250 SOCIETY OK NATURALISTS. 



not occiip}" the whole time of a four years' course subsequent 

 to the completion of the Grammar School course. There is, 

 therefore, ample time in the High School or Academy Course to 

 meet a moderate requirement in Natural Science for admission to 

 College. 



The facts which have come to the knowledge of the Committee, 

 and some of which are presented in this report, indicate clearly 

 that there exists, among all ranks of educators, a conviction con- 

 tinually widening and continually growing more active, that a 

 prominent place should be given to Natural Science in the 

 earlier portions of the educational course. We believe, however, 

 that there is danger that in many quarters this movement mav 

 fail of the good results which it should accomplish, by reason of 

 a misapprehension in regard to the true purpose and method of 

 scientific instruction. There is danger of getting, in many 

 schools, the form of science teaching without the substance, — 

 a memorizing of definitions and verbal statements of scientific 

 facts, without bringing the minds of the pupils into inspiring and 

 vitalizing contact with nature. However important the knowl- 

 edge of scientific facts may be as matter of information, it should 

 never be forgotten that the main benefit of scientific study lies in 

 the discipline of the powers of jJerception, imagination, com- 

 parison, and reasoning, by the practice of observation and experi- 

 ment upon natural objects, and by judiciously guided reflection 

 upon the phenomena which are brought before the student's atten- 

 tion. Especially pernicious will it be, if the learning of verbal 

 propositions is allowed to take the place of those object lessons 

 in Science which should form the main part of the scientific in- 

 struction in the Primary Schools. In the lower grades of the 

 schools, systematized bodies of fact and doctrine are altogether 

 out of place. While the scientific instruction in the High 

 Schools and Academies may be and should be more systematic 

 than in the lower schools, it should be continually remembered 

 that the discipline gained by actual contact with nature in obser- 

 vation and experiment is worth far more than anv amount of 

 second-hand information. 



The greatest difficulty in the way of securing tlie right kind of 

 instruction arises, of coinse, from the lack of properly trained 

 teachers. It is, however, a profoundly gratifying fact that this 



