Teaching the language-arts; speech, reading, composition

Front matter

Chap. Copyright No.

ShelikflLi:

UMKTED STATES OF AMERICA.

Author's Preface

Since this work was written, and since much of it was put in type, the teaching of English in the schools of the country has once more been brought prominently to the public attention. Eeference is made to the late Report of the Committee on Composition and Rhetoric to the Board of Overseers of Harvard College, and the comments that it has called out in the press.* Remarks on the present state of English teaching will be found scattered through the following pages, but it seems desirable in this preface to take a broader view of the subject. The

* Report of the Committee on Composition and Rhetoric to the Board of Overseers of Harvard College (1892).

The Classics and Written English, C. F. Adams, Harvard Graduates' Magazine, vol. i, p. 177.

The Root of the Evil, W. W. Goodwin, Harvard Graduates' Magazine, vol. i, p. 189.

Report of the Committee on Composition and Rhetoric to the Board of Overseers of Harvard College, April, 1895.

College English, The Nation, September 26, 1895, p. 219.

School English, W. W. Goodwin, The Nation, October 24, 1895, p. 291.

School English, C. P. Adams, The Nation, October 31, 1895, p. 309.

College English, Caskie Harrison, The Nation, October 31, 1895, p. 310.

A Plea for the Study of Latin Grammar, X, The Nation, November 21, 1895, p. 362.

x TEACHING THE LANGUAGE-ARTS.

new report from Harvard, like the former one of the same committee, is not devoted to the broad subject of teaching English, but to the narrow subject of teaching composition. My own remarks will be similarly limited.

The main fact that is pressed home by the first report and reaffirmed by the second one is, that as the English department at Harvard " is organized, under the existing standards of examination, the college seems compelled, during the Freshman year, to do a vast amount of elementary educational work which should be done in the preparatory schools." And this view seems to be generally accepted.

The impression that has been made upon many minds, to the effect that the Harvard authorities hold college preparation in English now inferior to what it was formerly, has no support in the documents. The contention is rather that the present preparation is discreditable to the young men who come to Harvard, and the reverse of satisfactory to the schools from which they come, but no comparison with earlier times has been made or suggested. Manifestly such a comparison would be peculiarly difficult to make and of uncertain value, owing to the tendency of men in adult life to carry back into boyhood their later ideals and standards, and thus to mislead both themselves and others. It is possible that preparation in English for admission to Eastern colleges is inferior to what it once was, but if the mass of the American people are not better instructed in English than they were a half century ago or a quarter of a century ago, the fact is very discouraging, because constantly increased attention has been bestowed upon it in the schools.

Men who pass an intelligent judgment on the college preparation of Freshmen must first answer the question, " How much should be expected of young men and

AUTHOR'S PREFACE. xi

women at the age of nineteen ? " In the case of English the answer will be found more difficult than in the case of most or all of the other studies. It is easy for practised writers, like the Harvard Committee and Professor Goodwin, far removed as they are in memory from their own personal struggles to learn to write, and far removed also from the practical teaching of English in the schools, to look for more than can be reasonably accomplished. For example, after remarking that the average student in the Freshman class is two years older than formerly, the committee said in its first report : " It would certainly seem not unreasonable to insist that young men nineteen years of age who present themselves for a college education should be able not only to speak, but to write their mother tongue with ease and correctness." Correctness is now the note of English prose style. Furthermore, " ease and correctness " is a relative expression, and one can not tell just how much the committee means by it. But if the ease and correctness of the practised writer is what the committee has in mind, it is much mistaken. The obvious parallel between speech and writing must not be unduly pressed. The majority of men, even educated men, never become as proficient in writing as they do in speech. Perhaps they could attain to the same proficiency if they had the same practice in the one art as in the other, but this is an impossibility. The number of men called educated who can not write good English with ease, or even at all, is proportionately large. One could wish to see a collection of the verbatim and facsimile compositions of four or five hundred professional men, including a proportional number of college professors, written under circumstances similar to those that attended the writing of the exercises that are reproduced in the two reports. There are marked differences in perxii TEACHING THE LANGUAGE-ARTS.

sons ; but for the average student who goes to college to create, and then to maintain, anything that deserves to be called a style, is one of the severest tests of mental cultivation. Again, Professor Goodwin, commenting on some translations that he quotes, remarks : " There is one charge that can not be brought against the writers. They have surely not neglected their English for Greek. ~ They are simply trying to translate from one unknown tongue into another." This remark suggests that translation is a severe test of ability to compose. The translator carries on a double struggle : one is to get at the thought of the original, the other to express this thought in the vernacular. It has often been remarked that translations by great poets are inferior to their original work. Translations should indeed be held up to Professor Goodwin's test, but many a schoolboy has found that either one of the two struggles involved a sufficient tax upon his powers.

