PROBLEMS OF THE YOUNG TEACHER.
Experience in the school-room counts for much. Teaching soon fastens
certain personal peculiarities upon the teacher which makes him
readily distinguished from other persons. Fifty teachers visiting
Chicago had agreed to be so discreet in their conduct that no one
would judge them to be teachers. Much to their surprise they had not
walked two blocks from the depot until a dirty-faced bootblack called
out in a drawling tone: “First class in geography, stan’ up.” Some
of these eccentricities may be detrimental. Others are worth much
professionally, as they give other people confidence in your ability to
teach. They are recognized as ear-marks of the teacher.
Pupils and patrons are often more critical of young teachers than of
teachers who have had experience, and have established reputations
as being able to teach and to govern. They are looking for signs of
weakness. Fortunate is the young teacher who can stand this test. His
first and second schools will pretty well establish his standing in the
community. After that they will be less critical and more apt to take
things for granted.
One of the hardest problems of the young teacher is to acquire the
feeling of familiarity or composure in the school-room. New clothes
sometimes do not set well and new positions are the same. He hesitates,
his voice does not sound familiar, he feels and looks awkward, he
lacks confidence in himself, and instead of children being considerate
of these things they notice them and are quick to take advantage of
them. The rougher element of boys and the more careless of the girls
may take pleasure in the teacher’s discomfort. Such things try the
mettle of the teacher. If he is made of the right material and has good
judgment, he will come out all right. If he is naturally a coward or if
he is full of egotism and conceit the pupils may soon lead him a merry
chase. The more clearly he has the work planned, the more definite
his ideas of what and how and why to do, the easier to gain composure
in the school-room. Then, too, many excellent teachers are sensitive.
They may soon grow easy and composed in the school-room with only their
pupils before them. A caller or a visit from the principal or a school
official completely unnerves them. They are ill at ease, they blush and
blunder, and are always at a disadvantage. Familiarity and composure
are the fruits of experience and study and practice in the school-room.
Composure, a level head, a knowledge of what you want done, and why
you want it done and faith in your own ability to have it done gives
composure to the whole school. Restlessness, lack of faith in self,
fear of failure, these bring about the very conditions you are striving
to avoid, and the school becomes restless, noisy, hard to control.
The school takes its coloring from your own attitude, and when things
go wrong, begin to seek the cause in your own actions, disposition
and manners. Learn to study yourself without upbraiding, and yet with
determination to find the cause of your failure. Confidence in yourself
and courage backed by good judgment will make government easy. Remember
the government of a school is more a matter of mind than of physical
strength. The clearness of your mental vision, your insight into
motives, your ideals of school and of life and your knowledge of boy
and girl nature count infinitely more than your avoirdupois. In very
rare cases from home training or peculiar environment wrong motives of
true manhood may inspire a bully until force--mere physical force--is
the proper remedy, and a downright good threshing is the thing needed.
But such occasions are rare indeed, and the young teacher should feel
that there is something radically wrong in his own personality and
methods of government if he must resort to such measures often.
A young teacher must guard his health. You can’t teach day and night.
The petty worries of the school-room must not be carried to your home
or boarding place. Shake them from yourself when you quit the building
and grounds. Lock them in the school-room when you leave it, and if
you sleep soundly they will have vanished into thin air before the
door is opened the next day. Your health will react upon your work in
the school-room. Not the work, but the worry kills. During my first
three terms I taught school all day and dreamed school all night. The
dreaming was harder than the teaching. My best pupils, the ones who
would not for the world do anything to cause me trouble, were always
in mischief in my dreams. From the first, force yourself to think of
the pleasant things of the day as much as possible, and forget the
unpleasant or shut them from your thoughts. Too often you find after
sleepless nights of worry about some frivolous little breach of conduct
by some thoughtless boy the whole thing glides by without a ripple, and
the problem solves itself.
If you are blessed with a good digestion, the world ought to look
bright to you. No terrors in teaching are equal to those caused by
undigested beefsteak, and a dose of pepsin is often a far greater aid
in teaching than a six-foot switch. Eat plenty of nutritious food,
such as agrees with you, drink plenty of pure water, take plenty of
exercise in the open air, laugh when you can, meet and mingle with
people, think good thoughts, teach yourself to believe in your own
ability and success without growing egotistic, sleep not less than
eight hours in each twenty-four, and make it nine if you can sleep
soundly; keep clean, and the world and your school will move well with
you.
The mind is self-creative. It can make a “heaven of hell or a hell
of heaven” Milton tell us, and it is true. But there is a close
relation between its activity and mental coloring, and the physical
condition of the body. Teachers especially should learn to keep the
body and the mind each at its best. Each reacts upon the other, and
your school as well as your own happiness depends upon keeping both
in the best condition. Avoid late study, irregular habits, and all
kinds of dissipation. Planning and preparation of work is necessary,
but it is not the number of hours you work, it is the intensity of the
application that counts most. Systematize your work and work regularly
and intensely, but do not encroach upon your hours of sleep unless you
want to pay the penalty with interest. Let me say here parenthetically
that if all teachers had a fair knowledge of shorthand, enough to
enable them to record their own thoughts and to read their own notes
readily what a saving of time it would mean in the preparation of their
daily work. Would not it be worth while for every teacher to know this
much stenography?
