286 ILLINOIS STATE ACADEMY OF SCIENCE 



text book? Simply because the company's literature satis- 

 fies us, and explains in a practical, instructional way the 

 workings of the battery and other parts, and touches 

 closely and appealingly to the project we have." "We must 

 remember," he adds, "that students are immature men and 

 women and do not enjoy studying dry, unrelated facts, 

 principles, theories and fundamentals any more than we 

 would." 



Why not bring small samples of real life and real work- 

 able problems to the school and college more than we do, 

 and give them as projects — those which will appeal to and 

 grip the student? This will not only interest them and 

 show the worthiness of physics, but it will develop their 

 thinking power. Dewey says that "there is no thinking 

 without a problem. When judgment is challenged to face 

 a dilemma it makes a fork in the road and thinking begins 

 here." 



I grant you that there are difficulties in the way of 

 teaching by the project method, such as large classes, lack 

 of suitable projects, the time factor in the teacher's and 

 student's busy life, lack of trained teachers, lack of equip- 

 ment and supplies, etc. Yet many science teachers in high 

 school, normal school and college are doing work of this 

 kind, and our plea now is for many more teachers to tackle 

 the problem and thus give students worthwhile opportuni- 

 ties of studying science in practical ways. 



Since time for this paper is so limited, I will confine my- 

 self to one phase of work in physics, namely, some prac- 

 tical projects in electricity. A few years ago while teach- 

 ing a small class of high school boys we took up some pro- 

 jects in electric wiring. Several small, roughly boarded 

 rooms in the manual training department served our pur- 

 pose. Only three sides and ceiling were boarded, leaving 

 the front of each room open. In these rooms the students 

 worked out in detail a number of projects in electric wiring 

 of homes, such as door bells, call bells and lighting. The 

 interest was keen, thinking was stimulated, and the re- 

 sults educationally were good, even though not all of the 



