TO TEACHERS

WO widely different methods of teaching composition

are found in the schools. One, the strictly technical method, makes constant use of the principles of rhetoric and grammar, and ignores the gain in power that may come to the pupil from the frequent and unfettered expression of his thoughts and experiences. The other reverses the process, trusting to the frequency of the act of composition to bring the pupil to a state of accuracy in his use of English. It is not likely that a great number of teachers rely wholly upon either one of these methods of instruction; but very few have been able to make a rational combination of the two, so that principles learned at any time may be used at once and thus become fixed as habit. More progress has been made in the case of rhetoric than in that of grammar, for while unity and the accompanying qualities of a theme have been taught to pupils as guiding principles of composition, a thorough and effective knowledge of syntax has often not been deemed necessary, or, perhaps, has been sought in the isolated study of grammar. Something may indeed be accomplished by such study, but it is the least economical method, and the one least likely to have an effect on oral and written language.

This means of teaching the technique of the sentence has had its trial. While it may be true that the country was never so grammar-mad as it was once spelling-mad, it is yet true that grammar as an isolated study had, for a long time, its due share of attention in the curriculum, and that it failed to influence our use of language in a degree proportional to the time spent upon it. A reaction

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followed, and writers of grammars began to maintain that the main object of the study of the science was not the improvement of our English, but mental discipline and the acquisition of one of the principal bodies of knowledge. This change of opinion seems to have been followed not only by a decrease in the amount of time devoted to the subject, but also by sporadic and unsystematic attempts to apply grammar to the composition of the pupil. This has been productive of some good; but still, in many schools, the old process has gone on: pupils study grammar from a book, and their conception of grammar is a book — a book in which the subject is carefully analyzed and its principles illustrated by isolated sentences, all of which is easily forgotten, as language teachers in first-year high-school classes well know. Any method of instruction, therefore, that will not only give boys and girls a knowledge of grammar but will cause them to think of this knowledge as something constantly applicable to their own language for the purpose of gaining more accurate, more forcible, and more rhythmical expression, will do something toward realizing the old idea that we improve our English by the study of grammar.

The method begun in A Child's Composition Book and continued in this Composition-Grammar is intended as a means of working out this idea. In the first book, along with an abundance of composition there is an untechnical study of the sentence as a whole, which is followed by instruction and drill in some of the verb forms that children habitually misuse, and by exposition of the nature of subject, predicate, and a few other fundamental matters of grammar, together with some practice in the recognition and use of them. The second book advances materially in these particulars, though at

all times the puzzles of grammar are avoided, and attention is given only to those parts of the science which are most serviceable in composition. In order to make the serviceability of grammar to composition available, the authors have employed several devices-example sentences accompanied by exposition, the writing of illustrative sentences, the study of quoted passages embodying principles that have been explained, the criticism of pupils' composition for the purpose of detecting and correcting errors, and writing in groups.

For the sake of simplicity and gradual approach this book is divided into three parts. The first concerns the sentence as a whole. The second deals with predicates and subjects, makes clear the nature of connectives and modifiers, explains the difference between phrases and clauses, and treats of several other of the more common matters of English syntax. Throughout both parts there are frequent demands for composition, both oral and written, for analysis of illustrative sentences, for grammatical study of sentences as they stand in the paragraph, and for exercise in criticism, in which is included group work. The third part is a very brief analysis of the parts of speech; it amounts to a review of what has already been studied, and may be an introduction to a more mature study of the subject of grammar.

The same principles of grammar are sometimes treated in both books, but on different levels. This difference of level is of itself sufficient explanation of the repetitions, but there remains another reason the positive need of doing the same thing again and again in order to fix it in the pupil's intelligence and to make it automatic in his use of language.

Grammar, however, constitutes only one part of the

books: the other is composition. This, too, has been treated on the principle that useful knowledge of technique is to be gained only through actual practice in expression accompanied by criticism and development of principles. The authors have endeavored at all times to select such subjects as will interest and stimulate pupils of the elementary-school age, and to give liberty for individual choice. Constant effort has been made also, in a simple and untechnical way, to make pupils realize that they know something to write about; their minds are full, if we teachers can only lead them to organize their mental content; for to organize thought is not only to put in order the ideas already possessed, but it is also to get new ideas to fill in the gaps. Therefore such simple devices as making notes before writing, preparing simple outlines, reproducing stories according to suggested outlines, criticizing the themes of other pupils for lack of fullness, and discussing subjects in such a way as to reveal their organization are constantly used, especially in this book. Attention is directed also to the frequent use of compositions written by pupils in elementary schools. They are generally given for the purpose of emphasizing some particular point, but, in the case of the best ones, they may serve the further purpose of gradually fixing in the minds of the young students a sort of standard of what they ought to be able to do; and for this purpose they are better than examples from the classics, whose excellence is unattainable by children.

The manner of conducting the recitation is always a matter of importance. The authors believe that in the case of this text it will usually be best to allow pupils to keep books open in the class. It is a common psychological truth that both young people and old find it easier to grasp