So much it has seemed wise to say by way of moderating exaggerated ideas of schoolboy English ; but the fact still remains that the English of the college Freshman is bad. Professor Goodwin scouts the idea that the preparatory schools that send pupils to Harvard have singled out the mother tongue for neglect and contempt. Nothing could be further from the truth than to think that the neglect of English is justified by the high standard of scholarship in Latin, Greek, and mathematics. " A similar test applied to any other department," he says, " would disclose a state of things in the lower ranks of scholarship which would be proportionally disreputable." There can be no doubt that the average American student at the age of nineteen, brought up in the secondary schools, is as much behind the English or Continental student of the same age in ability to compose in his mother tongue as he is in ability to perform other scholastic work. Pro-

AUTHOR'S PREFACE. xiii

fessor Goodwin says that boys of that age who come to Harvard College in most cases " are barely prepared to pass an examination which boys of sixteen or seventeen would find easy work in England, Germany, France, or Switzerland." He says, further, that at " Westminster School, London, boys of from fifteen to eighteen are studying Homer, iEschylus, Sophocles, Euripides, Aristophanes, Lysius, Plato, Lucretius, Terence, Horace, Cicero, St. Augustine, St. Cyril, with algebra, trigonometry, conic sections, statics, and dynamics." Much of this work is not required for admission to Oxford and Cambridge, but it all counts for honours. The Professor says further : "There is no hope of a substantial change for the better until the elementary studies which now occupy the time from fifteen to nineteen are put back where they belong, so that young men can devote themselves in earnest to studies which belong to their age." From this point of view, therefore, the question, Why is the English teaching in the secondary schools bad ? is expanded into the broader one, Why is our secondary education as a whole bad ?

This question has been much discussed the last few years, and in the course of the discussion it has been discovered that, in large part, the trouble lies below the secondary-school level. The Harvard Committee and Professor Goodwin tend to excuse the secondary teachers from blame for the bad preparation of students for college. The trouble, they say, is with the "system." This is extending the investigation to the elementary schools, which leads to the remark that the shortening and enrichening of the elementary course has been a favourite topic at educational meetings and in educational journals for some time past. I shall set down very briefly what appear to me to be the principal reasons why the American boy of nineteen, considered as a scholar, is two years in the xiv TEACHING THE LANGUAGE- ARTS.

rear of the German, French, or English boy of the same age.

1. The courses of study that lead French and German boys to the university have been brought to a high degree of perfection. The studies have been so selected and so co-ordinated that time is saved all along the line. For example, in the German gymnasium Latin begins at ten and Greek at twelve, while modern languages are brought in at an early stage, thus assisting materially the mastery of German. The gymnasium is not a finishing school, but every step from the first one is bent toward the university. Practically the same may be said of the French and English schools. In the United States, on the other hand, secondary courses of study have not been as well thought out and tested. Moreover, the double function of many of our schools, and particularly of high schools, has impaired their efficiency in both spheres. Keference is made, of course, to the fact that these schools are at the same time finishing schools for life and fitting schools for college. To be sure, the courses of study intended for the two purposes more or less vary. Whether this impairment of the American school is inherent in the system or is due to defective co-ordination, need not be considered here.

