LANGUAGE 



3318 



LANGUAGE 



First Year. The child has the foundation 

 for language when he enters school at five years 

 of age. If he comes from a cultured home the 

 foundation is well laid, and there shou!4 be 

 no break between the work of the home and 

 that of the school. Moreover, the work for 

 the first year should be planned with a view 

 to the work of the succeeding grades, so there 

 will be no abrupt change in the language les- 

 sons as the pupil passes from one grade to 

 another. 



"All activities of the child may be made 

 tributary to his training in English, since he is 

 always doing something and telling about it." 

 During the first year the work will be essen- 

 tially oral. The teacher will be expected to 

 follow the prescribed course of study, but the 

 pupils should receive drill on the following 

 points : 



1. Conversation Lessons. "The teacher's 

 prime duty is to make beautiful speech at- 

 tractive." To this end children must be trained 

 to talk, and that the desired results may be 

 secured they must be made to feel so much 

 at home that their speech will be spontaneous 

 and natural. The creation of a homelike 

 atmosphere in the schoolroom is essential to 

 successful language lessons. If the teacher is 

 natural and spontaneous, the pupils will fol- 

 low her example. 



The activities in the home, the stories the 

 children know and those the teacher tells them, 

 the birds, some of the common insects, simple 

 flowers and plants, the reading lessons, the 

 games the children play, and many other com- 

 mon experiences and pictures, may be drawn 

 on for material for these lessons. The chief 

 aim is to make good talkers that is, so to 

 guide the children that they will gain the 

 power to tell what they know naturally and in 

 logical sequence, and to express themselves in 

 good English. 



The first requisite is to fill the child's mind 

 with ideas. All conversation lessons during the 

 first and second years should be rich in con- 

 tent. The teacher should encourage the pupils 

 to observe the objects about them and to tell 

 what they see, feel and smell. She should lead 

 them to extend their observations by careful 

 questioning. Then before the lessons on any 

 subject are dropped for something else, she 

 should secure from each pupil just as com- 

 plete a story as he can tell of what he has 

 learned. 



The nursery rhymes, stories and myths that 

 the children have learned serve as excellent 



material for connecting the home with the 

 school, since the pupils will be eager to tell 

 what they know. These should be supple- 

 mented by many others during the year. The 

 teacher should therefore be a good story-teller 

 (see STORY-TELLING). 



The most difficult task that confronts the 

 teacher is that of securing correct forms of ex- 

 pression without suppressing the pupil's spon- 

 taneity. Criticism is necessary, but it must be 

 given tactfully. The teacher who solves this 

 problem successfully will solve without diffi- 

 culty all other problems .connected with her 

 language work. The following suggestions will 

 be found helpful: 



(a) Be careful to use correct language. The 

 pupils imitate your speech as well as your actions. 

 If you use good language you are serving as a 

 correct model. 



(&) Emphasize correct forms by calling atten- 

 tion to them in such a way as not to embarrass 

 the pupil. Ignore incorrect forms by not calling 

 attention to them. When a pupil makes an error 

 in telling his story it is best to let him finish, then 

 ask him to tell it again and to try to say it as you 

 do. In other words, your criticism should always 

 be of such a nature as to lead the pupil to feel 

 that you are helping him to say what he wants to 

 tell in a better way. 



2. Reading. Since this subject is discussed 

 under its title, it is not necessary to give it 

 space here further than to state that the read- 

 ing lessons are vitally connected with the lan- 

 guage lessons, and that they furnish much valu- 

 able material for language work. 



3. Written Work. The child is always inter- 

 ested in doing something new, and some time 

 during the first year the pupils should begin 

 to write. Since writing is a form of expres- 

 sion, the writing exercises are closely related 

 to the language lessons; when the pupils have 

 had enough practice in writing to enable them 

 to write two or more words, they may occa- 

 sionally be called upon to write short state- 

 ments, as / saw a robin. But the tendency is 

 to introduce written exercises too early. Until 

 the pupil has mastered the mechanics of writ- 

 ing, the act requires so much attention that it 

 is impossible for him to express his thought. 

 During the first year written exercises should 

 be very brief, consisting at first of not more 

 than one or two sentences. They may be in- 

 creased in length towards the end of the year. 



4. Dramatization. Children like to "act out" 

 their stories and the little dramas that can 

 easily be constructed out of such fables as 

 The Wind and the Sun and The Lion and the 

 Mouse, such poems as Old King Cole and 



