The Dallas express. [volume] (Dallas, Tex.) 1893-1970, 1919-12-27
The Ideal In Education Its Relation
To The Child. The School Is Fer
The Child And Not For The Teach.
er. The Child Is All In All.

we meeI lOudy III annual session to
have a heart to heart talk. The pur-
pose is not to display our knowledge
as glass toy that child plays with
to reflect brilliant and pas
ing image of light; but we meet for
that higher purpose, namely to reach
the ideal in education for the child,
If we would teach successfully, we
are first of all to know the child
and its relation to the ideal. Know
myself, know the child then to reach
the child, the teacher must be child
like in simplicity of right principles
that underlie the laws of the mind,
and work in conformity with these
laws.
Let me call your earnest attention
to the one great teacher of all the
ages, that greatest teacher of all
times. In all His teaching, ever and
anon. He always held up the ideal
and it is the ideal that the present
day teacher must hold up before her
pupils But what ideal did this great
est of all teachers hold up before
His pupils? Why did He teach both
by examples and precepts? Who was
this model teacher for all teachers!
What of the school of highest au-
thority at that He attended, and whence
has He this store of universal know
ledge? Come fellow teachers, come,
let us seek Him. Where may He be
found? We find Him in the very
act of His teaching, and by this sys-
TEN Of teaching, we may know Him
and learn of Him. Hear Him as He
teaches the ideal lessons of all the
ages, the sweetest and most inspir-
ing lessons. He both instructed and
inspired with interest those whom
He would teach. So the present day
teacher, must both instinct and in
spire, following the example of the
servant of all, the highest ideal, the
Christ of ALL as He would teach
first of all, the highest ideal, that
ideal that lies at the very base of
all instruction.
Then one question comes up be-
fore the teacher and presses for an
answer, it is this, Am l a teacher?
Rather the answer to this question.
II | am teacher, what are the
signs? Am l keeper Of school or
what is my real relation to those
teach? Does the license which the
state grant me make teacher? This
is a function of the state.
How many things press themselves
upon our minds as we begin to
search the record of our ability to
teach apuy what the state has EN-
ployed us to teach? We sign an
agreement to teach to the best our
ability, and to receive our reward
here, and the greater reward at the
Masters Treasure House.
First of all, we are builders, and
II builders, we are to have the blue
print, the plans of specifications,
and the models just as the master
builders if we would build with any
degree of certainty and accuracy.
What are these plans of specifica-
ton in the hand of the skillful
teacher? What architect has drawn
the plans? The answer is easy and
forthcoming. our Christ. the greatest
Of all teachers. has drafted the plans
and fitted the models. Hear Him. He
calls attention to the lily, not that
1t tolls, but for another purpose
He would have the teacher, to con.
slider the heat, the light. air and the
moisture these we would have the
teacher consider in the budding and
unfolding lily of the valley, the life
principle of the lily.
The Master taught without def
nitions. He had none to begin with
but as He advanced in the stage OF
His instructions, the definitions and
terms unfolded themselves, so that |
the simplest of understanding knew
as much as the philosopher, and as
much as the learned lawyer who
came to Him by night to seek infor-
nation of the new birth and is CIV
en- a lesson of the wind and the !
laws governing. its actions. Thus we J
are to learn methods from the |
Christ, highest methods known to
man. In considering the lily, the
teacher is to consider the life giving |
elements of the lily that tolls not,
and in the art of teaching, she is
to furnish those element that are
peculiar to the mind of her pupils,
and as the lily grew and unfolded
her beauty to the sun by proper
so the pupils in the
hands of the slillful teacher are
10 unfold their powers of mind
through right applications. That the
child being guided and exercised by
hem, may become the lily with its
sweetest oder, its fragrancy filling
he balmy air, useful plant bearing
'ruit and unfolding all that God has
it with, and to make it more
and more in beauty. in utility, in
culture, till the child shall stanG
the lily, like the Christ
,hild. l;
To reach this stage of training,
we are to take the child through the {,
home school, parental correct train
ng, through the school of civics that
L may learn it's relation, through |
he school Of civics that it may learn {
n eat bread by the sweat of skill
Tor, through the school Of COM ;
ice that it may learn the value |
a. Aonomy and the use of money,
10 aally back to the church school, |
10. hive that spiritual training,
from thpiW that leads Inn away
hiohau 'n imal passions to that
crosse spiriuAl essence. from the
nc 49, eielnene the sodid, and from
the uross to tina finer element in !
sne reiined gold " character the {
I. . tsa OF the highest type, citizen {
~toe state. the highest ideal. II
'or@y eachers: II Is mete and
Fellvw fsother To-Day to con-
proper that we Sae1H1ipe while
. stuer Methods and DiscipnAlight
~ 1e ar is still redolent with thlSe
~ ene star of Bethlehem an ~
SWEEP cadences Of angels Z
o4 iDing and re-echoinP anon solc
nauons and in every cline on$ .