Teaching Neatness

Teaching Neatness

by Edith Granger Hawkes

Don't be Afraid to Begin Early

There is no mother who does not want her children to be neat and orderly, but many mothers do not realize, or do not think, how early the children can receive their first training along these lines. Children are so decidedly creatures of habit that a little help and encouragement on the mother's part, a little patience and a little of her busy time now, will save her any amount of trouble later. Baby, when fifteen months old, understood perfectly the expressions "Pick it up," "Put it back," "Let's put your toys away," and willingly did any of these things. Children love to be doing something, and are just as pleased to carry a thing back where it came from as to take it in the first place.

We read occasionally of some little intellectual prodigy that learns at an amazingly early age to perform wonders in poetry, mathematics, etc. but a habit of orderliness is far more important to the average human being.

Baby is no prodigy at all, just an ordinary human baby, but she already of her own accord puts away many things when she finishes with them, lays a cracker or a toy up on the table instead of dropping it on the floor, frequently puts away one plaything before taking another, gets a napkin to wipe her mouth, goes to the towel and holds up her hands to have them washed when she gets them especially dirty, carries her bib or her bonnet and holds it up toward the hook she can not reach, and picks up and hands to me little things I drop. Baby is not unusual, and I simply cite her to show what may be done with a little effort.

Fulton, Cal.