Teacher education

“ The teacher who is alert to find some real need for the computations of arithmetic; who gives a genuine opportunity for oral or written expression; who appeals to the desire to use the knowledge gained in history and geography by means of the historical festival, the article in the school paper, and the like, as well as to the curiosity of the child; who allows children to make real things which satisfy their individual or collective needs in the industrial arts,—is the teacher who is teaching school subjects in the way that will mean most in the education of her pupils. ”

“ Class lessons must be thought out in advance, and teacher-preparation in itself meant a great change in teaching procedure. Emancipated from dependence on the words of a text, and able to stand before a class full of a subject and able to question freely, teachers became conscious of a new strength and a professional skill unknown in the days of textbook reciting. ”

“ The teacher who would improve must, in a good sense, be restless. He must bestir himself. He must study and read and experiment, attend teachers' meetings and conventions, and take teachers' papers, and find out what other teachers are doing and have done, ever remembering that improvement comes mainly by comparison. ”

“ They will help you to govern bad boys and naughty girls. Ignore them and you start in to re-discover all the pitfalls of the teacher. Then read the plans and devices that add spice and interest. They represent successful experience. Then the deeper educational works, those which point out principles, the books that are for laying the foundation for a real science of education and to prepare the way for a profession of teaching, shall teachers neither read, own, nor care for such books and yet call themselves teachers, professional teachers? ”

“ The training of the elementary school teacher tends to be dogmatic. True it is that vigilant individuality and passionate love for his exquisitely spiritual calling impel the school teacher to an untiring criticism of his methods, of his actual teaching, and of the life of the school which he directs and promotes. ”

“ PROBLEMS OF SCHOOL AND COLLEGE
3 I
THE IDEAL TEACHER
In America, a land of idealism, the profession of teaching has become one of the greatest of human employments. In 1903-04 half a million teachers were in charge of sixteen million pupils. Stating the same facts differently, we may say that a fifth of our entire population is constantly at school; and that wherever one hundred and sixty men, women, and children are gathered, a teacher is sure to be among them. ”

“ When this truth is fully apprehended we may expect to find that the young teacher is required to spend his first year in a school where the head master and one or more members of the regular staff are qualified to guide his early efforts and to establish the necessary link between his knowledge of theory and his requirements in practice. ”

“ What kind of a teacher should the university employ, then? The teacher who is eager to push the boundaries of human knowledge a little beyond the point yet reached and who also greatly desires to take knowledge as an instrument and with it develop boys and girls and equip them for leadership in the great world of action. ”

“ The thorough acquaintance of the author with his subject, and his practical knowledge of the difficulties which beset the teacher in the use of the text-book, and the necessity for the teacher's supplying deficiencies and omissions and amending the text to suit constructions found daily in parsing, and in other practical exercises in Grammar, have enabled him to prepare a work which will, on trial, be found a labor-saving aid to both teacher and pupil. ”

“ He should be a high example of the best product of the schools and education.85 His power, his carriage, his character, his thrift, his independence, his zeal in good works, should bear testimony and be the strongest argument for the schools. A genuinely good teacher, who has the intellectual and moral force to be a man among men, such a teacher in a few years will create a public sentiment that will demand good schools, buildings, equipment and teachers of the best, in the community in which he teaches. ”

“ The tests of success in practice-teaching are in the main those to be applied to all teaching. Do her pupils grow more honest, industrious, polite? Do they admire their teacher? Does she secure obedience and industry only while demanding it, or has she influence that reaches beyond her presence? ”

“ It is maintained by some, that all the Normal School work is professional, in that throughout the curriculum the aim is to present the subject matter of instruction in the way that the teacher should present it to his or her class of children, and so to make the lessons model lessons. ”

“ The teacher whose soul is on fire with her work, the pupil who is willing to learn, these are the essentials of a good school. The teacher, one whose heart is in the work, one who realizes the dignity and the importance of teaching, one who not only knows the subject to be taught and the laws of mental development, but has that innate tact and worth and personal magnetism that draws young people to her, such a teacher is a priceless gem. Such a teacher brings order out of chaos. The pupils feel the magnetism of her presence. ”

“ In some cases a different course is wise undoubtedly,—as, for example, where a teacher is commencing a private school, on a previously well-digested plan of his own,—or where one who has had experience, and has confidence in his power to bring his new pupils promptly and at once into the system of classification and instruction which he prefers. ”

“ Evidently devoted to the welfare of her pupils — attentive to their peculiarities of character — happy in discovering the best avenue of approach to their minds — possessing in a high degree the talent of simplifying her instruction and varying its form, she succeeded in that most difficult part of a teacher's work, the inducing youth to take an interest in their own improvement, and to educate themselves by exerting their own faculties. ”

“ I think our lives are but the school in which we all have set lessons to learn, set tasks to perform; and our wise Teacher, so patient, so gentle, so loving with us, when the great examination day comes, will hold us strictly accountable for every slighted lesson, for every neglected duty. ”

“ The fifth thing that matters is the realisation by teachers that opportunities matter more than results; opportunities to discover, to learn, to comprehend all sides of life, to be an individual, to appreciate beauty, to go at one's own rate; some are material in their nature, such as the actual surroundings of the child in school; others are rather in the atmosphere, such as refraining from interference, encouragement, suggestion, spirituality. The teacher has the making of opportunities largely in her own hands. ”

