necessary and important, drops into the second place in consideration. Here the needs of the child's development will be the special concern of the teacher, and will govern the methods employed.

Object Lessons should have training for their definite purpose, and this should be the case even when the term is used in a wide sense to include "occupation lessons" for infants and lessons in elementary science—whether the latter are taught in a connected series or not, so long as they form part of an object-lesson course. Teachers who test

the value of such lessons solely by the amount of information pigeonholed, complain that there is no room for them, and urge that fuller information in the elementary subjects is of more value. This is a lamentable mistake, which it is strange to see teachers making. Object-lessons are not, and never should be looked upon as, an "extra subject" to be learned from the examination side; and to treat them as though they were so that the child's energies are bent upon learning strings of facts-is to defeat the purpose for which they should be given. Properly used, they may to some extent furnish a corrective to the mechanical methods fostered by too close attention to examination requirements in the ordinary subjects. The increased power and intelligence gained by the children—the training of observation and attention, the quickening of interest and curiosity, the relief afforded, and the increased pleasure imparted to the work -should tell upon the teaching of the other subjects in every direction. To take the lowest view, object lessons should "pay" indirectly by their influence, even though they may not do so directly to any large degree by the information conveyed.

Too frequently the object lessons given in school are completely dissociated from each other. They are selected without any attempt to establish a bond of union between them, and without regard to similarity of subject, to the further application of any principle taught, or to the help which one lesson may be made to afford in the mastery of others. It is much better, as far as possible, to arrange them in short series, each of which shall contain related lessons, so that each lesson of the series may be clearly joined to, and in many cases grounded upon, the preceding one.

The method of training is slow, but it is sure, and it is very much to be doubted whether, in the end, as much information would not be gained in a given time as by the supposed quicker methods at

present in vogue of teaching facts. Of course much will depend upon the teacher, but it is surely worth the trial.

(3) Drill Lessons.-These have a distinct use in school work, and if properly employed, and kept in their place, may be made of much service. To fix a series of facts with certainty in the memory of a child requires much reiteration-often in fact more than can well be spared in ordinary teaching-and this the drill lessons should supply. They include such things as the repetition of tables, dates, names, summaries, and classifications; together with writing, reading, and arithmetic practice, and other work of a similar kind. They must not be confused with ordinary lessons, and should never be allowed to take the place of intelligent teaching. They should follow it, where they are necessary at all, and fix thoroughly those points which have been previously explained and taught.

Thus, for instance, what is known as "map-drill"—the learning of names and positions on a map by repetition—is useful if taken after the ordinary geography lesson, to secure the holding of the facts taught; but it is baneful when used alone as a method of teaching what in such a case would be called geography. The present tendency is for far too large a portion of school work to take this drill character.

(4) Review Lessons.-These are definite lessons, mainly of a recapitulatory and examinatory kind, which should be given at fixed times to review and sum up the teaching of a previous series of lessons. Skilfully employed such review lessons are of great value in keeping information fresh and ready for use, in giving a general grasp of the subject, and in enabling the pupils to look over a wider expanse so as to make out the relationship of the points they have learned. Without some systematic arrangement for review of previous work, much valuable knowledge is sure to be lost, or at least to sink into that no-man's-land of memory from which it is so difficult to recall it. The value and necessity of review lessons are not yet sufficiently appreciated; were such lessons more frequently employed, mere drill lessons would be less necessary.

NOTES OF LESSONS. Need for preparation of lessons. Of this it is perhaps not necessary to say much. Every one who has ever attempted to really teach a difficult lesson, must have felt not only

the importance of preparing the work, but the necessity for it. Unprepared lessons, even with skilled teachers, are very apt to be, and with unskilled teachers are certain to be, wanting in definiteness and point, loose in construction and arrangement, shallow as to the treatment of the subject-matter, and lacking in suitability, thoroughness, and impressiveness. If the teacher trusts to evolving everything just as it is wanted out of the "depths of his inner consciousness," his work is pretty sure to be random, unequal, and disjointed; and he is not likely to do justice to his subject, his scholars, or himself. Proper preparation should secure that he fully understands what he is about, and should limit his efforts within the bounds of what may reasonably be expected to be accomplished by deciding definitely what is to be taken and what left cut.

