HISTORY IN GRAMMAR GRADES 29! 



continuity of thought, we must be very considerate about 

 the young minds, and not tax them too severely. We wish to 

 give them just the powers so conspicuously lacking in many 

 people, but if too much is asked in difficult lines, a distaste 

 for the work is created that may never be overcome. In 

 fifth grades, and even throughout all the grammar grades 

 and the first year of the high school, outlines should be very 

 simple, rarely going to more than a second indentation, that 

 is, to the second division of a thought. They should also 

 be of use to a child, an aid in doing some work, for the 

 thought should never be permitted that the outline is the end 

 for which one is working; it is a tool. The outlines should 

 be made because they are to be used in reproductions, in reci- 

 tations, in writing, in memorizing, in examinations. Their 

 frequent use in this way leads a child to depend upon them, 

 which really means that the minds are being trained to de- 

 pend upon order, system, judgment, analysis. Is this not a 

 desirable end? Nevertheless, I have known teachers who 

 stopped using outlines when they noticed that the children 

 were beginning to depend upon them ! Did such teachers 

 comprehend the first uses of an outline? 



Recitations must be varied in order not to become monot- 

 onous. The child is roused to strive for a clearer under- 

 standing of what he is studying" if he does 

 Reproduction 



not know whether he is simply to tell the 



story, or to be quizzed searchingly, or to uphold his views 

 and knowledge in discussions with fellow-pupils. Discus- 

 sions are excellent eye-openers, and serve to make the chil- 

 dren alert to ideas, judgments, and conclusions. The talk- 

 ers should not be permitted to become personal in their argu- 

 ments, but a discussion can be very brisk and instructive 



