104 NATURE-STUDY REVIEW [11:3— Mar., 1915 



Presenting Child's Problem — How many of you children have trees in your 

 yard at home? How many different kinds have you? Have you noticed how 

 many kinds of trees there are in our school yard? Would you like to know the 

 names of these trees so that you can call them by their names as you do your 

 friends? Two trees growing in our yard are the elm and maple. I have here 

 some leaves from these trees and we will study them to see how they differ 

 so that we can tell the elm from the maple tree by means of their leaves. 



Development — 



OUTLINE OF POINTS QUESTIONS 



.Shape of leaf — What differences do you find in these leaves? How are they 

 different in shape? Several may go to the board and make 

 a drawing of each leaf and we will ask the class to decide 

 which shows the shape best. 



Size — Is there any difference in the size? 



Margin — Are the edges alike? Make a drawing on the board of the 



edges of the two leaves. 



Veining — Do the veins run in the same way in both leaves? Can some 



one make a drawing to show the difference? 



Arrangement — Look at these clusters I have here and see if the leaves are 

 placed the same on both trees. 

 Which do you think is the easiest way to tell these leaves apart? 



Application — When school is dismissed you may look carefully at the leaves 

 of the trees in the school yard and find a maple tree and an elm tree. To- 

 morrow I will ask each of you to tell the class exactly where these two trees 

 are. When the leaves begin to change color, we will watch these two trees and 

 see if their leaves turn the same color. 



In the development the outline suggests the main points to be 

 brought out that will help solve the child's problem. The exact 

 questions to be asked can not be definitely planned beforehand. 

 It is better to ask a few leading questions than man}^ minor ones. 

 The question involved in the statement of the problem "What 

 differences do you find in these leaves?" would be sufficient to 

 bring out most of the points in the lesson. After the children have 

 exhausted their answers to this question, if some other points of 

 difference have been overlooked, the teacher may then ask another 

 question to direct the children's attention to this point. The 

 questions given in this lesson are intended for this purpose in case 

 some point is overlooked. It is not expected that it will be neces- 

 sary to actually ask all these questions. 