In the very best steam-engine it is not possible to get more than a comparatively small proportion of the heat power actually changed into work; the rest goes to waste. Similarly a teacher will be certain not to get all that is theoretically possible out of his teaching, and this must be allowed for. In many lessons very much of the teaching runs to waste from defective handling, and passes off into the limbo of non-productive effort. To prevent as far as may be this spending of strength without effect, all lessons (except where some known method can be applied with but slight modification-as in reading, writing, etc.) should receive preparation to such a degree as is necessary to secure the greatest practicable efficiency. The amount of preparation will of course vary with the knowledge, experience, and skill of the teacher with his power of being able at once to throw himself mentally into the position of the learner, to look at things from the latter's point of view, and to recognise at a glance exactly what is wanted, what is the nature of any difficulty, and what is best to be done. In the case of most teachers such power is only to be gained by persistent exercise, and at first much thought and steady consideration are necessary. To carefully prepare a lesson, and to put the work down on paper in the best form which can be devised, is one of the most valuable means of securing the training required; and has a disciplinary value apart from teaching. To the young teacher such work is especially important; but the "notes" must be something beyond a few stray hints, or an ill-digested assemblage of facts, if they are to do good.

What is meant by Notes of Lessons.-Notes of lessons are not a means of displaying the teacher's knowledge, or of showing how skilfully he can make a digest or analysis; they are not simply storehouses of facts, or illustrations, questions, and explanations; they are not simply notes on or about the information required. They are a short statement of the best form in which the teacher can develop the ideas of his lesson, so that the whole may be orderly, consistent, and complete, as far as it goes; as well as of the best means he can employ for bringing the ideas clearly before the children, and securing that they shall be both understood and retained. "Notes" are his plan of battle settled distinctly before he begins, so that there may be no failure, no hurry, and no confusion when he actually sets about the accomplishment of his purpose. And just as a general pre-arranges all the details of a fight, so far as is possible, and ponders over the disposition of his forces and the contingencies likely to arise in the struggle; so the teacher looks to all the possibilities of his work, and endeavours to realise and prepare for any difficulties which may present themselves in the lesson. To put the matter in another way: "notes" should be to the lesson what the artist's careful design, or sketch in colour, is to the finished picture-a sketch containing all the essentials, but not burdened with the many small details which will come out in the work itself.

Briefly, we may define "notes as a draft of the lesson put upon paper, with all the important points, whether of matter or method, clearly marked. They should convey to another person a distinct idea of the teacher's power of arranging his subject-matter, and of his skill in presentation-of what the lesson would be like in all its main features. They should show not only what information is to be communicated, and how it is to be conveyed from the mind of the teacher to the minds of the scholars, but also to what extent the intelligence of the latter will be exercised and what permanent benefit they are likely to derive from the lesson.

Preparation must leave the teacher free. As instrumental in securing right knowledge, clear views, and pre-consideration of the teaching, "notes" are of much importance; but they should not be prepared in excessive detail, and must not be followed slavishly. From the main lines of the work, as laid down, it is unwise to

depart; but there should be no mere recitation of the notes, nor should the teacher have them so much in mind as to be constantly thinking of them rather than of his work. Known they should be, but they must not constrain the teaching. The teacher should cultivate the power to think in front of his class, and to seize upon everything which may be used to advantage; and at the same time keep himself sufficiently free to be able to adopt any change for the better. which may suggest itself during the teaching. Often, when the mind is thoroughly imbued with the interest of the actual work, the teacher will see a better mode of developing a point, or of overcoming a difficulty, than the one which occurred to him during preparation. To secure the freedom and interest necessary, however, he must have confidence; and this will depend to a considerable extent upon the fact that he has always the prepared methods to fall back upon. The teaching will often rise above the "notes" it should never fall below them.

The teacher must prepare his own "notes."-As models, to show on paper how the work of preparing a lesson may be carried out, "notes" by others, if carefully drawn up, may be made of much use; but the teacher is warned, as he values any vividness and reality in his teaching, and any increase in his power of dealing with a lesson, that such "notes" must not be used to teach from. If his work is to meet successfully the special needs of the children under his care, and make use of such powers as he possesses, the lesson must be the outcome of his own thought.

His notes upon a subject may be inferior in the abstract to those drawn up by another person, but practically to him they are of much greater value; and he will find his own sling and stone far more serviceable and trustworthy than the untried weapons, even of most elaborate pattern and perfection of finish, supplied by others. The great fault of the vast majority of so-called "notes of lessons" found in books is that they are merely summaries of facts, arranged in a way suited to cramming them for an examination, but not so presented as to be in a good form for teaching. Nor are they, even from this point of view, usually sufficiently full, as sources of information, to give a teacher ignorant of a subject the understanding of it necessary for teaching purposes. The artificiality of treatment, and the conventionality both of arrangement and headings, which are so lamentably common in "notes" drawn up by young teachers for inspection, seem to be largely traceable to this source.

In considering how the preparation of lessons may be most usefully made, it is convenient to view them as separable into the two following types :