g literature
itself; for example, teaching biography, etymology, history, geography,
or science in the literature lesson, because some feature of one or more
of these may be suggested by the language of the lesson. A knowledge of
such subjects is merely preparatory to the study of literature itself.

2. Teaching merely the meanings of words and phrases, and omitting the
greater things of imagery, thought, beauty of language, and the spirit
of the writer.

3. Trying to force appreciation by telling the pupils they must learn to
like such and such works because educated people like them. It is
useless, at this time, to try to develop the critical spirit, as the
pupil has not a sufficiently wide acquaintance with literary works on
which to form a judgment.

4. Doing for the pupil what he should be led to do for himself. A
literature lesson, in which the teacher has been doing all the talking,
or both asking and answering questions, will be barren of good results.

5. Paraphrasing. Short passages may be paraphrased, in order to show
whether the pupil has understood the force and vitality of the metaphor
or the condensed expression. But paraphrasing must be used with great
discretion. The teacher will not make the pupils appreciate the beauty
of a fine literary selection by converting refined gold into low grade
ore.

6. Attempting to draw some moral from every lesson. Not all lessons are
didactic. If the pupils have sympathized with what is noble and just in
the story, the statement of a moral at the conclusion is unnecessary.
Yet in poems that are plainly didactic, for example, _To a Waterfowl_,
Fourth Reader, p. 377, the moral lesson must occupy the first place.
There the teacher should show how the author has enforced the lesson of
_confidence in God's guidance_ by the incident of the migrating
waterfowl, the imagery, the music, the arrangement of parts, and the
similarity of his own position to that of the bird.

7. Dwelling unnecessarily on the intellectual side of a poem that is
mainly emotional and musical; for example, _The Bugle Song_, Third
Reader, p. 337, and _The Solitary Reaper_, Fourth Reader, p. 261. In the
former case, the pupils should be led to realize the visual imagery,
should hear, in imagination, the bugle calls and fading echoes, and
enjoy the rare and appropriate music. In the second case, the teacher
should call attention to the artistic suggestions of loneliness,
distance, antiquity, sadness