A MANUAL FOR TEACHERS OF ALL BY W. H. SKINNER LATE SUPERINTENDENT OF SCHOOLS, NEBRASKA CITY, NEBRASKA AND CELIA M. BURGERT STATE NORMAL SCHOOL, STEVENS POINT, WISCONSIN SILVER, BURDETT AND COMPANY NEW YORK BOSTON CHICAGO INTRODUCTORY NOTE THE accompanying work was prepared by Superintendent Skinner and his coadjutor two years ago, and would have been issued earlier but for the untimely death of the former of these persons. Mr. Skinner was a gifted and progressive educator, and had proved himself signally successful in reaching young minds with subjects and instruction generally considered far beyond their years. He demonstrated that nature work with the microscope was practicable for pupils in the earliest grades. He introduced new and successful features into almost every primary and grammar year. His latest success was won in adapting to the first years of primary work modes and tasks in literary interpretation which are used in secondary and higher instruction. This manual is largely a compendium of results obtained by Miss Burgert, under the supervision of Mr. Skinner, in administering the instruction called for in the attempt last named. The success of the experiment was so immediate and remarkable that the teachers of Nebraska and other states were anxious to have the material and method cast in a form practicable for use in their own schools. Mr. Skinner responded to this demand by editing and compiling the most suggestive material from the classroom into this iii manual. It was projected to serve as an introductory or method book to a series of school readers, upon a new and comprehensive plan, that should supply all needs in English work from the first primary through the last of the grammar grades. The present volume was laid aside till the other books should be at least sketched out, but in this interim its author was stricken with fever from which he did not recover. The work remains, except for palpable errors and oversights corrected, substantially as he left it. This book is intended to put into elementary application principles of literary study that have been used in the University of Nebraska since 1890. It is the earliest attempt to make those principles and methods available for the quickening and ennobling of young minds. Its paramount object is the education of the feelings; of taste before the intellect, instead of the intellect before taste. I am glad, by the present word, to introduce this handbook of my valued friend and pupil, and to certify to the correctness of the adaptations undertaken in it, having confidence that, with ordinary diligence and faith in the teacher, it will do its work. L. A. SHERMAN. THE UNIVERSITY OF NEBRASKA. PREFACE In its method of presentation this manual is intended for teachers of all grades. The lessons and selections are especially adapted to pupils of the first two grades, although they can be used to great advantage with other classes that have not had the work. Every lesson and every selection have been tested with pupils of the first grade. The poems used in the exercises are mainly such as refer to nature. The aim has been to select subjects that lie palpably within the child's experiences and interest. Poems of fancy and intellectual gems have not been included, because they are less effective in first interpretative studies, and because they do not need so much attention in early years. The stories have been condensed into "effect" elements as much as possible, in order to give the children a chance to think for themselves. They contain many "character hints" because of the literary as well as the moral value of such materials. The presentations of the several principles have been made in the form of accurate reports of recitations as conducted in a school of first-grade pupils. Hence the reader may judge from original exhibits or "sources." By this means also, many details of presentation have been included which could not have been set forth in any other way. The reported recitations should be studied closely, since, like all original sources, they |