holtzI COURSE OF NATURE-STUDY 191 



expediency. We should, in a measure, follow the line of least 

 resistance and utilize the materials at hand. That is, the nature 

 course should be adapted to the environment. Obviously, if one 

 aim of nature-study is to furnish useful information, such knowl- 

 edge must come from the field in which the life of the child is 

 spent. But this principle, so evident, is largely neglected City 

 children study a course adapted for the country, and country 

 nature-study has only recently begun to be adapted to farm life. 

 This principle of fitting nature-study to the local setting should 

 be the only one to make a difference in widely different localities. 

 Even in a single city, especially the larger ones, such a variation 

 should be permitted. Congested New York City is especially 

 concerned with the agents and processes of industrial life and 

 with personal and municipal hygiene. Therefore the nature- 

 study of this part of New York should concern itself with those 

 pioblems. Outlying suburban schools have other opportunities 

 and interests. Let each school be adapted to and utilize the 

 material at hand. This is not only sound pedagogy, as far as the 

 pupil is concerned, but would simplify the teacher's problem of 

 finding illustrative material. 



Another principle under the general head of expediency is 

 that of adapting the nature course to the seasons. Although Dr. 

 John Dewey, the other day, in his destructive criticism of our 

 scientific efforts in education generally, referred facetiously to 

 how the child in nature-study observes and records the changing 

 phenomena of the "rolling year, till at the end the child, like the 

 proverbial rolling stone, gathers no moss," he surely would admit 

 the foolishness and futility of trying to study robins and flower- 

 ing trees in winter instead of in their proper season. To remove 

 things of nature out of their seasonal setting is to lose a large 

 part of their significance. There is a psychological moment 

 when nature phenomena and natural objects are most striking 

 and interesting — that is in their season. Interest being so great 

 a factor in education, we cannot afford to neglect it here. 



The chief criticism of nature-study is that it lacks coherence. 

 The criticism is deserved, and probably from the nature of the 

 case will always apply in a measure. The necessity of sacrificing 

 system to variety, the necessity of adapting the study to the sea- 

 sons will always prevent nature-study from being a systematic 

 unit as high school or college science may be. But this extreme 

 systematizing of nature-study is not desirable, considering the 

 age of the pupils. 



