GRADED COURSES OF STUDY. 21 



matter available, selects such topics, and uses them in such 

 manner as will produce the desired effect upon the child. 

 His eye is on the child rather than on the circle of sciences. 

 His aim is not to make the mind fat with knowledge but to 

 make it, and the body too, strong and efficient for usefulness 

 and enjoyment. 



Graded Courses of Study. — Graded courses of Nature 



Study are now adopted in many of the Provinces and States. 

 Framers of the two Courses printed in this book have had the 

 benefit of the experience of several predecessors. Some courses 

 go further than those of Ontario and Manitoba, inasmuch as 

 they indicate not only the work advised in each grade, but 

 also in each month of the year. Teachers who think that such 

 courses w^ould help them will find one in Crawford's " Guide 

 to Nature Study," pp. 164-179. It is constructed in five 

 vertical columns, one for each reading class, and subdivided 

 for autumn, winter and spring study. The topics are arranged 

 in seven series : plants, animals, earth, natural phenomena, 

 celestial bodies, the child himself, and farm and street pro- 

 cesses. In C. B. Scott's "Nature Study and the Child" is 

 given a detailed course which has been used in some American 

 cities. It is tabulated horizontally for each of the ten school 

 months, and vertically into columns headed : — plant study, 

 animal study, earth study, physics, sky and weather study, — 

 for each of eight years. E. G. Howe's " Systematic Science 

 Teaching" opens with a chart of twelve pages tabulating 

 nature work and its relations in a series of steps covering 

 the first nine years of school life. 



The teacher who tries to follow any of these Courses in- 

 flexibly, even the best one, will take the life out of the subject. 

 They are each and all useful for suggestion, but as has been 

 said before, the interest of the pupils, the circumstances of the 

 school, and the availability of material should determine the 

 choice. 



