Practical plans for primary teachers in public or private schools

Contents

CHAPTER

The Room I

The Teacher II

Preface

This booklet is written for two purposes. One is to help the young teacher who has had no experience and does not know how to begin or what to do.

The other is that it may serve as a store house of useful information for the busy teacher, who has not time to hunt up helps for daily use.

The chapters on how to teach reading, spelling, numbers, etc., are for the first class.

The morning exercises are designed to be helpful to all, and may suggest some new things even to those who have had experience in dealing with children.

In the language work an outline for the entire session is given. Information by the teacher is collected from various sources, so that by turning to any given month there will be found ready for use :

1. Principal facts in the lives of noted people born during that month.

2. Nature Study accompanied by definite information about flowers, insects, etc.

3. Carefully GRADED EXERCISES for the use of English.

In the special day exercise complete programs are not given, but songs, suggestions, and recitations with which to supplement other material.

There are so many phases of primary work that not all can be treated in so small a book, but these are given in the hope that they may prove a benefit to some one.

The last pages give devices for seat-work, for when we have learned to keep children busy we have the key to successful work in the primary department.

Give children something to do and they will not have time to be bad. One short chapter tells where to get pictures and how to use them.

These suggestions and styles for teaching are the result of ten years practical work in the school room.

CHAPTER I The Room

If possible, have a separate room, and make it attractive. Whether you are in the city or country schools, seek to have the place v^here the children gather each day bright, cheerful, and pretty. Reward the little ones by putting their best work on the wall, language-work, maps and drawings. Collect pictures to place there and change them occasionally. Don't have one in the same place throughout the session. Teach the children to keep their desks in order. Just before recess call them little housekeepers and ask them to clean up their houses; or pretend that each desk is a room, and as they put them in order let them recite or sing some simple words, as :

We are little house-keepers.

Cleaning, cleaning.

We are little house-keepers

Cleaning up our rooms.

In Emile Poulsson's "Finger Play«," published by T^othrop Publiahing Co., Boston, is a song which is very suitable for this: *'Where oh! where are the little men?'' The merry little men being the ten fingers.

After the children have cleaned up their houses, call attention to the streets (aisles) and, as **many hands make light work" the room will soon be in order. Make work like play as much as possible. If two boys are told to pull up weeds in the yard, they perhaps will go about the task in a lazy, listless way, and get little done: but if you say, "Boys, see who can pull up a hundred weeds first," they will go to work with such energy that the task will be completed in a short time. Another plan to have children straighten their desks is to have them do it in concert as the teacher says the words. This has been tried with larger pupils and as the teacher said, "Inkwells closed, books in desks, paper off the floor," everything was done "decently and in order." Still another method is to say, 'Two minutes to clean up your houses." No matter how orderly and careful children are, some stray bits of paper will get on the floor and some books and pencils be misplaced.

Teach pupils not to bring mud into the house. Tell how it dries and fills the room with fine particles of dust, which float about and are breathed into the lungs. Encourage them to take care of their books and pencils, and to keep them in place. Set a good example by having your own desk or table straight. Initials should be cut on each child's pencil, which should be tied to his book or kept in his pencil-box. Some teachers prefer to take up the pencils each evening and distribute them again next morning. Others have a certain color for the pencils used in the first grade, another for those used in the second, etc., so that when one is misplaced it is easy to locate it. Have a trash-box for waste-paper, a knife in some special place where the children have access to it. Require them to put it in place always, or you may have it to hang by a strong cord. Keep scissors where the children can use them, so that there will be no excuse for ragged papers.

See that talc and erasers are in place before school and thus avoid confusion. A bottle of mucilage is convenient in a school-room and a hammer and tacks are almost indispensable. A broom should be near at hand, also a pointer and duster. All of these things should be taken care of and as they are for the convenience of ALL, the pupils themselves should be trained to keep them in place. If practicable have a cabinet, a home-made one will ansv^er, in which to collect shells, pretty rocks, different kinds of acorns, cocoons, pine-cones and numerous other things in which children take delight when they are encouraged to hunt for them. Keep a substantial vase on your desk if only an oyster can covered with bright paper, and try to keep it filled with flowers.

