The Apperceptive Basis of Story Telling

A PPERCEPTION is a formidable and sometimes confusing term for a very simple and easy-to-understand mental process. I once told Seumus MacManus' deliciously humorous story of Billy Beg and his Bull to a group of foreign boys and girls in one of New York's East Side Settlement Houses. The children listened with apparent appreciation, but, halfway along in the story, it occurred to me to ask them if they had ever seen a bull. No one answered me at first. Then Pietro, a little dusky-eyed son of Italy, raised a grimy hand.

"I seen one last summer when we was on a fresh-air," he said. "It's a bigger cow, a bull is, with the bicycle handle-bars on her head."

Pietro's description of a bull was an example of apperception, the method by means of which a new idea is interpreted, classified, "let into" the human mind. He knew the class, cows.  He also knew the class, bicycles.  He did not know the class, bulls—at least vividly enough to be able to put the idea into terms of a verbal explanation and description. So he did the most natural thing in the world, the only possible mental process in fact by means of which children or adults classify the new.  He interpreted it in terms of the old, explaining the unfamiliar idea, bull, by means of the familiar ideas, cow and a bicycle.

This, then, is apperception. It is the involuntary mental process by means of which the human mind makes its own the strange, the new, the unfamiliar idea by a method of fitting it into the class of familiar ideas already known.  Apperception is a means of quick mental interpretation. It is the welcoming of strangers to the mind-habitation, strangers who come every day in the guise of unfamiliar names, terms, scenes, and phrases, and determining in which corner of the brain house they will fit most comfortably. The most natural process is finally to give these new ideas an old mind corner to rest in, or an old brain path in which to travel.

A child's mind at the age when he is able to concentrate upon listening to a story, three or four years of age—kindergarten age—is not a very crowded house. It is a mind-house tenanted by a few and very simple concepts which he has made his own through his previous home, mother and play experiences. He is familiar with his nursery, his pets, his family, his toys, his food, his bed. If he is a country child he knows certain flowers, birds and farm animals, not as classes—flower, bird and animal—but buttercup, robin,  and sheep.  If he is a city child his mind has a very different tenantry, and he thinks in terms of street, subway, park, fire engine, ambulance.  These to the city child are also individual ideas, not classes. He knows them as compelling, noisy, moving ideas which he has seen and experienced, but they do not at all appeal to him as classes.

The story of "The Three Bears" is an obviously interesting one to children upon entering school. It has its basis of interest in its apperceptive quality, and it illustrates better than almost any other story for children those qualities which bring about quick mental interpretation on the part of the listener. The unusual, strange, hazardous characters in the story, the three bears, are introduced to the child in old, comfortably familiar terms which catch his interest from the first sentence of the story. It is extremely doubtful if the story of three bears set in a polar or forest environment would ever have been popular so long or made so many children happy as has the story of the historical three bears who lived in a house, ate porridge from bowls, sat in chairs and slept in beds. Nor are these the only apperceptive links between the life of the bears and that of the child. There is a tiny bear in the story, the size, one may presuppose, of the child who is listening to the story. The to-be-classified idea, bear,  is presented to children in this old folk tale in terms of already known ideas, house, porridge, chair, bed,  and tiny.  Very few story tellers have appreciated the underlying psychologic appeal of the story of "The Three Bears," but it illustrates a quality in stories that we must look for if we wish to make the story we select a permanency in the child's mental life.

The apperceptive basis of story telling consists in study on the part of the story teller to discover what is the store of ideas in the minds of the children who will listen to the story. 

Has the story too many new ideas for the child to be able to classify them in terms of his old ideas? On the other hand, has it one or two new thoughts so carefully presented through association with already familiar concepts that the child will be able to make them his own and give them a permanent place in his mind with the old ones?

