7 : Wi 7% hy cm 4 e Digitized by the Internet Archive In 2022 with funding from Princeton Theological Seminary Library https://archive.org/details/modernsundayschoO0arch_0 THE MODERN SUNDAY-SCHOOL Ti? 7 ’ ley | vs , e os ae : Any ‘pie wa i A fee STi : “a iy ‘ i , 7 ? ’ . fs _" 4 ° \ i 1 a7 i i] La | ] ta oe ; it's + > ese i . Piae ~~ F Siw a THE MODERN SUNDAY-SCHOOL Its theory and practice By George Hamilton Archibald Principal, Westhill Training College, Birmingham, England » tf \ ‘ MAR i4 1989 a ak { TFG ~ ee re AS SYLOGICAL SEES THE CENTURY CO. New York & London Copyright, 1926, by THE CENTURY CoO, PRINTED IN U. §S. A. TO THE ENTHUSIASTIC STAFF WORKING WITH HIM AT WESTHILL THE AUTHOR AFFECTIONATELY DEDICATES THIS BOOK LT a : Yh iy us om, bd 4 (2 oa ap pe see ty on aaah Hf u , ‘ é 4 7 j , ym , . Seger ei Meta y " ; a? } + ‘ 4 J i he Ps iw : t = oy t . ‘ ‘ « i ' ‘ i ' ¥ » | y ’ 1 pe % ; . we ‘ ’ é y f ; vero Vee SEN hay 4 pie ‘fs “) fay V.ieae Wii at: NaF es PREFACE This is not a book on psychology. It deals with psychology in a limited way for the light it may throw upon the problems of childhood and adolescence, and in particular upon methods of effective religious education of youth. The aim of the author, however, has been to produce a book that is more practical than theoretical. The practical suggestions it contains are the result of considerable experience as a Sunday-school super- intendent and scout-master. Most of the prob- lems discussed have been personally encountered. The methods suggested are the outcome of many experiments and are based on a fairly intimate knowledge of the difficulties which challenge the great multitude of workers who are giving gratui- tous service to the cause of the Christian nurture and training of youth. Se At » ~ ns : i , a’ of ie a ere ay oe h pv ‘7 - ' eae ) uy Hol ‘ .s % ‘ fe HOC gO i 4 a i ahih iar: } y'\ : oh Tay) waa sib. . a3 PRA ae) Gri S ah We iss aR oe rH, [OP A\Ap Mid ay ene oy. Bh batt A fips ly ie OS a At ‘¥ Aye us : Pi... eR oO Ae ’ vie. ay aay ¢ P 7%, a oi ; ‘ ; Le> i } re thing MAM he Ase) ; ~ he ai Wh i OL Oe ‘ Pi at fe os be atta PS AG a) Py ) aur tS, hata hip ‘ i i Fy ie } q : ,% xs f i CONTENTS CHAPTER I Tue Oup anp THE New . II BeraGinnines AND GrowTH III DecenTrRALizATION AND UNITY IV Tue Graded SCHOOL . V ATMOSPHERE VI Learnine sy Doine . VII Puay anp Expression VIII Svuacestion IX Specrau Days. X Weex-Day Activities XI Prizes anp Rewarps . XII Orricers aNnD MANAGEMENT . XIII Visrrine aNp Visitors XIV GiIvING . XV TRaApdITIONALISM XVI Lity Work Lay, 14] 151 . 163 . 174 vieu 188 - 192 197 . 204 c. + i ‘e) p ' vt r | “het iy ia ; ( oy ( Pa ¥ THE MODERN SUNDAY-SCHOOL THE MODERN SUNDAY-SCHOOL CHAPTER I THE OLD AND THE NEW “Tuy father and I have sought thee sorrowing.”’ The quotation is from the familiar story of the visit of Jesus to the Temple when he was twelve years of age. The narrative was not written for children and if told without explanation or com- ment exactly as it is written in Luke’s Gospel will doubtless leave a disquieting impression on their minds, the obvious deduction being that Jesus was not very thoughtful for his father and mother. The wording of the narrative appears clearly to give this impression, for his mother spoke re- proachfully, almost querulously: ‘Son, why hast thou thus dealt with us? Behold, thy father and > There is more than astonishment in the expression used. Mof- 3 I have sought thee sorrowing.’ 4 THE MODERN SUNDAY-SCHOOL fatt’s translation reads: ‘‘My son, why have you behaved like this to us? Here have your father and I been looking for you anxiously.” The les- son is clearly one for fathers and mothers, teachers and churches, who have been, and are, seeking youth anxiously, even sorrowingly. Boys and girls of the twentieth century, like the Boy of Nazareth, are misunderstood. The in- cident calls us to a reconsideration of our attitude toward childhood and youth, and the question arises, “Why are we seeking our children sorrow- ing?” 'The two-thousand-year-old narrative an- swers, “They understood him not.” There are at least two kinds of people in the world: those who seek to dominate their fellows, and those who seek to understand them. Reform is being advocated with great vigor by a large and ever increasing number of people who are seeking to make progress in religious education, not by dominance of the child, but by sympathy for and understanding of him. They sometimes come un- der the criticism of worthy people because they hesitate to overstress some of the old doctrines which dominated the practice of the Sunday- schools of yesterday. Take, for example, the doctrine of conversion. It involves an abstract idea, entirely beyond the comprehension of THE OLD AND THE NEW 5 _ younger children. But even for adults the Great Teacher was not satisfied with conversion. He said with emphasis, “Except ye be converted and...’ The significance is great. And what? “And become as little children... .” That is, be childlike; be teachable, be humble “like this little child.” It must have been a little child, one in whom the spirit of emulation had not yet awakened. The sympathetic student of the unfolding life sees the fallacy of making a religious appeal to the child in the same form as may be successfully used in addressing the adolescent or adult. He ob- serves cause and effect, and refuses to waste time, effort, and opportunity. He is anxious to bring the evangel both to child and to man, and possibly possesses the additional virtues of willingness to study and patience to experiment until he finds out the right method and the right moment. Again, sympathetic students of young life rec- ognize the need for grading and departmental or- ganization. Now, organization also is under sus- picion in some quarters as being unspiritual. Nor is it difficult to understand this more or less natural aversion, for there is too much government in the world and not enough freedom. Over-organiza- tion imprisons life and tends to stifle initiative. 6 THE MODERN SUNDAY-SCHOOL Organization should be as simple as it is possible to make it, but cannot be dispensed with lest indi- vidualism should run riot and codperative life prove impossible. Once we appreciate its dangers and at the same time realize its value we shall not go far wrong. Modern thought is becoming more and more averse to making fine distinctions between secular and religious. Body and soul are inseparable; at any rate it is impossible to reach the soul except through the body. ‘The mother’s work in caring for the body of the child is not secular. The day- school teacher’s work is not secular. The teach- ing of arithmetic, history, and geography is nec- essary and basal to spirituality. How can a man hope to do justly and live righteously if he cannot keep accounts and balance his books? How can a man appreciate international brotherhood if he knows nothing of geography? These things are basal and fundamental. Are not basal and fun- damental things of spiritual significance? The spiritual and the secular cannot be separated. Jesus came to bring healing, health, wholeness, holiness to mankind; to bring better housing, bet- ter food, better education, better relations between capital and labor, tribe and tribe, nation and na- tion: these things are all inseparable from religion. THE OLD AND THE NEW {{ The religious educator of yesterday rather prided himself that his work was essentially spiritual. With just a little suspicion of self-righteousness he looked upon modern movements as “machinery” and felt it his duty to call attention to that fact. Sometimes one wonders if he may not have made “spirituality” a cloak for inefficiency. The child is a pragmatist: he judges values by results. Religion for children must be presented as something to live by more, even, than something to die by. Generally speaking, the church is find- ing itself more and more concerned with man’s social conditions—with his unclean face, his scanty clothing, and his ravenous appetite. The Sun- day-school teacher of to-day is dealing with a far wider circle of need than the teacher of yesterday. Therefore the Sunday-school leader must have a clear aim, and that aim must be stated concretely. It is not enough to talk about sin and salvation in general. Make religion concrete, and the ab- stract will take care of itself. Boys and girls must be prepared specifically to meet every situ- ation that they are likely to have to face. Religious education must help youth to develop a sound physical constitution. This requires good nutrition, healthful exercise, and personal cleanliness. II] health is the cause of much moral 8 THE MODERN SUNDAY-SCHOOL delinquency. Abounding vitality ought to be the birthright of every normal boy and girl. Religious education must prepare youth for group life. As civilization advances, codperative life becomes more and more imperative. There is little place for the hermit and less for the cynic. The child must be trained as an individual, but even more, perhaps, as one of a group. The school must prepare the boy for industrial life. The project system in day or Sunday-school will help in this particular. The dignity of la- bor and freedom from snobbishness must be in- culcated. The Sunday-school cannot prepare the youth for an industrial vocation as the day-school can, but it can do much in molding him for honesty and integrity. Every man should be a producer. There is little room for slackers. Men must earn, not beg their bread. ‘There is room in the world for every good workman. Every man should have a trade or a vocation. Jesus was a carpen- ter. The Sunday-schools have done much to steady economic relations. Many men of high achievement owe a great deal to the religious edu- cation of Sunday-schools and are not backward in saying so. What has been done in the past will be done in the future, but it will be even better done. ee eee == —_ es THE OLD AND THE NEW 9 Religious education will furnish the mind of the youth with imagery of a high character and will inspire him with the nobleness of commonplace duties. The curriculum must be planned with the home and family life of the child in mind. This, not only to affect and improve his conduct in the home, but also to prepare him ultimately for parental obligations. The home is the heart of the com- munity, and the school can do much to cultivate a clean and wholesome atmosphere. ‘The destiny of the race is here at stake. Nor is all this a counsel of perfection. I know how easy it is to say what ought to be, but I sug- gest that we have wasted much time and effort in attempting to deal with religion almost wholly in the abstract and general. The right and success- ful way is to deal with it in the concrete and par- ticular. Remember we are dealing with the im- mature. Now, those who belong to the old school and those who belong to the new have in reality one aim and one purpose. ‘There is little to choose be- tween them in purity of motive, and one can see in these later days a better understanding growing up between the two groups. ‘The sooner there is singleness of aim the better for child and church. 10 THE MODERN SUNDAY-SCHOOL May it not be that these two great forces in the church will sink their differences and become allies, finding a common cause in educational evangelism? Speaking from a considerable acquaintance with modern school leaders, I believe it to be true that their aim is to bring the evangel to child and to youth, that this is their first and chief purpose; they have learned that a better method will make the evangel more attractive to the young. Edu- cation and evangelism must go hand in hand. Our pygmy minds cry out for finality, but there is no such thing in this life; probably not in any other. But out of an eternity of the past will grow another of the future. “It is better to travel than to arrive.” One thing is sure; if the church and the Sunday- school are failing, or partly failing, the fault is not with the children. We can get more than a grain of comfort from the fact that if the boys with whom we live were as good as the Boy of Nazareth we, like the parents of old, would still be crying out, “Thy father and I have sought thee sorrow- ing.” BIBLIOGRAPHY Schweitzer, Albert, “Memoirs of Childhood and Youth,’ Allen & Unwin (London), 1924. THE OLD AND THE NEW oa Taylor, A. R., “The Study of the Child,’ Appleton, 1909, Montessori, Maria, “The Montessori Method: Sci- entific Pedagogy as Applied to Child Education,” translated by A. E. George, Heinemann (London), 1920. Mumford, Edith E. Read, “The Religion of a Little Child,’ Pilgrim Press (London), 1921. Poulson, Emilie, “In the Child’s World,’ Philip (Lon- don), 1923. Coe, George A., “Education in Religion and Morals,’ Revell, 1904. Hadfield, J. A., “Psychology and Morals,’ Methuen (London), 1924. CHAPTER II BEGINNINGS AND GROWTH Tur Sunday-school movement, to-day one of the mightiest religious forces of the world, owes its beginning in its modern form very largely to Rob- ert Raikes of Gloucester, England, printer and publisher, whose father before him was editor and publisher of the “Gloucester Journal.” We know little of Raikes’ early life, but from his own mem- oranda the fact is established that the first Sunday-school was begun at the close of the year 1781 or the beginning of 1782. ‘The moral uplift of neglected children was certainly in his mind, but the earliest of his Sunday-schools was started more with the aim of helping street children to read and write than with any immediate higher purpose. He was always keenly desirous of up- lifting the poor and developing good citizens as well as educating the ignorant. In evidence of the early success of the movement Raikes’ memo- randum records: ‘*A woman who lives in a lane 12 li Mae in eR ae wo . so ed BEGINNINGS AND GROWTH 13 where I had fixed a school told me some time ago that the place was quite a heaven upon Sundays compared to what it used to be. 'The number who have learnt to read and say their catechism is so great that I am astonished at it. . . . The prin- ciple I inculcate is to be kind and good natured to each other ; not to provoke one another ; to be duti- ful to their parents; not to offend God by cursing and swearing.” } It is interesting to note that the first Sunday- school teachers were paid for their work. Raikes says, “Having found four persons who had been accustomed to instruct children in reading, I en- gaged to pay the sum required for receiving and instructing such children as I should send to them every Sunday.” ? Here is an interesting extract from an old di- ary: I, Adam Fitch, and my wife agree with the following gentlemen :— Mr. John Gray Mr. George King Mr. John Aldridge Mr. John Fincham 1 Lloyd, “Sketch of the Life of Robert Raikes Esq.,” pp. 14-15. 2 “Sketch of the Life of Robert Raikes Esq.,” p. 19. 14 THE MODERN SUNDAY-SCHOOL Parishioners of Haverhill, in the Counties of Essex and Suffolk, to teach the Children of the Sunday School in the aforesaid Haverhill on Sundays for one year begun for the first time August 3rd. 1788, for the Sum of six pounds, thirteen shillings and fourpence which is two- thirds of ten pounds. These Sunday-schools spread very rapidly, and in 1785, when there were about twenty-five thou- sand scholars in the Sunday-schools of England and Wales, the first Sunday-School Society was established. After this the voluntary system of teaching gained ground, and schools became more and more places for religious instruction. In 1803 it was felt that the churches should take up the institution as their own special work, and also that a Sunday-school literature should be created. To accomplish these things a Sunday-School Union was founded, and almost simultaneously the first lesson course was published. It was called, “A select list of scripture for a course of reading in Sunday-schools.” It is not definitely known when the first Sunday- school after the Raikes pattern was established in America. Francis Asbury had much to do with popularizing the movement, establishing what was doubtless the first Sunday-school in Virginia in 1786. The Methodist Episcopal Conference at BEGINNINGS AND GROWTH 15 Charleston, South Carolina, in 1790, ordered pas- tors to form Sunday-schools for whites and blacks, with voluntary teachers. In 1803 the first Sunday-school in New York was established. In 1812 a Sunday-school was instituted in Boston. In 1814-16 there was a general awakening of in- terest in the churches on behalf of Sunday-schools. In 1816 the New York Sunday-School Union was established, and in 1824 the American Sunday- School Union organized. From this time on the growth of Sunday-schools was steady. Special interest attaches to the establishment in the year 1872 of the Uniform Lesson System. The idea appealed to the sentiment and to the im- agination so strongly that it was readily taken up and adopted by all Sunday-schools, not only in America but practically throughout the world. From the point of view of the adult the idea of millions of pupils and teachers studying the same lesson weekly was one to inspire even the laggards, and it did so. The uniform lesson undoubtedly has done much to bind together as a unit the great Sunday-school forces of the world. The move- ment was opportune. The haphazard method of choosing lessons soon became a thing of the past. Publications and helps sprang up around the uniform lesson, and Sunday-school teaching as a 16 THE MODERN SUNDAY-SCHOOL whole increased in power and usefulness. The uniform lesson was a step forward. It lacked per- manency, however, because the lessons were not chosen from the point of view of the nature and needs of the child. Still, it served its purpose and laid foundations for further advance. But what was good for 1872 may not be good for a half-century later. The point of view is changing, and past achievements are to be used as stepping-stones to future progress. Just at the time when the principle of the International Uniform Lessons seemed to be well established thoughtful men began seriously to study child psy- chology. Previously psychology had centered in the study of the mature mind, but now it extended to the study of the immature. Bodies of facts concerning child life and mental development