44 THE NATURE-STUDY IDEA 



schools was the desire to know the names of the 

 parts of plants. It came with the excellent text- 

 books of Asa Gray and others, in which the 

 results of studies in morphology and physiology 

 and histology were codified and defined. These 

 books were nearly as rigid in their systems and 

 methods as text-books of physics ; and the pupil 

 recited mostly from the book, with perhaps some 

 accessory observation on plants. 



The third epoch is that of training for inde- 

 pendent investigation. In very recent times, and 

 chiefly since the death of Gray nearly two decades 

 ago, the German laboratory methods have been 

 widely copied in America by the many young and 

 brilliant botanists who have studied abroad. As a 

 result there are many high schools which are 

 equipped with microscopes and apparatus that 

 would have done credit to a college or university 

 twenty-five years ago. The laboratory method is 

 a distinct advance on the preceding methods of 

 teaching in the fact that the pupil actually studies 

 plants ; but its motive and point of view are 

 distinctly wrong for the elementary school from 

 the fact that it attempts primarily to teach botany 

 rather than to educate the pupil. The field of 

 view is also very narrow, and the pupil's mind is 

 likely to be closed to nature and restricted in its 

 range. The stage of the microscope and the tables 

 of the laboratory are poor and narrow ranges for 

 the young mind when there are fields and gardens 

 adjacent. The German laboratory method is no 

 doubt ideal for the teaching of botany to investi- 



