The successful treatment of tuberculosis is psychic, as well as physiologic. So, too, must the treatment of juvenile delinquency be considered. The physician impresses the patient with faith in his recovery. So, too, must the teacher impress the child. She must have faith in him, a faith so wholesome that he will learn to have faith in himself. She must encourage so that her encouragement will spur the weakest to effort. Oh, the effect of a tender word on a parched and starving little heart! Cases of individual rescues effected by a kind word crowd upon me.
Dominick, the little Italian, the terror of three successive schools, who to-day is not only a fine lad, but who has reformed several other boys, changed from a lawless, defiant misdemeanant to the pride of the class—how? By a teacher who said to him, “I think you are trying to-day, dear.” Poor little chap! He told his teacher frankly that it was her calling him “dear” which developed in him a determination to please her.
The insolent, defiant Irish boy, driven from room to room, who to-day is working steadily—respectful, law-abiding, ambitious—what worked his reform? A teacher, who in reply to the principal’s question, “Well, how is Tom doing in here?” looked at the class in line and noticing that Tom was standing up straight, said: “Oh, he’s going to be all right. He’s the best stander in the class.” And Tom, poor Tom, the first time he had ever been the best anything, took heart, and worked for further commendation.
Ikey, the little Russian boy, in rags which almost fell from his poor, thin, little legs, what changed him from an ugly little outcast to a boy who tried, really tried, to do what was right? A clean suit of clothes, a warm bath, and a daily glass of milk, given by a teacher who sensed the boy’s needs.
Have you read Owen Kildare’s account of the effect upon him of the first gentle touch he had ever felt?
Seldom in his life as a child had any one said a kind word to him. One day when a strange woman patted him on the cheek he almost cried with the joy of it.
“With a light pat on my cheek and one of the sunniest smiles ever shed on me.” he says of the incident, “she put a penny in my hand. She was gone before I realized what had happened. Somehow, I felt that were she to come back I could have said to her, ‘Say, lady, I haven’t got much to give, but I’ll give you all me poipers, me pennies, and me knife if you’ll do that agen.’”
Go back to your schools. Pick out the so-called worst boys. Find out whether heart-hunger as well as stomach-hunger may not be one of the symptoms of the disease. There is not a teacher in all our broad land who would knowingly let a child’s body starve to death for want of physical food. Why should any child’s heart or soul be allowed to starve to death for want of a little sympathy and affection? Bodily starvation, at its worst, can only end in death; soul starvation, at its worst, ends in a hateful, ugly, defiant, lawless attitude toward authority, which not only ruins the starved one but brings disaster to the social order. Does not some blame belong to the school if its teachers fail to feed these starving souls?—Julia Richman, “Proceedings of the National Education Association,” 1909.
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HEART-INTEREST