The late scholar is no blessing, and yet he is far from an unmixed evil. The wise teacher will get all the good he can out of him.
Of course, he is to be transformed into the early scholar, care being taken lest by mistake he be transformed into the scholar absent altogether. And during this process of transformation there is a small harvest of advantage to be tended.
Let his entrance be a danger signal. Don't act mad. Of course, the electric current of interest is flowing by this time, or never, and the late scholar rudely breaks it. But never mind. Better the total loss of your scholars' interest in the lesson than the loss of their respect for you.
Remember, too, that there may be a good excuse,—even late coming may mean earnest endeavor,—and premature impatience in such case will cause you dismayed repentance.
The late scholar cannot be ignored; don't try it.Sometimes we fiercely attempt to finish our sentences, or get answers to our last questions. The late scholar is a potent and aggressive fact, and cannot be got rid of in that way.
No. Accept the situation promptly and sensibly. Stop short at once, and greet the late comer heartily. Don't let him sneak into a back seat, but set him in the midst. See that he has a Bible or a lesson paper. Incorporate him. Then proceed thriftily to utilize him. He is your opportunity for a review. You probably need one at this stage of the lesson, anyway. Here is your chance for gathering up loose ends and binding all the truths thus far taught in a compact whole.
You may do it in this way: "Before you came in, Charley, we were talking about Christ's command to lay up treasures, not on earth, but in heaven. We've been deciding what some of the earth-treasures are. We've agreed that they include money and clothes and houses and studies and friends, and that we mustn't win any of these in such a way that they will belong merely to earth. You see? And now, class, can any one think of another earth-treasure?"
Or you may do it in this way: "Here's Charley. John, will you please tell him what we talked about at the beginning of the lesson? That's good. And Bess, tell him, please, what conclusion we have come to thus far. That's right. And now let us go on."
Similarly, all through the lesson, the late scholar may be your excuse for bringing up points mentionedat the opening of the hour, and needing repetition. "Something was said at the start which bears on that matter, and Charley wasn't here. Ned, please tell him what that was."
Bring him into the electric circle by a question as soon as you can. But remember that it takes time for him to become charged with interest and understanding as fully as the rest, and ask him easy questions at first, or, perhaps better, call on him to read a verse or two.
The late scholar's exit is fraught with as much danger as his entrance. You must utilize that also. Let your questioning be jolly and indirect: "Too much sleep this morning, Billy?" "Sorry, Ellen, that you couldn't start in with us"; "Some good points you missed at the opening, Fred."
If rightly used, this is an opportunity for learning of some need or temptation that besets your scholar. She may be lazy. He may be too fond of sleep. She may keep too late hours. He may be led astray by the Sunday morning papers. They may fail to see the value of the opening prayer and songs. You get fresh insight into their characters.
When Nature heals a broken bone, she makes it the stronger for the break. And so, though the late scholar seem to fracture sadly the interest of the lesson, the wise teacher will know how to mend the matter in such shrewd fashion as to knit the whole class more firmly together.
Even the poorest teacher has a right to the course he has marked out for himself; even the smartest scholar has no right to side-track him.
Some scholars side-track their teacher merely to show that they understand how to use the switch; others do it by simply fooling with the switch, in pure carelessness and thoughtlessness; others really wish to bring the teacher nearer some private interest of their own.
Their motive must determine your treatment of them,—whether it is to be the bruskness that rebukes conceit, the firm patience that resists carelessness, or the considerate postponement of questions that are prompted by a need.
But so far as its effect on the lesson is concerned, it makes no difference whether the teacher is side-tracked by a switch of gold or one of brass,—the lesson is "held up," and often permanently.
It is not always easy to tell when these question-switchesare open, and when they are closed,—when they will side-track you, and when they will merely salute you with a friendly rattle and let you pass; the tokens are not so definite as on the red and white faces of the switch indicator. And yet you cannot engineer your class far without wrecking it, if you do not learn to read these question indicators, and tell at a glance whither they will send you.
But what is the use of reading them, if you are to be at their mercy anyway? How shall we circumvent these mischief-making switchers?
Some would abruptly take away their switch-keys, and practically dismiss them from the force; that is, they would prohibit questioning altogether. But this is capitulating to the problem. Some would swing smilingly off upon the side-track, as if they had intended to go there. But that is surrendering their preparation. Some would rush precipitately into the side-track and through it, expecting to find at the other end a switch back to the main track. But thus the lesson is usually derailed.
On the railroad, of course, there is authority; but in the Sunday-school the less appeal to authority the better. No, the likeness, to a large extent, stops here; for in the Sunday-school the only way to deal with a scholar who side-tracks the train is to win him by friendly arts to become your helper rather than your hinderer.
In the first place, many a lesson is side-tracked because the main track is not made sufficiently plainto the scholars' apprehension. When the lesson winds like a snake, with a purpose known only to the teacher (if to him), small blame to the scholars if they switch it off the wrong way by a question. Strike out in a bee-line at the start, and stick to it. No one will then ignorantly side-track you.
In the second place, many a lesson is side-tracked because the teacher does not act as if he cared whether he ever arrived anywhere or not. Lackadaisical in manner and matter, his carelessness provokes equal carelessness in his scholars. Let him, on the other hand, appear to be eagerly on the scent of some truth, on the track of some fact, following the path of some event or demonstration, and his scholars will, in the main, be "forth and right on" with him.
In the third place, many a lesson is side-tracked because the scholars are not on the side of the teacher. Of course, when the two parties are at cross-purposes, things run no more evenly than they would if the engineer of a train were out of touch with his crew. The teacher must get up anesprit de corps, a class spirit, or his class will be perpetually flying off from him on a tangent. His scholars must be interested in him, if they are to be interested with him. He must draw them to himself, or they will never pull together. Friendship in his crew must take the place of authority in the railroad crew; and the more friendship, the less side-tracking.
