them rigidly to the program that she has marked out for them and that she knows is best for them. However, in doing this, she need not lose her temper and deal with them in a manner certain to drive them away from her. The way of kindness, even though it be the way of severity, is the way by which the teacher must lead her pupils if she would keep their hearts open to her and their lives responsive to her efforts.

2. Self-confidence is another element the teacher must possess if she would put heart into her work and reach the heart of the pupil. Too many teachers fail because they do not take hold of their work. They stand off at arm's length and do not get into the work in such a manner as to gain the confidence and arouse the enthusiasm of their pupils. This lack of confidence is due, in most cases, to a feeling on the part of the teacher that she does not know the subject or how to use the subject in reaching the child. Hence one of the first requisites to success in teaching is a thorough knowledge of the subject and a feeling of ability to use that subject in bringing about the child's development. The teacher must also know child life, especially the lives and characteristics of her own children. The work of the teacher who does not have enough interest in her children to do all in her power to study their lives and individual peculiarities is sure to end in miserable failure.

The teacher's knowledge, too, should be something more than mere book knowledge. Teachers have been accused long enough of being theoretical, bookish, and it is time they were coming down to real things. They are certainly dealing with a very real thing in the life of the child, and they should, above all people, be practical and have common sense. A knowledge of common things will constitute the teacher's most effective means

of education, and it will be a great day for the schools when those things that are right around us mean as much, at least, as the things that happened three thousand years ago and on the other side of the world.

When the teacher knows her business thoroughly, and knows that she knows it, she will be able to do her work with that confidence which will draw her pupils to her and make it possible for her to touch their inner lives. It will enable her to get away from self, free herself from self-consciousness, and enter the life of the pupil. She can then study his powers, resources, and possibilities, and know how to deal with him so as to get best results.

Then the teacher must have confidence, not only in herself, but also in her pupils. She must let them know that she has confidence in them, and for this reason she should never say or do a thing that would cause them to feel that she doubts them. She should point out to them their faults and do all she can to help them to correct them, but she should do this in kindness and never in such a manner as to lower their self-esteem.

3. Love. The cardinal element in the teacher's life is love for her children. Without love for her children she can never reach their hearts. It is love that brings the teacher and the pupil together and gives their intercourse that genuineness and spontaneity essential to good results. It is love that enables the teacher to look beyond the crude exterior of the pupil, the dirty face, the tousled hair, the ragged clothes, to the hidden possibilities that lie in his inner life. It is the magic word that opens the door of his heart and lets her into his life. There is no way in the world by which the teacher can reach the pupil's heart except that of genuine love.

But if a teacher does not naturally possess this love, how is she to cultivate it? In answer to this, I will say

that love is based on sympathy, and the teacher cannot learn to love her pupils unless she is able to sympathize with them. A safe test of genuine teaching ability is not to be found in a knowledge of the subjects to be taught, but in the ability to sympathize with the lives of children. That person who cannot recall her own childhood days and the experiences of her life as a child has no place in the schoolroom. This is the supreme test

of teaching ability, and it is not enough for the teacher to feign sympathy. There is in our ranks far too much of this. There is too much would-be childishness on the part of teachers which the child easily detects and for which he has nothing but the profoundest contempt. It is only genuine, unfeigned sympathy that will draw the teacher and the pupil together and bring about that spirit of freedom so essential to good results.

The teacher who wishes to cultivate in her heart this love and sympathy for the pupil should read again of the life of Pestalozzi and his work for the children. He possessed love in a high degree and was the very incarnation of unselfish devotion, patience, and sympathy. He was willing to bury himself there with his children and be forgotten if only he could know that he was helping them to better things. Although they were ragged, repulsive, covered with vermin and sores, he stayed with them night and day, through sickness and in health. He wept with them in their little sorrows and rejoiced with them in their childish joys. He was with them constantly, and it almost broke his heart when the government closed his school and he was forced to leave them. Such unselfish devotion is enough to make most of us hang our heads in shame and resolve that we shall never again complain of bad conditions and of the difficulties in our way. If he endured so much in such love,

sympathy, and patience, we certainly have no right to complain that our yokes are heavy or that our burdens are hard to bear.

Love for the pupil means that the teacher is to get away from self and seek, not her own good, but the good of her pupils. It means that she is not to think of self or to work for her own good, except as greater good to herself will mean better things for her pupils. All mere show and pretense not for the best interests of the children under her care will be carefully avoided, although it might add to her own reputation and standing as a teacher. No doubt one of the greatest hindrances to good work among teachers is the desire to make a show. There is much insincerity in reports that go out to parents, and frequently the sincere, honest teacher must suffer because of the high grade given by the dishonest teacher. While it is, perhaps, true that teachers are above the average in honesty, the temptation here is so great that many teachers fall. The teacher who places the growing life of the child above her own welfare will send to parents an honest statement of just what the child is doing, and will make no effort to deceive in order to bring some good to herself.

Love sees no fault in the child it may not have felt itself, and for this reason it is slow to criticize the child. It looks for the good rather than for the bad, and when the child does not learn, it imputes that fact to its own faults rather than to those of the child. However, this is quite contrary to the attitude assumed by those teachers who never think of their own weaknesses, their own failures, but charge every failure in their work to the weaknesses of the child. "He has n't been trained properly before," "he is dull," "he is indolent," or "he is mischievous," when, as a matter of fact, in the great majority

of cases, the trouble would vanish if the teacher would correct her own faults. Love makes the teacher sincere with herself and causes her to search for her own faults and to overlook the faults of her children.

Drummond said, "Love is the greatest thing in the world," and none of us is disposed to doubt it. It will make the darkest schoolroom the lightest; the coldest, the warmest. It will cause enthusiasm to glow in the teacher's heart and send out sparks that will kindle the fires in the hearts of all her children. It will make the teacher happy in her work; it will make the children happy; it removes all the difficulties and makes the hardest problem seem the easiest. It puts a smile on the teacher's face and sends out from her a beam of sunshine that will brighten the faces of all her children. It will open their hearts and make them responsive to every effort of the teacher. When the teacher is guided by love, she cannot make a mistake; when she is not guided by love, every move she makes is a mistake. Surely love is the greatest thing in the world, and it is also the greatest thing in the life of the teacher.

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4. Patience. A fault of teachers that does much to impair the efficiency of their work is the lack of patience. The average teacher has learned to labor, but she has not learned "to labor and to wait." She expects results too soon. She plants the seed to-day and expects to see the ripened harvest to-morrow. She is like the child who plants the grain of corn in the garden and, before it has had time to germinate, goes and digs it up to see how it is doing. She sees the weakness in the child and cannot understand that such weaknesses cannot be corrected in a day. She fails to realize that it takes time for the lessons in grammar, geography, or arithmetic to become a part of the child and she finds fault with