the Babies

Eleanor M. JOLLIE, Principal Laurel Hill School, Pawtucket, R. I. (Based upon story of "Little Folks in Far Away Lands" in this num

ber.)

"T

HERE," Miss May said, as she took down some twenty-five slates, which had been consigned to the store room, "they are just exactly what to use." "Would you like to dust them, Bobby?" she asked of her little assistant who had stayed after school to "Please may I help?"

"What are you going to do with those slates?" asked her next door neighbor, the second grade teacher.

"Take the babies to Holland on them for a little trip," laughed Miss May.

The next day she gathered her little pupils about the number table, which happened to be a very long one, and covered it by placing sheets of blue paper over it.

"That is water," she said, looking into the eager eyes. Jack put his finger into it, and so great was his faith in Miss May, that he was surprised to find that his finger remained dry.

"Tisn't real water, is it?" he lisped, "but we can make believe and that's just as good," and the babies nodded.

"Run to the corner and each bring back a slate," was the next request, and soon the number table was changed into a bit of houseless and windmill-less Holland.

The slates, which Miss May covered with damp sand as soon as they reached the table, made the best little individual Dutch farms that you can imagine, and while the little land owners were placing their slates according to directions, Miss May was telling in a simple way, of that land which lies below Old Ocean himself.

Of course the canals were spoken of, and the blue paper, showing wider or narrower as the case might be between the slates, or little groups of slates, represented those same canals.

The first busy work period was spent by the babies in building dykes of sticks, and little stones, and sand, all around the edge of the sand table.

Noel, the little visitor, was allowed, to his great joy, to impersonate the ocean, and went roaring gently around, while the babies made the most industrious of Dutch dyke builders.

The days that followed were full of interest to those first grade children, so full of value as well, that you might like to see a list of the talks given and just what seat work followed them.

(NOTE-Stiff cardboard might be used instead of slates. Box covers make good "farms" if sides are removed.)

VI

Draw, from patterns on

Interior of house; the board on square of paper, neatness; tiles on floor; with colored pencils, tiles. stoves; carved furniture. Design tiles. Use pegs. Delft ware. Model dishes of clay. Color blue. (Bluing is very good for this work.)

Fill a window-box with paper tulips. Cut according to pattern. Color red, yellow, or pink, using wax pencils.

Fold petals and fasten together with a little paste, to look like tulips. Use a long (perhaps four inch green stick) for stem. Stand in window box. Have children draw and color a row of tulips at the bottom of blackboard.

Have children lay out the garden according to their own ideas. Cut tiny flowers of colored paper and put in space allowed for them.

Build arbor of soaked peas and toothpicks. Four toothpicks stuck in damp sand will serve for posts. On top of each put a soaked pea. Connect the vertical posts by toothpicks, four more toothpicks being used. Cover the framework of the arbor with vines made by stringing tiny paper leaves together.

Model clay summer house; Color blue (chalk); stand in garden.

Cut out of paper, tiny dolls, to represent members of Rika's family. Color with wax pencils. Stand on farms.

I want to tell you of an inspiration that came to me at the beginning of the year. I had always been bothered to find suitable counters for the children to keep in their desks to use in doing their adding and subtracting. I got some small cards and pasted on colored circles, placing them as they are placed on dominoes, one on one card, two on the next, three on the next, and so on up to ten. While the child is working, he has them laid on the desk. He is then always working with the concrete as well as the abstract numbers. Try it, teachers, and tell me how you like it.

Mass.

Teaching

PRIMARY

I hold that a man is only fit to teach so long as he is himself learning daily. If the mind once becomes stagnant, it can give no fresh draught to another mind; it is drinking out of a pond instead of from a spring.

A schoolmaster's intercourse is with the young, the strong, and the happy; and he cannot get on with them unless in animal spirits he can sympathize with them, and show that his thoughtfulness is not connected with selfishness and weakness.-Arnold

Attendance and Punctuality

Dear Editor:

I send you a sample of the device that I used to promote good attendance and punctuality in my school last year. I found it the best incentive that I had ever used.