The facts may be put in another way. In European countries schools are based on the existing social organization. The aim is to provide education for those youths who will pass out of school at thirteen or fourteen years of age, for those who will pass out of it at eighteen or nineteen, and for those who are destined for the higher institutions of instruction. These pupils are not taught together as far as the first class go, and the remainder are not all taught together as far as the second class go, but to a great extent are separate almost from the time that

AUTHOR'S PREFACE. xv

they go to school, and are taught with reference to their supposed destination. All kinds of pupils may be taught together for the first three years, but this is not necessarily, or indeed commonly, the case. This is what may be called the "three-pyramid plan" of organizing schools. " The three courses of instruction," says Dr. Fitch, " primary, secondary, and higher, may be compared to three pyramids of different sizes, though all in their way symmetrical and perfect ; but you can not take the apex of the larger pyramid and set it on the top of the smaller. You may indeed fit on, with a certain practical convenience, the top of the higher scheme of education to the truncated system of the lower, provided you go low enough," etc. Our State school systems are organized on the one-pyramid plan. The comparative merits of the two plans for general purposes is a topic aside from the present purpose. But the three-pyramid plan has two obvious advantages. One is that courses of instruction can be made out with sole reference to completeness in themselves, and the other that the abler pupils, who are the ones destined for college as a rule, are put by themselves, and so can move, even in elementary studies, at their own natural rate of speed. How far our social conditions would justify an attempt to reorganize our schools on this plan, and how far studies that are now taught exclusively in the secondary schools can be brought down into the elementary grades, are very interesting questions. For one, I. look with considerable confidence to the experiments now being made in the second direction.

2. The teachers in the foreign schools, as a class, are superior to ours. They are better prepared to do their work, and they do it better. This preparation includes better scholarship, more distinct ideals, and superior teaching ability. These teachers know just what is expected of xvi TEACHING THE LANGUAGE-ARTS.

them, and know they will be held responsible for the result. It is needless almost to refer to the fact that, on an average, they pursue their work for a much longer period of time.

3. National tone is a not unimportant factor in the question. The industrial, commercial, and political tension of American society is the highest known in the world. In this respect we are keyed up to the highest note. But in science, philosophy, and literature — that is, in the intellectual sphere proper — our tension is distinctly lower than that of England, France, or Germany. The average intelligence may be as high in this country, or even higher, but our higher culture so called is of a lower grade. The high intellectual tension of the educated class abroad is felt in the schools. There now lies before me a description of a German gymnasium written by a student of my acquaintance who passed through it, and I doubt whether there is a city in the United States where a school with such a regimen could be maintained. The key is too high for American life as now attuned.

What has been said about general culture is particularly applicable to the language-arts, — speech, reading, and composition, which are a very delicate test of personal cultivation. I have not hesitated to avow the opinion (page 54) that the relatively low standard of culture prevailing in the country, including teachers as well as pupils, is in large measure the cause of the low state of these arts in the schools. There is perhaps reason to think that the average cultivation of college students, including English, is lower than it was fifty years ago. Were not college students a more select body then than they are now ? Did they not better represent the highest cultivation of the country? Have not the great increase of wealth, the enormous material improvements that have been effected,

AUTHOR'S PREFACE. xvii

and the growth of population, together with the democratizing of society, tended appreciably to make American college students, as a whole, a more heterogeneous class of persons ?

What is the final conclusion ? That we should remain satisfied with the teaching, and particularly the English teaching, as it is to-day ? By no means. The present work has been written in the faith that improvement is attainable. Two or three practical remarks may be- made on this point.

First. In the following pages I have laid constant stress on imitation in teaching the language-arts. Good models are insisted upon, I fear, to the weariness of the reader. Practice under suitable correction has also been emphasized. Remarking upon the proficiency in baseball and other athletic sports of the boys who come to Harvard College, the committee asks how it is acquired, and replies that it does not come by studying rules printed in books devoted to athletic sports, or by listening to lectures on curves and the like, but by practice. "It is only through similar, daily, and incessant practice," says the committee, " that the degree of facility in writing the mother tongue is acquired, which always enables the student or adult to use it as a tool in his work."

Secondly. The use of the word " tool " suggests a serious defect in many American schools. There is a great difference between set formal exercises in any art as an end in itself and the habitual use of the same art as a means or instrument to accomplish some other end. Mr. C. F. Adams, chairman of the committee, like many others, has remarked the difference between formal class spelling and spelling in ordinary writing. The same distinction may be made in respect to penmanship and drawing. How very different the writing that children xviii TEACHING THE LANGUAGE-ARTS.

put in their familiar letters is from the writing that they put in their copy-books ! And the same in composing. u For want of practice," says Mr. Adams, " the scholar does not carry into his other and daily work the results of his teaching. He can write a formal composition, such as it is; he can not render Greek or Latin into English." This is the crux of school composition. Nothing but plenty of writing, and particularly non-formal or extemporaneous writing, as in the daily work of the school under a moderate tension of criticism, will transmute the pupil's specific skill into formal skill. How wide the distance between the set composition and the extemporaneous composition of the common pupil or student ! We need more extemporaneous composition in the schools. In this respect the German or the English student is distinctly better off than his American cousin.

