in the beginning love to work, and that there must be something the
matter with our education since this love is so early lost and so
seldom reacquired. If when young children wish to help mother they
are almost invariably permitted to do so, and their efforts greeted
lovingly, this delight in helpfulness will remain a blessing to them
throughout life.

[Sidenote: To Make "Helping" of Benefit]

But in order to get these benefits from the domestic activities two or
three simple rules must be observed. (1) Do not go silently about your
work, expecting your child to be interested and to understand without
being talked to. Play with him while you work with him, and see the
realization of youthfulness that comes to yourself while you do it.
Many tasks fit for childish hands are in their nature too monotonous
for childish minds. Here your imagination must come into play to rouse
and excite his activity. For instance, you are both shelling peas.
When he begins to be tired you suggest to him, "Here is a cage full of
birds, let us open the door for them;" or you may tell a story while
you work, but it should be a story about that very activity, or the
child will form the habit of dreaming and dawdling over his work. Such
stories may be perfectly simple and even rather pointless and yet
do good work; the whole object is to keep the child's fly-away
imagination turned upon the work at hand, thus lending wings to his
thought, and lightness to his fingers. Moreover, the mother who talks
with her child while working is training in him the habit of
bright unconscious conversation, thus giving him a most useful
accomplishment. Making a game or a play out of the work is, of course,
conducive to the same good results. When the story or the talk drags,
the game with its greater dramatic power may be substituted.