"An ounce of success is worth a ton of excuses.' I. Problem WRITE in the form of a business letter an excuse for tardiness. If you are tardy, you will not be permitted to enter any of your classes until you have succeeded in producing a letter which is satisfactory in content and flawless in technique down to the last dot. I reached school at 8.01 this morning and am therefore late for my first class. This misfortune is due to no fault of my own, but to the fact that a coal wagon, which had broken down on the track, delayed my car about ten minutes. If you will excuse me, I will promise hereafter to start from home so early that no similar accident will produce a similar result. Yours truly, [II. Time Schedule 1 Monday (a) Dictation of model. OLIVER GOLDSMITH. (b) Discussion of the following topics: 1 TO TEACHERS. The time schedule offered here is of course merely suggestive. Varying conditions demand various arrangements; and deviations from this and the following schedules may and should fre 1. Point out the "Four W's." 2. Give the reason for each mark of punctuation in the model. 3. Tell whether each sentence is simple, complex, or compound. 4. Tell what part of speech each word is. 5. Why is there a period after "Mr." but none after "Miss"? 6. Explain the construction of morning, first, due, wagon, which, down, car. Tuesday (a) Reading of minutes of Monday's lesson. (b) Review of Monday's lesson and of last week's "Notes and Queries." (c) Observe that Sentence 1 in the model states the facts of the case, that Sentence 2 offers an excuse, and that Sentence 3 contains a promise. These are the three essentials of an excuse for tardiness. (d) What is wrong with the following excuse? Why does it seem ludicrous? DEAR MR. CORNS: Please excuse Reginald's tardiness. He fell down. in the mud. You will greatly oblige me by doing the same. MRS. SMITH. (e) In the model what word or words connect Sentence 2 to Sentence 1 and Sentence 3 to Sentence 2? (f) Observe that these excuses are in reality business letters. You are asked to learn to write them quently be made in order to get the best results. They are inserted in the hope and belief that they may be helpful to teachers whose experience in composition teaching is limited and to pupils who find the study of English indefinite. with absolute accuracy because every man and woman needs this skill. (g) Write in class an excuse for tardiness, being careful to embody in it all of the essentials shown in the model. Wednesday (a) Reading and discussion of the excuses written Tuesday. Writers must be ready to defend their reasons and their English. (b) Questions for Oral Discussion. 1. Why is tardiness bad for a school? 2. For a pupil? 3. If there are two hundred school days in a year and the superintendent expects that each school shall have a percentage of 99.5 in punctuality, how many pupils with perfect records are required to offset the sins of one boy who is tardy five times in fifty school days? If a boy is tardy five times in fifty days, he will probably be tardy twenty times in two hundred days. 4. Find, copy into your notebook, and bring to class three quotations on the subject of promptness. When the roll is called, you will be expected to answer with one of these. Quotations previously given will not be accepted. The following may help: (a) Procrastination is the thief of time. EDWARD YOUNG (1684-1765). (b) Time, sir, time is everything. Five minutes make the difference between victory and de feat. HORATIO NELSON (1758-1805). (c) I owe all that I have achieved to being ready a quarter of an hour before it was deemed necessary to be so. Thursday ARTHUR WELLESLEY, DUKE OF WELLINGTON (1769-1852). (a) Oral Composition on topics drawn from current work in other subjects. (b) Hand finished excuses to teacher. Friday Public Speaking. The programs for Friday should be arranged by a committee of club members appointed by the president of the club. It should include the recitation of poems, declamations, exceptionally good finished themes, debates, and short plays. The teacher should see to it that everybody takes part in these exercises, and as Critic should offer criticisms on the following Monday morning. On Friday, however, he should be seen, not heard. IV. Memorize THE BUILDERS (continued from Page 12) Build to-day, then, strong and sure, With a firm and steadfast base; And, ascending and secure, Shall to-morrow find its place. Thus alone can we attain To those turrets, where the eye HENRY WADSWORTH LONGFELLOW. CHAPTER IV LETTERS OF FRIENDSHIP - YOUR SCHOOL result misery; work with "Work with your eye on the clock · your eye on your work — result happiness." I. Problem WRITE to a friend a letter describing your school. II. Model MY DEAR PAPA: SHELFORD, February 22, 1813. As this is a whole holiday, I cannot find a better time for answering your letter. With respect to my health, I am very well and tolerably cheerful, as Blundell, the best and most clever of all the scholars, is very kind, and talks to me, and takes my part. In my learning I do Xenophon every day and twice a week the Odyssey, in which I am classed with Wilberforce, whom all the boys allow to be very clever, very droll, and very impudent. We do Latin verses twice a week, and I have not yet been laughed at. We are also exercised once a week in English composition and once in Latin composition and letters of persons renowned in history to each other. We get by heart Greek grammar or Virgil every evening. As for sermon writing, I have hitherto got off with credit. We had the first meeting of our debating society the other day, when a vote of censure was moved for upon Wilberforce; but he, getting up, said: “Mr. President, I second the motion." By this means he escaped. My room is a delightful little chamber, which nobody can enter, as there is a trick about opening the door. I sit like a king, with my writing-desk before me, for (would you believe it?) there is a writing-desk in my chest of drawers, my books on one side, my box of papers on the other, with my arm |