I. THE STORY IN PRIMARY INSTRUCTION.
The greatest need of the primary school to-day is some positive content or subject matter of instruction. The popular conception of such a school is that its main function is to teach the young child to read, write, and cipher. That is, that it has to do mainly with the formal aspects of language and numbers. So long as a certain amount of facility is gained in these formal arts, there is little disposition to demand anything more.

Even so great an authority as the Committee of Fifteen has championed this view, and has given as its deliberate judgment that the first four years of school life should be devoted to the mastery of the formal phases of instruction. While it may be contended that it is not meant to exclude the giving of a positive subject matter, still it is interpreted as sanctioning the present obvious over-emphasis of the formal side of language in our primary schools.

A strict conformity to this formal program would mean that the first four years of school life, the most impressionable[6] period in the pupil’s school career, are to be empty of any real subject matter. The mastery of written and printed forms is to be set up as an end in itself, losing sight of the fact that they are but means for conveying the thought, feelings, experiences, and aspirations of the race from one generation to another.

When we consider what the child at the age of six or seven really is; when we consider his love of story, his hunger for the concrete material of knowledge, his deep interest in the widening of his experience,—it is evident that such a course is out of all harmony with his real nature. It is the giving of stones when the cry is for bread. It is even worse than the proverbial making of bricks without straw. It is attempting to make bricks with straw alone.
THE MASTERY OF A VOCABULARY NOT THE MATERIAL OF INSTRUCTION.

It will be granted that the mastery of a printed and a written vocabulary is of the utmost importance. As a subordinate end, the ability to interpret the printed page and to express thought in correct form is the most imperative demand upon the school. But these acquirements are not a content in themselves. They are not the material of instruction. In themselves, they do not enlarge the understanding or furnish the food which the young mind hungers for—and must[7] have if it is maintained in a condition of health. They are mere forms, and the dwelling upon them during the impressionable years of childhood results in a deadening of his interest and dwarfing of his powers, so that the over-emphasis of this phase of education to the exclusion of content defeats its own ends.

Laying the foundation for a future character edifice, keeping active the developing interests, the widening of his experience, the formation of interpretative concepts,—these are of greater value from the point of view of language mastery, even of its spoken and written forms, than the persistent drill in its formal elements.

Language teaching must be approached from the content side if we are to get any genuine interest in the overcoming of difficulties on the part of the child. There is no interest for the child in the language forms themselves when presented in abstraction and emphasized as such. He may be drilled into proficiency, but the interest does not come from the relation of these formal elements to his own needs or activity. The interest has been external and it flags as soon as the external excitement is withdrawn. A genuine interest, an intrinsic one growing out of his own needs and nature, can be fostered only by supplying a subject matter adapted to the various levels of thought through which his development leads him. If this is furnished, it is no partial, intermittent[8] attention that the pupil gives. While dealing with such a content he is not forming the habit of mind-wandering and inattention so frequently seen when children are kept closely to word drill and to reading for elocutionary purposes.
A WIDER CIRCLE AND PURPOSE, GROWING OUT OF THE CHILD’S LIFE AND NEEDS.

The possession of a wide acquaintance with the standard subject matter of child literature before serious attempts at learning to read are made, will subordinate the acquisition of a reading vocabulary as means to an end desired on the part of the child. There will be purpose in it for him. The learning to read will be seen as a step necessary to a fuller expression of activities already going on, and difficulties will be overcome because their mastery is a means in a wider circle of purpose growing out of the child’s own life and needs. If, in early years, the emphasis is removed from the form to the content side of instruction, if his native hunger for folklore and nature-material is satisfied, the learning to read will be lifted out of drudgery and will be accomplished with self-effort, and with a rapidity truly surprising.

The early forcing of technique is not a real gain in the child’s education, however much may be apparently accomplished. Immediate results are not a safe guide for instruction in the primary grades. They are, many times, a positive loss[9] in time, and are gained at the expense of dwarfing the mental and physical powers. There is no real need of forcing the process of learning to read if the teacher is ready with a subject matter which the child is already going out to meet.

