in writing exactly the same copy, word, or letter. One may take twenty different headlines, say of small hand, and there will hardly be a single copy amongst them that is not composed of elements common to all.
Finally the practical use to be made of the Black Board as a medium for instruction in writing when Headline Books are used, is identically and precisely the same that a Blank Book advocate would make of it after he had written the copy, viz. to illustrate or explain any point of difficulty principle or mistake, that might arise in the day's teaching.
Indeed such is the preponderating weight of evidence in support of Headline Copy Books, and so slender, flimsy, and untenable all the arguments for Blank Copy Books, as to render the use of the latter a matter of personal pressure, accidental impulse, inclination to novelty, or of vested interests.
Isolated cases may occur and particular individuals may possibly secure good Blank Book results by means of that devotion and abnormal expenditure of labour and zeal which hobby-riders so generously and so generally indulge in, but it is vain to expect that the tens of thousands of our teachers will accept a system which literally bristles with anomalies, difficulties and defects.
It may be that, in the words of a zealous defender of Blank Books, "The day of Headline Books is past"! "Headline Copy Books are obsolete"!! "Headline Copy Books are virtually a thing of the Past"!!! It may be so, but appearances are against it, facts disprove it, and logic derides it, and it must be asserted with the calmest deliberation that on all counts, in all aspects and respects the verdict is unanimously and unreservedly against and opposed to the introduction of any System of Blank Copy Books for the teaching of writing in our Elementary and Secondary Schools.
Note: Lest the assertion on page 60 reflecting on the quality of the writing of our teachers be considered exaggerated or unfounded I here reproduce some extracts just taken from the Blue Books of current and recent years, in reference to handwriting in England.
