the bare and barren trunk, the words of a text not understood; to frame questions which shall be as the fire beneath the crucible to separate the gold from the dross in the student's gathered treasure-this is the work of a master.

All teachers ask questions. Probably most of us ask too many. It is easy so to "educate" a class that its members can not recite outside the bars of an interrogative go-cart on text-bookish wheels. A question should not be a staff upon which the hobbling pupil may lean. The Socratic method (not the Socratic idea) may be made the weakest of methods. Let questions be so put as to give pupils a many-sided view of the thought, fact, or idea under discussion. He who has viewed but one side cannot know. The only time I ever "got lost" was when, as a boy, I came home from uncle's, "cross-lots," and had a rear view of several farm-houses that I had seen from the front a thousand times. I then saw them from a new stand-point and did not recognize them. Rigid, uncompromising questioning should make our pupils familiar with the back-doors and side-entrances of their mental possessions. It is not enough that the pupil may be able to reproduce, orally or upon paper, the language of a text-book, though such ability may yield the highest percents. The best products of good teaching cannot be measured in percents. The best products of poor teaching-of mere routine drill-may be so measured. Skillful cross-examination will reveal the real wealth or poverty of the pupil's possessions. Too many teachers, with malice prepense, employ tricks and devices in questioning which reduce to a minimum the possibility of a failure on the part of the pupil. It is so flattering to both pupils and teacher to have all questions correctly answered. Flattering, indeed, but by no means always indicative of good teaching. The thought-inducing teacher will ask many questions which his pupils can not answer "off-hand," many that will show them that they have not pushed their investigations far enough; questions that will determine whether the student has thought, or has merely been "rattling the shells of thought." Often it is better to accept for the moment a pupil's ill-considered and inaccurate statement, and use it as the basis of a few incisive questions which will compel him to see the absurdity of his position, than simply to say, "You are wrong; so-and-so is the fact." The former course possesses two advantages: a flat, unrelieved contradiction is irritating to the contradicted party; and the chagrin of defeat upon his own chosen ground will tend to arouse in the pupil a determination not to permit himself to be again so defeated.

A few illustrations may not be without value to the young teachers, for whom I am trying to write.

A boy is reciting a lesson in grammar, and says, "It is a declarative sentence." It was a declarative sentence, and the direct-examiner (his teacher) was proceeding to the next point, when a visitor asked, "What is a declarative sentence ?" "A declarative sentence is one that declares something." "What do you mean when you say 'it declares something?"" "I don't know." (This answer was correct.) "Make a declarative sentence." "Shut the door." He had the shell but not the kernel.

Class in Geography: T. "What is an island ?" is a body of land surrounded by water." "How large do you suppose an island to V. "As large as the school-yard?" P. P. as our village?" P. "May be so." V. P. "Oh, no; not so large as that."

P.

"An island visitor inquires : "I dont know."

Then the be ?". P. "Larger." V. "As large "As large as County?"

"Meridians, etc."

Again : T. "What are meridians ?" P. (Correctly answered.) V. "How many meridians are there?" P. "I have never counted them." V. "Could you count them ?" P. "Yes, sir." V. "Where?" P. "Upon the map." V. "Are there any meridians passing through this village ?" P. "I think not; I have never seen any." V. "Are there any passing through this room ?" P. "No, sir," etc., till it was perfectly plain that the pupil possessed the words of the text, and nothing else.

Class in Geography, Eclectic No. 2, studying South America. The subject of latitude, etc., came up. In answer to questions put by the visitor, latitude, longitude, meridians, parallels, etc., were correctly defined, but Venezuela was located in north latitude and Mexico (on another map) in south latitude. A little patient questioning revealed the fact that they or some of them-thought that places at the top of the map were in north latitude, and places at the bottom of the map in south latitude. Further questioning brought out the fact that they supposed meridians and parallels to be straight lines and that there is a definite number of them-the number represented on the maps. When asked if a straight line can be drawn on the surface of a sphere, or ball, the majority replied, "yes." The minority were silent. A little time spent in observation and reflection served to set the majority right. A few still thought a very short straight line might be drawn on a sphere. Some still insisted that there was something wrong, as the lines on the wall-map (Mercator's) were straight. This was not a dull class. Its pupils were intelligent, diligent, and obedient. They had not been thoroughly cross-examined.

Such illustrations might be multiplied from actual experience till the iteration would become tedious. My experience may be exceptional,

but I fear that very many self-satisfied teachers would be appalled at the meagerness of the products of their labors, would they but critically examine them.

Questioning closely has its humorous side.

A little third-reader girl read: "Besides Jamie, Mrs. Brown had three other children, and her hands were full." "Full of what ?" asked the visitor. "Full of children," was the prompt reply.

At "morning exercises," a hundred pupils, and several visiting Reverends present, a pupil recited a "gem" which contained the word "proverb." "What is a proverb ?" asked the principal. "A proverb is what some man writes," said one. "I wrote something a few days ago," said the principal; "was that a proverb ?" "No," replied an eleven years old girl; a proverb is a wise saying which some smart man writes." The principal proceeded with the exercises as soon as preachers and pupils stopped laughing.

A pupil called the teacher's attention to a sentence in Froude's "Cæsar a Sketch." : "Political storms are always cyclones." "Why cyclones ?" asked the teacher. With a twinkle of humor came the answer "I suppose because there is so much hard blowing." Perhaps the humor might excuse the slang.

