GOOD TEACHING CONDITIONS.
The life of the school is the teacher. There is less difference in
pupils than in teachers. Under a weak teacher pupils will take every
advantage they can. Under a strong teacher the pupils will behave as
well as they can. The difference in rooms is usually a difference in
teachers. If the equipment of rooms are the same or practically the
same, and the teacher is not over burdened with pupils, the spirit and
condition of the room will be determined by:
1. The teacher’s ideal of what constitutes good conditions.
2. The teacher’s strength and personality in getting results in conduct
and work.
3. The former training and efficiency of the class. This will be seen
more in the matter of attainment than in conduct. I have seen the worst
of classes in conduct transformed into a class of good behaviour in
three months by a change of teachers.
The teacher’s ideal of what constitutes good conditions counts for
much. This ideal is a composite product, a result of all the former
experiences of the teacher with her natural gifts. Training in good
schools, teaching under good conditions, professional study, and
natural high ideals in life count in one’s ideal of school. If the
teacher is satisfied with dirty desks and scraps of paper on the floor
she will get these conditions. If sloven, half-executed work suits her
she will get it. If disrespect, sullenness and angry retorts will pass
with her she will get them. If she is willing for the boys to whittle
on the desks, they will whittle. To the practiced eye a five-minutes’
glance at a school-room will show pretty well the spirit of the teacher
and her ability to get results.
High ideals of school work coupled with common sense and executive
ability will get results. High ideals will prevent you from being
satisfied with low standards in conduct or work. Common sense will
guide you over rough places, and executive ability will have nerve
force.
Common sense will keep you from attempting the impossible and then
worrying because you cannot accomplish it. It will keep you out of
difficulties in the school-room and in the community. So many teachers
are lacking in this great characteristic of the plain, honest, thinking
citizen. In a fit of anger they set a punishment impossible to be
inflicted and then compromise themselves by withdrawing it. Arbitrary
rules with no reason behind them often get teachers into trouble.
Sensible rules, common sense rules, rules that would stand the test
of good judgment, judiciously applied, bring good fruit. Setting a
specific punishment for _all_ pupils who for any cause go outside the
school ground, locking the doors at a certain time regardless of the
weather, forbidding any pupil from leaving the room, etc., the list
of arbitrary, unreasonable rules are many. Now we shall agree that a
healthy pupil should not have to leave the room once in three months.
Restrict it, be positive in the matter, but do not forbid it, and then
be compelled to vary the rule or do worse.
Most of the trouble in the school-room comes either from lack of action
on the teacher’s part or action that is hasty and hence injudicious.
The teacher of experience and one who has profited by experience could
give numerous cautions to young teachers, all of which summed up might
be the advice to use common sense. Among these cautions and suggestions
those of most importance might be named as follows:
_1. Remember that order in the school-room does not mean deathlike
stillness._--There is the noise of work--a noise pleasing to the ear of
the successful teacher, and the noise of idleness and confusion. The
first is as inspiring to a good teacher as the second is discouraging.
The stillness that comes through fear of punishment may be the worst
of conditions. Under routine drill to quietness under the eagle eye of
a so-called disciplinarian, the pupils are often on the borderland of
anarchy. They have never learned the lesson of self-control nor the
reasons for good behaviour.
Order means opportunity for effective work. The mind of the pupil and
the mind of the teacher in perfect contact; this is order. When a pupil
is preparing his lesson the author or text becomes the teacher, and
there must be perfect unity between his mind and the thought of the
text. Order, good order, permits this. Anything that disturbs this
contact is detrimental to the school and is that far poor order. The
criterion, then, for the teacher as to what constitutes good order is
how nearly are conditions perfect for proper contact of the minds of
the pupil and the teacher.
_2. Do not lose your head._--Composure counts for more perhaps in the
school-room than elsewhere. A nervous teacher makes a nervous school.
Teachers sometimes pace the floor like a wild animal in a cage. Learn
the art of sitting to hear a recitation without becoming lazy. Stand
with composure when you stand. If you cannot govern yourself you will
find it hard to govern others. Too many teachers are afraid there will
be disorder. They can neither sit nor stand with composure during a
recitation. They fidget and make the pupils fidgety. They watch the
bad boy suspiciously. They walk back to his desk repeatedly to see if
he is in mischief instead of waiting with composure, and if he does get
into mischief punishing him for it. If you show that you expect a boy
to be bad he will seldom disappoint you.
