One important means by which the teacher may make his scholars careful of their reputation is to show them, thus, that he is careful of it himself.

Now in such a case as this, for it is, except in the principles which it is intended to illustrate, imaginary, a very strong interest would be awakened in the class in the work assigned them.  Intellectual effort in new and constantly varied modes is in itself a pleasure, and this pleasure the teacher may deepen and increase very easily by a little dexterous management, designed to awaken curiosity and concentrate attention.  It ought, however, to be constantly borne in mind that this variety should be confined to the modes of pursuing an object—­the object itself being permanent, and constant, and steadily pursued.  For instance, if a little class are to be taught simple addition, after the process is once explained, which may be done, perhaps, in two or three lessons, they will need many days of patient practice to render it familiar, to impress it firmly in their recollection, and to enable them to work with rapidity.  Now this object must be steadily pursued.  It would be very unwise for the teacher to say to himself, My class are tired of addition; I must carry them on to subtraction, or give them some other study.  It would be equally unwise to keep them many days performing example after example in monotonous succession, each lesson a mere repetition of the last.  He must steadily pursue his object of familiarizing them fully with this elementary process, but he may give variety and spirit to the work by changing occasionally the modes.  One week He may dictate examples to them, and let them come together to compare their results, one of the class being appointed to keep a list of all who are correct each day.  At another time each one may write an example, which he may read aloud to all the others, to be performed and brought in at the next time.  Again, he may let them work on paper with pen and ink, that he may see how few mistakes they make, as mistakes in ink can not be easily removed.  He may excite interest by devising ingenious examples, such as finding out how much all the numbers from one to fifty will make when added together, or the amount of the ages of the whole class, or any such investigation, the result of which they might feel an interest in learning.  Thus the object is steadily pursued, though the means of pursuing it are constantly changing.  We have the advantage of regular progress in the acquisition of knowledge truly valuable, while this progress is made with all the spirit and interest which variety can give.