^16 BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. 



iu close companionship with things of life and beauty, with birds and 

 flowers, with dogs and bugs, and stones, and brooks, and sky, and air, 

 why, we ask, should such a life which has been the school in which he 

 has learned more of expression in word and action, in which he has 

 developed more intense interest and power of attention than he will ever 

 again develop in the same time, be suddenly ended, and he be introduced 

 into a world of hieroglyphics, of sound and form, with the restraints of 

 discipline that belong to the average school room? No, rather let school 

 be a natural continuation of child life, with such additions and modifi- 

 cations as are required by the growing powers of the child. 



We then continue studying nature in the first grades, taking the child 

 where he is and making use of the material he ah-eady has. How soon 

 the little one begins to observe more carefully, seeking to know the why 

 and to learn the new names. What is he more interested in than his 

 pets? Here the teacher can often aid him by suggesting hints about the 

 care, food, shelter, etc., of these pets; then in protecting and making the 

 birds happier, in watching and learning about the plants that he loves. 

 His interest grows stronger. He begins to understand and love the old, 

 old story that is ever new. He reads it in his own language. The teacher 

 but turns the leaves. In his freedom and joy he is like the bird itself. 

 These two types of life, the child and the bird, bi-ought into such close 

 and loving contact, form a union which makes 



"The sad old world forget awhile 

 Its sorx'ows for their sakes." 



We continue this work through the eight grades, still placing nature's 

 great open volume before the child and studying with him the beautiful 

 and wonderful pictures found upon its pages. We read with him, little 

 by little, the marvelous serial story. We learn with him, bit by bit, its 

 chapters on geology, chemistry, botany and animal life. We learn slowly 

 with him the lessons in astronomy and history which the pages reveal. 

 Above all we learn, still with the child, the harder lessons of order, law, 

 patience, industry and of the tenderest love, with which the book of 

 Nature is filled. We take for companions and friends Hiawatha, Robert 

 of Lincoln, The Barefoot Boy, Sir Lauufal, and scores of others belonging 

 to their family. "We set a child in the midst." We begin with the 

 senses and trust the work Avill not stop until the soul is reached and 

 harmonized "from the creation to the Creator." In determining the form 

 of expression to be used in our nature work, we call poetry and music 

 to our aid to express emotion, joy and pleasure; we sing about the seasons 

 and the happy birds. Language we use to tell about life and action, and 

 use the development of the buds, the germination of seeds, the beauty and 

 work ot leaves and flowers. We use prints of the paintings of our great 



