son is now, I should
have to tell others, and thus should adopt a practice which I have
condemned."

Take another case. You assign to a class of little girls a subject of
composition, requesting them to copy their writing upon a sheet of
paper, leaving a margin an inch wide at the top, and one of half an inch
at the sides and bottom. The class take their seats, and, after a short
time, one of them comes to you, saying she does not know how long an
inch is.

"Don't you know any thing about it?"

"No, sir, not much."

"Should you think _that_ is more or less than an inch?" (pointing to a
space on a piece of paper much too large).

"More."

"Then you know something about it. Now I did not tell you to make the
margins _exactly_ an inch and half an inch, but only as near as you
could judge?"

"Would _that_ be about right?" asks the girl, showing a distance.

"I must not tell you, because, you know, I never in such cases help
individuals; if that is as near as you can get it, you may make it so."

It may be well, after assigning a lesson to a class, to say that all
those who do not distinctly understand what they have to do may remain
after the class have taken their seats, and ask: the task may then be
distinctly assigned again, and the difficulties, so far as they can be
foreseen, explained.

By such means these sources of interruption and difficulty may, like the
others, be almost entirely removed. Perhaps not altogether, for many
cases may occur where the teacher may choose to give a particular class
permission to come to him for help. Such permission, however, ought
never to be given unless it is absolutely necessary, and should never be
allowed to be taken unless it is distinctly given.

4. Hearing recitations. I am aware that many attempt to do something
else at the same time that they are hearing a recitation, and there may
perhaps be some individuals who can succeed in this. If the exercise to
which the teacher is attending consists merely in listening to the
reciting word for word some passage committed to memory, it can be done.
I hope, however, to show in a future chapter that there are other and
far higher objects which every teacher ought to have in view in his
recitations, and he who understands these objects, and aims at
accomplishing them--who endeavors to _instruct_ his class, to enlarge
and elevate their ideas, to awaken a deep and paramount interest in the
subject which they are examining, w