294 NATURE-STUDY REVIEW [11:6— Sept., 1915 



foundations of the rural problem were laid through the failure of 

 the school to develop and keep pace with the development of other 

 institutions. 



Bending all its energies to give the youth a training which would 

 fit them to make their way in the world, which meant their way 

 in the city, it took no thought for the training necessary to equip 

 for life those who were to remain in the country on the farm. 

 It took no note of the social needs of these ; of the play and relaxa- 

 tion as necessary to these as to people living in the city, for country 

 folk are not built on one plan and city folk on another ; they have 

 the same social instincts. The school gradually lost its old con- 

 nection with the pupils out of school hours; it had no bearing on 

 the lives of country children as such , nor any connection with their 

 life after they left school. 



Present Day Conditions 



Except in rare cases the doors of the rural school to-day are 

 locked except between the hours of nine and four, for five days 

 of the week, during forty weeks in the year; and in so far as the 

 social life of the coummnity is concerned, they might as well be 

 locked in perpetuity and "the key thrown down the well." 



Children, as a rule, enter school at too tender an age to be kept 

 there all day, but from the first day till the last it is push, cram, 

 memorize, prepare for examinations. Both parents and teachers 

 are obessed by the glory of getting the children through the 

 Entrance Examinations at a very early age. So engrossed are 

 they in this that they lose sight of one of the most important factors 

 in education, — namely, that of play- The training in resource- 

 fulness in making their own pleasures is wholly neglected. Indeed 

 play is looked on with but scant courtesy in the country. They 

 say there, "You will never make a living by that" — that hideous 

 spectre of making a living. 



It is high time that people realize that we are in the world not 

 merely to make a living, but to live. And to live means to be that 

 kind of boy or girl, man or woman, that the world is some bit 

 more breautiful, happier and better for his or her existence. 

 For all such there is a living safe enough. 



Sociologists have long realized the importance of play in the 

 lives of people ; and teachers and social workers are learning more 

 and more that their chief opportunity for character building in the 



