News Notes 



CAl.IFORXIA 



The California Nature-Study League conducted by Mr. C. M. Goethe, has 

 sent out some very inspiring and helpful bulletins to the teachers of the state 

 in an effort to build up a Nature-Study Field Excursion. The Bulletin for 

 December was on Galls with directions how to collect and care for them until 

 the adult insects should issue. The Bulletin for January- was on Lichens. The 

 one for Februar%' was on a "Fair\- Ring," from which we quote the following: 



Last week, I found underneath some oak trees near Orangevale, a "Fairy 

 Ring." Its toadstools, growing from a center, exhaust the plant food as they 

 progress. Falling on barren ground, their spores star\'e. Those on the outer 

 edge, find food, live, reproduce in rings sometimes eight feet across. 



These rings were familiar to our ancestors in Europe. Their active imagina- 

 tions pictured them as the fairies' dancing places. Wonderful interference in 

 the human lives was supposed to be planned by these kindly little butterfly- 

 winged creatures as they met for dance and scheming in the light of the moon 

 in the fairj' ring. 



NOV.\ SCOTI.\ 



We like to think of the schools of Nova Scotia following out the directions for 

 Local Nature Observations sent out by the Superintendent of Education. 

 There is so much that is interesting and practical and well worth imitation in 

 them that only lack of space prevents us from printing them in full. As we 

 realize that throughout the foiir years of recent struggle the children of Nova 

 Scotia were being directed in the same pathway always looking for Nature's 

 wonders, tr^-ing to forget man's sufferings, we are filled with deep admiration. 



The Leaflet sent to teachers gives a list of 52 wild plants and shrubs and 13 

 cultivated ones with blank spaces to be filled in to make a record as to when 

 these plants are first seen and when the\- are becoming common. Dates for 

 plowing, sowing, planting of potatoes, shearing of sheep, harvesting of hay and 

 grain, and potato digging are also asked for, and also data as to the opening of 

 rivers, snow, frost and storms. Dates of the fall and spring migrations of 20 

 birds, the first piping of frogs and appearance of snakes are asked for. To fill 

 out this Leaflet adequately would supply any school with abundant experience 

 in Nature-Study. 



OHIO 



Toledo. The following accounts from The Toledo Museum of Art News show 

 how Nature-Study may be promoted in a most delightful fashion. 



.\ NEW DEPARTURE 



Mr. Morrison R. Van Cleve has been added to the staff of the Museum with 

 the title of Supervisor of Nature-Study. Toledo is rich in natural beauty, and 

 there are unUmited possibiUties for its enhancement, all of which comes within 

 the province of art. 



Mr. Van Cleve is an enthusiastic educator intensely interested in the develop- 

 ment of the child. He is instructor in elementar\- science at the Waite High 

 School, and for a number of years has been Director of the Summer Nature 

 School at Buck Hill Falls, Pa. This latter position he will relinquish to devote 

 his time to the children of Toledo. 



207 