In the fourth place, there must be frankness ofspeech. A misplaced switch on a railway, if it provoked no further collision, would at least provoke a clash of words. There is no reason why, if a question is too far aside from the main purpose of the lesson, the teacher should not frankly say so. He may lay it away in his mind for later discussion; he may promise to talk it over after the session; but no fear of being thought incompetent, or unsympathetic, or arbitrary, should induce him to turn aside from his one purpose. The wise teacher will make many exceptions, of course, to every rule; but nevertheless, a rule of the wise teacher it must be, to say to every irrelevant question, kindly and tactfully, yet firmly, "Get thee behind me." For the half-hour is all too short. The impressions made are all too confused. The instruction given is all too fragmentary. However wise and earnest the individual moments may be, there is danger that the half-hour may pass into oblivion at once, unless these individual moments have been wise and earnest to some single, distinct end.
There is a place for switches in our Sunday-school lesson. The train must be made up. Side excursions must often be made. There are sundry connecting lines whose cars must be switched in. But in genuine Sunday-school railroading there must be no delay upon side-tracks. Let all teachers, as far as possible, run express.
The analogy for the class-building of some teachers is the arch. Every scholar is needed in his place, or the class-work collapses; and of course there is no room for a visitor. The analogy for the true class is the electric circle. Join hands all around, and ever room and electricity for one more.
I do not mean to imply that the visitor is not a problem. He is an intrusion on your familiar little group. He is a foreign and constraining element. He is a problem, however, that you cannot get rid of, but must solve.
Utilize the visitor. Go to work in such way as to transform him into a scholar; or if circumstances forbid that, at any rate win from his visit fresh interest and inspiration for the class. Every visitor is an angel of opportunity, entertained—how often!—unawares.
Let your reception of the visitor be to your class an object-lesson in Christian courtesy. If he comesin alone, and awkwardly drops into a distant seat, do not wait for the busy superintendent to get around to him. If he is of fit age for your class, drop everything,—the most valuable lesson you could be teaching is not so valuable as this practical example,—and go to the stranger. Introduce yourself cordially to him, and him to the rest of the class, or, at any rate, to his neighbors.
Sometimes resign the pleasure of seeking the visitor yourself, and send some persuasive scholar, thus letting him have a taste of the joy of giving invitations. Possibly it will help him into the habit of giving invitations outside.
Get your scholars to hand the visitor a lesson leaf or a Bible. Show them that he is their visitor as well as yours. They will soon learn to be delightfully courteous. But an iceberg teacher makes an iceberg class.
And now you are on trial before your class. They will judge you by the interest or the apathy of the visitor. They are watching him, ready to be ashamed or proud of you.
Yet do not fear your visitor. He may come from a better school and a better teacher. He may be critical and sneering and skeptical. Nevertheless, he is your opportunity. Rejoice in it.
If he is a better scholar than any in your class, what a valuable and inspiring example he may be made to them! If a poorer scholar, what an opportunity to make your class feel the joy and power of teaching some one!
If he is sneering and critical, the indignation of the class will bind them more enthusiastically to you. If he is skeptical, what a chance for examining and strengthening foundations!
The visitor is a mine of new ideas and experiences. Old thoughts take on novel forms when fitted to him. His questions and answers exhibit needs in your own class, unobserved because unfamiliar. His ways and words freshen the stagnant class atmosphere.
And so he is your chance to get out of ruts and into new ways and moods. Bless Providence for him, and question him vigorously, making use of him to the utmost.
Two cautions, however. Let your questioning be very clear. He is unused, remember, to your little mannerisms, and must not be confused by idiosyncrasies. And in your exultation over him do not neglect the others, nor seem to change your plans for the visitor, or to be striving to show off before him.
Final advantage of the visitor: Teach your scholars to ask him heartily to come again, not forgetting to do so cordially yourself. Committees on church extension, remember, are trained in the Sunday-school.
Thus you see that the value of the visitor does not depend upon the visitor so much as might be imagined. Yet just a word on how to visit well.
Go to give good. Take hearty interest in the lesson, and have some thought to add to the discussion. Better yet, have some earnest question to ask. And ask it. If you come from another school, consideryourself a Christian ambassador bearing greetings of brotherly good will and common endeavor.
Go to get good. Be unobtrusive and teachable. And especially, show that you have received good. Express appreciation, after the lesson, to teacher and scholars. Then will you be blessed, and, changing the meaning of the word "visitation," these words from the Wisdom of Solomon may be applied to you: "In the time of their visitation they shall shine, and run to and fro like sparks among the stubble."
One of the brightest women in the United States, a woman well known to the Protestant churches of the world, was groaning to me the other day: "WhatshallI do with those boys in my Sunday-school class? They are just at the age when they think they know a little more than anywoman. They need a man. Don't you think the superintendent ought to remove them from under petticoat government?"
This cry, that came so strangely from a woman of her ability and fame, comes also from a throng of baffled Sunday-school teachers. The answer would be easy, if there were anything like as many good Sunday-school teachers among the men as among the women. As it is, however, most boy classes must be assigned either to a distasteful petticoat government, or to an incompetent pantaloon government, or—cast adrift until, long years afterward, they drop anchor in the haven of matrimony, and happily, perchance, appear once more in the Sunday-school, in the "Bible class."
The remedy, however, though not easy, is manifest. The boys do not need a man, but they do need in their teacher certain manly qualities that could be incorporated in a woman's teaching. These qualities all women whom the Lord of the Sunday-school has set over a class of his boys, should seek to get.
The most obvious of them, I think, is a certain dignity and reserve that show themselves as well in refraining from scolding as in declining to pat on the head or hold by the hand. Boys of the undefinable age we are talking about highly appreciate the title "Mr." Their greatest horror is petting; their greatest aversion is nagging. A young man, set to teach a class of boys, will approach them with a sense of comradeship; will at once make himself, if he is a teacher at all, "hail fellow well met" among them; and yet, as the boys say, "there is no nonsense about him."
