2. A consciousness, on the part of the teacher, of the ability to properly conduct the exercise.

A

No recitation can be effective unless these two conditions exist simultaneously. class may be ever-so-well prepared and an aimless, incoherent manner on the part of the teacher destroy what good effects might otherwise be hoped for, while the reverse of these conditions would prove equally barren and fruitless.

The proper attitude on the part of the class is found in: (a) quiet, (b) attention, (c) interest, each following, the outgrowth of the preceding. A class that is quiet, is prepared to be attentive, and the attention which is strengthened by interest is the kind that lends vital force to all investigation.

The conscious ability on the part of the teacher, can but be the outgrowth of: (a) a thorough knowledge of the subject proposed for discussion, (b) a clear conception as to manner and method of procedure, and (c) a concise and accurate realization of the end to be attained in the recitation.

With these observations as to the general Conditions essential to a recitation, it will be in order now to consider the special conditions necessary in the actual working of pupil and teacher during the recitation. Without following the usual method of discussion laid down in the "books," the object or aim of a recitation is given under three general divisions.

First.--The primal object of every recitation is to ascertain the extent of the individual pupil's information, though this can not be considered the highest or greatest object. This may be attained in three ways, or through three agencies:

(a) By individual discussion on the part of the pupil

(b) By direct inspection on the part of the teacher.

(c) By questions from other members of the same class.

These three means properly employed, by skilled teachers and earnest pupils, will give a very complete and thorough test of any information a pupil may possess on a given subject. This plan does even more. It allows the largest possible freedom for the exercise of the pupil's individuality, and insures the fullest possible investigation on the part of both teacher and pupil. Second.-The next object of a recitation is the acquiring of additional information

by a pupil from the fund of information obtained by other pupils of the class. This may also be arrived at in three ways:

(a) By questions, by the teacher, to the other members of the class.

(b) By suggestion from the other pupils.

(c) By questions asked by the individual pupil, directed to both teacher and other pupils.

This exercise allows informal discussion of any part of the recitation after it has been technically considered by the class as a whole.

Third. The third object which should be borne in mind by the instructor when he conducts a class exercise, is to give the whole class information on the subject under discussion, which they had not been able to obtain from the particular text used by them, from the class discussions, or from other sources, and which they should know as a part of the lesson material. This likewise, may be accomplished in three ways, by the instructor:

(a) From sources similar in nature and kind to information already acquired. (b) From individual experience.

(c) From the conclusions of his highest judgment.

This part of the recitation, well conducted, is most valuable. It takes the instructor outside the text-book and places him in the position of a guide, director, and philosopher. This is the great work of the true teacher, and he who fails to realize its importance loses his most powerful field for good. It is not here contended that all recitations must, singly, conform to these specifications, but it is contended, and with some degree of reason, that these conditions, both general and particular, include all possible forms of class recitations.

The final question to be considered in this connection will be: What should the recitation do for the individual pupil of the class? What should be the tendency of its influence? What results should follow? These questions are serious and yet necessary. sary. After several years experience, and mature deliberation on subjects of this nature, it seems evident to my mind, at least, that well-conducted recitations should develop in the pupil, (1) a new love for the subject considered, (2) a stronger desire for thoroughness, (3) an ambition for higher knowledge, (4) a desire for original investigation, (5) a clearer thought power, (6) a

more extended and more accurate vocabulary, (7) a more accurate judgment, (8) an ability to reason more clearly, (9) a greater veneration for mind power, (10) a greater love for truth, (11) a greater respect for the opinion of others, (12) a better individual.

These twelve results may not all come from a single recitation, but they should be clearly in view at all times when any instructor attempts to lead a class up to greater intellectual heights. It is frankly admitted that these crude observations are more especially

on the aim, or intent of a recitation, than on how to conduct a recitation in order to attain these ends. Nothing can take the place of "tactful" resources in a teacher. Lytton, in speaking of a philosopher, said: "He possessed the nameless art of making a personal impression upon his disciples, and of creating individual enthusiasm." The teacher who possesses this "nameless art" will always conduct his class recitations so as to attain the highest good for the pupils temporarily placed under his direction.

FRANKFORT, KY.

