12 PLANT PHYSIOLOGY. 



The course as here outlined is completed by my own 

 students in one college year, working each week about eight 

 hours in the laboratory, with one lecture and one hour devoted 

 to criticism of experiments and comparison of results. 



The publication of the English edition of Part I of Pfeffer's 

 full and authoritative 4 4 Handbook of Physiology, ' ' with its many 

 citations of literature, and the probable early appearance of 

 Part II, render unnecessary any special references to literature. 

 It is assumed that his work, together with such standard books 

 as are mentioned at the end of the next chapter, are in the 

 laboratory and constantly used. Special papers, accordingly, 

 are only cited where their reading is particularly profitable, as, 

 for example, where they contain remarkably good summaries 

 in English by experts in the particular topics, or, in the case 

 of original contributions, where they are particularly illuminat- 

 ing to the topic under discussion. 



2. TEACHING AND LEARNING. 



IT is altogether probable that wherever such a course as is 

 outlined in this book is taken up, it will be under direction of 

 one who is both a trained botanist and a skilled teacher, and 

 that any students electing it will already have acquired some 

 skill in scientific ways of \vorking and thinking. Hence it may 

 seem superfluous to volunteer advice upon teaching or learning 

 physiology. Yet discussion and comparison are essential to 

 progress, and therefore I shall give in brief synopsis some of 

 what seem to me the characteristics of good teaching and good 

 learning in physiology, adding thereto some suggestions, based 

 upon personal experience, as to profitable procedure in the 

 physiological laboratory. 



The general principles of good scientific teaching apply in 

 full force to a practicum in physiology. The true teacher, for 

 his part, is a liberal but firm leader, a genial though uncom- 

 promising critic, a sympathetic and helpful friend. He studies 



