THE 



NATURE-STUDY REVIEW 



DEVOTED TO ALL PHASES OF NATURE-STUDY IN 

 ELEMENTARY SCHOOLS 



Vol. I JANUARY, 1905 No. i 



INTRODUCTION 



In introducing this, the first number of The Nature-Study 

 Review, it seems necessary to define the Hmits of the field which 

 the journal will attempt to cover, because the term nature-study 

 in the descriptive part of the title may be so variously understood 

 at the present time. The different interpretations of nature-study 

 for schools will be presented and discussed in this and later num- 

 bers of the journal ; but here it may be said, without defense, that 

 the aims and plans of the editorial committee are based upon an 

 interpretation of nature-study in its literal and widest sense as 

 including all phases, physical as well as biological, of studies of 

 natural objects and processes in elementary schools. It is evident 

 that from this general point of view nature-study includes all the 

 " natural-science " studies of the lower school : the natural his- 

 tory of plants and animals (nature-study in its common and most 

 limited sense), school-gardening and the closely allied elementarv 

 agriculture, elementary physical science, the physical side of geog- 

 raphy, and physiology and hygiene with special reference to the 

 human body. With all these phases of nature-study, and espe- 

 cially with their relations to each other in elementary-school edu- 

 cation considered as a whole, The Review will deal. 



Nature-study interpreted in such a wide sense must obviously 

 draw its materials from the fields of the several sciences, and the 

 working out of the problems must be through the united efforts of 

 experts in the fields of biology, geography, physics and chemistry, 

 agriculture, and education. Recognizing this need of cooperation 

 from several points of view, it was decided as part of the initial 

 plan for this journal that the editorial committee and the board 



