Fig. 29.––Single Sandpaper Letter.
Fig. 30.––Groups of Sandpaper Letters.
In the didactic material there are series of boxes which contain the alphabetical signs. At this point we take those cards which are covered with very smooth paper, to which is gummed a letter of the alphabet cut out in sandpaper. (Fig. 29.) There are also large cards on which are gummed 93 several letters, grouped together according to analogy of form. (Fig. 30.)
The children “have to touch over the alphabetical signs as though they were writing.” They touch them with the tips of the index and middle fingers in the same way as when they touched the wooden insets, and with the hand raised as when they lightly touched the rough and smooth surfaces. The teacher herself touches the letters to show the child how the movement should be performed, and the child, if he has had much practise in touching the wooden insets, imitates her with ease and pleasure. Without the previous practise, however, the child’s hand does not follow the letter with accuracy, and it is most interesting to make close observations of the children in order to understand the importance of a remote motor preparation for writing, and also to realize the immense strain which we impose upon the children when we set them to write directly without a previous motor education of the hand.
The child finds great pleasure in touching the sandpaper letters. It is an exercise by which he applies to a new attainment the power he has already acquired through exercising the sense of 94 touch. Whilst the child touches a letter, the teacher pronounces its sound, and she uses for the lesson the usual three periods. Thus, for example, presenting the two vowels i, o, she will have the child touch them slowly and accurately, and repeat their relative sounds one after the other as the child touches them, “i, i, i! o, o, o!” Then she will say to the child: “Give me i!” “Give me o!” Finally, she will ask the question: “What is this?” To which the child replies, “i, o.” She proceeds in the same way through all the other letters, giving, in the case of the consonants, not the name, but only the sound. The child then touches the letters by himself over and over again, either on the separate cards or on the large cards on which several letters are gummed, and in this way he establishes the movements necessary for tracing the alphabetical signs. At the same time he retains the visual image of the letter. This process forms the first preparation, not only for writing, but also for reading, because it is evident that when the child touches the letters he performs the movement corresponding to the writing of them, and, 95 at the same time, when he recognizes them by sight he is reading the alphabet.
The child has thus prepared, in effect, all the necessary movements for writing; therefore he can write. This important conquest is the result of a long period of inner formation of which the child is not clearly aware. But a day will come––very soon––when he will write, and that will be a day of great surprise for him––the wonderful harvest of an unknown sowing.