Hearing recitations.

I am aware that many attempt to do something else at the same time that they are hearing a recitation, and there may perhaps be some individuals who can succeed in this.

If the exercise to which the teacher is attending consists merely in listening to the reciting word for word some passage committed to memory, it can be done.
I hope, however, to show in a future chapter that there are other and far higher objects which every teacher ought to have in view in his recitations, and he who understands these objects, and aims at accomplishing them--who endeavors to _instruct_ his class, to enlarge and elevate their ideas, to awaken a deep and paramount interest in the subject which they are examining, will find that his time must be his own, and his attention uninterrupted while he is presiding at a class.
All the other exercises and arrangements of the school are, in fact, preparatory and subsidiary to this.

Here, that is, in the classes, the real business of teaching is to be done.

Here the teacher comes in contact with his scholars mind with mind, and here, consequently, he must be uninterrupted and undisturbed.