66 THE NA TURE-STUD Y RE I YE W [ 2 . 2 _feb R uary, .906 



School. It was because of it that the science requirement was 

 added to teachers' certificates in 1872, but a year later was repealed 

 from the second grade, thus defeating its purpose. Its solution 

 demands continual pegging away at the doors of our country 

 schools; and the vast increase in our nature literature, papers like 

 Country Life in America, paid lecturers on agricultural education, and 

 the national movement nature-ward, all point to the speedy opening 

 of those doors. 



The second part of the problem — what to do in these schools, 

 and how, is dependent upon knowledge. The teachers hesitate to 

 take up a new study, and we are ready to admit that to bring out 

 the real possibilities of the subject is no holiday task. Like other 

 things of value it is not going to come without some work. But if 

 the facts were really known, of how much can be done with jars 

 and aquaria, simple insect cages, tin cans, window boxes and a 

 garden strip ; with the aid of a few good books like those of Com- 

 stock, Hodge, Bailey, King, Hemenway, Keeler, and Chapman ; 

 and without a single set lesson in school hours, by merely turn- 

 ing loose the instinctive love of collecting and of doing, on the part 

 of the pupils ; if the teachers could see how the nature-study spirit 

 is able to change the whole attitude of the school and teacher from 

 that of "impossible cram and mental pretense"' to relations of 

 mutual helpfulness, where all are learners together, and it is no dis- 

 grace to say, "I don't know," where questions continually arise 

 that "all the wise men cannot answer;" if these things, I say, were 

 widely known, the hesitation would vanish. There is no need of 

 adding a new recitation to the school. In my opinion nothing will 

 kill the movement so quickly as the cut and dried lesson ; and it's a 

 sin to try to crowd any more recitations into the country school pro- 

 gram. But if the work is taken up in this informal way, at any rate 

 in the beginning, and the beneficent influences of nature and quick- 

 ened observation are permitted to spread out over the proverbial 

 three R's, over the geography, and composition and literature, we 

 believe that there will never be a return to the old conditions. 