T IS quite common for wolves to masquerade in sheep's clothing pedagogically as as well as religiously. Thus it happens that a great deal of fraudulent practice is smuggled into even good schools under the cloak of pretentious doctrines and principles. A friend of mine who is not a teacher, and hence is philosophically reliable, says that there is nothing so illogical in practice as the logical extreme. Probably there is no greater source of illogical, senseless school work than the logical extreme of very fundamental doctrines. Some pedagogist suggests correlation and straightway the disciple rushes off to correlate everything within reach, evidently with the assumption that studies are made for correlation and not correlation for studies, and quite forgetting the other fact of every existence, isolation, or individuality. Another recommends "nature-study" as worthy of systematic teaching and a good point of departure in working out the program of instruction, and "the progressive teacher" rushes away again to base all of her work upon so-called science, in utter oblivion of the fact that there is a world of man constituting the other half of the universe, and much dearer to the child-heart than maple leaves or grasshoppers' legs. Or, it is suggested that it is not wise for school-children to eat mince pie for dinner, whereupon it is proposed that we shall straightway attach a commissary department to the school organization. Now, correlation, nature-study and

school hygiene are fundamental to successful teaching, but they are not the only fundamentals, nor can they be carried to logical extremes without the exclusion of other factors just as vital. These, in a way, illustrate a detrimental feature of much of our "up-to-date" school practice.

A fundamental doctrine of correct pedagogy is the law of growth through self-activity. But like all good things it is a cloak for vicious practice. From certain quarters has gone out the gospel of educating the child by having him to do whatsoever he wants to do the proposition that the important thing is for the child to be doing something in his own way. The idea is constant occupation in something of interest to the pupil-rather, something pleasurable to him. The teacher is satisfied so long as her pupils are actively engaged sewing cards, sorting beads, folding papers, matching colors or making unintelligible pictures to illustrate something of little consequence. Now, all these activities are of great value as means to end when used in proper connections, but, as ends in themselves, they are waste of time and energy. Teachers easily forget that to perform with an equipment does not necessarily insure any good to the child.

Not all activity is educative. Mere doing something does not give growth. The something must be worth doing, and must be done in an educative way. That is an educative act, in the final analysis, which gives

the individual power to do a new thing worth the doing, or to perform an old act more perfectly. It is supreme effort within the range of one's ability which gives growth. Not all activity involves supreme effort, or any effort, for that matter. What a child does automatically is done outside of his consciousness, beyond his horizon, and without the functioning of his personalty. Automatic activity is not educative. The child may do thousands of acts that bring him no new mode of action nor greater skill in the modes already acquired.

A deal of school work, primary work esspecially, is absolutely a waste of energy because it is not educative-because, in the pursuit of this work the child does not get this increase of skill nor a new mode of action. A large part of the "busy work" of the primary grades cannot stand the test of educative value. It is merely so much performance with material. Indeed, one chief weakness of primary work to-day, is the very prevalent feeling on the part of the teachers that their chief duty is to manipulate "the material belonging to their grades;" that is, the blocks, papers and other equipments. Back of it all there is a sort of hazy assumption of a mystic charm in performing with the apparatus supplied. If teachers will examine their reading and language exercises, their nature-study, and other lines of instructions, they will discover numerous instances of prolonged activity without educative activity. And if they will substitute for these non-educative exercises in their programs activities that are really educative, they will find abundant time for the many lines of instruction that are proposed.

In the details of what many are pleased to call "modern teaching" will be found a deal of absolutely worthless work done on the assumption that any and all activity is educative. The great bold-faced questionmark that should stand over every exercise is: Does the pupil receive real growth from this activity? Is it educative? And before the teacher's eyes William Hawley Smith's aphorism should stand a constant monitor: "When the stage carpenter becomes the star performer the drama is sure to suffer."

Another source of weakness in the primary school occurs in the endeavor of teachers not trained in kindergarten to extend the work of that department through the first two or three grades. The pedagogist assures the teacher that Froebel's ideas should pre

The

vail throughout the elementary school. Well and good. But what are Froebel's ideas? For one thing, they are not the manipulating of the gifts and the occupation material of the kindergarten outfit. kindergarten idea is not introduced into the grades by "stocking up" with a set of kindergarten furniture. Nor does the "kindergarten idea" consist in manufacturing titbits, gewgaws, and fancy frills. These things sometimes occur in the kindergarten, but they are merely the bubbles on the surface. Froebelism means that the school is an ideal community engaged in an intellectual, aesthetic, and moral survey of itself and enviroment, and that in this ideal community the individual is an active participant in all the activities in progress. It means, also, that the child has possibilities for great things, and that the school ought to furnish conditions for drawing him out in these many directions, for making him active in line with his possibilities. The kindergarten stands for two things above all else: the community idea, and the laboratory method. The trained teacher, when she speaks of continuing the kindergarten work through the grades, means kindergarten principles, not kindergarten programs. She means that the sweet joyousness of the kindergarten life, its activity, interestedness, its community life and laboratory method shall go on. To her there is nothing more deadly formal than mere paper-folding, bead-stringing or stick-laying. A teacher once said to me that her work in the first year was chiefly kindergarten, and pointed to a stock of lentils, gummed rings and coated papers as evidence in the case. There is but one thing more formal, and that is learning to read by first going through the spelling book.

