SPECIAL METHOD HISTORY A COMPLETE OUTLINE OF A COURSE OF BY CHARLES A. MCMURRY, PH.D. DIRECTOR OF PRACTICE DEPARTMENT, NORTHERN ILLINOIS New York THE MACMILLAN COMPANY LONDON: MACMILLAN & CO., LTD. All rights reserved SEP 25. LIBRARY Subscription Fund COPYRIGHT, 1903, BY THE MACMILLAN COMPANY. Set up, electrotyped, and published August, 1903. Norwood Press J. 8. Cushing & Co. - Berwick & Smith Co. PREFACE THIS book contains a plan of a complete course of study in history for the grades below the high school. It is an attempt not only to outline this historical course, but also to point out with definiteness the materials which may appear in each year's study, to estimate the value and fitness of the matter selected for each grade, and to discuss and illustrate at some length the method of handling these materials. A separate chapter is given to a somewhat full discussion of each of the four grades of work. The chapter containing the course of study names the topics for each year's work, and also points out at length the correlations with geography, reading, and literature, while a separate chapter discusses the value of these correlations. The final chapter contains for each year a carefully selected and arranged series of books for children and teachers. It is hoped that this list will enable the teacher to carry out practically the course of study which precedes it. In order to carry out the plan of oral instruction advocated for fourth and fifth grades, the author has prepared three small volumes of Pioneer History Stories of America, which are designed to furnish the suitable story-material which may be easily arranged for any part of the country, according to local geographical position and needs. This book is one of a series of Special Methods in the common school studies. The others of the series are The Special Methods in the Reading of Complete English Classics, in Primary Reading and Oral Work with Stories, in Geography and in Natural Science. The entire series of Special Methods is designed to work out and apply in the detail of each study the broad principles discussed in the General Method and in the Method of the Recitation. A complete Course of Study for the Grades of the Common School is in preparation, which will bring together in two volumes the comprehensive plans, outlines of courses, and full references for all the studies of the common school. This course of Study in History, while it establishes American history as the central body of historical material, also draws extensively from the history of England and of Europe, and, in connection with reading and literature, looks for a still wider extension of the child's horizon of thought. CHARLES A. MCMURRY. PALATKA, FLORIDA, March 24, 1903. |