The first day of school I showed the children a plain white cardboard butterfly, and told them that I had one just like that for each one in school and that I was going to paste a pretty colored dot on each butterfly every day they were in school, and that they might all take home their own butterfly at the end of the month. It was surprising how much interest they manifested and how eager they were to have perfect cards. The first day of October we talked about dew and frost, how they both shone like diamonds, etc., and then I told the little folks that we would use a diamond to paste our dots on that month. In November we used a circle. When I showed the first card one of the little ones raised his hand and told me that it looked just like a pumpkin. So we called it our "pumpkin card." For December we used a star and we used small silver stars instead of colored dots. We used a bell for Jan

uary, a heart for February, a robin for March, a chicken for April, and a flower for May. For a half day's absence 1 gave a half a dot, and to mark a tardiness I cut a small piece out of the upper part of the dot if it was in the forenoon, and out of the lower part if it was in the afternoon. A September card shows that Lena was absent one half of the first Wednesday, all day the third Thursday, and tardy the last day of the month.

At the end of the year, each pupil that had nine perfect cards, brought them back to school, and I mounted them on ribbon in such a way that they made a very pretty wall decoration.

This year we will have all new designs, for with the exception of one class I have the same pupils that I had last year.

My county superintendent expressed herself highly pleased with the device in general and she asked me to send a sample to you. She said they might not be of any value to you, but she thought you would be at least pleased to see them.

Making Presents to Little " Helpers"

I was down town with a friend not long ago, and remarked, innocently, that I must not forget to buy my presents for my little helpers. Several pieces of a very decided mind were hurled at me, together with some opprobrious names. Among other things she intimated unmistakably that I was guilty of bribery. I was so completely overwhelmed at the unexpectedness of her attack that I could find no words to defend myself. The friends to whom I referred the matter warmly sided with me; but somehow I have the feeling that if they had heard her they might have sided with her, so deadly in earnest was she. I am not at all comfortable in my mind since the interview and so ask the opinions of other teachers. Now how can anyone think it is bribery to present a child with a gift for having helped one.

Keeping Primary Children after School for Work

Do you think there is anything gained by keeping primary children after school for work? I have almost concluded that there is not. I kept a little fellow because of his poor writing to-night and as he passed me his second paper, he seemed so tired, and looked so longingly out of the window where were ringing the merry voices of children at play, that my heart smote me, and although the last paper looked no better than the first, I said, "That will do, Charlie. Run out and play now." Was I wrong? Ought I to have kept him writing and rewriting it until he had made a perfect (approximately) paper? I entered a school-room one night nearly an hour after the first dismissal. I expected to see the teacher alone, but, to my surprise, there sat three little children, none of them more than seven years old, bending over writing papers, and in the waning light trying to keep the e's from getting above the second line, and make the tall letters just touch the third line. They had written three papers, the teacher told me, and the last was no better than the first. And that teacher was called a fine teacher because "she got such good results." Are there not results higher than perfect papers to be gained? Is it a gain when the child is made to hate the work? I would like to hear from other teachers about after school work.

Teaching Babies to Use Ink

E. E.

I am tired to-night and disgusted with everything and everybody. Many little things, most of them too small to mention, happened in provoking consecutiveness to-day (I must put in some long words so that you will believe I am a really, truly school-ma'am), until, as the last straw came down, I could have raised up my voice in wailings and lamentations over my failure as a teacher. What was this last straw? Well, it does look more like a straw than it did. At four o'clock it looked to me like a phenomenally big log. To come to the point. To-day, according to the ruling of the powers that be, I started my first grade ehildren in pen and ink. (That "in" is used advisedly.) The result was that most of them went home with conspicuous

evidences of the venture on hands, face, and clothing. I scolded them for their carelessness, which only made a bad matter worse, for the flow of tears only served to spread the inky surface on hands and face. This was my first attempt in this line, as this is my first year of teaching. Do please tell me, some of you good, kind, experienced teachers, how I may do it next time without getting into a "mess." That isn't a real pedagogical word, but for this occasion is very proper. INEXPERIENCE

Left-handed Children

I am so glad that our kind friend, the editor of PRIMARY EDUCATION, has given us this page on which we may talk over our troubles, for as "two heads are better than one," so many heads in consultation are of value in proportion. So to begin with trouble number one. I have among my second grade pupils a boy who is left-handed. He cannot write at all with his right hand. He makes the attempt when I insist upon it, but when I look at him from the other side of the room, the pencil has fallen into its natural place in his left hand. I say "natural," for after six months' struggle, during which I would accept no work done by him with the left hand, I am almost ready to succumb and allow him to write in the way most natural to him. Isn't there a physiological reason for left-handedness? Is it right to demand of the child the double effort required to write like the righthanded child? What are the objections to his using his left hand? Is there any other than the awkward appearance which he presents working with right-handed children? Do let me hear from some of you who have had experience in and have given thought to the subject. DOUBTFUL