A child's mind is an eery place for an adult to try and enter. Teachers, kindergartners and story tellers are a little prone to think that a knowledge of one child's mental content gives them the power to know the mind of the child-at-large. Our psychologists have given us studies of child mind, not child minds. This mind hypothesis is, perhaps, sufficient for the general working out of systems of teaching, but success in the delicate art of story telling means a most critical study and observation of the minds of the special group of children who will hear the story. The story teller must ask herself these questions:

"What do these children know?" 

"Have they any experience other than that of the home on which to bank?"

"Do they come from homes of leisure or homes of industry?"

"Have they had a country or a city experience?"

"Have they passed from the stage of development when toys formed their play interest to the game stage in which chance and hazard interest them more deeply?"

"Are they American children, familiar with American institutions, or are they newcomers to our land, unfamiliar with and confused by our ways?"

When she has satisfactorily answered these questions, the story teller will select her story having for its theme, atmosphere and motif  an idea or group of ideas that will touch the child's mental life as she has discovered it and by means of which it will find a permanent place in his mind through its comfortable friendliness and familiarity.

The child who has come directly from his home and the sheltering arms of his mother or nurse should not, at first, be taken far afield through the lands of fairies and giants. If he is told a fairy story, it should have for its content the sweet, homely qualities that characterize the home.

I am using as a good example of the apperceptive story, "The Cap that Mother Made." The child listeners are carried, it is true, to the palace of a King and are formally introduced to a Princess, but this is brought about through the familiar symbols of the home: mother, brothers, the farmer,  and the queer little cap  with its red and green stripes and blue tassel. Although Anders, the story hero, spends a happy hour at the Princess' ball, he finally finds his way home again, and the story has an apperceptive appeal which is unusual. It is full of precious, familiar concepts that establish an association in the child's mind between fairyland and home. After hearing the story, he will be very apt always to remember a palace as a very charming place to visit, but not to stay in, when one may go home to mother.

THE CAP THAT MOTHER MADE

Once upon a time there was a little boy named Anders, who had a new cap. And a prettier cap you never have seen, for mother herself had knit it; and nobody could make anything quite so nice as mother did. It was altogether red, except a small part in the middle which was green, for the red yarn had given out; and the tassel was blue. His brothers and sisters walked about squinting at him, and their faces grew long with envy. But Anders cared nothing about that. He put his hands in his pockets and went out for a walk, for he wished everybody to see how fine he looked in his new cap. The first person he met was a farmer walking along by the side of a wagon load of wood. He made a bow so deep that his back came near breaking. He was dumbfounded, I can tell you, when he saw it was nobody but Anders. "Dear me," said he, "if I did not think it was the gracious little count himself!" And then he invited Anders to ride in his wagon.

But when one has a pretty, red cap with a blue tassel, one is too fine to ride in a wagon, and Anders walked proudly by.

At the turn of the road he met the tanner's son, Lars. He was such a big boy that he wore high boots, and carried a jack-knife. He gaped and gazed at the cap, and could not keep from fingering the blue tassel.

"Let's trade caps," he said, "I will give you my jack-knife to boot."

Now this knife was a very good one, though half the blade was gone and the handle was a little cracked; and Anders knew that one is almost a man as soon as one has a jack-knife. But still it did not come up to the new cap which mother had made.

"Oh, no, I'm not so stupid as all that; no, I'm not!" Anders said.

And then he said good-by to Lars with a nod; but Lars only made faces at him, for he had not been to school much, poor boy; and, besides, he was very much put out because he could not cheat Anders out of his cap which mother had made.

Anders went along, and he met a very old, old woman who courtesied till her skirts looked like a balloon. She called him a little gentleman, and said that he was fine enough to go to the royal court ball.

"Yes, why not?" thought Anders. "Seeing that I am so fine, I may as well go and visit the King."

And so he did. In the palace yard stood two soldiers with shining helmets, and with muskets over their shoulders; and when Anders came to the gate, both the muskets were leveled at him.

"Where may you be going?" asked one of the soldiers.

"I am going to the court ball," answered Anders.

