A little school was conducted in a neighboring house by a lay teacher appointed by Mertz. Still, Neumann, finding the man's conduct unsatisfactory, dismissed him and took up the task of teaching himself, two hours in the morning and two hours in the afternoon, until securing the services of another teacher seven months later. Neumann was a gifted teacher, and his students fondly remembered his stories in catechism class years later. He would often reward good students with small gifts, and when teaching the children to sing in the liturgy, he would induce those who complained of sore throats to return to singing with rock candy, of which he seemed to have an inexhaustible supply. Neumann again had a school after moving his headquarters to North Bush in 1837 and was erecting a third schoolhouse at Lancaster by December 1839.