October io, 1901] 



NA TURE 



59f 



of the Phlegt.-ean Fields, drawn up by Mr. Gtinlher, was pre- 

 sented. Mr. Giinther's work being still in progress, the report 

 w IS of a preliminary nature, but it is satisfactory to note that 

 the materials for the investigation have proved more valuable and 

 abundant than was anticipated. 



On Tuesday morning Mr. \V. N. Shaw, F. R.S., exhibited a 

 complete series of the weather maps published daily by various 

 countries. Most of these bore the date January i, 1901 ; others 

 June I, 1901. The list is interesting as showing the position of 

 this branch of meteorology at the beginning of the twentieth 

 century : — Austria, Bavaria, Belgium, British Isles, Denmark, 

 France, Germany, Holland, Italy, Portugal, Russia, Sax'>ny, 

 Spain, Switzerland, Algeria, Australasia, Canada, India, Bay of 

 Bengal, Japan, Mexico, United States, Roumania. 



The rest of the morning was devoted to papers on the 

 Antarctic expeditions. Dr. J. Scott Keltie described the 

 organisation and equipment of the National Antarctic Expedi- 

 tion, and Dr. H. R. Mill gave an account of the voyage of the 

 Discovery as far as Madeira, to which point he accompanied 

 the vessel for the purpose of working out the details of the 

 meteorological and oceanographical routine. Mr. W. S. Bruce 

 then read a paper nn the methods and plans of the Scottish 

 National Antarctic Expedition, in which he announced that 

 sufficient funds had been subscribed, entirely by Scotsmen, for 

 one complete year's work in the Antarctic. It is proposed to 

 purchase a whaler of about five hundred tons, and to leave this 

 country in about a year's time. The ship will carry a scientific 

 staff of five, five officers, and a crew of twenty. An attempt 

 will be made to push as far south as possible in the Weddell 

 Sea, and the deep reported by Ros; in lat. 68° S., long. 13° VV. , 

 will be specially investigated. The expedition will confine 

 itself almost entirely to marine work, and it is not intended to 

 winter in the ice. 



In the afternoon Jlr. H. Vule Oldham read a paper on the 

 experimental demonstration of the curvature of the earth's 

 surface. Mr. Vule Oldham has repeated Wallace's Bedford 

 level experiment on the old Bedford River between Welney 

 Bridge and Denver Bridge, a perfectly straight stretch of six 

 miles. A mark was set up midway between the bridges, at the 

 same height above water level as marks on the two bridges, and 

 found to stand six feet above the line of sight. Records of the 

 experiment have been obtained by the use of a special tele- 

 photographic lens. 



Dr. R. Logan Jack then gave an account of an expedition in 

 Western China, in which the Chenglu Plain was crossed five 

 times, and a good deal of mapping done of the margins of the 

 plain, and the courses of the rivers reaching it from the north. 

 At the Maha gold mines the party received information of the 

 massacres at Pekin, and were advised to make for Burma. 

 Bhamo, in Upper Burma, was reached after many difficulties. 



A paper, by Mr. Archibald Little, on the Ctux of the Upper 

 Yang-tse, was read by Mrs. Little. The paper contained an 

 extremely graphic account of an ascent of the river during the 

 flood season, and the condition of the country and of river 

 navigation was compared with that obtaining during the 

 winter. 



The last paper was by M. Galeron, designer of the great 

 celestial globe at the Paris Exhibition, on the representation of 

 the heavens in the teaching of cosmography. After pointing 

 out the difliculty experienced by the student in realising the 

 apparent positions and motions of the heavenly bodies from a 

 study of the ordinary celestial globe, in which the celestial 

 sphere was represented as seen from the " outside," M. Galeron 

 exhibited and described an apparatus in which a celestial globe 

 is made of thin muslin, and sufficiently large for the head of the 

 observer to be placed at the centre. The apparatus, which can 

 be constructed very simply and cheaply, enables the chief 

 phenomena to be demonstrated with great clearness. 



