HARRY LAUDER'S ADVICE TO TEACHERS.

Dominion, Volume 6, Issue 1659, 28 January 1913, Page 4

HARRY LAUDER'S ADVICE TO TEACHERS.

VALUE OF KINDNESS AND A • jWIILING FACE.

A naw and interesting appearance was '!52? 0 TO Cen P y -A^ y - Mr..'ll«rrr'Lauder 'in Iho Woman Teachcr's World," to Which Uo contributed tho weekly "messago" to teachers. Ho; offers some advice which, if not new, is flhvays worth read ing. 'I should say," he remarks, "that tlio mam duty of a teacher is to gain the conUdenco and respect of the pupil. Let tho boy or girl brought under your charge realise that you nro n good - and wiso rriend, and not a fearsome personage, to bo regarded with a combination of awe and dread, Lnr moro can be douo with a youngster bv knidnessmnd a,smiling face than by hectoring and a grim countenance, .When stern treatment is necessary, it is more effective when it comes from tho teacher who has ivon the lovo and respect of his pupils. "Again, I should say that a genuine love for tho work of teaching is a most valuable part of the teacher's' stock-in-trade. If a pupil, by reason of tho teacher's own conduct, comes to regard him as a mere automatic machino for seeing that the arithmetic and, spelling and the geography nro properly 'dono,- 1 thero will never be any love lost between , the 'forms' and the 'desk.' Instead, there will bo on tho pupil s part an unwillingness to escel —what, we in Scotland would call a 'dourness,' a feeling that schools and teachers and lessons were invented as part of a horrible system of juvenilo torture. On tho\other hand, if the teacher brings, to tho practice of his .profession an atmosphere of personal pleasure in tho work of his pupils, of delight in their progress, and encouragement all round, I am certain that success will smile on his efforts. "Another .'point which I think worth considering—don't givo your best attention to the 'clever' child, It is not always wise to keep pushing on tho best children in tho class at tho expense of the others.. Yes, 1 that is what it amounts to! I think tho really great tcacher—and I We tho word 'i*reat' intentionally—is tho teacher who tries his utmost to discover the hidden qualities in tho backward child quito as much as he takes pleasure in bringing out tho abilities of tha really clever pupil. I may ,1)0 wrong, but it strikes mo that if our teachers mado moro of an effort to discover the 'bents' and tho hidden qualities of tho young minds given over to their care they would bo doing a work tho importance of wliich it would bo difficult to ovor-estjmnto." '

Th<j .sum total of Mr. Lauder's own schooling, lie tolls us, was "n year or two's attendance at a half-time soliool in Arbroath."