It is a hard ideal to live up to, but it is a valuable ideal to try to live up to.  And one of the best chances to work toward attainment is in telling stories, for there you have definite material, which you can work into shape and practice on in private.  That practice ought to include conscious thought as to one’s general manner in the schoolroom, and intelligent effort to understand and improve one’s own voice.  I hope I shall not seem to assume the dignity of an authority which no personal taste can claim, if I beg a hearing for the following elements of manner and voice, which appeal to me as essential.  They will, probably, appear self-evident to my readers, yet they are often found wanting in the public school-teacher; it is so much easier to say “what were good to do” than to do it!

Three elements of manner seem to me an essential adjunct to the personality of a teacher of little children:  courtesy, repose vitality.  Repose and vitality explain themselves; by courtesy I specifically do not mean the habit of mind which contents itself with drilling children in “Good-mornings” and in hat-liftings.  I mean the attitude of mind which recognizes in the youngest, commonest child, the potential dignity, majesty, and mystery of the developed human soul.  Genuine reverence for the humanity of the “other fellow” marks a definite degree of courtesy in the intercourse of adults, does it not?  And the same quality of respect, tempered by the demands of a wise control, is exactly what is needed among children.  Again and again, in dealing with young minds, the teacher who respects personality as sacred, no matter how embryonic it be, wins the victories which count for true education.  Yet, all too often, we forget the claims of this reverence, in the presence of the annoyances and the needed corrections.

As for voice:  work in schoolrooms brings two opposing mistakes constantly before me:  one is the repressed voice, and the other, the forced.  The best way to avoid either extreme, is to keep in mind that the ideal is development of one’s own natural voice, along its own natural lines.  A “quiet, gentle voice” is conscientiously aimed at by many young teachers, with so great zeal that the tone becomes painfully repressed, “breathy,” and timid.  This is quite as unpleasant as a loud voice, which is, in turn, a frequent result of early admonitions to “speak up.”  Neither is natural.  It is wise to determine the natural volume and pitch of one’s speaking voice by a number of tests, made when one is thoroughly rested, at ease, and alone.  Find out where your voice lies when it is left to itself, under favorable conditions, by reading something aloud or by listening to yourself as you talk to an intimate friend.  Then practise keeping it in that general range, unless it prove to have a distinct fault, such as a nervous sharpness, or hoarseness.  A quiet voice is good; a hushed voice is abnormal.  A clear tone is restful, but a loud one is wearying.