It is noteworthy that the Artisan's Lecture this year, although 

 geographical, was not an account of travel and exploration, but 

 an exposition of the application of geographical principles. In 

 his lecture on " The Movements of Slen by Land and Sea," 

 Mr. Mackinder showed how the progress of civilisation has been 

 affected by the configuration of the Earth's surface, and pointed 

 out the profound changes going on in political and social life 

 under our eyes, as the result of the development of the great 

 ocean lines of communication and of the transcontinental rail- 

 ways. The lecture was a perfect illustration of the aims and 

 methods of the " new geography," and should do much to make 

 those better understood and appreciated. 



EDUCATIONAL SCIENCE AT THE BRITISH 



ASSOCIATION. 

 'T'HOUGH the new Section of the British .Association was 

 only appointed for a year, the success of the tneetings.at 

 Glasgow was of so decided a character that the Section will 

 probably become a permanent part of the Association. It can 

 scarcely be said at present that an educational science exists, 

 but the statement of methods and results, and the discussion of 

 the relationships between principles and practice, apart from all 

 political considerations, should do something to organise the 

 conclusions of people who have given serious attention to 

 educational problems. The .Section will exert the greatest 

 influence in connection with scientific studies ; and there is no 

 reason why it should not lead to improvements in methods of 

 teaching as valuable as tho.se which have been produced by the 

 .scheme for a course of work in chemistry, drawn up by Dr. 

 H. E. Armstrong for the British Association Committee on the 

 methods of teaching chemistry. It is not too much to say that 

 this scheme started a revolution which gathers strength every 

 day. The system of science instruction by didactic methods 

 still exists in places, but only because the machinery for carrying 

 on the work on more rational principles has not been obtained. 

 Wherever the object is education, the methods of research have 

 been introduced, and it is recognised that real scientific know- 

 ledge can only be gained by individual experience. 



Educational Kxpcriment and Research. 

 Sir John Gorst accepted the principle of research in education 

 in his address as president of the Section, and Dr. Armstrong 

 emphasised it in an early paper. The power of research, the 

 art of acquiring information for oneself, must, he pointed out, 

 be cultivated in all because it is the power on which advance in 

 life depends. The chief work of the Section will be to teach 

 this doctrine, and impress it upon the teachers. A science of 

 education must be shaped, and a national programme must be 

 constructed in which research methods are encouraged and 

 teachers are trained to have sympathy with them. The human- 

 ists must enter into an alliance with the naturalists, and the 

 union should take place on equal terms. At present our educa- 

 tional system is entirely one-sided. The schools still at best 

 suffer science ; they do not love it and the old universities do 

 not even regard it as a necessary element of culture. 



Reform will be brought about by the development of work- 

 shop and laboratory methods. The experimental method of 

 teaching is adapted to the curiosity and activity of the average 

 boy, and should be the basis of instruction at the earliest stages. 

 Prof L. C. Miall gave strong support to the experimental 

 method, which he described as the most complete embodiment 

 of the methodised art of trying, of ignoring failures and im- 

 proving successes, and perpetually going on until the goal was 

 reached. This is the habit it is desired to set up and which will 

 take an important place in future educational work. Sir Michael 

 Foster emphasised the view that science is not learnt in the 

 lecture room, but in the laboratory. The first aim should be to 

 teach a boy to think, and this can be done by practical work 

 properly arranged. It has been stated over and over again 

 that pupils who have been prepared by the older learning take 

 to science more readily when they are brought to it than those 

 who have been trained from the very beginnings in science. This, 

 Sir Michael said, was easy to understand, because teachers in 

 the humanities have been trained to teach for generations, 

 while men of science are only now beginning to learn how to 

 teach. 



Methods of teaching are of great importance, and the British 

 Association can be the means of producing improvements in 

 them. Prof. H. L. Withers, however, in a paper on the scope 

 of educational science, expressed the opinion that before 

 deciding how this or that subject should be taught it is desir- 

 able to formulate a theory of the curriculum, that is, to arrive 

 at some conclusion as to the proportional value of subjects. 

 Mr. P. A. Barnett also took this view, the main argument 

 of his paper being that the criterion of success in education 

 must be, not what people have been taught to do or to make, 

 but what they are and how they bear themselves in all the 

 relationships of life. But the educational value of a subject even 

 considered from this point of view depends upon the scope of 

 the subject and the methods of teaching, so that a reasonable 

 curriculum cannot be drawn up until a decision has been 

 arrived at as to what is implied by the name of each subject. 



NO. 1667, VOL. 64] 