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The style of question and answer illustrated in the examination conducted by the gentleman who visited the school with "Thomas Gradgrind, sir; a man of realities, a man of facts," is probably not wholly out of use. "Now let me ask you, boys and girls, would you paper a room with representations of horses? After a pause, one half of the children cried in chorus, 'Yes, sir.' Upon which, the other half, seeing in the gentleman's face that yes was wrong, cried out in chorus, 'no, sir,'-as is the custom at such examinations. 'Of course, no. Why wouldn't you?' 'Do you ever see up and down the sides of a room in reality-in fact?' one half, 'no, sir' from the other," etc.

horses walking 'Yes, sir,' from

The term uni

Class in Physics.-Universal properties of matter. versal properties defined, universal properties named and defined, and teacher about to pass to next topic. The visitor says, "Name an elastic substance." Done. "Another." Done. "Is rubber elastic?" "Of course." "Is water elastic ?" "Yes, sir," from one half. A pause on the part of the visitor. "No, sir," from the other half, and discussion failed to settle the question to the satisfaction of all. "Is putty elastic?" "No, sir," from a decided majority, "yes, sir," from an undecided minority. The class needed the discipline of crossexamination.

I will close by expressing the hope that some master will soon give us a volume on "The Art of Questioning."

A FEW HOURS WITH EDUCATIONAL JOURNALS.

We think our readers will enjoy the following racy article, contributed by Dr. E. E. White to the January number of the Indiana School Journal:

I have just put in my library eleven newly bound volumes of the Indiana School Journal. These, with the nine volumes bound in 1870, contain a valuable record of school progress in Indiana for twenty years, and I am very desirous of securing the preceding five volumes, several of which were edited by the lamented Henkle.

I have also added to my library seven bound volumes of the OHIO EDUCATIONAL MONTHLY, completing the set of this journal from 1852 to 1882 inclusive. These thirty-one volumes (15 of which I edited), with the prior four volumes of the Ohio School Journal and a volume of the Public School Advocate, both edited by Dr. A. D. Lord, present a complete history of educational progress in Ohio from 1848 to the present year.

My library also contains twenty volumes of the Pennsylvania School Journal, beginning with 1861, and twenty-seven volumes of Barnard's American Journal of Education, beginning with the first volume, issued in 1856-the greatest work of the kind in the English language, if not in any language.

My collection of Educational Journals also contains one or more bound volumes of nearly all the more important American journals, hitherto published. Among these are four volumes of the Connecticut Common School Journal, from 1838 to 1842, inclusive, edited by Henry Barnard; three volumes of the R. I. Institute of Instruction, 1845 to 1848 inclusive, also edited by Henry Barnard; twelve volumes of the Massachusetts Teacher, the first being the sixth volume, issued in 1852, and early volumes of the New York Teacher, Connecticut Common School Journal, Rhode Island Schoolmaster, Illinois Teacher, Wisconsin Journal of Education, etc.

Of all the educational journals published prior to 1870, only three are still issued. These, in the order of their ages, are the OHIO EDUCATIONAL MONTHLY, the Pennsylvania School Journal, and the Indiana School Journal-all three being well sustained and vigorous, with the promise of many years of usefulness.

I have recently spent several hours in looking over the later numbers of these journals and comparing them with the earlier volumes. The comparison has been very interesting and suggestive. The improvement in the character of the journals is very marked, and in no direction has this progress been greater than in the practical value of

the articles. There is a clearer grasp of guiding principles and a more intelligent application of these principles to school work in the later than in the earlier volumes; and this suggests the value of these jour. nals as a record of school progress. Nowhere else can the improvements made in school systems and in methods of teaching be more satisfactorily learned. In the earlier volumes will be found articles earnestly advocating measures and agencies now almost universally employed. The later volumes advocate improvements in these agencies and the remedying of defects.

But in no other respect is the change in these journals so marked as in the discussion of methods of instruction—and especially of primary instruction. Thirty years ago there were very few articles devoted to the teaching of little children, and these either described methods long since discarded, or they hinted at better methods in such terms as show that they were ideals and not methods actually used by the writers.

As a rule, the earlier papers on methods are general and indefinite, with few details, but here and there the reader finds a paper that opens wide windows into what is properly called a natural method of primary teaching papers showing clear vision and practical knowledge. The more recent papers on methods abound in details, showing, on their face, that they are not mere theories, but are the delineations of actual school work. They map out the way and note the steps to be taken with the minuteness and accuracy of the practical surveyor. All this indicates the progress actually made in elementary instruction. The better methods known to a few superior teachers thirty years ago, and later taught in normal schools and teachers' institutes, have widely worked their way into the American school, and are now skillfully used by thousands of progressive teachers. This has been the work of no one man or score of men. Hundreds of wise teachers have been solving this problem of child teaching, and, as a result, the methods of the primary school have been radically improved-not in all communities, but in many communities. The progress made in embodying sound theory in successful practice in the schools has, it is true, been slow-an illustration of the wise remark of Jno. Stuart Mill, that "a reform even of governments and churches is not so slow as that of schools, for there is the great preliminary difficulty of fashioning the instruments; of teaching the teachers." It is for this reason, that improved methods of teaching are usually worked out by individual teachers or by a body of teachers under the instruction and oversight of a superior teacher. It is for a like reason that such improved methods are disseminated largely by what may be called the training