Like the sculptor, she is
striving to bring the angel of her dream into the face of the child; and
when this hope is realized, the privilege of being a teacher seems the
very acme of human aspirations. The animated face and the flashing eye
betoken the sort of life that her teaching aims to stimulate; and when
she sees these unmistakable manifestations, she knows that her big
enterprise is a success and rejoices accordingly. If, for any reason,
her enthusiasm is running low, she takes herself in hand and soon
generates the enthusiasm that she knows is indispensable to the success
of her enterprise.
=Redemption of common from commonplace.=--She has the supreme gift of
being able to redeem the common from the plane of the commonplace.
Indeed, she never permits any fact of the books to become commonplace to
her pupils. They all know that Columbus discovered America in 1492, but
when the recitation touches this fact she invests it with life and
meaning and so makes it glow as a factor in the class exercise. The
humdrum traditional teacher asks the question; and when the pupil drones
forth the answer, "Columbus discovered America in 1492," she dismisses
the whole matter with the phonographic response, "Very good." What a
farce! What a travesty upon the work of the teacher! Instead of being
very good, it is bad, yea, inexpressibly bad. The artist teacher does it
far better. By the magic of her touch she causes the imagination of her
pupils to be fired and their interest to thrill with the mighty
significance of the great event.
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