GOOD BOOKS TO ADOPT NOW FOR SEPTEMBER USE Each teacher who is considering the choice of text-books for the coming school year should have at hand a copy of our 1910 Catalogue of STRONG BOOKS FOR ELEMENTARY SCHOOLS. It describes briefly but clearly 200 of the leading books, including: Our GUIDE TO GOOD READING, an attractive 72 page illustrated pamphlet, describes 228 volumes of Supplementary Reading, on all subjects and for all grades, forming the largest and most complete list of its kind ever issued. Among those most recently issued are: Both of these helpful catalogues will be mailed to any teacher on request. Primary Education A MONTHLY JOURNAL FOR PRIMARY TEACHERS VOLUME XVIII PRIMARY EDUCATION PUBLISHED BY THE JUNE 1910 PRIMARY EDUCATION COMPANY 50 BROMFIELD STREET, BOSTON NOTICE NEW SUBSCRIPTIONS may begin at any time. Ten issues, September to June in clusive, constitute the volume. RENEWALS Subscribers do not always find it convenient to renew at expiration, and as a matter of convenience to them, we follow the general custom of continuing the paper, and extending to all subscribers a reasonable time in which to make payment, unless they order the paper discontinued. KEMITTANCES-Checks, drafts, and money orders should be made to the order of the I NUMBER 6 Quietness in Discipline M. V. O'SHEA, University of Wisconsin HAVE been observing two teachers who have under their charge pupils of about the same age and of the same general character. Some of the pupils in both these rooms come from homes where courtesy and gentleness prevail, while other pupils come from homes of a quite different sort. The problems of discipline in these rooms are as a consequence unusually difficult. The children from the so-called "better" homes are accustomed to a good deal of freedom, and they do not know how to interpret the attitude of the teacher who chastises them for activities which are thought to be entirely proper in their own home, and for which they are often commended by their parents and friends. The children from the so-called "poorer" homes are rather callous to the ordinary appeals of the teacher, so that her complaints and comments slip off their minds as easily as water off a duck's back. The teachers in these rooms have always felt more or less strain and tension in their effort to preserve a fair degree of good order. The teachers who have charge of these rooms at present show very different conceptions of how discipline should be administered. In one room the teacher always gives publicity to every case of discipline. She corrects any individual pupil in such a way that every one in the room can hear what she says. She has the habit of speaking to the school as a whole, usually at the opening exercises in the morning, of the typical sorts of disorder which should be guarded against. Being under strain and stress, her voice reflects her tension so that pupils feel she is complaining. The effect of this method upon the school is to give prominence in the minds of pupils to correction and discipline, so that this is really more conspicuous than instruction itself. The pupils all feel it, though they are not always explicitly conscious of each case of discipline. But nevertheless the air is surcharged with criticism, faultfinding, and the administering of penalties. Across the hall from this teacher is another who pursues an altogether different method in the discipline of her room. She rarely speaks to a child by way of correction before the entire class. If she finds it necessary to straighten out any pupil during the progress of the day's work, she goes to his seat, and speaks to him as privately and quietly as possible. Of course, the class may realize that discipline has been administered, but it is done so inconspicuously that it is impressive rather than irritating. That is, quietness is the predominant characteristic of this method. Now, quietude in the leader of a group suggests quietude to those who are being led. And the opposite of this is equally true. Much of the discipline of this special room is done when the school as a whole is not present at all. During the day the teacher jots down the names of pupils who need to be restrained in respect to some tendency in the school-room, and she invites these to remain with her after school. She then has a conference with each one privately, so that the full force of what she says can be spent on him alone. In nine cases out of ten this will have a much better effect then to try to discipline the individual when there are fifty onlookers. In the latter case, the force of criticism or exhortation is apt to be annulled, though if the crowd is in thorough sympathy with the teacher's program and reinforces her comments, the result will be more dynamic than it could be in any other way. But the constant repetition of commands will fail to secure the right sort of response from a school as a whole. Occasionally it should be used in the more serious forms of discipline, and then it will be a valuable aid to the teacher. As a general proposition, it can be stated unqualifiedly that he will be the best disciplinarian who deals most directly with individual offenders. He will be the least successful who makes all his discipline so prominent that every one is affected by it, thus creating an atmosphere of unrest and disorder. The chief aim of the teacher should be to make the legitimate work of the school more prominent than discipline. His voice should be heard in praise and instruction far more frequently and predominantly than in fault-finding and chastisement. Often teachers get into the habit of complaining about restlessness, noise, and disorder in a room, charging the entire group with misconduct, when only certain individuals are at fault. The first