"No, you are not," said the other soldier, stepping forward. "Nobody is allowed there without a uniform."

But just at this instant the princess came tripping across the yard. She was dressed in white silk with bows of gold ribbon. When she saw Anders and the soldiers, she walked over to them.

"Oh," she said, "he has such a very fine cap on his head, and that will do just as well as a uniform."

And she took Anders' hand and walked with him up the broad marble stairs where soldiers were posted at every third step, and through the beautiful halls where courtiers in silk and velvet stood bowing wherever he went. For no doubt they thought him a prince when they saw his fine cap.

At the farther end of the largest hall a table was set with golden cups and golden plates in long rows. On huge silver dishes were piles of tarts and cakes, and red wine sparkled in shining glasses.

The princess sat down at the head of this long table; and she let Anders sit in a golden chair by her side.

"But you must not eat with your cap on your head," she said, putting out her hand to take it off.

"Oh, yes, I can eat just as well," said Anders, holding on to his cap; for if they should take it away from him nobody would any longer believe that he was a prince; and, besides, he did not feel sure that he would get it back again.

"Well, well, give it to me," said the princess, "and I will give you a kiss."

The princess was certainly beautiful, and Anders would have dearly liked to be kissed by her, but the cap which mother had made he would not give up on any condition. He only shook his head.

"Well, but see," said the princess; and she filled his pockets with cakes, and put her own gold chain around his neck, and bent down and kissed him.

But he only moved farther back in his chair and did not take his hands away from his head.

Then the doors were thrown open, and the King entered with a large number of gentlemen in glittering uniforms and plumed hats. The King himself wore a purple mantle which trailed behind him, and he had a large gold crown on his white curly hair.

He smiled when he saw Anders in the gilt chair.

"That is a very fine cap you have," he said.

"So it is," replied Anders. "Mother knit it of her very best yarn, and everybody wishes to get it away from me."

"But surely you would like to change caps with me," said the King, raising his large, heavy crown from his head.

Anders did not answer. He sat as before, and held on to his red cap which everybody was so eager to get. But when the King came nearer to him, with his gold crown between his hands, then Anders grew frightened as never before. If he did not take good care, the King might cheat him out of his cap; for a King can do whatever he likes.

With one jump Anders was out of his chair. He darted like an arrow through all the beautiful halls, down all the marble stairs, and across the yard.

He twisted himself like an eel between the outstretched arms of the courtiers, and over the soldiers' muskets he jumped like a little rabbit.

He ran so fast that the princess's necklace fell off his neck, and all the cakes jumped out of his pockets. But his cap he still had. He was holding on to it with both hands as he rushed into his mother's cottage.

His mother took him up in her lap, and he told her all his adventures, and how everybody wanted his cap. And all his brothers and sisters stood around and listened with their mouths open.

But when his big brother heard that he had refused to give his cap for the King's golden crown, he said that Anders was stupid. Just think how much money one might get for the King's crown; and Anders could have had a still finer cap.

That Anders had not thought of, and his face grew red. He put his arms around his mother's neck and asked:

"Mother, was I stupid?"

His mother hugged him close and kissed him.

"No, my little son," said she. "If you were dressed in silver and gold from top to toe, you could not look any nicer than in your little red cap."

Then Anders felt brave again. He knew well enough that mother's cap was the best cap in all the world.

This story is only an example of many others that may be selected and fitted to the mental status of the individual child or group of children who make up the story circle.

I had great difficulty one season in gaining and holding the attention of a group of particularly rough boys to whom I was telling stories in a neighborhood house. To my surprise, they listened most attentively to an adaptation of "The King of the Golden River," and clamored to have it repeated.

Looking into the reason for their keen interest in the story, which really took them quite far afield in its descriptions and plot, I discovered that the incident of the holy water had gripped my audience. The boys were Romanists and they found a point in the story which touched their own lives, in the visits of the brothers and Gluck to the priest. I never afterward found difficulty in holding the attention of this special group of boys. I had been able to establish a bond of sympathy between the boys and the story characters.