The third and last suggestion is that much current language teaching affects English composition unfavourably. " Sight reading," which rests on the assumption that the student should understand the author in the original, has for some time been the vogue in preparatory schools. X points out very clearly that the revolt from the grammar and dictionary has gone so far that a positive deterioration of both classical and English scholarship has often resulted. He says students who come to Harvard, and picked ones, too, " have not even a conception of what accurate work means. They have obtained by practice a kind of knack of guessing at the meaning of a sentence ; but in most cases they see it ' through a glass darkly,' often very darkly." This writer thinks, accordingly, that some of the emphasis recently given to sight reading should be withdrawn, and more stress be laid on thoroughness. The traditional importance assigned to translation as an English exercise may

AUTHOR'S PREFACE. ' xix

be exaggerated. No doubt translation is sometimes a positive loss to the pupil's English rather than a gain, undoing, owing to slipshod methods, what formal instruction has done. Still, good translation is an important ally of the English teacher.

The purpose and scope of the present work are stated in the introductory chapter. While nothing more is called for on that head, a few words concerning its origin are deemed pertinent.

More than ten years ago, while serving as Superintendent of the Public Schools of Cleveland, Ohio, my attention was closely drawn to the nature and relation of speech, reading, language lessons, composition, and literature. I gave much thought to methods of instruction, and particularly to the correlation of the several lines of teaching. Afterward, when called to my present position, it became my duty to give instruction on these subjects as part of a course in the art of teaching. I now came more clearly to conceive of these arts as a distinct group by themselves, and to assign a new importance to imitation, and especially unconscious imitation, in learning them. Thus there gradually grew up, within the course referred to, a series of lectures denominated Lectures on Teaching the Language- Arts. These lectures, revised and extended, comprise this work. Whatever may be its merits, it has grown out of practical experience, and has been matured by reflection.

Those teachers who are abreast of the best current practice in the schools will find nothing in the book relating to method that is very novel or original. The claim to merit must rest on these particulars : First, the clear conception and description of speech, reading, and composition as arts ; secondly, the large place assigned to use

XX TEACHING THE LANGUAGE-ARTS.

and wont, to models and imitation, and the small place to reflective art in teaching them ; and, thirdly, the grounding of the several teaching processes in the fundamental facts of human nature. In other words, this is a book of principles illustrated by methods rather than of methods illuminated by principles. If this claim be allowed, I do not hold it to be a slight merit. With nothing do the teachers of the country stand in need of closer familiarity than with educational principles. Principles do not supersede methods ; facts, rules ; theory, practice ; science, art : but principles, facts, theory, and science must, in the long run, govern and control all practical applications.

I have not therefore sought to add another to the list of " Lessons " and " Exercises " in English, " Composition Books," and the like, which is already so long, but rather to show the ends to which such books should look, the methods to which they should conform, and the reasons for such conformity. Exhaustive treatment has not been aimed at. The purpose has been to confine the discussion to schools ; and if much of it has an application to colleges, as indeed it has, the reason is that the leading principles set forth are unlimited by grade lines, but are continuous.

My thanks are due to my friend Professor I. N. Demmon for valuable aid in preparing this work. I have had the benefit of his criticism on many special features of the work, and, what has been of greater value, have enjoyed repeated opportunities to discuss the subject with him in its general bearings.

B. A. Hinsdale.

The University of Michigan, December 14, 1895.

Contents

PAGE

Editor's Preface v

Author's Preface ix

CHAPTER I. The Scope of the Present Work 1

The Liudley Murray conception of grammar, 1, 2 ; Professor Greene's books, 2, 3 ; the present state of English in the schools, 3, 4 ; aims of the present work, 4, 5.

