PREFACE This grammar, of which the present volume is the fourth in a series of four, is a practical working text-book for pupils of elementary-school grade. It provides a wealth of exercises arranged in logical sequence such as to make the mastery of grammar comparatively easy and the demands on the teacher relatively light. The inductive method is inherent; both teacher and pupil are forced to this form of reasoning by the method of presentation and the very nature and order of the exercises. The inductive method takes the form of asking the pupil to observe a number of particular instances illustrating the topic, to note the generalization based on these instances, and to apply the generalization to exercises, an example of which is given when deemed advisable. It is assumed that the teacher knows how to teach, how to present new matter, how to review and to drill, and how to teach pupils to study. Her chief need is a liberal supply of material. In this series exercises are given in profusion, and the space on the page is used to the maximum consistent with artistic typography. No teacher, however, should be appalled by the quantity of material offered. She may not use it all, but it is here if she wants it. A striking feature is that most of it lends itself readily for use in the study period, group work, and homework. Definitions and rules are given in matters essential only. They may be memorized as the work proceeds; for the convenience of the student they are collated at the end of the volume. Rigid classification is avoided designedly and for two reasons: first, students of elementary-school age do not seize the finer grammatical distinctions—the elementary school is no place for discriminations about which the masters quarrel; second, children enter into the iii grammatical spirit only by the concrete use of the properly selected sentence copiously illustrated. The technical names of the parts of speech, etc., are frankly used as soon as the need arises; the pupil is not "babied," so to speak, by calling a noun a name word. The verbal is treated as a part of speech; the result is that the pupil can classify every word in the language as some part of speech. The circumlocutions and complexities involved in the usual presentation of the topic are thus avoided, and the finer distinctions postponed to the student's high-school and college periods. It is believed that the present treatment of the verbal and the verbal phrase will clear the path of both teacher and pupil in dealing with these ordinarily troublesome elements in English grammar. It is assumed that pupils have studied certain elements of composition that are anticipatory of grammar study-simple rules of punctuation, capitalization, and spelling. These rules are reviewed by way of preparation for the presentation of more advanced rules. It is felt that pupils profit by setting forth in formal order their analysis of a sentence. Hence the form of verbal analysis is frequently given. Graphic presentation makes a special appeal, and hence the verbal analysis is supplemented by forms of graphic analysis, a term which is regarded as more desirable than the traditional diagramming. While graphic analysis is not the end of grammar study, its inherent interest makes it a valuable accessory. The system here used-an original device—is simple and its rationale so obvious that the structure of the sentence appears at a glance. The distinction between entire subject and entire predicate seen in the simplest sentence is maintained even in the most complex; the lines are either vertical or horizontal, light or heavy, dotted or full; every word is written in the familiar direction and is frequently parsed by its very position in the graph. |