the writer's conviction that nothing is so much needed at the present time as the unification of English work from the earliest to the latest stages of progression. It should be controlled by unity of purpose and programme, and animated by unity of spirit. Each step should be taken with a clear knowledge both of the steps that have preceded and of those that are to follow it, and with a clear recognition of the all-important fact that the powers which are being trained are, at the beginning, the same powers that in their riper stages of growth are still being trained by the high school teacher and college professor. The child is busy from the beginning to the end, appreciatively, with the same great types of literature, and, expressively, with the same four kinds of writing, narrative, descriptive, expository, and argumentative. What is essential to success is agreement as to the stages and methods by which. the work is to be carried forward. 'Ah," said a practical grammar grade teacher, leaving a lecture by Professor Skyward on English Teaching, "if these learned professors would only descend to the level of practical talk, and instead of outlining Utopia to us, would suggest definite aims and definite ways of achieving them, time would not be wasted in listening to their lectures." The writer hopes he is not open to this reproach. He has aimed to be definite enough without being too prescriptive; to be practical without sacrificing suggestiveness. What is set down here is the outcome of his own efforts in the class room and in the work of supervision in the Ethical Culture Schools of New York. He may be permitted to say that his more audacious experiments were first put to trial in the Manual Training High School of Brooklyn, and to record here his appreciation of the opportunities generously afforded him in that institution by the Principal, Mr. Charles D. Larkins. Since then, he has reaped the benefit of working in what is generally regarded as one of the experimental stations in education, -the Ethical Culture Schools founded by Dr. Felix Adler. Here, in fortunate association with Mr. J. F. Reigart and Mr. Frank A. Manny, successively its Superintendents, -not omitting Dr. Adler himself, who takes the keenest personal interest in the English work, - he has had a chance of getting into vital touch with a school that covers the whole field of elementary and secondary education. He owes much in opportunities and friendly aid to the school and its teachers, and would make especial acknowledgment of criticism and suggestions received from Mr. Manny, and, among the teachers, Miss Katharine C. Burnett, who have been kind enough to read the book throughout. If a word may be added to intimate the point of view assumed in the writer's outlook upon his task, it may be this he has conceived of the duty and privilege of the teacher of English to be that of teaching it not only for its linguistic values, for the making of intelligent readers and capable writers and speakers; but for its large culture values, and, above all, for its character values, for the spiritual enlargement, clarification, and discipline of young hearts and minds and wills, which are to be touched to finer issues by its potent ministry. P. C. CONTENTS The Literary Movement and the Contemporaneous Scientific The School versus the Social Environment - The Double PAGE ing Principles - Education as Nurture - Self-activity- What is required of the Teacher as to Voice, Manner, Diction -Story-telling-Conversation and Story-reproduction - Correction of Faults - Material for Memorizing and Dec- lamation - First Rate and Second Rate Standards of The Modern Reaction against Bookishness The Divorce between Words and Things — Postponing the Read-Write Process Professor Dewey's Position Methods; the READING IN THE PRIMARY GRADES: I. WHAT TO KEAD Criteria of Suitability - Correlation and its Conditions he Tastes and Interests of the Child Order of Development READING IN THE PRIMARY GRADES: II. HOW TO READ Methods of Treatment as Factors in determining Suitability - |