PREFACE This First Reader is intended as a text-book and has been prepared with special reference to the needs of beginning classes. In such a book it is essential that the sentences be short and simple, that the thought be objective and intrinsically interesting to young children, and that the lessons be so graded that the pupil may pass by steps imperceptible to himself from the simple to the more difficult.. It is believed that these requirements have been successfully met. It is, furthermore, essential in a first reading book, designed to be used as a text-book, that only a few new words be presented in each succeeding lesson, that the lessons contain only words which have been taught, and that sufficient provision be made for the repetition of words to impress them on the mind of the pupil. These are requirements which must be adhered to more rigidly in a text-book than in a book which is designed only for supplementary use, as all teachers of experience well know. The classical literature of fairy tale and fable has been introduced in simple form in this book, and more generally in the other books of the series; but not to the exclusion of choice material in prose and poetry, which gives variety, interest and help to the work. |