Such a race quickens the pulse of every lover of athletics. Each fellow is putting his every ounce of muscle and sinew into the effort. How about the Loser? · Not every fellow can win. What does the Write a story, loser get? He may get experience for another race. showing how the fellow who lost so studied his losing as to snatch victory out of defeat the next time. EXERCISES IN SPELLING (a) Try a written spelling match. Take certain lists from the notebook and give the class several days for study. Choose sides, and give out fifty to one hundred words to be written by all the pupils of the class. Let the captain of each side name one, these two to name a third student, and these three to check the results. The student named by one captain will check the papers of the other side, and vice versa. The third student selected will look over all papers, and place the final marks. Average the two sides, and declare the result. A series of three matches may thus be made, the best two out of three to win. (b) An old-fashioned spelling match. Announce certain lists to be studied, as found in the English notebook. Choose sides. Let all pupils stand. Let some teacher, or some clear-voiced student from another class, give out the words to be spelled, first to one side, then to the other. When a word is missed by one side, pass it to the pupil next in order on the other side. Pupils who miss must sit down. Give out the whole set, but not necessarily in the order in which they come in the list. If the time is limited, for instance to a period of forty or forty-five minutes, stop two minutes before the last bell rings, but see that each side has had the same number of students called on to spell. Each pupil should have a time limit of ten seconds in which to spell his word. If he fails to do so within that time, let it count a miss for his side. When a contestant spells a word, let that spelling stand as right or wrong. After the word is spelled in full, allow no changes in spelling. The number of pupils left standing at the close of the match is to decide which side is winner. If it is a tie, do not give out any additional words, but let it go as a tie. Let a referee be chosen by the two captains. The decision of the referee is to be respected with regard to all disputes arising during the spelling match. For instance, if a contestant claims not to understand the word given out, the referee may pronounce it. The contestant must then spell the word. (c) At the blackboard. — Send eight or ten pupils to the blackboard. Give out ten words. Any pupil who spells the set of ten words correctly will take his seat. Pupils who fail in one or more words will remain at the board until one complete set has been correctly spelled. Select the words from the lists in the notebook. Suggestion as to Conferences. It is often worth while for the instructor in English to arrange individual conferences with pupils who have special difficulties: punctuation, with one; spelling, with another; how to take hold in writing or in preparing to speak, with a third. These conferences will prove helpful in promoting a better mutual understanding.1 1 Provision should be made for conference between the teacher and each individual pupil. — From the Report of the National Joint Committee on the Reorganization of High School English. CHAPTER VII THE EFFECTIVE USE OF MATERIAL Method will teach you to win. - GOETHE. An Effective Plan. In attempting to speak or write on the exercises thus far given, you have perhaps found yourself perplexed to know just how to express what you have to say. Your mind may have suggested abundant material, but how are you to use it most effectively? Barrett Wendell, a writer on rhetoric, makes a valuable suggestion. He says that any story must naturally fall into parts, and then asks, What shall those parts be? In what order shall they be arranged? The simplest way to answer these questions, says Wendell, is to take slips of paper, or blank cards if you can get them, and write down the separate headings that occur to you, in what appears to you the most natural order. Then when your little pack of cards is complete, — in other words, when you have a card for every heading that you think you can use, study them and sort them almost as deliberately as a good player does a hand at cards. Advantages of the Card Plan. Wendell states that it has rarely been his experience to find that a shift or change of arrangement will not decidedly improve the original order. He says that a few minutes' shuffling of these little cards has often revealed more to him than he would have learned by hours of unaided pondering over his story. The great advantage of the cards is that they enable the writer by this simple act of rearrangement to make any number of fresh plans. You will recognize that you yourself have been doing something like this. You have been testing your work, first, to see if there is anything you can leave out to advantage. And then, after discarding any unnecessary point, or any hindering detail, you have sought to get the best order possible to bring out your meaning. And finally, you have been trying by proper arrangement to secure the strongest emphasis of which your story is capable. This card plan will enable you to do all this a little better and a little more easily than before.1 EXERCISES BASED ON PICTURES This Palazzo Vecchio. - This title means "The Old Palace." was at first the seat of republican government at Florence, and later the official residence of the Medici, that famous family which gave eight dukes to Tuscany, two queens to France, and four popes to the Vatican. Here was also the prison of Savonarola, who was burned at the stake at a corner of the palace. The pavement of this court yard was for centuries covered once each year with violets in memory of the good Savonarola had done, and in token of repentance for his cruel death. Write a description of the palace, or if you prefer, give a short account of its history. Other Plans. The card plan has other advantages. It helps clear your mind and arrange your ideas on the topic of which you have to speak or write. Of course, this is not the only way to do this. (1) Some writers sit down 1 Good writing demands a large vocabulary, a clear and vigorous style, and firmness and flexibility in the construction of sentences and paragraphs; also correctness as to details of form. From the Report of the National Joint Committee on the Reorganization of High School English. |