Chapter II

Science and art, 6 ; two phases of art, 6 ; the school studies and school arts discriminated, 7, 8 ; the two phases of the language-arts, 9, 10 ; effects of wrong classification, 10, 11.

Chapter III

The Vernacular as an Educational Instrument . . .12 Language and mind, 12-14; language a factor in national culture, 14, 15 ; a factor in individual culture, 15-18 ; Professor Laurie and Dr. Schurman quoted, 18-20.

CHAPTER IV. The Work of the Elementary School 21

The child's mental possessions at the age of six, 21, 22 ; the work of the primary teacher, 22-24 ; authorities quoted on vocabularies of children, note, 24, 25.

• CHAPTER V.

The Origin of the Child's Knowledge 26

Fundamental facts of the mind stated, 26-28 ; the child's ideas at the age of six grouped, 28-32.

xxi xxii CONTENTS.

Chapter VI. Page

The child's instinctive vocal utterance, 33, 34 ; the child uses his voice to express mental states, 34, 35 ; the office of imitation, 35- 39 ; no trace of rule or formal method, 40 ; authorities quoted on imitation, note, 40-42.

Chapter VII

The Language-Arts in the Lower Grades . . . .43 Professor Laurie's analysis of language, 43, 44 ; child first deals with language as substance of thought, 44, 45 ; methods of instruction: conversations, stories, object lessons, reading lessons, selections of poetry memorized, and written exercises, 45-50 ; ethical value of language lessons, 50, 51 ; association, 51, 52 ; rules, 53; language agents classified, 53, 54.

CHAPTER VIII. The Language-Arts in the Higher Grades and in the

High Schools 55

Changes of school regimen to come slowly, 55 ; former methods to be employed, 56 ; copying and dictation, composing themes, paraphrasing, imitation of chosen models, arid translation, 56-61 ; etymologies, 61-63 ; history in words, 63-65.

CHAPTER IX. The Art op Reading 66

The printed page, 66, 67 ; relation of the author to his composition, 67 ; the function of the reader, 67-70.

Chapter X

Eelation of reading to guidance studies, 71, 72; to disciplinary studies, 72, 73 ; to culture studies, 73, 74 ; to general literature, 74-77 ; Mr. Lowell and Professor Norton quoted, note, 77, 78.

CHAPTER XI. Requisites for Reading 79

The threefold preparation, 79 ; attention to be paid to each requirement, 80 ; Professor Blackie on our original knowledge, 80,

CONTENTS.

81 ; apperception, 81, 82 ; the reader to have one life with the author, 82-85 ; value to the child of acquaintance with Nature, 85.

CHAPTER XII. Teaching Reading as an Art

The symbolism of the printed page, 86, 87 ; the vocal values of the symbols, 87, 88 ; significance of the symbols, 88-90 ; reading not at first a source of new ideas, 90, 91 ; rules, 92 ; Professors Dowden and Corson on reading aloud quoted, 92, 93 ; Mr. Elisha Ticknor quoted, note, 93.

Chapter XIII

First teaching of reading an homogeneous exercise, 94, 95 ; the work begins to differentiate, 95 ; the reading lesson, 95, 96 ; the pupil's study of the lesson, 96 ; the teacher to study with the class, 97 ; reading lessons to be connected with other sources of cultivation, 98 ; the study of definitions, 98-101 ; testing pupils, 101-103 ; remarks on school readers and the child's reading matter, 103-106 ; freedom and criticism, 106, 107 ; illustrative lessons, 108-111.

CHAPTER XIV. Teaching Composition . . . 112

The old regime, 112 ; definition of composition and its relations, 113, 114 ; difficulty of the art, 114 ; natural gifts and practice, 115, 116 ; practical suggestions for the teacher : training in language lessons, pupil's interest to be enlisted, choice of a subject, the teacher to choose and assign subjects, the teacher to instruct in the modus of composition, making outlines, rules, and criticisms, 117-124; relation of thought material to thought expression, 124, 125 ; the intensive plan, 125, 126 ; Dr. Franklin's style and the value of the art of composition, 126, 127.

Chapter XV

The object or aim to be held in view, 128 ; Mr. Quick's definition of literature, 128, 129 ; the two aspects of literature, substance and art, to be held together, 130, 131 ; subordinate aspects, 131; false ideals, 132-134 ; Mr. Hudson's model, 134, 135 ; the subordination xx iv CONTENTS.