were gathered and important principles deduced from these facts. Child study centered attention upon the nature and needs of children. Man had learned much about himself in the study of ma- turity, and now he began to develop a better un- derstanding of children. The study of the child revealed the fallacy of uniformity. From the adult point of view uniformity seemed to many to be ideal, but from the point of view of the needs of children it was sadly deficient. BEGINNINGS AND GROWTH 17 Everything depends on the point of view. The popular view in 1872 was that all religious educa- tion must begin with the Bible; but the point of view of the present day is that all religious educa- tion must begin with the pupil. In the olden days childhood was looked upon as a misfortune, some- thing to be pitied, and the object of the parent and teacher was to rescue the child from himself. The idea was to press him, push him, hurry him into being a man. The argument was: there’s only one life worth living and that is the life of maturity ; immaturity is something to escape from with all possible speed. But the new point of view is that life in all its beauty is to be found in the child. Not life in embryo only, but glad, happy, full, free life. Life, young or old, is a growth, and the joy of living is the joy of grow- ing. When we look at the religious life from this point of view we see that the object of the teacher is to help each individual to live out his growing, developing life to the full, and to supply it with the nurture needed not only for the future but primarily for the present stage of development. The uniform lesson was doubtless better than the old haphazard system, which might have any or no plan. But the new appreciation of the needs of the child demanded a new type of lessons. The 18 THE MODERN SUNDAY-SCHOOL International Lessons Council in the course of years came to recognize this fact and provided a system of graded lessons to meet the needs of the growing, developing child. ‘These graded lessons are within reach of all the schools. With the establishment of the International Lesson System there came a new impulse in the Sunday-school movement. America became par- ticularly active in propaganda, and, linking up with English workers, teachers’ conferences and conventions were organized, which led to a world- wide movement for establishing and improving Sunday-schools throughout the world. The first World’s Sunday-School Convention was held in London in the year 1890 with 904 del- egates registered. Three hundred and sixty of these were from the United States and sixty-nine from Canada. The Sunday-school enrolment of the world at this time was reported to be 19,715,781. In the year 1893 the second World’s Convention was held at St. Louis. One hundred and twenty-five foreign delegates attended. ‘The third World’s Convention was held in 1898 in Lon- don; and in 1904 the fourth was convened in Jeru- salem, 526 delegates attending from twenty-five different countries. Half of these were Amer- icans. ‘Three years later, in 1807, the world’s BEGINNINGS AND GROW'TH 19 fifth convention was held in Rome, with 1118 delegates registered. More recent conventions have been held at Washington (1910); Zurich (1913); and Tokyo (1920). Consider what it means that such a convention should be held in Japan, a country that a little more than two generations ago was “almost as much a hermit nation as Thibet is to-day.” It certainly indicates something of progress for a Sunday-school con- vention to be received with open arms by a nation which only recently welcomed the Christian ideal. The convention in Tokyo touched the imagination of the Christian churches of the world. The great convention hall, especially built for the purpose of the convention, was burned to the ground six hours before the hour announced for the opening of the first meeting. With the codperation of the Japanese Government the officials secured other buildings and carried the program of the conven- tion to a successful issue. Though to many a visit to Tokyo meant a journey round the world, the convention was attended by 1814 accredited delegates from five continents and seventeen coun- tries. It is quite possible that World’s Conventions have reached high water-mark so far as numbers attending them is concerned. ‘The Glasgow con- 20 THE MODERN SUNDAY-SCHOOL vention held in June, 1924, was not so largely at- tended as some of the others, there being present 2693 delegates from fifty-four countries, 797 of these being Americans. The Glasgow convention aimed to be practical. There were a number of sectional conferences, an exhibition of value, and a pageant portraying the history of the Sunday- school from its inception. Thus out of the past has grown a movement of mighty power. The influence of the Sunday- school is much greater than is imagined. It does its work quietly and persistently. It has many shortcomings, and much of its work is amateurish. It lacks the glamour of the preaching services and the emotional power of the evangelistic mission so that slackers without persistence soon give it up. Nevertheless it is becoming ever more deeply rooted in the convictions and interest of Christian workers. Its ramifications extend to the ends of the earth. Each denomination has its own pub- lishing house, which supplies literature, propa- ganda material, and requisites of all kinds. Each has its editors, with associates and assistants. Conferences, institutes, and training-schools are held by the thousand. A complete system of teacher training is being wrought out. Theolog- ical seminaries, though slow to respond, are awak- J - BEGINNINGS AND GROWTH 21 ening to the need of special training in religious education. The war was a setback, but notwithstanding all the materialism and all the slackness that must in- evitably follow a crisis such as we have passed through, there is every cause for hopefulness. BIBLIOGRAPHY Faris, John T. (editor), “Report of the Ninth World’s Sunday School Convention, Glasgow, 1924,” World’s Sunday School Association. Brown, Arlo A., “A History of Religious Education in Recent Times,’ Abingdon Press, 1923. DECENTRALIZATION AND CHAPTER III UNITY Tue modern Sunday-school is decentralized ; that is, it is organized into departments, each a distinct and separate unit. has the following departments: Department 1 Cradle Roll 2 Beginners’ De- partment 8 Primary Depart- ment 4 Junior ment 5 Intermediate De- partment 6 Senior Depart- ment 7 Young People’s Department 8 Adult Depart- ment Depart- Hope for the with the graded movement. Period Infancy Early childhood Middle childhood Later childhood Karly adolescence Middle adolescence Later adolescence ‘Adult life The complete school Age from birth to 4 years from 4 to 5 years, inclusive from 6 to 8 years from 9 to 11 years from 12 to 14 years from 15 to 17 years from 18 to 23 years from 24 years on success of the Sunday-school lies Grading and decen- tralization exist so that instruction and activities 22 DECENTRALIZATION AND UNITY 23 may be specialized to meet the needs of the devel- oping life. In many a Sunday-school the first re- quirement is to bring order out of chaos. There is little use in discussing principles of teaching until the problems of reverence and atmosphere are solved. We have many times heard it said that order may only be secured by good teachers, but that is, at most, only half the truth. Many schools have few good teachers because they cannot keep them when they get them, for the simple reason that good teachers cannot or will not work in chaos. Order, reverence, and suitable atmosphere are largely the result of good organization. When the word “decentralization” was first in- troduced into the discussion of Sunday-school ad- ministration it brought apprehension to many be- cause they thought that decentralization would destroy the unity of the school; but their fears were groundless, as has been proved by later de- velopments. There is such a thing as unity in di- versity, diversity in unity. ‘The Sunday-school of to-morrow will be decentralized, but it will also be centralized. There will be a large measure of necessary freedom in each department, but also a centralization through oversight in codperation with leaders, officers, and teachers. The principle 24 THE MODERN SUNDAY-SCHOOL of gradation and decentralization will do more to make effective work possible than any other one new principle that has been introduced in these later years. Blackboards, pictures, requisites of whatever kind, all take second place as compared with decentralization and its accompanying grad- ing. These are of primary and, vital importance to the welfare of every Sunday-school. The principle of decentralization has really been accepted for years, for one never hears of a Sunday-school that has not at least its “infant class” or “primary department” separated from the main school. Most superintendents appreci- ate the fact that the little children must be sepa- rated from the older ones. But the vitality has been sapped, the energy of the school neutralized, and the older departments rendered comparatively valueless because of the limitation of the princi- ple. There is as great need for children of nine to eleven years of age, and twelve to fourteen, to have their own departments, as for four- and five- year-olds. ‘This statement will be questioned, but not by the careful student either of psychology or of school administration. In the Sunday-school of to-morrow there must be no “main” school. We are familiar with all the arguments used by those who like to see a large company, who have built DECENTRALIZATION AND UNITY 25 the Sunday-school buildings almost as a replica of the church building itself, and whose methods are borrowed from those of the pulpit. We are com- ing to see that if we are to deal successfully with the adolescent youth we must differentiate them as a psychological group. Further, each group must be limited in number. Many leaders favor departmental groups that do not exceed sixty or at the outside seventy pupils each. There are a number of reasons why decentral- ization is essential. First, it settles the much dis- cussed problem, Would you have small classes or large? An Intermediate Department, for exam- ple, with forty scholars, divided into eight classes with five in each, has all the advantage both of a large and a small class, for the leader and the teachers can then make the appeal both to the group and to the individual. The department leaders and teachers may meet in weekly conference and discuss their individual and group problems. ‘They may talk freely about particular pupils in the department—their be- havior and interests—and all this helps to solve class problems. It will thus be seen that the ques- tion of large or small classes is answered by retain- ing the best elements in both plans. Secondly, psychologists recognize that there 26 THE MODERN SUNDAY-SCHOOL must be physical nearness to secure mental near- ness. ‘The problems of order, reverence, and at- mosphere will never be solved until the smaller de- partmental system is introduced. Divide the av- erage main school of one hundred into two groups of fifty and try the experiment for three months. Given the right conditions the chances are a hun- dred to one that the experiment will become per- manent. In the smaller group the superintendent and teacher both get nearer to the individual pupil. Of course, with little children the princi- ple that physical nearness brings mental nearness is a well established one, but we are coming to find that it applies almost equally to work with ado- lescents. Schools should experiment and discover for themselves what is the right number. Of course it will be said by many, “We cannot experiment; we have no room.” But why not? The introduction of the principle of decentraliza- tion permits the school to meet at different hours. The hippodromes are meeting twice nightly, and the picture-shows are giving continuous perform- ances. ‘The Sunday-school of to-morrow must not be tied to any one tradition. Some Sunday- schools in Scotland meet at five o’clock in the evening, others at half-past six. In eastern DECENTRALIZATION AND UNITY 27 America schools often meet at twelve or half-past twelve. I know the arguments that are used against two sessions on Sunday afternoon. I also know one school with three sessions on Sunday, though no officer, teacher, or pupil attends more than one. ‘The Sunday-school of the future may be an all-day school, meeting continuously from morning till evening; a place where children and teachers meet for worship, for lessons, for super- vised study, for occupations, for reading, or any other activities that naturally suggest themselves. There may be morning Sunday-schools, afternoon Sunday-schools, and evening Sunday-schools, though they may be called by some better name. Sunday-school will be a rendezvous where comrade meets comrade, friend meets friend, and pupil meets teacher. Its activities will be prolonged; there will be no hurry, comparatively little set pro- gram, but abundant opportunity for expression. The church will provide picture-rooms, music- rooms, work-rooms, recreation-rooms, worship- rooms, cinematograph, wireless; and many of these will be in use from morning till evening on Sunday, to say nothing of week-days. It will be urged that this is not the highest ideal. Ought not society to cluster round the home rather 98 THE MODERN SUNDAY-SCHOOL than the church? We are not living in an ideal state of society. There is a city in England (and it is not London) with sixty thousand houses “back to back,” not one of which provides half enough room for the family. The youths of such fam- ilies are bound to find a rendezvous somewhere. If the church cannot provide this rendezvous, the street or the public house will. It is not more Sunday-schools that are needed but more useful ones, schools that are human, virile, efficient, pow- erful, pragmatic. Again, other things being equal, the division of the school into specialized groups will not only be a potent force in securing order and reverence, but it will make possible right atmosphere. We recognize in the very beginning that if we mix junior children with intermediate boys and girls the securing of either a good junior or inter- mediate atmosphere will be impossible and unifica- tion of aim impossible. A department of the Sunday-school that attempts to group together children of nine and youths of sixteen raises an effectual barrier to success. Another argument for decentralization is that it makes possible indirect teaching. It is one thing to carry on a campaign of personal evangel- ism with adults, quite another with children. The DECENTRALIZATION AND UNITY 29 child is so suggestible that the gospel call can be brought to him much more powerfully indirectly than directly. ‘Therefore, the leaders of the school must above all things create an atmosphere that will do its own work. The point is this. If you wish to evangelize a mature adult you must reach him chiefly through his intellect ; you will argue with him and show him the reason for things; but the child accepts truth uncritically. The best method to use in the adult department may be the worst possible with the be- ginners. If space permitted we could bring argu- ments to show that like differences exist all the way through the grades. A decentralized Sunday-school without a train- ing class misses a most vital part of its life. Or- ganization helps spirituality, just as spirituality helps organization. It is at this weekly class that most of the arrangements, changes, and plans are made; here is unity. The opening devotional ses- sion of the weekly class is of the utmost importance in gaining unity. It matters little if the children of the Cradle Roll or the Beginners’ Department are not known to the members of the Intermediate and Senior Departments; but it is of first impor- tance that teachers of all departments are ac- quainted with one another, and that leaders of de- 30 THE MODERN SUNDAY-SCHOOL partments work in harmony with each other. It is not so much unity of spirit among the pupils that is necessary for the school’s good as wnity of spirit among the workers. 