tution especially for this purpose, in which should also be taught the mathematics, literature and sciences which are a part of the high school curriculum; these should be adapted to bear directly upon industrial problems. The entire course should be such that the average student completing it would be qualified to enter the shops upon the basis of an ordinary workman, and as his instruction should have covered, by theory or practice, the entire field of his trade, he should make rapid progress into the ranks of the highest skilled workmen.

The majority of the students upon leaving the high school trade courses will enter the shops, because they can at once command a higher salary at their trades, than to begin at the bottom in some other work. Thus the future supply of skilled workmen would be largely augmented, and from a class of young men who are ambitious and intelligent to a degree which will lead them to ever strive to improve their skill and knowledge, and better their positions in their trades. This will naturally result in an improvement in methods and products, and an increasing absorption of the better class of young men into the production departments of our industries, the result of which is the most fervent desire of our manufacturers.

How to Reach the Individual Student

BY PRESIDENT J. E. HICKMAN, BEAVER CITY, Utah.

W

E have heard a great deal concerning how to reach the individual student. Some of the common methods are: (1) Be companionable; (2) Get his confidence; (3) Have private interviews with him; (4) Join in his sports, etc. All this is well and good, but I believe there is something yet to be done that will bring us into a closer approach to ◆◆ the individual student which will give truer conception of his defects and their remedies. To reach him we must understand and help him where he needs it. To interpret the individual student we must have: (1) a conception of who he is, where he has been raised, and under what conditions; (2) a knowledge of his hereditary endowments-mental and physical; (3) an insight to his physical condition and this last is only known after a medical examination. There was a time when we used the jerk-line method of handling students; this is rapidly disappearing for we find that we must have an individual line on each. It is an easy thing to criticise and to advise but the question is: When and how shall the advice be given? There are some plants so sensitive that they close up at a rude touch; there are others that grow better through the strong winds, or when grazed off at certain periods of their growth. In a broad analogy human beings are akin. Some students have been offended by unstudied personal handling and like sensitive plants have folded up, and they have gone through school-if they remain so long-misunderstanding and being misunderstood. There are others who grow better under more thoroughgoing criticism and handling. reach the normal individual is rather an easy matter, for he comes within the lines laid out for the majority; and by so doing we easily touch his individual life, but it is another problem to rightly control the exceptional student for they are either over sensitive, under sensitive, wayward, or otherwise socially abnormal. In attempting to reach any student through appeal, criticism, giving of lessons, or what not, the teacher must have within

To

it all, life, action, reason and humanity. He must be a character with human sympathy that will draw the individual student to him whether that student be commended or rebuked. Some teachers cannot criticise a student and afterwards get back into the student's grace and confidence. Such criticism, be it deserved or well meant, has been harmful. It is an anti-toxine that has done harm.

Too often the student is overlooked in our classes and schools in general, unless he either "cuts a wide swath" in good work or becomes derelict, then the personal student is singled out. The normally good are neglected. I once heard a student say that he felt like doing something wrong in order to have a personal talk with one of his teachers. He had been so completely unnoticed that he felt humiliated over the impersonal way he had been handled. We too often display our greatest genius in attempting to reach the wayward and are too often totally forgetful of the average good ones. In the above case we are neglecting the ninety and nine for the erring one. To notice and recognize merit in daily work is one way to reach the individual pupil. To interpret intelligently the individual student equals an analysis of his characteristics. The same approach of the same stimulus can hardly hope to get the same results from any two persons. We have the normal and the abnormal, yet there is an unbroken line of gradation between the very good student and the very bad student which must be recognized in this matter of personal approach. It is said that self-judgment is righteous judgment, but I believe it to be a very unrighteous judgment for in such cases we tend to neglect perchance not to understand-individual differences in students. Self-judgment implies self, not others. We tend to form one set of fixed habits dealing with all and these rules are too often based upon self. The social judgment is the most reliable.

