Part I.] REPORT OF STATE ORNITHOLOGIST. 113 



includes bird study, but the Commonwealth has done little, if 

 anything, toward the actual establishment of bird study in rural 

 public schools.^ Such instruction as is given there is voluntary 

 and sporadic on the part of teachers or philanthropic associa- 

 tions, and has no place in the school curriculum. The Com- 

 monwealth should do something annually to stimulate interest 

 in bird life in the schools. 



. Bird Talks in the Schools. 



The impossibility of supplying from this office the school 

 demand fcjr lectures on birds is shown by the experience of 

 Henry Oldys of Silver Springs, Maryland. In March, 1915, he 

 was engaged by the Massachusetts Audubon Society and the 

 National Association of Audubon Societies to give free lectures 

 in Massachusetts on the utility of birds, with imitations of bird 

 songs. He took more than 100 engagements in a month and 

 filled 90 of them. Most of his audiences consisted of school 

 children or contained them. 



Provision should be made for the employment by the Com- 

 monwealth of a first-class speaker, approved by the State Board 

 of Education, to tour the public schools of the State annually 

 and give talks to at least one grade in each town regarding the 

 usefulness of birds and the means of protecting and attracting 

 them. Nothing will so arouse the interest of children in school 

 hours as good colored plates properly explained and correct 

 imitations of the songs of birds. This will lead many of them 

 to an interest in the living birds. The speaker would require 

 but one hour from each pupil in one grade, or perhaps . two 

 grades, during each school year, and in that one hour a trained 

 man could put a few facts so forcibly and clearly before the 

 children that many would never entirely forget them. 



Bird Day in the Schools. 

 Every public school teacher and pupil in this enlightened 

 Commonwealth should be required by law to give up one school 

 day in each year to the study of birds. We have already an 



1 Bulletin of the Massachusetts State Board of Education No. 8 contains a suggested course of 

 Btudy in practical science designed for certain rural schools. It was arranged by teachers in State 

 normal schools, and contains suggestions regarding bird study, helping the birds and the value of 

 birds. 



