by nervously throwing it aside. A long and persistent training is 

 given these little folks who are afraid of the animals or who do not 

 know how to handle them. Gradually all the children can be 

 taught, and their pride is developed till they are able to announce 

 that the whole class can be trusted. 



Method of Introducing Work Into Schools 



This work should be introduced in the school in the following way: 

 First the animals should be taken to the children as visitors. After 

 they have learned to handle the pets and to care for them, the 

 children should be encouraged to build homes and to bring pennies 

 for food and to get ready for families they want to raise. If they 

 have the means, they should buy their own animals. This develops 

 in the children a sense of ownership which brings with it a feeling of 

 responsibility for the proper care and protection of their animal 

 friends. 



The work should be varied according to the needs of each school 

 group, for the interests, superstitions and fears differ greatly with 

 the different nationalities and with the varying opportunities of 

 different children for knowing animal life. 



The same animal can be used throughout all the grades. The 

 little folks show joy and interest in observing and hugging the pets. 

 As children grow older they ask questions about the habits, habitat, 

 enemies and economic uses of the animals. Gradually, beside all 

 these other interests in the animals, their place in the animal world 

 and their values to man become of absorbing interest. Throughout 

 the entire work sketches are made, stories told, poems learned and 

 games, which have been developed by the children to represent 

 scenes in the lives of the animals, are played. 



The children should have a chance to select the pets whenever 

 possible, or should appoint a committee to buy them. It seems 

 almost an inborn trait in the children that they select the parents 

 which are mature and in a healthy condition. They reject with 

 scorn any animal which does not look well. Parents which have 

 different genetic traits should always be selected. For instance, a 

 white (albino) doe mouse and black or lilac buck; in guinea pigs, a 

 short-haired English male with an Abyssinian female. Where there 

 is an opportunity for raising chickens, an interesting cross is that 

 between a bantam rooster and a Plymouth Rock hen. The children 

 notice the traits of the parents cropping out in the second and third 

 generation and soon announce with intense interest that it makes a 

 difference what kind of parents the babies have. 

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