You may stay as you are,
and make extra exertion to be perfectly regular and studious, or I will
find seats for you where it will be a great deal easier for you to be
so. Which do you think you should rather do?"
The boys hesitate, look at one another, and presently say that they had
rather sit together.
"Well," said the teacher, "it is immaterial to me whether you sit
together or apart, if you are only good boys, so you may take your seats
and try it a little while. If you find it too hard work to be studious
and orderly together, I can make a change hereafter. I shall soon see."
Such a conversation will have many good effects. It will make the boys
expect to be watched, without causing them to feel that their characters
have suffered. It will stimulate them to greater exertion to avoid all
misconduct, and it will prepare the way for separating them afterward
without awakening feelings of resentment, if the experiment of their
sitting together should fail.
Another case would be managed, perhaps, in a little different way, where
the tendency to play was more decided. After speaking to the individuals
mildly two or three times, you see them again at play. You ask them to
wait that day after school and come to your desk.
They have, then, the rest of the day to think occasionally of the
difficulty they have brought themselves into, and the anxiety and
suspense which they will naturally feel will give you every advantage
for speaking to them with effect; and if you should be engaged a few
minutes with some other business after school, so that they should have
to stand a little while in silent expectation, waiting for their turn,
it would contribute to the permanence of the effect.
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