Rensselaer Union, Volume 7, Number 16, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 7 January 1875 — Teaching Hints. [ARTICLE]

Teaching Hints.

Teaching school and keeping school are two widely-different affairs. A popular teacher is not always a good teacher, nor an unpopular teacher a poor one. Whipping is the fruitful parent of most school disorders. Ventilation tends to secure pure blood, sound body, active brain and good lessons. School fires should be built a little previous to a quarter to nine o’clock. If teachers arrive at school later than pupils it seems as though the pupils were the most interested. School-houses were not built for playhouses—notice recesses and mornings. Teachers should try to associate with the people among whom they teach. Remember that reading, spelling, writing and ciphering are the topics we shall use most and consequently ought to know best. Order is said to be Heaven’s first law. but it would seem to be the fast law of some teachers. Schools may be spoiled by too much kindness as well as by too much vigor. Teachers should prepare each lesson as regularly as pupils should. Six hours’ work per day is the school day of lazy teachers only. , Why do many pupils “gothrough" text-books many times and then not know their contents? A well-recited lesson is not always a well-known lesson. The moral nature of pupils is as worthy of cultivation as the intellectual. Industrious, orderly, civil teachers usually find the same qualities in their pupils, for “as the teacher, so is the pupil.” Written work should be required in every branch of study. Some teachers expect their pupils to progress, but make, no effort to progress themselves. A reading exercise is something more than a pronouncing exercise, a pause exercise or an inflection exercise, and requires as much study as any other school task. Lazy pupils always like concert recitations—they call them splendid. Teachers who use the text-book at every recitation really say by actions that they do not know the lesson they are hearing. Never fail to inspect all written work unless you wish the next poorly done. Our best teachers are the best subscribers to educational works—poor teachers don’t need them. The art of questioning properly is known to few* teachers and practiced by fewer. A tidy school-room is an honor to the teacher. "Study your leesone Jive times” generally secures its study one-fifth of a time. Many educational ladders have the lower rounds missing. Not “ how much” but “how well” is the motto of a good teacher and the foundation of good scholarship. If teachers could “ see ourselves as others see us” fewer bad habits would be copied by pupils.— Baraboo (BTs.) Be publi<an.