Alma record. (Alma, Mich.) 1878-1928, 1889-10-18
RATIONAL TRAINING.
The Proper Way OF Developing the In.
tellects OF school Children.

The Proper Way OF Developing the In
tellects OF school Children.
The development OF the mind OF the
the reflective faculties develop quite
early; in others, quite late. Some are
very imaginative and love poetry;
others are not at all imaginative and
can not bear TO read poetry Some
children develop a mathematical fac
ulty and delight in arithmetic, and can
very soon study the Clements Of geom-
etry and algebra Others are almost
ounces in mathematics. In older times
it was supposed that child should be
made TO study that which he most dis
liked, in order to promote his equable
development. For example, if his
memory was poor, his memory should
be trained directly. This is wrong.
The mind must proceed along the lines
OF greatest activities. not along the
lines of the least activities. Let us see
what this means. If child delights to
read and write, but has poor technical
memory, let that child read and write
10 her hearts content Let the memory
alone, but give exercises in reproduc-
ing what is written or read, also in
comparison and association. The
memory will be thus trained without
giving words or dates to be committed
to memory. Much is said now concern
ing the training of the retentive facul-
~, nd ha hao IF hn
have studied the matter is that memory
is strong in proportion as the observa-
ton. association and imagination are
strong. Careful habits Of observation
and the forming OF habits Of associating
similar things will always strengthen
the memory. In no other way can
this work be accomplished.
Then wisdom shows us that we
should give such children as have poor
memories great deal OF observation
work and association work. and it will
be seen very soon that the memory will
assert its power. For example, il a
child dislikes TO memorize dates in his
tory, at first, give no dates in history
for the child to remember But what
shall we do? Take this course: Tell a
story to-day, tomorrow tell another
one; let it follow in the order OF time
after the preceding one; the next day
tell another one-let this follow in the
order of time. Now. after several sto-
ries are told and reproduced, ask which
one came first. which second, which
third. Now, what relation has the sec
ond to the third and so on. After the
order Of relationship has been estab-
lished then the date can come in; but
not until this order of relationship has
given. II this course be pursued, the
children will have no difficulty in re-
Numbering dates and names also.
The reason that some children do
not like numbers is because the faculty
of relation is not developed; the child
puzzles over his examples in arithmetic
because he does not see the relation
between their parts He reads: "A
man bought piece Of ground for $500,
and sold one-half it for $500 and one
fourth OF the remainder for 5000. What
did he make by the transaction
Many are entirely unable to solve such
an example as this-not because it is
difficult, but because the relations be-
tween the parts are not clearly seen.
Do not urge children on in mathemat-
les faster than they can understand;
urge them IN as fast as possible in the
direction they like to go, and every
month reclassify the school in refer
ence to attachments. Very much more
could be said under this head, but
enough has been written to show in
what directions children should receive
impulses. and in what directions they
should not. jerome Allen, in School
Tor,n,1