196 Third Conference 



alone, but put into the school library two or three 

 of those classic books like White's Selborne, which 

 was written by a man who saw things with his own 

 eyes, and who can help other people to see them 

 in their turn. Don't let us devour a series of half- 

 facts about the country, and suppose that we can in 

 any way approach Nature by a travesty of that 

 description. Above all, I should like to insist upon 

 the teacher, in all this Nature- study work, taking 

 up a very small piece of work and doing it very 

 thoroughly indeed. I do not care to see anyone trying 

 to teach in one session, or in one year even, the whole 

 development of a plant. You will find quite enough 

 to occupy you if you take a seed or leaf and find out 

 all you can about that. Don't be ambitious in the 

 sense of covering too much ground, but do be am- 

 bitious to pass over no questions which the child 

 may put to the teacher, and which the teacher 

 may put to himself. Try and exhaust the subject, 

 at any rate as far as it goes. In that way, by 

 taking a small portion of the subject, and by not 

 being afraid that there won't be much to put 

 down in the schedule to show the inspector; by 

 doing that courageously — and I think the inspectors 

 will help — you get the opportunity and time really 

 to do experiments. And Professor Armstrong has 

 told us what an experiment means — it does not 

 mean the demonstration of some well-known fact; — it 

 means just trying to work out things for ourselves, 

 asking questions and letting the thing itself answer 

 them. Many of these experiments which deal with 

 living creatures take time; they take, perhaps, weeks 

 before the answer develops itself As practical 



