ts of instruction, and what is the system of
discipline, and of rewards and punishments, to which the school has been
accustomed.

If, in such conversations, the teacher should find a few intelligent and
communicative scholars, he might learn a great deal about the past
habits and condition of the school, which would be of great service to
him. Not, by any means, that he will adopt and continue these methods as
a matter of course, but only that a knowledge of them will render him
very important aid in marking out his own course. The more minute and
full the information of this sort is which he thus obtains, the better.
If practicable, it would be well to make out a catalogue of all the
principal classes, with the names of those individuals belonging to them
who will probably attend the new school, and the order in which they
were usually called upon to read or recite. The conversation which would
be necessary to accomplish this would of itself be of great service. It
would bring the teacher into an acquaintance with several important
families and groups of children under the most favorable circumstances.
The parents would see and be pleased with the kind of interest they
would see the teacher taking in his new duties. The children would be
pleased to be able to render their new instructor some service, and
would go to the school-room on the next morning with a feeling of
acquaintance with him, and a predisposition to be pleased. And if by
chance any family should be thus called upon that had heretofore been
captious or complaining, or disposed to be jealous of the higher
importance or influence of other families, that spirit would be entirely
softened and subdued by such an interview with their new instructor at
their own fireside on the evening preceding the commencement of his
labors. The great object, however, which the teacher would have in view
in such inquiries should be the value of the information itself. As to
the use which he will make of it, we shall speak hereafter.

3. It is desirable that the young teacher should meet his scholars first
in an unofficial capacity. For this purpose, 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. The intercourse between
teacher and pupil should be like that between parents and children,
where the utmost freedom is united with the most perfect respect. The
father who is most firm an