teacher mentioned in this note is addicted to this habit, with the result that all pupils are included in much of her criticism. When she complains of inattention, she does it in such a way that every pupil wonders whether he is referred to, and so on with a long list of offenses. Now, this is wrong, for it tends to sow disorder in a school, and to impress it upon the minds of pupils as the principal thing in the school. Ask pupils in the room just referred to what has happened during any school day, and ninety-nine responses out of every hundred will speak of cases and of the angry expressions of the teacher. Surely it is possible to govern a school without leaving such impressions as these. with pupils. The children themselves seemed entirely unconscious of the necessity, and joyfully took each day as it came, caring not a straw apparently for its name, and less, if possible, for the spelling of it, or that it should be written with a capital letter. For the spelling when it wasn't strictly phonetic, the strictly ornamental letters were liable to be encountered anywhere. If variety were the spice of spelling, as it is said to be of life, the spelling of these required words was highly spiced. "Keeping in" produced tears, but scarcely better spelling or more capital letters. On a fortunate day, Miss L. came upon a little book of rhymes in the public library. One chapter contained rhymes concerning the troublesome days of the week and the months. The next morning early, the hektograph came into requisition, and in language time, each pupil received a slip of paper, which he immediately proceeded to examine and read, because these slips always had on them something new and interesting. and no child, contrary to theory, was sensitive enough or apperceptive enough to be shocked and depressed by this setting forth of one of the inexorable facts of life. The rhyme alone claimed their attention and gave them delight. Miss L. sent the class, still exhibiting much hilarity, to the board, with their papers, to copy the jingle, exhorting them to make an exact reproduction. The mistakes were few, and the illustrations which most of the pupils volunteered were unique and full of life, albeit grotesque and much out of drawing. The next day each slip had on it a different rhyme, and the children went to the board with the same reminder as to exactness in copying, and the information that the class would be permitted to read aloud all that were legible enough. One very little girl wrote: How many days has my baby to play? Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Then she stood swaying her small body and nodding her small head in time to a measured repetition of the lines under her breath. It fell to the lot of Peter, the irrepressible, to write: Sneeze on Wednesday, sneeze for a letter, Sneeze on Saturday, joy to-morrow. And while he was writing he was surreptitiously sneezing in pantomime. Boys and girls alike were pleased with the familiar everyday facts as well as the rhyme in: They that wash on Monday, Wash for very shame; The papers were mounted on the stiff covers of used-up tablets, for permanency, and given to the children for study, and soon all could repeat the rhymes. For seat work they sometimes picked out and copied the names of the days of the week, or tried to write them from memory on the board. Sometimes they illustrated the jingle on the board and wrote lines of it beneath. Certain it was that they finally mastered the difficult spelling. Later came the names of the months in the same way. As it happened to be in spring the first poems used were: March winds and April showers Bring forth May flowers. There was much drawing of smooth foreheads and pursing And of lips in the attempt to sound some of the unfamiliar words; but, shortly, faces smoothed out and smiles began to appear, and then raised hands and requests to read aloud. Somebody read and this is what he read: Solomon Grundy, Took ill on Thursday, Worse on Friday, Died on Saturday, Buried on Sunday. This is the end of Solomon Grundy. Another pupil read and then another, and as they read they became sure enough of the words to catch the rhythm. In the end a little girl read with amazing swiftness and the lilting jingle of the lines brought a gale of laughter in which the little girl herself joined. Not a thought was given to poor Solomon's taking off, presumably in the full enjoyment of life, In the sweet month of April When leaves begin to spring, Little lambs skip like fairiesAnd birds build and sing. A swarm of bees in May Is worth a load of hay; A swarm of bees in June Is worth a silver spoon; A swarm of bees in July Is not worth a fly. T HIS is how it came about. One Monday morning, in grade 3, it seemed to Miss White that everything was going wrong. No less than three urchins were "pouty" and cross, in spite of her brave efforts to bring the smiles. Tommy, the incorrigible, was at his worst. Finally, just before the noon hour, Miss White said, "Some of us haven't had a very happy morning, and I'm sorry. We call our room "Sunshine Room," and when we gave it that name, we said we would try always to have sunshine inside, no matter what the weather might be out-of-doors. This morning we've had a "cloudy" room, but when I come back from lunch this noon, I hope I shall find our room full of sunshine again." Then she read to them this little poem: If I knew a box where the smiles were kept, Then over the land and the sea, broadcast, I'd scatter the smiles to play; That the children's faces might hold them fast For many and many a day. If I knew a box that was large enough To hold all the frowns I meet I would like to gather them, every one, From nursery, school, and street, Then folding, and holding, I'd pack them in, I'd hire a giant to