The time of the first year of school life would conduce far more to the child’s progress if spent with learning to read and write as a secondary consideration, and the giving of a real body of culture, ethical, and nature material as a main purpose. Subsequent progress would be all the more rapid and instruction be all the more educative because a wider range of interest would call forth self-active participation of all the powers. The widening of experience and the formation of interpretative concepts would allow further instruction to be grasped with sufficient avidity to carry it over into actual assimilation into the self.
LANGUAGE TEACHING.

What has been said with regard to the relation of reading to a content is equally true with regard to what is known as language teaching. It is a hopeless task to endeavor to give skill in the use of language independent of a content which is not in accord with the pupil’s own stage of development. The interest, to be genuine, and productive of self-effort, must always be in the content. An enrichment of his vocabulary, a proper use of words, correct form of oral and written speech[10] must come, not for themselves, but as results of an effort to the adequate expression of something which the pupil is interested to communicate.

The widespread criticism directed against the results of language teaching in our schools no doubt has something of justification. This defect does not come from lack of attention to the matter, or from indifference on the part of the teachers, but largely from the over-emphasis of the purely formal aspects of language. The matter is approached from the wrong side. In early years, to get form we must emphasize content. In the primary grades, formal insistence on correct technique should be at the minimum, while richness and variety of subject matter should be at the maximum.

Nor is this without application to the remaining forms of language expression,—drawing and music. Skill in aesthetic forms can come only from an interest in something to be expressed in these forms.

When we consider that the child, up to the eighth or ninth year of his life, has not a sufficient mastery of a reading vocabulary to enable him to get for himself out of books material for which he has deepest need, and which is his natural and proper nourishment, the imparting to him orally such material assumes an aspect of gravest importance. Shall his early years of school life be barren and empty? Surely the teacher has a duty in this respect beyond giving merely formal[11] instruction. She should not allow the pressure for immediate technical results to deprive the child of his inheritance in the folklore and the epic treasures of the race.

It has been shown by experiment that, with young children, instruction is taken more readily through the ear than through the eye. Their pre-school education has been acquired largely through auditory impressions and exists in the mind in the form of auditory images. To throw the emphasis at once on visual impression and imagery is too violent a break in their mental habits.
II. THE SELECTION OF THE SUBJECT-MATTER.
The kind of content proper to early childhood is determined by the nature of the child himself. It is the child that is to be educated. The teacher must take him as he is, with full trust that the strengthening of those powers at present active will result in his highest good. All attempts to improve on nature has been abortive. Every normal child is active in those ways which the race experience has embedded in him. His activities are echoes of those by which the race has been successful. The conception of the child standing over against the real subject matter of education and in direct antagonism[12] to it, between which and him there is no intrinsic relation and into which he must be introduced by external means, is not in harmony with an optimistic philosophy or with a correct understanding of pedagogical principles.

There must be, in the nature of things, a relation between the activities already functioning in the child and the material the assimilation of which will constitute him not only a thoroughly equipped individual but also a socially efficient factor. It is a mistaken view to suppose that the exercise and the development of the activities dominant in early childhood will lead away from the best interests of the individual or endanger his efficiency as a member of society. It is anomalous to assume that the impulses and interests of childhood must be suppressed or eradicated in order to fit him for participation in social life. These impulses have been implanted in his nature by actual participation in a social life on the part of his ancestry, and they are the possibilities of a worthy social development.

While this is true, while the determining factor in the selection and arrangement of the subject-matter of education is the child himself, yet the undoubted parallelism between his growth and that of the race widens the scope and furnishes the broader basis for such selection and arrangement. It matters little to what extent such a parallelism is accepted. The principle once established makes it a matter of indifference[13] whether we proceed from the individual or from the broader standpoint of the psychological history of the race. This psychological history is made out by a study of the literature products left behind in the ascent from the lower levels of development to the higher, as represented in modern civilization.
PHASE OF MIND ACTIVITY IN EARLY CIVILIZATION.

