266 NATURE STUDY. 



gaining ideas by means of language ; and they serve as 

 models for the children, or ideals toward which they 

 may aim, in their individual written work. Hence such 

 reading-lessons should contain and emphasize the im- 

 portant ideas or facts, should show the best work of 

 the best members of the class, and should be models in 

 both content and form. 



Not infrequently such blackboard reading-lessons are 

 entirely the work of the teacher, and not gained from 

 the children. Then they lose much of their value, be- 

 cause they are not the expression of the ideas of the 

 pupils. On the other hand, the lessons may be gained 

 from the children, but the matter may be so poorly 

 selected and expressed, and so lacking in sequence, 

 that the lessons are anything but models in either con- 

 tent or form. 



.. Care must be taken that the children do not, in their 

 individual written work, merely copy or repeat what 

 they have had in their reading-lesson ; otherwise the 

 reading-lesson may be a detriment to the individual ex- 

 pressive work. The reading-lesson should, if possible, 

 come after the individual work, rather than precede 

 it. 



In the first grade the blackboard reading-lesson is the 

 first step in training the children in written expression. 



"Blackboard stories," based on what the children have 

 seen in their nature work, gained from the children by 

 careful questioning and written upon the blackboard 

 by the teacher, are very helpful even before the little 

 folks can read or write a word. They impress on the 