'The weekly prepara- tion class smoothes over and harmonizes little matters that might easily lead to friction and yet leaves with each department all the power to plan, to apply method, and to secure the spirit that is so vitally necessary to make each Sunday’s work the best possible. Paradoxical though it may appear, the aim of decentralization is not separation but unity. The modern school seeks to unify itself in the church. It aims to unite church and school in inseparable bonds of worship and service. Indeed, the Jun- ior Department is the church for juniors. At- tempts have been made to organize and carry ona so-called Junior Church apart from the Church School, but none of these have been so successful as the Junior Department itself. When possible, officers, heads of departments, and teachers should attend the more important meetings for adult worship. But it is physically impossible to attend all, and pastors who have ex- pected this have been responsible for much lack of unity. The conception of the church must be DECENTRALIZATION AND UNITY 31 broadened or these breaches of unity will be per- petuated. Dr. John Cairns once said, “When I see a young man teaching the Gospel to half a dozen children I recognize a living branch of the church of Christ.” From this point of view it will be seen that the modern Sunday-school is undertaking a work of first importance. Its aim is to provide a place where the children may not only learn but wor- ship, and not only worship but worship with ap- preciative intelligence. The modern school is aiming to supply that which the senior church can- not provide, namely, a worshipful atmosphere suited to the changing need of the unfolding life. It is aiming to provide an atmosphere in which the Father can be worshiped in the beauty of holiness. Though equal in reverence and devotion to the most beautiful adult service, it will not by any means be a copy of such a service, for children’s worship must be more spontaneous than that of grown-ups who carefully observe all the conven- tions and traditions. When this imperative demand of child nature is recognized by the church it is probable that leaders will be set apart, trained, and ordained for this special service; and so it ought to be. But 82 THE MODERN SUNDAY-SCHOOL such leaders must not be men only. Leadership in the younger grades is a woman’s work. Child nature demands a graded school, and the vexed question of the child’s relation to the church will never be settled until this principle is recognized. The failure to recognize it causes many very de- plorable breaches between church and school. The problem of holding the older pupil for the church, will never be solved until the needs of the spiritual life of the little child are supplied. A small percentage of children now attend the adult church services, and it is a question whether those who do are helped or hindered. ‘To attend a serv- ice regularly when only one tenth of that service is meant for him may be detrimental to a child. An occasional visit with parents or teachers is a different thing. To have to sit still week by week through a comparatively uninteresting service may have serious effects in the subconscious nature of the child. ‘The result of this will be seen as soon as the pupil is free from authority; in many cases the church sees him no more; we reap as we sow. ‘lhe Sunday-school of yesterday, while se- curing the attendance of multitudes of children, more or less failed to nurture the love of worship, and the church is suffering to-day in consequence. DECENTRALIZATION AND UNITY 33 BIBLIOGRAPHY Athearn, W. S., “The Church School,” Pilgrim Press, 1914. Cope, H. F., “The Modern Sunday School and Its Present-Day Task,’ Revell, 1916. CHAPTER IV THE GRADED SCHOOL A symMpaTHETIc study of the unfolding life of childhood and youth has convinced open-minded folk that for effective religious education the pu- pils must be graded. But not only must the pu- pils be graded; lessons, methods, and even forms of worship also must be graded. ‘The one is as imperative as the other. Calendar age, in itself, is not a sufficient basis for grading. Age group- ing is approximate only, but, generally speaking, departmental groups include the years named in the preceding chapter. Let us consider these de- partments in detail. THe Crappie Rott DepartMEentT.—There must have been a spark of inspiration in the soul of the enthusiast who first suggested the Cradle Roll, for it has been and continues to be a valuable adjunct to the Sunday-school. The Cradle Roll is a distinct department. It links up the home and the church by the regis- tration of the infant as a member of the church 34 THE GRADED SCHOOL 35 school. This is accomplished, after the consent of the parents has been obtained, by recording the name of the newly born child on the Cradle Roll register. The Cradle Roll in the Episcopal Church is called the Baptismal Roll. Many families who are not interested in the ordinary activities of the church may be reached by this seemingly insignificant agency. In the Cradle Roll will be found a point of contact with the un- churched that is singularly effective. The church must reach the home and touch the home life. The presence of people in large numbers at the church service does not in itself insure that this is being done. Through the Cradle Roll it is easily possible not only to influence the mother and father of the child in intimate personal ways but also to lead them for the little one’s sake to make their home Christian in its ideals and atmosphere. ‘This is a community service of the highest order. ‘The Cradle Roll has often un- locked doors and permitted the entrance of the gospel messengers to families that otherwise would have remained untouched. Each minister should see to it that there is a Cradle Roll in his Sunday- school. The Cradle Roll needs the backing of the min- ister and the officers of the church. It will not 386 THE MODERN SUNDAY-SCHOOL be efficient if it is carried on by one or two individuals merely on their own initiative. If the pastor fancies the Cradle Roll to be an insig- nificant agency and not worth advocating, the effort will likely be handicapped and the result minimized. One Cradle Roll sermon a year is a good investment for any minister. There is a touch of sentiment about the idea, and mothers, especially those who are not attached to any particular church, are usually willing to allow the names of their little children to be en- tered. The very fact that the arrival of the new baby has been worthy of notice by the church folk means a good deal, and the consciousness that some one outside its own particular family is in- terested in that baby means much to the mother. The Cradle Roll card helps to seal the compact, making the parents feel that the child is in some slight sense, at any rate, a part of the church’s life. The Cradle Roll is a simple thing and can be carried on unobtrusively. Every minister and every superintendent should see to it that this department receives special encouragement. The Cradle Roll superintendent must have a gift of winning her way into the hearts of mothers and fathers. She should be a person of some leisure. One who is a mother is to be preferred; THE GRADED SCHOOL 37 at any rate the superintendent should be a married woman. She should be one who is en- thusiastic, resourceful, and have a deep sense of responsibility. She should not be one who is easily discouraged. She should be officially ap- pointed by the board of religious education. She should gather a group of helpers about her who will canvass the community. She will find many opportunities of inviting children, other than the babies, to join the Sunday-school. Careful rec- ords should be kept and the name, date of birth, name of father and mother, and church member- ship of parents noted in the records. The requisites required will be two Cradle Rolls—one for the Beginners’ Department, and one for the Primary Department; Cradle Roll enrolment forms and birthday greeting cards for the first, second, and third birthdays. In some departments a miniature cradle is used in which to place the name of the new member on the day of its reception and enrolment. ‘This practice appeals to the imagination of the children and cultivates a special consideration for the tiny ones. The enrolment of a Cradle Roll member should take place at the Sunday service of the Beginners’ Department. The most appropriate child—a 388 THE MODERN SUNDAY-SCHOOL brother, or sister, or cousin, or friend of the baby —should present the new baby’s name and ad- dress written on a piece of paper. After the child has told all he knows about the baby a Cradle Roll song may be sung, and the depart- ment may join in an appropriate devotional pause and prayer. Very frequently the children count over the number of names already on the Cradle Roll. Entering a name should be recognized by the department as a very important part of the service. When possible it is preferable to have the parents and the baby present in the depart- ment when the enrolment takes place. The visit of course must be a brief one. Probably on most Sundays the Cradle Roll babies will be remem- bered in prayer or song. On the fourth birthday a very special invitation should be sent to the child, who is now ready to come and join the Beginners’ Department. ‘The name is then removed from the Cradle Roll and placed upon the Beginners’ register. On that day a welcome song should not be forgotten, and mothers and fathers should be given a special in- vitation to be present. Once a year at least there should be a special Cradle Roll day in each church; on that Sunday all parents may be asked to bring their babies to THE GRADED SCHOOL 39 the school and to participate in the brief exercises ; they must not stay long, for the babies may protest. Systematic visitation ought to take place in the Cradle Roll Department, and on the first, second, and third birthdays special birthday greeting cards should be sent to the homes. Occasional meetings of mothers of Cradle Roll babies should be held. A strong leader can easily arrange mothers’ study classes for con- ferences on baby welfare, child nature and nurture, and these may be made of immense value to young mothers. Often very useful methods of community service will suggest themselves to the Cradle Roll visitors. ‘There are almost endless possibilities. The Cradle Roll is the foundation-stone in Sunday-school organization. It begins at the very beginning. ‘The babies of to-day will be the children of to-morrow; the children of to-morrow will be the church of the future. THE Brecinners’ DepartMEenT.—This depart- ment includes children of four and five years of age. If the Cradle Roll is well conducted most of the recruits for this department will come from that source. It is better not to receive into the Beginners’ Department children under four years 40 THE MODERN SUNDAY-SCHOOL of age. Though an occasional child under that age might be self-controlled enough to participate in the activities of the group without causing serious difficulty, the average three- or two-and-a- half-year-old is unready for the necessary co- operation essential even for the simplest program. The Beginners’ is by no means the easiest de- partment to conduct; four-year-olds are very individual in their outlook as well as in their activities. Since development is exceeding rapid at this period the most successful leaders grade still further into “young fours” and “‘old fours,” but young or old they all enjoy doing things in- dependently and are keen to explore everything and to make discoveries for themselves. Begin- ners learn chiefly through the senses of touch and sight and therefore must be allowed great liberty of action and supplied with all sorts of useful and interesting material to assist them in their quest. ‘To play out the story is one of the most useful forms of expression for them, but the story must be a very simple one. It is important to have the Beginners’ Depart- ment entirely separated from the Primary De- partment. ‘There should therefore be a special staff for the Beginners’ Department. The leader THE GRADED SCHOOL 41 ought to be an experienced kindergartner, and she should have a few sympathetic helpers con- stantly in attendance. ‘These helpers should have had at least some little experience in work with children. The really successful department from the child-nurture point of view must necessarily be small. Beginners cannot be handled in crowds; much individual attention is essential. The law that there must be physical nearness in order to secure mental nearness applies here. A cheerful, sunny room is most desirable for these little ones. It should be bright and beau- tiful. Babies absorb their environment more than do grown-ups. The requisites for the Beginners’ room are as follows: a rug or rugs for the floor; kindergarten chairs; low tables for handwork, drawing, and building; a sand-tray as large as consistent with the size and convenience of the room; a black- board for the teacher; individual blackboards for the children, or better still, blackboards on the walls, of course within reach; chalks and dusters, for use with blackboards; blocks for building; pictures and loose-leaf picture-books; scissors; vases and bowls for flowers; a few jugs and a watering-can; a dust-pan and brush; a depart- 42 THE MODERN SUNDAY-SCHOOL ment register; a good piano; a cupboard low enough for the children to reach every shelf and compartment. There will, of course, be a pianist. ‘The atmos- phere created by good and suitable music is quite as essential here as in any other department. The influence of the pianist in training the young child is probably quite as potent as that of the story-teller. The Beginners’ Department superintendent and her helpers should meet weekly with time to go thoroughly into all questions and problems that arise, and these are many. ‘The problems that arise for discussion are largely those con- cerned with the children’s activity and behavior. Though the lesson material and its presentation must of course be carefully considered, the most interesting questions are those concerning the directing of activities which will make for a help- ful atmosphere. The atmosphere of the ideal home where the little ones are surrounded with the spirit of loving codperation should be the aim, and all the simple stories, talks, hymns, prayers, and activities should lend themselves to this end. Remember we learn by doing. Never do for the Beginner what he can possibly do for himself ; and it is astonishing what the little child can do THE GRADED SCHOOL 43 under a restrained leader. “A little child shall lead them” must be the motto for this department. It will often be found that the most elaborate plans made in advance must be abandoned, for the beginner is a capricious mortal and has ideas of his own, and these ideas cannot always be successfully ignored. A Beginners’ leader must be prepared for anything, for she never knows what is going to happen next. The secret of success in the Beginners’ Department will be found in Froebel’s motto, “Observe the child; he will tell you what to do.” The British Lessons Council have given care- ful and intelligent attention to the choice of suitable lessons for each department. The un- derlying principles guiding their choice will be helpful to leaders and teachers of the Beginners’ Department. ‘They are as follows: (1) The little child will only realize the Fatherhood of God by dwelling on his gifts of father and mother love, food and drink and shelter, etc. Hence the need of stories of the common happenings of daily life, and Bible stories which center round the familiar things of home. (2) By the way of nature and its laws the child is led to a knowledge of and gratitude to 44 THE MODERN SUNDAY-SCHOOL God, the Creator, whose loving thought and care surround everything that he has made. (3) Through stories of Jesus the child is in- spired to love and follow him. (4) Through stories and the practice of kind- ness to animals, and through stories of people who serve the community, the child is led into a con- sciousness of his responsibility to others and to a sense of the interdependence of all life. Tue Primary DeprartmMent.—This, like all the other departments of the graded school, is a distinct group of children, teachers, and officers. The children are of both sexes, six, seven, and eight years of age. ‘The sessions of the depart- ment are entirely separate from those of other groups. It may meet occasionally with other departments of the school, but for the most part its work is done in its own room, its program growing directly out of the needs of children of this age. ‘The music, hymns, prayers, stories, lesson materials, and activities, as well as the physical equipment, are all adapted to the pupils’ requirements. The modern Primary Department is not only a place of nurture for children but also a laboratory of training for the teaching staff of to-morrow. An outstanding weakness of the Sunday-school THE GRADED SCHOOL 45 of yesterday was its haphazard method of finding teachers. ‘There was neither purpose nor plan about it. The modern school with its well or- ganized departments and its practice classes has done much to solve the teacher problem. The Primary Department lends itself, perhaps more effectively than any other, to practice teaching. The superintendent of the Primary Depart- ment should be the best obtainable. She is in charge of a delicate and difficult piece of work. What are the qualifications necessary for one in such an exalted position? ‘Taking for granted her spiritual attainments, which are indispensable, the leader must have a deep sympathy with the needs of child life, and a sincere devotion to children. She must be conversant with child psychology. She requires a good working knowl- edge of the principles and the art of teaching. She should be a really good story-teller and of course a Bible student. She should be a good or- ganizer, not only for the sake of the Sunday work but in order to arrange successful week-night social activities of a refining and uplifting nature. These are high qualifications, but the supreme importance of the work demands them. There should be an assistant superintendent, whose duty it will be to assist the superintendent, and 46 THE MODERN SUNDAY-SCHOOL in case of her absence take charge of the de- partment. A separate departmental room is required for the Primary Department. It should be of ample size to accommodate the department—the exact dimensions dependent of course upon the number of pupils—well lighted and cheerful. A cloak- room, or lobby which will serve as such, is most desirable. Specially designed Primary tables and chairs are important. Other necessary equipment includes a good piano; a small table for the su- perintendent; a table for the secretary; registra- tion apparatus; chairs for visitors; well chosen pictures; a blackboard; white and colored chalk; vases and bowls for flowers (assorted sizes); a Cradle Roll; a small doll’s cradle; collection bas- kets; a cupboard for storing materials; a waste- paper basket; duster and also a dust-pan and brush; and such materials for expressional ac- tivity as drawing-paper, pencils, crayons with boxes to keep them in, sand-trays and sand, small bricks or blocks for sand-tray use, ordinary building bricks in considerable numbers, plas- ticine, and scissors. If tables are impracticable, mill-boards should be provided which the children may support upon their knees in writing and drawing. THE GRADED SCHOOL A] Lesson material must be chosen to suit the needs of children of Primary age. 