The reason then, that some of the class add so slowly, is not probably because they want skill and rapidity of execution, but became they work to a great disadvantage, by working in the wrong way. I have often been surprised at the dexterity and speed with which some scholars can count with their fingers, when adding, and yet they could not get through the sum very, quick—at least they would have done it in half the time, if the same effort had been made in travelling on a shorter road. We will therefore study the addition table now, in the class, before we go on any farther."
The foregoing narratives, it is hoped, may induce some of the readers of this book to keep journals of their own experiments, and of the incidents which may, from time to time come under their notice, illustrating the principles of education, or simply the characteristics and tendencies of the youthful mind. The business of teaching will excite interest and afford pleasure, just in proportion to the degree in which it is conducted by operations of mind upon mind, and the means of making it most fully so, are, careful practice, based upon, and regulated by, the results of careful observation. Every teacher then should make observations and experiments upon mind a part of his daily duty, and nothing will more facilitate this, than keeping a record of results. There can be no opportunity for studying human nature, more favorable than the teacher enjoys. The materials are all before him; his very business, from day to day, brings him to act directly upon them; and the study of the powers and tendencies of the human mind is not only the most interesting and the noblest that can engage human attention, but every step of progress he makes in it, imparts an interest and charm, to what would otherwise be a weary toil. It at once relieves his labors, while it doubles their efficiency and success.
CHAPTER IX.
THE TEACHER'S FIRST DAY.
The teacher enters upon the duties of his office by a much more sudden transition than is common in the other avocations and employments of life. In ordinary cases, business comes at first by slow degrees, and the beginner is introduced to the labors and responsibilities of his employment, in a very gradual manner. The young teacher, however, enters, by a single step, into the very midst of his labors. Having, perhaps, never even heard a class recite before, he takes a short walk some winter morning, and suddenly finds himself instated at the desk,—his fifty scholars all around, looking him in the face, all waiting to be employed. Everything comes upon him at once. He can do nothing until the day and the hour for opening the school arrives,—then he has everything to do.
Under these circumstances it is not surprising that the young teacher should look forward with unusual solicitude to his first day in school; and he desires, ordinarily, special instructions in respect to this occasion. Some such special instructions we propose to give in this chapter. The experienced teacher may think some of them too minute and trivial. But he must remember that they are intended for the youngest beginner in the humblest school; and if he recalls to mind his own feverish solicitude on the morning when he went to take his first command in the district school, he will pardon the seeming minuteness of detail.
1. It will be well for the young teacher to take opportunity, between the time of his engaging his school and that of his commencing it,—to acquire as much information in respect to it, beforehand, as possible,—so as to be somewhat acquainted with the scene of his labors before entering upon it. Ascertain the names and the characters of the principal families in the district, their ideas and wishes in respect to the government of the school, the kind of management adopted by one or two of the last teachers, the difficulties they fell into, the nature of the complaints made against them, if any, and the families with whom difficulty has usually arisen. This information must of course be obtained in private conversation; a good deal of it must be, from its very nature, highly confidential; but it is very important that the teacher should be possessed of it. He will necessarily become possessed of it by degrees, in the course of his administration, when, however, it may be too late to be of any service to him. But by judicious and proper efforts to acquire it beforehand, he will enter upon the discharge of his duties with great advantage. It is like a navigator's becoming acquainted beforehand with the nature and the dangers of the sea over which he is about to sail.
Such inquiries as these will, in ordinary cases, bring to the teacher's knowledge, in most districts in our country, some cases of peculiarly troublesome scholars, or unreasonable and complaining parents,—and stories of their unjustifiable conduct on former occasions, will come to him; exaggerated by the jealousy of rival neighbours. There is danger that his resentment may be roused a little, and that his mind will assume a hostile attitude at once towards such individuals; so that he will enter upon his work rather with a desire to seek a collision with them, or at least with secret feelings of defiance towards them,—feelings which will lead to that kind of unbending perpendicularity in his demeanour towards them which will almost inevitably lead to a collision. Now this is wrong. There is indeed a point where firm resistance to unreasonable demands becomes a duty. But as a general principle it is most unquestionably true, that it is the teacher's duty to accommodate himself to the character and expectations of his employers, not to face and brave them. Those italicized words may be understood to mean something which would be entirely wrong; but in the sense in which I mean to use them, there can be no question that they indicate the proper path for one employed by others to do work for them, in all cases, to pursue. If therefore the teacher finds by his inquiries into the state of his district that there are some peculiar difficulties and dangers there, let him not cherish a disposition to face and resist them, but to avoid them. Let him go with an intention to soothe rather than to irritate feelings which have been wounded before,—to comply with the wishes of all so far as he can, even if they are not entirely reasonable,—and while he endeavours to elevate the standard and correct the opinions prevailing among his employers, by any means in his power, to aim at doing it gently; and in a tone and manner suitable to the relation he sustains;—in a word, let him skilfully avoid the dangers of his navigation, not obstinately run his ship against a rock on purpose, on the ground that the rock has no business to be there.
This is the spirit then with which these preliminary inquiries, in regard to the patrons of the school, ought to be made. We come now to a second point.
2. It will assist the young teacher very much in his first day's labors, if he takes measures for seeing and conversing with some of the older or more intelligent scholars, on the day or evening before he begins his school, with a view of obtaining from them some acquaintance with the internal arrangements and customs of the school. The object of this is to obtain the same kind of information with respect to the interior of the school, that was recommended in respect to the district, under the former head. He may call upon a few families, especially those which furnish a large number of scholars for the school, and make as many minute inquiries of them, as he can, respecting all the interior arrangements to which they have been accustomed; what reading books and other text books have been used,—what are the principal classes in all the several departments of instruction,—and what is the system of discipline, and of rewards and punishments to which the school has been accustomed.