2542 Journal of Applied Microscopy 



lessons are therefore inevitably the result, and pupil and teacher alike come 

 to detest the subject. 



Why, then, has not the teaching of physiology been consigned to the rubbish 

 heap with other educational ideas that have been found to be impracticable or 

 useless ? The answer to this question is perfectly simple. In every state of the 

 Union but two, statute laws threaten with more or less dire penalties school 

 authorities who do not devote a disproportionate amount of time to instruction 

 as to the effects of alcohol and narcotics. No other subject, so far as I know, is 

 thus dominated by legislative enactment. The result is that our high school 

 pupils, at least in New York, call their physiologies " the liquor books," and 

 while able to tell you a good deal about delirium tremens, are utterly ignorant of 

 the commonest processes involved in nutrition. 



How can we expect satisfactory results either from an educational or practi- 

 cal point of view, from the study of physiology when the method of approach is 

 wrong, when the subject is taught by untrained teachers, and when most physio- 

 logical instruction is avowedly an appendix to instruction on alcohol and narcotics ? 



So much for the past, and possibly for the present situation. Let us now 

 look at the possibilities which lie open before the well-trained and enthusiastic 

 teacher of physiology. At the outset it is important to emphasize the fact that 

 physiological processes can never begin to be understood, unless the pupil is 

 given some idea of at least the simpler principles of chemistry. He must become 

 more or less familiar with carbon, hydrogen, oxygen, and nitrogen ; he must 

 know how to test for carbon dioxid, for acids, and alkalis, and he must learn 

 something of the common processes of oxidation, neutralization, and evaporation. 

 Unless these lessons are taught early in the course and taught by experiment, 

 the boy will find his foundation weak when he attacks the more difficult processes 

 involved in digestion, respiration, and excretion. Most of these simple lessons 

 can be taught from common matches, a few chemicals, and pieces of glassware. 

 If a pupil once gets clearly in his mind the nature of elements, compounds, and 

 the process of oxidation, an immense amount of subsequent labor and disap- 

 pointment will be saved. 



Suppose now we take up the important subject of foods. The pupil should 

 first familiarize himself by laboratory experiments with the five or six nutrients 

 that are found most commonly in foods. For the starch tests a quart of iodine 

 solution can be made for a small sum, and this, put into small bottles, will supply 

 a large class. Most of the experiments in food analysis can be carried on suc- 

 cessfully at home, the only real difliiculty being that the pupil is likely to get so 

 interested in his experiments that he forgets to learn his other lessons. When 

 he has followed the simple directions given him, has tested ten to twenty foods, 

 and has been called upon to defend his results in the class room, a boy is not 

 likely to forget that cereals usually contain a large amount of starch, and that 

 this nutrient is absent in foods of animal origin. Instead of relying on text-book 

 authority, he has demonstrated beyond a doubt that potatoes and flour contain 

 a large quantity of starch, and that peas and beans commonly have less of this 

 nutrient. The conflicting results derived from the testing of spices furnish a 

 good text for a discussion of food adulterations. 



