OUT-DOOR SCIENCE. 



FREDERICK A. VOGT, 

 Principal Central High School, Buffalo. 



THE first step to take in teaching 

 science to young people and in 

 popularizing the study among 

 older people is to throw away 

 much of the traditional polysyllabic 

 phraseology and use a little common 

 sense and good old Anglo-Saxon now 

 and then — to teach nature, instead of 

 science. 



There is not only great danger in 

 being too technical, but in telling too 

 much. We all like to talk on our pet 

 subjects. We rattle along, airing our 

 opinions and pouring out big volumes 

 of knowledge, and expect the poor 

 pupils, like great dry sponges, to ab- 

 sorb the gracious gift. But they don't 

 absorb; it isn't their business; they be- 

 long to quite another sub-kingdom; 

 and while we are just about to congrat- 

 ulate ourselves on our facility of ex- 

 pression and wise beneficence, we are 

 rudely made aware that our eloquence 

 was all lost; and, worse still, we have 

 been guilty of repression, of stifling 

 natural curiosity, and crushing what 

 might become a priceless, inquiring, 

 intellectual habit. 



Is it any wonder that so few ever go 

 on with this geology, mineralogy, bot- 

 any, or zoology, after they leave school ? 

 What is our object as teachers? Is it 

 to cram geology and botany down pas- 

 sive throats in one or two school terms, 

 or is it to lead our students so gently 

 and awaken so keen a desire that they 

 shall study these sciences all their lives, 

 to be a never-ending joy, a pure plea- 

 sure and a solace amid coming cares 

 and darkening days? Oh, I, too, have 

 been guilty, and may heaven forgive 

 my exceeding foolishness! The re- 

 mainder of my days are being spent in 

 penance, in propitiating the office of 

 the recording angel by a more humble 

 and righteous way of life. 



So much for the language of the 

 teacher, and now for the means of giv- 

 ing reality to his teaching efforts This 

 can only be done by the laboratory 

 method or investigation in the field. 

 With the latter, out-door work only 

 does this paper especially treat. 



ACTUAL CONTACT WITH NATURE. 



While I do not for a moment decry 

 the use of books, either for collateral 

 reading or for text-books — in fact, I 

 plead for a wider reading and pro- 

 founder study of the best scientific 

 writers — still, I feel just as you must 

 feel, that there is something radically 

 wrong in much of our science teach- 

 ing, and that we have come to regard 

 books as more real than the earth, 

 the sky the rocks, the plants, and the 

 animals, which are all about us. 



Just why this is so, I am unable to 

 understand. Nature is so lavish! On 

 all sides, easy of access, are the phen- 

 omena and the realities, while the 

 school-room is artificial, and the teacher, 

 alas, in perfect keeping with the school- 

 room. 



Can it be that pupils are averse to 

 actual contact with nature? Not at all. 

 From the earliest childhood throughout 

 life there is in most persons a remark- 

 able turn toward curious investigation, 

 and thorough understanding of the 

 things of nature. That I know from 

 my own experience while teaching in 

 the grammar schools. 



One day I asked the pupils to bring 

 me in any specimens of stones they 

 might find in the vacant lots and the 

 fields; and then I promised to give 

 them a talk about these stones, I ex- 

 pected perhaps twenty or thirty speci- 

 mens. What was my amazement and 

 secret horror when, the next day and 

 the next came dozens and dozens of 

 specimens until, in a few days, I had 

 over a ton and a half, containing 

 3,000 specimens. There were granites, 

 gneisses and schists and quartzes; there 

 were sandstones, slates, shales, lime- 

 stones, glacial scratchings, marbles and 

 onyx; there were geodes, crystals, ores, 

 stone hammers, arrow-heads, brickbats, 

 furnace slag, and fossils. I took every- 

 thing smilingly, and at night the janitor 

 and I buried many duplicates and the 

 useless stuff in a deep hole where they 

 wouldn't be likely to get hold of it 

 again. 



We soon possessed an excellent cabi- 



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