INTRODUCTION 



Educational methods have changed. Fifty years ago 

 the education of children was on the theory that they were 

 all naturally bad, while to-day it has dawned upon teachers 

 and also the public that there are both good and bad ten- 

 dencies in every child, and that education should not at- 

 tempt to make children over according to rule. They should 

 be led to love and cherish and cultivate the best tendencies, 

 while the undesirable ones will fade from neglect and lack 

 of encouragement. Mother Nature teaches many a lesson 

 not to be learned in school. True education should pro- 

 mote a happy development along the natural tendencies 

 rather than provide punishments for not bending to arbi- 

 trary rules to be obeyed. To be sure, discipline is needed, 

 but it should be along natural lines of development, rather 

 than by the too arbitrary "Thou shalt, and thou shalt 

 not." A child should fully realize that greatly upon his own 

 actions and character depend his own happiness or punish- 

 ment, thus fewer laws and rules would be necessary. Mod- 

 ern educational methods rely more upon a fundamental 

 love of nature and of our fellow-travellers through life than 

 upon force, punishment, and the ability to lean? certain 

 generally accepted forms of words and phrases. 



All teachers who are such from love of their work have 



