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CURREN FF LIFERAAAIRS, 
BOOK REVIEWS. 
A new school botany.’ 
AT least three things must be considered in making an estimate of a 
text-book, namely, its style, its reliability, and its pedagogical standpoint. 
Professor Bailey’s style is too well known to need description or commenda- 
tion. He is one of our clearest and most forceful writers. The general 
facts of botany are fairly well established and are common property, so that 
the preparation of an elementary text involves merely selection from a great 
mass of well-known material. In the book before us, therefore, there is no 
occasion to discuss style or reliability, although in the latter feature Profes- 
sor Bailey is as great a sinner as the rest of us. In regard to the pedagogi- 
cal standpoint, however, he has raised a distinct issue and this deserves 
statement and some discussion. The author has had an extensive experience 
with teachers and schools, and his verdict is that “the schools and the teach- 
ers are not ready for the text-book which presents the subject from the 
view-point of botanical science.” To discover the explanation of this state- 
ment by means of his book, it becomes evident that the author does not 
believe in the organization of botanical material so that some conception of 
the science as a whole may be developed. From his point of view the study 
need not develop the idea of relationships, or need not be used to illustrate 
principles. The selection of material is to be made from forms and phe- 
nomena which are familiar, and which are related to the experiences of the 
daily life. All of this means that in the judgment of the author the average 
recent botanical text is not adapted to the majority of teachers and of schools 
as they are, but overshoots them. 
At least two objections to this view have doubtless had weight with those 
botanists who have prepared texts from a different standpoint, namely, the 
Conviction that pupils of secondary-school age are ready for some organi- 
zation of a science, and the further conviction that teaching can only be 
improved when some pressure is brought to bear upon teachers to become 
properly trained. It should be said that the author distinctly disclaims any 
Criticism of existing text-books, but recognizes the need of one adapted to 
actual rather than to ideal conditions. 
An illustration of the result of not keeping hold of some little thread 
of — may be found in Professor Bailey’s chapter XXv, entitl 
* BAILEY, L. H.: an ceremings 2 text for schools. 8vo. pp. xiv-+356. 
New York : pei leant aces 1900. 
t90r] 129 
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