"It is said that nature-study teaching should be accurate, a statement 

 that every good teacher will admit without debate ; but accuracy is often 

 interpreted to mean com^pleteness, and then the statement cannot pass 

 unchallenged. To study ' the dandelion,' ' the robin,' with emphasis on the 

 particle ' the,' working out the complete structure, may be good laboratory 

 work in botany or zoology for advanced pupils, but it is not an elementary 

 educational process. It contributes nothing more to accuracy than does 

 the natural order of leaving untouched all those phases of the subject that 

 are out of the child's reach; while it may take out the life and spirit of 

 the work, and the spiritual quality may be the very part that is most worth 

 the while. Other work may provide the formal ' drill ' ; this should supply 

 the quality and vivacity. Teachers often say to me that their children 

 have done excellent work with these complete methods, and they show me 

 the essays arid drawings; but this is no proof that the work is commend- 

 able. Children can be made to do many things that they ought not to 

 do and that lie beyond them. We all need to go to school to children." 



— ' The Outlook to Nature," L. H. Bailey. 



The photographs of plantain were made by Verne Morton for this Leaflet. 

 The photograph of wild geese was made by A. Radcliff Dugmore, and is used 

 here through the courtesy of Country Life in America. 



For assistance in the study of wild geese read : " Birds That Hunt and Are 

 Hunted," Blanchan, p. 137; "In Quest of Waptonk the Wild," in Northern Trails, 

 Long; "The Homesickness of Ke-honk-a," in Kindred of the Wild, Roberts. 



"34 



