Wausau pilot. [volume] (Wausau, Wis.) 1896-1940, 1906-12-11


/ But now you come at noon"
What can do to overcome tardiness
and increase the attendance at school
This is a question that causes teachers,
especially in the country, considerable
trouble and anxiety. Let's see. Can
remember any rules | learned in my
books on methods of teaching to cover
this case No, not one, and my Pages $
Theory and Art is lost, my "Patrick's
Pedagogy loaned to a friend who is
noted for his efficiency in bookkeeping
and "Baldwin's Art of School Manage
ment" doing service in the nursery
where the baby delights to fondle with
the leaves and inscribe his lovely APP
pellation on its diIapidated covers.
Now / am at sea. But what does it
matter; each individual case of tardi-
ness and absence is different from any
other, so you see that makes differ
ence, and perhaps | could not find the
right rule anyhow to cover this particu-
lar case.
Which reminds me of the rule on the
desk. l have known teachers to appro-
pirate this rule as a remedy for tardi-
ness. But does it help? Yes, in a way
it does. The child who is regulated by
this rule for tardiness today will not be
tardy tomorrow. He will not come at
all. So you see, the rule ruled. And
can you blame the child 2 / can't |
wouldn't, either, come to school, if
were a child, to be ruled by a rule.
Would you?
The spirit of the rhyme is all right,
and | think Mother Goose was all right,
although | did not enjoy the pleasure
of her acquaintance, except in the book.
And that reminds me of the book. Give
the child a book, for Christ's sake give
him a book. Then he will have some
thing to come to school for. lie will
come to read in his book. Once dull
his sense of progress and you have him
slouching. would give baby book
in the cradle if it were only to look at
the pictures and eat the leaves; for
doesn't the great Francis Bacon say in
his essay on Studies, that some books
are to be "chewed and digested ?' And
| think that ought to settle it. But it
does not settle the question of tardiness
and absence from school. In my
perigrinations through the country re-
Gently | met a boy who was snaring
rabbits. He was "nine years DID," he
said, and when | asked him why he had
not gone to school that day he said,
''Huh, what's the use | aint got no
| book anyway" | asked him what rab-
bits lived on during the winter, and
looking up in an intelligent way he
answered, "buds and bark" Who will
deny that this boy learned more in the
woods that day than if he had gone to
school without book? Meet the tardy
pupil at the door with smile Give him
the glad hand. Welcome him in. Tell him
you were waiting for him and you knew
he'd come. Instead of having the
school sing the ''Song of the Lazy
Scholar" greet him with the song, ooh!
Willie, We Have Missed You,-Wel-
come, Welcome Home ~ For the
school room is really your home and
the home of the children during the
long cold winter. They are your fam
| lily. You are their teacher, guide,
friend, companion, mother. Make
school beautiful for them. Many of
them come from beautifully furnished
homes. They have carpets on the
floors, cushions on the chairs; pictures
on the walls, apples in the cellar. Here
they have come, many of them mile
or more, perhaps knee deep through
the snow to a cold, dreary, desolate,
barn-like looking building which for
want of a better name we will call a
| school house.
(Here wish to make apology to the
good people who have built fine, com
modious, up-to-date school houses and
furnished them with modern apparatus
| for the comfort, convenience and edu-
OdblOh Oi bhCll JuOu oSuOOl
houses IN the country, however, like
hens teeth, are few and far between.
But of this, more anon.)
Have patience with the tardy pupil.
Do not scold him for being late. Ascer-
tain, if possible, the cause of his tardi-
ness. He may not be wholly to blame.
Many children are made to suffer for
the shortcomings of their parents, even
unto this generation. Think of the peo-
/ pie who are tardy at the church, theater
and public entertainments.
Hardness is a national feeling You
must create public sentiment against
it. This is not best done by Furnishing
the delinquent or scolding the school
And remember, too, you need the boy
in school, Do not regulate him out,
but rather make it a point to beguile
| him in. Do little electioneering-I
mean missionary work. Spread the
gospel of education. Go out into the
highways and byways and gather them
in. | have no patience with teacher
who complains Of absence or tardiness
Bring them in, rope them in, any way
to get them in. Have them coming
your way by all means. Don't you
hear their beautiful voices singing as
they come a?
eve come from alley. lane and street,
| We come we're coming still
| We come we come with humble feet
! From valley and from hill.
/ We come from many distant road,
A mile OF more we come.
| We come from many bright abode
From many happy home