PAGE

of grammar, philology, etc., to literary elements, 136 ; discursive study and intensive study to be combined, 136, 137 ; literature and recitations, 137, 138 ; literature and examinations, 138, 139 ; haste in education, 139 ; history of literature, 140 ; teachers sometimes too ambitious, 141 ; why literature should be taught in the schools, 141, 142.

Chapter XVI

Ancient definition of grammar, 147, 148 ; Murray's and Kirkham's Grammars, 149 ; traditionary view of grammar false, 150 ; grammar a science, 151, 152 ; causes that broke down the authority of the scholastic grammar, 153-155 ; reasons for studying grammar : confers knowledge of the vernacular, 156 ; has disciplinary value, 156-158; is the logic of speech, 159 ; influences practice through mental activity, 160 ; relation of study of grammar to use of the vernacular, 161-165 ; practical suggestions for teachers, 165-167 ; illustrative exercise, 168-170.

CHAPTER XVII. The Function of Rhetoric 171

Definitions quoted, 171-173 ; rhetoric a threefold study, 174 ; has disciplinary value, 175 ; has culture value, 176 ; rules of rhetoric of two kinds, mechanical and psychological, 177 ; rules for punctuating and capitalizing, 178 ; psychological rules, 176-180 ; Herbert Spencer's Essay on The Philosophy of Style quoted, 180, 181 ; Professor Minto quoted, 182 ; rhetoric in the high school, 183, 184.

Chapter XVIII

Criticism a practical art, 185 ; causes of the difficulty of the subject, 185-188 ; the problem involves the harmonizing of criticism and freedom, 188, 189 ; practical suggestions : early criticism must rest on authority, 189 ; must be repeated, 189 ;' must be conducted with reference to child's age and progress, 189, 190; teacher not to expect too much, 190 ; rules and reasons to be gradually introduced, 190, 191 ; the spirit of criticism, 191, 192 ; many exercises to pass without review, 192; pupil to play the critic of himself, 193, 194 ; the " Nature" rules discussed. 194-197.

CONTENTS.

CHAPTER XIX. Teachers op the Language-Arts

Qualifications of primary teachers, 199, 200 ; the special teacher question, 200 ; report of the conference on English quoted, 200, 201 ; co-operation of teachers and special exercises, 201, 202 ; qualifications of the teacher of literature, 202.

Bibliography

TEACHING THE LANGUAGE-ARTS.

Chapter I. The Scope Of The Present Work

Lindley Murray spoke in accordance with, the tradition that had been delivered to him when, at the close of the last century, he gave this definition : " English grammar is the art of speaking and writing the English language with propriety." It might at first seem that, starting with such a definition, the learned author would have given the world a practical rather than a scientific book — something like the books on Composition and Language Lessons that, in recent years, have poured into the schools like a flood. He did nothing of the kindy There could hardly be a wider gap between the definition of a subject and a treatise devoted to its discussion than the gap which lies between Murray's definition and the body of his English Grammar. He first declares grammar to be pure art or practice, and then treats it as pure science or theory. The same inconsistency appears in all the writers and teachers of that period. The grammatical tradition that these writers and teachers had received, was not suffered to influence the practice of the schools of the old regime. For example, the teachers devoted a great deal of time to parsing. The better pupils became profi- 1 cient in " parting " — that is, classifying — words; in declining, conjugating, and comparing them ; in detecting and pointing out " agreement " and " government," and in applying rules of syntax which, it is fair to say, they did not half the time at all understand. There are many persons still living who went through much or all of Paradise Lost or the Essay on Man, or perchance The Course of Time, in this way. All this, it is almost superfluous to say, was purely theoretical work. The correction of false syntax, to which much time was given, was the only point at which the pupil touched practice at all ; and there is great reason to fear that this exercise was harmful quite as often as it was beneficial. Beyond this little was done in the schools in the broad field of what we now call " English " and the " study of English." Below the college, grammar reigned supreme. Essaywriting was practised in some schools. Besides the exercises in reading, which were of course important, no attention was given to English literature, either in the schools or in the colleges.