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THE NATURE- STUDY REVIEW 



[2 : 8 — Nov., 1906 



can take the place of the specimen. With it a teacher can say: "Here, 

 children, are the eggs of the white-marked tussock moth just as they 

 were laid on the bark of an elm tree. There are several hundred 

 eggs in the mass and each may hatch into a caterpillar, like this one 

 you see in the case. If we are not careful, they may become so 

 numerous as to strip the leaves off from our orchard and shade trees. 

 Let us see who can bring to school the greatest number of them before 

 they hatch this spring." The same may be done with a hundred or 



Fig. 2. — Insect nature-studv in the schoolroom. Grade IV, Downing St. School, Worcester' 

 Mass., Miss Edna R. Thayer, teacher. To the left is a large screen-wire breeding cage for liv- 

 ing insects. On the left-hand corner of the table is a 4 by 5 insect mounting case arranged for 

 an ants' nest. The rest of the picture shows the insect mounting strips, with Miss Thayer bend- 

 ing one into form, other materials and unfinished and finished mounts. 



more common insects, if we have the specimens to start them off with. 

 What sort of collections, then, shall we have for our nature-study 

 work? Too often we have seen nice little collections pinned out in 

 cigar boxes in the spring reduced to dust by dermestes by the time 

 school opened in the fall. This is discouraging to pupil and teacher 

 alike. Plaster Paris moulds, such as are used in show-museums, are 

 too expensive and are not suited to elementary instruction because 

 they do not permit seeing both sides of the specimen. Further, they 

 are usually made for single insects and do not lend themselves to 

 life-history collections. Children require the life-story side and, 

 hence, this is a fatal defect in the method and unfits it for purposes 

 of elementary instruction. 