A survey of the literary remains of the past gives conclusive proof that the characteristic phase of mind activity in the dawning periods of civilization is the imaginative or mythical. The earliest literary product of every people is the epic, whose chief elements are legends, myths and the heroic, and whose authorship is not individual but of the race itself. Such a product, not the creation of any one mind, but slowly fashioned through the centuries by the poetic genius of the race, however trivial it may seem, has strong claims on our deepest veneration. It should receive most careful study and consideration.

These epic remains come from the innermost life of a people. They are the expression of this life. They are eloquent witnesses of a strong imagination dealing with the mysteries of earth, of sky, and of life itself. They tell of the morning of history, when man was close to nature—a part of nature. The earth, trees, waters, animals—all forms, animate and inanimate,[14] had voices for him. He communed with them. He treated them as of equal rank with himself.
A THIRD ELEMENT OF THE RACE PRODUCTS.

But, in addition to their imaginative character and their closeness to nature, these race products have still a third element of the utmost value for use as material for primary instruction. While they “enforce no moral” they tell “a story, and the moral in solution with the story.” Each tale is a narration without comment. The ethical teaching involved is in the most concrete form. It is not set out and emphasized, but lies wrapped up in the movement of the narrative itself and awaits the exercise of the child’s ethical judgment.

Viewed from our ethical standpoint, folklore does not always come up to the highest standard. There are objectionable features in many tales. In this respect they reflect the uncritical and even crude morals of the time. While this is true of some of the tales, in many the ethical teaching is pure, lofty and wholesome, and furnishes an element greatly needed in our primary schools. We have here held up for esteem and veneration these virtues of head and heart and action that lie at the base of a happy, considerate and industrious home life. Baseness, cruelty, ingratitude, and laziness are brought home to the individual in their consequences. The corresponding[15] virtues are shown in their true relation to happiness and well being. This may not be the highest form of ethical activity, but it is the only kind of ethical teaching on a level with child thought. The morality of the stories is set forth in the concrete as a principle of action found valuable in the race’s history.

That such a content is a great desideratum for purposes of ethical instruction in our schools all will admit. The condition of religious thought is such as to preclude the use of sacred literature. Perhaps it would not afford so many advantages for purposes of ethical teaching in the first year of school life as literature closer to the childhood of the race in its origin. Some subject-matter that affords opportunity for the exercise of the ethical judgment is an imperative demand for our time. What is there more suitable than this embalmed judgment of the race as to what is valuable in conduct and character? Here are stored up in a form that appeals to the child material for generalizations as to the conditions of well-being and of happiness, as well as of a moral and a useful life. All that the race has thought, felt, and experienced is here at the service of the child. One is almost tempted to use the expression of Hegel and say that, in assimilating the ethical teaching of these racial literatures, the child is being suckled at the breast of the Universal Ethos.

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THE LEGENDARY AND THE MYTHOLOGICAL THE CHILD’S NATURAL FOOD.

Even to casual observation there is close correspondence between child nature and the characteristics of the early literature of the race. Children are wholly in the imaginative on mythical level of thought. They are immersed in the sensuous. They refuse to be bound by the hard matter of fact. They will away and claim the world as their own through which to roam on the unfettered wing of fancy. They claim freedom to construct their own world and to people it with creatures of their own fabrication, independent of the shackles of time and space.

The child also feels himself a part of nature, not as something standing over against it. The separation has not yet come. He ascribes an equal and like personality to animate and inanimate objects. He is at home among animals and plants. There is spontaneous interest in all phases of nature, and inborn love for her creatures; and as to the ethical element, the child is not without points of contact for it. He is born with social impulses. He is not only to be a social creature, but is one at all stages of development. He is nothing if not social. The fiction of original, independent individuality which must be thrown off, given up, or eradicated before becoming a social being, is fast giving way to the natural or[17] organic theories of social origin and growth. The very impulses which are sometimes cited to show the natural depravity of childhood are the vigorous reaching out of his nature toward a participation in the social life.

