The contrary practice of reading volumes of extracts
from the writings of the most gifted men of ancient and modern times,
without preparation by the pupil, without example, explanation,
correction, or questionings, by the teacher, cannot be too strongly
condemned. The time will come when these selections may be read with
profit; but it is better to read something well than to read a great
deal; or there should be at least thorough drill in connection with
every exercise, until the pupils have attained some degree of
perfection. It may not be best to confine advanced pupils to the
exercises in the text-books. If such pupils are invited occasionally to
make selections from their entire range of reading, the teacher will
have an opportunity to correct whatever is vicious in taste; and the
pupil making the selection will be compelled to read in such a manner
that those who listen can understand, which is not always the case when
the language is addressed to the eye as well as to the ear.
The introduction of Colburn's Intellectual Arithmetic was an epoch in
the science. It wrought a radical change in the ability of the people to
apply the power of numbers to the practical business of life. Its
excellence does not consist in rules and illustrations by which examples
and problems are easily solved, but in leading the mind of the pupil
into natural and apparent processes of reasoning, by which he is enabled
to comprehend a proposition as an independent fact.
Pages:
108
109
110
111
112
113
114
115
116
117
118
119
120
121
122
123
124
125
126
127
128
129
130
131
132