In like manner, successful farming depends upon a definite knowledge of the materials employed. To be efficient, the farmer must understand the chemical ingredients of the crops he raises and the relative prevalence of these ingredients in the soils he cultivates. He must know when and how to sow and reap most advantageously. He must be familiar with improved farm implements and with their relative value in preparing the soil.

Whether it be fishing, farming, house building, running a grocery, the making of brooms, the constructing of automobiles, or the baking of bread, adequate and continuous success depends upon a thorough knowledge of the materials employed by him who is conducting the enterprise.

Skill in Controlling Materials. One may have a definite aim and a perfect understanding of the materials to be employed and yet fail in an endeavor. A sportsman may have a very clear notion of the game he expects to bag and a very thorough knowledge of guns and ammunitions, and yet disgrace himself in a hunting contest. Indeed he may understand the specific purpose of each make of gun, be familiar with the propelling power of each grain of explosive used, and know the degrees of hardness of the bullets employed. Moreover, it is possible that he may be conscious of the fundamental principle which is involved in all successful shooting, namely, "two points determine a straight line," and yet fail as a sportsman. Successful hunting consists in more than a definite aim and a thorough knowledge of the materials employed in the realization of that aim. It is conditioned by the degree of skill employed in manipulating the firing piece.

What is essential to success in hunting is essential to a greater or less extent in other successful enterprises. As

human endeavor becomes more highly specialized and as competition increases, skill becomes an increasingly large factor in success.

Boundless Enthusiasm. - One would suppose that if he possesses a definite aim, a thorough knowledge of the materials to be employed, and skill in manipulating the materials in the furtherance of the aim, a successful accomplishment is assured. On the contrary, however, experience is rich with incidents that belie the apparent trustworthiness of this supposition. Who has not known a tramp or a vagabond who possessed "skill," a "thorough knowledge of materials" and who at intervals apparently had a "definite aim"? Not infrequently the persistent lounger on grocery boxes, in railway stations, around public buildings, and about public squares possesses one or all of these factors of success.

Purpose, knowledge, and skill, though essential, are not in themselves a sufficient guarantee of success. They must be reënforced with a boundless enthusiasm, to insure a high degree of success. Emotion is the mainspring to action. It insures persistency of effort. It alone keeps one "on the job" against great distractions. Enthusiasm need not be of a violent form. It may be and usually should be quiet and submerged. Indeed, the best sort is of the quiet and intense kind. It must, however, possess the endeavorer. It must keep one at his task until he manipulates the materials he understands, in such a way as to realize his purpose.

It is apparent from the above analysis that successful conscious endeavor involves a definite aim, a knowledge of the essential materials needed in the realization of the aim, skill in adjusting the materials to the requirements of the

aim, and lastly an unabating enthusiasm. One possessed of these qualities can scarcely fail in any normal enterprise which engages his attention.

FACTORS PECULIAR TO A SUCCESSFUL TEACHING ACT

If one constructs a box or a series of boxes successfully, each of the factors referred to above is involved. Should he teach another to construct the box, what steps should he take? It is apparent that there is a decided difference in the two processes. The problem before us is: In what essential particulars does doing a thing differ from teaching some one to do that thing? How do the factors involved in constructing a box differ from those involved in teaching some one to construct it?

One may be very successful in making boxes and yet have little or no capacity for teaching others to make them. Children may observe a box-maker make a box and through the process of conscious imitation learn to make an equally good box. The box-maker, however, does not teach the children to make the box any more than the squirrel, the cow, and the sheep teach those who imitate their voices. In all such cases the children learn, but they are not taught. Teaching consists in something more subtle than the expression of ideas and the solution of problems subject to imitation. It involves a round of inter-related activities quite as marked and more difficult of comprehension than those concerned with an ordinary overt act.

Social Aim. The first of these activities, when teaching is properly directed, is a social aim. The school is an instrument of society, created and maintained by it, first of all, for its own betterment. Buildings, appliances, books,

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and teachers are all utilized in the accomplishment of this end. When once this view is obtained it serves as a standard in deciding the suitability of the subject-matter. Without it the teacher is helpless in the choice of curricula. His only recourse is imitation. A teacher must have a very definite notion of what society wants the school to accomplish in order to avoid traditional imitation in the choice of subject-matter. The social aim is to the teacher what the barometer is to the weather expert and the polar star is to the navigator. A further analysis reveals other significant factors in the teaching process. Function and Structure of Subject-Matter. It is not enough that the teacher know what society desires the child to become. He must be familiar also with the function and structure of the subject-matter employed. Scholarship is a prerequisite to successful teaching. There is no substitute for scholarship. The teacher must know what he should teach and understand the method of exposing it, if he would insure its transfer to others. The importance of this factor in the teaching process is evidenced by the fact that teachers in all ages have stressed its relative value. Young teachers have been more concerned with the nature of subject-matter than with the nature of the child activity involved in its attainment, and probably always will be. It is quite certain that an understanding of the importance of the other factors involved in teaching should in no wise lessen our respect for a sane understanding of the subject-matter. Scholarship will always be a vital and essential factor of good teaching.

Knowledge of the Reactive Attitude of the Child. — A chicken while being chased indiscriminately by a small child ran through a gate into the inclosure where its com

panions were. Its going into the inclosure was in no way determined by the forethought of the child or conditioned by any systematic effort on his part. It chanced to run into the inclosure. On another occasion it may run in the opposite direction. In either case the child should not receive credit for determining the particular outcome of the chase.

Suppose on the other hand an adult who has long cared for chickens undertakes to get a strayed chicken into its pen. He will probably get some corn and scatter it near the chicken. After a little he will scatter it nearer and nearer the gate until the victim of his strategy strolls through the opening into the inclosure.

The results of these two acts are the same. The processes are decidedly different. The first result was one of chance. There was no forethought, no reflection on the reactive attitude of the chicken, no anything, except undirected and impulsive energy. The result was one of chance, not one of conscious effort. The second act was conditioned by experience. The performer had observed how chickens react when food is thrown before them. He had observed how they react when chased or when thrown at. A comparison of the results had led him to the conclusion that chickens can be successfully "tolled" through gates and into pens by means of properly directed grains of corn. There was no chance in this act. There was a certainty, at least as much of a certainty as accompanies the ordinary plans of life. A knowledge of chicken behavior which results when various stimuli are applied was essential to the specific results acquired.

In like manner child behavior may be controlled in these two ways at least. By chance one may create stimuli