Touching a child's life through the medium of a story is like a friendly hand clasp. An Irish folk tale told to a group of little sons and daughters of Erin, one of the Uncle Remus tales told to a kindergarten circle of little negroes, the story of one of our Italian operas adapted to the understanding of Sicilian and Neapolitan children, one and all mean enriching those child lives. How could the Gaelic tale fit the Italian group, though, or the story of the opera make an appeal to the little negro boys and girls?

Successful story telling means, then, a careful consideration of the apperceptive basis of the story, first of all. This, reduced to very simple terms, means studying the mental life of a child and selecting for his first stories those that have a well-defined association through their word pictures, dialogue and plot with the child's own previous experience. When the story teller makes the question of apperception the first consideration in selecting her stories, she will find that her appeal to the children will be an active and successful one.

Goody Two Shoes

SELECTED FOR ITS APPERCEPTIVE APPEAL

Of course Goody Two Shoes was not her real name. In fact, her father's name was Meanwell, and he had once been rich, and prosperous, and one of the most well-to-do farmers in the parish, but he lost his money. However it happened one could hardly tell, but his farm was seized, and he was turned out with his wife, and Tommy, and little Marjery, with none of the necessaries of life to support them.

Care and discontent shortened the days of Farmer Meanwell. He was forced from his family and taken with a violent fever of which he died. Marjery's poor mother died soon, too, of a broken heart, and Marjery and her little brother were left alone in the wide world; so they started off together, hand in hand, to seek their fortunes.

They were both very ragged, and though Tommy had two shoes, Marjery had but one. They neither had anything to support them save what they picked from the hedges, or got from the poor people; and they slept every night in a barn. Their relations, who were rich folk, took no notice of them, because they were ashamed to own such a poor little ragged girl as Marjery and such a dirty little curly-pated boy as Tommy.

But there was a very worthy clergyman named Mr. Smith who lived in the parish where little Marjery and Tommy were born; and having a relation come to see him who was a charitable man, he sent for these children. The gentleman ordered little Marjery a new pair of shoes, gave Mr. Smith some money to buy them clothes, and said he would take Tommy and make of him a little sailor. He had a new jacket and trousers made for Tommy, and he was soon ready to start for London.

It was hard indeed for Tommy and Marjery to part. Tommy cried, and Marjery cried, and they kissed each other a hundred times. At last Tommy wiped off Marjery's tears with the end of his jacket and bid her cry no more, for he would come to her again when he returned from sea, and he began his journey with the kind gentleman while Marjery went crying to bed. And the instant that Marjery awoke the next morning, the shoemaker came in with the new shoes for which she had been measured.

Nothing could have helped little Marjery bear the loss of Tommy more than the pleasure she took in her two shoes. You remember she had worn only one shoe before, and a ragged one at that. She ran out to Mrs. Smith as soon as they were put on, and stroking down her ragged apron cried out, "Two shoes, Madam, see, two shoes!" And so she behaved to all the people she met, and she obtained the name of Goody Two Shoes.

With Tommy gone there was not a great deal for Goody Two Shoes to do, so she made up her mind that she would learn to read. Now in the long ago days when this little girl lived, one had to pay quite a sum of money to go to a dame's school and be taught how to cross stitch, and to bow politely, and to read. Only rich children could go, but Goody Two Shoes would meet the little boys and girls as they came from school, and learn from them and then sit down and read until they returned. After a while she had taught herself more than they had learned of the dame, and she resolved to go the rounds of all the farms and teach the little children who were too poor to go to school.

And such a clever, pleasant way of teaching children to read as Goody Two Shoes invented! With her knife she cut some wooden sets of letters with which the children were to spell and make sentences by laying them together. These wooden letters she put in a basket and with the basket over her arm she became a little trotting tutoress who was known through all the countryside for her kindness and patience.

