2/O METHODS IN TEACHING 



the desired accomplishment. The majority of the children 

 need to drill again and again on every means of progress; 

 but there is no monotony if the stories are well selected. 

 The stories are always a delight, and the progress in the 

 mechanics of thought and language is a steady growth. 



SECOND YEAR GRADE 



In the second grade as in the first no attempt is made to 

 teach history as a subject. The stories for the year are still 



grouped around the holidays, they are 

 Material 



chosen because of some correlation with the 



literature, or they are simple biographies. The stories sug- 

 gested by the holidays are as follows : Admission Day, or 

 '* the birthday of California," in September ; Thanksgiving 

 Day; Christmas. The stories correlated with the literature 

 are " Horatius," the poem for January; "William Tell," 

 the story for March; and Indian life made interesting 

 through the poem of " Hiawatha." The more purely his- 

 torical narratives are about Columbus, in October; and 

 Washington's boyhood and life during parts of the Revolu- 

 tion, given in February. 



The work in the first grades is so simple that there is no 

 repetition in the second grades even when the subjects reap- 

 pear. For instance, the Thanksgiving story in the second 

 grade tells of the Pilgrims, always interesting to little folks. 

 The Christmas story tells of the babyhood of Christ, the 

 flight into Egypt, and other points that belong to his youth 

 or to the description of the country where he lived. The 

 stories of the Indians become farther reaching than was at 

 all possible in the first grade, including little studies of 

 Indian wampum, the peace-pipe, canoe making. 



