12. Read aloud to younger classes every advance lesson. Explain the meaning of difficult or unusual words. In this way, it is possible for pupils to get the sense of what they read.

13. Make a list of words that pupils most frequently mispronounce, and drill your pupils in the correct pronunciation of these words. It is not enough to tell a pupil of a fault he commits; make him correct it himself. Put an instant stop to screaming, shouting, or drawling.

14. Occasionally take a spelling-lesson from the reading - lesson, but do not mix up spelling and reading together. "To make the child spell all the time he is reading," says Superintendent Eliot, "is like tripping him when we would have him walk. Spelling is to be practised at the outset only so far as it is a help to reading; but it never should have the lion's share it has long claimed in our teaching."

15. Train your classes daily, the higher grade as well as the lower, in some one of the following exercises in vocal culture:

1. Attitude.

2. Breathing.

3. Vowel sounds.

4. Articulation.

5. Enunciation.

6. Pronunciation.

16. Breathing exercises are of great value as an aid in securing an erect attitude and the free use of the vocal organs. Introduce every lesson with a short drill. Train your pupils to keep their lungs well filled with air, and to breathe often while reading.

17. In all classes, from the highest to the lowest, give frequent and thorough drill upon words containing the vowel sounds, properly grouped and arranged. Pay special attention to those sounds which children in some parts of

our country are apt to give incorrectly: such as a in hälf, cälf, läugh, etc.; intermediate a, as in ȧsk, lást, påst, åfter, etc.; u after r, as in true, rude, fruit, etc.; u as in tube, tune, etc.; o as in do, two, etc.; o as in road, coat, etc. The school is the proper place for correcting provincialisms in pronunciation.

18. Do not allow children to pronounce the words one by one, slowly and monotonously. From the first, pay particular attention to the much-abused articles a and the. These should be read as if they formed a syllable of the following word: as, a-book', a-hat', just as a is sounded in around', along the sound of a slightly obscured and shortened, not the sound of u in but. So, also, "the book" is sounded thu-book', not "the book'" nor "thur'-book'." Pupils from the outset should be taught to read in phrases: as, The-poor-man, had-on-his-head, a-white-hat.

19. In the primary classes, teach pupils at least the dictionary notation of the long and the short vowel sounds; and, in the grammar grades, explain, by blackboard drill, the entire notation of the school dictionary in use, so that pupils may be able to find out for themselves the correct pronunciation of words. Train your pupils to refer to the dictionary for definitions as well as pronunciation.

20. Avoid the extreme of a high-pitched, sharp, piercing, unnatural school-tone, as well as the other extreme of feebleness and indistinctness. The following will indicate a good standard of force and loudness in school reading:

Every scholar must read so that every other member of the class can easily hear every word without looking at the book.

In order to determine this standard, listen to the reading without a book in your hands, and occasionally let

your pupils close their books while one of their number is reading.

21. In a graded class of fifty pupils, it is desirable to train the whole class together a part of the time; but sometimes it is best to divide the class into sections of ten each, taking one section at a time, and allowing the others to study a spelling-lesson or to write a composition.

In

22. In grammar-grade classes, make reading-lessons the basis of exercises in grammar and composition, but take them as exercises distinct from the mere act of reading aloud. [See Part III., "Reading."] In one lesson let the pupils find out all the nouns, in another the verbs, and in a third every pronoun, etc. In one lesson confine the attention of pupils to phrases, in one to clauses, and in another to simple, complex, or compound sentences. one lesson call attention to nothing but the use of capitals, in one to the use of the period, and in another of the comma. The interest and success of these lessons depend on the principle of taking one thing at a time. Then let your pupils copy the whole or a part of a lesson from the open book, and, next, require them to write what they can of it from memory.

23. In order to prevent monotony, occasionally carry into school a good story book or paper, such as The Nursery, Harper's Young People, Esop's Fables, St. Nicholas, Robinson Crusoe, etc., and from that let each pupil, in turn, read a paragraph or page while the others listen. Such an exercise, rightly managed, will kindle an interest in the deadest class ever fossilized under the steady dropping of the old-style reading-lesson.

24. Let the older scholars occasionally read something from their scrap-books. When you find an exceedingly

interesting story or anecdote in the newspaper suitable for school use, clip it out, cut it up into short paragraphs; paste these upon card-board slips, number them, distribute them to your class, and let each pupil read one slip.

25. The speaking of dialogues is a material aid in securing naturalness in reading. The reading or recitation of short selections of poetry also forms a part of reading culture.

26. In order to fix and hold the attention, occasionally let each pupil read only one line of poetry or prose, around the class, until the lesson is finished. Again, let each scholar read only one word.

27. For concert reading, sometimes divide your class into small sections of four, six, or ten pupils each, and then match one against another to see which reads the best.

28. Do not allow a scholar, when reading, to be interrupted by corrections, or made nervous by upraised hands. Let the corrections be made after the reading.

29. Do not be too critical yourself, and do not allow class criticism to run into needless fault-finding. Be more watchful to commend good reading than to criticise poor reading.

30. Once in a while, let the scholars choose sides and make up a reading-match, every one who makes any mistake to be seated.

31. The pupils of all the higher-grade classes should be trained to lift their eyes from the book and look at the teacher or the class. In order to do this, the eye must anticipate the voice, taking in the last part of the sentence, so that it can be uttered while the reader is looking at his listeners.

32. "The investigation of the reading - lesson," says Currie, "forms the highest exercise of connected thinking in the common-school, and, if judiciously conducted, ought to contribute very much to the habit of reflective reading in after-life."

33. As ninety-nine hundredths of all the reading done by men and women is done silently and mentally, it is evident that the main purpose of the teacher, in all the higher-grade classes, should be to train pupils to think when reading, and to gather up all the thoughts of the writer from the printed page.

34. "Systematic reading," says Russell, "is a valued means for cultivating reflective habits of mind; reading which is study, not perusal; reading which is attentively done, carefully reviewed, exactly recorded, or orally recounted. Memory, under such discipline, becomes thoroughly retentive, information exact, judgment correct, conception clear, thought copious, and expression ready and appropriate."

35. Every school library ought to contain several sets of school Readers, to supplement those in the hands of the pupils. When scholars have read through their cwn books, the new ones will excite a fresh interest. Besides, in all except the lowest classes, an intelligent child will extract most of the information worth anything, from an ordinary class-book, in less than sixty days. "No one thing," says Horace Mann, "will contribute more to intelligent reading than a well-selected school library."

II. QUOTATIONS FROM EDUCATORS.

I. "If teachers will cease to require little children to 'read over' and to 'study' beforehand their reading ex