The example of great lives.—­So, along with the great Bible characters we will bring to the child the men, and women of other generations.  We will bring to him the great souls who, as missionaries, have carried the Light to those who sit in darkness; those who in honesty and integrity of purpose have served as leaders of nations or armies or movements to the blessing of humanity; those who, with the love of God in their hearts, have gone out as ministers, teachers, writers of books, singers of songs, makers of pictures, healers of sickness; or those who, in any field, of toil or service, have given the cup of cold water in the name of the Master.

And we will bring to the child the story of the nations, showing him one people growing in strength, power, and happiness while following God’s plan of human justice, mercy, and kindness; and another going down to destruction, its very name and speech forgotten, because it became arrogant and perverse and forgot the ways of righteousness.  At the proper time in their development we will bring to our pupils the life and problems of the present—­the wrongs that need to be righted, the causes that need to be defended and carried through to victory, the evil that needs to be suppressed, the work of Christ and the church which is, awaiting workers.  Thus shall we seek to bring the challenge of life itself to those we teach.

PICTURE MATERIAL

No discussion of the curriculum can ignore the use of pictures as teaching material.  Teachers of religion have long recognized the value of visual instruction, and every lesson series now has its full quota of picture cards and other forms of pictorial material.

In this picture material may roughly be distinguished three great types:  (1) the symbolical picture; (2) the rather formal picture, often badly conceived and executed, always dealing with biblical characters or incidents; and (3) the more universalized type drawn from every field of pictorial art, representing not only biblical personages and events, but also typifying aesthetic and moral values of every range adapted to the understanding and appreciation of the child.

Types of pictures.—­Representative of the first, or symbolical, pictorial type are found the more or less crude pen drawings of such things as the heart with a key, an open Bible with a torch beside it, tombstone-like drawings representing the Tables of the Law or three interlocking circles representing the Trinity, etc.

Not only are all these abstract concepts beyond the grasp or need of the child at the age when the pictures are represented, but the symbols are in no degree suggestive to the child of the lesson intended; they are devoid of meaning, without interest, possess no artistic value, and lack all teaching significance.  Such material should be discarded, and better pictures provided.