SUGGESTIONS TO THE TEACHER. 303 



course I would require that all the work outlined in the text be done 

 by the student, and that the greater part of it be done by each student 

 for every animal studied. Just how much dissecting and how much 

 field work, etc., should be required, will have to be determined in 

 accordance with the abilities and needs of individual classes. Some 

 of the larger dissections may be made as demonstrations by the 

 teacher or assistants ; but I consider it absolutely necessary that each 

 student should study the structure of every type, and record his 

 observations in some permanent form, notes, drawings, or preparations 

 of illustrative material. While freely acknowledging the great value 

 of original drawings, however crude, I think it should be borne in 

 mind that the student who has no aptitude for this art may find 

 continual drawing as irksome as it is unsatisfactory to him. I have 

 found students, wholly incapable of making a presentable drawing, 

 able to make beautiful preparations of material for demonstrations 

 and for collections. The true ends of scientific instruction will not 

 be promoted by keeping any student long at work which he cannot 

 make pleasant or satisfactory. 



The field work suggested in this book forms an important feature 

 of it, yet not so important, I am persuaded, as it should be made. 

 I would require of the students, that, in so far as is possible, they 

 collect all their own material for study. The observations made 

 while doing this will not be among the least valuable things learned 

 about animals in the course. And I would not discourage the collection 

 of cabinet specimens. This has its place. There is one benefit to be 

 had from a thorough study of types, and there is another benefit to 

 be had from personal contact with nature in a great variety of forms. 

 I would go out with the students often, and direct their observations 

 in the field. Making use of the haunts of animals most accessible 

 for study, I would assign simple tasks of outdoor observation, requir- 

 ing little time, and I would not limit these to observations on the 

 types studied in the course. Many a teacher neglects abundant oppor- 

 tunity for doing this. Material for such study is at the very doors of 

 a majority of the schools in which elementary zoology is taught. Our 

 higher institutions of learning, located often in the heart of great 

 cities, by establishing seaside and lakeside laboratories, get, at a great 

 expenditure of time and money, that which the secondary schools 

 may have if they choose, without expense, as a part of their daily life. 

 And who shall say that the study of animals in their relation to nature 

 is of more worth in one school or in the other ? 



I urge as most important, that the teacher maintain strictest super- 

 vision of all work, that there may be no idling in the field, no smat- 