Every boy should have a special hook on which to hang his hat and overcoat, and every little girl likewise should know exactly where to look for her hat and wrap. Umbrellas and overshoes should not be mixed promiscuously, nor should lunch-baskets. In the country these rules should be observed just as much as in towns and cities. It not only saves the teacher trouble and annoyance, but trains the children to be methodical in their habits, and to respect the rights of others.

During the summer, prepare to make your primary room attractive by collecting material. Go to the school house the day before the opening and set things in order. If you are a young teacher with no experience and in a strange building, decide where you will have your table or desk, where you want the chart, where you would like to have the pupils when they are reciting, and how they will march out. Some rooms are so arranged that you have no choice in these matters, but at least look over your ground and know beforehand what you want to do. Pin a few pictures on the wall, put up any maps you may have, and arrange your busywork where you can get it when needed. If you want to put a motto around the clock you can use the words, ^Tm watching you/' ''Keep busy," or "Take care of the minutes." Hang a calendar in a convenient place, see that the windows are bright, and everything neat and clean. Have a pencil and tablet ready and prepare a schedule of what you wish to do on the first day.

People are unconsciously influenced by environment. Some children have nothing pleasant to look at in their homes, so give them something here. Often in the country a teacher has to combine secondary with primary work. These plans for method, and order, of having "a place for everything and everything in its place" are applicable there also. The yard as well as the house should be kept clean. There are schools in the country where paper, applecores and chickenbones are strewn in every direction, so that the whole place has an air of neglect and untidiness. The waste paper may be utilized for making fires and the remains of dinner deposited in a receptacle and burned, or thrown where birds can get them. Growing plants in a school-room always add to its beauty.

Desks should be so arranged that pupils will not face the windows. Light falling over their left shoulders is preferable, then their hands do not cast shadows when they write. This is an important item about the room and should be remembered. Another thing to be considered is the ventilation. So many persons constantly breathing out poisonous gas and using up the oxygen necessarily make the air unwholesome. During every recess, doors and windows should be opened wide for a few minutes, so that fresh air may circulate and fill the room. If windows are kept open for the purpose of ventilation, great care should be taken to avoid draughts. The bodies as well as the minds and hearts of children should be kept healthy. Watch the fire, or appoint a responsible pupil to do so. Do not keep the room too hot or too cold.

Select only good pictures for your walls. Do not think you have to use every cheap print brought by the chidren. (See last chapter.) Teach children not to deface property, not to waste chalk, cut their desks or mark on the walls. Let them feel that the schoolroom belongs to them all and gain their co-operation to keep it in good condition.

A set of book-shelves or a book-case is a helpful addition. If you start to collect books for a children's library, it is astonishing how they accumulate. Publishers send them to you if you are a wide-awake, progressive teacher. Friends help you, and the children themselves make contributions, sometimes by lending and sometimes by giving their own books. Then you can make others. Old catalogues of convenient size and shape may be turned into scrap-books and filled with stories and pictures. Make your room so bright, -attractive and pretty that the children will feel that it is good to be there.

CHAPTER II The Teacher

Why are you teaching? Is it because you love your work, love the children, and are trying to do good in the world? Is it because you are obliged to do it in order to make a living? Is it because you love to have money to spend? Is it because some of your friends or relatives are on the school board and gave you the place?

Perhaps it is for several of these reasons combined. Now for another question: What kind of teacher are you? You may fill a teacher's position because circumstances compel you to do so, but the way in which you fill it depends on yourself only. Are you in earnest about your work? Do you realize the sacred responsibility of training little children? Do you read professional books and school journals, try to fin^ out what others are doing, keep your eyes open, seek to train the hearts as well as the minds of the children under you? In short are you a teacher, with your whole soul in your work, or merely a person filling a place that by rights some one else should have?