Thus there can be little doubt as to the fitness of legendary and mythological material for the needs of the child. It is his natural food. It fits in with his forms of thought—is in obvious relation to them. It meets the needs of activities already functioning. It discloses a world in which he can be at home. It falls in with his interpretation of this world, while the simple social life therein depicted appeals to his interest.
HOW ARE WE TO DISCRIMINATE AS TO MATERIAL TO BE SELECTED?

If this position is granted, how then, out of the vast richness of the material, are particular selections to be made? What principles should govern in our choice? As already hinted there are degrees of value, for purposes of instruction, in the immense treasury of folklore, myth and fable. It will be readily conceded that what is known as folklore has qualities rendering it of greatest value, for the first years of school life. It is simple and direct. Its conception of the world is that of pure naturalism. The formal myth and fable belong to later stages of mental development. The fable, too, has the objection of being explicitly didactic in its enforcement of the moral.

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NARRATIVES SELECTED AND THE BASIS OF SELECTION.

In the following narratives, for the most part consisting of German M?rchen, the principles of selection given below have been kept in mind:

1. The story must be simple, direct, and imaginative.

2. It must have strong ethical significance and must avoid cruel situations. Stories dealing with happy home life—emphasizing industry, thrift, and usefulness—are to be given preference.

3. It must offer a content rich in social allusion, in outdoor life, and in references to natural objects, animate and inanimate.

4. It should be of such abiding worth that it will bear repetition and hold interest.

5. It must be dramatic; that is, there should be movement, activity, dialogue, interesting and even humorous incidents, but all subordinate to a central unity. Only such a dramatic unity can work a deep and lasting impression.

These principles of selection are in the main those enunciated by William Rein in his excellent manual, Das Erste Schuljahr, a book with which every primary teacher should be familiar. The stories here presented have the sanction of such eminent students of pedagogy as William Rein, Ziller,[19] Just, and Hiemish—all leaders of educational thought in Germany.

The text of the first fourteen tales has been translated with a few adaptations from the German of Hiemish, as found in his Das Gesinnungsunterricht. To these have been added Andersen’s Fir Tree and Miss Harrison’s Hans and the Four Big Giants.

The order here given is not essential, but on the whole it will be found a rational one. The succession could be determined by many points of view. The one here chosen is that of relation to home life. The series begins with the simplest home relations of parents and brother and sister. It gradually broadens into the wider circle of companionship, and contact with the world external to the home. It culminates in Miss Harrison’s fine story, Hans and the Four Big Giants, where the separation from home is complete and the child is brought into contact with the highest industrial and scientific phases of modern civilization. Transition from the more simple situations to the more complex and longer narratives have also been kept in mind.
THE FOUR STORY GROUPS.

Thus the stories fall into four groups. The First Group comprises The Seven Little Goats, The Star Dollars, Red Riding Hood, Sweet Rice Porridge, Mother Frost, and Rose-Red[20] and Snow-White. These stories are confined chiefly to the home circle and deal with the relation of parent and child.

The Second Group is The Cock and the Hen, The Death of the Cock, and Birdie and Lena. These are partly inside and partly outside the family circle. There is contact with persons outside the home.

The Third Group is The Wolf and the Fox, The Street Musicians, The Straw, The Coal and the Bean, The Wonderful Traveler, and Cinderella. This group extends the relationship further into the external world.

Lastly, in the story of Hans and the Four Big Giants, the horizon is widened so as to include the separation from the home and an independent career among strangers. The Fir Tree is added for use as a Christmas story for those who desire it. In fact, many of the stories could be taken out of their order and be used as introductions to the study of the seasons. The Cock and the Hen is an autumn story, while several others might be used as dealing with spring time.

