CHAPTER IX
In these days, when the teaching of any virtue necessitates a special Society, and when no Society is complete without its Children’s Branch, children’s meetings are matters of almost everyday occurrence.
To say that these meetings are for the most part successful would be scarcely accurate. They are too numerous, and speakers to whom children will listen are too few.
To Whom will Children Listen?
To whom, then,willthey give a hearing? That is a difficult question, almost as difficult to answer as if it were asked “Who can whistle a tune?” At all events it is quite as difficult to tell people how to gain the attention of children as it is to tell them how to whistle a tune. If they can, they can; and ifthey can’t, it isn’t much use telling them. However, it is just possible that anyone who has looked through the pages of this little book may have been stirred to think about children, and to try to understand them. In that case a step has been taken on the road to being one of those lucky people to whom children will listen.
Children Know their Friends.
Small boys and girls, like dogs, know by intuition the people who are fond of them, and unless the would-be speaker belongs to this class he need not hope to get their attention. Grown-up people listen to someone whom they do not like on the chance of finding something to criticize or ridicule. Children simply do not listen at all.
Children must be Understood.
But a love for children is not enough. There must be the effort to understand them. Unless there be at least some comprehension of their characters, there is bound to be a lack of that sympathy which is the essential requisite.Somehow or other, children seem to feel at once whether or not there exists that subtle link between themselves and the speaker, and if they cannot discover it they will not—perhaps even cannot—listen.
A Difficult Art.
The mistake so often made is to imagine that it is easy to understand children. The exact opposite is the fact. It is far easier for anyone to understand grown-up people whose minds work much in the same way as his own than to comprehend and sympathise with the curiously complex thoughts and reasonings of children.
An Honest Saleswoman.
It has been seen how strangely imaginative all children are, but at the same time they are often most literal. There is a well-known story of a little girl selling artificial flowers at a bazaar who was so anxious that there should be no mistake on the part of the purchasers that she said to each, “They are notreal, youknow; they arestuffed!” No doubt this same child would have treated these same flowers as absolutely real if she had had them to play with, and would have let her imagination run riot with them.
Again, children are often so tender-hearted that they cannot bear to hear of the sufferings of other children, but will inflict intense pain on some insect with complete callousness, the reason being that the one comes within their comprehension while the other does not.
These simple matters are mentioned here merely to show the complicity of children’s characters, and to try to induce those who wish to teach them to abandon the idea that it is perfectly easy to understand children.
Infection Spreads Rapidly.
The next necessity for anyone who wants to gain the attention of a group of little ones is to remember that they are extraordinarily liable to infection.
Just as chicken-pox introduced into a children’s party by one child will spread to most of the others, so if one person at a meeting be thoroughly interested and keen, the rest will be sure to catch the infection. That person must, of course, be the speaker.
Platitudes Useless.
Simplicity Essential.
It is no sort of use talking to children because the speaker has got to say something. It is essential that he should have something to say. Further, it is no use his having something to say unless he is himself enthusiastically interested. Anyone who has tried to speak to children will know how their attention is gone in a moment so soon as he says half-a-dozen words of mere platitude. All this points to the need of careful preparation and thorough knowledge of what he has to say. Then he must say it simply. Children do not understand long words, and cannot follow involved sentences. It is not unusualto hear the chairman of a children’s meeting begin by saying, “My dear young friends,—if I may be allowed so to designate some whose acquaintance I have hitherto not been so fortunate as to cultivate—the admirable society to which, as I understand, you have given your adherence inculcates those principles of self-abnegation which have long been designated as the true foundations of all existence at once joyous and altruistic.” Can anything be more hopeless? The succeeding speakers must be uncommonly vivacious and interesting if the children are to recover from such a fatal beginning.
A Sermon in Monosyllables.
It is no bad thing to try to speak in words of one syllable. If that is thought hopeless it may be mentioned that the Bishop of Bristol not long ago published a whole sermon in monosyllables, just to show what can be done.
Children Resent Feeble Talk.
But, on the other hand, it is a serious mistake to talk down to children. Thatis to say, the stuff must be good though the language be simple. Children resent having washy sentiments served up to them in baby language. They can understand great thoughts if properly presented.
It has been suggested that when very young indeed they dislike the nonsensical manner in which they are addressed by many adoring women. This has been given as one reason why a baby on being first introduced to a strange man and a strange woman will generally prefer to go to the man. The supposition is that the baby thinks he will stand more chance of hearing rational language. It is certain that most people have heard ladies speak to little children in a babble which they would not use to a self-respecting dog for fear he should bite them!
The Ingredients of a Speech to Children.
But to speak more seriously: yet another matter to bear in mind is thatmonotony must at all costs be avoided. A speech which, however good in other ways, is entirely pathetic, will fail to keep children’s attention, while a speech that is entirely funny will fail to rouse their interest in the object of the meeting. There may be tears—a few—there must be laughter—now and then. There must be stories and there must be morals: the art is to make the one almost as interesting as the other.
Position of Speaker Important.
It may perhaps be allowed to insert here one or two practical hints. For instance, it is absolutely essential that the children should be able to see the face of the speaker clearly. It is well that he, too, should be able to see the faces of his audience. But the former is the more important. If a room, then, has windows so placed that either the speaker or the children must face them, it is better that the speaker should do so.Children find it almost impossible to listen to anyone whom they cannot see, a fact which points to the value of a sustained effort on the part of the speaker to catch the eye of first one and then another of his audience.
Meetings as Informal as Possible.
That leads on to the desirability of getting rid so far as possible offormality. There should be no barriers between the speaker and the children. A high platform is fatal. It is even more fatal when there is also a table and a water bottle. The speaker should be as close to the children as he can, consistently with being able to see and be seen.
A Successful Meeting.
Here is a description of a thoroughly successful children’s meeting. A large low room with old oak beams and a dark polished floor. The only light a blazing fire of logs. In the darker corners a few groups of mothers and other “grownups.” Near the centre of the floor, two or three large Indian mats, and in front of them a big low easy chair facing the fire light. In this chair is the speaker, and on his knees and on the arms of the chair cluster three or four of the smallest children. The rest are sitting just anyhow upon the coloured mats. They are all perfectly quiet and well inclined for a rest, for they have just had a succession of games—blind man’s buff and “Jacob, where art thou?” the favourites. For half-an-hour or so they sit and listen to the story of other children less happy than themselves, and learn how best to help them. Then comes “Good-night,” and they go away with impressions still vivid, and with new and brave resolutions.
Garden Meetings.
Some such happy informal talks as this may often be held in summer on the grass beneath the trees, but the many distractions of the open air—a butterfly may turn away all thoughts—make suchmeetings more difficult than those held indoors.
The hints given in these few pages seem utterly inadequate, and to include only such matters as must occur to all. They have been set down here as some reply to the frequent question “How can children’s meetings be made successful?”
There is but one more word to be said. Grown-up people are so greatly distracted by the cares and occupations of their daily life that it needs special preparation before they can understand little children. To anyone who wishes to influence their simple yet imaginative minds the task is almost hopeless unless he will try to fulfil that most difficult command and himself “become as a little child.”