For twenty years they had taught the class subjects by the one safe method of vigorous oral cram.

This method had answered their purpose, and it was but natural that they should continue to teach by it.

What happened, when separate grants ceased to be paid, was that the need for responsiveness on the part of the scholar gradually lessened.

The pellets of information were still imparted, but it became less and less incumbent upon the teacher to see that his pupils were ready to disgorge them at a moment's notice.

And so the cramming lesson gradually transformed itself into a _lecture_, in which the teacher did all or nearly all the talking, while the children sat still and listened or pretended to listen, an occasional yawn giving open proof of the boredom from which most of them were suffering.
That is the type of oral lesson which is most common at the present day.