io THE NATURE-STUDY IDEA 



Jackman began teaching biology in the Pittsburg 

 High School. During five years' connection with 

 that school he became strongly impressed with 

 the necessity of having a broad foundation laid in 

 the elementary grades for the study of science. 

 The pupils were ignorant of the simplest phenom- 

 ena that occurred about them. In the spring 

 of 1889 he planned a general course in nature- 

 study and presented it to the Superintendent and 

 the Principals of the ward schools in Pittsburg. 

 It was agreed that in the fall he should have the 

 privilege of meeting the teachers for the purpose 

 of starting this work in the primary and grammar 

 grades. Before the year closed, however, he 

 received an invitation from Colonel Parker to enter 

 the Cook County Normal School and take up the 

 work with him. He entered on the work in the 

 Cook County Normal School in the fall of 1889. 

 During this year (1889) he elaborated the plan 

 already begun, as above outlined. The features 

 which perhaps most distinguished this scheme of 

 nature-study were : ( i ) That it adopted the appar- 

 ently irregular plan of using all the material 

 which the " Rolling Year," season by season, 

 brought into the lives of the children; (2) that 

 it rejected the idea of close and specialized study 

 of inert or dead form and sought to place the 

 children in the fields and woods that they might 

 study all nature at work; and (3) that, instead of 

 looking upon nature-study as being supplementary 

 to reading, writing and other forms of expression, 

 nature-study in itself became a demand that these 



