(3) Christian heroes. The teacher ought to be a Christian hero himself. Out of missionary literature, out of the lives of great men who have lived, out of Bible characters, heroes must be multiplied. The Sunday-school lessons ought to be hero studies, not sermons. Heroic literature ought to be put into the hands of the children—either directly or through indirect suggestion in some curiosity-arousing reference to the story. This means the most effective type of instruction during all the week as well as Sunday.
(4) A lesson requiring work on the part of the pupil. Telling a Junior class primary stories will deplete it in numbers and weaken it in strength. Assigned work to be prepared at home, questions, note-books, map-making, anything to stimulate and utilize the activity of mind and body through interest, not compulsion, is the great necessity of the lesson hour.
21. Difficulties of the Junior Age.—Three difficulties may be encountered.
(1) A misdirected energy. Energy means finest growth and development if it is under direction and control, but devastation otherwise. The key to the situation is in the teacher's personality, plus a plan for the hour's work, appealing to interest and calling for constant activity, either mental or physical, on the part of the pupil.
(2) Evil associates. The teacher cannot guard the child through the seven days of a week; often the home does not, and in this new social interest there is a danger from evil associates. Better pastoral work by the teacher, a closer co-operation with the home, and substitutive—not prohibitive—measures avail much in meeting this difficulty.
(3) The enticement of bad literature. This period and the next are the time of greatest hunger for reading and there is a real danger from the temptations of pernicious books. Satan has emissaries on the school-grounds and in the candy store, and boys and girls are his shining marks. The substitutive measures here again are the only wise and effective ones.
22. Results to be Expected in the Junior Age.—The results of work in this period ought to appear in an increase in Bible knowledge, the strengthening of right habits and manly ideals of life, and back of it all the warm love of boyhood and girlhood for the Lord Jesus Christ.
Test Questions
1. How may spiritual ends best be gained?
2. How may the pupil's efforts in right doing be aroused?