The bystander. [volume] (Des Moines, Iowa) 1916-1922, 1918-10-25
CHILD EDUCATION.

CHILD EDUCATION.
"Manners and Home Training. The
Importance of Ethical Training in the
Home AS the president Of our club,
Mrs. Harvey Brown, handed me the
tOutline Study glanced at the word
"ethical'' and could recall very dis
tinctly Webster's definition Of the word
ethical,' meaning "moral philiso-
ply system Of principles and rules
Of duty, etc. The effects on the indi-
vidual, the race and the nation will be
dealt with in later study.
Abraham Lincoln said of his mother:
"All l am and all that ever hope to
be, / owe to my angel MOTHER The
world will never know the greatness of
its debt to Lincoln s mother, for doing
what she could in stamping of her own
lofty conception of duty and obligation
upon the hearts and consciences of her
children, and she called Abraham to her
bedside and said to him (and he was
only ten years old at the time of her
death: 81 am going away from you,
Abraham, and shall not return. I know
that you win be good boy; that you
will be kind to Sarah and your father.
I want you to live as have taught you,
and to love your Heavenly Father. -
In the evening when her work was done
she would tell to her children the
stories Of Abraham, Moses, David, and
the Child of Nazareth. Little did this
mother know how deeply her lessons OF
truth and virtue went down into the
heart of her listening son; how, in the
fullness Of time the germs would put
forth their tender shoots, how her own
spirit rcappeared in his and the beauty
of her soul glorified his life.
/ We can point to Lincoln and to no
other president since his time, who lived
and believed that, Whatsoever we
| would that men do to you, do we also
unto them,'' and he believed .'that all
men were born free and equal, and in
the tronblous times of his leadership in
the congress-, stood almost alone ION the
question of the rights of man. How
many mothers must have failed in their
duty toward their God, their children
and their fellow man, else we could
point to more Lincolns. l can suggest
no fixed rule for mothers to follow for
there are no two dispositions in the
world entirely alike. For instance,
+" Ny boy of ten has strong will and
while 1 constrain him to obey, L en-
courage the habit of deciding and. act
ing for himself in matters which might
be safely left to him. | believe that
strong will, directed upon worthy OBJ
iects, is a valuable manly quality If
properly guided, and try to exercise
great care III the study of my child s
will. L believe that we should instill
into our children s minds that self-re-
lance, .resolutc, working, patient pur-
pose, steadfast integrity and truly noble
character will enable one of even the
humblest rank to work out for them
selves All honorable competency and a
sclid deputation. Even when men are
born of wealth and high social position
they cannot hire people to do their
thinking. The environments through
out the country are of inestimable value
to our youth and the training and ex-
perience are comforting on them de-
gree which could never be obtained in
universities or colleges.
My boys teacher said, t'Mrs. Smith,
Jack s marks iii English are usually
higher than the other pupils and how
does it happen 1 admitted that /
did all 1 could, not to make him get
higher marks in school, but to know and
love good literature, and to use the
English language i'll the very best way
he can in speaking and writing. Ny
boy loves poetry and he appreciates the
charm of it's rhythm and sound. 1t
never matters if the poetry we read is
sometimes over his head, having to
reach helps him grow mentally. James
Whitcomb Riley, John G. Whittier, Dun
bar, Longfellow, Tennyson and Shakes
peare are some of his favorites and he
is vet only ten i believe that we have
to instill into children IS minds a love
for real beauty as first step in edu-
cation. No child who has been accus-
toned to hearing beautiful English, for
instance, will say, He done good, - or
F.sHe ain It got no show, whether he
realizes the grammatical error or not.
A trained sense of beauty of form will
make those mistakes distasteful to him.
II am old fashioned enough too to have
my boy love and learn the Bible stories.
This winter we will take up the Shep-
herds of Luke and Longfellow's poems
about the & Three Kings. It takes lots
of work ana patience and time to do lots
of these things, but 4 consider my
child's ethical training one of the main
duties in life, so r find it a very great
pleasure zoo. We mothers must not
send our children to battle this hard
world without the armor which she
alone can buckle upon him. The char
.acteristics which one expects to find in
ithe man and WHICH il the basis from