3. While doing what is here indicated, let a constant application be made of the knowledge acquired in the phonic drill. This knowledge can be retained only by

constant use.

4. The teacher may, at his discretion, either pass next to another selection analyzed in the book, or he may take up, for analysis and reading, a piece similar to the one already read. The pupils should prepare such written questions as they can by way of analysis,-the teacher carefully examining them, and supplying additional ones wherever necessary to develop the thought.

5. The pieces analyzed in the book should be studied before other similar ones are attempted.

6. As much of the original thinking as possible should come upon the pupil, and he should, finally, make full and complete analyses for himself.

7. The appendix should be carefully examined when a lesson has been assigned, and all the notes bearing upon the piece carefully learned. Many other points will require explanation beside those set forth in the notes.

8. Every good teacher will possess one or the other (it would be best to have both) of our unabridged American dictionaries, and will strive to be on intimate terms with its pages. The notation of the recent edition of Webster is adopted in this book, but there will be no inconvenience in using Worcester in connection with it.

9. The teacher must be prepared to illustrate by his own reading the proper rendering of every sentence the pupils are called upon to pronounce. It is impossible to teach young people, or any one else, to read well, except by setting a good example before them.

10. LET THE TEACHER SEE TO IT THAT, AT EVERY STEP, HE IS THOROUGHLY MASTER OF THE LESSON IN ALL ITS BEARINGS,-THAT HE NOT ONLY KNOWS IT FOR HIMSELF, BUT IS PREPARED TO LEAD HIS PUPILS INTO A CLEAR AND COMPLETE UNDERSTANDING OF IT.

INTRODUCTION

TO THE

PHONIC ANALYSIS

No one will deny that a ready and exact enunciation is a requisite to good reading. In the belief that such promptness and accuracy can be best attained by a thorough drill on what are called the vocal elements, the following Lessons-for some time tested in the Illinois. State Normal University-are presented for use in other schools.

Every intelligent and unprejudiced mind will welcome any means by which loose and pernicious habits of enunciation may be cast off, and correct ones formed in their stead. This is not an easy task. The pupil of fifteen or eighteen years of age, who has been accustomed to say givun for giv'n, kitch'n for kitchen, and smort for smart, will not be likely, by a single effort, to set his speech right. By well directed and persevering effort he can do it: with proper guidance and encouragement he will do it.

Most who thus mar the English are unconscious of their defects. They have either never observed a different style of pronunciation-possibly have heard no otheror they have accounted whatever differences they have noticed in others as peculiarities, worthy only of a smile or a jest. If the ear, because of dullness, has failed to report the actual diversity, it must be quickened; if the judgment and taste are false, they are to be corrected: in both cases, the organs, untrained to the just utterance of the language, are to be exercised on elements, combinations, syllables, words, and collocations of words, until they become loyal to well-spoken English.

Nor is it to those alone whose enunciation or pronunciation is excessively bad, that this drill is of use. To the

thousands who speak and read with passable accuracy, the study and drill upon vocal elements is not less useful. These are often ready to seize upon the leading principles, as well as the grosser facts, pertaining to the science of Orthoëpy, and they find ample compensation for their labor, in the generalizations suggested by a few weeks' practice in phonetic analysis.

SUGGESTIONS.

1. This drill, to be of real use, must be thorough. THE TEACHER MUST MASTER IT FIRST. Let him be sure of this, at least, that, before calling upon a pupil to utter a given element, he is prepared to utter it himself."

2. The teacher may need to exercise some care and patience, before each pupil is prevailed on to abandon the habit of saying "em" for the first sound in the word make, and "kay" for the last sound. The aim has been to make the Lessons explicit on this point.

3. ALLOW NO FEEBLE WORK. In recitation, the pupil should stand erect, have the lungs well supplied with air, and utter each element forcibly. Repetition is all-important; but repetition with inaccuracy is almost an unmixed evil. Before, as well as after, analyzing a word, the pupil should pronounce it with all the clearness and precision he can command. If it be a polysyllable, still more repetition is recommended; thus,-"melody; měl mel | ō melō | d ĭ dĭ | melody."

4. The manner of beginning with a class, and especially where the exercise is a novelty, must be left to the judgment of the teacher. A concert exercise may be judicious, as tending to remove the feeling of awkwardness and to beget confidence. After a lesson or two, however, there should be already established in every pupil's mind a feeling of personal accountability for the work assigned; and concert drill should thereafter occupy none of the time needful to the teacher in determining the degree of thoroughness with which each pupil has prepared his lesson.

5. Phonic writing is a valuable aid to both teacher and pupil. When a vocal element is recognized by the ear, there are striking advantages in having a character by which uniformly to represent it: First, the pupil's progress is accelerated by his being compelled to subject each doubtful sound of every word assigned, to a discriminating study, in order properly to represent it on the paper to be passed in for the teacher's inspection; and, secondly, a class may be set to write a lesson "by sound," whether at school or at their own homes, thus enabling the teacher to get more work done, and, by means of the thoroughness of this mode of examination, to acquaint himself with the care and proficiency of each member of his class.

6. To use the characters proposed involves a mastery of nearly the entire Pronouncing Key of Webster's Dictionary—in itself a very valuable acquisition. We use Webster's rather than Pitman's or any other strictly phonetic notation, because we suppose that fewer teachers will be repelled by whatever of novelty and uncouthness it may present to the common eye; and Webster's rather than Worcester's, because we have reason to think that more teachers are already somewhat familiar with the former than with the latter.

7. No good teacher will omit to give explicit directions in regard to the paper which is to be passed in to him. The following points are certainly worthy of attention: 1. The form and size of the paper. 2. The place for the pupil's name. 3. The arrangement of words—whether

in horizontal line or in column. 4. Neatness.

8. While marking the errors found in a written classexercise, the teacher will do well to make a list of such as are most frequent or most important, in order that to these he may call the attention of the entire class. After rea sonable time has been allowed, every pupil will be called on to state how each word that he finds marked by the teacher should have been written.