r
the future.

My plan would be to have a familiar talk with the children one day,
drawing from them, as far as it can be done, the rules of behavior which
the teacher wishes to impress upon them. When she can illustrate a point
by a story, the impression will be deepened. It is well also to speak
of acts which have come under the teacher's eye in the school-room, on
the play-ground, or on the way to school, and let the children decide
whether these were polite or impolite, and why. This will make the whole
matter more real to them, and, if they are encouraged to furnish
illustrations, they will open their eyes and find them in their own
little worlds. We want our children in school, from the youngest to the
oldest, to notice a breach of politeness as quickly as an error in
recitation. A little girl of five from a wretched family, who had proved
an apt scholar in the branch under consideration, one day performed some
trifling service for an awkward little new scholar. I shall never forget
her look and tone of amazement as she turned to her teacher with, "Why!
he didn't say 'Thank you.'"

At the time of the next exercise, I would have the children reproduce
from an outline placed upon the blackboard the precepts deduced from the
previous talk, not insisting upon any form of words, but encouraging
them to use their own. This will be also a good oral exercise in
language. If the scholars are old enough, this oral review can be put
upon paper, either at this time or for a composition exercise another
day. Nothing except practising the precepts will so fix these in their
minds.

If the teacher thinks best, a copy of this manual may be placed in the
hands of each scholar, and the lesson prepared like other lessons, from
the printed page. This course would diminish the amount of blackboard
writing.

Let the teacher, when it seems wise, commend acts of politeness in her
scholars. If they know she sees and appreciates their efforts, they will
redouble them.

It should be her constant aim to lead her scholars so to think on these
things that are lovely and of good report in the province of manners, as
well as in the higher one of morals, to which it is so closely allied,
that thinking may take the shape of doing, and doing may crystallize
into habit.

LESSON I.

OUTLINE FOR BLACKBOARD.

MANNERS IN GENERAL.

_Quotation about manners._
_Golden Rule._
_Need of constant pract