The stayer. (Canyon City, Tex.) 1896-1903, 1902-12-04

'onIront the teacher. The Bibli-
cal exhortation, Let him thai
thinketh he standeth take heed lest
he fall applies with peculiar force
to the teache, No sooner has he
general principle fully settled
than all his fine spun theories are
overthrown by some particular case
of failure in its application. Have
you not seen all the pet theories OF
a fine disciplarian overthrown by
one small boy who seemed mischief
embodied? Or all the cherished
methods and devices of a fine
teacher of Mathematics come to
grief in their application to one
slowly developing mental machin-
cry represented in his class?
| | sincerely believe that no other
class of people in all this great un-
iverse of ours must meet so many
difficult problems as must the ordi-
nary school teacher. started to
say Public school teacher" but re-
membered that that statement
would exclude myself, so left out
the Public" So much for force
of habit.
Not the least difficult of these
problems is the one under discus
sion at the present time, Teaching
Pupils to Study" 1t may be in or
der for me to repeat the subject
occasionally in order that you may
know what it is. may do as the
preachers sometimes say, talk from
my text with emphasis on the prep
osition. But you must remember
that it is much easier to deal in
generalities than in particulars.
But do not know but that it would
be necessary to deal very much in
partlculars-to the extent of each
particular student involved-in or
der to meet the demands of the
subject. Yet if this question could
be satisfactorily settled by each
teacher, he would find it panacea
for all the ills-not that flesh is
heir to-but that teachers are heir
to. Perhaps no class of people can
so thoroughly appreciate the truth
of the statement that AN idle
brain is the devils workshop as
can teachers. If all pupils had
been taught to study, then there
would be no more need of discuss
ions of questions of discipline by
tired teachers whose locks have
grown permanently white and
whose faces have grown perma-
nently scanned with lines of care. |
The studious pupil is self gov
erning. All the methods and de-
vices which we employ would be
unnecessary with pupils of stud
ious habits because they would
solve for themselves the problems
and find for themselves the an
swers to the questions which all
our devices are helping to make
easy for them. In fact, the great
object to be attained in all our
school work is training to studious
habits. Inasruch as we have done
that, we have succeeded. And in
asrnuch as we have not done that.
we have failed.
Education is a development, a
growth. And we educate in order t
to gain power. This object can {
never be accomplished until the pu-
pill has been trained to self help, '
and he never reaches that point I'M t
i'll he has become q real student
nave worried, as doubtless you have, S
about how few real students we 7
urn out of our schools. Our boys
Ind girls leave us with so little S
.bility, or inclination to bend their d
energies to any subject or to solve s
ife's problems in an intelligent S
way. They are so superficial, so +
hallow. Where does the trouble Il
e? They are the results of our s.
andiwork to very great extent. "
IRE we to blame2 Am | to blame a.
ecause that boys life is failure9 a,