Mothers' Meetings

I know mother's meetings are popular and the teachers who hold them declare they get great benefit from them afterwards, through the increased interest and co-operation of the parents. But I can't get my parents out to such meetings. In vain 1 write notes of formal invitation on my best stationery, and give the thimbleful of "the cup that cheers" and conventional wafercrackers for afternoon tea" to the few that come, but the contagion doesn't spread. The few that did come were not native Americans, not used to afternoon tea, and I presume they concluded that my menu was very proscribed. Do you say "Show their children's work," etc.? Yes, I did, and they didn't seem to understand what they doubtless called "new-fangled notions." Tell me where my failure lies. ELLA J. PARSONS

Educating the Will

The education of the child's will seems to be a topic foremost in the minds of educators just at present How can we best train the child to know the right and have a will sufficiently strong to do it? Is it wise to punish a child in order to make him do right? Does it strengthen the will to enforce obedience? If he is forced to do right won't the habit formed be of some value? There are many ways of looking at it, and it ought to be of great interest to us as teachers. I wish we might hear from many on this subject.

A Question of Discipline

ANXIOUS

I have wished to look at one subject from every view-point and get different opinions:

Teachers should be good detectives, but with all the tact and ingenuity possible, there are times when nothing but the testimony of witnesses will bring the culprit to light. Now, putting the matter in the form of questions: 1 Should children be allowed to give testimony unasked? In other words, is "tattling" sometimes justifiable and under what circumstances? 2 Is a teacher wrong in taking evidence from unwilling witnesses? And is a pupil stubborn who refuses to tell on his mates when questioned? Have we a right to ask or expect a pupil to confess his own misdeeds? Does it tempt him to lie? Charles Kingsley in "Water Babies" protests against the crying evil of trying to force children to confess their own faults. On the other hand, it takes some nerve to punish a child who stoutly protests, his innocence. A CALIFORNIA TEACHER

Pen Holding

Does any primary teacher undertake to teach a proper position in pen and pencil holding in first and second years of school? KATHERINE

"No, mamma, I don't believe I want to play games any longer, and I don't care about being read to, either. I'm tired of that, too. Oh, dear, if I only had something alive to play with!”

All this sounds rather cross, but really, Howard was not so much to blame. You see, he was just recovering from scarlet fever, which had left his eyes so weak that it would be a long time before he could use them much.

"Would you like a pet of some kind?" asked mamma, after a moment's thought.

"Yes, indeed, I would," cried Howard excitedly. "Oh, mamma dear, do you think I could have a goat?"

MARCH

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"I'm afraid that wouldn't be just the thing to keep in the house. You know it will be a good many weeks before you can go out of doors. I wouldn't decide on any animal, now. Let's think it over a while first."

Aunt Clara came to see Howard the next day. "Mamma says you are to have a pet," she said. "I know just where to get the very thing. It's a beautiful white Angora kitten. Her name is Lady Blanche, and she is just as wise as she can be. I'll go down and buy her this afternoon if you think you'd like her."

"I do love cats, Aunt Clara. You are ever so kind," replied Howard.

Papa came in just then and the plan was explained to him.

"Cats are for girls," he said. "A dog is the thing for a boy. I've been looking at some to-day. There was the smartest little Boston terrier that you ever saw. He can do all sorts of tricks, and I know you can't help liking him. His name is Tip. I'll buy him to-night if you say so."

Perhaps it was because Howard didn't feel very strong, but the Angora kitten seemed alluring to him, though the Boston terrier sounded interesting. "Let me think it over until to-morrow," he said.

That afternoon, as he was considering the comparative merits of Tip and Lady Blanche, another soft white animal hopped into his mind. “Oh, mamma," he cried, "I do believe I'd rather have a rabbit than anything else in the world. It would amuse me so much. Do you think I could have one?" Mamma looked rather doubtful, but she didn't like to refuse him.

Just then Uncle Harry came in.

"Where's the boy who wants something alive to play with? What do you say to a beautiful gray parrot that can talk.just like a person, and can sing ever so many songs? You'd have great sport with her for she's very clever. Say the word and she's yours."

Howard felt sure now that he wanted the parrot. Mamma said, "Think of the beautiful kitten, the dog, and the monkey. Which do you really want most?"

"Oh, I don't know; it's so hard to decide."

"I'll tell you," said Uncle Harry. "Let's have them all up here to-morrow, and you can select one from them. I'll hunt up a monkey somewhere." The next day

(Let the children tell you the rest of the story.—THE EDITOR.)