Los Angeles herald., 1907-07-11
ART IN TEACHING
BY new METHODS
EXPRESSION AS IMPORTANT AS
KNOWLEDGE
Whether by Poetry or Prose, by OBJ
lect Lesson or by Mechanical
Demonstration, Fact Is Al
ways Necessary

Many helpful ideas and hints were
given to the teachers at the meeting OF
the department of elementary education
of the National Educational association
in Emmanuel Presbyterian church yester-
day morning.
elementary education, Teachers college,
Columbia university, in his address on
'"The Story and the Poem" made thor
ough canvass of the topic.
Mr.. Suzzallo said in part:
ut may be SAID that good instruction
In the command of language involves
thorough association between experience,
or the ideas which stand for them anu
their corresponding symbols. Experiences
will influence people similarly. Out OF
the same experience most people VIII get
some meaning. Symbols are quite va
riaDle. Almost every nationality has It's
own symbols. A word from given Ian
guage may give you meaning ana IL
may not. An Englishman and "A French
man may have the same experiences, but
their words or symbols for them VIII
differ greatly. Language instruction 49,
therefore, largely a matter OF memory,
getting more or less arbitrary symbol
associated with an experience.
''In every language there are really TWO
LANGUAGES or two sets TO Oh SyhoTlsO r ai
reading and oral language represent one
aspect of instruction in English Ihere
are two functions connected with oraI
language, appreciation and expression.
Listening and understanding Is oral APP
probation Thinking and speaking is
oral expression.
expression. We appreciate more than we
can express. Expression recruits ltselL
from appreciation. Expression IN turn
is hopelessly restricted If our apprecia-
ton is restricted to the language we near
In ordinary life and class room WORK.
So we read what absent masters have
written, give them voice so that appeal is
made to the ear and sound association
The story and the poem read aloud are
instruments for the deepening of our oral
appreciation of language.
I'm reading and language three prob
lens present themselves: o. mastering
the mechanics; (2) obtaining or express
ing thought; (S) sensing or giving form to
aesthetic or literary feeling. The story
and the poem find their greatest value in
instruction in what they contribute 10
lens. Wherever we strive for literary
feeling or form, even in the slightest de-
gree, the story and the poem are the
they represent the combination of the
three elements in the beauty of literature,
the beauty of o. material, (2) form, and
81 meaning"
Science in Weaving of Words
Mr.. Suzzallo made an exposition of the
subject. and Miss Emma c. Davis, super
visor of primary schools Cleveland, o.,
followed with discussion of the use
and advantages of the story and the
poem. she SAID IN part.
1.-THE consideration of the relation OF
story telling to oral reading and oral
language leads at once to the question OF
the relation which these bear to the edu-
cational process, and this in turn looks
forward to the educational aim.
What is education and what Is Its
goal may be answered in brief as char.
ae eencies q that fife employs to this end are
the Individual experiences and activities,
and the experiences of other people por-
trayed or communicated either by word
Of mouth or through literature and other
arts - :. docs - o+ soon,
clear what part the story and poem play.
in this process? What interpretations of
life, what self violations, what insights,
what Qualifications, what harmonizing in
plantations in terms of the imagination
are possible through stories and poems
which, if properly selected. have power
to reveal the world to the child and the
child to himself.
Practical Results
LAS for the practical results. We have
not far to seek. We have seen how story
and poem may touch the whole range of
life-a magic touch at which thought and
feeling spring to greet the pictured
experience and is illumined words and
expressions come into consciousness to
clothe thought in speech and the language
power expands.
''The expansion in language which
comes in this most vital way is reinforced
and made permanent by the memory and
imitation of now language forms in which
the stories were clothed. 1t transcends
the language development that comes
through ordinary conversation upon act
ual activities and experiences, because
these being intenigible by the use of the
more common words and forms, make
few demands upon the language power,
whereas the literature in which most
stories are embodied supply higher type
and wider of language
DEMONSTRATION as Emphasis
Dramatization is a new factor in the
school curriculum, and Thomas c. Blais-
dell of the department of English State
Agricultural college, Lansing, Mich, in
his paper yesterday morning on Drama
tiZing," explained what was meant by the
term, the interest the pupils took in turn
ing the story into drama and the
children when acted out by them or be-
fore them.
Mr.. Blaisdell spoke, in part as follows:
Dramatizing or the informal playing
of stories by pupils, although already
potent factor in the school room, has
been developed almost entirely within a
half dozen years. That It has had so
rapid rise in favor is easily understood,
for children, with their active imagina-
tons, are naturally actors. In their hun
ger to comprehend life they are impelled
to reproduce in their play the life about
them. Thus they are ready a a sugges-
tion to reproduce in the school room the
occupations of their parents and the
stories which they hear and read, for
such concrete presentation of them gives
a vital meaning and one that the child
readily understands.
Life Makes Orator
Power to live through an experience
imaginatively makes good oral readers as
well as appreciators of literature. 1t is
this power that dramatizing develops. In
order to play the parts in the story of
the boy who called wolf when there was
no wolf, thus alarming the reapers, the
pupil must be the foolish boy or the
frightened and later impatient reapers,
OF must have the cunning and ferocity of
the wolf. Every time he enacts such
part he is training his mind to understand
more readily other stories, and thus to
read with more expression Dramatizin
also makes self-conscious pupils forget
themselves and gives an interest and
purpose to the dull and listess pupils,
thus helping them to become better
readers.
las a factor in teaching oral language
drama tizing is potent because it teaches
plnils to observe details and thus to
think more clearly. 1t shows them a di-
rect relation betMeen literature and the