264 METHODS IN TEACHING 



complicated narratives of later days and countries. Besides, 

 when a perspective view can be taken down several centur- 

 ies, confusing details are subdued or entirely hidden, and 

 there are thrown into striking relief the broad principles chat 

 have meant the making or the undoing of a country. Even 

 a sixth or a seventh grade child can see readily that the giow- 

 ing corruption, luxury, and vices of Rome were important 

 reasons for the downfall of that country, and the whole 

 study can be based upon stories so completely that theie is 

 no feeling on the part of the child that the teacher is moral- 

 izing or that history is prosy. On the contrary, the young 

 reader is liable to feel that he has discovered a great truth, 

 and he will pore over his readings with an intensity of 

 interest. But, to produce this effect, the stories can not be 

 taken at haphazard, they must be well selected to illus- 

 trate the phases of national or individual life that it is de- 

 sired to teach. 



History should begin with carefully chosen stories for 

 the primary grades ; it should not become a serious study 

 before the seventh year, and even in this 

 Material grade the story element should still pre- 



dominate. Throughout the primary and 

 early grammar grades history stories should be for cultural 

 and character development and for the accumulation of a 

 great amount of information, so important in a well- 

 balanced, educated life. The training that can be derived 

 from history studies is also a most important factor in the 

 life of a child. As the pupil passes into the later grammar 

 grades, the subject matter becomes more scholarly and the 

 presentation grows more systematic. 



There is so much material for story work that to choose 