Each morning she would start out at seven and run up to the door of a farmhouse.

Tap, tap, tap!

"Who is there?" the mother of the house would ask.

"Only little Goody Two Shoes," Marjery would answer, "come to teach Billy his A B C's."

"Oh, little Goody," the mother would cry, opening the door wide. "I am glad to see you. Billy wants you sadly, for he has learned all his lesson."

Little Billy would come out and have a new spelling lesson set him with the basket of letters, and then Goody would go on to Farmer Simpson's.

"Bow, wow, wow!" said the dog at the door.

"Sirrah," Mistress Simpson would say, "why do you bark at Little Two Shoes? Come in. Here's Sally wants you sadly, for she has learned all her lesson."

Then out came the little one.

"Good morning, Goody," she would say. "Good morning, Sally," Goody Two Shoes would answer; "have you learned your lesson?"

"Yes, that's what I have," the little one would say, as she took the letters and spelled pear, and plum, and top, and ball, and puss, and cow, and lamb, and sheep, and bull, and cock, and hen.

"Good," said Marjery, and she hurried on to Gaffer Cook's cottage. Here a number of poor children were met to learn to read and they all crowded around Marjery at once. So she pulled out her letters and asked the little boy next her what he had for dinner. He answered, bread.

"Well, then," said she, "set the first letter."

So he pulled out a big B, and soon the other letters, and there stood the word as plain as possible.

"And what had you, Polly Comb, for your dinner?" asked Goody Two Shoes.

"Apple-pie," answered Polly as she spelled her word.

The next child had potatoes, the next beef and turnips, which were spelled with many other words until the lesson was done, and Goody set them a new task, and went on.

The next place she came to was Farmer Thompson's, where there were a great many little ones waiting for her.

"Oh, little Miss Goody Two Shoes," said one of them, "where have you been?"

"I have been teaching," said Goody, "longer than I intended, and am afraid I am come too soon for you now."

"No, but indeed you are not," replied the other, "for I have got my lesson, and so has Sally Dawson, and so have we all," and they capered about as if they were overjoyed to see her.

"Why, then," said she, "you are all very good; so let us begin our lessons."

She was indeed a wise and painstaking little tutoress for a long, long time. At last Dame Williams, who kept the village school for little gentlemen and ladies, became very old and infirm, and wanted to give up teaching. So the trustees sent for Little Two Shoes to examine her and see if she were able to keep the school.

They found that little Marjery was the best scholar and had the best heart of any one who wanted to be the teacher, and they gave her a most favorable report.

So Goody Two Shoes' troubles and travels were over. She taught the dame school for the rest of her days, and never lacked for shoes or anything else needful.

STORIES THAT HAVE A GENERAL APPERCEPTIVE APPEAL
TO A CHILD UPON ENTERING SCHOOL

The House That Jack Built
   In Fairy Tales Too Good To Miss: In the Meadow

The Three Bears
   Frederick Richardson, in Old Old Tales Retold

The Three Little Pigs
   In Fairy Tales Too Good To Miss: In the Meadow

Little Red Riding Hood
   In Fairy Tales Too Good To Miss: In the Meadow

The Wolf and the Seven Little Kids
   In Fairy Tales Too Good To Miss: In the Meadow

The Little Red Hen
   Frederick Richardson, in Old Old Tales Retold

The Town Mouse and the Country Mouse
   Milo Winter, in The Aesop for Children

The Elves and the Shoemaker
   Sara Cone Bryant, in Stories to Tell to Children

The Top and the Ball
   Adapted from Andersen in For the Children's Hour

How the Home Was Built
   Maud Lindsay, in Mother Stories

The Little Gray Grandmother
   Elizabeth Harrison, in Story-Land

The Pig Brother
   Laura E. Richards, in The Golden Windows

Grandfather's Penny
   In For the Children's Hour

Tiny Tim
   Adapted from Dickens, in For the Children's Hour