THE NORMAL COURSE IN READING. BY EMMA J. TODD, TRAINING TEACHER IN THE PUBLIC SCHOOLS OF AURORA, ILL., AND W. B. POWELL, A.M., SUPERINTENDENT OF PUBLIC SCHOOLS, WASHINGTON, D.C. SECOND READER. SELECT READINGS AND CULTURE LESSONS. SILVER, BURDETT & CO., PUBLISHERS NEW YORK... BOSTON. CHICAGO 1895 Gra THE Education Jatt Sully. NORMAL COURSE IN READING. COMPRISING:- PRIMER: Preliminary Work in Reading; FIRST READER: First Steps in Reading; SECOND READER: Select Readings and Culture Lessons; ALTERNATE THIRD READER: How to Read with Open Eyes; PRIMARY READING CHARTS: Preliminary Drill in Reading, 48 COPYRIGHT, 1891, BY SILVER, BURDETT & Co. Typography: John Wilson & Son. Presswork: Berwick & Smith. Illustrations: H. A. Dennison. PUBLISHERS' NOTE. PROBABLY no books in our schools represent, on the whole, more effort and enterprise on the part of publisher and author alike, than the school reading books. They have constantly received contributions from our ablest and most thoughtful educators, and to their publication have been given the best endeavors of our most successful schoolbook makers facts which abundantly attest the importance of the subject and the interest taken in it by the educational public. That there have yet remained possibilities for improvement in this department of school work cannot be doubted by any who have followed the discussions of the subject among educators and in the press. Our best teachers have not been satisfied with the readers of stereotyped pattern, and have over and again expressed a desire for something different and better. All this has revealed and emphasized the necessity for improvement, not alone in the manner of presentation, but also in the subject-matter presented. It is confidently claimed that the Normal Course in Reading fully answers this demand for improvement. Its literature is of the choicest. Its subject-matter is drawn from topics which attract and engage all children, appealing at once to their intelligence and interest, and giving them something to read about and think about. Its order of presentation and treatment is based on true pedagogical principles. Its plan and scope are natural, comprehensive, and in full accord with the most advanced school work of to-day. A more definite and detailed exposition of the plan, scope, and subject-matter of each book in the series will be found in the Suggestions to Teachers," prepared by the authors. The publishers confidently commend the Series to all progressive educators, and anticipate for it large favor at the hands of those who appreciate the best schoolroom work. 3 SUGGESTIONS TO TEACHERS. DURING the early part of the child's course in reading, the ability to read understandingly and well will proceed most naturally from the habit of talking well. During the latter part of his course in reading, he will talk interestingly and well, proportionately with his ability to read understandingly and well. The child will learn to read well most easily, and therefore most rapidly, by first learning to talk well. The child will take pleasure in learning to read if he has an interest in the subjects about which he is to read. The greater his interest in a subject, the greater will be his delight in reading about it. It is not good educational policy to simplify reading matter to the child's standard of untrained expression. It is better educational work to raise the child's standard of expression to the plane of good English construction. -- This can be done only by training him to talk well. Talking well involves much more than talking with grammatical accuracy. It involves structure of composition, the sequential arrangement of thought and the use of the idiom that properly and elegantly represents such arrangement. To learn to talk well the child must learn to see groups of associate thought as entireties. He must also see the relations of the parts of such groups or units, if they are descriptions, respecting position, size, color, form, etc.; or, as in a group of events, respecting time or relative importance of the events constituting the unit. "My children use as good English in common conversation about their studies [the recitations consisted of conversations about topics of which the lessons treated] as is found in the texts that are placed in their hands," said a most successful teacher of reading. This teacher declared it to be most fascinating work to teach children to read. 4 SUGGESTIONS TO TEACHERS. 5 The subjects about which the child should learn, and be led to talk, are those concerning which he will be afterward called on to read. Most of the words used in this book are in the vocabularies of the children who will read it. The children know the meanings of most of the words well enough to use them for the expression of what they want to say; but they do not know the use of many of the idioms used. The use of these must be taught them by conversation. Let the teacher remember, however, that the children must be made to do the talking, and when talking must be led to use the proper idiom. After the desired use of the idiom has been secured it may be written on the board, that the child may learn its form before he meets with it in the text. The children should be made ready to read the lessons of this book by work adapted to the lessons respectively. Definiteness of purpose should characterize every preparation. There should be variety of methods in the work of preparation. The good teacher will give as much variety to this work as is found in the topics on which the lessons treat, increased by the variety found in the forms of their settings. The children may be prepared for most of the lessons by properly conducted conversation, the children doing most of the talking. As The children are to be prepared to read a description by first being made able to describe that of which the lesson treats. the talking lesson proceeds let the difficult words, new phrases, and involved sentences be written on the board, to be read by the children. All of this work should be sequential in its order, accurate in the expression of exact thought, correct in its grammatical construction; and, while showing variety in arrangement and expression, should involve the use of the difficult new words and idioms of the text. For the lessons in narration let the teacher relate a story, using the utmost care both with the structure of the thought and with the construction of the sentences. Then let the children reproduce the story, being guided to the same care in securing the sequential arrangement of thought and the purity of language. As the reproductions develop, let them appear on the board to be read by the children. |