'Time was when all education began with the book, or with the teacher, not with the child. It used to be thought that the important thing was the lesson, but the point of view is changing: the important thing is the child. When material was chosen from the lesson point of view the lessons committee endeavored to divide the Bible into sections so as to cover the whole book in six or seven years’ study; the question of the effect of this method upon the child was secondary. But in these days our lessons committees are placing the child in the foreground, and the question of what will meet his needs is of supreme importance. This change of point of view accounts for the many changes that have taken place in the selection of lesson material in these later years. The lessons produced for the graded school by the British Lessons Council are chosen with very much thought and care and have met with much favor in departmentalized Sunday-schools. ‘The principles underlying the choice of lessons by the British committee are as follows: (1) To choose only such stories as will convey a thought of God, of Jesus, or of goodness, which the 48 THE MODERN SUNDAY-SCHOOL child can grasp at his present stage of development. To be led always by the child’s developing interest and need. Hence, to avoid such stories as might convey false or confusing impressions to the child mind, and to keep back certain periods of Bible history in order that they may come fresh to the child at the age when they will have a special value. (2) To show the Christian virtues—self-control, rev- erence for God and man, courtesy, truthfulness, kindness to animals, happiness as portrayed in familiar surround- ings. (3) To show the oneness of the human family by means of stories of children of other lands. Certain stories are included in the course as throwing special light on Bible truth and every-day Christian virtues. The sources of such stories are indicated in the courses, and the stories are treated by lesson writers. (4) To make due provision for Easter, Christmas, and special gift Sundays (flower, Harvest, hospital) ; also to provide special groups of lessons for August which shall insure that where the department is dis- organized during the holiday month by the absence of leaders or teachers, neither the sequence of the course nor the teachers’ study shall seriously suffer. (5) The Bible verses heading the various groups and those attached to the lessons are inserted only for the guidance of the teachers in the treatment of the lesson, and are not intended for the scholars. THE GRADED SCHOOL 49 Worship is quite as important an element of the Primary program as instruction. The pianist should make it his or her pleasurable duty to secure the best and most suitable music for the department. No one hymn-book should be used exclusively. Hymn-books are never put into the hands of the pupils, nor are hymn-sheets neces- sary. The children soon learn the simple Pri- mary hymns by heart. Children are happy when they are singing; it is for them one of the most natural ways of ex- pressing happiness. Music should be a real out- flowing of the soul, and therefore all the hymns should be chosen from the child’s point of view. The words should be simple, easily understood, and the music should be set neither too high nor too low to suit the child voices. Each word and syllable should have a corresponding note. As far as possible both words and music should in- spire and lead to action. Tur Junior DepartMENT.—The Junior has come almost to a halt in physical growth. Later childhood brings a pause in which the child matures and makes ready for the adolescent ac- celeration which will come with the pubertal crisis. Though halting in physical growth, he is growing 50 THE MODERN SUNDAY-SCHOOL strong both in body and mind. He is becoming self-reliant, too, and while still ready to believe what he is told, he begins to question things. Riotous imagination is giving place to judgment and reason. Quite unconsciously he is finding that he can think better as he gathers more facts to think with, and he is ready to absorb information in vast quantities. His social life, too, is widen- ing. He is passing from the comrade to the group or tribal stage. ‘Though heroes do not appeal to him so much as they will later on, he is ardently fond of good stories and should be fed with them. Biographies are excellent story material for him, for he may be said to make his history out of the biographies which he absorbs. As an Interme- diate he will be busy connecting these up into chronological history. The Junior Department should supply this need for concrete biography. In this period the child is rapidly developing mentally, and while he continues to absorb spirit- ual atmosphere through his feelings he is ready now for considerable intellectual effort. The department includes children approximately nine, ten, and eleven years of age and should not extend beyond these limits; indeed, narrowing would be preferable to extending them, and in large schools this may be done. By the time children reach THE GRADED SCHOOL 51 eleven years of age there is such a quickening of eager interest for new information that they can no longer be kept in the same class with chil- dren of nine; therefore, strict attention should be given to close grading at the top end. The department must have its own room, its own lobby or cloak-room and, like other depart- ments, be conducted as a separate unit except on occasions when the whole school gathers in a united session. ‘The department should be divided into small classes, preferably of not more than five pupils. Classes should be kept small for the fol- lowing reasons: for the sake of convenient group circles; for close touch of teacher with pupil to facilitate the carrying on of expression work. The classes should be grouped in semicircles in three or four rows, the youngest children in the front and the oldest at the back. This will bring the children and leader into “physical nearness” with one another. It will also enable all the pupils to see the hymn-sheets where these are used. The equipment for the department should in- clude chairs of proper height for the children; tables for classes; a good piano; junior hymn- books, and a selection of suitable music; hymn- stand and calico hymn-sheets ; pictures and maps; offering-baskets or plates; blackboard and easel; 52 THE MODERN SUNDAY-SCHOOL white and colored chalk; dusters; small table for the leader; vases; a box for each class large enough to hold expression materials; a box of colored crayons; Bibles, preferably the Revised Version; ruled paper for written expression and a thin drawing-paper of the same size for the pur- poses of making drawings, maps, or diagrams; some sort of holder for these, made perhaps of stiff paper, or thin cardboard; a table for the secretary; attendance records. Hymn-sheets are to be preferred in some re- spects to hymn-books and can be readily made by the superintendent of the department or her helpers. For this purpose ordinary white calico thirty-six inches wide should be purchased and the printing done with a set of rubber printing stamps, which can be procured at almost any rubber stamp outfitting shop at small cost. The capital letters should be one and one fourth inches and the small letters about an inch in height. If they are larger a larger sheet of calico will be required. If they are smaller than this they will not be decipherable. The necessary qualifications of the Junior De- partment superintendent are much the same as those of the leader in the Primary department. To be successful, he or she, for either a man or THE GRADED SCHOOL 53 woman may fill this post, must possess real powers of leadership. The superintendent also should be a teacher par excellence. He will find in this department an incomparable opportunity for teaching the Bible to children. It is astonishing how much can be acquired in an hour by Junior children, if the teaching work is thorough. There must be no slipshod, haphazard method here; right principles of teaching must be recognized and fol- lowed. ‘There should be no wearisome tasks, no dull, unrelated memory passages, for the learning of which character-impairing bribes have to be offered. The Bible must’be presented so that the child will be fascinated by its stories, thrilled by its life, refined by its poetry, and uplifted by its Christ. Not only must there be a special selection of Bible stories which fit the grade, but the leader must keep in mind that this is the most suitable time for teaching Bible geography as well as Bible manners and customs. These three— stories, geography, manners and customs—will make an appeal to the most active and restless boy or girl that will be certain to secure an atmosphere of interested attention. The superintendent must be willing to spend much time in the selection of hymns to be used. 54 THE MODERN SUNDAY-SCHOOL “Didn’t that last hymn fit?” said a ten-year-old boy at the close of a service; a worthy compli- ment to the leader. It should be even more pos- sible here than in the Primary Department to make of each service a unit of thought and feeling, each item contributing its share to make clear the central thought of the hour. Talks supplementary to the lesson story (which are generally given previous to the latter) should often deal with the setting and surround- ings of the lives of its heroes. ‘The geography, manners and customs, and climate, of the land in which the central figures live or have lived should be clearly depicted. Maps, diagrams, and other means of lesson illustration are useful in this department. A good sized brown paper map made by the superintendent is often of more value for the Junior Department than much more elab- orate ones sold at high prices. Most maps have too much on them and are confusing. Simplicity is very necessary in teaching geography. There should be within reach one good physical map of Palestine and a good clear map of the world. The Junior Department staff should consist of the superintendent, an assistant superintendent, a pianist, a secretary, a door-keeper, and teachers. There should be a Junior preparation class, or THE GRADED SCHOOL 55 training class for specialized training. Teacher training classes have not been more successful in the past largely because of the fact that they have been carried along on too general lines. The Junior Department training class should be highly specialized; it is for Junior teachers alone. To attempt to combine Primary and Junior classes is fatal. As has been said elsewhere we undertake very much more than simply Bible exegesis; Bible study there is, but it is specialized Bible study. It cannot be emphasized too strongly that it is better to have a small class highly specialized than a larger general one. The superintendent of the department should lead this preparation class. Assistance may be had from the minister or other specialists, but the superin- tendent should do most of the teaching. The following is an agreement made between the superintendent and teachers in the Junior Department of one Sunday-school: “It is agreed, that teachers shall make a particular point of informing the department leader if they can- not be present on Friday evenings at Training Class at 7:45 p.M.; that there shall be two helpers appointed every Friday night to arrive at Sunday-school precisely at 2:30 p.m. to help the superintendent in the prepara- tions; that teachers shall arrive on Sunday afternoon 56 THE MODERN SUNDAY-SCHOOL not later than 2:45 p.m. and be ready to receive the children in the cloak-room at precisely 2:55 p.M.; that the children shall be admitted by the secretary at pre- cisely 2:55 P.M. except on rainy Sundays, when they shall be admitted as soon as the helpers specially ap- pointed for this purpose are ready to receive them; that all children shall be visited once a year by the depart- ment superintendent and that class teachers shall visit their own children after two Sundays of absence, in- variably making a report of such visits immediately fol- lowing the visit; that for every twelve teachers in the Junior Department there be three others who will act as substitutes. No teacher shall have more than a period of six months substituting; but other things being equal, each teacher should take a share of at least three months substituting during their term of Junior Department work. What are the most suitable lesson materials for Juniors? In answering this question we can- not do better than to quote what the British Lessons’ Council says concerning the principles that should determine the selection of Junior Lessons. ‘The aims are: (1) To lead the pupils toward a fuller idea of the character of God, as expressed in ways of truth, justice, and mercy. (2) To help them toward a true ideal of duty to THE GRADED SCHOOL 57 God and man, expressed in love, honor, obedience, fair- play, and self-control, through stories of heroes whose acts and motives bear some relation to the experience of boys and girls. (3) To present the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ—(a) That the pupils may see in his Per- son and deeds the highest embodiment, not of power alone, but of truth, courage, justice, love, and grace; (b) That they may feel the supreme attraction of his person and call, and desire to love and obey Him. The British lessons chosen in accord with this statement are definitely planned for children of nine to twelve years of age. The course covers in outline the main narrative portions of the Bible, but the proportion selected from different periods varies according to their relation to the interests and powers of the child. As a rule the material is concrete, positive, and in story form. It con- sists in the main of stories of such deeds and ex- periences as illustrate simple relations of obe- dience and love to God, and personal qualities of courage, truth, justice, and faithfulness. Les- son links are simple, logical connections, rather than historical, as such. The lessons are ar- ranged in groups, under some unifying thought. Reviews are suggested where necessary at the close of such groups. A selection of passages suitable 58 THE MODERN SUNDAY-SCHOOL for memorizing is suggested for each group. A series of four or five missionary lessons in each year presents Christian ideals in the heroic form a child may grasp. Suitable topics are suggested for Easter, Whitsunday, Temperance, and Christ- mas Sundays. Tue IntermMepiate DepartMent.—Like other groups of the graded school, the Intermediate Department must have its own organization, its own separate room, and its own specialized pro- gram. In the average school, numbers will be about the same as those of the Junior Depart- ment. If the Intermediate attendance exceeds fifty, difficulties in management will be likely to present themselves. From the standpoint of administration the small department is preferable. If the enrolment is large and such a plan is prac- ticable it is well to have two departments with sessions at different hours. It is of first importance that the Intermediate group shall be separated from the “main” school. Specialized services, lessons, and methods are just as fundamental in this group as with the younger pupils. If the “main” school is grouped into three or four departments, preferably four, Inter- mediate, Senior, Young People, Adult, the solu- tion of the problem of grading is, so far as THE GRADED SCHOOL 59 organization is concerned, within sight of solution. All agree to-day that the Primary Department should be separately administered, and most agree that the Junior as a separate unit is highly desirable. As a matter of fact, the separation of the Intermediate from the Senior Department is of even greater utility, as all schools that have tried the plan can testify. Abolish the main school, is the dictum of the graded workers; de- partmentalize and specialize from the top to the bottom is, so far as organization is concerned, its watchword. Equipment required for the Intermediate Department includes a piano; a selection of suit- able music; hymn-books; a blackboard; chalks and duster; Bibles; hymn-stand and calico hymn- sheets; a table for the superintendent; books and pencils for expression work; some receptacle for holding expression and other material for use in each class; bookcase for books; a museum cup’ board; pictures in abundance; maps; offering- baskets or plates; vases for flowers; desk for the secretary; and, if possible, a table for each class. Each class should be limited in number to six or eight pupils. With a department of fifty this would give a teaching staff of seven or eight 60 THE MODERN SUNDAY-SCHOOL teachers. Besides this there should be one or two reserve teachers. ‘The other officers besides the superintendent will be an assistant superin- tendent, pupil president and secretary, a door- keeper, and a pianist. The department is, of course, made up of both boys and girls, though in this grade it is usually preferable to have separate classes. It is better to have men for the teachers of boys’ classes and women for the teachers of girls, but the rule should not be a hard and fast one. In practice it sometimes works out the other way about. Pupils as well as teachers should have a voice in the management of the group. Questions coming up for decision should be referred to committees with full opportunity for discussion. Intermediates are democratic. Let committee members be selected by the pupils, one from each class. It should be said that the superintendent of the de- partment is, ex officio, a member of all committees. Questions that have been discussed by pupils’ committees are such as these: How can the depart- ment be made really efficient and splendid in every way? What should be done with late pupils? Why should all hats and coats be taken off during the service? What is the best way to arrange the furniture of the room? How shall the THE GRADED SCHOOL 61 offering be taken? What shall be the depart- mental motto? What kind of badges shall the committees have? Shall the department run a magazine? Helpers from among the pupils may be ap- pointed, whose duty will be to arrange the room in turn, put out the hymn-sheets, and make any other necessary preparation; all this being done under the guidance of the superintendent of the department. They will also in turn clear away at the close of the session. This is the period of early adolescence. The girl develops earlier and may be moved up into the Senior Department a year sooner than the boy. The stirrings of sex, and all that these imply, remain for the most part comparatively quiescent during the Intermediate period. Boys and girls are not nearly so much interested in