It is far better—bad as that is—to talk over the heads of boys than to talk down to them. It is far better to use too few words than too many. If a teacher would hold boys, she must be concise, straightforward, businesslike. Indeed, the latter adjective comes near to being the key to the situation. Boys dislike fussiness, and wordiness, and beating about the bush. Woman teachers that are eager for boys' souls will take a long step toward their astonished approbation if they school themselves to brevity, dignity, and "business."
Set the boys to work. Imitate common-schoolmethods. In the public school woman teachers hold the boys, and win their honest hearts. It is largely because here there are definiteness of purpose and firm continuity of aim. Boys are easily mastered by a taskmaster who is master of her task. Boys that cannot be won by Sunday-school preaching are readily won by Sunday-schoolteaching. Lay down a distinct course of work, with a goal in fair view, and they will gird up the loins of their minds; but they refuse to follow you in aimless wanderings through a thicket. To learn in chronological order the seventy-five prominent events in Christ's life; to trace through the Bible the doctrine of the atonement; to commit to memory every Scripture passage bearing on the temperance problem; to write a six-hundred-word abstract of the Book of Genesis; to make a classification of the Psalms by topics; to compile the Bible proverbs that have to do with money and wealth-getting; to make a diagram graphically depicting the history of the Old Testament Hebrews; to write out the Ten Commandments, and place in parallel columns the New Testament enlargements and interpretations thereof,—these are samples of the work boys would like to do. They would give high praise to a teacher who conducted them through such tasks. They would say that she "meant business."
And that leads me to mention another point in which woman teachers are more likely than men to fail, though both are far too weak,—the use of evidence, of proof. This is a hobby of mine, but it isthe boys themselves, and recollections of my own boyhood, that have set me on the hobby. Wherever a thing is susceptible of proof, boys want it proved to them. If it is not susceptible of proof, they wantthatproved to them, also. Woman's traditional "because" does not commend itself to the lawyerlike boys. Fresh from their botany in the public schools, they refuse to take on faith the Cana miracle. Ready for their physiology or physics the next day, they want more proof than a "say so" that a leper was ever healed by a word or that Peter really walked on the waves. "It is in the Bible" is not enough; they must know why they must believe the Bible.
Now I am not so foolish as to advise any one to suggest skepticism to a boy, and I know that there is a way of handling Scripture evidences that serves rather to raise doubt than to confirm faith; but I have enough of the boy in me to be sure that in no way can a teacher more highly exalt both herself and Christianity in the eyes of the boys than by insisting on the reasonableness of both. I had the best of Sunday-school teachers, quite a score of them, women and men; yet until full manhood I wrestled all alone with a concealed and absolute skepticism that would not down until I had hunted out for myself the many overwhelming proofs of the resurrection of Christ. If any of my twenty teachers had set those proofs with lawyerlike force and directness before my boyish mind, I should have been saved some very dark years that came near making an infidel of me altogether.Because I think that boys feel this need of proof and evidence more than girls, and that women are less ready to meet the need than men, I have ventured to add this suggestion to my list.
And that list may close with only one point further. Boys like to be taught by men, because through men they get a telescope-view into the life-work that lies before them. Men teachers draw their illustrations from mannish things, from business life, from inventions, from politics, from commerce, from the law. Where a woman might illustrate dishonesty by apple-stealing, thereby causing every urchin before her to exclaim "Chestnut!" under his breath, a man would be more likely to make some discussion about watering stock or falsifying entries. A man is more likely than a woman to render Scripture vivid and practical by reference to current events, dropping a word here and there about the war between China and Japan, about Gladstone's retirement, about the Manitoba school question, about the Honduras lottery,—just a word, but the boys prick up their ears. A woman might compare Gideon with David, but a man would be far more likely to compare him with Parkhurst.
And now my point is that the boy needs both,—both David and Parkhurst. There is no reason why the woman teacher cannot give the boy everything he could get from a man teacher, and more. It is easy to appear to a boy quite a Solon regarding current events. It is not so very hard, by the exercise of a consecrated imagination, to place yourself by theboy's side on the outskirts of the great, wide world of busy activities he is soon to enter, and feel his impatience to be there and his hunger for any tidings from that charmed country. Show him how Christianity untangles the skeins of business, is the master-key to all true politics, the foundation of law, the compass of commerce, the force of civilization. Read the newspapers wisely, and find out what is going on in the world. Read wisely the hearts of your boys, and find out what is going on in that world. Lift manfully over both worlds the banner of Christ.
One point at a time, with cheerful persistence, the teacher that "means business" will win for her teaching these adaptations to the needs of her boys. And in the process, losing nothing of womanliness, she will have nobly broadened her own life, while as its result she will have won a double hold, both a woman's hold and a man's hold, on the hearts of the boys.
The teacher's manner must be heart-born. It must not become mannerism, which is head-born, and never reaches hearts. "Manner maketh the man," and also the teacher,—half-way, at least. If we suspect, however, that our manner is defective, the manner itself is the last thing to look at; we must look at our heart. That is the place to get the change.
Three heart qualities produce the ideal teacher's manner. One of these isearnestness. If you would make on your scholars an impression that will last beyond the hour, you yourself must be deeply impressed with the eternal years. To move their life, keep before you their death. That is hard to do, when confronted by such abounding youthful vigor and vitality. Become an advocate, a pleader, with eternal life as the stake. Learn to know deeply the great central truths of sin, atonement, sanctification. Aim at radical and positive results in confession, testimony, spirituality, character, and conduct, and press toward these as the genuine verdict on your teaching.
The second quality ischeeriness. We are prophets of awful alternatives, but we are also ministers of the most blessed joy. Happiness is the best recommendation of Christianity. In it center all the Christian evidences. Learn by heart all the promises; they are better teaching weapons than the prohibitions and warnings. Keep a smile very close to the surface, and improve every fair chance to laugh. The teacher that is in earnest, need never be afraid to be merry. Permit no exaggeration of the facts of wickedness, either in them or in others. The more stormy the day and the fewer in attendance, the cheerier be you.
