BY
EDWARD S. ELLIS
Introduction.
Nothing need be said concerning the importance of the study of good health. The first lesson that a child should learn is the law of his being. Hitherto the aim has been mainly to train the mind regardless of the requirements of the body. The vital connection of the two has been ignored with a persistency little short of criminality.
Anatomy, Physiology, and Hygiene have their places in the curriculum of our leading schools, but the knowledge too often is simply technical and without practical results. What greater travesty than to listen to a glib discourse on nutrition, digestion, circulation, respiration, the muscles, nerves, bones or brain by a pupil with thin chest, lack-lustre eye, sallow complexion, and weak frame?
With no wish to slight the value of a thorough knowledge of Physiology, this little volume seeks to give the fundamental laws of health, in such simple language that every boy and girl advanced enough to read, can understand them. Accompanied and supplemented by the earnest words of the teacher, who shall estimate the good that may be accomplished?
In the preparation of these pages, the author is glad to acknowledge the valuable assistance received from C. Shepherd, M.D., Superintendent for many years of Public Schools, Trenton, N. J., and Washington Hasbrouck, Ph.D., Principal of the New Jersey State Normal School.
It is your bounden duty to instruct your pupils in the laws of health. If you fail to do so, you are not fit to be their teacher.
The vices of cigarette smoking, of tobacco chewing, of beer and alcoholic drinking, threaten the very existence of the rising generation. You cannot be too earnest and persistent in impressing this truth upon the boys who look up to you for counsel.
You need not be reminded that the most powerful teacher is your own example. Boys respect and admire manly vigor. You ought to be able to outrun, outjump, outthrow, outswim, outwrestle, outspar, and outplay, at all points, the largest and most active boy in school. Many a teacher, when he attempts to take part in an athletic game, becomes the laughing-stock of the youngest urchin, by reason of his flabby awkwardness.
While our youth often need to be restrained rather than encouraged to cultivate their muscles, yet they should be told to play when the opportunity is theirs. You ought to take the lead in their games. Your eye should be as bright, your sight as true, your cheeks as rosy, your step as elastic and your physical prowess the equal at least of any lad in school.
All the text-books in the land are less effective than a few timely words from you. Occasions are continually presenting themselves which should be utilized. When a boy has been playing too violently, or when he neglects play, when he is careless as to his clothing or shows evidence of falling into any bad habit, a kind but pointed warning will accomplish more than weeks of study.
There are other dangers to which boys are peculiarly exposed, and which obviously cannot be referred to in these pages, concerning which it would be criminal for you to remain silent, but in all such cases, your warning must be uttered to the offender in private, or by the father to whom you may make the suggestion.
Of course you will see that the school-room is properly warmed and ventilated; that the pupils are kept out of all drafts; and that the air is as pure as possible. The faithful teacher will find almost hourly opportunities for impressing these vital truths upon the children, and, only by doing so to the fullest extent, can he approach a proper fulfillment of his own mission as the friend, counselor, and guide of the coming generations.
What has been said to your co-laborer about assuming the lead in observing the laws of health, applies with equal force to you. Your experience and knowledge give you invaluable opportunities for instructing the girls in what is truly the great question of life and death.
Cleanliness, clothing, food, and all the subjects treated of in the following pages, should be supplemented by the practical illustrations which the girls themselves continually present. No observant teacher can have failed to become acquainted with the rudimentary laws of her being, and to none is given so golden an opportunity to make that knowledge a living truth as to her whose calling it is to instruct the future mothers of our country.