bigblow] TRAINING OF TEA CHERS OF NA TURE-STUD Y 1 8 1 



get good nature-study and science in their preparation for teach- 

 ing. The supervisory system has done great harm because so 

 many school officials have failed to see that they were attempting 

 the impossible and that failure of a supervisor does not mean 

 failure of nature-study. 



3. Training by colleges: All colleges give technical science 

 courses; but experience shows that these alone are not adequate 

 for training teachers of nature-study. The college science does 

 not give the proper point of view and knowledge of needs of 

 elementary schools. Of course this is not necessarily so; I am 

 simply stating facts easily observed in most colleges today. In 

 fact, in very few colleges do the science courses give adequate 

 preparation for even high-school teaching, and elementary schools 

 are still more distant from the colleges. But changes are coming 

 rapidly. Many college teachers of science are beginning to 

 recognize that introductory science courses in colleges should deal 

 with those facts and great ideas which appeal most to the man 

 who can take but one course in any one science. We are cer- 

 tainly coming to an age when the first college course in zoology 

 will not omit half the great groups of animals and the first course 

 in physics forget to mention light and electricity, because the 

 professors want to reserve these topics for advanced courses. 

 Introductory science from the viewpoint of liberal, not technical 

 education, is the demand of the hour; and the final result will be 

 courses which approach much nearer the nature-study point of 

 view. Such improved science courses, added to the courses in 

 education now being introduced into colleges, will go far towards 

 making the average college graduates of science sane and useful 

 workers in elementary-school nature-study and in high-school 

 science. 



4. Fourth and finally, and most important, normal-school 

 training: All that has been said concerning college training can 

 be applied legitimately to many normal schools, because their 

 science departments copy closely the ordinary undergraduate 

 college courses and forget (or have never learned) that normal 

 schools are intended to train teachers for public schools. It is 

 true that a few of the better normal schools are now working hard 

 at nature-study problems. Some of them offer technical science 

 courses, in order to give students the subject-matter; and then in 

 a pedagogical course, select and adapt the materials to nature- 



