Enthusiasm for reading means better understanding in arithmetic thought problems, better grades in writing essays, more inteerest in geography and history, and better spelling. Pupils who learn to read well grow up to be men and women who appreciate good books, understand instructions on a label, and read and understand the Word of God. It is important to train children to be observant. It is an everyday need, a habit that will help them all through life. They need to be inspired to open their eyes and see what there is to see, to keep an ear ready for the thousands of meaningful sounds breaking around them, to train their noses to identify hundreds of smells.
Some teachers have charts on the schoolroom wall with gold paper stars showing perfect scores.
These charts can be an incentive for the child to try harder to have a perfect score. However, while these stars are a way of rewarding intelligence, they are also a way of displaying ignorance. A child who senses that he has been labeled a failure, often proceeds to live up to that expectation. At some time or another, children need to learn to work without being rewarded, to learn that achievement in itself is a reward. Competition has its place in the classroom, but too often it is overdone and proves unfair to the less fortunate pupil.