“Look for goodness, look for gladness,
You will find them all the while.”
Many, many times have I heard teachers say to pupils, “Sit down and be
still,” when I wanted to say to them, “Go and do the same thing.”
_3. In the long run pupils will give you the respect you deserve._--If
you think you have the meanest pupils in the world they will not
disappoint you. If you treat the pupils with firmness, and courtesy and
respect they usually return to you in kind. When after a few months
the majority of your pupils do not respect you, and have confidence in
you, begin to examine yourself. In changing teachers, especially if
your predecessor has been popular, you may for a few weeks feel that
the pupils are not in sympathy with you. Tact and good judgment will
win them if you have wearing qualities. Do not resent their feeling of
respect for the former teacher. Try to be worthy their respect, and
when you leave they will regret your leaving just as much.
_4. The teacher who has ceased to learn becomes a phonograph, and can
do nothing but repeat._--When you have something fresh, something new
to you, something worth while to bring to the recitation, do you know
how anxious you are for the time to come. The very gleam of the eye
tells to pupils that you have a message for them. You cannot have the
enthusiasm that appeals to childhood and continue to depend upon an old
stock of goods.
_5. You will find the school-room a good barometer._--When I began
teaching, bad days came and I worried about it. Things went wrong,
lessons were not well prepared, boys got into trouble on the
playground, and girls were idle. I was often in despair. But perhaps
the very next day was a delightful one. Everything went so well that
I disliked for night to come. It took me several terms before I found
out the relation of the weather to conduct, but it exists. The weather
barometer that hangs on your wall is little better in its predictions
of change than are the careful observations of the conduct of the
pupils. Ask a dozen teachers at night how the day passed, and see what
a majority will vote the same way. A bright morning, clouds gather and
thicken--a bad day. Clearing weather--good work in the school-room.
Observe if it is true.
_6. A pleasing voice, freshness and vivacity in the teacher, quickens
and inspires the class._--Her questions come as if she were really
seeking information. They are crisp and to the point. The answers are
cheery as if they were meant to impart information and not simply to
tell something already known. Her face beams at a good answer, making
the pupil believe he has done his teacher a favor by imparting the
information. A cheery smile and a quick question that in its answer
shows the error in the first follows a wrong reply. Discussions are
bright and animated, and full of life, but always respectful and
courteous. She is in strong contrast to the teacher that talks and
talks in a monotonous tone until half the class are sleepy and the
others thinking about everything else save the subject she is trying to
explain. One draws out information and stimulates thought. The other
pours in second-hand information and deadens thought. One sharpens
intellect. The other dulls it.
_7. Proper seating and grouping pupils, the calling of classes, the
distribution of wraps, the collection of papers, the passing of
classes, the dismission of school at recess and at night, the answering
of questions, the passing of pupils from the room or across the
floor--all these do much to make or mar the school._--A well-arranged
program that indicates not only the time and order of the recitation
but of the study period as well will help. Teachers make woeful
failures often from no other cause but that they fail to plan carefully
in advance just what to do, how to do it and when to do it.
_8. The afternoon dismission to the careful observer is a fair index
not only of the day but the teacher’s grasp of her school._--Teachers
often hurry to dismiss the children, anxious to be rid of the
responsibility. The pupils rush from the door with a jump and a shout
as boisterous as a wild group of Comanche Indians. Of all the periods
of the day, the one just before dismission is the one when the teacher
should show most composure and deliberation. Of all the periods of the
day, the pupils are most at the teacher’s mercy. Let them understand
that quiet and decorum precede dismission. If it requires one minute,
ten minutes or half an hour, let them know that no lines pass until all
is quiet and orderly. Then at the customary signals, the lines pass
quietly, orderly, respectfully.
_9. Running, jumping, or boisterous conduct in the school-room is
never in place._--The school-room should be looked upon as a pleasant
workshop, not a skating rink or vaudeville theater. Best results
always come where pupils are decorous in the room at all times. Quiet,
homelike conversation is in place, but no rude or boisterous conduct at
any time unless you expect to pay the penalty with interest in days to
come.