“ If the school is of higher order, the teacher should, in the same manner, before he forms his plans, consider well what are the great objects which he has to accomplish. He should ascertain what is the existing state of his school, both as to knowledge and character;—how long, generally, his pupils are to remain under his care,—what are to be their future stations and conditions in life, and what objects he can reasonably hope to effect for them, while they remain under his influence. ”

“ The teacher, on the other hand, is required to spend years in preparation for his work. He is expected, moreover, to set a worthy example for children to follow. "As the teacher so the school," is a maxim that has stood the test. ”

“ First ascertain that superintendent, principal, and teacher can be trusted, and then trust them. The testimony of countless good teachers has been uniform, when asked, "Why don't you do better work? why don't you use the methods learned in normal schools, and educational periodicals, and books?' 'We can not do it. Look at our course of study. In three weeks or months these children will be examined. We have not one moment of time to spend in real teaching.' No wonder that teaching is a trade and not an art! No wonder there is little or no demand for books upon the science and art of teaching!" ”

“ What sort of results do teachers secure who compel children to learn their lessons through fear of being ridiculed or otherwise punished? If these children know as much as other children whose teacher has them at work satisfying their idea of pleasure,—which will result in being able to read well to the class, prepare their part of the class drama, or investigate in fields in which they are much interested,—would you, then, consider the first sort of teaching as satisfactory as the second? ”

“ For the special Normal training of teachers the practice of teaching in the lower grades and classes under the supervision of a regular critic teacher, is carried through the greater part of the [Pg 154] senior year, after the study of psychology has been mastered and the principles of school management have been taught. ”

“ Thus I learned from life itself. At the beginning I was only a little mass of possibilities. It was my teacher who unfolded and developed them. When she came, everything about me breathed of love and joy and was full of meaning. She has never since let pass an opportunity to point out the beauty that is in everything, nor has she ceased trying in thought and action and example to make my life sweet and useful.
It was my teacher's genius, her quick sympathy, her loving tact which made the first years of my education so beautiful. ”

“ More capable in the beginning than the average teacher, led to professional study, ambitious for the best things, they make greater progress than they otherwise would do, and are sufficient in themselves to inspire the general body of teachers. For the sake of the pupil-teachers, and the children, too, this plan is best. ”

“ There may be variety in methods and plan, but, through all this variety, the school, and every individual pupil of it, must go steadily forward in the acquisition of that knowledge which is of greatest importance in the business of future life. In other words, the variations and changes admitted by the teacher ought to be mainly confined to the modes of accomplishing those permanent objects to which all the exercises and arrangements of the school ought steadily to aim. ”

“ The idea of teaching we have found is a great benefit—to the teacher. The teacher gets most out of the lessons. Once a week there is a faculty meeting, when each teacher gives in a verbal report of his stewardship. ”

“ A daily watching the methods of life of the class of society from which one’s pupils come.—If they are children or youth or adults, if from the lower, middle or higher walks of society, the teacher should know the influences which surround the life and the methods which govern it, in order to rightly fit the teaching to the life. ”

“ The controlling authority of the teacher, the comprehensive instruction of the teacher, the unifying affection of the teacher, in a word, the central personality of the teacher, makes one body of the class-members around the teacher in their growth into life-long companionship, aye, in several cases, into eternal co-pilgrimage. ”

“ Every action of the teacher is viewed by the child under the microscope of the class-room. Throughout the most impressionable and receptive years of the child's life, the teacher's character is one of the chief formative influences to which it is exposed. ”

“ But from it we gather that the teacher has the art of interesting children and enlisting their affections, and that the system of instruction is eminently suitable for children, for their faculties are always pleasantly on the alert and their minds and bodies are constantly occupied. Whatever the teacher does each child has to do, and furthermore it has to understand why. ”

“ There is no method of teaching which can take the place of a thoroughgoing knowledge of the material which bears upon the topic to be treated. The teacher who finds in the life of the children outside of school, in school activities, in books, pictures, magazines, in study and travel, material for her daily class work, will make any course of study vital and interesting to children. In such an atmosphere pupils will grow not only in knowledge, but also in the desire to inquire and investigate and in power to satisfy their intellectual craving. ”

“ Rather it will be found, I venture, that the efficient teachers, as measured by the results which we can test, are, on the whole, the teachers that are doing the noblest work. Strength of personality, appreciation of child nature, a life which by its example makes for truth and beauty in other lives, are qualities not uncommon in the teacher who is glad to be judged by the results which pupils can demonstrate. ”

“ The methods of instruction and the modes by which the teacher gains and holds his influence over his pupils have been wonderfully improved in recent times, so that where there was one teacher, fifty years ago, who was really beloved by his pupils, we have fifty now. ”

“ But the present plan of changing teachers would be even better than that if only every teacher’s work could be made to project itself not only to graduation day, but to the days of mature manhood and womanhood. 264If only every teacher were able to make each lesson a vital prophecy of what the pupil is to be and to do twenty years hence, then that lesson would become a condition precedent to the pupil’s future behavior. ”

“ Each class tries its teacher, not because the children wish to be aggravating, but because it is ordained that they shall gain their knowledge and experience by testing each new situation in which they find themselves, and each new person with whom they are brought into close contact. ”