THE PI.ANT WORIvD 205 



Editorial. 



Americans have for some time been priding themselves on the sup- 

 posed superiority of educational methods prevailing here, but occasionally 

 it is good to see ourselves as others see us. The Mosby Educational Com- 

 mission, composed of prominent English educators, spent many months 

 in studying our system of education, from the kindergarten to and beyond 

 the university, and the preliminary report of their work has just been 

 published by Professor Henry E. Armstrong. While finding much that 

 is good and not a little that is of superior merit. Professor Armstrong 

 concludes that a considerable portion is more or less superficial, and 

 especially does he pass these strictures on our so-called " nature study." 

 When this nature-study idea began to gain a foothold a few years ago it 

 spread from one end of the country to the other like an epidemic, but it 

 may surprise many to learn that much of it is not the "real thing." 

 Rather is it " nature love," as Professor Armstrong says, than " nature 

 study " in its best phase, and when one stops to think of it, how could it 

 have been otherwise when a great body of teachers accustomed to teach 

 by the book were suddenly called upon to give instruction about nature. 

 "Don't humming-birds and bumble-bees belong to the same class?" 

 asked a public school teacher of the writer ! Doubtless this same teacher 

 would have said that a whale was a fish, that swallows could hibernate 

 at the bottom of lakes and ponds, and live frogs be split out of the 

 solid trunks of trees. These examples of what Mr. Dooley aptly calls 

 assorted mis-information ' ' have been regaled to our children under the 

 pretext that it was nature study. The love of nature is undoubtedly 

 an excellent thing to inculcate — would there were more of it; but it is 

 or may be quite a different thing from intelligent nature study. Walks 

 afield, valuable at least from the hygienic point of view, the pulling apart 

 of a flower, or the collecting of birds' eggs may be far from the legitimate 

 object in mind. What we need in this country, and what we will ultimately 

 have, is a body of teachers who have themselves been properly taught 

 before they have been set the difficult task of instructing the children. 

 Furthermore, the daily press requires liberal need of education in its 

 selection of paragraphs on natural science topics. The attitude of most 

 editors in this matter is inexplicable if we assume them to be in any 

 way anxious for truth. The writings of students and observers are set 

 aside for bizarre stories of wonderful tropical plants exhibiting human 

 intelligence, or of trees that poison all who pass by them ! The need 

 was never greater for a large and well -trained body of teachers and 

 writers on biological topics. 



