NOTES. 



HE project of organizing the children of the State 

 into nature-study bands or chibs is meeting witli 

 unexpected success. The Junior Naturalist Club 

 is organized, in the language of its charter, that 

 " every member thereof shall love the country better and be con- 

 tent to live therein." The Cornell Nature-Study movement has 

 for its purpose the awakening of a love for natural and native 

 things. It stands for naturalness and freedom. It would deepen 

 every life which it touches, by giving it fuller sympathy with every- 

 thing that is and by enriching its experience. It does not attempt 

 to teach elementary science, nor primarily to popularize knowl- 

 edge ; and herein it differs from other nature-study movements. It 

 is not seeking to make investigators of the coming generation, to the 

 end that the boundaries of science may be widened. It wants to 

 teach the child how to live. It is the spirit, rather than the letter, 



that quickeneth. 



* * * 



Each Junior Naturalist Club receives a charter, and each member 

 may receive a button. Each member pays dues twice each school 

 month by sending a letter on something which has been seen or 

 studied. Often these letters are the school-room compositions con- 

 cerning nature subjects. Each month we issue to the clubs a Junior 

 Naturalist Lesson, suggesting what topic may be studied to advan- 

 tage. This fall we have made much of the topic " seed travelers ; " 

 and our otKce has been full of seeds from the four corners of the 

 State. How much the little minds have opened as they have pic- 

 tured the journeys of the thistle-down and the stick-tight, no one can 

 ever know. 



* * * 



A School of Nature-Study for teachers is offered at Cornell in the 

 summer of 1900, as in 1899. Term opens just after the Fourth, 

 and continues six weeks. Because of lack of room and equipment. 



487 