one another as they will become later on. The secret of success lies largely in the choice of the right person as superintendent of the de- partment. ‘The leader may be of either sex, but there must be a personality at the head. The leader must not be an autocrat, for there is much to learn both from teachers and pupils. As in the Junior Department the leader must be a teacher. ‘The Intermediate pupil is ready and 62 THE MODERN SUNDAY-SCHOOL willing to be taught. He is still very much of a school-boy and will remain so while in this depart- ment. The leader, therefore, must be a good teacher. Indeed, he must hold his own with the pupils’ day-school teachers. And we must not ignore the fact that in these days boys and girls in both elementary and secondary schools are better taught than they were of yore. The Intermediate pupil recognizes the teacher who, in the words of the secondary school-boy, “‘gets the stuff across.” But the Intermediate superintendent must be more than a teacher, for religion cannot be taught as a subject. Religion cannot be separated from life—physical life, mental life, emotional life, and social life. Religion is not acquired by memoriz- ing the catechism or texts of Scripture. The teacher who endeavors to bring religious teach- ing to the boy and girl must be conversant with their weekly pursuits, their interests and hobbies, and their temptations. Otherwise he will make little contact with their need, and his teaching will be abstract, something apart from life. We must educate the whole boy physically, mentally, and morally. Intermediate Department problems are quite THE GRADED SCHOOL 63 as numerous and difficult as those of the Primary and Junior Departments. A departmental train- ing class or workers’ conference is just as essential here as in the elementary departments. There are many advantages in having a compulsory training class. The Intermediate period is the golden op- portunity for continuing education in Bible and general religious knowledge. Interest in history is now developing strongly. Stories of great heroes and groups of heroes, explorers, and mis- sionaries make the strongest appeal at this age. Therefore extra-biblical material may be wisely introduced into the courses of study, but the heroes of the Bible and the Hero of heroes should have a central place. Loyalty is the crux of moral character in this age, and lesson material that appeals to loyalty should be frequently presented and opportunities for its expression should be provided. Week-day activities play a large part in suc- cessful work with Intermediate and Senior pupils. It is largely owing to a lack of these activities that the older pupil is not retained. When pos- sible the lessons and the week activities should be related to each other. ‘The British Lessons Coun- 64 THE MODERN SUNDAY-SCHOOL cil states that their aim is to present during the Intermediate years: (1) The great virtues such as loyalty, chivalry, moral heroism, forgiveness, purity, etc., as embodied in those pre-Christian characters who prepared the way for Christ, in whom all the heroic qualities they revealed were seen to perfection. (2) Jesus as the Hero of heroes, who by his life of love, service, and self-sacrifice met and overcame the power of evil, inspiring his followers through the ages to exhibit the fruits of his spirit in their lives. SENIOR, YOUNG PEOPLE’s, AND ADULT DEPaRT- MENTS.—In England these departments are some- times referred to as Lower Senior, Upper Senior, and Adult. Each age period is clearly marked psychologically, though there may be some dif- ference of opinion as to the exact ages. Group- ing cannot be based upon the calendar in any exact way; calendar age is always approximate only. There are no cut-and-dried plans or methods to be prescribed for these departments. Much depends upon available facilities and leaders. One may speak more or less dogmatically with reference to the form of organization in the Begin- ners’, Primary, and Junior Departments, and THE GRADED SCHOOL 65 even in the Intermediate Department, but in the more advanced departments allowance must be made for more or less variation. A considerable degree of self-government is advisable. The purpose of the Young People’s Depart- ment has been well stated by one writer as follows: The central aim of this department is to create a comradeship of young men and women who are seeking to know Christ, trying to interpret his Gospel in their own lives, and applying its teaching to the problems of their generation. We want to help them to discover what the Kingdom of God means and how it can be established here. We want to help them to become real citizens, both national and international, to understand the problems and needs of their time, and to realize their own responsibilities. In the report of a commission recently issued by the united board of Sunday-school organiza- tions of Great Britain the aim is stated as follows: ‘The department exists to help young people to understand all the glorious possibilities of the Christian life which is God-centered and spent in the service of others; of a life that is rich and full because it is directed to the positive end of service and ruled by passionate love for Christ. Fullness of life in Christ, the achievement of Christian personality ;—that, on behalf of each of 66 THE MODERN SUNDAY-SCHOOL its members, is the aim of the department.” It will be realized that the choice of leaders for these departmental groups must be made with extreme care. It probably may be true that m most churches there is a limited choice, for real leaders of seniors and young people are few and far between. ‘To be successful the leader must be a man of big and broad sympathies. He must be acceptable to the group itself; one might safely say he ought to be nominated by them, for democracy must prevail here or the work will fail. He must be more than a “good” man, for there are many good men who are wholly incompetent for work of this sort. Athletics and outdoor sports are imperative if youth is to be helped to fight the moral battles of hfe successfully, and it is surely best that week- day activities should be carried on at least under the supervision of those who lead on Sunday. The physical and the spiritual are closely co- ordinated; it is difficult to differentiate them. The church must recognize that the call for a recreational and social life is a deeper thing than a mere seeking after pleasure. It is the call of the blood; it is the call of sex; and it must find expression in physical activity and social inter- THE GRADED SCHOOL 67 course or it will give vent to itself in immoral practices. Here is the church’s opportunity to save. ‘Time will come when she will have men especially trained for this job, just as specially trained as ministers are trained for preaching. The church must touch community conditions and make wholesome provision for its need. But the problem is the problem of leadership. Any man suitable for such work should be freed from other calls and enabled to give himself whole- heartedly to the service of youth. It is obvious, therefore, that he should be a young man, vigor- ous and strong, intellectually alive, emotionally on fire with love for youth. He should be free from the love of dominating, willing to learn from those he leads, suspicious of mere sentimental plety—a genuine man, wholesome, sane, and human. The right leader for the girls must in general be of the same sort. If the perfect leader cannot be found, the church must look out for one who comes as nearly as possible to the ideal. It would be well if every leader in charge of a department in the modern Sunday-school were largely exempt from other church and social duties in order that he or she might be able to 68 THE MODERN SUNDAY-SCHOOL specialize, for the work is more or less an all-the- week job. Once-a-week will never succeed, cer- tainly not in these upper grades. There are many in the churches who are “inter- ested in religious education,” but who are not suffi- ciently interestéd to give much time to it. They are quite ready, if some one else will do the spade work, to give a talk or an address, but few are will- ing, week in and week out, to keep patient with the adolescents’ crude humor, their sometimes rough horseplay, and frequent breaches of social eti- quette. There are not many Christians good enough to sacrifice their social functions, their warm fireside, and the gratification of their liter- ary, musical, or recreational tastes to be real pals to youth; this is where the church is failing. Taking up the cross is more than a mere question of attending church, giving money to the poor, or subscribing to foreign missions. It means and must more and more mean a sacrificing of time and comfort for the sake of providing needed rendezvous and still more needed friendship for boys and girls just embarking upon, or midway across, the tempestuous sea of adolescence. All Sunday-schools should have a coédrdinated course of lessons throughout the departments. Lesson courses should be graded. If we make THE GRADED SCHOOL 69 reference once again to the aims of the British Lessons Council we shall find them stated for these departments as follows: It is felt that for these departments lessons and topics must be chosen on a different principle from that which operates in the earlier grades. In the Junior and In- termediate school the Old and New Testaments are studied in lessons, graded to meet the needs of the children at different ages, so as to fill in with ever fuller detail their knowledge of the biblical history and teach- ing. But the years which carry our young people to the verge of manhood and womanhood bring new conditions, questions, and difficulties. It is also the time at which we are seeking with renewed earnestness to promote or confirm their allegiance to Jesus Christ, and to equip them as intelligent servants of the Kingdom of God. Instruction, therefore, ought to be given, their inter- est stimulated, and their questions met on subjects, the ground of which is ever in the Scriptures, but which can only be presented by taking wider surveys of biblical truth than is possible in the consecutive treatment of individual books or narratives. It seems proper that at this time lessons should be given in such subjects as: the Bible as a whole, and the right method of approaching it; the character and work of our Lord, and the implications that lie in them for faith and conduct; the nature, privileges, and obligations 70 THE MODERN SUNDAY-SCHOOL of the church He founded, and its missionary task in the world; the Christian life with its personal and social duties; the great fundamental truths, drawn from the word of God, which are the living faith and strength of the church. In both the lower and upper Senior Depart- ment there is a fine opportunity for self-teaching. If the department can be inspired really to set itself to work, much will be accomplished. The commission referred to above, which has published its findings under the title of ‘‘Princi- ples of Senior Work,” makes some interesting suggestions which are worth summarizing here. The members of the commission point out that the conception of Christian life which in the past has been considered as something pertaining to the spirit only is too narrow an interpretation, and they urge that the aim should be the salvation of the whole man, spirit, mind, and body. “We must not,” they say, ‘attempt to teach the Chris- tian faith apart from its bearings upon life as a complete whole. The incarnation forbids us to regard the human body as a mere prison-house of the soul and a drag upon the spirit in its ascent to God.” Working on this basis they demand an all-round program. ‘They recommend organizing on comradeship lines with local self-government. THE GRADED SCHOOL 71 They point out the fact that it is impossible to teach personality, that the learner cannot be a mere passive recipient of truth. The Senior De- partments down to their last detail should give opportunity for the self-expression of members. The session of the department must be more than a mere meeting; it must be a fellowship, a fellow- ship of service. The report says, “The real glory of a department is not in the number on the books or actually attending the session, but in the number it has set to work.” As far as method is concerned the commission emphasizes the need of discussion. The long lesson is to be a thing of the past. The aim is to draw out the diffident pupil. The general plan of group discussion is recommended. The method of the Senior Department must not be borrowed from the pulpit. The Senior Departments offer the final op- portunity for the training of the boys and girls in service before the responsibilities of adult life are upon them. Expressional activities, are quite as important in these departments as in those for younger pupils. One of the advantages of having the Senior Department’s meeting at a different hour from the remainder of the school is that members may 72 THE MODERN SUNDAY-SCHOOL be employed in the school itself as teachers, secre- taries, door-keepers, and librarians. Here are some forms of service that have been tried in one school or another. One Senior De- partment organized and carried on a missionary exhibition. The girls of another organized a créche where mothers could leave their young children while attending church and communion service. The same group gave relief to other mothers by taking charge of the children for cer- tain periods in homes where the mothers needed such relief. One scout troop organized a chair brigade which made church-going possible for some elderly people. One Senior Department undertook the care of the gardens and ground sur- rounding their church premises. The secretary of another church used the Senior Department to help him in conducting church correspondence. Such work helps to bring the boys into closer relationship to the church. Concerts and enter- tainments may be given in hospitals, infirmaries, cripples’ homes, and old people’s homes. Doing things is better than talking things. It is better to live the gospel than merely to preach it. I’d rather see a sermon Than hear one any day. THE GRADED SCHOOL 13 I’d rather one would talk with me, Than merely tell the way. Methods of social service should often be a topic of discussion in the Senior Departments. “My class will listen to me, but I cannot get them to do anything,” is the lament of many a Senior teacher. The explanation in many cases is to be found in the teacher’s method. Too often there is entire failure to encourage sugges- tions by members of class or department, to stimulate initiative, and to create a sense of re- sponsibility on the part of the pupils themselves. A weekly workers’ conference of Senior teachers meeting at the same time as the training classes of the other departments, is a valuable acquisition to department plans. THe Parents’ DepartMent.—The Sunday- school will never reach its zenith until there is closer codperation between school and home. There must be frequent opportunities for the superintendents of departments to explain their aim and their method to parents; opportunities also for parents to report the effect of the teach- ing upon the children. Conferences between teachers and parents will help to solve problems of sex teaching. ‘This is particularly true for the "4 THE MODERN SUNDAY-SCHOOL intermediate and senior grades. Then there is the question of social activities, dancing, and other debatable forms of recreation which need ventilating. If parents are brought into the dis- cussion of plans and methods they may be the more readily interested in financing scouts, brig- ades, clubs, and the like. Codperation is more than desirable; it is imperative. But beside all this the church might do much more than she is doing in helping parents to train their children better. The church is doing much to make parents feel their responsibility, but she is not giving enough assistance to help them ade- quately to discharge these responsibilities; she is perhaps dealing too much with abstract ideas and not giving enough concrete help. ‘True, the church is a worshiping institution, but it is surely a teaching institution also, and there is no sub- ject that needs illumination more than that of child nature and child nurture. Generally speaking, parents want to do their best for their children and are willing to seize op- portunities offered to help them in their task. Mother instinct will do much; but instinct con- verted into clear and intelligent insight will do more. Every plan made to bring the church and home THE GRADED SCHOOL 75 into closer codperation should be seriously con- sidered. We have already had something to say on the value of the Cradle Roll. Another form of organization that has possibilities of eminent service is the Parents’ Department. In some churches this department should be separately organized. In the majority of instances the preferable plan will be the organization of parents’ classes within the Adult Department. Whether department or class, it may or may not meet on Sunday. Some groups meet at an entirely different time. Conferences and dis- cussions on various aspects of child welfare and child training may be held, with occasional lectures; or classes may study some of the ex- cellent text-books now available. The study- circle group should not be large if the best results are to be obtained. Groups should not con- sist of more than twenty; half that number would be better. In some cases members of the class will bring books on child nature and child nurture for sup- plementary reading, and these can be kept cir- culating among members. A child-study library is a valuable acquisition. These departments and classes have helped many parents to find the solution of home problems that would otherwise 46 THE MODERN SUNDAY-SCHOOL have been insuperable for them, and the general result has been a quickened interest in child life, an improvement in methods of discipline, an ap- preciation of the value of a wholesome home at- mosphere, and a closer codperation between the school, the church, and the home. Much of the success of this department depends