HOME NATURE-STUDY COURSE. 



TEACHER'S LEAFLET. 



BASED ON THE WORK FOR FOURTH AND FIFTH YEAR PUPILS AS OUTLINED 



IN THE SYLLABUS OF NATURE STUDY AND AGRICULTURE ISSUED BY 



THE NEW YORK STATE EDUCATION DEPARTMENT. 



THE VIOLETS. 



After the special study of different flowers by the pupils, much interest 

 may be added to the work by making a collection of all the species of a 

 family in one locality. This is excellent training for quite incidentally 

 it teaches the children to discriminate between two closely allied forms, 

 :.o keep their eyes open for new forms, to note the different localities 

 and habits of growth of flowers that resemble each other, and more 

 than all it gives them object and special interest for completing the work. 

 The violet family is almost ideal for beginning this systematic work; 

 the flowers are attractive and easily found and are in all ways interesting; 

 moreover, most of them blossom before the school term ends in June. 

 Although the latest botanies list many species with quite minute dif- 

 ferences, yet there are certain well-marked forms that may be found in 

 any locality in New York State, 



To make this work of the greatest use and interest each pupil should 

 make a portfolio of the violets of a locality. This may be in the form 

 of pressed and mounted specimens or of water color drawings. In 

 either case the mounted specimens or drawings should show the leaf, 

 the leaf stem, the flower, the flower stem and the rootstock, and should 

 be neatly labeled with the name, the locality and the date. A portfolio 

 of drawings is, from the nature-study point of view more desirable, 

 since through drawing and coloring carefully the pupils become more 

 observant of the differences in structure and color which distinguish 

 the species, and thus they learn more than they are likely to do by 

 simply collecting and preserving the specimens. Such a portfolio may 

 be made a most beautiful object; the cover of thick drawing paper may 

 have an original design of conventionalized flowers and leaves of the 



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