If you are not a real teacher, why not? It may be you have never thought much about it at all, and that with you, lying dormant, are powers for good of which you are yet unconscious. If this is the case oh! wake up and think what you are doing. "What if God should place in your hands a diamond and tell you to inscribe on it a sentence which should be read at the last day and shown there as an index of your own thoughts and feelings, what care, what caution would you exercise in the selection ! Now this is just what God has done. He has placed before you the immortal minds of children, more imperishable than the diamond, on which you are to inscribe by your instruction, by your spirit and by your example something which will REMAIN and be exhibited for or against you at the judgment." Isn't this a serious, a conscience-searching thought ? How earnest we should be, how careful, how zealous!

It is strange that people have not found out long ago that a poor teacher may dwarf a child's mental ability, may deaden his sensibility. A man would not take a costly watch to any but a skilled goldsmith to be repaired ; if his eyes troubled him, he would trust only a specialist to treat them; and yet think how much more important than a watch or the eyes even, is the mind of a child. The watch may tarnish and the works within give out, the eye will die with the body, but a child's mind, his soul, lives on forever.

Sometimes when a poor teacher loses a position

people say, "Oh ! aren't you sorry for Mr.

or Miss ? I don't think it is fair to give

that place to some one else." Think of this question: was it fair to those children to give them any but the very best teacher? Their little minds were being dwarfed, their powers and capabilities repressed, their mental and moral growth retarded. Was that fair? Children have a right to the best instruction and not the poorest.

There is a constantly increasing demand for skilled teachers, and especially is this the case in the primary department. The time is fast coming when a poor teacher will not be employed any more than a poor dentist or a poor physician. People can't afford it. They will find out that even if it costs more money, it pays to have their children taught well.

The primary teacher more than all others holds a responsible position, because it is while the children are young that the strongest impressions are made on their minds. It is then that the foundation is laid for all future work, and if the building is to be strong, well proportioned and symmetrical throughout, how important it is that the foundation should be good. It requires more time, thought and study to be a firstclass primary teacher than to be any other kind.

You have probably heard words to this effect : *'0h ! she has only the lower classes in school, anybody can teach them." This is not true. It takes skill, tact, preparation and patience to teach the lower branches and to do it successfully. It takes experience, too. You may have heard this also, "I'd rather have a young teacher's enthusiasm than an old teach^er's experience." That depends upon what kind of young teacher or what kind of old teacher you have. Enthusiasm alone is not all that is necessary, neither is experience ; but both are needed. Of course the longer you teach the better you can teach, if you don't allow yourself to get into a rut, as the lady did who used the same Geography for fourteen years. Text-books change, methods change, and the teacher, in order to keep up with the onward march of progress must change. Experience we must have and the longer we teach, the more we know that there is more to know. Teaching is no child's play, it is genuine work, and only those who have taught can realize how much it means. Education, what is it? It isn't to see how many facts can be stored away within the child's brain, but how much the mind and heart grow and are developed, that is the true aim of teaching. The word "educate" comes from "educo," to ''lead out.'

All real teachers as the years go by, look back and see where they might have done better, and constantly strive to go forward. Whether we begin well or ill our whole work is determined by our ideals. "In what spirit am I working?" we should ask ourselves. It should be the spirit of love and of humility. We should try to serve the children and study the best means of doing this. Hundreds of questions will be asked by the eager, curious little ones, questions not in the books but in their own bright minds, and we must be ready with answers as often as possible. Never deceive a child when he asks a question. If you can't answer him, it is better to say honestly and candidly, "I don't know, but I will try to find out," than to pretend to knowledge which you do not possess.

A teacher should keep up with the times and be informed about the latest text-books. Even if you can't use them in your school, you gain ideas from seeing and reading them. Buy, borrow, or exchange books with some friend who is a teacher. If you are in the country try to keep in touch with some live city teacher who will be glad to give you ideas. Take a day off occasionally and visit other schools. Don't be satisfied with your own work but see what others are doing. On the other hand, don't adopt every new book and method of which you hear. What may suit one school or class may not be adapted to another. Attend County Institutes, and if they are uninteresting make them interesting. Be so enthusiastic yourself that you will inspire others. Give the results of your reading and your methods when you think it will do good; don't keep them all to yourself. Help and get help from these meetings, that is what they are for. Whether you teach in a public or private school don't neglect to meet with other teachers. Learn what you can from them, and give out what you know so that others may use your ideas. The true teacher is ready, willing and anxious to teach not only pupils but any one who needs to be taught.