drop the box To the depths of the deep, deep sea. "Now," she said, "I want you, this noon, to hunt for smiles. Get all you can. Fill your pockets full of them, so full that you can scatter them all along the way to school, and have enough left to last all the afternoon!" The children went home quite delighted with the new idea of "hunting for smiles," and in the afternoon they came back again, filled to overflowing. Their mission had been successful, and Miss White's heart was made glad by the sight of the happy little faces before her. But what was that which the sly little Tommy dropped on her desk in passing? A card-torn and soiled, but with a message all its own for right across the center was printed: "KEEP SMILING" and just above: will be our Sunshine Book. I'm going to put this picture on the cover." She held up a picture of a dear little girl with the brightest, happiest, "sunshiniest" little face imaginable. The children were delighted. Then she held up Tommy's card. They liked that too. "I'm going to put that on the first page of the book. Then I'm going to put in our poem about the smiles, and also this story which I have read to you about the Sunshine Club." "Here's another little verse which I shall put in: "Three little rules we all should keep To make life happy and bright; Just here, a little hand shot into the air and a little arm waved frantically. In answer to Miss White's "What is it, Evelyn?" Miss Evelyn responded, "I know what would be. a good one to put in: "It's easy enough to be pleasant,' and then Miss White knew what was coming! Evelyn re peated the whole verse. Sure enough—it was just the thing! But how did this "midget" come to know it so well? > "My papa taught me to say that," solved the mystery, and Miss White could not help wishing that more papas were given to teaching such splendid bits of verse to their boys and girls. "This must surely go in our 'Sunshine Book,' said she, "and now I want you to see what else you can find for it. Look through your books and papers or magazines at home, and if you can find a verse, or a story, or a picture, or anything that makes you think of smiles and sunshine, bring it for the book. Let's see what a "happy" book we can make. The children were enthusiastic and soon all sorts of contributions began to come in. They enlisted the older ones at home, and whenever they in their reading came upon anything suggestive, it was sent to 'Sunshine Room for the "Sunshine Book." The book was hung by a ribbon in a conspicuous part of the room, so that the children might look at it whenever they liked, and there was more real sunshine crowded into that little book than can easily be estimated. It was always shown to visitors, and the "smiles within" never failed to being "smiles without." Experience Corner IX Do You Like Teaching? (A Symposium) NOTE: The author of Experience Corner lately became very much interested in the series of letters published in World's Work on the subject, "Why I Don't Like Teaching." In order to find out what the majority, or at least a representative number of local teachers, had to say upon this subject, the above question was put to each of them and the answers are given verbatim and as nearly as possible in the honest tone in which the question was answered. The body of answers afford a useful fund of ideas that have to do with ideals, practical views of life, general methods of school work, and many opinions as to the current regime as well as the evils of the management of buildings, etc.) Number 1 (A successful but rather frail-looking teacher of a primary room. She dresses prettily and has very pleasing manners.) "Do I like teaching as a profession? To be honest, I don't, and to be confidential, I have wondered a good many times whether there was not something more pleasant that I could do. I used to like it, that is, when I first began to teach. I can remember when I just hated to hear the bell sound for dismissal time, but that was nine years ago - oh, yes, I have taught for nine years straight in a row and without any time off. Some people won't believe it, but it's true just the same." "Why don't I like it? Well, I believe the worst thing about it is the constant necessity (that any teaching requires) of keeping yourself up and being enthusiastic when you feel like a squeezed-out sponge. Yes, it is a necessity. Any teaching requires vim to make things move along successfully. That is where the drain on the teacher's strength comes in. It is so hard to constantly cheer and encourage and smile when you don't feel like it at all. Strange to say, I really enjoy my work from the beginning of the term up to the Christmas vacation. That three months seems just like the old days, but from January on, it is a regular old drag until I feel ready to drop almost all of the time. I believe if I could have a year off and might enjoy the privilege of doing absolutely nothing, that is, the chance for a long rest, I might like it better because, strange to say, I rather look forward to the beginning of the year, after I have had three good months of vacation." Number 2 (A principal of a large building, who is a spiritual looking woman with very refined appreciation of all forms of art and beauty. She is a very inspiring character and much loved by her teachers.) "Yes," she said in a reminiscent tone as she looked about the small office that bore such unmistakable marks of her personality," this has been my little sanctum for fifteen years and it doesn't seem half as long as that either. On the whole, I feel that I am in the work that I am fitted for and, when all is said and done, teaching is one of the noblest professions if one only succeeds in putting aside the trivial difficulties and getting the larger view of it. Of course it |