The third quality issympathy. The true teacher has, or gets, the poet's ability to project himself into the lives of others. He keeps invisible, tactful antennæ playing in all directions, feeling this one's coming embarrassment before it arrives, conscious of that one's eager assent before it lights his eyes, exploring homes and occupations and character in order to adapt question to scholar. Without argument or plan, but by instinctive appreciation of differing personality, the true teacher assumes dignity with this pupil,bonhomiewith that. So far is he from treating all alike, that he never treats even the same person in the same way two days in succession, knowing, by feeling rather than theory, that no one—especially no child—is the same person two days in succession.
These are the teacher's three graces: earnestness, born of faith and unsatisfied until it has inspired anequal faith; cheeriness, born of hope, and hope-creating; and sympathy, born of love, which is the greatest of all. These in the heart blossom outwardly into the perfect teaching manner,—earnestness to arrest, cheeriness to attract, and sympathy to hold. "Covet earnestly thebestgifts."
I believe in the organization of Sunday-school classes, because it fosters class spirit. If it is a good thing to have a class, it is a good thing for the class to have a spirit. This class spirit should promote the school spirit, just as theesprit de corpsof a company enhances the loyalty of soldiers to their regiment.
When a scholar has signed a constitution, he feels that he belongs to the school. Lacking this feeling, he will not be long with the school or with anything else.
In the simple constitution of my class (which is a class of young men) are provisions for a porch, a lookout, and a social committee.
The porch committee watches the morning congregation for strange young men, and invites them to come to Sunday-school. The lookout committee seeks throughout town and church for permanent additions to the class, whom, through its chairman, it proposes for membership. This is a great gain.When a teacher urges people to join his class he is inviting them to the gospel, certainly, but he is also inviting them to himself. In the first cause he is as bold as a lion, but in the second many a modest soul is naturally, even though foolishly, bashful. Happy the teacher whose scholars are zealous in this vital service, for him so delicate and for them so blessed!
The voting in of new members, with the subsequent producing of the constitution for signatures, is a little ceremony as useful for the old scholars in reminding them of their class autonomy as it is inspiring to the new scholars. A hearty word of welcome from the teacher to the new-comers gives them a formal and public installation. They have indeed taken on themselves a new function.
The social committee will greatly add to the efficiency of any class. Monthly class socials are genuine means of grace. Our socials are thus managed: Each social has a solid backbone, consisting of a paper or talk by some member of the class, detailing little-known points in his own business. Of a neighboring class similarly organized, one is a young architect, another works in a rope-walk, a third holds an important position in a newspaper office, a fourth is in the leather business, the teacher of the class is a judge. Utilizing the experiences of their own members and friends, this class has held quite remarkable socials. It has found the contribution of the clerk in a furniture store as interesting as that of the young banker. The class have been wonderfully knit togetherby the bonds of a common and a widening interest. After these papers or talks (which are often appropriately illustrated), come discussion and questions, followed by games or light refreshments. By occasional joint socials of this kind we hope to draw together this class and my own. Of course, this is only one out of a myriad schemes of entertainment that could be devised for these class socials. The point the shrewd teacher will notice is that it is the scholars themselves who plan these socials, and who thus take into their own hands the creation of a warm, helpful class atmosphere. Every teacher should know that in making new scholars feel at home it is hardly his own sociability, but that of his scholars, that counts.
If the class is thus organized, the teacher must guard the authority of his class president as jealously as his own. If you want your class officers to feel genuine responsibility, it must be genuine responsibility that you put upon them. Give up to the president, during the conduct of business, your place in front of the class. Wait to be recognized by him before you speak. Make few motions. Inspire others to take the initiative.
The election of officers should come every six months, and it is best to bring about a thorough rotation in office. Improve every chance to emphasize the class organization. If your school arrangements permit, vote every month on the disposal of the class collections. If you must be absent a Sunday, askthe class to elect a substitute teacher, and ask the president to inform the substitute of his election. An alternate should be chosen also, to make the thing sure. This little device serves to make the scholars as loyal to the substitute teacher as to their own, for they have made him their own. In the course of the lessons, also, a wide-awake teacher will frequently mention and emphasize the class organization.
Of course the whole plan will fall flat if the teacher wholly delegates to his scholars any or all of these lines of work. He also must invite the strangers, if he expects his scholars to do so. He also must seek for new members, if he would inspire them to do the same. Without his sociableness they will soon become frigid. The teacher alone has the dipper of water that starts the pump. Any contrivance that lessens his responsibility lessens his success.
But the plan I have outlined has value, not because it permits the teacher to do less, but because it incites the scholars to do vastly more. An ounce drawn out is better than a ton put in. One thing you get them to do is a greater triumph than a dozen things you do much better for them.
Before his listless and restless audience the lecturer took in his hand a piece of chalk, turned to the blackboard, and touched it. Instantly he had the eager attention of all. He did nothing with the chalk; had not intended to do anything; he carried his point with it, nevertheless.
A teacher, plus a bit of chalk, is two teachers. And any one may double himself thus, if he choose to take a little pains.
Surely there need be no hesitation as to the materials. If you can have a blackboard, that is fine. I myself like best a board fastened to the wall, and a second board hinged to this after the fashion of a double slate. The outside may be used for "standing matter," and the inside opened up for the surprises.
But this is a great luxury. A portable, flexible blackboard will answer, if your class is away from the wall. You can roll it up and carry it home to practise there. You can use both sides of it. Such blackboards may be obtained now for two dollars.
Not even a flexible blackboard, however, is essential.A slate will serve you admirably, and some of the best chalk-talkers use simple sheets of manilla paper tacked to ordinary pine boards.
Then, as to the chalk, by all means use colored crayons. It is easy to learn effective contrasts of colors, and bright hues will increase many fold the attractiveness of your pictures and diagrams. But these crayons need not be of the square variety, sold especially for such work at thirty-five cents a box. They produce beautiful results, but the ordinary schoolroom box of assorted colors will serve your turn admirably and cost much less.
