“Three criticisms must occur to even a sympathetic English teacher: first, the possibility of what in England would be a probable waste of time to the listeners. Americans say that these, though they often look indifferent and inattentive, are really attending; they are used to the method and they play the game, so to speak, by listening attentively as well as by reciting readily when their turn comes. Second, the whole thing is very dull and slow; each pupil speaks very slowly, with very little grace of delivery or beauty of language, such as might be expected from the teacher, and nothing like the same amount of ground is covered as is the case in a lesson on the oral method. With the recitation method in England we should not arouse sufficient interest to get the best out of our pupils; we could not get through the work we have to do in the time, nor would English boys and girls be sufficiently quick and clever to understand the difficulties in geometry, for example, or in Latin or French grammar, unless they had clear and skilful explanations from the teacher, who presumably understands the art of making things clear. Americans would probably say that their students are quick enough and earnest enough to make progress without this careful exposition and without this atmosphere of interest and intellectual stimulus, and there is probably some truth in the reply. Our pupils too often do not want to work, and their minds do move more slowly. We have been obliged to find ways of making class-work attractive, either by intellectual stimulus and interest, or by rewards and punishments, since we have not that strong outside belief in education which makes the task of the American teacher much more easy. It is also true that the examination demand has forced us to explain clearly to the duller pupils in the class difficulties which the cleverer ones could see through for themselves. Probably here Americans are right and we are wrong; we make the work too easy by, as it were, peptonizing the lesson material, before giving it to the hungry sheep who look up to us to be fed. Our aim has been to help them to assimilate the knowledge required, not to develop in them the power to grapple with new material. This aim the American recitation system undoubtedly develops, and this is one of its great merits.