on wise guidance in choosing courses. Abstract subjects should be avoided. Parents desire help on concrete problems. ‘There are an unlimited number of home problems that may be profitably discussed. Parents will talk about their children and gladly listen to the experiences of others. The following series of topics was discussed during a winter session in one Parent’s De- partment: Nurture by atmosphere: how to develop right feeling; training the child in truthfulness, honesty, and obe- dience; children’s rights; learning by indirection; at- mosphere in the home, school, and community; citizenship. Nurture by food: the child’s need of food, light, sun- shine, and exercise; the child mind and heart hunger; emotions and their culture, fear and flight; anger and resistance; ownership and acquisition; curiosity and in- vestigation. Nurture by exercise: the value of activity; the rest- — THE GRADED SCHOOL T7 less child; the playful child; the quiet child; the mean- ing of play; the child that does not play. As a matter of fact this outline program led into all sorts of interesting subjects. Punish- ment and discipline proved to be ever recurring topics, and this gave opportunity for discussing a variety of questions. Some of them may be of general interest. What is the relation of atmos- phere to punishment? Should children always obey? What rights has a child? How serious are children’s lies? Their origin? What is the most effective treatment? How should children’s questions about God be answered? How may the child’s curiosity about sex be satisfied in wholesome, morally helpful ways? In this instance the interest in the topics under consideration was so great that three times the group appointed a mid-week meeting to con- tinue the discussion. BIBLIOGRAPHY Bernard, Winifred E., “The Beginners’ Department,” National Sunday-School Union (London), 1928. Clover, Muriel Frankham, “Child Study Notes for the Beginners’ Leader,’ Pilgrim Press (London), 1925. Clover, Muriel Frankham, “The Beginners’ Service,” Pilgrim Press (London), 1925. "8 THE MODERN SUNDAY-SCHOOL Johnston, Ethel Archibald, “The Primary Department: Its Principles and Methods,’ National Sunday-School Union (London), 1924. Wilson, Dorothy F., “The Junior Department of the Sunday-School: A Practical Handbook,” National Sunday-School Union (London), 1921. Harris, H. H., “Leaders of Youth,’ Methodist Book Concern, 1922. Harris, H. H., “The Organization and Administration of the Intermediate Department,” Teacher Training Publishing Association, 1924, Thompson, James V., “Handbook for Workers with Young People,’ Abingdon Press, 1922. Barclay, Wade Crawford, “The Organization and Ad- ministration of the Adult Department,” Caxton Press, 1925. Stevenson, James W., “The Parents’ Department: The Need and the Plan,” Pilgrim Press (London), 1921. CHAPTER V ATMOSPHERE Ir is ~ gnificant that the idea of the Sunday- school session as a place of worship is only begin- ning to be realized. It is both well and necessary that a basis for faith should be laid in knowledge, but we must not be content with this alone. Young people must not only know about God; they must know God and be able to think of him and to speak of him as one whom their hearts con- sciously realize. ‘T'o know God after this manner is to be worshipful. ‘To behold the beauty of the Lord is to add to faith, reverence. ‘This addition to faith, children make naively and naturally. The child can be led to feel intensely the wonder of the divine presence all about him. An irreverent atmosphere is much more dan- gerous for a child than for an adult. The adult does not so readily respond to stimulus; for him familiarity has taken off the keen edge of desire. The child is all on fire for new knowledge, new feelings, new experiences; and he attends with 79 80 THE MODERN SUNDAY-SCHOOL great mental alertness. He wants to learn and moreover to put into action the knowledge that he has gained; to make it a part of himself. If church leaders could but realize the injury that a badly conducted Sunday-school or kindred organization can do to the subconscious char- acter of the child, they would stand aghast at their delinquency. In fact I do not hesitate to say that the children of many Sunday-schools would be better off in the street, for the reverence and order that we look for in church we do not expect to find in the street. ‘The Sunday-school is con- nected with and for the most part meets upon church premises. The church stands for wor- ship, for reverence; but the street, the movie theater, even the day school, each has its own particular atmosphere and must necessarily be in a different category from the church. The public school does not tolerate carelessness or flippancy. The work of the Sunday-school and of other kindred agencies of the church must be organized and conducted in such a manner as will nurture rather than repress the highest and holiest impulses of the child’s soul. Good motive on the part of those who are responsible is not enough; there must be efficiency in operation as well as purity of purpose. A reverent atmos- ATMOSPHERE 81 phere is absolutely essential to Sunday-school work. But what is atmosphere? Atmosphere is like the air that the child breathes, as contrasted with the food that he eats. He thrives just as much upon what he unconsciously inhales as upon that with which he is consciously fed. Since atmos- phere is something felt, rather than known, it cannot be adequately described. It is not order only, nor is it silence. It is not something forced or mechanical. It is only present when there is spontaneity, freedom, and yet unity. It arises out of environment, setting, personality, pres- tige, music, beauty. ‘The very walls of the room, the color-scheme, the voice of the leader, the vest- ment, the ritual or the lack of ritual—all foster it; but the greatest of all is the personality of the leader. To be very practical let us consider some of the most commonplace hindrances to a right at- mosphere. We may perhaps divide them into groups: physical hindrances, gradation hin- drances, management hindrances, indifferent music, and personal hindrances. PuysicaL Hinprances.—Pupils must be com- fortable. If the room is too hot or too cold, if it is badly ventilated or dingy, if the furniture 82 THE MODERN SUNDAY-SCHOOL is misplaced or decrepit, if there is no cloak-room and the children and teachers have to sit with coats and wraps on, the possibility of right at- mosphere is minimized from the very beginning. Fresh air, warmth, brightness, fitness, beauty, all help to produce what is wanted. A well fur- nished room is most remarkable for what is left out. I have known Primary Departments that were more like lumber-rooms than places of wor- ship. In our churches we see to it that atten- tion is given to the last details of cleanliness, tem- perature, and arrangement of proceedings. In the auditorium care is usually taken that every- thing makes for dignity. But in the children’s rooms “evil is wrought for want of thought.” Benches are of course utterly unsuitable. Chairs should be provided; and the chairs should fit the children. Primary chairs should be eleven, twelve, and thirteen inches in_ height; junior chairs thirteen, fourteen, and fifteen inches; intermediate chairs fifteen, sixteen, and seventeen inches. Separate class-rooms may become a hindrance to the desired atmosphere. I have in mind a cer- tain school rather above the average in size, with an average attendance in excess of three hun- dred. It is attached to a fairly wealthy congre- ee ee ee ee ATMOSPHERE 83 gation. Here is the making of an ideal school so far as premises and equipment are concerned. It makes some pretense of grading. It likes to be considered a first-class Sunday-school and is rightly proud of its past history. But its lead- ers are failing to get the first glimmerings of the meaning of atmosphere. I visited the Junior Department. There were about 140 pupils. The room was inconveniently arranged. The children were restless. The organ was out of tune. The printed hymn-sheets were nearly in- visible. Pupils came in late, one as much as twenty-five minutes; and there were continual in- terruptions from beginning to end of the pro- gram. On the top floor of the building there was a series of class-rooms, and pupils and teach- ers scampered up and down a long corridor and a flight of stairs to get to and from these. The disorder and chaos that this caused simply made the creation of right atmosphere out of the ques- tion. Class-rooms attached to Primary, Junior, or Intermediate Departments are likely to be found a greater hindrance than a help. As we have shown elsewhere the modern Sunday-school is de- centralized into moderately sized groups, and if the rooms are arranged properly there is little 84 THE MODERN SUNDAY-SCHOOL need for class-rooms. These remarks do not ap- ply to the Senior and Young People’s Depart- ments, but for the Primary and Junior and Intermediate Departments class-rooms are a detriment rather than a benefit. In this connection, surely, the purpose of the opening service has ever been misunderstood. The average opening exercise in the Sunday- school lacks aim and purpose, but in the decen- tralized school the hymn, the prayers, the Scripture reading, the music, the pianist, the supplemental talks, the leader, all in turn help to provide the right setting for worship and also a spirit of united fellowship for the considera- tion of the lesson. It would seem not only unnecessary but unwise to disturb this atmosphere by the bustle of de- parture to class-rooms with the many distractions that attend such a change of environment. It is found in practice that if classes are properly ar- ranged in the department and the right atmos- phere secured the groups will not in the least interfere with one another during the lesson-time. In the Sunday-school of to-morrow every sec- tion will meet in its own room, conduct its own opening and closing service, teach its own lessons, select its own hymns, pray its own prayers, and ATMOSPHERE 85 create its own atmosphere. When, upon occa- sion, it is desirable that all the departments as- semble together, even the act of assembling will be arranged with the greatest care, and carried out with dignity. From the point of view of creating right at- mosphere a cloak-room is indispensable. Here the assembling pupils may move about, meet with one another and with their teachers, and remove their cloaks. The cloak-room affords a splendid opportunity for conversation between teacher and pupil, and this intercourse is useful in fostering acquaintanceship. The few minutes spent there before the opening of the school may do more to prepare for the desired atmosphere than any other one thing. In the absence of more adequate ac- commodation the lack of cloak-room can some- times be overcome by curtaining off one end of the room. ‘The children may gather behind this cur- tain and remove their wraps as in an ordinary fully equipped cloak-room. The departmental room needs to be carefully arranged. Without crowding, everything should be as near together as conveniently possible. The chairs may be arranged in semicircles, so that no child will be a great distance from either teacher or leader. The blackboard, pictures, piano, 86 THE MODERN SUNDAY-SCHOOL superintendent’s table, visitors’ chairs, should all be placed in such a way as to make for the comfort of the whole department. ‘There should be little need of shifting about during the session. If careful preparation is made, no other furniture than the teachers’ chairs need be moved. There should be no platform; the leader should be on the same floor-level as the children. This obtains throughout all the departments. Ugly platforms and dilapidated reading-desks must be eliminated. Leaders are finding that the old idea that a plat- form is a necessity in a departmental room is al- together a fallacy. Ina school I visited the other day the face of the leader, because of the shining light behind him, could not be seen. The right relationship between leader and pupil will be secured by the glance of the eye, the look on the face, and the emotional expression. Here is where personality gets its opportunity. Attention to detail of every sort is of the first importance. Leaders should give much thought to the careful arrangement of the room and should not be afraid to experiment. GrapaTION Hinprances.—The splendid effort made in many a Primary Department is defeated because there is no Beginners’ Department. Four- or five-year-old children in a Primary De- ATMOSPHERE 87 partment will handicap the best effort of the best leader. The same thing is true of nine-year-olds in a Primary Department. Grade closely. The children should be near the leader. In the Beginners’ Department the teacher and the child should be very close together. I have found many Primary Departments handicapped because their leaders have not learned the principle referred to elsewhere in this book, that physical nearness is essential to mental nearness. With the young child this principle is imperative. With adults it obtains, but, of course, not nearly to the same extent. In a full church every adult will be able to follow the discourse of the preacher and pos- sibly be interested. But if the congregation con- sisted of beginners, how many of them would, or rather could, listen? He who teaches little chil- dren—beginners, primaries, juniors, and, indeed, even intermediates—must learn that to bring about the best results the teaching must be done in small groups and not in masses. To arrange the room, therefore, so that the leader is separated very considerably from at least half the pupils is to create difficulty. Graded school workers have been trying experiments for years with the object of discovering the limit of numbers with which the best work can be done in a department, and many 88 THE MODERN SUNDAY-SCHOOL have come to the conclusion that a Primary or Junior Department can do its best work if num- bers do not exceed fifty. I saw recently a Pri- mary Department numbering 120 children. Wise leadership would separate that department into two, each meeting if necessary at different hours with, of course, a different leader, pianist, and staff of teachers. Any one who has ever seen a large gathering of children knows how difficult it is to get what Froebel calls “‘altogetherness,” that which is the imperative antecedent of atmosphere. The principle that departments must be strictly limited in size rests upon a thoroughly sound basis. Sunday-school problems will never be solved with present accommodation. We must accustom our- selves and our schools to the continuous use of premises so that each department may succeed in securing the atmosphere that makes for genuine success. One child must not be allowed to spoil a depart- ment; the greatest good for the greatest number should be the principle of the leader. ‘There should be no hesitation, therefore, in dealing with a child who is making difficulty. Sometimes, for example, a child who is slightly subnormal men- tally may be welcomed in the school with the re- sult that his presence is of no benefit to the child ATMOSPHERE 89 himself and harmful to the other pupils. But ex- perience shows that such children vary greatly in conduct. On some days they are perfectly good, but on other days almost uncontrollable. Such a child should be put in a class by himself, and this class should be placed where, if necessary, the child may be quickly removed from the depart- ment with as little interruption as possible. Ex- ceptional children must have exceptional treat- ment, and generally that treatment should be individual—one child, one teacher. ADMINISTRATIVE Huinprances.