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by the teacher again to take his seat, except by written permission of the sub-committee of the school.

3d. "And scholars dismissed during school hours by the request of their parents or guardians, shall be considered absent for the half day on which such dismission is requested."

The report goes on to say, "these regulations went into operation on the 1st day of November last. The result was most favorable; absences, except for sickness, have since been hardly known. Dismission before the close of the school, has in only one or two instances been requested, and tardiness very infrequent. So perfectly satisfactory has been the result of this measure, that the statistics furnished from the registers of the teachers, prove conclusively that, in both departments, 1,632 half days of absence last year were unnecessary, and have been saved to the school this year, by these regulations, in the short space of four months." Or to alter and abridge a little the committee's language, more than three quarters of the whole number of absences of the former year have this year been prevented, and of the remainder, only 24 were for other causes than sickness, during the four months above mentioned.

Thus much from the committee's report. And I will only add, that these regulations continue to work as well as at the first. It ought also to be stated, that what, in our opinion, gives to them their peculiar efficacy, is the fact, that whenever any scholar is absent for other reasons than sickness or death in the family to which he belongs, the committee allow us to require him to make up the time as well as the studies lost by his absence. Moreover these rules explain how we get rid of the an

noyance and interruption of dismissing scholars before the close of the school. Boys so dismissed, during school hours, at the request of their parents or guardians, are considered as absent for the half day, and may be required to make up the whole time. And so effectual has this regulation proved in removing the evil complained of, that such requests are now very "few and far between ". -a rare occurrence.

Again, how to begin school. Dr. Johnson says it is always difficult to make a good beginning; and all teachers know that this remark is particularly true in the case of school-keeping. Mr. Abbott, in his Teacher, has well stated these difficulties and how they may be best met and overcome, in a chapter entitled "the teacher's first day," which I would recommend to the careful perusal of all beginners. He has one or two suggestions which came into my head long before I ever saw his book; but as he has expressed them very clearly and happily, I shall use his language. "It is desirable," he says, "that the young teacher should meet his scholars first in an unofficial capacity. For this purpose, he should repair to the school-room, on the first day, at an early hour, so as to see and become acquainted with the scholars as they come in, one by one. He may take an interest with them in all the little arrangements connected with the opening of the school. The building of the fire, the paths through the snow, the arrangement of seats, calling upon them for information or aid, asking their names, and, in a word, entering fully and freely into conversation with them, just as a parent, under similar circumstances, would do with his children. All the children, thus addressed, will be pleased with the

gentleness and affability of the teacher. Even a rough and ill-natured boy, who has perhaps come to the school with the express determination of attempting to make mischief, will be completely disarmed by being asked pleasantly to help the teacher fix the fire, or alter the position of a desk. Thus by means of the half hour during which the scholars are coming together, the teacher will find, when he calls upon the children to take their seats, that he has made a very large number of them his personal friends. Many of these will have communicated their first impressions to others, so that he will find himself possessed, at the outset, of that which is of vital consequence in opening any administration—a strong party in his favor." And, I may add, by continuing this practice of going to the school-room early for several days, and by keeping up a free and friendly intercourse with your pupils both before and after school, you will soon secure an ascendancy over their minds, which will greatly assist you in discharging your arduous duties and will render your task. comparatively easy and pleasant.

Dr. Franklin once gained the friendship of a man bitterly opposed to him, by borrowing of him a valuable book, and soon after returning it with his thanks for the favor; and many a teacher has won the confidence of a wrong-headed, cross-grained pupil, by simply requesting him to perform some little service and expressing gratitude for his kindness.

I wish somewhere, in this lecture, to say a few things about school-rooms, which will not come in very well under any of my "hows" of school-keeping. And I may perhaps as well say them here, parenthetically, as any where else.

The advantages of a neat, comfortable, and pleasant school-room, need not now be spoken of, nor can they well be overrated. And while it is not the business of teachers to build school-rooms and make them convenient in the first place, still they have much to do in keeping them in good order and in rendering them pleasant; and in so doing they will find their reward. Boys are like men, and love extremes. If a school-room is defaced and dirty, they will take a pleasure in making it look worse; and, on the other hand, if it is convenient and beautiful, they will take a pride in improving its condition and making it look better.

Travellers tell us that the malaria about Rome, causes the inhabitants to desert the marshes and to leave them undrained and uncultivated, and, on the other hand, that this very desertion aggravates the malaria. Thus the two things act reciprocally upon each other as cause and effect in a vicious circle, and of course the state of things is becoming worse and worse continually. And just so the school-room and the school act reciprocally each upon the other. A bad school has a tendency to make a bad school-room, and, in turn, a bad school-room has a tendency to make a bad school; that is, it tends to excite in scholars the bump of destructiveness, as the mesmerizers say. Take special pains, therefore, to keep your school-room neat and to make it pleasant.

But I see that I am in danger of making a long story. I will therefore arrange what further suggestions I have to make to you, on the present occasion, under two pretty comprehensive "hows" or heads, viz: How to secure good order, and how to conduct the recitations in school; in short, how to govern and how to instruct.

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And first, how to secure good order. And here I might say much of the advantages of a high moral and religious influence in schools, and yet not say one half which the importance of the subject demands. If wisely and judiciously exerted, its good effects cannot be measured. It is not, however, my present intention to speak at large of this influence or of the mode in which may be best secured and exercised, but I shall leave that to the skill and discretion of each individual teacher. One thing, however, I may not omit, and that is, that I regard it as very important that the school should be opened with prayer. Its influence can hardly fail to be salutary. And let me add, that I have found no method so effectual in securing silent attention during this exercise, as that of requesting the pupils to recline their heads on their desks before them. Some may be disposed to regard the mere posture as a small matter, but those who have been long engaged in teaching know full well that almost the whole business of successful schoolkeeping, is made of what would seem to lookers-on as small matters.

And I

And here, under this head of governing, I may illustrate more at length, what I meant in the beginning of this lecture by originality; that is, by every teacher's forming and following a plan essentially his own. dwell the longer and speak the more emphatically on this part of my subject, because there is a class of theorizers on education, who seem wonderfully enamored with uniformity, as though this was the talismanic power which is to reform and regenerate our schools. They would have uniform systems of teaching, and uniform modes of government, uniform school-houses and uni

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