the pupil._ Telling a
Junior class primary stories will deplete it in numbers and weaken it
in strength. Assigned work to be prepared at home, questions,
note-books, map-making, anything to stimulate and utilize the activity
of mind and body through interest, not compulsion, is the great
necessity of the lesson hour.

#21. Difficulties of the Junior Age.#--Three difficulties may be
encountered.

(1) _A misdirected energy._ Energy means finest growth and development
if it is under direction and control, but devastation otherwise. The
key to the situation is in the teacher's personality, plus a plan for
the hour's work, appealing to interest and calling for constant
activity, either mental or physical, on the part of the pupil.

(2) _Evil associates._ The teacher cannot guard the child through the
seven days of a week; often the home does not, and in this new social
interest there is a danger from evil associates. Better pastoral work
by the teacher, a closer co-operation with the home, and
substitutive--not prohibitive--measures avail much in meeting this
difficulty.

(3) _The enticement of bad literature._ This period and the next are
the time of greatest hunger for reading and there is a real danger
from the temptations of pernicious books. Satan has emissaries on the
school-grounds and in the candy store, and boys and girls are his
shining marks. The substitutive measures here again are the only wise
and effective ones.

#22. Results to be Expected in the Junior Age.#--The results of work
in this period ought to appear in an increase in Bible knowledge, the
strengthening of right habits and manly ideals of life, and back of
it all the warm love of boyhood and girlhood for the Lord Jesus
Christ.

Test Questions

1. How may spiritual ends best be gained?

2. How may the pupil's efforts in right doing be aroused?

3. What is needed in this period in addition to impressions?

4. What essentials of the Christian life may the pupils readily have
at this period?

5. What aspect of Christianity appeals most to pupils of this age?

6. What method of teaching should be substituted for story telling?

7. What three difficulties may be encountered in the Junior Age?

8. What results may be expected?

Lesson 7

The Intermediate Age--Twelve to Sixteen

#23. General Character of the Period of Adolescence.#--The
Intermediate age ushers in a time known as adolescence, including the
years approximately