Special Method in Primary Reading and Oral Work with Stories

by Charles A. McMurry

2. The child needs not only to be able to recognize groups of words, but he must be able to get thought from them. The following are some devices to that end:—

(a) Suggestive pictures can be made use of to advantage all through the primary grades. If the child reads part of the story in the picture, and finds it interesting, he will want to read from the printed page the part not given in the picture.

(b) Where there is no picture—or even where there is one—an aim may be useful to arouse interest in the thought, i.e. a thoughtful question may be put by the teacher, which the children can answer only by reading the story; e.g. in the supplementary reader, "Easy Steps for Little Feet," is found the story of "The Pin and Needle." There is no picture. The teacher says, as the class are seated: "Now we have a story about a big quarrel between a pin and a needle over the question, 'Which one is the better fellow?' Of what could the needle boast? Of what the pin? Let us see which won."

(c) Let all the pupils look through one or more paragraphs, reading silently, to get the thought, before any one is called upon to read aloud. If a child comes to a word that he does not know, during the silent reading, the teacher helps him to get it—from the context if possible—if not, by the sounds of the letters which compose it.

As each child finishes the task assigned, he raises his eyes from the book, showing by this act that he is ready to tell what he has just read. The thought may be given by the child in his own language to assure the teacher that he has it. Usually, however, in the lower grades, this is unnecessary, the language of the book being nearly as simple as his own.

The advantage of having all the pupils kept busy, instead of one alone who might be called upon to read the paragraph, is evident. Every child reads silently all of the lesson. Time would not permit that this be done orally, were it advisable to do so. When the child gets up to read, he is not likely to stumble, for he has both the thought and the expression for it, at the start.

While aiming to have the children comprehend the thought, the teacher should not forget, on the other hand, that this is the reading hour, and not the time for much oral instruction and reproduction. There are other recitations in which the child is trained to free oral expression of thought, as in science and literature. Such offhand oral expression of his own ideas is not the primary aim of the reading lesson. Its purpose is to lend life to the recitation.

3. Steps 1 and 2 deal with preparation for the reading. Up to this time, no oral reading has been done. Now we are ready to begin.

Children will generally express the thought with the proper emphasis if they not only see its meaning but also feel it. Suppose the children are interested in the thought of the piece, they still fail, sometimes, to give the proper emphasis. How can the teacher, by questioning, get them to realize the more important part of the thought?

(a) The teacher has gone deeper into the meaning than have the children. Her questions should be such as to make real to the children the more emphatic part of the thought; e.g. in the Riverside Primer we have, "Poor Bun, good dog, did you think I meant to hit you?" John reads, "Do you think I meant to hit you?" The teacher says, "I will be Bun, John. What is it that you do not want Bun to think?" ("That I meant to hit him.") "But you did mean to hit something. What was it you did not mean to hit? Tell Bun." ("I did not mean to hit you.") Now ask him if he thought that you did. ("Did you think I meant to hit you?")