The oftener a piece is recited by a pupil, the more firmly are the single words and especially the word-combinations rooted in his memory; indeed it has even been attempted to base a whole system of instruction on this experience, as for instance in v. Pfeil’s highly interesting pamphlet: “Wie lernt man eine sprache am leichtesten und besten?” (Breslau, 1884), and in several other works by the same author, especially his “Eins, Beiträge zur erziehung im hause” (3rd ed. Leipzig, 1879), which is also valuable for other pedagogical suggestions. His method of procedure is simple: no grammar; no translation from the mother-tongue; only one language at a time, which then is pursued at full speed (as a rule, six or more hours a week) in the following manner. From the very beginning, an author is taken up; the same piece (a couple of lines to begin with) is first read aloud by the teacher, then by the pupil (if necessary, several times), is thereupon translated word by word by the teacher (“to the complete neglect of German sentence-construction; I would not tolerate having turns of expression rendered into good German”) and afterwards in the same way by the pupil, is then read aloud by the pupil twice more in the course of the same lesson and once again in the beginning of the next; finally every Monday, the pupil reads aloud all that has been gone through in the preceding week, and, not stopping at that, whole books or large sections of books may be read through connectedly after they have in this manner been studied in instalments. Translation is omitted as soon as there is no danger of miscomprehension, and can soon be quite dispensed with in dealing with easy sentences, which then are only read through the stated number of times. During this repeated recitation of the foreign sentences—at least four times after the pupil has understood their meaning—the mother-tongue steps into the background of its own accord, as it were, and the idioms of the foreign language take firm hold upon the memory. So far v. Pfeil, who, as he himself asserts—and why should we not believe the man?—has had good results in the course of a short time, both in taking and giving instruction according to this method, which, to be sure, he has only employed in private instruction, never having tried it in a class. The impulse to make independent use of the language-material thus learned makes its appearance very early. Thus v. Pfeil tells about a pupil thirty-two years old, who was brought up in a country school and who had never before learned any foreign language, but who after ten lessons wrote him an Italian letter filling four octavo pages, which, if not quite correct, was still quite intelligible.
But the method is terribly spiritless and mechanical, perhaps you will say. Oh, yes—but is it really more spiritless to read something aloud many times in which there is some meaning—and some meaning which you understand—than to translate something just as many times in which there is no meaning at all, to say nothing of all the other inane things which our old methods bring in their train, such as grammatical rigmaroles, etc. However, it is by no means my intention to give the v. Pfeil method an unqualified recommendation, at all events not for school purposes; it is too monotonous, and a more varied method of instruction may surely have the same or greater advantages. Already, in the preceding suggestions, it will have been noticed that there were several deviations from v. Pfeil’s method of procedure; here I shall merely call attention to some things which we can learn from it: first, that we must as soon as possible dispense with translation where it is decidedly superfluous; and secondly, that our most important object, namely, that the foreign turns of expression shall make such an impression upon our pupils that they themselves can use them on occasion, cannot be attained without much repetition.
During the first lessons, it is of so much importance for the pupils to catch and reproduce the sounds that the repetitions which are necessary for practice in pronunciation also serve to impress the sentences on their memory; the teacher must only make sure that the pupils know the meaning of each sentence before they begin to practise pronouncing it, and that they do not forget it, so that the words become merely meaningless sounds. Such a selection as the one introducing my French primer (La chèvre)[16] lends itself well to this purpose; it occasions many repetitions of the same sentences, still without becoming tiresome, and the rhythm encourages natural, fluent and non-stuttering recitation.
Later on, of course, there is no necessity for so much repetition merely for the sake of the pronunciation. Then one might require the texts to be committed to memory; but this involves the danger that they might be learned and remembered as lifeless series of words without any regard for their meaning, especially if the teacher makes a routine of it. But it might be quite useful every half-year, for instance, or perhaps a little oftener, for the pupils to be assigned each a piece to commit to memory; they may themselves choose one of the pieces which have been read, and then they must be expected to recite it with a very good pronunciation and correct expression; no parrot-performance! But otherwise the main point is for the pupils to be occupied with the text repeatedly in such a way that they do not lose sight of the meaning, so that they may thus become so familiar with it that at last they know it almost or entirely by heart without having been directly required to commit it to memory. And this can at the same time be done in such a way that the pupils are led to say a number of things without following them in the printed text, so that imperceptibly they are being prepared to be able to say something in the language quite of their own accord.
