The Portland daily press., 1879-10-06
The Primary School Revolution.
The New Way Of Teaching Children to
Read Before Learning Their Letters.

The reform method of primary education in
Boston went into operation with this school
year. The Boston Advertiser gives the follow
ing description
The main work of the primary schools is to
teach children to read, or rather to begin to
teach them to read, for it is well known that
few pupils after their three years in these
schools have made much progress. Besides
this they get o little knowledge of numbers
and little of writing. The old way of teach
ing children to read was by teaching them their
letters, one by one, then the simplest combi-
nations, like alb, alb, and so on by slow pro-
cess, combined with spelling at every stage. 1t
is but little while since this was done away
with, and what is known as "the word-meth-
od'' was introduced, by which children were
taught to recognize words by sight before they
knew the names of the letters, and of course
before they could spell at all. 1t was great
surprise to the teachers by the old system to
discover that child would learn to recognize
the form of the word hat for example, when-
ever he saw it, sooner than he could be taught
to recognize the letters separated, and then be
educated up through ''at' to chat by the eX-
ercise of his reasoning faculties. But upon re-
Election, it does not appear strange that the sign
for hat, which is instantly associated in child'S
mind with the object, hat, which he knows very
well should be more easily remembered than the
sign or or t, which means nothing, unless
perchance, the last is confused in his mind
with the name of his mothers favorite bever-
age, in which case he has something to unlearn.
In all good schools the word method, if no bet
ter one, is now followed; but it had to encoun-
ter very obstinate, not to say conceited, con-
Servatism when it was introduced.
Another improvement of modern date, to
help the child-mind over the difficulty of the
same letter. was the invention of the Leigh
type, which gives each letter peculiar form
for each sound it has. This is serviceable in its
way, but is not yet by any means in universal
use.
The latest advance in the art of teaching
children to read would seem to be very natu-
raj ore after the triumph of the word-method,
it nevertheless encounters great opposition.
While it is q development OF the word-method,
it is much more. 1t is an application of object
teaching, and it reverses the traditional order
by teaching the child to read the written words
and to write them before he reads printed
words, or even knows the alphabet. We have
no space here to go into an elaborate eXpOsi-
ton of the method, but brief sketch will in
dicate it. The teachers perhaps, draws on the
blackboard picture of a cat, and by converse
ton gets the attention OF the children to the
subject. Then she writes the word cat" and
tells them what it is, talks about the word,
erases it and writes it again, makes a column
of repetitions of the word, constantly calling
upon them to recognize and pronounce 1T, re-
quires them to watch her as she writes 1t slow
ly, to see where she begins and how she pro-
CcGuS.# w uoll Sll6 Has uN6lI Ou tlIo WOlu oui-
fcently it is left ON the board, and the children
take their states and pencils to make the word
for themselves. Their work is examined in
dvidually, corrections made and hints given.
They write it over and over again. By such q
system the pupils acquire in a few days a
knowledge of several simple words, including,
perhaps, two or three verbs and adjectives.
and read short written sentences, and can write
the sentences themselves with surprising faith
fulness to the teachers copy, or even from die
tation. In few weeks, much sooner than
might be expected, the pupil has acquired a
considerable written vocabulary, and has an
acquaintance by eye and the power to make
with pencil all the more common combinations
| of script letters. Then the teacher may begin
| to teach the printed words, either from the
| blackboard or with charts; but not neglectlng
the writing which is continued constantly, so
| that the pupil habitually uses the pencil and
| practices writing, not as penmanShip with
careful teaching of up-sroke and down-stroke,
and oval and loops, but imitatively. In time
the letters composing the words are taught,
and then the pupils are exercised i'll spelling
the words they write.
This brief explanation of the new system is
given after witnessing the method of teaching
| now pursued in the primary schools OF the
| city, OF course it has not been long enough IN
| operation here to enable any conclusions TO be
| drawn as to the ultimate success of the meth
| cd. 1t is as new to the teachers as to the chill
| dren; but several with whom we have con-
versed appeared to have no doubt that the
| children would advance faster than under the
| old system, and that at the end of three years
| from entrance to the schools the class trained
| this way would be better readers, better spell
ers and better writers than the primary schools
| have heretofore sent to the grammar schools
| However, this is not merely matter OF con-
| lecture. For several years the system has
been pursued in the schools of Quincy, and we
believe there is no longer there any question OF
| its superior advantages.