—The _ early pupil may be a more serious hindrance to atmos- phere than the one who is late. Whatever is our opinion of the treatment of late pupils, there can only be one on the question of the early pupil. We must not allow early arrivals to assemble in the room where the department will meet for wor- ship; some kind of annex or waiting-room is in- dispensable. If on arrival early pupils are ad- mitted into the departmental room, associations are almost certain to be formed which will make a worshiping atmosphere extremely difficult to ob- tain. Except in very bad weather it is best to keep the doors, even of the cloak-room, closed un- til about ten minutes before the time of commence- ment. 90 THE MODERN SUNDAY-SCHOOL When we speak of the late pupil we enter the realm of controversy. Many Sunday-school lead- ers with big hearts say they will never turn a pupil away. I was visiting a department not long ago where late pupils continued to arrive as much as thirty-five minutes after the school had begun. From the point of view of atmosphere such a state of affairs is deplorable. Any one who has ever been the chairman of a committee, or the teacher of a group of students, knows that a new arrival alters the psychology of the group. The new- comer breaks the unity of the whole, and the leader naturally feels that he must begin all over again. ‘There should be no late arrivals. It takes a resolute man or woman to make a rule like this, and it will take firmness to enforce it. Once the session begins it should be protected from every interruption. We must keep in mind that the reading of Scripture or the singing of hymns is just as much an act of worship as is a period of silence or a prayer. In my own school the ex- perience is that so long as we allowed late pupils we had them, but once we refused to permit them the difficulty was overcome. It took some visit- ing and some persistence, but we succeeded. I know a school which meets at a quarter to two, although the morning service is not over until ATMOSPHERE 94 half-past twelve. These hours do not leave time for pupil or teacher to get back to school without being late. The cure for this is, of course, to change the hour. What has been said goes to show the need for careful preparation for each session. Indeed the training class, or workers’ conference, is indis- pensable if atmosphere is to be secured. In the graded school the preparation class has a wide range of subjects for discussion. In days gone by this class existed for Bible study and little else. In the graded school training class every difficulty of organization is considered. Careful thought is given to cloak-room problems, ventilation prob- lems, the arrangement of the room, grading of pupils, the early and the late pupil, the problem of interruptions, the music for the session, and sundry though seemingly unimportant details that make or mar the success of department administra- tion. The departmental training class is funda- mental. Experience teaches us that where it is dispensed with atmosphere is lost and disintegra- tion sets in. An indifferently arranged order of service has often been responsible for a disappointing session. The hymns must be chosen with the utmost care and only after the lesson for the day has been well 92 THE MODERN SUNDAY-SCHOOL thought out. Hymns, prayers, supplementary lesson, Scripture reading, quiet music, pictures, everything should be selected so that the whole service will become a unit of harmonious thought and expression. Those who manage the Sunday-school must guard against interruptions in the service. The Sunday-school superintendent in the graded school is a protector whose business it is to see that every department gets an uninterrupted opportunity for doing its work properly. This means, first of all, doorkeepers. The doorkeeper may also be the secretary or the assistant leader, or possibly some one especially selected, but he should be there early and late and all the time. He must see to it that the department is guarded not only from casual visitors but from officious officials. I have known superintendents themselves who made more disorder than they quelled. The bustling busy- body who does not appreciate the need or the meaning of atmosphere, the minister who uses the Sunday-school session as a time of visiting with teachers or pupils, who presumes that his official position gives him the right to interrupt at any time, must be tactfully but firmly dealt with. He sees to it that when he is officiating in the pul- pit interruptions are guarded against, and he ATMOSPHERE 93 ought to have the same consideration for teachers and pupils. Visitors must be especially provided for. They should not be permitted to go from department to department or to move about the room. They should do nothing that will attract the attention of the pupils while at their work or worship. I once noted in a Primary Department six different interruptions sufficiently great to break the con- nection in the order of service. Over-zealous secretaries must be forestalled. Records, as has been suggested, should all be at- tended to in the secretaries’ office. The collec- tion of these need have no place in the service, but absent pupils, particularly those who are ill, may be referred to and remembered. ‘The utmost care should be taken that all interruptions are elimi- nated and that everything which would disturb in the least degree the reverence and order of the service is avoided. Very seldom should the whole school be gathered together for an address by an outsider. There is a place for the united gathering, a time when fathers and mothers and children meet like a big family together, but such gatherings should be in- frequent. When missionaries (and these ought always to be welcome in the Sunday-school) are 94 THE MODERN SUNDAY-SCHOOL invited, they should come prepared to speak to one of the departments at a time. We have seen in previous chapters that it is well nigh impos- sible to address children of all grades at the same moment. For his own sake as well as for the sake of his cause, the missionary ought to be ready and willing to specialize and make his message suitable to the grade. Indifferent music should beeliminated. Poetry, not doggerel, should be used for the hymns. A most careful selection of the latter should be made, and no one hymn should be used too fre- quently. Too familiar hymns are apt to make for levity. If the children once get into the habit of humming the familiar music, atmosphere will be dispersed. One chord is usually enough to start a well known hymn. On the other hand the playing over of unfamiliar hymns will be listened to eagerly and will help the children to learn them. PrrsonaL Hrnprances.—What shall we say of the teacher who is ever attempting to impose moral lessons upon his pupils? Some teachers cannot trust the child to make his own deductions; instead of leading the child to think, they try to think for him. Always pointing morals, they take every opportunity of preaching little sermons and thus boring their pupils into listlessness. If the child ATMOSPHERE 95 thinks we are trying to teach him moral lessons he becomes suspicious. Be content, therefore, with simply leaving the ideal before his mind; the more indirectly this is done the more certainly will he receive it uncritically. And what shall we say of the superintendent or departmental leader who is fussy and noisy, who comes without careful preparation and attempts to make up in busyness for lack of thoroughness? Like parent, like child; like leader, like school. Any lack of self-control on the part of the leader is fatal. The quiet tone, the subdued though not dull manner, quiet freedom from haste, these will soon create in a department such seriousness as may be desirable. But there must be codperation in this on the part of the helpers. Teachers who are indifferent, who forget themselves because of their interest in their fellow-teachers, who have not risen to the importance of the occasion and are unacquainted with the sensitive suggestibility of the group, will be hindrances rather than helps. These are all matters that must be discussed at preparation class. The Sunday session ought to be the supreme effort of the week so far as the religious life of the children is concerned. Con- sequently there must be no haste, and almost never must there be prohibition. 96 THE MODERN SUNDAY-SCHOOL If the administration of the Sunday-school rep- resents skill, there will be little occasion for so- called ‘“‘discipline.” Busy children are good children. Suitable rooms and furniture, good ventilation, freedom from interruption, class grad- ing and the rest, if they materialize, will prove that there is little need for prohibition and repri- mands. ‘This is not merely a counsel of perfec- tion. There are many schools which have proved the efficacy of these plans. Somebody says, “Personality makes the pro- foundest appeal to man’s emotions that the history of the world affords.” The child is a being of in- finite sensibility and impressionability and will unvaryingly respond to the influence of personal’ ity. Strive to make the environment right—I mean both the physical and the personal environment— and trust the children to make the responses. Much the biggest part of education consists in the nurture of right feelings, for feeling is the pioneer of knowledge. One can scarcely reckon the number of times it has been stated that the Sunday-school can never be as successful as the day-school because in the former there is no right “‘to enforce discipline.” There should be no need to enforce discipline. ATMOSPHERE 97 The kind of “discipline” makes the difference be- tween the estimable and the indifferently good Sunday-school. The teacher who understands the child rarely needs to use force or fear. Pos- sibly if he understood more perfectly, even the rare occasions might be eliminated. The sym- pathetic teacher follows the line of interest; he knows that discipline is not secured by punish- ment but rather by diversion. By careful organi- zation and management, by keeping the child busy, by appealing to his dominant interests, by giving him a voice in the affairs of the depart- ment, he draws the child rather than forces him. It was the great schoolmaster, Comenius, who as early as the seventeenth century aptly com- pared the parent or teacher using force to a musician striking with his fist a violin that is badly out of tune instead of using his hands and ears to bring it to correct pitch. Obedience in itself is neither good nor bad; it is neither moral nor immoral; it depends on whom or what we obey. It is willing obedience that matters ; it is the ethical principle at the root of obedience that is the chief thing. ‘Therefore it is better to persuade than to compel. We must fight that which is low in the child by fostering that which is high. ‘The aim is not parental con- 98 THE MODERN SUNDAY-SCHOOL trol, but self-control on the part of the child. We develop this not by suppression, not by out- ward force, but by inward desire, not by bribe, but by inspiration and persuasion, not by lessons so much as by atmosphere. BIBLIOGRAPHY Du Bois, Patterson, “The Natural Way in Moral Training,’ Revell, 1903. . Hartshorne, Hugh, “Worship in the Sunday School,’ Teachers’ College, Columbia University, 1913. Miller, H. Crichton, “The New Psychology and the Teacher,” Jarrolds (London), 1921. Russell, Henry, “Sunday School Worship,’ National Sunday-School Union (London), 1925. CHAPTER VI LEARNING BY DOING Time was when the chief business of Sunday- school pupils was to read the Scriptures, learn the names of the kings of Israel, and memorize the catechism and so-called “Golden Texts.” It mattered little whether the passages read or texts memorized were within the comprehension of the pupil. Interest was a will-o’-the-wisp which had to be dragooned into submission. Activity was an enemy, not an ally. Thrills of joy springing out of heartfelt interest were seldom experienced, and learning was comparative drudgery. All this has changed where the educational maxim of learning by doing is recognized. In the effort to bring jungle instincts into subjection, the teacher finds a powerful ally in this principle. Carlyle says, “Man without tools is nothing; with tools he is all.” Learning by doing is a maxim that is to-day written large over all educa- tional movements. In the first place the child who attempts to express a thought in action soon 99 100 THE MODERN SUNDAY-SCHOOL realizes how important it is to observe clearly and correctly. A child attempting to draw a cow from memory omitted the ears. When asked where were the missing parts, he made an excuse to absent himself, hurriedly visited a neighboring pasture, and, returning, drew the ears in their proper place. “Expression makes for accuracy. Certainly the little child learns by doing. Watch him at his play. All the wise mother has to do is to supply him with material, and he needs no urging to keep himself busy. He, like Helen Keller, explores life with his fingers. “My fingers,” she says, “are ever athirst for the earth.” A pile of sand at once becomes the focus of at- traction. Children at the seaside in the summer or playing in a pile of snow in the winter never lack employment. They dig trenches and build walls, construct castles and forts. Imaginary horses and carts carry weighty loads from place to place. Motor-cars speed from town to country and from country to town. Stately sailing ships cross the ocean, and mighty steamers ply from port to port. A little boy home from the sea- side and, sadly missing the sand, invented the idea that he was a coal merchant. He backed his imaginary cart against an imaginary ship, de- livered his coal to imaginary customers, made out LEARNING BY DOING 101 bills and collected the money which he imagined jingled in his pocket, and that night prayed that God would make him a better coal merchant. It was all very vivid to him. Children at play toil tirelessly from early morning and only reluctantly cease their engrossing employment. Make- believe is as good as reality and much less ex- pensive. Dickens describes Mr. Gradgrind as a kind of cannon loaded to the muzzle with facts, prepared to blow children clean out of the regions of childhood at one discharge. He seemed a gal- vanizing apparatus, too, charged with a grim mechanical substitute for the tender young imag- inations that were to be stormed away. — Activity is Nature’s way of developing her off- spring. He who acts learns. The little tot in the Beginners’ Department is busy all day long absorbing sense-impressions. He is educating himself through his senses. Mother Nature urges the child to learn through seeing objects, handling them, tasting and smelling and dropping them, but when the time does come for the mind to break away from the literalness of sense-impressions his ability to make mental pictures is greatly en- hanced. If it were not for the increasing volume of sense-impressions his mind would be handi- capped and his conclusions would ever be crude 102 THE MODERN SUNDAY-SCHOOL and inadequate. The imagination feeds on past memories, and Nature is always urging the child to obtain fresh experiences as food for his grow- ing mind. He is continually asking: What is it? What is it like? What is it for? The sense of touch is far and away the most valuable of all the senses. Taylor says: ‘“With- out the sense of touch the child would not only see things flat, but the myriad forms that fill the earth and sky would never be known to him... neither rough nor smooth, fine nor coarse, sharp nor blunt, round nor square, far nor near, in high nor low relief. In fact he would have no idea in the concrete or in the abstract of any such quali- ties. He would in manhood be tumbling down- stairs, over chairs, into the fireplace, into the wash- tub, and everywhere else just as he does in childhood before his sense has taught him the re- hef and relation to objects. Without it he would know neither land nor sea, wood nor mineral. Ifa man were deprived of the sense of touch, every loom, every railway car, every industry in which man is engaged would instantly stop. All these are dependent upon its high cultivation for its successful conduct.” } Age means a cessation of experimentation, a 1 Taylor, “The Study of the Child,” p. 29, cos ~aeeeanl LEARNING BY DOING 103 satisfaction with present attainments, an abate- ment of curiosity, a slackening of effort to con- quer new worlds; but childhood and youth are ever pioneers; they explore life with their sense- organs. ‘The little child’s insistent desire to run away is an expression of desire to learn by doing. The boy’s impulse to cross the ocean is the urge of the same great principle. A child’s religion is action; not, what wilt thou have me believe? but rather, what wilt thou have me to do? But let us go further. It is probable that the learning of all new truth begins by doing rather than by knowing; that is, doing precedes thinking and even precedes feeling. Do we feel and then act because of our feelings, or do we act first and feel afterward? ‘The question is one of practical importance for all who have to deal with young life. Bovet, who carefully investigated the origin of children’s quarrels says: ‘‘We have to lay it down as a general rule that feelings of hostility are by no means the cause of quarrels. They are their effect. The quarrel does not arise from hatred, but gives rise to it.” Do we think first and act because of the thought, or is it the other way about? Intellect develops late; it is late in the race and late in the 104 THE MODERN SUNDAY-SCHOOL individual. Primitive creatures are governed much more by feeling than by thought. Intellect has little place in the very immature; feeling governs to a greater extent. The beginning of life is action, not feeling. Action precedes; feel- ing follows. I once spent a delightful summer afternoon with two children, a girl and a boy, the one seven and the other just over eight years of age. We were rather aimlessly playing about the garden when presently a large caterpillar was discovered. Both the children were shy of it. I took the opportunity to help them to overcome their in- stinctive repugnance toward the creepy, crawly creature. I found it of little use to say, “Don’t be afraid.” I even told them a story about a wonderfully brave child who was not afraid, but made little progress until by imitation I encour- aged them to allow it to crawl on their hands and arms. I bared my own arm and allowed it to crawl first on my fingers, then on my hand and up my arm. Gradually the children imitated me, first the boy and then the girl, allowing the cater- pillar to crawl on their fingers, then on their hands and ultimately up their bare arms. The fear was overcome. It was not accomplished by telling the children that it would not hurt them; LEARNING BY DOING 105 the new feelings of confidence and courage grew with the doing. The snake-charmer and the lion-tamer grow familiar by contact. They not only learn by doing but they develop the necessary emotion that gives them confidence for still further action. The necessary new emotion comes as a result of action, not action as the result of the emotion. The seat of the emotion, as Cannon has shown, is in the body; an emotion is the way the body feels. Baudouin puts it this way: “According to what is known as the peripheral theory of the emotions, propounded by Lange and William James, it is an error to believe that emotion se- cures-expression through physical signs. ‘These psychologists hold, on the contrary, that the phys- ical sighs are the actual cause of the emotion. We ought not, they contend, to say, ‘We weep because we are sad; we tremble because we are afraid; we clench our fists because we are angry.’ We ought to say, ‘We are sad because we weep; we are afraid because we tremble,’ and soon... . the most potent method of overcoming fear by induced suggestion would appear to be for the suggester to direct his attention not to the fear itself, but to the accompanying movements.” * 2“Suggestion and Auto-Suggestion,” pp. 61-62. 