STORIES AND READING
If we would teach religion to our children we must adopt the method of
Jesus; that of telling stories. The story has the advantage, first, of
its natural interest, and, then, of the indirect manner of its
presentation of the truth, together with the fact that that truth is
embodied in a statement of life and experience. Besides, story-telling
to any person of active interests is one of the easiest and most
stimulating methods of teaching.
§ 1. STORY-TELLING
So much has already been written on the art of telling stories that only
a few suggestions are needed here. First, understand why you tell the
story. Normally a double motive enters in, namely, the conveyance of
truth in life, at the same time affording real pleasure to the
listeners. Either motive alone will be inadequate. You cannot convey the
truth without the desire to give pleasure; you cannot make the pleasure
worth while without the truth. But this is the place to insist that the
truth which you desire to convey must find its way to the conviction of
the child through the story and not through any moral or preface or
particular statement which you may make. The moral or lesson must be
clear to you but carefully held in reserve to direct the matter and
manner of the story.
Secondly, be prepared to pay the price of this most effective method of
instruction. It will cost the reservation of a certain amount of time
both for acquiring the story and for relating it. It will require
careful thought and planning, especially to be sure that the story is
told in sympathy with the child's world. People who are too busy to tell
their children stories are, perhaps fortunately, coming to realize that
they are too busy to have children. If it looks like a waste of time to
turn off the lights and sit by the firelight for from twenty to thirty
minutes, we shall need to revise our estimates of the value of
child-character. Nor must we shrink from the investment of time in
preparation for the narration of the story; if it is worth telling, it
is worth telling well.
Thirdly, keep a record of sources of stories. This may be preserved in a
notebook. One parent used a card-index for this purpose. There are a few
books published containing good collections.[17] You will find most
valuable your own little book in which you have noted down the fugitive
stories and short selections which are to be found in general
literature.[18]
Fourthly, do not tell a story so as to close the child's interest in the
narrative. Stories ought to lead to inquiry and further reading in the
book or other source from which they have been drawn; indeed,
story-telling is one excellent method of quickening an interest in
reading.
Fifthly, allow the children to retell the stories to one another. Often
the whole family will be entertained and helped by the explanation which
a small child will give of the story he has learned by hearing it
repeated a few times from his mother's lips.
Sixthly, telling Bible stories to children in the quiet hour is the best
of all methods to stimulate their interest in the Bible itself. It is
much better to tell the story in your own language than to read it
either in the Bible or in a paraphrase. For one reason, you will never
tell it twice the same way, and children will watch with interest
changes in the narration. As soon as they can read, secure some of the
simple Bible narratives and put these in their hands.[19]
§ 2. BOOKS AND READING
A home without books is like a house with only one window; it can look
out in only one direction, in that of the present. It knows only a
limited world; its children have a short measure of the joy of life,
they can know here only those whom they see today, their friends must be
few, their world narrow and confined.
If the books are not in your home the children will find them elsewhere.
Unless the school kills the taste for reading, as it sometimes does, the
young folks will open ways somehow into the ideal realm of books. As
they grow up, the book takes the place of the story. The printed page is
the child's key to all routes of travel, routes that lead to other times
and lands, routes that lead to other people and into their hearts and
minds. The child sees conduct and feels it as it is in action in lives
before him, but he begins to discriminate and to analyze it only through
reading; souls are revealed where the purpose of the writer is that the
reader may see the springs of action in the character portrayed.
Fiction, biography, travel, and adventure soon pass from the merely
exterior happenings to the discovery of meanings in character.
§ 3. DANGERS OF READING
Since the book needs only one for its enjoyment, while the story
requires two, there is less control over reading. There is only one way
to be sure that children are not devouring vicious books and that is to
make sure that they have an ample supply of healthful, helpful ones.
This is especially necessary in a day that caters to sloth in reading.
The tendency is for reading to take the facile decline from book to
cheap magazine, from magazine to newspaper, and from the newspaper to
skimming the headlines and the "funnies." The cheaper papers appeal to
the lowest intelligence and strike at the line of least moral and mental
resistance. Reading enriches the life but little and may impoverish it
greatly unless there is developed the habit of drawing on the world's
great treasures of thought and feeling. Open windows in your children's
souls by giving them books; keep them open by encouraging the reading
habit. Great souls wait for them, willing to converse and become their
friends and teachers if they will but take down these books from the
shelves and open them with an eager mind.
§ 4. DEVELOPING GOOD TASTE
_What can be done to quicken a love of good reading in children?_
Recognize that not all children develop this appetite at the same age,
that girls read more than boys, that boys usually have a period of
decline in reading interest from seventeen to twenty-one or even later.
