The Somerset reporter. [volume] (Skowhegan, Me.) 1868-1909, 1890-12-11
Teaching as an Art.

The study OF teaching as an art has not
been better illustrated than In the recent
instance of Sunday-school in an un-
ruly section Of great city, where the
teachers had taught by the old routine of
reading and recitation, without resorting
to any special means of interesting the
children, which probably they would
have considered claptrap, and where they
not only failed to excite interest or even
attention, but where they found it i'm
possible to maintain discipline, to com
mand silence, or create reverence, to
make themselves heard, to do any good
whatever In the old methods. In de-
spair they resorted to young woman
for help, teacher In a secular school
in q troublesome portion of the town,
who had become known for her good
work. She agreed to help them IL they
would let her do so in her own way,
the teachers Withdrawing, and letting her
have the school In her own hands com
pletely. As they did SO, she went with
an assistant into the chapel where the
children were assembled. Pandemonium
reigued in the place, with confusion
worse COMPOUNDED; the children were
talking, laughing, wrestling, amusing
themselves-in all. seething caltron of
noise and disturbance. The teacher
mounted the plstform quietly, ami, 10
the habitual disregard of teachers there
almost unobserved. Instead of calling
the school to order, which would have
been an entirely impossible and us less
proceeding, as no one could have heard
her and no one would have obeyed her.
she opened box she had brought. took
out Of 1t q large white dove, she held it
aloft in her extended Arms, but did not
say word. At the same time her assist
ant took from another box long stalk
Of white lilies and held 1t up beside her.
For moment or two the uproar contin-
ued then one child CHANGED to cstch a
glimpse of the singular sight, and called
to another, and that one to another;
those that faced the platform stopped
stone still ; the others turned to see what
was the matter, In three mnut-s there
was not whisper, one could have heard
pin drop, and the new teacner told the
children the story of Christ's baptism;
and although it is some time since, there
has never been o moments disturbance
10 that rude school again.
The same methods rs those used by
this teacher-that is to say, in their gen.
eral principle-have been having telling
results In day-schools of late. In this
case, the teacher had studied the intelli
gences and temperaments aud habits of
children so thoroughly that she knew at
once how to captivate their interest and
bring them into subsection; and although
she herself may have had some peculiar
gift of fine organization or Imagination,
she only used the modern system, apply
ing to the use of the Sundsy-school the
object-lesson which had proved SO val
uable In the secular school, BY these
methods everything studied becomes q
living aud. IS 1t were, visible reality tn
the student, and the stimulation Of the
Imagination fixes the knowledge, in
creases the capsblity of receiving and
adapting, and 10 SO doing enlarges the
possibility of future knowledge In the
race. No one thing In this world can go
forward without taking another along
with 1t, till all things are working to-
gether. There have been, then, tremen-
dous strides forward In this century,
many of which must be considered the
result Of the work Of the century that
went before It. There ought, therefore,
to be some wondrous advance In the
twentieth century, - result Of the ap-
plicstion of thought to the work Of the
nineteenth. Hdrper's Bazdr.