realitycheck(dot)ie

Irish doctor with too many thoughts, too little time and a blog that's supposed to check in on reality.

Thursday, September 14, 2006

How to Behave in Class

Before Miss Abigail Time Warp Advice became the cool blog it is now, I was a big fan.

In this installment from Abigail's massive collection of vintage advice books, this post, featuring excerpts from the little known classic "Everyday Manners for American Boys and Girls by the Faculty of the South Philadelphia High School for Girls (New York: MacMillan Company, 1923)" deals with behaving in school.

This post is aimed both at Northsiders (the Disillusioned Lefties) and at Culchies (the baby sister) who are starting college in coming days/weeks.

The traffic rule, Keep to the right, applies to classrooms as well as to streets and corridors. If you keep to the right, and leave a passageway at your left, you will make entrances and exits easy.

When you enter a classroom go at once to your own seat. Put into your desk everything you will not need for that period. Nothing looks worse than a roomful of desks littered with piles of books, packages of lunch, baseball gloves, and oranges.

Never borrow books, inkwells, pens, or pencils from the teacher's or a pupil's desk without asking permission. Never sit in the teacher's chair unless the chairmanship of the lesson has been given over to you. Never stand close behind a teacher's desk, except when talking to her. The books and papers on her desk are her private property. You have no more right to examine her papers or read any writing there than you have to read other people's letters.

Interruptions of any sort are just as rude in the classroom as anywhere else. If you raise your hand while another pupil is reciting, you interrupt him. Often the sight of hands waved madly in the air breaks one's train of thought and makes it impossible for one to go on. If you wish to ask or answer a question, wait until the one who is reciting has finished and until the teacher recognizes you. Try to break the hand-waving habit.

Never ask a new question until the one perviously asked has been answered. That, too, is an interruption. Do not answer a question addressed to some one else.

If you do correct some one, do it tactfully. It is often the manner in which the correction is made, not the correction itself, that hurts. The one who is corrected should accept the criticism courteously.

Do not make fun of other's mistakes. To laugh reasonably at an amusing remark or happening is natural, but it is rude and unkind to make a boy or girl feel ridiculous.

At the end of the period, do not gather up your books until the signal for dismissal has been given. Never rattle paper or stand poised for flight while some one is talking.

If you are the first one to leave the room, fasten the door back. If it cannot be fastened, hold it open for the person behind you. He should hold it open for himself as soon as he reaches the door. Doors should never be slammed, but always closed quietly.
~~

2 Comments:

Blogger Kevin Breathnach said...

Cheers Auds! I'll keep that all in mind. What's the culchie studying?

September 15, 2006 6:48 p.m.  
Blogger Auds said...

Actuary.

I don't know what it says about my parents that 66.66666% of their children are actuaries.

September 15, 2006 7:28 p.m.  

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