The music chosen for children should be easy and simple, fluent and varied. Hymn tunes should be of a rather lively character, as the more dull and sombrous are not well adapted to the infant ear. Airs for the tables or exercising songs are required to be very cheerful and inspiring, and then they tend to excite pleasure and liveliness, which should often be aimed at in an infant school.
As children take much interest in singing, and readily learn verses by heart, so as to sing them, although not properly instructed in their meaning or rightly understanding them, singing has been considered by many persons the "soul of the system." This is a grievous error as regards the intellectual advancement of the children, and still worse as regards their health and that of the teacher. I have at times entered schools as a visitor when the mistress has immediately made the children show off by singing in succession a dozen pieces, as if they were a musical box. Thus to sing without bounds is a very likely way to bring the mistress to an early grave, and injure the lungs of the dear little children. Use as not abusing is the proper rule, tar all the new modes of teaching and amusing children that I have introduced; but it has often appeared to me that abuse it as much as possible was the rule acted upon. Call upon the first singers of the day to sing in this manner, and where would they soon be?
CHAPTER XIX.
GRAMMAR.
Method of instruction—Grammatical rhymes.
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"A few months ago, Mr. —— gave his little daughter, H——, a child of five years old, her first lesson in English Grammar; but no alarming book of grammar was produced on the occasion, nor did the father put on an unpropitious gravity of countenance. He explained to the smiling child the nature of a verb, a pronoun, and a substantive."—Edgeworth.
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It has been well observed, "that grammar is the first thing taught, and the last learnt." Now, though it is not my purpose to pretend that I can so far simplify grammar, as to make all its rules comprehensible to children so young as those found in infant schools, I do think that enough may be imparted to them to render the matter more comprehensible, than it is usually found to be in after years.
The great mystery of grammar results, in my opinion, from not making the children acquainted with the things of which the words used are the signs, and moreover, from the use of a number of hard words, which the children repeat without understanding. For instance, in the classification of words, or the parts of speech, as they are called, nouns, substantives, and adjectives, convey, as terms, no idea to the minds of children; and, in spite of the definitions by which their import is explained, remain to them as unintelligible as the language of magical incantation. That the children can easily comprehend the difference between words which express the names of things, and those which express their qualities, and between words which express actions, and those which express the nature of those actions, is undeniable; and this is just what should be taught in an infant school. In the first place, let the children be accustomed to repeat the names of things, not of any certain number of things set down on a lesson card, or in a book, but of any thing, and every thing, in the school-room, play-ground, &c.: next let them be exercised in telling something relating to those things—their qualities; as for instance, the school-room is large, clean, &c.,—the children are quiet, good, attentive, &c.—the pictures are pretty: the play-ground is pleasant, &c. Having accustomed the children, in this manner, first to give you the names of things, and then to observe and repeat something respecting them—you have gained two ends; you have, first, taught the children to be observant and discriminative; and, secondly, you have taught them to distinguish two distinct classes of words, or names and qualities; and you may now, if you please, give them terms by which to distinguish these respective classes, viz. substantives and adjectives. They will no longer be mysterious words, "signifying nothing," but recognized signs, by which the children will understand and express definite ideas. The next thing you have to teach them is, the distinction betwixt singular and plural, and, if you think proper, masculine and feminine; but before you talk to the children about plural number and masculine gender, &c., let them be made acquainted with the realities of which these hard-sounding words are the signs.