"The center, around which everything revolves, is the teacher. If she is happy, bright, and full of enthusiasm, with quick perception and a kind heart, her character will be reflected in the little ones about her. If she is cross, or does things in a mechanical, halfhearted way, this, too, will have its effect." What the teacher is, the school will be. If we wish to govern others we must first learn to govern ourselves. This is at once the most important and the most difficult rule to keep. If you allow yourself to grow irritable, the feeling will be communicated to the pupils, but if you preserve an even temper and a well-balanced head and heart, everything will move on smoothly and without friction. "Greater is he that ruleth his own spirit than he that taketh a city." Certain it is that only when we control ourselves are we fitted to control others.

Are you ever cross in the school-room? Do you scold the children and find fault with them and think they are the worst children you ever saw? Do you ever think to yourself, "I can't stand this any longer?" Then at night do you feel ashamed of yourself, and discouraged at the same time? There are two things the matter. One is that you do not plan your work well. You didn't give these children anything to do and very naturally they fell into mischief. Then you showed that you felt cross, and that made the children feel cross. Yes, that is one trouble, but the cause back of all that, is that your nerves are giving out, and that you are slowly and surely committing suicide. Don't you know that teaching is a great strain on even the strongest constitution ? Look about you at the teachers of your acquaintance, how many look healthy? Can't you think of more than one teacher who has broken down from overwork? They tell the children to obey the laws of health and how many know how to take care of themselves? You need more sleep. You need to go to bed earlier and to have some rest. You need recreation and a little break in the monotony of work. The human frame can stand a great deal, but there must be a reckoning some time. Don't use up all of your nerve force at once. Work as much as you please, keep busy, study, read, but remember that "All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy." Your teaching will be better if every now and then you allow yourself to relax.

It helps the primary teacher to have mother meetings. Most mothers send a child to school and never even visit the school to see what the teacher is giving him. One of two things must be true, either the parents must have unbounded confidence in the teacher or must care nothing, think nothing of the child's character being moulded for time and eternity. Sometimes they do not even know the teacher, do not see him or her, until the close of the session. This is often the case in the country and too frequently in town, and yet that teacher has put into that child's life thoughts and ideas that will last always. Parents need to know the teachers, teachers need to know the parents, and as both are factors in influencing the child's destiny they ought to work together. Both need to study the child, to find out what is best for his particular nature; what his natural tendencies are, which need to be strengthened and which discouraged.

Better work would be done and better results obtained if parents would realize this. There are many teachers who have waked up to the importance of their work and are ready and eager to do the best they can ; but they need help, they need support, they need the co-operation of the fathers and mothers who should realize the importance of the teacher's work, should be interested in it, and should visit the p,laces where their children are daily taught.

Call the mothers of your pupils together. Organize a club, and discuss questions pertaining to the welfare of the school. Read everythnig in the Primary Department of The Normal Instructor. Find out what other mother clubs are doing and seek to gain practical results from co-operation.

Teachers, our work is high and noble, the greatest of all professions next to the preaching of the gospel. We hold the future of this nation in our hands to a great extent, for who are these children but the future men and women of our country? They will make its history hereafter. We, as teachers, are moulding them, and according to the way in which we bend and train their minds and inclinations so will they be. We do not have more influence than some parents, for while there are those who through thoughtlessness or ignorance neglect their childrn, there are others who give the most earnest consideration to training their little ones aright. They pray over it, they strive to their utmost to keep them in the right path, to throw in their way good books, to have them associate with kind, well-behaved chidren, to give them employment and amusement in the home, in order to keep them happy and healthy in mind and body. Yet many of these do not realize that our work as teachers is the same as theirs. Some of them think that if their children are taught to read, to write, to spell, and to cipher that the teacher has done her part. Ah! but she hasn't. If this were all, if the responsibility stopped here the work would be easy enough. There are many who could do this who are not teachers in the true sense of the word.