III. THE PROBLEM OF CORRELATION.
The two chief problems of educational practice concern the selection and the arrangement or organization of the educative[21] material. The problem of the organization of the subject-matter is spoken of as Correlation or Concentration. Any proposal silent on this point would not be adequate to the best school thought or practice of the hour.

The main contention over this question hinges on what subject should be taken as a center around which other lines of instruction should be gathered. Against the proposition to use the historical or culture-historical material as such a center objections can easily be raised. It will be granted that it does not offer an ideal point of departure for all the activities of even the primary school. It will be granted further that such a center is not the true center of the social life. It is liable to over-emphasize the purely intellectual side of instruction at the expense of the volitional phases, and it cannot be a center for the correlation of number.

But mathematics and literature do not correlate. Arithmetic and formal science have arisen in dealing with the practical problems of industrial processes. They are forms which industrial processes have taken on. There are some reasonable objections to the correlation of what is called “Construction Work” with this literature material.

But, on the whole, the narrative, or story, offers, under present conditions, the only practicable center for correlation in the first school year. Especially since, at this period, formal[22] number work and science proper are at their minimum. For the language arts,—reading, writing, spelling, exercises in oral speech,—it is the natural medium. The aesthetic arts,—drawing and music—and even construction work, can be correlated here without undue violence to instruction as an organic unity. This material, too, furnishes at least a point of departure for what is known as nature study. It will find abundant inspiration in the animals, plants, and natural objects alluded to.

From what has been said, it will be seen that the stories are to be used as a medium of instruction, not just told and enjoyed. They are to be regarded as subject-matter to be assimilated and expressed. They provide a content by means of which the various school arts may reverse their usual direction and become, so to speak, centrifugal—the spontaneous outflowing of the self.

Merely telling the story does not exhaust its possibilities. It should be made a means for the exercise of the entire round of childish activities. Unless the understanding is enlarged, the sympathies widened, the ethical sense deepened, and steady advance made in all lines of technique, the teacher will miss the true aim.
IV. SUGGESTIONS.
The manner or method of presenting and using the material is based largely on Herbart’s “Formal Steps.” Though an effort has been made to get away from their rigidity, no teacher can afford to become hampered by the requirements of a too rigid system or a too formal method of instruction. Yet there must always be a consciousness of what meets the demands of educative instruction. Apperception, or learning, takes place under certain conditions only. These conditions must be met.
THE TREATMENT.

It is not the intention to give a list of set questions whose form and order are to be rigidly followed. It is difficult to fix upon the precise point where such questions cease to be helpful and suggestive and begin to trench on the legitimate province of the teacher. In order to avoid this unpardonable sin, the treatment of some of the stories has been elaborated quite fully, to show the work entire as it has been given to children; while that of others has been outlined, noting only the main points to be brought out and leaving the form of presentation largely to the teacher’s individuality.

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Nothing can take the place of originality and spontaneity. If a fixed program is followed, the main purpose of the work will be missed and the interest for both teacher and children will evaporate. In the treatment of the two elements, the ethical and the nature material have been separated from each other and from the other parts. This is for the purpose of emphasizing them in the teacher’s mind. The plan need not be followed in the actual work. Questions and explanations may be introduced into the narration if care be taken that the interruption does not break the thread of the story.

There has been no attempt to divide the subject into lessons. However, the preparation, the narration, and the deepening should, in most cases, be all that is undertaken in one period of fifteen minutes. This is as long as young children should be kept to one exercise. If this is done in the morning session, the reproduction and the other exercises could come in the afternoon session.
REPRODUCTION.

A child learns to talk fluently and with correctness by talking. Oral speech should come before written speech. If the pupil can talk in good English with ease there will not be much trouble with written expression. To this end there should be much time given to oral reproduction by the children.[25] Even the most backward child should be encouraged to attempt it. There will be a strong temptation to allow the brilliant story tellers to do most of the reproducing. Each child should be thrown wholly on his own responsibility. Let him tell what he can in his own way and reserve corrections until he is done. The story itself should be kept fluid. It should not be allowed to crystallize into set phrases on the part of either teacher or children. Great liberty should be allowed in reproduction, so that freshness and spontaneity may never be lacking. The reproduction may immediately follow the deepening process or be reserved for a separate period. It should be given from the beginning frequently.
THE PREPARATION.

