary instruction, without telling them just what to write. After a suitable time has been occupied in writing they are called upon to read their several stories. From her picture of a clearing in the forest, with its log cabin, &c. Eliza has filled her slate with an animated account of the emigrant family, their former home, present circumstances, character, &c.; Emma has a pleasant description of the woodcutter and his work in the woods; John has a dozen lines about the dog, Albert as many about the farmhouse, and little Mary has printed on her state two or three short sentences about Jane and her bird, with some foreign idiom, some words wrongly spelled, but carefully done. All are read with interest and appreciation, and here is not a small benefit to the reader. The scholars understand what they have written, and the meaning of the words they have used, and therefore can read intelligently. Perhaps our schools would not be losers by it, if Mr. Gallaudet's method with his children were adopted to some extent, that of requiring them to compose their own. reading lessons. While the scholars have been writing, the teacher has had opportunity to look at all the slates and correct on each some expression, some word incorrectly spelled, some wrong use of capital letters, or the formation of some

As an oc-. At another

letter, according to the advancement of the pupil. casional exercise this plan has succeeded well. time the teacher might read a story as the subject, or might talk with the school on the subject he has chosen for the

exercise.

But, first of all, begin early with composition; do not wait till boys and girls are twelve years old, or till they have learned to write; let them print, if they cannot write; let them learn at once, to think, compose, write and spell. NOVEMBER 22d, 1861.

K.

For the Common School Journal.

MAKING LESSONS INTERESTING.

Ir is, no doubt, a very uninteresting thing for the child to recite a task from the book day after day without a word of instruction or of illustration from the teacher. Indeed, it must be a wearisome process to the teacher himself. Some children will work out for themselves, in part at least, the meaning of what they recite, and others will lay by the stores committed to memory till more mature age and larger experience shall interpret their hidden meaning and discover their unnoticed relations. To other children this learning the strict lesson assigned, with nothing from the teacher to relieve its dullness and fix their attention, is a dead lesson now, and will be a dead lesson always. The teacher must do what he can to make the load light enough for the child to carry without that degree of weariness which will discourage him.

But granting with all cheerfulness the propriety of making all school exercises "interesting" that they may be understood and remembered, is not the tendency of the instruction of many teachers, to make them so interesting by means of episodes and excursions from some starting point suggested by the lesson, as to take from them all their substance and leave nothing but the unsubstantial shadow for the mind to feed on?

Any class in Geography or History will be entertained by stories of places or events connected with the lesson; but

anecdote is not Geography, though the class seems ever so eager to listen, and amusing incidents are not the pith of History, though the class may be all agape to hear them. And how, sometimes the reading lesson "branches out into infinity," to use a saying of Burke's, and that which ought to be the busines of the lesson becomes only the occasion for lessons on all sorts of topics. What is true of these is true of all lessons of older pupils. Instead of being made the occasion of close study and careful preparation, of thorough thinking and adequate expression, of exhaustive questions and complete answers, they are made the occasions of diverting trifles and irrelevant nonsense. The problem of the recitation seems to be-given so much truth to reduce it to the thinnest solution; whereas it should be-given so much truth to be mastered and digested. And what is true of older classes is true to a greater degree of younger classes. The truth presented to them must be sugared and spiced, or they will not take it. If there is a pitiable display of a want of judgement any where in the school-room, it is in the dilution of lessons to their comprehension till there is nothing left to comprehend, and this for the honest purpose of enlivening the exercise and so making it "interesting.” What small rations are served out to hungering minds! And what want of robustness is the natural consequence!'

For all classes we say, the illustration for the sake of the lesson, not the lesson for the sake of the illustration. Let the lesson be the basis of any interest which may be connected with it and if it has no inherent interest, if it has no point of contract with the learner's mind, throw it aside and take something that has. Truth does not need dressing in such gaudy colors; her own simple robes of white are sufficient to attract and hold attention; and especially is this the case with young children-unless the sight has been previously blurred by pretentious exhibitions. Almost any class may be interested by being kept busy with either some thing to do, or something to think about, and any teacher ought to be able to find employment for his classes during the actual time of reciting, and being kept busy is the condi

tion and the means of being interested in school exercises. If this is done there will be no time or disposition for trifling. Though we like to see animation and fulness of resources ready at command, in every teacher, and see them liberally bestowed on all fitting occasions, we confess to a lingering respect for the learning of the lessons which used to be required, and to more than a suspicion of the results of explaining things, till they are explained away. At any rate, give us as much as our modern characters and manners will bear of grappling with difficulties, and sowing of seeds, and grafting of ideas, so that when we become men and put away childish things we may not have put away our entire stock, and be cast upon the world poor and naked. Let our recitations be the arenas of mental gymnastics, and not mental picnics where our pupils are fed on plum cake which both impairs their digestion and spoils their taste.

H. B. B.

SCHOOL DISCIPLINE.

(WHILE teachers are required to maintain order in School and secure obedience to necessary rules, they are reminded that passionate and harsh expressions and injudicious measures, tend only to evil, and the best disciplinarian is the one who can secure order by the gentlest influences.-Rules of Toledo Board of Education, Art. IV., Sec. 16.)

It is comparatively an easy task, to find teachers for our schools, who have the requisite knowledge of the branches taught in them. It is far more difficult, to find those who can discipline properly. In nearly every instance, of the dismissal of teachers from the service of the Board, defective discipline was the prime cause.

So important is this faculty, this power of governing well, that, without it, the best education and the most earnest enthusiasm, become almost valueless. Indeed, I have known repeated instances, where teachers of very ordinary attain

ments otherwise, have met with decided success, because of their power to discipline well..

The requisition of the Board requires the teacher "to maintain order in school and to secure obedience to necessary rules." With a simple suggestion, as to the means to be employed, it wisely leaves the question of "How shall my school be governed?" to the individual teacher.

The results to be obtained by the discipline of the school, are habits of obedience, a just respect for law and right, the culture of the manners and morals, as well as of the mind. The means to be used are left to individual choice, or habit. And yet, one must be very unobservant, who shall visit our schools, any day of their session, and not remark a wide difference in their discipline. Some teachers seem never to be governing their schools, and the pupils seem under no irksome restraints, and yet all things move on quietly and in order. This quiet, even seemingly unconscious method of discipline, rarely using in its dealings with children, other weapons than justice, truthfulness, patience and sympathy, is in strange contrast with that other method, which seems always anxiously at work to force an outward observance of rules, by the use of harsh words, ill temper, corporal punishments, and much other jarring machinery of Force.

In our schools, as in most Public Schools, corporal punishment is resorted to as a means of discipline. In most instances, it is used by the teacher as a last resort, and judiciously. In but a few instances, have parents entered complaints against our teachers, for undue severity of discipline.

Perhaps it is impossible, in view of the mixed character of our schools, to assert that in all instances, they can be gov erned without a resort to corporal punishment.

This would only be possible, were the home influences surrounding each pupil, as favorable to good discipline, as in the case of the most favored in this respect. Where the parent gives an unhesitating support to the teacher, in enforcing just rules, there is little difficulty with the pupil. VOL. IX.

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