which the mental strength is of little value. So many great minds have seemed to absorb the small weak bodies in which they were enshrined. We do not want this for our children. Let us as teachers do what lies in our power to build up good strong bodies for the children. We have one half hour a week for hygiene assigned to each grade. Let it be practical as well as theoretical; more practical than theoretical. How frequently we have been pained at the sight of poor little children trying to study with ill-nourished bodies, the blood so weak that the little brains were unresponsive to the most alluring method of presenting a subject. It is very frequently not knowledge of the laws of health that is wanting but actual food and clothing. Sometimes the sympathies and purses of teachers are taxed beyond endurance. Teachers, especially in large cities, provide both food and clothing for scores of children under their charge, and do this on very meagre salaries. There is no calling in life that makes greater or more persistent calls upon the sympathies and the wallet than that of the teacher. In certain cities free lunches are provided for those who care to have them, and in this way these children get at least one good meal a day. Might not a certain amount of money be set apart by School Boards for the purpose of feeding the hungry children. The hardest work on earth is trying to teach a hungry child.

--THERE is no teaching until the pupil is brought into the same state or principle in which you are; a transfusion takes place; he is you, and you are he; there is a teaching; and by no unfriendly chance or bad company can he ever quite lose the benefit.

Emerson.

-IT is a good divine that follows his own instructions; I can easier teach twenty what were good to be done, than to be one of the twenty to follow my own teachings.

Shakespeare.

-THE childhood shows the man as morning shows the day.

Milton.

-THE spirit of insight is more necessary to the doctor, the naturalist and the geometer than the spirit of geometry. Gladstone was reading Homer and writing Latin verses during his whole life at Eton; he was barely taught the

elements of arithmetic. Reverse the circumstances, imagine him a profound arithmetician but with no literary training. It is very doubtful if he would ever have become an incomparable financial minister.

Fouillée.

-IT is little matter what you learn, the question is with whom you learn.

Emerson.

I AM at school now as a student, every day; and unfinished curricula reach out into undefined futures. I shall "finish" my education.

never

Chancellor Vincent.

REMINDERS.

--GYMNASTICS can never take the place of play in the life of the child.

Children are not going to speak English correctly by merely studying an English grammar.

Let one subject in the school course throw light upon others.

The child without thoughts finds composition hard. When thoughts come the pen moves easily. Therefore, let the compositions of children be on subjects suited to their age. What can they know of the "pleasures of friendship" and "the beauties of a spring morning"? They feel these things but cannot separate them from their other joys as subjects of composition. But when a child wants to soar above his everyday life, do not hold him back, correct his

errors.

Because you have taught a subject in a certain way for twenty years it does not follow that that is the best way. It is the most familiar way to you.

As a rule the hours of school are quite long enough for the preparation of lessons-of so-called home lessons.

All children desire to know. Sometimes the wrong knowledge is desired.

It does not follow that a child knows what is on a page of his text-book because he can say it by heart.

In a week or so some of the teachers will be standing in the presence of very small classes, in some cases as few as five, six or seven pupils. Remember that you may have a Shakespeare, a Milton or a Bacon; you certainly will have

boys and girls with minds capable of almost indefinite expansion. If you grow weary and discouraged with the smallness of the number of your class an irreparable injury will be done to the five, six or seven pupils-an injury, the extent of which will continue as long as time lasts. Be faithful to the few. Wait with patience for the time when the numerous small schools of a country district shall be gathered into one large school.

The teacher's reward is to see the light of thought illumine the face of each pupil.

The child should work for the love of work, not to gain some paltry prize or to surpass his school-mates.

-THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION OF THE UNITED STATES.-This Association met at Los Angeles, California, last July. It has grown to an almost unwieldy size, consisting of ten departments. These are the Departments of Elementary Education, of Secondary Education, of Higher Education, of Normal Schools, of Business Education, of Physical Education, of Natural Science Instruction, of School Administration, of Libraries, and Indian Department. The last named was added this year. These departments have separate buildings, or at least separate halls of meeting. The teachers and citizens of Los Angeles accorded the Convention a right royal welcome last July. Let not Qubec be behind in this matter if Montreal be chosen as the next place of meeting of this largest body of teachers in the world. Some of the subjects that occupied the thoughts of the teachers were "Usurpation of Home by the School, Educational Journalism, its Trials and Triumphs, "The Usefulness of the University," "The School in Relation to the Higher Life," "Vices of Childhood and Youth," "The Path of Least Resistance in Education," "In Fundamental Civic Ethics, What Ought We to Teach as the American Doctrine of Religion and the State," "Continuous University Sessions," "The Study of Education in the University." "Observation as a Factor in Training School Work," "Claims of Commercial Education to a Place in our Public School System," "Play Instincts," "Relation of High Schocl to College Mathematics," Quo Vadis, School Board," "How to Acquire a Taste for Good Reading" and "Use of the Library."

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SOME THOUGHTS FROM THE PAPERS READ.

"The years of childhood come but once, the lessons they teach and the experiences they give can never be eradicated."

"We rise in the scale of being on stepping stones within ourselves and not by climbing over others."

"Each song should bear the musician's stamp and be tuneful without the support of the piano." This referred to the kindergarten specially.

"One should not break the spirit and freshness of childhood by too much discipline."

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Assembly rooms are to be attached to every schoolhouse for the use of the people every day and every evening of the year."

"Vacation schools are becoming a necessity.

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"The ideal education is suggestive rather than commanding." This is the gist of the problem of education: So to adjust the pupil's environment that he may engage in right activities freely, successfully, joyfully."

"Dislikes, antagonism, adverse under-currents of feeling sap energies which should be utilized in fruitful school work."

"True school progress lies between uniformity and individualism, and it is the privilege of teachers to teach according to their best judgment.

"Some parents have believed that the educating or failing to educate their children was a matter for their sole decision; but the conception of the State seems to be that the child does not exist entirely for the parent's good but for the good of all."

"The manual training teacher must be first of all a teacher-everything in education and culture and character which we would have other teachers be. But he must also be a good mechanic. Unworkmanlike work is not educational. The teacher must be a good cabinet-maker if he is to be a good character maker."

-THE citizens of Los Angeles contributed $14,000 to the Convention, and feel that they have been amply repaid in the money left them by the teachers, but still more in the impetus given to education and the closer drawing of the

ties between home and school. The teachers of Los Angeles gave over $1,500 for fruit and flowers, and they feel repaid in the hearty expressions of gratitude heard on all sides.

seen at once

-A TEST IN GRAMMAR FOR CHILDREN.-Put appropriate words, either verbs, adjectives or pronouns in the following blank spaces:-The greatest number of faces that can be two. He, you or I going to sing. going to school. Either John or James Neither of them a book. Let you and Divide the candy between you andnor the cat eating hay. The man's of the two. Did you really believe it was ? Many high words passed between

He or you reading.

ride a race. Neither the dog horse is the

? Is it

Mr. Povy and

-WHY OBJECT LESSONS FIND A PLACE IN THE SCHOOL COURSE. The thinking teacher continually asks herself in relation to each branch that she teaches, "Why do I teach this subject, of what use is it to my pupils?" She has not far to seek the correct answer or an approximation to the right answer in relation to reading, writing and arithmetic. But if one may judge from the way in which this subject is taught, object lessons present a difficulty to the majority of teachers. The name of the subject has not the slightest flavor of book about it. It is object, and objects the child should have to examine from all points of view. The great value of object lessons is the bringing of the child into contact with things in contradistinction to names. How many words we use in everyday life that call up no distinct image to the mind. That which cannot be handled or at least be well represented has no place in the object lesson class. The bringing the child into contact with things themselves under proper direction develops the faculty of observation and therefore furnishes opportunity to the child of comparing and contrasting objects, experimenting_upon objects, noting results and drawing conclusions. In the second place, in bringing the child into direct contact with nature we are teaching him to be orderly and methodical. Is not order Heaven's first law? In the third place to multitudes of children object lessons have opened the door to original research. Many a successful man in various field of research has looked back to the object lessson class as the birthplace of his genius. Then again, the