METRICS
I
THE STUDY OF METRICS IN ELEMENTARY SCHOOLS
One of the novelties included in our experiments was the teaching of metrics, hitherto reserved for high schools. The love shown by children for poetry, their exquisite sensitiveness to rhythm, led me to suspect that the native roots of poetry might be present in little children. I suggested to Miss Maria Fancello, a teacher of literature in the high schools and my colleague, to attempt such an experiment. She began with children of different ages, and, together, we succeeded in discovering a highly interesting department of education, the object of which might be to give the mass of the people, prepared for life in the primary schools, the basic elements of literary appreciation, thus opening a new source of pleasure calculated also to increase general enlightenment. A populace capable of enjoying poetry, of judging the beauty of verse, and hence of coming in contact with the spirits of our greatest poets, would be something quite different to the masses we new know. To find the like we have to imagine the people of ancient story, who talked in poetry and moved their bodies to the rhythm, thus laying the foundations of refined civilization.
It is not our intention to describe in detail all we did in these experiments. It will be sufficient to summarize the results, which may suggest useful material end methods to others.
As soon as the children are somewhat advanced in reading, poetry, which they loved so much in "Children's House," may be included in the materials offered in partial satisfaction of their insatiable desire to read. It is best to begin with poems composed of stanzas of different lengths, the stanzas being printed at easily noticeable intervals from each other. The lines may be counted, in teaching the two new words "stanza" and "line." The process involved is a recognition of "objects," suggesting the first exercise in reading, where the children put names on things; though here the situation is much simpler. At the same time we have the exercise of counting the lines. In short, it is a review exercise of the greatest simplicity.
The counting of the lines leads at once to the identification of such groups as the couplet, quatrain, octave, etc. But little time is spent on such a crude detail. The little ones almost immediately become interested in the rhyme. The first step is the recognition of rhyming syllables which are underlined with colored pencils, using a different color for each rhyme. Seven-year-olders take the greatest delight in this work, which is too simple to arouse interest in children of eight or nine. Those of seven do such work about as quickly as those of ten, the speed of the younger children being due apparently to their enthusiasm, the slowness of the older to their lack of interest. We may note in passing that these exercises furnish tests of absolute exactness as to rapidity of work. Children of eight are able to go one step beyond marking the rhymes with colored pencils. They can use the more complicated device of marking lines with the letters of the alphabet: aa, bb, cc, etc. Marking with numbers to the left the lines in their order, and the rhymes with letters to the right, we get a specimen result as follows:
| 1o Rondinella pellegrina | a |
| 2o Che ti posi sul verone | b |
| 3o Ricantando ogni mattina | a |
| 4o Quella flebile canzone | b |
| 5o Che vuoi dirmi in tua favella | c |
| 6o Pellegrina rondinella? | c |