PART I. The Teacher's Teaching Work. CHAPTER 4. Teaching The true order of study. Job,-how much longer than Methuselah would the man have to live before he had reached the bottom of that lesson? The exhaustive study of any question is always exhaustless, and is practically out of the question. Unless a teacher realizes this truth, he is not prepared to begin the wise study of a lesson as preparatory to its teaching, according to any plan. The words of the lesson must first be considered in a teacher's studying; then, their connected meaning; then, the legitimate inferences from their declaration; first, the simple text of the lesson; then, the plain teachings of the text; then, the applications of those teachings. In this studying, a reference Bible with maps, a concordance, an English dictionary, and a Bible dictionary, are indispensable; unless, in the lack of these, one has the substance of their information on points at issue in a well-arranged lesson-help. What is here said? What is the obvious teaching of this? What is the bearing of all this on my scholars ?—are the questions which every teacher must consider all the way along, as he studies a lesson with a view to its teaching. Or, in a compacter form, it amounts to this: What is there in this lesson that I ought to teach my scholars, and that I can hope to teach them? And this latter question must have in mind, for its answering, the individual scholars as they are known individually to the teacher. The special portion for Selecting from the Bill of Fare. Willy, the special portion for Mary, and the special portion for each of the other scholars, must be looked for and recognized in the lesson, in order to complete the process of " rightly dividing the word. of truth”—which is the duty of every teacher who "needeth not to be ashamed" of his failure in his attempted work. There is a vast deal more in every lesson than you can hope to teach your scholars; or than you ought to try to teach them. It is right for you to know more than you attempt to cause your scholars to know. Goethe, indeed, says: "Nothing is worse, than a teacher who knows only as much as he has to make known to the scholar." A forgetfulness of this truth stands in the way of good teaching by some who study hard, and who gather material enough on every lesson for a dozen classes, and for a month of Sundays; and then are troubled because they cannot teach it all. The question, therefore, is not, What do you know of this lesson? but, What are you to cause your scholars to know of this lesson? Until you can answer this question explicitly, in view of your knowledge of your scholars, and out of your experience in their teaching, you are not yet through with your indispensable study as preparatory to your teaching of the lesson now in hand. Your study must include a great deal more than an acquaintance with all the multitudinous dishes on the extended PART I. The Teacher's Teaching Work. CHAPTER 4. Methods of the Teaching Name your points. bill of lesson-fare. You are to decide which of these dishes are suited to your particular scholars, with their tastes and needs as you know them; for unless you do this you will cram your scholars without feeding them, or they will famish while you are expatiating on the merits of dishes which are wholly beyond their reach. A good way of both perfecting and testing your preparatory study of a lesson, as a teacher, is for you to state to yourself in a few words the points of your proposed lesson-teaching. Some one has facetiously said, that in the average church prayer-meeting he would like the privilege of calling out at the close of a rambling speaker's remarks, according to the custom in deliberative bodies, "Will the gentleman be so good as to submit his proposition in writing?” In other words, What have you been saying? What point, if any, were you trying to make? It would be well for every teacher to ask himself, before he sets out for his class, What am I now ready to teach my scholars to cause my scholars to know-to-day? His preliminary study should be made with that question before him for ultimate answer. The Third Requisite. 125 III. HOW TO PLAN FOR A LESSON'S TEACHING. Necessity of a Teaching Plan; Tantalus and his Successors; Bugbear Methods of Teaching; Being Scientific without Knowing it; Various Lights from one Crystal; Ananias and Sapphira; A Beginning, a Middle, and an Ending; Keeping within Time; One Teacher's Way of Doing. PART I. The Tea her's Work. CHAPTER 4. Methods of the Teaching Process. EVEN when the teacher knows clearly the scholars whom he would teach, knows them individually Teaching according to their peculiar capabilities and needs; and knows, also, the lesson he would teach to those scholars, knows it as suited to their condition and requirements; he is not yet prepared to begin its teaching. The essential requisites of a teacher's preparation for the teaching-process have been shown to be threefold, including a knowledge of one's scholar, a knowledge of one's lesson, and a knowledge of wise teaching methods. When two of these essentials are secured, the third must be added, to make the others of any avail. Unless a teacher The third or knows how to teach the lesson he has learned, to the scholar who needs to learn it, that teacher is as yet incapable of being the teacher of that lesson to that none. PART I. Teaching CHAPTER 4. Thirsty scholar. Hence a plan of teaching is as needful as a plan of study, in one's wise preparation for the teaching-process. A thirsty man craves drink. Another man knows the thirsty one's need, and obtains a bucket of water. When the full bucket and the empty man are near each other, the thirst is not yet quenched. If no way is provided by which the water in that bucket can be transferred to the parching throat which longs for it, the thirsty man is as sure to famish, as if the bucket were still empty. That is the very idea of the fate of the fabled Tantalus. He was always thirsty, and the water which might have quenched his thirst was always near him; but there was no way of bringing together the water and his longing lips. He was always hungry, and luscious clusters of fruit always swung temptingly before his eyes, just beyond his reach. It is tantalizing to have a full teacher and an empty scholar within reach of each other, without any knowledge on the teacher's part, of a way by which he can give to the scholar that with which he is full and running over. Knowing how to cause the scholar whom the teacher knows, to know the truth which the teacher knows, can change that which is tantalizing into that which is satisfying. And to this end every teacher must plan in his lesson-preparing. Teaching methods are numerous, and it is often the case that an intending teacher is confused and |