turner] SCOPE OF NA TURE- S TUB Y 263 



the high school. Neither has defined the scope by establishing 

 principles for the selection of material. The one has laid stress 

 upon faculty development, the other on the value of a disposition 

 for scientific research. 



More recently there has been an earnest effort to break away 

 from former influences in an attempt to discover principles that 

 are in touch with the educational advance of our time. The 

 Nature -Study Review has been doing an admirable work in its 

 effort to- draw out and organize the best that has been felt in 

 nature-study. It has set for its task to discover the scope of 

 nature-study and thus distinguish it from elementary science. 

 Many of its contributors in attempting to define the scope of 

 nature-study are unable to get away from the influences of the 

 original sources of the subject. Others use sound educational 

 principles, but, as it seems to us, do not use all that are involved. 



Professor John Coulter in setting forth the aim of nature-study 

 states that it is to keep functional the "tentacles of inquiry "in the 

 child. In the same number of The Review, Professor Bigelow 

 says that "nature-study deals with the simple facts of nature as 

 they are related to man's general interest in them." 



These views considered together seem adequate to define the 

 aim of nature-study. Either by itself is but half the truth. This 

 must seem dogmatic, yet if it is the business of education to fit one 

 to function as a social being, it means that not only the "ten- 

 tacles of inquiry" be kept functional, but that the material 

 selected shall prepare him to meet his obligations as a member of 

 society. It is these phases that affect the intellectual and social 

 life of the child's nature that must determine the scope of nature- 

 study. The material chosen must answer these two questions: 

 1. Does it awaken a natural interest in the child ? 2. Is it the 

 most valuable in fitting the child for the social and industrial 

 life that he is to live? These two questions lead us into vital 

 problems of psychology and sociology. 



We must resort to the nature of the child if we select material 

 in harmony with this first principle. He is implusive — propul- 

 sive. He can not long hold his attention. It is constantly 

 changing. If he is long to attend an object it must be changing. 

 He responds to live things and active processes. The more active 

 the things and processes the closer he will attend to them. This 

 all means that the child's nature selects that which it would attend. 



