170 NATUEE STUDY. 



I 



constantly. We associate the evaporation of water with 

 the formation of rain and snow, and are apt to expect a 

 child to do the same. If he does he merely takes the 

 relation on faith, as we probably took it originally. Be- 

 tween the evaporation of water and the falling snow 

 there is a long series of intermediate steps : the process 

 arid conditions of evaporation ; condensation and the 

 formation of water-dust, mist, fog, cloud, and rain- 

 drops ; the process of freezing and crystallization, by 

 which frost and the snowflakes are formed ; perhaps 

 also the work of heat and gravitation, of the sun and 

 wind, in the formation of snow from evaporated water. 



At times, of course, the path is too steep, or the 

 climbing too difficult, for the children. Then the 

 teacher must carry them. However, children are much 

 better climbers, and need much less carrying, than the 

 average teacher assumes or supposes. If allowed and 

 encouraged to climb in their own way, they can do 

 wonders. 



The lack of sequence, of step by step progression, 

 is a serious fault most prevalent in class-room work, 

 particularly in nature study, in which, more than in 

 most other studies, the teacher is usually left to plan 

 her own work and determine her own order. In the 

 writer's experience with teachers, he has found it help- 

 ful, in overcoming this fault, to have the teachers, in 

 -planning and conducting their work, divide each lesson 

 into two or more distinctly marked steps, and to have 

 each step carefully reviewed and summarized by two or 

 more pupils before passing to the next step. A lesson 



