Literature in the Elementary School

om the general landscape, it is true that there are certain characteristics of children within the elementary period, and certain accepted conclusions concerning the nature and spirit of their other work, that must be taken as guides in the matter of their literature. It is not sufficient--though it cannot be too often said that it is necessary--that the literature be good; that, no matter how simple it be or how complex, it must satisfy the demands of good criticism--however important it be that it be good, it is equally important that it be fit.

One who reads the courses of study and lists of reading prepared for the elementary grades, and examines the manuals for their teachers, comes near concluding that the larger number of mistakes, and the mistakes most disastrous, lie here--in losing sight of the principle of fitness. For in these formal lists, and suggested in the manuals, one may find, first and last, heaped up all that various teachers have themselves happened to like; all that critics have