And if the materials are readily obtained, so is the artistic skill. Trust to the active imaginations of the children. Remember in their own drawings how vivid to them are the straight lines that stand for men, the squares that represent houses, the circles with three dots that set forth faces with eyes and mouth. I once saw Mrs. Crafts teach the parable of the Good Samaritan in a most fascinating way to some little tots, and her blackboard work was merely some rough ovals, each drawn half through its neighbor, to represent a chain of love,—love to papa, love to mamma, to sister, brother, friend, teacher,—neighbor. And as circle after circle was briskly added, every child was filled with delight. That same parable of the Good Samaritan I once saw perfectly illustrated—for all practical purposes—by four squares, each with two parallel lines curving from one upper corner to the opposite lower one, to represent the descent of theJericho road, while the various scenes were depicted with the aid of short, straight lines, the man fallen among thieves being a horizontal line, the priest and Levite being stiffly upright and placed on appropriate points in the road, while the line for the Samaritan was leaning over as if helping his fallen brother rise! Surely that series of drawings was not beyond the artistic skill of any teacher.
One of the beauties of such simple work is that it may be dashed off in the presence of the scholars, while more elaborate pictures must be prepared beforehand; and half the value of blackboard work is in the attention excited by the moving chalk. I use the expression "dashed off," but I do not want to imply careless work. The straight lines should be as straight as you can make them without a ruler, the circles as true circles as can be drawn without a string, and the stars should have equal points. The simpler the drawing, the more need that every mark should have its mission and fulfill it well. A confused scrawl will only make mental confusion worse confounded. Don't be satisfied with rough work, or it will constantly become rougher. Try to do better all the time.
Of course, this means home practice, even for the simplest of exercises, like Mrs. Crafts' links of the love-chain. The nearer the links are to perfect ovals, the better. The more nicely they are shaded on one side, the more distinct will be the impression of a chain. And the more rapidly they can be drawn, the more tense will be the children's interest. A few easylessons in drawing, from some public-school teacher or some text-book, will prove of inestimable value,—lessons enough to give you at least an idea of perspective, so that you can make a house or a box stand out from the board, and know which sides to shade of the inside of a door. Make such simple beginnings as I have indicated, and determine to advance, however slowly. It is hard to draw a man, but not so difficult if you are willing to begin with a little circle for the head, an oval for the body, and two straight lines for legs.
But even if you do not draw at all, it is well worth while to use chalk. Almost magical effects may be produced by a single sentence, sometimes a single word,writtenon the board. If your lesson is the last chapter of the Bible, the one word "Come!" will be blackboard work enough. Add to it, if you will, at the close of the recitation, this earnest question: "Why not to-day?" Every lesson has its key-word or its key-sentence. Write it large on your scholars' hearts by writing it large upon the blackboard.
In such work, as in drawing, you may begin with simple writing (your best script, however!) and go on to as high a degree of elaborateness as you fancy. A printer's book of samples will introduce you to fascinating and varied forms of letters. Your colored chalks may be used in exquisite illumination. You may learn from penmen their most bewitching scrolls. And all of this will be enjoyed by the children, and will contribute to the impressiveness of the truth,providedyou are jealous to keep it subordinate to the truth. Otherwise, plain longhand is to be preferred to the end of the chapter.
Another easy way to use the blackboard—still without venturing on drawing—is by constructing diagrams. What a key to Scripture chronology, for instance, is furnished your scholars when you draw a horizontal line to represent the four thousand years from Adam to Christ, bisect it for Abraham, bisect the last half for Solomon, bisect the third quarter for Moses, and continue to bisect as long as a famous man stands at the bisecting-point! How it clears up the life of Christ to draw two circles, the inner one for Jerusalem, the outer for Nazareth, dividing them into thirty-three parts for the years of our Saviour's life, and running a curved line in and out according as his journeys took him to Nazareth and beyond its circle, or back to Jerusalem at the feast-times! Such circles will also serve to depict graphically Paul's missionary journeys, the outer circle representing Antioch. Any series of historical events may well be strung along a vertical line divided into decades, and parallel series, as in the history of the northern and southern kingdoms, along two parallel verticals. An outline map, such as the teacher may draw from memory, will furnish an excellent basis for another kind of diagram, the progress of persons or of series of events being traced from place to place by dotted lines, a different color for each person or journey or group of incidents.
Acrostics furnish still another use for the blackboard.For example, draw out from the class by questions a list of the prominent characteristics of David. He was
Not until the list is completed does the class see that its initial letters spell David's name. You have attained the element of surprise, so valuable in work of this sort. Again, in a lesson on the rich young man, or on Dives and Lazarus, or on Zaccheus, write in a vertical column the letters of Christ's name, and draw straight lines to the right in various directions, as shown in the following diagram. Transferring the letters, or getting some scholar to transfer them, to the points indicated, you quickly insert an E, and it reads: "Christ—richest."
Christ is Richest
The application is obvious, and will never be forgotten.
Often, in seeking for such an effective presentation of a lesson's truth, we hit upon alliteration, and then our blackboard work is easy. Three P's:
P P P
Fill them out, as the lesson proceeds, thus:
harisee ompouslyP Prayed Publican enitently
And often, again, our form will be based upon similar terminations or beginnings of words, such as:
{ choosingSolomon { reigning{ sinning
Suggestions and examples of such work might be indefinitely multiplied. It is one of the easiest, yet one of the most effective, methods of fixing the points of a lesson.
The earnest teacher will be drawn irresistibly from the use of the chalk in diagrams, acrostics, and the like, to simple drawings; and by this time he will realize the importance of simplicity. A set of steps, for instance, is easy to draw; we may use only the profile; but the drawing will fix forever in your scholars' minds the events in Solomon's life. To a certain point the steps are all upward. Yellow chalk shows them to be golden. A word written over each stepgives the event it symbolizes. On a sudden the steps turn downward, become a dirty brown, each representing a sin, and break short off as Solomon takes his terrible fall.
