SCHOOL DEPARTMENT 



Edited by ALICE HALL WALTER 



Address all communications relative to the work of this depart- 

 ment to the editor, at S3 Arlington Avenue, Providence, R. I. 



THE VALUE OF CO-OPERATION, continued 



During the last season, an entertainment of unique interest was presented 

 to the American public, which it would have profited every child of school 

 age, as well as every adult, to see. This was the remarkable series of moving 

 pictures made by Mr. Ponting on the Antarctic expedition of the late Captain 

 Scott, which is described and illustrated in a recent issue of the Scientific 

 American (June 21, 19 13). 



Only those who took advantage of the opportunity to gain a clearer and 

 more vivid conception of the conditions of polar exploration, and in particular, 

 of the natural history of the Antarctic region, by seeing these pictures and lis- 

 tening to the brief but instructive lecture which accompanied them, can realize 

 how much such an entertainment might be made to accomplish in the way 

 of stimulating interest in geography and bird- and nature-study, if it were 

 brought directly to the attention of scholars and teachers. 



To enumerate only a few striking subjects which Mr. Ponting's pictures so 

 graphically represent, volcanoes, glaciers, seals, penguins, skua-gulls, killer- 

 whales, sledges and sledge-dogs, camping-outfits, and operations, taking 

 samples and testing the temperature of sea-water at different depths, may 

 be cited. 



Hitherto unobserved habits of the Weddell seal, such as its method of 

 gnawing a path through the ice, were recorded by the photographer, while the 

 actual hatching of a skua-gull's egg is undoubtedly the first attempt to show on 

 the screen this obscure process of nature (see The Auk, Vol. XXX, No. 2, 

 p. 290, Craig's Studies of Bird Behavior). 



The penguin films alone make up a set of pictures of rare attractiveness, 

 while, throughout the entire series, the conscientious effort to reproduce those 

 scenes and activities which would best convey a truthful idea of nature in the 

 vicinity of the South Pole, and the methods and difficulties of polar exploration, 

 can be followed and appreciated. 



It is probably true that a relatively small number of school-children saw 

 these pictures, and it is also equally true that, if our Audubon Societies had 

 taken sufficient interest to introduce and vouch for the educational value of 

 this entertainment, many hundreds of children and adults might have been 

 reached, who never even heard of it. 



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