He goes on through college, we will suppose, teaching from time to time
in the vacations, as opportunity occurs, taking more and more interest
in the employment, and meeting with greater and greater success. This
success is owing in a very great degree to the _freedom_ of his
practice, that is, to his escape from the thraldom of imitation. So long
as he leaves the great objects of the school untouched, and the great
features of its organization unchanged, his many plans for accomplishing
these objects in new and various ways awaken interest and spirit both in
himself and in his scholars, and all goes on well.
Now in such a case as this, a young teacher, philosophizing upon his
success and the causes of it, will almost invariably make this mistake,
namely, he will attribute to something essentially excellent in his
plans the success which, in fact, results from the novelty of them.
When he proposes something new to a class, they all take an interest in
it because it is _new_. He takes, too, a special interest in it because
it is an experiment which he is trying, and he feels a sort of pride and
pleasure in securing its success. The new method which he adopts may not
be, _in itself,_ in the least degree better than old methods, yet it may
succeed vastly better in his hands than any old method he had tried
before. And why? Why, because it is new. It awakens interest in his
class, because it offers them variety; and it awakens interest in him,
because it is a plan which he has devised, and for whose success,
therefore, he feels that his credit is at stake.
Pages:
292
293
294
295
296
297
298
299
300
301
302
303
304
305
306
307
308
309
310
311
312
313
314
315
316