Overview

Elementary English begins with the astonishing assertion, A group of words which expresses a complete thought is a sentence. The rather ambitious book of Harper and Burgess, Inductive Studies in English Grammar (which is called inductive because it abstracts the rules from the study of Hawthorne's delightful tale of the Golden Touch, which is mercilessly dissected), defines on page 14 nouns as being names of persons and things, and verbs as words asserting some action. But in the text from which these definitions are expected to be abstracted, occurs such a noun as time, and such verbs as lived, was, had, knew. Will any child be able to make them fit the given definitions? Similar discoveries can be made in all existing school-books, of which the writer has had occasion to examine many, indeed. 'It may recommend itself to the competent teacher to place no text-book at all into the hands of the pupils, but adapt the instructions to the varying needs and opportunities. Yet the better text-books, such as those mentioned above, contain many valuable suggestions. No attempt is here made to outline a course of study on the basis of the principles set forth. What has been here proposed is mainly tentative, and may have to be thoroughly revised. But the value of the facts presented remains unshaken, even if some of the inferences drawn from them may prove to be fallacious. The main object of the writer has been to urge the discussion of the subject of grammar instruction from a new point of view, viz., that of Child-Study and psychology. - The Review of Education: An Educational Review of Reviews, Volume 4

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