=The School Program.=--A program or exhibition by the school should be
given occasionally. This would differ from the work of the literary
society in that it would be confined to the pupils of the school. Such
a program should be a sample of what the pupils are doing and can do. It
should be a mental exhibition of the school activities. There is
scarcely anything that attracts the people and the parents of the
neighborhood more than the literary performances of their children,
younger and older. Such performances, as in other cases, may be
overdone; they may be put forward too frequently; they may also be too
lengthy. But the teacher with a true perspective will see to it that all
such extremes are avoided, for he realizes that there are other
activities which must be developed and presented in order to secure a
change of interest. These school programs occupy the mind and thought of
the community for some time. The performance of the different parts and
the efforts of the various children--both their successes and their
failures--become the subjects of thought and of talk in the
neighborhood. It acts like a kind of ferment in the social mind; it
keeps the school and the community talking and thinking of school and of
education.

=Spelling Schools.=--For a change, even an old-fashioned spelling school
is not to be scorned. Years ago this was quite the custom. An entire
school would, on a challenge, go as a sleigh-ride party to the
challenging school. There the spelling contest would take place. One of
the teachers, either the host or the guest, would pronounce the words,
and the visiting school would return, either victorious or vanquished.
A performance of this kind enlists the attention and the interest of
people and schools in the necessity of good spelling; it affords a
delightful social recreation, stirs up thought and wakes up mind in both
communities, by an interesting and courteous contest. Such results are
not to be undervalued.

=Lectures.=--If the school is a consolidated one, or even a large
district school, a good lecture course may be given to advantage. Here,
again, care must be taken that the lectures, even if few, shall be
choice. Nothing will kill a course of lectures sooner than to have the
people deceived a few times by poor ones. It would be better to have
three good lectures during the year than six that would be
disappointing. These lecture courses may be secured in almost every
state through