It is a serious error for teachers to neglect individual differences and form one set of fixed habits for dealing with all children. To recognize the individual differences and provide for them is to be protected against fallacies in teaching and blunders in government. Another error from which many of us suffer, is to credit our scholars with natures like our own. Thorndike is right in saying: "If we are quick learners ourselves, we ex

pect too much of our students; if we have sensible, matter-of-fact minds, we have no patience with their sentimentality and sensitiveness; if we are precise and neat and systematic we fail to understand how intolerable it is for them to lead an orderly, regular existence." It is well to see ourselves as others see us, but far more important, from a teacher's stand-point, to see others as they are and appreciate the difference.

The scholars of thought make least trouble and are easily directed, but there are the motor-restless, the plodder, the careless, the gusher who is "all fuss and feathers," the dullard, and finally the unawakened. Each deserves individual and respectful treatment peculiar to himself, with a view at times of modifying or changing the individual differences into a more desirable charSacteristic. These different types should be known and handled accordingly. The motor-type often become restless and leave school in disgust, and yet they frequently go out into the business or industrial world and make an eminent success. Some students think ideas and others think things, they should be known and our courses should provide for them. The plodder needs time and patience; the dullard needs personal attention, suggestion, and infinite patience. Harshness or irritability manifested by the teacher offends. In such cases his approach to the individual student is barred. He deserves as much consideration and genuine respect as the most brilliant. His endowment, poor as it may be, is nature's gift and must not be abused. Then there is the emotional student, often like a March day sunshine or storm. He is the school's best friend or the school's worst enemy. He needs curbing or urging, and, perhaps, at times, cajoling. He is unstable as water, yet, perchance, a coming artist or poet. Poet or gusher, he should be met on his own plane. It has been my experience that if you would be most successful with the varied individual pupils, you must go to their level and (lead them to yours. It is a losing game to attempt to harpoon and drag them to your station. Finally comes the the unJawakened; they have nothing in common with you or your cause. They are with you, perhaps, because sent by urgent parents; perchance they are there because they desire to escape the twelve-hour shift on the farm, or perhaps, it is because they feel the need of an awakening and hope they may get it by some mysterious means

through enrolling in school and going to classes; but until the awakening comes, they are the teacher's burden. In exemplification of the foregoing, I was about to dismiss a young man from school for his bad conduct and unawakened condition. "Professor Hickman," he said, "I came here for the purpose of being lifted up."

The questions that confront us are: (1) Are those unawakened dull or brilliant, or are they physical defectives? Are their conditions due to the abuse of their own lives, or is it heritage? Each demands its own treatment and before that can be given, an individual investigation must be made, unless the cut-and-dried method is used. We may get the information from parents, friends, or from personal examination which may aid us in interpreting the individual. When this information is acquired, what must be done to profit by their personal insight? That frequently lies more with the genius of the teacher than any special mode of procedure. I have in mind a unique example of what may be done through the force of genius. The following incident was told me by one of the best disciplinarians in the state. One of his students, a young man with very unorthodox habits, in fact his conduct was very reprehensible, deserved to be handled in a very drastic manner. This principal entered the department and asked the young man to get his hat and follow. Outside the door the principal said that he wished the young man to take a walk with him. They walked and talked for an hour or two, the young recreant feeling, I take it, that each minute he should have to meet the charge of which he was guilty. But instead, the conversation carried on, mainly by the principal, was pleasant and confiding, but not an intimation concerning the student's conduct. The pleasant stroll ended on reaching the academy again. The student was left at the outer door with: "Well, we had a very pleasant walk. Thank you for your company." The young man was left to wonder where he was hit or what it all meant. It takes but two words to tell the results. He reformed. Other students might be walked and talked with as long as Enoch walked and talked with the Lord and then fail for want of the right kind of homeopathy. The individual student is to be interpreted and not crushed. The Alexandrian method has no place in the handling of phychological puzzles.