Rutland weekly herald. [volume] (Rutland, Vt.) 1859-1877, 1873-06-26
enforce obedience and secure order, the
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| all just requirements, and their ODSerV-
ance of order and quietness in the school.
1t is said: ''Order is the first law of
heaven'-it certainly ought to be in the
| school.
We are not pleading for straight
! jacket" systems nor for eXceptionable
extremes; nor for forbidding tyrany
or reign of fear; nor for so rigid repel-
ling rules as to make the school room a
| prison house to well disposed minds; but
even this is better than constant con-
fusion or open disobedience and defiance
to all authority.
The most orderly school may likewise
be the most cheerful and enthusiastic
for progress, In this, as in many other
things, there is happy medium, and
happy that preceptor and his pupils who
know the medium and maintain it.
That the teacher is morally obligated
to secure and sustain good discipline in
the school is manifest from several con-
sideratiOns
l. That school which is best disciplined
will, all other things being equal, make
much the best progress in study. Like
the selfish dog in the manger, who will
neither eat nor let the hungry OK, so dis
obedient, disorderly scholars will neither
study much themselves nor let those
study around them who would. And
even if it were possible-which it is not
for a disorderly school to learn as
much from the textbooks, the democrat
iZing influence of such an undisciplined
school, in its lawless effect upon the
general behaviour of the scholars, may
more than balance all the good theymay
get at such a school. Often the exam
pie of even one disorderly, disobedient
scholar may be as contagious as a moi
some, noxious disease, and prove de-
structive to all discipline in the school
! So far as progress in useful knowledge
in disorderly school, or the public ben
eft derived from it, the means and the
labor are largely lost in its mainten-
! ance.
2. From his parental relation to the
scholar the teacher is morally bound to
maintain proper school discipline. To
allow disobedience and disorder is an in
| Justice to the scholar disobeying. Not
only will it prevent due progress in the
requirement of practical knowledge, but
it will tend to confirm him in habits OF
! lawlessness, willfulness and ungOverna-
BILE passions, which will unfit him for
the highest duties and pleasures of intel
| 1I0tuG ClIlLtuSDtD. w I'LL 1lO SLlttlt ICfiSpll
| has many a wicked wretch and wreck
among men cursed his earlier guardians
and guides for not enforcing wholesome
obedience to righteous rules when they
were moulding his mind and morals for
| the duties and destinies of a responsible
| manhood. For the WretchedneSs and
woes so often burdening the life of law
| less, willful, passionate men, who, be-
| A;~o;,,1.,ol 10 nhaIinnNa 0nl
order when young, are violent and base
when old, their teachers are morally
much to blame in the neglect of good
school discipline For the sake of the
! future of the scholar, in his moral we'll
being, school discipline is morally bind
| ing on the teacher.
B. From the relation of the teacher to
society and the State, as determining the
character and conduct of the coming
citizen, the teacher is under moral obi
CATION to maintain wholesome school dis
cipline.
The neglect or opposition of careless
or lawless parents to the proper disci-
pline of the child at home or at school
| cannot excuse the teacher from that re
spOnsibility.
The neglect of the parent cannot JUS
tify the neglect of the TEACHER, any more
! than the ignorance of the parent would
excuse the ignorance of the preceptor.
While the want of home discipline
renders school discipline much more
onerous and irksome. it also makes
this the more needful and i'm
perative If all parents did their
| duty faithfully in the home tram
ing, the work Of the teacher, in this re-
spect, would be comparatively light
! But when undisciplined, rebellious child
rem are sent to school, society and the
State have a right to expect the teacher
while lawfully in the place of the parent,
| will do his duty in the way of discipline,
so as to secure the public against injury
from law-defying men.
The graduates OF our schools go out
either to bless and beautify the world
with reverence for law and labors OF
| love, or to fill it with cursing and crime !;
which shall be the fruit of their doings
depends in no small degree upon their
school discipline.
To the teacher the public says guard
the virtues and protect the interests OF
| society and State by sending out young
citizens well disciplined to respect rulers
and maintain just laws; but instead OF
this. an undisciplined, disorderly school
| is educating citizens to defy law and de-
moraliZe society.
| The lack of reverence for law and re-
spect for rulers made rebellion possible
by those whose will and passions had
never been disciplined to restraint, and
| every ungoverned school in our land Is a
nursery of rowdyism and rebellion
HOW SHALL SCHOOL DISCIPLINE BE MAIN
TANNED?
| It is purely question of expediency.
In some manner, by some means, 1t should
| always be maintained.
The best method and means for this
must be determined by the circumstan-
ces. 1t depends upon the experience
and tact of the teacher, upon his readily
and rightly reading human nature, his
executive ability and power to control,
upon the character, temperament and
| temptations of the scholar, his habits
and home training, together with then
| ture and circumstances of the given case !;
these and other considerations should be
taken into account in determining the
proper mode and measures for securing
and sustaining good discipline. If kind
looks. loving words, appeals to self
respect, to reason, to the affections, to
| self-interests are sufficient, well it is
best to avoid all harsher measures if the
kinder means will gain the end desired.
But if all these having been patiently.
faithfully tried, and all these have failed
to secure ready obedience and good or
4 der. as they not unfrequently do fail in
! certain cases in almost every school,
then let such methods of correction be
used, and such chastisement be inflicted
as will secure obedience and maintain
order. If the case be SO extreme, as it
sometimes is, that the rod or rawhide be
alone sufficient, then amen let it fall /!
Better o thousand times the scars of the
lash on the body, and obedience and or
der Herewith, than the scars that law
less disobedience and persistent success
full defiance will leave on the mind and
disposition of a rebellious scholar.
Refusing to use the rod under some
circumstances is no evidence OF human
! or heavenly wisdom or love. Whom
the Lord loveth he chasteneth. He that
snareth the rod hateth his son, is prin-