Читать книгу The Principles of Language-Study - Harold E. Palmer - Страница 16

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No work is likely to be successfully accomplished if the student is not interested in what he is doing, but in our efforts to interest the pupil we must take care that the quality of the teaching does not suffer. Habit-forming work has the reputation of being dull and tedious. The remedy, however, would not be to abandon it in favour of work which in itself is or seems more interesting (such as reading, composition, and translation exercises), for by so doing we should merely be leaving undone work which must be done. The true remedy is to devise a number of varied and appropriate exercises in order to make the habit-forming work itself interesting.

The most ingenious and interesting arithmetical problems alone will not assist the student in memorizing the multiplication table, and the most ingenious and interesting sentence-building devices alone will not cause the student to obtain the necessary automatic command of the fundamental material of the language.

There are notably six factors making for interest (and the observing of these will not in any appreciable degree violate the eight other principles involved), viz.:

(1) The Elimination of Bewilderment.—Difficulty is one thing: bewilderment is another. The student must, in the ordinary course of events, be confronted with difficulties, but he should never be faced with hopeless puzzles. Rational explanations and good grading will eliminate bewilderment and, in so doing, will tend to make the course interesting.

(2) The Sense of Progress achieved.—When the student feels that he is making progress, he will rarely fail to be interested in his work.

(3) Competition.—The spirit of emulation adds zest to all study.

(4) Game-like Exercises.—Many forms of exercise so resemble games of skill that they are often considered as interesting as chess and similar pastimes.

(5) The Relation between Teacher and Student.—The right attitude of the teacher towards his pupils will contribute largely towards the interest taken in the work.

(6) Variety.—Change of work generally adds interest: an alternation of different sorts of monotonous work makes the whole work less monotonous. Spells of drill-work, however, should be relieved by intervals devoted to work of a less monotonous character.