But everything really depends on whether we ourselves love good books
and keep them on hand. One of the life-centers of a family should be the
bookshelf, while the picture of the evening lamp and the reading group
will constitute one of its best memories. Where books are at hand and
where they are used daily, the children need little urging to read. Now
this does not mean that yards of choice editions make a book-loving
family. There is a difference between bindings and books. It means books
known and loved, familiar friends for daily converse, books on handy
shelves and fit to be used as common food.
_Do you know what your children read?_ Do you watch as carefully the
food of mind and spirit as you do that of the body? Do you show an
interest in the books they plan to draw from the public library? Can you
guide them intelligently when they ask for suggestions of interesting
books? Do you know the healthful, suitable ones?
§ 5. PROMOTION OF THE READING INTEREST
The Sunday school might aid greatly in promoting the habit of selecting
and reading good books. Children often come home from day school
clamoring for some book which the teacher has recommended as interesting
and valuable. The Sunday-school teacher's recommendation would also
carry weight. In every church, whether there exists a Sunday-school
library or not, there ought to be a library or book committee which
would watch for the right reading for the different grades and would
cause the titles of good books to be placed on a bulletin board.
Further, such a committee might very well place a copy of the book
selected in the teacher's hand in order that the teacher might call the
attention of the class directly to it. Of course the range of selection
should be as wide as the world of books and should include fiction,
romance, song, and story.[20] Parents could do the same sort of thing.
Why not talk up the best books we remember? As to those old-time books,
we need to realize that tastes change. Perhaps they owed much of their
interest to their vivid descriptions of contemporary life. Therefore we
must commend the new books, those that belong to the children's own
days, too. This can be done, provided we really know the books, not by
saying, "We should like you to read _Sandford and Merton_," but rather,
"There is a capital story in _Captains Courageous_; have any of you read
it?" Leave the matter there, or, at most, go only far enough to
stimulate interest.
I. References for Study
St. John, _Stories and Story Telling_, chaps. i-v. Eaton & Mains,
$0.50.
Forbush, _The Coming Generation_, chap. viii. Appleton, $1.50
Winchester, "Good and Bad Books in the Home," in _The Bible in
Practical Life_, p. 38. Religious Education Association, $2.50.
II. Further Reading
Partridge, _Story Telling in School and Home_. Sturgis & Walton,
$1.25.
H.W. Mabie, _Books and Culture_. Dodd, Mead & Co., $1.25.
III. Methods and Materials
ON STORY-TELLING
E.P. St. John, _Stories and Story Telling_. Eaton & Mains, $0.50.
Wyche, _Some Great Stories and How to Tell Them_. Newson & Co.,
$1.00.
L.S. Houghton, _Telling Bible Stories_. Scribner, $1.25.
Bryant, _How to Tell Stories for Children_. Houghton Mifflin Co.,
$1.00.
E.M. and G.E. Partridge, _Story Telling in School and Home_.
Sturgis & Walton, $1.25.
DIRECTING CHILDREN'S READING IN THE HOME
Macy, _A Children's Guide to Reading_. Baker & Taylor Co., $1.25.
Field, _Finger Posts to Children's Reading_. McClurg, $1.00.
Arnold, _A Mother's List of Books for Children_. McClurg, $1.00.
For a short practical list see the different lists classified under
Sunday-School Departments in W.S. Athearn, _The Church School_,
particularly pp. 54, 83, 118, 169. Pilgrim Press, $1.00.
IV. Topics for Discussion
1. Do you remember any stories which especially impressed you as a
child? What were their qualities? What were the qualities of their
narration?
2. What are your difficulties in story-telling to children?
3. Is the habit of reading books passing among children? If so,
what are the reasons?
4. What responsibility has the public library toward the child's
selection of books? toward promoting book reading?
5. How many families co-operate with the library?
6. How might the church co-operate?
7. Does the reading of newspapers by children affect their general
habits of reading? In what ways?
8. What personal difference is there, if any, between the effect of
a borrowed book and of one the child owns?
FOOTNOTES:
[17] Laura E. Cragin, _Kindergarten Bible Stories_. Fifty-six of the Old
Testament stories. There is also a companion volume of New Testament
stories.
James Baldwin, _Old Stories of the East_. Fresh and interesting versions
of the familiar Old Testament stories.
Kate Douglas Wiggin, _The Story Hour_. Good stories and a suggestive
introduction on story-telling.
_Half a Hundred Stories for the Little People_, by various authors.
[18] _A List of Good Stories to Tell to Children under Twelve Years of
Age_, Carnegie Library of Pittsburgh, $0.05. There are references to
books in which the stories may be found, including 25 Bible stories, 16
fables, 14 myths, 14 Christmas stories, 7 Thanksgiving stories, etc.
[19] Such as O'Shea, _Old World Wonder Stories_; George Hodges, _The
Garden of Eden_; Cragin, _Old Testament Stories_; Mary Stewart, _Tell Me
a True Story_.
[20] The H.W. Wilson Co., White Plains, New York, publishes a list of
_Children's Books for Sunday-School Libraries_.