252 NATURE STUDY. 



So far as we emphasize in nature study the life side, 

 the forces and processes, the ideas must be expressed 

 mainly by language. The child cannot tell how a bud 

 develops, or how a stream wears away its banks, and car- 

 ries and deposits the sediment, by a drawing or model 

 or painting. He must tell it in words. On the other 

 hand, he cannot tell the form or structure of the bud, 

 the results of the work of the stream, its course or the 

 slope of its banks, so well in words as by a drawing or 

 model. 



Drawing and modelling are particularly helpful in 

 expressing what comes through the eyes. Language 

 expresses also intellectual and spiritual ideas other than 

 visual or physical or sensuous ideas. We have found 

 it wise in earlier years, when children are so dependent 

 on their senses, to emphasize that which appeals to and 

 impresses the senses, and to leave until later years that 

 which is not so immediately dependent on the senses 

 and requires greater intellectual power. Is it not, then, 

 wise and logical to emphasize in earlier education those 

 forms of expression, such as moulding and drawing, 

 which are adapted to express sense-perceptions, and to 

 emphasize more in later education that form of expres- 

 sion, language, which best expresses those ideas with 

 more intellectual, moral, and spiritual content ? 



Three varieties of language expression may be used in 

 our nature work. The children may describe what they 

 see, the horse-chestnut bud, for instance, impersonally 

 in the third person. " The horse-chestnut bud " has a 

 certain form and color and covering, with certain parts, 



