The Somerset herald. [volume] (Somerset, Pa.) 1870-1936, 1882-05-17
METHODS OF INSTRUCTION.
BY A. c. HoLBERr.
CHAPTER ".

Geography is branch of the COM
mon school course, in which chill
dren usually take great interest. You
and l have, perhaps, forgotten most
of the subject learned by us at school;
others will do the same in the years
to come. l can recollect the time
when a mud-puddle furnished oceans,
seas, CULTS, rivers, ETC., while the sand
about it could be nodded into con-
tinents, islands, peninsulas, capes,
etc. Most of US have had similar
experiences. What pleasure thrill
ed us then as we disported around
the puddles and framed those little
microcosms of our own! We were
at once creator, preserver and de-
stroyer if we so will.
The idea has been taken hold OF
and applied in our city schools to
teaching young children the subject
of geography so far as the knowledge
of the divisions of land and water
and their peculiarities are concerned.
Small pupils are furnished with a
board, which is provided with a
raised border; this board is water
tight. Some sand, nice and clean,
is heaped in one corner of the board
about a quart of water is poured on
the board, and the children work,
literally, in a world of their own.
Who can suppose that the divisions
formed by them will ever be forgot
ten, either in name or character?
Why cannot such system be intro
duced into our county schools? l
am well aware that much opposition
would be made. Parents would say,
when / want my children to spend
their time playing in the mud, I'll
set them at it myself, and not send
them to school to learn the art" but
/ am well satisfied that much may
be taught by the means / haye men,
toned. You have a class of ad-
vanced pupils. They are deep in
the mysteries of physical geography.
Perhaps they are studying up the
subject of icebergs. A bucket OF
water and a lump of ice will assist
their comprehension of the subject.
You can by actual measurement
show them just how much of the
ice is below the water and how much
above. Warm the water a very lit
tie, and see how it will round off the
ice until it becomes top-heavy and
rolls over. Then imagine the ice a
million or more cubit feet instead OF
two or three cubic inches, and they
will readily see that it would be a
most dangerous neighbor for ship.
Make the water slightly salty; SET
it out on a cold night, and show
your class that the water made by
melting the ice frozen during the
night is perfectly fresh, while the
brine is stronger.
Have you ever read ''Tyndall's
Forms of Water" or his "Heat as a
Mode of Motio1?" If not, procure
and read them. You will arise from
their perusal with more advanced
ideas than you now possess. You
will be better able to do your work
in the school room, too.
No teacher can do his best work
in the school room without a certain
amount of apparatus, suitable for
the branch which he is teaching. ]
shall allude to this as | take up the
different branches. In geography
there are wanted at least globe, a
hemisphere globe, an orrery may be
made useful, and a set of outline
maps. If you have these things use
them. Don't stow them away in
the garret; use them; that is what
they were made for. If you don't
know how to- use them, for heavens
sake and for your own sake learn
how at once. Don't take pay fol
furnishing the children with bread
when you give them but stones
Perhaps you have no outline maps
Well, what of it? Take some old
geography and cut the maps out Of
lit; hang them up at such distance
that your class cannot see the paint.
ed names. You will have set then
that will answer, and you can use
your own work as an incentive to
your board of directors to persuade
them to procure set. If you have
no globe make one. "Three pota-
toes may be so used as to thorough
ly explain eclipses." An orrery is
better, but if l have no orrery / will
not hesitate to use the potatoes; will
you?
have said that children usually
delight in the study of geography.
Can we find any way of accounting
for this? The mere fact that it con-
tains an account of other countries,
men, animals. etc, will not account
for it. / can account for it in but
one way, viz: That this study calls
into play the child's memory for
facts which is then the dominant
memory. You or / cannot to-day
learn the dull, dry list of facts that
we once could. l remember once
committed to memory great many
verses from the New Testament in a
week and recited them at Sunday
school. / would not agree to do it
aow for as many dollars. ! merely
mention this to show what the MEM
orv may be forced to do. These
verses were as meaningless to me as
the hand writing on the wall was to
Belshazzar. / can yet, after long
wears, in which my mind has been
constantly concentrated on other
things, frequently recall long pass
! ages from that lesson. / wish to i'm.
press on the mind of the teacher the
fact that whatever is to be remem-
bered merely as a fact and in the
words of the book must be laid up
| in the storehouse of memory before
the reasoning powers are developed
Can you commit and retain piece
of poetry now? / venture to say
you cannot. Yet when you were
fourteen or thereabouts you would
have deemed it play.
Geography deals in facts, dry sta.
tistics; you must be more or less a
Gradgrind in teaching. Those long
rows of statistical figures can b.
placed in the memory and ''they