The Teacher | Page 9

piece of ground with a poor team and a small plow, and then, when overcome by the difficulties of the task, should vent his vexation and anger in laying the blame on the ground instead of on the inadequate and insufficient instrumentality which he had provided for subduing it.
[Illustration]
It is, of course, one essential part of a man's duty, in engaging in any undertaking, whether it will lead him to act upon matter or upon mind, to become first well acquainted with the circumstances of the case, the materials he is to act upon, and the means which he may reasonably expect to have at his command. If he underrates his difficulties, or overrates the power of his means of overcoming them, it is his mistake--a mistake for which he is fully responsible. Whatever may be the nature of the effect which he aims at accomplishing, he ought fully to understand it, and to appreciate justly the difficulties which lie in the way.
Teachers, however, very often overlook this. A man comes home from his school at night perplexed and irritated by the petty misconduct which he has witnessed, and been trying to check. He does not, however, look forward and endeavor to prevent the occasions of such misconduct, adapting his measures to the nature of the material upon which he has to operate, but he stands, like the carpenter at his columns, making himself miserable in looking at it after it occurs, and wondering what to do.
"Sir," we might say to him, "what is the matter?"
"Why, I have such boys I can do nothing with them. Were it not for their misconduct, I might have a very good school."
"Were it not for their misconduct? Why, is there any peculiar depravity in them which you could not have foreseen?"
"No; I suppose they are pretty much like all other boys," he replies, despairingly; "they are all hair-brained and unmanageable. The plans I have formed for my school would be excellent if my boys would only behave properly."
"Excellent plans," might we not reply, "and yet not adapted to the materials upon which they are to operate! No. It is your business to know what sort of beings boys are, and to make your calculations accordingly."
Two teachers may therefore manage their schools in totally different ways, so that one of them may necessarily find the business a dull, mechanical routine, except as it is occasionally varied by perplexity and irritation, and the other a prosperous and happy employment. The one goes on mechanically the same, and depends for his power on violence, or on threats and demonstrations of violence. The other brings all his ingenuity and enterprise into the field to accomplish a steady purpose by means ever varying, and depends for his power on his knowledge of human nature, and on the adroit adaptation of plans to her fixed and uniform tendencies.
I am very sorry, however, to be obliged to say that probably the latter class of teachers are decidedly in the minority. To practice the art in such a way as to make it an agreeable employment is difficult, and it requires much knowledge of human nature, much attention and skill. And, after all, there are some circumstances necessarily attending the work which constitute a heavy drawback on the pleasures which it might otherwise afford. The almost universal impression that the business of teaching is attended with peculiar trials and difficulties proves this.
There must be some cause for an impression so general. It is not right to call it a prejudice, for, although a single individual may conceive a prejudice, whole communities very seldom do, unless in some case which is presented at once to the whole, so that, looking at it through a common medium, all judge wrong together. But the general opinion in regard to teaching is composed of a vast number of separate and independent judgments, and there must be some good ground for the universal result.
It is best, therefore, if there are any real and peculiar sources of trial and difficulty in this pursuit, that they should be distinctly known and acknowledged at the outset. Count the cost before going to war. It is even better policy to overrate than to underrate it. Let us see, then, what the real difficulties of teaching are.
It is not, however, as is generally supposed, the confinement. A teacher is confined, it is true, but not more than men of other professions and employments; not more than a merchant, and probably not as much. A physician is confined in a different way, but more closely than a teacher: he can never leave home: he knows generally no vacation, and nothing but accidental rest.
The lawyer is confined as much. It is true there are not throughout the year exact hours which he must