Historic Cold Spring Village Cape May County Living History Museum

Its full title, however, was much longer: “The American Spelling Book: Containing the Rudiments of the English Language For The Use Of Schools in the United States” by Noah Webster, Esquire.When you open up the book, one thing you notice is quite a few long lists of words. Students memorized many of their lessons. Rote memorization is not a very stimulating way to teach, but most teachers of that era had no training for their jobs, and few skills were necessary to teach this way. A scholar might be told to memorize a column of words, (how they were spelled, what they meant) then be called by the schoolmaster or schoolmistress to stand up next to their desk, repeat all the information, and sit down again. This was also believed to teach students something called “elocution,” the ability to speak in public in front of others, which was thought to be a useful skill for scholars to learn