Then, too, regular habits count for so much--regular eating, regular
sleeping, regular exercise. Teachers who board cannot always get
just what they want, but as a rule their accommodations are fairly
good--often as good as they would get at home. One can adjust
themselves to the conditions if these be regular. In most homes the
meals are served nearly on time, seldom varying more than half an
hour, but sleeping is often irregular. Regular sleep is perhaps the
most important item of all--a good bed, ventilation, comfort, quiet,
with little variation in retiring or rising--these are important to
the teacher who must meet with plenty of reserve and nerve force the
problems of the school-room next day.
There are various forms of dissipation. In addition, however, to
intoxicants as a beverage, the habitual use of many patent medicines
may be almost as injurious. Then, too, there are lighter beverages very
injurious. The coca-cola habit is little better than the beer-drinking
habit, and the same is true of many other drinks so “refreshing to
tired nerves.” One of the worst forms of dissipation is day-dreaming,
or simply idling away the time. If you have time to idle or to
day-dream, do it in the open air and in the sunshine where the exercise
will do you good or go forth on a still, clear night and watch the
movements of the heavenly bodies, the star-decked sky, and drink in its
inspiration and beauty. Much of the light reading--newspaper, magazine,
and the rag-time fiction so current--is the worst form of mental
dissipation.
The love-sick young man and the giddy girl are too often teachers, and
the time and energy in thinking and writing to one another is more than
is used in their teaching. I do not speak lightly of love or criticise
teachers for falling in love or in loving one another or in loving
some one who is not a teacher. Love in its highest form and love of
the individual as well as the love of humanity as a whole is essential
to the development of the person. Nothing creates higher ambition or
nobler impulses than love. To love a pure-minded woman--a teacher she
may be--is one of the greatest things that can happen to a young man.
It is equally valuable to a young woman. The young man or young woman
in love, with the hope that this love is or may be mutual, and when
this loved one is idolized as made up of all that is pure and worthy
and noble, is always safe. It gives new life and energy and ambition.
It can be seen in the flashing eye, the elastic step and the bodily
poise. No tonic is so life-giving, no beverage so invigorating, no view
of life so rich in its coloring. Health, hope, courage, ambition, all
good things follow in its wake. Such love as this is not dissipation.
But the love-sick young man who pines for his lady love--the last one
who smiled on him, it matters little who; the giddy girl who has two
strings to each of her half a dozen beaux and is too busy pulling these
strings to think of anything else--these are unfit to teach.
Then, too, the young teacher must sacrifice something to public
opinion. Public opinion may be ever so narrow, so unreasonable, so
unjust, but if you are to establish your reputation in that community
as a reliable, trustworthy teacher, you cannot afford to be indifferent
to it. I am speaking especially of the town, the village, and the
country where all eyes are on the teacher, and where every man, woman
and child knows him. In the towns, villages and the country the
teacher is relatively of greater importance than in the city. Young
men teaching in these communities cannot afford to do much keeping
company or going to see the girls, and young women teachers cannot
afford to have many beaux or even one regular one whose attentions are
quite noticeable to the public. The highest motives may prevail, the
enjoyment and pleasure may be great, and even then the teacher, like
the minister, must forego many things which would be unnoticed in
others, or else pay the price which is often dear enough. Sniggering
school boys and giggling school girls for weeks will nudge one another
and make remarks at your expense, and not always complimentary. Rail
against it if you will, but it makes matters worse. Laugh about it and
it often compromises your dignity. Punish for it, and you stir up a
hornets’ nest in the neighborhood. You can soon kill your influence in
that neighborhood for good by a little harmless indiscretion. Beware!
Just how to get the good will and respect of patrons and pupils no one
can tell you. It is a problem to be solved by your own good sense and
personality. It is easier to tell you what not to do than to tell you
what to do. The best advice is to be yourself, but to be your best
self. Do not try to show off. Do not try to advise on every topic that
comes up. Do not push yourself forward in outside matters. Listen
to those older than yourself. Weigh what they say, but in school
matters be your own boss. Talk little about your plans or your past
success. Keep your school room troubles strictly to yourself. Do not
criticise former teachers, and if teaching with other teachers beware
of criticising another teacher in the same school, however much you may
dislike their methods. The teacher may be ever so unpopular, and the
person may invite criticism ever so much, but it is your place to avoid
it. Then, too, do not criticise or praise one pupil before another
pupil or patron outside of school. It is dangerous, and a little tact
will enable you to avoid it. Your criticism will do no good, and your
praise may cause the bitterest of jealousy. “Miss Jones, don’t you
think Grace is smart?” said a little girl. “Yes, we have many smart
pupils in school,” replied Miss Jones, and the girl’s question was
answered and no jealousy created.
Your success and power for good in the neighborhood will be determined
very largely by the esteem and confidence the pupils and the patrons
place in you.