Excerpt from The Child's Own English Book: An Elementary English Grammar Our semi-grammarless age - a period of conflicting opinions regarding the teaching of English in lower schools - has resulted in confusion of mind to many pupils, and in discouragement to many upper-class teachers. Because of the writer's firm conviction that the difficulties with the subject in disrepute are largely owing to wrong methods of presentation, an attempt is now made to approach it from a new angle. Two of the strongest factors in child-growth - love of play and a strong dramatic instinct - are used to assist in bringing life to what has usually seemed a "dead language," or, at best, a cordially disliked subject. The query of the anti-grammar group is always, "Of what use to a fifth- or sixth-grade child is knowledge of a noun?" The pro-grammar adherents agree that unless such knowledge is made a part of the child's experience in a vital, organic way, it is futile; but they believe that, as preparation for more advanced, critical study in later years, it is as essential to know early the fundamental structure of the English tongue, as it is to know geographical nomenclature, or the simple elements of arithmetic. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.