THE SCHOOL JOURNAL TO ITS PATRONS.

I come with an earnest greeting-
A glad and "Happy New Year;
They are not idle, empty words,
They epring from a heart sincere.

When eighteen hundred fifty-nine
Its varied course began,

I ne'er had seen the light of day—
My life, an embryo plan.

Many there were, both wise and learned,
Who oft foretold my wretched fate,
-Strangled at birth, or, at the best,
A feeble and half-living state

To drag along from month to month,
Until, at length, the struggle o'er
"For want of food," my warmest friends
Should say,—" Alas! he is no more."

But some there were, with more of faith

In Vermont's good sons and daughters,
Than to believe they'd leave to die

One who sowed" beside all waters."

Mid April's showers and sunshine,
I was ushered into life,
And have met with more of favor,
In the struggle and the strife

That I sought to wage with folly,
With ignorance and sin',
Than I had any right to hope for

Mid life's bustle and its din.

While many have said," God speed you,"

But lifted ne'er a finger;

Others their acts have not allowed

Behind their words to linger.

To such our warmest thanks we bring,
We wish them every pleasure;

May all the good that they have wrought,
Return in tenfold measure.

And all our patrons, great and small,
Who've borne with our faults of youth,
Kindly casting away the dross,

And gathering up the truth;

We thank you, and are glad to say,
We hope, as the months do speed,
To please you more and try you less ;
-"Progress," the motto we heed.
And one and all, again we bid

A happy," Happy New Year!"
May the holy law of kindness
To your hearts be ever near;

Sorrowing with others' sorrow,

Rejoicing in their joy:

So shall the year bring happiness,

And peace without alloy.

M. E. L.

OUR SCHOOL DEBT.

How great the debt we owe the Common School!

Who can

esti nate its value, or compute its amount? Who separate its influence from his business habits, his practical every day life?— Many, so called self-made men, are really Common-School-made

men.

The school is the child's world. Here he meets his peers and commences with them the career of active life;-here his ambition is stimulated by the influence and example of others;-here he learns to repress selfishness, to be generous, and to be just; -here he feels the force and the value of law and order;-here his mind expands, his memory strengthens, and his taste and manners are cultivated. Take away all the pleasant memories connected with the Common School, and you dry up a fountain of enjoyment in every heart!

By the casual and interrupted instruction given at the fireside, children may acquire the first rudiments of language, but in the Common School they learn to read correctly and understandingly; under the stimulus of competition with those about them, they

readily learn to detect errors in pronunciation and tone of voice, and to excel in the class, becomes the height of their ambition.

At home, they may have learned to count ten or more ;-but the wonders of Addition, Subtraction, Multiplication and Division, have first been comprehended in the Common School.

At home, their language may be kind and respectful but unpolished and incorrect-in school, the study of English Graminar. and the example of a competent teacher, soon effect a decided change in this respect.

Another debt we owe the Common School is, facility in the use of language, ready and correct expression of thought, resulting from recitation and familiar questions and answers.

What gems of English literature have sparkled on the pages of our school books, imbuing the young and ardent mind with a love for Milton, Thonon, Goldsmith, or Cowper;--or a burning desire to know more of Leonidas and his heroes,-of Charles V. and his dominions! And above all, how great a part of our New Testament knowledge has been gained with our toes on the crack of the Common School floor!

In the Common School, the child may, and undoubtedly will, encounter finesse and knavery no less than in his more advanced intercourse with society; but he may also here learn the true phase of existence, and, by early experiencing the trials of life, he may acquire the power to resist the evil, and to embrace the good; so that much of his success in after life may result from moral impressions, widening and deepening as years increase, but first received in the Common School.

St. Paul calls himself " a debtor both to the Greeks and to the Barbarians: both to the wise and to the unwise." Our Common School debt may be similar as it regards to whom due, but Rot the less are we its debtors.

M.

The aim of education should be to teach us rather how to think--rather to improve our minds so as to make us think for ourselves, than to load the memory with the thoughts of other

men.

STUDY-NO. IV.

To be successful in directing book-study, the teacher must see to it: 1, that his pupils know just what to get; 2, that they know how to get it; 3, that they get it. This last is the test of thoroughness. If this test were generally applied, there would not be so much doubting and disputing about the comparative thoroughness of teachers; but there would be more thorough teaching. A teacher is sometimes supposed to be very thorough because all his pupils are required to pursue their studies in a certain order, no matter how arbitrary, or to go straight through a reading book, without omitting any thing, from title page to "finis;" while another is thought by some to be superficial, because his pupils learn O before they know it; or, in Latin, begin to translate and parse without having first commited to memory the whole grammar, in order To be always going a certain round with military precision, like a machine"like clock-work," does not prove thoroughness; and, on the other hand, to learn things out of their usual order-geometry before arithmetic,-mensa before baker; to omit parts of a textbook; not to attend to the most practical things first; not to know everything or all about anything,-all this does not prove a want of thoroughness on the part of the pupil or his teacher; but to pretend to study anything, without actually getting it, does it; and to do this for prove mere show proves more-it proves a want of honesty. The planning of study for a pupil or a school tests the wisdom, not the thoroughness of the teacher. To return: The teacher must see that the pupils get their lesson.

1. He must see that they get it. There is no such thing as studying by proxy. Let them understand that, if the teacher or any one else does a part of their work for them, they cannot honestly take the credit of the whole.

2. He must see that they get it. Pupils are very liable to the mistake of imagining the lesson learned, when it is only understood; and teachers sometimes only confirm them in the error. One may read a lesson, and see that no part of it is unintelligible;

-may read a proposition in geometry, for example, understandingly, and not discover till he attempts to recite, that he has not got it; and perhaps not even then, if the teacher will help him. along by hints and questions. A teacher who is not thorough, instead of requiring his pupils to show what the lesson contains, will often show them; and then be satisfied, if they recognize it as something that they have seen and understood in the book. But seeing is not getting. In hunting, the first thing is to find the game; but when it is fairly in sight, if that is all, even that is useless. The boy who claims as his own, the fish in the brook, or the lesson in the book, merely because he has seen it, no matter how distinctly, tells a-fish story. There is no right of discovery in these cases; there must be actual possession.

3. He must see that they get it, the lesson, not something else. If the lesson is the precise words of the book, let them not be satisfied with getting the sense, as some men quote scripture; if it is the sense, let them not substitute the bare words; if it is both, let them get both. In this particular, pupils are most apt to err without knowing it, even though they perfectly understand what the lesson is.

If we study the art of directing book-study, while we practice it, we shall see that the hints contained in this number and the previous ones, are only the beginning of a discussion which might be continued without limit.

The subject is one of great importance, not only because so large a share of all that the scholar learns, is learned from books, but because his training in this respect will seriously affect his habits of hearing, observation and reflection. E. P. S.

FEMALE TEACHERS.--We have frequently heard parents object to the employment of a lady in a district school, because, as they said, she could not govern the larger boys. An acknowledgment that a youth cannot be governed by a lady should come from a parent with a blush, we think. Such boys are not governed at home, and will be insubordinate whatever be the sex or size of their teacher.--Missouri Educator.