PREFACE 



IN most matters of importance there are various ways of attacking the 

 main problems that come up for solution. The subject of education forms 

 no exception to the rule, and different experts and, it may be added, 

 faddists also have strenuously advocated mutually exclusive methods 

 as alone capable of leading to satisfactory results. The numerous ex- 

 ponents cannot all be right, and perhaps none of them are altogether wrong 

 in their ideas. Even those who only aspire to fill the pupil with certain 

 definite information, to be used for examination or other purposes, are 

 able to urge that at anyrate they escape the charge of indefiniteness of 

 aim which too often lies at the door of those who cry for education rather 

 than instruction. 



The ideal course is that which would succeed in combining both results, 

 and whilst enlarging the intellectual horizon at the same time manages to 

 assure the solid asset of useful knowledge. 



But during the earlier years of life a boy or girl easily picks up and 

 assimilates information, witness the tenacity with which the knowledge 

 acquired in youth is retained in after life. The matter of vital importance 

 during this period is so to impart instruction that the appetite for learning 

 which is the natural heritage of almost every child shall not be blunted 

 by satiety or destroyed by improper forcing. This lamentable result may 

 be as easily achieved by cramming with peptonised doses of information, 

 so that the power of independent assimilation becomes atrophied, as by 

 the old-fashioned application of over-strenuous mental discipline, which 

 creates a distaste for all forms of intellectual exercise. 



Amongst the studies that deserve to take a high rank in the educational 

 subjects, that of Nature Study ought to occupy a high place, especially in 

 the case of young people. It is concerned with all the phenomena of the 

 world around us, and its problems are those which confront us everywhere 

 in our daily life. But regarded from the educational standpoint, its value 

 largely depends on the use that is made of it by the teacher. A principal 

 object which should never be lost sight of is the stimulation of the power of 

 independent inquiry and observation on the part of the children themselves. 

 It is of little or no use for the teacher to attempt to teach it. The objects 

 themselves should be the teachers, and the business of the schoolmaster or 

 mistress really lies in explaining to the pupils the rules of the game. Nature 

 only speaks to those who know how to listen and how to question, but 