What must a teacher have? First above all things she must have patience, unbounded patience: patience that will enable her to be gentle when children are noisy and restless and have bad lessons. Then she must have love ; love for all of the little ones who are placed in her care. Mothers love their own children but how many of them have patience when the child of the neighbor runs through the house with muddy feet or how many are just, and able to see both sides in a quarrel between the little neighbor child and their own. Yet a teacher must have love enough and a heart big enough to gather all of the little ones in, and must be impartial enough to decide against one she loves perhaps the most, if another is in the right. She must be just, she must be wise, must have tact and prudence, must learn the modern and improved methods of teaching. She must have forethought, and plan out each week how best to make the lessons interesting for the week following. She must have good common sense and her mind must be stored with various kinds of knowledge. Even if she doesn't teach them, she must know something of History, of Geography, of Geology and Botany. She must acquire the art of story telling, must study the natural world about us, the birds, the trees, the flowers, the sunshine and the rain. She must take a wide range and visit the realms of poetry, of music, of art. She must know something about these wonderful bodies of ours and how to keep them healthy. She must be well-informed on current topics and most important of all, must be filled with kindness of heart. Woman is spoken of rather than man because of late years the work of the primary department is being given into her hands.

The ideal drawn is high and perhaps none of us can attain it, but we can try, and there are many who do try.

"Heaven is not reached at a single bound,

But we build the ladder by which we rise. From the lowly earth to the vaulted skies.

And we mount to the summit round by round."

So, little by little, must we rise in our chosen profession. Sometimes we are discouraged. There is much to do, there are many Ideas that we can not put into practice. It is hard to be always self-controlled, always patient, always kind, but we must not mourn over failures. Let us rather say, "I will forget those things which are behind and press forward."

CHAPTER III The Children

Here are the children ; school has begun. What will you do with them? How will you control them, by means of love or fear? Will you lead or drive them? How will you teach them, wisely and well? When they leave you next spring or next summer will they be better or worse for your influence? They must be one or the other. They are as marble in the sculptor's hands. Beautiful traits of character are to be rounded out and developed, the angles of bad habit and wrong tendencies are to be cut off or rubbed down. Are all children alike? In some respects yes, but in others how vastly different. Here is one child who tells a falsehood as naturally as he speaks, he doesn't think about it at all. Another has been told the sin of it but the habit is so firmly fixed that he finds it hard to stop. Another is truthful but high-tempered. One child is timid, self-conscious, painfully bashful, while one of the same age is aggressively pert, likes to be noticed and has evidently been taught at home that she is the most important of all persons.

What is the best thing to do for such children? Study them, find out their thoughts, their aspirations, their minds, their good and bad traits, their likes and dislikes. The florist in order to bring blossoms to perfection studies flowers, how much more important it is that we study the blossoms placed in our care! He knows that all plants must not be treated in the same way, that some need a sandy soil while others do not, that some require more water than others and some need the sunlight more. So it is with children ; some require a great amount of kindness and patience on the part of the teacher and can be reached in no other way. With others the teacher is compelled to use firmness.

Each child must be studied with a view to helping that particular one. Study them in the class, on the playground, in their homes. Learn what their early training has been. Are their parents poor or rich, kind or unkind, cultured or ignorant, worldly or Godfearing? With whom has this boy or that girl associated? All of these things help to determine the character of each little one in your room. Oh! if you could know the home life of some, it would make you patient and forbearing. You would pity instead of blame.

In this country there are educated workers who for some time have urged the study of psychological phenomena in children. This is done in order that we may have better schools and better teachers. A national society for this study was formed in Chicago in 1893 and Dr. G. Stanley Hall was made president. The movement really began in Boston in 1879 when six primary teachers under the leadership of Mrs. Shaw took several children at a time and tried to find out what they knew.

The results were surprising. Many had never seen a live chicken, a robin nor a growing strawberry. When asked the size of a cow, one little tot said it was as big as her kitten's tail, and another thought it was no bigger than her thumb nail.

Since then, laboratories have been established in the large cities, and children have been measured, tested, questioned, and the results each time written down and preserved for future reference. Special schools exist for the benefit of children whose physical or mental growth has been retarded. Dozens of books have been written about the study of children, and numerous articles have appeared from time to time in the magazines.