Who cannot draw a number of rough circles? They will stand for the stones thrown at Stephen. A word or initial written in each will represent the different kinds of persecutions that assail faithful Christians in our modern days. Who cannot draw a shepherd's crook, and write alongside it the points of the Twenty-third Psalm, or the ways in which Christ is the Good Shepherd? Who cannot draw a large wineglass, and write inside it some of the evils that come out of it? Who cannot draw a rectangle for a letter, and write upon it a direction, to make more vivid some of the epistles? or a trumpet inside seven circles, to brighten up the lesson on the fall of Jericho? As a rule, the very best chalk-talks are the simplest, and require the least skill in drawing.
But how to get the ideas? Where to find the pictures?
Of course, in the first place, from the books of first-rate chalk-talkers, such as Pierce's "Pictured Truth," Frank Beard's "The Blackboard in the Sunday-school," and Belsey's "The Bible and the Blackboard" (an English book). Of course, also, from the many admirable periodicals that publish blackboard hints, such as the "Lesson Illustrator," the "Sunday-school Times," and the teachers' magazines of the various denominations. Get hints also fromthe blackboard work of the public school and the kindergarten, as to manner, if not as to matter.
But as for the design, your own is the best for you, and not another's. Study all the blackboard work you can find, and retain whatever gravitates to you; but your own original design is the one you will best understand, and in presenting it you will have more of that enthusiasm which makes success.
Learn to find pictures all through the Bible. I have just been searching my mind for a Bible text that promised nothing in the way of a picture. At last I thought that "All have sinned and come short of the glory of God" would do. But in another second two pictures popped into my mind. I saw a river whose further bank was beautiful with flowers and trees, the paradise of "the glory of God," and across the river a bridge—lacking its final portion. I saw a ladder reaching up into some golden clouds back of which shone heaven, the city of "the glory of God"; but all the top rounds of the ladder were missing. Bridge and ladder had "come short." God's hand was needed, reaching across, reaching down, to help us over the sin-gap into "the glory of God." I do not believe it possible to find any Bible texts, still less any twelve consecutive verses of the Bible, that do not hide somewhere a capital picture.
Read your Bible pictorially. Make sketches everywhere upon the margin. For practice, often take some passage sure to come up in the International Lessons, such as Psalm 1, Isaiah 53, Proverbs 3,Matthew 5, Luke 2, John 14, Acts 9, Romans 12, 1 Corinthians 13, Hebrew 11, James 3. Delve into the passage, meditate long over it, and see how many pictures you can get out of it.
Of the greatest assistance will be a book,—indexed as to texts, and also as to subjects, such as "temperance," "missionary," "resurrection," "courage,"—in which you will preserve every drawing you make, and all the most suggestive blackboard hints you clip from the teachers' magazines, together with simple outlines of all sorts of common subjects. These last will be particularly useful. There will be a ladder, an anvil, a horse, a lily, a broom, a fountain,—anything likely to be of use for a symbol. You will clip these from advertisements, catalogues, the illustrated papers and magazines, and you will find your collection useful in many ways.
I have spoken as if the teacher should do all the blackboard work. On the contrary, he should do none that he can get his scholars to do for him. No matter if they do not do it as well as he. Get them to practise beforehand. Let them begin with only the simplest work; they will soon astonish you with their proficiency. And the class will take far more interest in a poor drawing by one of their own number than in a good drawing by you.
Yes, and even when you preside at the blackboard yourself, give the class pencils and paper occasionally, and let them copy what you draw. Their attention will be assuredly fixed, and an ineffaceable impressionmade on their memory. The drawings they complete, however crude, they will be glad to carry home to show their parents, and treasure as souvenirs of the lesson, or keep, if you choose, against the coming review day. If you use this method, you will soon come to cherish a deeper liking for that prime pedagogical virtue, simplicity.
For a final word: Take pains that your word-pictures keep pace with your chalk. Don'taskyour class what you have drawn—that might lead to embarrassing results!Tellthem. Put in all sorts of graphic little touches, even though you cannot draw a tenth of what you are talking about. The man on the Jericho road—how full of fear he was as he walked; how he whistled to keep up his courage; how one robber peeped from behind a rock, and another whispered, "He's coming!" how they sprang out, and he ran, and a third rascal sprang out in front and knocked him down; how he shouted, "Help! Thieves! Help!" and how only the echo answered him in that lonely place—all this must have happened many a time on that Jericho road, and you have a perfect right to stimulate with such natural and inevitable details the imagination of the children.
That is what they are for—both our word-picturing and our chalk-picturing: not to exhibit our nimbleness of wit or of finger, but to quicken the minds of the children,—that alone,—and make them more eager in the pursuit of truth.
The work of the primary department lies at the foundation of all Sunday-school work. This does not mean that there is no chance of a child's becoming a good Bible scholar and a noble Christian if he misses the primary training, but it does mean that without a flourishing primary department a school can scarcely be called successful, while with it half the success of the school is assured. The primary teacher molds the soft clay; her successor with the child must cut the hard marble.
Teaching that thus lies at the foundation must deal with fundamental matters, with the greatest lives of the Bible, the great outlines of history, the great essentials of doctrine, the root principles of morality. Details are to be filled in later. The danger is that the teacher will attempt to teach too much, will expect the little ones to know about Hagar when it is enough for them to know about Isaac; or about Jeremiah, when Daniel would be sufficient; or aboutthe order in which Paul wrote his letters, when it might well suffice for them to know that Paul wrote them.
But though many questions are too hard to ask, no question is too easy, and no point is so simple that in these first days you may safely take it for granted. Laugh if you please, but I do not think that even these days of sand-maps and pricked cards have produced a method much more helpful for the primary teacher than the old questioning of my boyhood, over and over repeated: "Who was the first man?" "Who was the strongest man?" "Who was the oldest man?" and the like.
