VOADEN] NA T URE-ST UDY AND THE TEA CHER 213 



Other logs were hollowed out according to the plans of Baron von 

 Berlepsch. Many flickers occupied them this spring. The total 

 number of bird boxes (368) made are arranged as follows: 



Nuthatch 75 Robin 40 Red-headed Woodpecker . . 30 



Chickadee 80 Wren 50 Flicker . 15 



Bluebird 40 Phoebe 30 Owl 8 



It is to be hoped that the present movement for nature-study 

 will not slacken, and that another year more birds will take advan- 

 tage of the feeding stations, and that all of the bird boxes will be 

 occupied. 



Nature-Study and the Teacher, or the Point of 

 View in Nature-Study 



John Voaden 



This brief outline is undertaken with the desire to assist younger 

 teachers, with little or no experience, to begin and continue the 

 work along proper lines and in accordance with the interests and 

 activities of the children in our public schools. It may also help 

 some of our more experienced teachers, who are still, in the name of 

 Nature-Study, teaching high school science to the children in a 

 very dry, bookish way that is distasteful to them. Only recently I 

 learned about a teacher who was teaching (?) agriculture by 

 assigning lessons in a text book and just hearing them recited. 

 The children did not like it. vSimply giving information and 

 learning facts or any method other than that which will lead the 

 children to enjoy the work in Nature-Study and Agriculture is 

 most detrimental to the aim in view and must not be continued. 

 So much is being said and done now in regard to arousing greater 

 interest in agriculture and making the farm and country life appeal 

 to the young people that it is most important for our rural teachers 

 to assist this effort by using better methods in the school room and 

 taking greater interest in what is going on in Nature outside. 



I. The first principle: Take advantage of the child's natural 

 desire to wander abroad. He is more or less an aimless wanderer. 

 He sees a host of things but for the most part in a very vague and 

 indefinite way. He loses much time and many chances to secure 

 at first hand a knowledge of the facts before him. Therefore, guide 

 him more definitely, take an interest, ask him questions, let him 



