2 1 8 THE NA TURE-STUD V RE VTE W U = 7~ oct., .908 



many of the latter took were afterward used in the language work 

 as reports. The plan demonstrates the possibility of making 

 this kind of work especially valuable in the development of a 

 course of study in elementary science. The scheme followed 

 was to divide the city into districts using certain school-houses 

 as centers. To these were brought by their teachers the several 

 classes of designated grades at four o'clock in the afternoon. 

 Teachers were permitted to select the lecture to attend, although 

 as a rule they went to the one in their own district. The lectures 

 were about forty minutes long, and the time of the year selected 

 enables all children to reach their homes before dark. 



The preservation of birds is so necessary to plant life that 

 the children are instructed as to their value so that there may be 

 due appreciation of their worth and so that wanton destruction 

 may be stopped. The close interrelation between birds and 

 plants and insects and plants as shown in the seed eating and the 

 seed carrying in the fall warrants the study of the two together. 

 "Whenever animals are studied, except in the lowest grades, 

 attention is called to structure, and its wonderful adaptation to 

 environment and to function, and as many specimens as possible 

 are observed on the excursions to the parks and on the visits to 

 the zoological gardens or the circus parade. 



City schools are unfavorably located for the most satis- 

 factory work in this phase. Schools in the suburbs have the 

 opportunity to note the birds and insects in their habitat; those 

 in the congested urban districts can have, as a rule, only the dead 

 specimen near at hand. To supply the need for such specimens the 

 Board of Education rented from the American Museum of 

 Natural History fifty cases of birds, insects, corals, and woods, 

 and their use has been very helpful. The city is divided into 

 eight districts and once a month the boxes of specimens are 

 moved from school to school by an employee of the Board of 

 Education. This is in accordance with a prearranged plan, 

 and records are forwarded to the office so that close personal 

 supervision is thus insured. 



In one school there is a room fitted up for experiments in 

 physics, in several there are dark rooms for lectures with lantern 

 illustrations, and in others there are aquaria in courts. The 

 following is a report from Principal B. C. Miner of the Ann 

 Street School of the work actually done in his school, and some 

 opinions of his teachers: 