It is well to give the aim or purpose of the story first. This may be in the form of a brief outline giving the general direction which the story is to take. Some such hint seems a pedagogical necessity. Nothing is so tiresome to an adult, even, as to listen to a discourse whose aim and purpose are not apparent. And then the movement as a whole should be in the mind of the children from the first.

It is in accordance with sound pedagogy to bring to the foreground of consciousness the ideas already possessed by the children, and known to be related to what is to be presented.[26] The new is learned or understood (apperceived) by the old. That which has been once assimilated enters into and modifies old concepts; these in turn classify the new material and reduce it to order and unity. It is therefore important that, before a story is told, the related ideas be brought forward ready for use by means of a few well directed questions. In many cases the proper result may be attained by suggesting a difficulty or problem for the children to solve.
THE NARRATION.

After the preparation follows the story. It should be given in short divisions. Each such division should be as far as possible a dramatic unity, subordinate of course to the main one.

The story should be told, not read. Every primary teacher should be a story teller. Anyone that has felt the deep, enthusiastic response of children to a story well told will feel amply repaid for any effort to cultivate the art of story telling. On this point few suggestions can be given. The main elements of good story telling are intrinsically connected with the emotional and spiritual endowments. A genuine appreciation of child-nature must be combined with a lively and emotional manner of expression.

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THE DEEPENING.

It is wise in most cases to question on the main points of the narration. This fixes them in the children’s minds so that reproduction of the story will more readily follow. The amount of such questioning must be determined by the needs of the class. Only the main points should be dwelt upon. With young children details should be avoided.
THE NATURE-MATERIAL.

The best way to widen the experience of children is to bring them into actual contact with things. But, as organized and carried on at present, the school can do very little of this first-hand teaching. However, at school age, such is the activity of childhood, most children have a considerable body of nature experience which can be used as interpretative concepts for new and similar material. Careful teaching will always aim to discover what experience the individual members of a class have had in order that inadequate ideas may be strengthened and given greater detail. This may be done by some child’s telling his experience, by the teacher giving the information—using descriptions, pictures or drawings,—or finally by proper questioning.

Starting from what is already known, a skillful teacher can build up an idea, though of course more or less indefinite, of[28] the object or process that is comparatively unknown. Questioning can never do more than bring into explicitness what is really in the mind in a vague way. Yet, when we consider that the possibilities of all science and, in fact, of all knowledge, are implicit in the experiences of the normal child of school age, it is seen that the use of questions as an educative means is practically unlimited and that it should not be neglected even in the primary grades.

There is in the stories an abundance of nature-material and of material bearing on industrial occupations and processes that may serve, when properly used, as an excellent basis for mental growth in these directions. In making sure that ideas along these lines are clear, a foundation is being laid for a more vital grasping of geographical instruction later on.

The old object-lesson was an effort in this direction, but its formality and isolation killed it. It is not the purpose to recommend formal object lessons. The main purpose should be to see that the allusions to natural objects and to industrial occupations and processes are understood. And if they are not, to bring them into adequate clearness by proper instruction.
THE ETHICAL MATERIAL.

There is a wide difference, so far as method is concerned, between setting forth the moral to a tale in an explicit way[29] and allowing children to express their judgments upon concrete facts of conduct. The latter is all that should be attempted. In the reaction from formal moral instruction there is danger of going to the other extreme and neglecting it entirely.

The vital element in literature—its ultimate raison d’etre—is its ethical import. It constitutes the ethical medium. It gives each child the benefit of the experience of the race. The duty of the school to give occasion for the exercise of ethical judgments is greater than its duty to train the merely intellectual judgment. For the one determines what is good or bad, the other what is real or unreal. Right conduct is of more importance than mere knowing.
READING.