106 THE MODERN SUNDAY-SCHOOL This author then adds the following illustration : “A boy of twelve had from earliest childhood evinced a positive phobia of toads. Whenever he caught sight of one, his face grew pale, his back became arched, and he made convulsive movements with the forearms. This phobia had originated in imitation of his mother, who had similarly de- rived it imitatively from her mother. Ascending through the generations the symptoms were more violent. The grandmother had a severe nervous paroxysm at the sight of a toad, falling convulsed to the ground. In her case, too, the trouble came by imitation. Her mother, in a deathbed de- lirium, witnessed by the daughter, had been af- fected with the hallucination that toads were crawling all over her body. In treating the boy, I dealt with the motor symptoms, saying, ‘You will no longer arch your back at sight of a toad,’ etc. After three sittings at which these sugges- tions were made in the waking state, the phobia had disappeared. It seemed as if, by stopping the movements expressive of fear, I had actually dealt with the cause of the fear.” ? In character building does the same principle hold? Does feeling precede action, or does action precede feeling? For example, if the desire be 3 “Suggestion and Auto-suggestion,” p. 63. LEARNING BY DOING 107 to develop chivalrous conduct in an adolescent boy, should we try to stir latent chivalrous feel- ings, and expect action to follow, or try to induce, say by imitation, chivalrous action. Is it certain that chivalrous feelings will result? Is the spring of moral life in action or feeling? Should the aim be imitation or inspiration? Which should come first? Are virtues the flowers of right action, or are actions the flowers of virtues? It would require a whole book to discuss this in- teresting question adequately, and the discussion would not be satisfactory unless many tests were made and scientific proof obtained. Whatever may have been the genesis of fear and anger, we feel certain that the higher feelings, such as chivalry and philanthropy, are induced first by imitation. Perhaps in the past we have not given a sufficiently important place to imitation as a character producer. The urge to imitate is of first importance. Woodworth says: ‘But what I wish especially to emphasize is the imitation motive. There exists in the child at a certain early age, and in some degree later as well, a tend- ency to imitate, a drive, easily aroused, towards performing acts like those perceived in other persons, especially in persons that possess for the 108 THE MODERN SUNDAY-SCHOOL child a degree of prestige. The imitating child, or youth, or adult, is not a purely passive mech- anism, but contains a drive towards imitation that can readily be aroused to activity. The child likes to imitate, this liking being part of his general social orientation. The objection to the imitation psychology, as usually taught, is that it makes of imitation a ready-made reflex mech- anism, while it fails to recognize the drive towards imitation, or the drive towards social perception and behavior generally.” # I saw a child one day following her mother. It was raining, and the mother was holding up her skirt with one hand and her umbrella with the other. ‘The child also carried an umbrella, but though her skirt reached only to her knees she daintily lifted it up as she saw her mother doing. Here was an example of the tendency to imitate. Kirkpatrick classes it as an adaptive, that is, a specialized form of instinct only possessed by higher animals and man. The function of imita- tion seems to be to adapt the individual “while young and plastic to modes of life that will secure survival in maturity.” It also is helpful to adult individuals in making quick adjustments of be- havior to new conditions. McDougall, referring 4“Dynamic Psychology,” p. 186. LEARNING BY DOING 109 to social movements, says: “Imitation is the prime condition of all collective mental life... . Imitation is then not only the great conservative force of society, it is also essential to all social progress. . . . If imitation, maintaining customs and traditions of every kind, is the great conserv- ative agency in the life of societies, it plays also a great and essential part in bringing about the progress of civilization. Its operation as a factor in progress is of two principal kinds: (1) The spread by imitation throughout a people of ideas and practices generated within it from time to time by its exceptionally gifted members; (2) The spread by imitation of ideas and practices from one people to another. There are certain features or laws of the spreading by imitation that are common to these two forms of the process.” ® Boys accept as their hero not the men who think things but rather those who do them. Nature’s method of teaching her offspring is to urge him to action. ‘The man who makes a name at baseball, the mighty footballer, the fastest runner, the speediest swimmer, the fearless doer of great deeds, these all are the heroes of youth; the phi- losopher was never a boy’s hero. 5 “Social Psychology,” pp. 326, 328, 334-335. 110 THE MODERN SUNDAY-SCHOOL In the last analysis it is better models rather than better teachers that immature children or primitive nations most need. Perhaps this ex- plains the comparative powerlessness of the church. She has taught her children to feel and to know without developing sufficiently the power to do. If this error in method is ever to be rectified there must be a large place in religious education for expression. We learn, primarily, not by memorizing, not by thinking, but by doing. It has been well said, “All truth dies in the mind that is not lived out in practice.” The catechism must have been invented to help indolent fathers and mothers to free themselves from the real task of training their children. It certainly was never written by sympathetic lovers of child life who appreciated the “learning by doing” principle. Goethe says, “The highest cannot be spoken.” But that does not mean that it cannot be com- municated, for if it can be acted it can be communicated. L. P. Jacks says: ‘Though the highest cannot be spoken, it can be always acted. By acting it we not only grasp it firmly ourselves but we communicate it in the clearest manner one to another. ‘There is a language of action as well as a language of words; and of the two the lan- LEARNING BY DOING 111 guage of action is the more telling, the more in- telligible, the more unmistakable, and in the deepest sense the more eloquent. Some of the profoundest truths ever revealed to mankind have been conveyed through the language of action, —Christianity is an example.” ° We cannot tell the love of God, we cannot preach the love of God, the highest cannot be spoken, but we can act it, live it. Again quoting Jacks: “Beware of the eloquence of mere speech and ground nothing upon it which cannot be con- firmed by the higher eloquence of action. Truths which have nothing but speech to recommend them are apt to degenerate into cant. Truths which are eloquently argued for but not acted—such truths I find very hard to distinguish from les. You may prove them up to the hilt, but until you act them you will convince nobody.” * What, then, is wrong with the functioning of our Sunday-schools? Indeed, with the function- ing of much religious education? And what is the line of reform and progress? The Sunday- school is not organized along sufficiently practical lines. I mean that religious education for the most part is too preachy and “talky-talky.” It 6 “Living Universe,” pp. 22-23, 7™“Living Universe,” p. 27. 112 THE MODERN SUNDAY-SCHOOL aims to instruct and inspire, but fails to furnish opportunity for completing the teaching through expression. ‘l'o be good, one must be good for something. It is better to practise goodness than it is either to talk about it or to think about it. Perhaps the Sunday-school benefits the teachers more than it does the pupils, for it is by teaching we learn; docere est discere. 'The modern Sunday-school excels in that it provides work for many more workers than the old-fashioned school did, but it still falls far short of the ideal. It must not only provide lessons for all stages of development, but it must become an institution for learning and for learning by doing. The more advanced schools already provide opportunities for expressing the lesson in various ways. I have made one or two references to the proj- ect method in the last chapter. The project method means learning by doing codperatively. It means impression through expression. ‘The aim is to organize “projects” that are closely coordinated with the curriculum. ‘The idea is to set on foot activities that can be played or wrought out by groups of children either in make- believe or downright reality. It is obvious that to be successful these projects must follow the line of the child’s interest and be exactly suitable to LEARNING BY DOING 113 the stage of the pupil’s development. For ex- ample, let us suppose that the leader’s aim is to promote a good codperative spirit in the life of the group. In the Beginners’ Department she will begin with games that make for a better ac- quaintance one with another. Many of the games can be-played with dolls acting out the courtesies in play life. In the Primary Department the winter feeding of birds can be taken up, each pupil bringing a little something to add to the food-store, or mak- ing a bird feeding table, erecting it in the school grounds or the children’s own home garden or yard, and caring for it. Other possible activities include playing courtesy games or illustrating street scenes in other lands; acting a story for one of the other grades in tableaux or scenes, such as a story illustrating how to settle a quarrel; plan- ning a harvest home day in school, distributing the gifts that are received. In the Junior De- partment a class may act as a party of explorers, landing among Indians as did William Penn and living with them without quarreling. Pupils may also build huts, implements, and furniture and establish schools and hospitals. These actiy- ities are merely suggestive. Others equally adaptable and serviceable will readily suggest 114. THE MODERN SUNDAY-SCHOOL themselves to teachers of these and higher grades who appreciate the importance of the principle. The great field for expression in the Sunday- school is in the practice of goodness. Courtesy between companions, unselfish helpfulness in the home circle, deeds of loving service to those in need, must all become part and parcel of the teaching process. Kindness to pets, the care of plants and gardens, service for the sick, gifts for the poor, and Christmas programs, should all be planned on the principle, “It is more blessed to give than to receive.” With such a program the session of the Sunday- school may be considerably lengthened and week- day activities of all sorts arranged with the aim of giving opportunities for social intercourse and learning by doing. The church as a worshiping institution alone will never solve the ills of life. ‘Pure religion and undefiled before our God and Father is this,—to visit the fatherless and widows in their affliction, and to keep himself unspotted from the world.” Jesus said, “My meat is to do the will of my Father.” He went about doing good. St. John writes: “A moral lesson has never been learned until it has been lived. There is no magical process by which pious plat- itudes poured into the ears of a child are LEARNING BY DOING 115 transformed into the tough fibre of Christian character. It is only when his feelings have been stirred and found manifestation in the conduct to which they prompt that he has prof- ited by the lesson.” Jacks, quoting a head master replying to his question, ‘Where in your time-table do you teach religion?” says: “We teach it all day long. We teach it in arithmetic by accuracy. We teach it in language by learn- ing to say what we mean, ‘yea, yea, and nay, nay.’ We teach it in history, by humanity. We teach it in geography, by breadth of mind. We teach it in handicraft, by thoroughness. We teach it in astronomy, by reverence. We teach it in the playground by fair play. We teach it by kind- ness to animals, by courtesy to servants, by good manners to one another, and by truthfulness in all things. We teach it by showing the children that we, their elders, are their friends and not their enemies.”’ ® BIBLIOGRAPHY Johnston, Ethel Archibald, “Possibilities of Expression Work,” Pilgrim Press, 1921. Collings, Ellsworth, “An Experiment with a Project Curriculum,’ Macmillan Co., 1923. 8“Living Universe,” pp. 50-51. 116 THE MODERN SUNDAY-SCHOOL Dewey, John and Evelyn, “Schools of Tomorrow,” E. P. Dutton & Co., 1915. Character Education Institution, 1922, “The Iowa Plan of Character Education.” Stevenson, John Alfred, “The Project Method in Teach- ing,’ Macmillan Co., 1921. Jacks, L. P., “Living Universe,’ London, Hodder & Stoughton, 1923. New York, George H. Doran Co. CHAPTER VII PLAY AND EXPRESSION Anp what shall we say of play, its place, its power, and its possibilities in the religious educa- tion of children and young people through the Sunday-school? The public school is recogniz- ing its value. Sunday-schools and churches are following their lead, though, truth to tell, some- what reluctantly. The significance of play as related to physical growth and development has long been recognized, but play as a unique, useful, and efficient ally in religious education is a dif- ferent concept. Great teachers work with nature. Nature has constituted play not only an essential to physical development but an _ educational method with roots as deep as instinct. The tendency to expression in play is as old as heredity. As hunger and thirst express physi- ological need, so play is the expression both of physical and psychological necessity. The au- thoritative demand of this twofold necessity must be heeded. 117 118 THE MODERN SUNDAY-SCHOOL In the Sunday-school of to-morrow, the teacher will plan his work so that play will be an essential part of his teaching program. The play activities of the child change with his developing life. It is a fascinating study to note the changing interest in games. The child of three or four is happier with his bricks alone than in any codperative play. A little child’s tea- party always results in each child playing his own game. ‘The codperative interest does not awaken till later. Children are often, indeed, led to play cooperative games before they are really ready for them. ‘There is a significant difference in the child’s interest in a baseball score as compared to that of his elder brother’s. Members of the lower school team start by asking, “How many runs did I maker” And the lad is satisfied if he made a high score, even if his side has been defeated ; the idea of playing for one’s side comes later. But let us look deeper into the meaning of play, for deep indeed is its significance. As long ago as the seventeenth century the poet Schiller wrote, “Deep meaning oft lies hid in childish play.” Poets are seers. They glimpse the dim and dis- tant future and blaze the trail for the scientists. Except by the seer the value of play was not ap- preciated in the olden days, and it is only begin- PLAY AND EXPRESSION 119 ning to be generally realized in the twentieth cen- tury. The love of play is something comparable to the love of story or, on the negative side, to the repulsion one feels in the presence of a serpent. Why does the human being shrink from crawl- ing creatures? Why does the child love a story? Why are these instinctive reactions so deeply im- bedded in human nature? May it not be possible that the cause dates at least from the time when our forefathers were tree-dwellers? ‘There they were safe from the attack of the larger animals; lions and tigers and elephants had comparatively little terror for them. But the serpent and other creatures that crept and crawled had access to their habitations. For ages these preyed upon the offspring of the tree-dwellers; the serpent was one of the few creatures who could steal the babe from the mother’s arms. Thus the peculiar terror that is inborn in the female, though not wholly confined to the female, becomes comprehen- sible. ‘The stories of the Garden of Eden picture sin as a serpent. ‘The terror of the serpent was known, or at any rate felt, by primitive folk; con- sequently the figure was a perfect one to make vivid the awfulness of sin. Children love stories because in the olden days when there were no newspapers, no books, no 120 ‘THE MODERN SUNDAY-SCHOOL printing, not even writing, all knowledge was passed on from generation to generation by means of tales handed down from father to child. Gathered round the camp-fire and the chimney- corner, the youth of the tribe or the clan listened to tales of heroic deeds until “once upon a time” became a marvelous charm. It will always retain that charm. As with stories, so it is with play. Play is a racial inheritance. That is why it offers such an irresistible appeal to all grades of unfold- ing life. Play is more than mere idleness. No adult is ever more busy in his life’s work than he was when, in childhood, he was absorbed in play. It is safe to assert that the best player makes the best prophet. ‘The child who plays needs a director; the child who does not play needs a doctor. Consider the difference to the child between play and work. The child is busy with his bricks: he piles and repiles them all day long, and we call it play. The bricklayer erecting the building plys his trade, and we call it work. What is the difference? One man plays baseball; another makes it his profession. ‘The business man takes his recreation in the summer-time catching fish in streams and sea; but the fisherman performs his hardy toil, takes all the risk and hardship of the PLAY AND EXPRESSION 121 ocean, and toils early and late at his work. It is obvious that we must have clearly in mind what we mean by play. Perhaps we shall find a solution if we recognize that the term “play” may be applied to all activities that are free and spon- taneous and are performed for the sake of the activity rather than for the result attained. One plays for the sheer joy of playing; one works to make his living. ‘The child builds his blocks for the joy of building, only to knock them down again, but the bricklayer lays his bricks for the permanent value that accrues to himself or to the community and for the reward that he gets for his toil. The term “work” therefore includes all those activities in which by means of concen- trated attention one performs actions and tasks for the sake of the gain that comes rather than for the activity itself. It is a question of atti- tude and motive rather than occupation.