The primary teacher's right-hand man is named Drill,—Ernest Drill. No mnemonic help—thatisa help—is to be despised. Rhymes giving in order the books of the Bible, the Commandments, Beatitudes, list of the twelve apostles, may wisely be used. No memory verse or golden text, once learned, should be allowed to lapse into that easy pit, a child's quick forgetfulness. Better one thing remembered than a hundred things forgotten. Foundation-stones are few and simple, but they must be firm.
Now the first essential, if one would do this foundation work successfully, is to get a room to work in. A room that lets in floods of sunshine and fresh air. A room with pretty pictures and bright mottoes on the wall, with canary songs and blooming plants. A room with little chairs, graded to the scholars' little heights. A room with a visitors' gallery for themothers. Or, if your church was not blessed with a Sunday-school architect, then such a room in a house next door or across the street, to which your class may withdraw after the opening exercises. Or, if your work must be done in the church, as so much primary work must be, then a temporary room, shut off by drawn curtains, or even by a blackboard and a screen, is far better than the distractions of the open school.
The blackboard just mentioned, at any rate, the room should contain; the shrewd use of it will create an intense interest that will almost cause oblivion of the most distracting surroundings. A padded board gives the best effects,—such a board as you yourself may easily and cheaply make with a pine backing, a few layers of cheap soft cloth, and a covering of blackboard cloth nailed firmly over all. In the chapter on blackboard work I have tried to show how easily possible, and at the same time how valuable, is the use of the blackboard. If the children are too small to read, they may at least know their letters, and recognize S for Saul and P for Peter, and a cross for Christ, while the immense resources of simple drawings are always open to you.
The primary teacher is fortunate, nowadays, in being able to buy, at slight cost, series of pictures illustrating each quarter's lessons. These pictures are either colored brightly or simple black and white, and vary in size from four or five square feet to the little engravings in the Sunday-school paper. Whateverpicture is used should be hidden until it is time to exhibit it, and produced with a pretty show of mystery and triumph. Some teachers hang these pictures, after use, in a "picture-gallery," where the children may become familiar with them, and to this gallery they may be sent for frequent reference against the coming review day.
After all, the primary teacher's chief reliance for purposes of illustration must be natural objects. In this reliance we merely imitate the example of the great Teacher. The objects to be used will most often be suggested by the lesson text itself. A lily, a vine, seed, leaven, a door, a sickle, a cake, a cup, grass,—are not each of these objects at once associated in your mind with passages of Scripture? Hunt out the suggested objects, and simply hold them before the children as you talk about the lesson, and you will find them a wonderful assistance.
A more difficult process is to discover illustrative objects when none are directly suggested in the text. In a temperance lesson, for instance, there may be no mention of the wine-cup, yet you will bring a glass, fill it with wine-colored water, and place in it slips of paper cut to resemble snakes. On each is written some fearful result of drinking alcoholic liquors; and after the children have drawn forth, with pincers, one after the other, and read what is written upon it, they will not soon forget how many evils come out of the wine-cup.
You may be talking about the imprisonment ofJohn the Baptist. Produce a pasteboard chain, painted black on one side. Each link tells in red letters one of the horrors of his imprisonment,—loneliness, fear, despair, and the like. Turn over the chain and show the underside gilded, the links reading, "More faith," "Near to God," "God's favor," "Courage," "Eternal reward." There was a bright side, after all.
You are on the stumbling-block lesson, and you bring in some awkward, rough wooden blocks, on which you tack labels as the lesson proceeds: "A spiteful temper," "A gossiping tongue," "Envy," "Suspicion," "Swearing," "Treating to strong drink," "Playing marbles for 'keeps.'"
You are teaching about the paralytic let down through the roof. It has not required many minutes, with pasteboard, scissors, and glue, to construct a dainty little model of an old-time Jewish house, outside stairs, inner court, overhanging court roof, and all. And how the little model illuminates the story! The jail in which Peter was imprisoned, the table around which the Last Supper was celebrated, the Tabernacle, the Temple,—from the many excellent pictures and descriptions obtainable, even quite ambitious models are possible of manufacture. And once made, they are aids and joys forever.
The sand-map has become justly popular. It is easily formed, requiring only a shallow tray, some sharp, clean sand, pieces of looking-glass for lakes and seas, blue yarn for rivers, some rocks for mountains,wooden blocks for houses, dried moss for trees, little toy men, boats, horses, and such readily found apparatus.
In turn you can build up, with its accommodating materials, the Sea of Galilee and the scene of the feeding of the five thousand, all Palestine with the courses of Christ's journeys, Asia Minor and Macedonia with the route of Paul on his second great missionary journey. Much of this the children themselves will help you prepare, and will learn a great deal by so doing. Indeed, the wise teacher will do as little as possible herself even in getting ready to teach, and will make her scholars themselves her assistant teachers.
That is one of the beauties of such kindergarten devices as pricking paper and weaving bright yarn back and forth to fill up the picture outlined by the holes. It is the scholars' work, and not your own, and they do not forget their own work. Simple designs illustrating the lessons can thus be pricked into the children's memories at the point of a pin.
It is best not to confuse the class with a multiplicity of objects, but to fix on a single symbol for each lesson, that will stand distinctly for the lesson in the weekly and quarterly reviews. The kind of object should constantly vary. If this week it is cut out of pasteboard, next week let it be modeled in clay, and the following week let it be a picture in black and white. The simpler, the better: a cup for the lesson at Sychar; a dried leaf for the parable ofthe fig-tree; a square of white cloth for Peter's vision on the housetop. Do not produce the object till you want it in your teaching, or the children's interest will be dissipated before you have need of it. Get a little cabinet in which to store all your teaching apparatus. Do not keep the object in sight after you are through with it, or you will lose attention from your next point. Remember, in all object-teaching, how inferior is any symbol to the truth symbolized,—its shadow only, a mere hint of it,—and learn to drop the interest-exciting object and use the interest for the truth you want to teach.