There is abroad in the land the idea that lavish expenditures upon salaries and equipment mean progressive schools. Communities point with no little pride to the stationery and books furnished free to the pupil, as evidence of their progressive spirit. Now, not the least valuable feature of the public-school system is the fact that the whole people are taxed for its support. The public purse is close neighbor to public interest. terest. One generally guards well what one has paid handsomely for. A perceptible tax for educational purposes creates a healthy school interest; healthy because it is sometimes critical, and healthy because it is the outgrowth of the people's creative self-effort

vidual cannot satisfactorily prescribe mental food for another. It is one of the essentials of true study, that the mind is unfettered, and is permitted to follow out, as far as may be, the natural sequence of its ideas. Mental dicipline of a severe kind is necessary for the attainment of thoroughness; but it is contrary to the spirit of real learning to draw a line round the mental field, and forbid excursions beyond a set limit.

These remarks will strike you as mere truisms, but please consider how far the conditions mentioned obtain in our ordinary systems of education. Even the college student is by no means free in his choice of books, while the literature of the public schools is prescribed wholesale, often by persons who could hardly be described as literary men. I am not prepared to deny that this is more or less necessary and inevitable, but it may as well be recognized that we are sacrificing something in order to secure efficiency in other ways; just as when we turn out fabrics by machinery instead of making them by hand, the gain is not all gain, there is a very real loss in artistic merit and often in quality.

Already we are beginning to rebel from the tyranny of the text-book, and are coming to regard that. instrument of learning as something to be set aside as often as we feel able to avoid its use. We even hear that the pupils in the history class are to read up the "sources,"-copies of original documents, and the like; while science pupils are no longer to be reproved if they have the temerity to question what is printed in black and white. This revolt must necessarily bear good fruit, but it is by no means universal, and boards still continue to purchase by the hundred-weight, books which they oblige the teachers to use, regardless of the special needs of individuals.

In defense of the present system it may frankly be said, that we are not in a position to offer anything much better. Economy demands that we make each teacher, and each book, go round as far as possible. We can not place a library at the elbow of every pupil, nor can we secure many teachers, who are at the same time students, leading an intellectual life. Further, the public demands a certain uniformity in the accomplishments of the pupils; and it must be admitted that the unfettered mind does not always choose those paths which lead straight to dollars and cents. Still again,

and this is an important consideration, at least a large proportion of our pupils are not intended by nature for students at all, and while they might make good mechanics, for example, they could never be got to interest themselves in books except under the pressure of a well-defined system of "education;"-the name for the process being here a misnomer, since it consists of putting something into them which they do not possess, while carefully abstaining from developing what is there.*

But I am addressing you, a student, on the choice of books; and it is apparent that your first necessity is to be able to make a choice. You have graduated from the high school, and are in a position to go to college. I should be the last to deny the advantages which the college offers you, but there may be cases in which independent study is more fruitful than the following out of a set course under the most approved teachers. There is a very natural tendency among the faculties of colleges to prefer those students who are working for a degree, and "irregulars" are scarcely encouraged, if tolerated. It would be hard to imagine a college in which all the students were irregular and independent, and received their degrees for so many years' residence and a thesis alone. Yet, things seem to move in that direction, at least in Europe; and the principle is quite well recognized as applicable to post-graduate work for higher degrees.

Supposing that you have the opportunity to choose your reading, the first and fundamental principle is that it should have a certain organic unity. For this reason, lists of "the hundred best books," and so forth, will hardly serve your purpose; those who use them are rather dilettantes than students. Having some main study, by all means branch out therefrom in many directions, but let each excursion start from a point previously attained. Supposing you are studying botany, this will lead you, quite naturally, to read books on geology and geography, and even chemistry and ento

*I do not wish to suggest for a moment that the bornmechanic is in any respect inferior to the born-student. It is a cruel error, continually committed, to assume that those who have comparatively little aptitude for book-study are of inferior grade. It is lamentable to think of the mechanical, artistic, and other talents which must have lain dormant in "stupid" pupils; dormant because we take no pains to educate the hand or eye, but concentrate our efforts upon certain mental activities, especially the development of the memory-a comparatively low and primitive faculty. The Swedish "Sloyd" system, now well-known, recognizes and remedies these evils, and should be adopted as widely. as possible.