The teacher can divide the day’s lesson into sentences, which he pronounces and the pupils repeat after him. They have all closed their books, and when the teacher says a sentence, no one knows who is to repeat it. By this manner of teaching, which is also practicable in connection with the exercises which I shall suggest later, the teacher makes sure that a pupil’s attention cannot wander in the confidence that it is some one else’s turn; it is every one’s turn all the time. Thus the teacher says, for instance: Les abeilles ressemblent aux mouches; Pierre, répète.—Peter: L. a. r. a. m.—Teacher: Jean, répète ça encore.—John: L. a. r. a. m.—Teacher: Mais elles ont un aiguillon; répète, Charles.—Charles: m. e. o. u. ai.—Teacher: Et elles piquent très fort quand elles sont en colère; répète tout ça, Adolphe, etc. Or, by way of a change, the teacher can let the first one who repeats the sentence mention one of his comrades, who is to repeat it again.
Let me remark in passing that I have always given my pupils French names immediately in one of the first lessons; they are written on the blackboard (in phonetical transcription of course, see below), and are very quickly learned; as a rule, they are simply translations of their first names, occasionally of a nickname, etc. It amuses the pupils, and the teacher has the advantage of being able to use their names in the middle of a French sentence without marring the run of the language.
Other similar methods: pupil A reads aloud; after every sentence, either the teacher or he himself appoints someone to repeat.—Or: the teacher reads a sentence aloud, then says: traduis, Jules; and after Julius’ translation: répète ça en français, Paul. This is better than to let the same pupil first translate and then say it in French, for thus neither one has to make a sudden change from one basis of articulation to another.—Or: when a piece has been read aloud as a whole, the teacher may render it into English, a sentence at a time, and get the pupils to express the same thought in French. This is, of course, the most difficult of these methods and ought to be employed with caution, for the pupils may easily be tempted to translate from English (that is, to construct their French after the English) instead of reproducing the French which has been given, so that we thus risk all the dangers which are commonly associated with the old-fashioned method of translation from the native to the foreign language (cf. below). Therefore it were best that this kind of exercise merely be used occasionally, and only when the selection employed is otherwise so familiar to the pupils that they almost have it by heart in its French form. A variation of all these exercises is, instead of a single pupil, to let the whole class repeat the sentence in unison.
If the pupils should begin to lag, it indicates that the class is not yet sufficiently familiar with the text, and then the best thing to do is to say: Well, now you read the piece through three times in chorus and then we shall begin from the beginning in the same way as before with repetition without the book. It does not take long before the teacher can to advantage enter upon little deviations from what the pupils know from the book; thus he secures himself against thoughtless pattering out of what has been committed to memory at home—which of course the attentive teacher easily can detect through the manner in which the pupil reads. But too great deviations are scarcely advisable; they easily lead to confusion and to the danger of wandering too far from the matter in hand, which is of course to make the pupils thoroughly familiar with the text. As examples of permissible changes of the sentences which have just been employed, I shall mention: Une abeille ressemble à une mouche (L’abeille ressemble à la mouche) mais elle a un aiguillon | et elle pique très fort quand elle est en colère—or: Les abeilles ressemblent beaucoup aux mouches, | mais elles ont un petit aiguillon, et elles piquent fort.... Or one may interpolate: les mouches ressemblent aux abeilles, | mais elles n’ont pas d’aiguillon, | et elles ne piquent pas comme les abeilles. It is best not to enter upon greater deviations, because then it will too frequently be necessary to let a pupil translate the sentence constructed by the teacher, since otherwise it is not certain whether the whole class has understood it or not[17]. The most important thing in these exercises, as also in the exercises with questions (see below), is not to let the pupil get beyond his depth so that he will become frightened and lose confidence, for then he will never learn to swim.
We have hitherto assumed that the pupils repeat what has been said orally; if the repetition is written, we have dictation—an exercise which must not be neglected and which can be conducted in different ways, partly parallel with those just mentioned. The teacher can either say a sentence or one of the boys can read it aloud; once may be enough, but the teacher may also say it twice, or else say it himself first and then let one of the pupils repeat it before it is written down; it may be a sentence taken from the reader (first stage), a sentence taken from the reader but slightly changed (second stage), or an entirely new piece (only for advanced students);[18] the dictation may be written on the blackboard or in copy-books (on slates); one pupil may be occupied in the first way while the rest of the class is occupied in the second way; sometimes the class itself may correct the mistakes; if there is blackboard space enough, several pupils can be writing the same or different things at the same time. The dictation may be required to be written with phonetical transcription (see below) or orthographically, or one pupil may write in one way, another in the other way, the two being afterwards compared.
Finally, dictation may be used in connection with several of the exercises which I shall suggest later. A question is dictated, and the pupils are required to write both the question and the answer; a sentence is dictated in the first person, which is then to be inflected in all persons, etc. The advantages of dictation are, that it trains the pupils in rapid and sharp comprehension of spoken words, that it gives the teacher an effective means of testing what each pupil has comprehended, and that the pupils generally remember pretty well what they have once written down. But the disadvantage of dictation, as of all written class work, is that it consumes more time than oral exercises. Dictation with “catches” is of course beneath the dignity of a modern language teacher.