probable that, while the school undertakes to lay a
general foundation for homemaking efficiency, the home, when it
reaches the full measure of its power and responsibility, will be best
fitted to help the girl to specialize in the direction most suited to
her individual power. It can, if it will, _give_ the girl individual
opportunities such as the mere fact of numbers forbids the school to
give.

The special work of the church in training the girl is necessarily
that which has to do with her spiritual concept of life, the
strengthening of her moral fiber. Here school, home, and church must
each contribute its share. None of them can undertake alone so
important and delicate a task. Any attempt to make arbitrary divisions
in the work of these three agencies is bound to be at least a partial
failure. Conditions differ so widely that we can only say of much of
the work, "at school or church or in the home," or, better, "at
school and church and home in cooeperation." Each must supplement the
efforts of the other, and where one fails, the other must take up the
task. It really matters little where the work is done, provided that
it _is_ done. The ensuing chapters of this book are written in the
hope that they may bring the vital problems of girl training and girl
guidance home to both teacher and parent; and especially that they may
convince both of the value of cooeperation in the inspiring work of
helping our daughters to make the most of their lives.

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 4: Ida M. Tarbell, _The Business of Being a Woman_.]

CHAPTER VI

TRAINING THE LITTLE CHILD

"Children are the home's highest product." That means at the outset
that we have children because we believe in them, and that we train
them, as the skilled workman shapes his wood and clay, to achieve the
greatest result of which the human material is capable.

A factory's output can be standardized. An engine's power can be
measured. But he who trains a child can never fully know the mind he
works with nor the result he attains. We do know, however, that if it
is subject to certain influences, trained by certain laws, _the
chances are_ that this mind which we cannot fully know will react in a
certain way.

To attempt in a chapter to outline a system of training for children
would be an attempt doomed to certain failure. Books are written on
this subject, and the shelves of the child-study and child-training
department in the libraries a