The Press., 1890-08-28
(Contributed.) ORAL GEOGRAPHY AND DRILLS.

The gentle presiding deities of the con- mon schools get into the rut of repeating to the pupil what he can be easily led to notice for himself. A better way is the ob- jective method, and if any barriers exist that render this impracticable, break them. Rather would I take into the schoolroom, and that by the spade or spoonful, the hill called Bunker" on the lake called Wan gumbaug, than fail to illustrate by an ob- jective oral course in home geography, the facts of position, direction, distance, soil, climate, productions, horizon line, etc. that shuts in the primarian's "little world of home." The primary geography lesson may include little object lessons on plants, animals and minerals, and yet not not sub iect the teacher to the criticism of using too many branches.
 A good way to impart ideas of distance is to draw a straight line upon the blackboard and let the scholar divide it into two or three equal parts, then test the accuracy by measurement. Let the pupil discriminate and word the distinctions between 8 hill, mountain, bluff, ridge, needle, ,foothill, ,crag, pinnacle, butte, mesa, range, terrace, pass, cliff, canon, crve, gap, plains, plains that contain a number of farms, etc., and every natural and artificial diversity of the earths
 
 forded by heavy rain for the out of doors lesson in real miniature islands, capes, etc.. these objects are better for illustration than any crude piles upon the molding board. Let elementary lessons be void of all te- diousness by allowing mental pictures to be roughly sketched upon the blackboard. | The teacher calls attention to village, ten miles away the eclassimaginesit il, and the adja- cent lands lifted up until the village is above the clouds, and the schoolhouse at the foot of very high mountain, perhaps two miles | high and it is days walk up to the viii lage. Now take off this village from the top and cover with snow, Ca white capped summit may easily be shown by fecks of crayon,) near the top make no trees or shrubs, but lower down in the outline make few dwarf pines, still lower for est and now at the base make some irreg- ular boundary lines of farms extending up the slopes.
 Pleasing pictures drawn by primarians develop ideas more clearly than so much over and over descriptive text. Primary geography may be made so interesting, even in our rural districts, that to escape Interruption visitors will have to be kept in quarantine. The teacher first wakes up and rivets the attention of the class by requiring 8 description of the surface, whether even or uneven, of Frank Spaul- ding's farm let them by knowledge of handling tell you the various earths, sand, clay and loam. Next take up grains, veg etables, fruits, foods and quadrupeds, those that are cud chewers and those with 8 eleven foot, and those that eat flesh, and those that are commonly used for food. Give lesson on animals, those that bur- row, that infest. those that are hunted for food and fur, birds, races, occupations, lesson on time, old methods of measuring time, the seasons, etc., all requiring labor, thought, application and oral training. Take 10 minutes after the regular exercise to ''converse" with scholars upon one of these topics, your discretion guided al. ways by your acquaintance with the little students and by a normal school reference manual. This course will be a robbery of time to no pupil, as sometimes the routine : concert drill exercise is.
 Mechanical routine is out of fashion, and nothing in my own school work ever ex ceeded the stupidity of those ssdisplay drills" A great amount of time and ef fort was lost in requiring the brighter pu F pills to go over and over again what they had already mastered for the benefit of the : duller pupils. There was the spelling 3 drill in the mixed school, bright girls spelling over and over the words that nc child could possibly mispell. An amend ment is to diversity the drill, not to ''cut it altogether. If you state the fact that General Grant died on Mt. McGregor July 23d, 1885, this will suggest an oral illus tration. Who was General Grant Where is Mt. McGregor, and how long ago die this occur Take new fact twice week } in connection with the history or geogra phy lessons, and waste no time in term over-term, useless, semi-musical hum-drum concert drilling. Better all sing a pretty roundelay.
 5 But when commenced writing I hai only in mind that so much "home geogra phy" was to be had for the mere recogni . ton of it, as not to require instructors tt go to antipodal localities to find the objec lesson. Now if you will reflect a momen you will be surprised to find how many 3 subdivisions geography includes.
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