children of their parents' neighbors were all simultaneously being sent
to school. We wish not to be lonely or eccentric, and we wish not to be
cut off from our share in things which to our neighbors seem desirable
privileges.

In the schoolroom, imitation and emulation play absolutely vital parts.
Every teacher knows the advantage of having certain things performed by
whole bands of children at a time. The teacher who meets with most
success is the teacher whose own ways are the most imitable. A teacher
should never try to make the pupils do a thing which she cannot do
herself. "Come and let me show you how" is an incomparably better
stimulus than "Go and do it as the book directs." Children admire a
teacher who has skill. What he does seems easy, and they wish to emulate
it. It is useless for a dull and devitalized teacher to exhort her
pupils to wake up and take an interest. She must first take one herself;
then her example is effective, as no exhortation can possibly be.

Every school has its tone, moral and intellectual. And this tone is a
mere tradition kept up by imitation, due in the first instance to the
example set by teachers and by previous pupils of an aggressive and
dominating type, copied by the others, and passed on from year to year,
so that the new pupils take the cue almost immediately. Such a tone
changes very slowly, if at all; and then always under the modifying
influence of new personalities aggressive enough in character to set new
patterns and not merely to copy the old. The classic example of this
sort of tone is the often quoted case of Rugby under Dr. Arnold's
administration. He impressed his own character as a model on the
imagination of the oldest boys, who in turn were expected and required
to impress theirs upon the younger set. The contagiousness of Arnold's
genius was such that a Rugby man was said to be recognizable all through