The teaching of the mechanics of reading concerns itself with affixing visual images of words to the auditory vocabulary already possessed by the child. As this is a purely formal process, having little educative value in itself, the judicious teacher will welcome any suggestion toward minimizing routine drill. Instead of attempting to fix the visual form of each word, she will limit the formal instruction to giving the child a capability of deciphering new words for himself, that is, of translating them into motor images of articulation. Instruction[30] that does not give to the child this capability is wasting time and misdirecting energy.

In order to have facility in the mastering of new words, it is necessary that there be a knowledge of the vocal value of the letters and an acquaintance with the groups into which words may be separated according to similarity of sound. Thus daily short drills upon the purely formal side seems a necessity. This should be done in a separate exercise, however.

At the same time this formal process should not be wholly divorced from the thought side. The learner should be able to grasp quickly the meaning the sentence conveys as a whole, and to give it natural expression. To make this connection between the two elements as close as possible, the sentences to be given visual form should be taken from the children themselves. These can be written on the board, or printed in large type on Manila sheets (forming a chart),[A] or in ordinary type on slips to be given to the children.

The possession by the class of the common subject-matter which the stories supply, renders this plan feasible and always full of interest. Knowledge of the content will reinforce the recognition of words and sentences and thus make progress in acquiring a visual vocabulary rapid and, in part, unconscious. Moreover, the anticipation of the meaning of what is about[31] to be read will result in a natural expression of it. If the child has even a provisional grasp of the meaning of the whole sentence before attempting to read it, the expression will largely take care of itself. Until the comprehension of the meaning is instantaneous, there should always be a preliminary study of the sentence to be read, so that the thought as a whole may at least be foreshadowed in the mind of the child.

In this way there is a vital relation between reading as a formal process and that which is read. This obviates the necessity of using isolated and unfamiliar topics as well as those having no value in themselves. From the first the reading matter should have value for the child—be related to his stage of thought and to his dominant interests.
DRAWING, ETC.

The stories are an excellent source from which to draw material for expression in the various aesthetic exercises—drawing, paper cutting, modeling clay, or dramatization. Whatever the form, it should be the spontaneous portrayal of the child’s own imagery. However crude the product may be, if it is a genuine attempt at such expression, it has the essential element of an aesthetic creation and should have our respect as such. With a very little instruction in putting[32] on sky and ground, in representing distance, progress will be rapid.

Drawing should be in a color medium, and be a daily exercise. Paper-cutting is of absorbing interest to children and is a form of school art that rapidly gives definiteness to the images of natural objects. It brings out a high degree of manual dexterity and offers almost as wide a scope for individual composition as drawing.

These exercises, not needing the teacher’s immediate direction, can take the place of the many forms of meaningless “busy work” that a misdirected ingenuity has devised for the purpose of keeping children “still.”
DRAMATIZATION.

Another form to which the stories lend themselves readily is dramatization. Children take intense delight in throwing striking situations into dramatic form. This exercise also should be undirected. If the story has not become crystallized into set phrases, this form of reproduction becomes a genuine language exercise.
CONSTRUCTION.

In the foregoing we have examples of artistic creation. There is a spontaneous impulse toward embodying in a suitable[33] form the child’s own imagery. This activity goes on for its own sake; it gives pleasure.

In construction proper, where direction is given and objects are made from dictation to serve a useful purpose, we have activity passing over into what is called work. This side should not be neglected. Children are to live in a real world, where the purpose of activity is not always in the activity itself but may lie in something external to it. Things have to be made for certain definite purposes and because of certain needs. These control the activity.

While it may be admitted that the stories do not form the ideal connection for uniting such activity with the whole, yet, under present conditions, they offer the only means practicable. Children will take a deeper interest in making Red Riding Hood’s basket than in making one that has not this ideal environment.

Attention is called to that excellent little manual, “Construction Work,” by Worst, where measurements and directions can be found for the construction of most of the familiar articles of the household.