52 THE REPORT OF THE No. 19 



INSECTS AS NATURE STUDIES. 

 By S. B. McCready, Professor of Nature Study, Macdonald Institute, 



GUELPH. 



My interest in this topic is not that of an entomologist, but that of the 

 schoolmaster. To the student of insect life nothing, perhaps, is more natural 

 as nature studies, than insects; nothing perhaps is more likely to awaken 

 readier interest and develop powers of careful observation; nothing in animal 

 life has much, if any, greater concern with our lives. But while our teachers 

 are quite ready to acknowledge that the study of insects may profitably be 

 admitted to a place amongst the multitude of school studies, they are, as a 

 class, quite at a loss to know how to commence the study of them. They feel 

 afraid, or helpless, or rebellious, or indifferent. They feel that they have been 

 imposed upon; they have been trained and accepted into a work which is 

 suddenly changed; sometimes it is hinted that their inability to handle the 

 work is through fault of theirs to readily adjust themselves to new conditions; 

 i-n fact through insects and the other "what-nots" of nature studies, the con- 

 scientious teacher's burden has become considerably heavier in these later 

 days. 



Here are the insect studies prescribed for Manitoba schools, e.g. : 

 Grade I. Butterflies and moths. Reference to color, beauty, movements, etc. ; 

 study of simple life-history of butterfly or moth; preparation for 

 winter by insects. 

 Grade II. Observation of habits of the ant, bee, wasp, and grasshopper. 

 Grade lY. The House moth. The eggs, the larva, the cocoon and pupa, the 

 imago, the egg; or the study of a wasp in nest making, feeding 

 young, guarding young, and in winter season. 

 Grade V. Ijisect life in relation to the shade trees; aphis, caterpillar and 

 leaf gall of maple suggested ; rearing mosquitoes and butterflies from 

 eggs in order to obtain life histories ; recognition of lady-bird beetle 

 with a view to protecting^ it. Finding the larvae on trees infested by 

 aphids; observation of insect life in an old log, a rotten stump, a 

 sand hill ; incidental observation of insect life. 

 Grade VI. Interdependence of insects and flowers; special study of grass- 

 hoppers; finding the eggs, obsf^rving young hoppers, and growth of 

 their wings; the most favorable weather, food how eaten, behaviour 

 in wet and windy weather, etc. 

 Grade YII. Cockroach and field insects. Simple classification of insects ac- 

 cording to character of wing. 

 Grade VIII. Insects of field, Bee. 



This is the outline of insect work for the Manitoba teacher in the Public 

 Schools, and is like that for Ontario schools, except that it is more specific — 

 the Ontario outline is expressed in general terms e.g., in Form IV. the work 

 is life histories of conspicuous and economic insects; organs and functions. 



With most teachers, even those who have had advantages of University 

 training, there has never been an awakening of interest in insect life — life 

 histories, moths and butterflies, aphids, beetles, larvae, galls, caterpillars, 

 «ocoon, pupa, impgo, egg — such terms mean very little, if anything. They 

 are cut off from helping themselves as they may do in other subjects; the 

 work demands actual personal obpervation if it is to be rightly presented; 

 ithey cannot read ahead of their classes as in history, geography, and arith- 

 metic and make proper presentation of the siibject; it isn't in books, m fact 

 it needs quite another kind of adjustment, a humiliation, a really putting of 



