The measure of a man's sin is the difference between PERSONAL AND EDUCATIONAL DEPARTMENT... Programs of the Indiana State Association of School Boards and the Six- teenth Annual Meeting of the Town and City Superintendents' Associa- HISTORIES Myers' Ancient History Revised Edition List Price, $1.50 A thorough revision of the most widely used text-book on the subject. This new edition has made possible many improvements in the text itself, in the illustrations, and in the mechanical execution of the volume. Myers' Mediæval and Modern History Revised Edition List Price, $1.50 A companion volume to the revised edition of Myers' "Ancient History." The book presents a narrative marked by an instructive unity and characterized throughout by the absence of irrevelant details. Myers' General History List Price, $1.50 A complete outline, in one volume, of the world's history from, that of the early Eastern Nations to the present time. Myers' Eastern Nations and Greece Revised Edition List Price, $1.00 This convenient volume comprises the first half of the author's revised "Ancient History." It is admirably adapted for those schools which offer a separate course in this part of ancient history. Myers' History of Greece List Price, $1.25 Although written on the same plan as the author's "Eastern Nations and Greece this book is much wider in scope, and is intended for a longer course and for more mature pupils. Myers' History of Rome Revised Edition List Price, $1.00 An unrivaled short course in Roman history is provided by this companion volume to Myers' "Eastern Nations and Greece.' Myers' Rome: Its Rise and Fall List Price, $1.25 From the point of view of modern scholarship, few books in the field of history are so well prepared as Myers' "Rome" to invite the closest scrutiny of educators. Descriptive announcements of Professor Myers' histories will be sent, postpaid, to any address on request GINN & COMPANY PUBLISHERS Address: 378-388 Wabash Ave., CHICAGO, ILL.: VOL. VI. OCTOBER, 1905. NUMBER 2. ENGLISH GRAMMAR IN THE SEVENTH YEAR. KATE MORAN, PRINCIPAL TRAINING SCHOOL, INDIANA STATE NORMAL SCHOOL, TERRE HAUTE, IND. In the common schools the child begins grammar at the commencement of the seventh year, when he is about twelve or thirteen years of age. The time for entering upon any study is determined by three considerations: Is the child's mind sufficiently developed? Has an adequate foundation been laid? Will this particular study prepare him for the succeeding phases of development? Grammar addresses itself primarily to the reason, hence it may be begun when this faculty begins its period of rapid development-that is, at the twelfth or thirteenth year. Before this age grammar, to the average child, is but a distasteful memory process. From this it does not follow that this study may not be taken up later, yet if the child has been thoroughly prepared by previous work in language, there are excellent reasons for beginning thus early. As grammar appeals especially to the reason, it develops a love for the product of this power-abstract truth-and may well be begun at this time, in order that the child may have two years' training in reasoning in this particularly helpful realm before he is permitted by law to enter life's hard school, in which of all his faculties. this is perhaps the most severely tried. That the child may be prepared to enter upon this study with pleasure and profit, the work in language must be thoroughly done. If the child has been familiarized with correct English, and if his errors have been corrected with judicious persistence, one serious handicap has been removed. If he has learned to read well-that is, to understand the thought through the form-a very great stumbling block has been avoided. If by means of copying dictation and original writing he has been established in correct habits of punctuation, use of capitals, use of paragraphs, etc., he has been greatly helped. If the language teacher has made skillful use of substitution and variation, the child has already grasped the very essence of grammar-that is, that any change in language arises from a modification of thought. He can feel the difference between these sentences: "The man is honest and the man is worthy of respect." "The honest man is worthy of respect." "The man of honesty is worthy of respect." "The man who is honest is worthy of respect." "Honesty is worthy of respect." If the child has grown into a love of beautiful language by hearing and learning selections of prose and poetry, he will take a delight in the studies that make clear to him the laws upon which this beauty rests. Grammar merely brings into clear consciousness what the child has already learned-the law of the sentence. A thorough training in grammar is necessary for the future work in school. When the child has seen the development of the sentence from the simplest to the most complex form, he can understand. and enjoy the elegant, the sonorous, the rhythmic sentences of Macaulay, of Milton and of Arnold, with the pleasure of a skillful chess player. The form will present no difficulty, and the entire energy may be devoted to the thought of the text in history, geography or physiology. High school work will not be hampered because the child is unable to cope with the language of the books. A knowledge of the grammatical construction of a sentence is as necessary for its oral expression as for its silent interpretation, since the former depends upon the latter. While oral reading is not of prime importance as an art, it is as valuable as singing and should be given equal emphasis. The study of grammar is of value in establishing that correct habit of English with which the child should leave the common schools. It is true that the home is more important in determining the speech of the child, but the fact that the child of the foreigner learns to use our language in school shows that the school. can at least modify the child's speech. Then, too, the work in grammar affects the child's written work very directly, and this in turn can be made to react upon his spoken language. If a child be confronted by his own error in black and white, he is more easily induced to correct it. Written composition should go hand in hand with the grammar work, and in correction of the composition reference should, when possible, be made to the work in grammar. One child may be permitted to correct his companion's work, and if common errors appear it should, if possible, be made the subject for a lesson in grammar. If in reading a child shows that he has failed to grasp the thought of a sentence because of inability to see the sentence construction, he should be questioned upon the sentence, which may at some future time become part of the grammar lesson. He should be encouraged to point out in any reading matter the various grammatical forms as he studies them. In this way the grammar is made vital and useful, while the reading is rendered more easy and interesting. From what has already been said, it is apparent that not the definition, not the outline and not the diagram, but the sentence in all its variations is the subject matter of grammar. This is the one subject in the common school curriculum in which the laboratory method may always be employed, since the material is always ready for use. The only text that is at all useful is a book of well-selected and judiciously arranged sentences. With this book should go a key-a teacher well trained in English. The fact that so many teachers are not and can not be well trained while the profession is at ebbtide in finances is the reason why school boards and publishers are forced to bring pressure to bear upon authors so as to induce them to spoil excellent scientific books by the addition of ready-made definitions, outlines and diagrams. These are merely means of assuring the teacher that the child understands the subjectmatter-the sentence. Of what value is it to any one that a child is able to define the subject of a sentence if he thinks that "great" is the subject in the sentence "Great are thy works"? How is the child helped by repeating, "The copula is a relational word which asserts the relations between the thought-subject and the thought predicate," if he mistakes any word of two or three letters for a copula? There is only one right method of teaching grammar-presentation of the sentence in its manifold variations in well ordered groups. Since the subjectmatter of grammar is the sentence, and since the sentence is the body of which the thought is the soul, no study of grammar can begin without some study of the thought. In the genesis of the thought there are three distinct phases which correspond to the three essential elements of the sentence. In the first, the mind seizes the object as an undifferentiated unit-the baby can say "Papa;" in the second, the mind by analysis differentiates one attribute the baby can say, "Papa-big;" in the third he unifies the emphasized attribute with the object-it is dimly conscious of its own activity-the baby can say, "Papa is big." The work upon the thought may be begun by directing the child's attention. to the baby's process of learning to talk. Let the fact that at twelve the average child has done thus much "child-study” as is proved by his ready answers, be the teacher's defense for inflicting psychology upon him. By careful questioning it is easy to lead |