In this branch of your work a knowledge of common science will prove invaluable. Botany and geology, chemistry,zoölogy, and astronomy open one's eyes to the beauties and marvels of God's handiwork, and disclose analogies abounding and true. There is much also to learn from the books of models,—models for suggestion, of course, and not for slavish imitation,—such as Tyndall's "Object-lessons for Children," Roads' "Little Children in the Church of Christ," and Stall's "Five-minute Object-sermons to Children," or his "Talks to the King's Children."
The most valuable "objects" are the children themselves, when you can carry out an illustration with their own active bodies. For instance, in teaching the lesson on the first council at Jerusalem, arrange the chairs in two groups, distant as far as possible from each other. One is Antioch, the other is Jerusalem. Two picked scholars, Paul and Barnabas, setout from the Antioch corner toward Jerusalem corner. Some of their comrades accompany them part way. The scholars at the other side of the room receive them with interest. Paul and Barnabas—or the teacher for them—tell their story. A Pharisee rises, and the teacher puts words in his mouth. Peter rises and tells about Cornelius. James, the most dignified boy present, gives his decision. Judas and Silas are selected to escort Paul and Barnabas back again, bearing a letter.
The visit of the Queen of Sheba, the taking of Joseph to Egypt, Paul's vision in Troas and passage to Macedonia, the parallel history of the northern and southern kingdoms,—indeed, countless events,—may be illustrated in this way. The only danger is that the whole may seem too much like play; but this danger is easily avoided by an earnest teacher, and the gains in interest and remembrance will prove rich justification.
An illustration still simpler, and very effective, may be obtained from the children merely by the motion of their hands. "Wentdownfrom Jerusalem to Jericho"—all hands raised high and rapidly lowered. "Andgreatwas the fall thereof"—the same movement. "The Queen of Sheba wondered"—hands raised in astonishment. "A sower went out to sow"—hands sweep to the right and left. These concert movements not merely fix the attention of the class, but serve as outlet to their restlessness. Some teachers advise a halt midway in the lesson for the introductionof some light gymnastics to rest the class. That is well; but if the same result can be gained in immediate connection with the lesson, so much the better.
After all has been said, however, the primary teacher's great art is the art of story-telling. Learn to start right in. Preliminary preachment will spoil it all. Use short and simple words. Keep clear and distinct the order of events, and do not confuse the children by going back to take up omitted points. Nevertheless,—and this is not a contradiction,—repeat and repeat and repeat, telling each section of the story over and over, in different ways and with ever-fresh particulars, till the children's slippery memories have laid hold upon it.
Introduce a myriad natural details, for which you must draw on a consecrated imagination. You should hear Mr. Moody tell a Bible story! It is not enough to say that Abraham determined to offer up Isaac as a sacrifice. The great, loving soul of the evangelist has brooded too long over the Bible for a statement so cold as that. He must tell about the patriarch's sleepless nights; about his getting up and going over to the bed of the boy so peacefully sleeping; about his weeping when no one was watching him; how he couldn't eat his breakfast; how his heart beat whenever he looked at the lad. And long before Mr. Moody is through, the great sacrifice is so vivid to him and to us that we all weep together, and no moralizing is needed.
You are not Moodys? No; but hundreds of primary teachers are doing just this work, telling to their children the Bible stories as they must have happened, reading with the heart and telling them to the life. Long meditation is needed, persistent "putting yourself in his place," and it is even well to write out the story in full before you attempt to tell it. When you receive the reward, you will count the trouble as nothing.
Music is a great aid in the primary room. If you cannot afford a piano, learn how cheap are the "baby organs," and how effectively they will lead the children's singing. Even though you work in an extemporized class-room, shut off by screens or a curtain from the rest of the school, you can at least use "whisper songs." Yes, and these whisper songs may often be motion songs, and serve to illustrate the lesson.
At least one song of the hour should bear directly on the central thought of the hour, and before it is sung you should explain why you call for it. Most of the best songs for this purpose will prove to be standard hymns, and there is every reason why the simplest of these should be taught to the children, that they may find as many points of contact as possible with the services of the older church. The aid of the parents may well be invoked to teach these hymns at home to the children,—a helpful task, for more than the children's sake, at which to set the parents.
The primary song-books contain bright little hymns appropriate to introduce prayer, to open and close the school, to be sung before Bible-reading and while the collection is taken. A clear-voiced assistant, sitting and singing among the children, will train them insensibly, and draw their childish voices into harmony with her own. Just as the children will enjoy a class name, motto, colors, so they will be delighted to select a class song; and this device may be tried, together with many others mentioned in the chapter on "A Singing Sunday-school."
Our foundation work will surely fall if it is not itself founded firmly on the Bible. Be sure that each scholar has his own Bible—and a large-type copy. Why is it that the smaller the child, the tinier the type? It is not so with the children's other books. How can we expect them to take any interest in pages that look so black and uninteresting, and that, moreover, would ruin their eyes for life if they did read them?
The Bible must not be so expensive that it cannot be marked freely. The children will learn much by this exercise. A little set of colored pencils may be given to each child, for class use only. The golden texts and other verses, and the places where the lesson story may be read, should all be marked with pencils of appropriate symbolic color. The children can easily find the place, and the folks at home will know just what passages to read to the children and to help them learn.
Make much of memory verses. We are filling the little heads nowadays far more with sand-map puppets and blackboard rebuses than with the Word of God. Drill often and thoroughly on these verses. Prepare a Bible roll by fastening a long strip of manilla paper on a spring window-shade roller. Let the lower line contain a few initial letters hinting at the memory verse concealed just above it. After recitation, pull this down for the scholars to compare; and so proceed through the roll. An alphabet of Bible verses may thus be learned, or an alphabet of Bible men and women.
One point needs especial emphasis. No matter how thoroughly you have told the story, or how fascinated the children have been held by your recital, never consider the hour well spent till you have read from the Bible itself the story you have been telling. The more delightful and satisfactory your own account has been, the more necessary is it to show the children that within the covers of the Book are to be found all these beautiful stories.
Part of your foundation work is certainly to teach the children to pray. There are many appropriate prayer poems, such as, for the beginning of the lesson: