330 REPORTS ON THE STATE OF SCIENCE, ETC. 
science and geography. The first cause will be removed only when it is under- 
stood that geography is a scientific as well as a humanistic study, and that 
it is desirable that those who teach it, even up to the standard of the First 
School Examination, shall have received a training in practical science and 
scientific methed. It is thus specially important that geography should have 
a full place in the courses of the Faculties of Science in our Universities ; and 
it can in its turn contribute to those faculties an important humanist element. 
The separation of faculties now in vogue has probably been carried too far, 
and it seems important that some students at any rate should grow up with 
reasonable knowledge of method on both sides. The attention of universities 
and of their schools of geography is invited to this point. 
Assuming that the teacher possesses this knowledge, and is therefore capable 
of making correct use of whatever scientific facts are required to comprehend 
particular geographical differences, relationships, or consequences, the lack of 
correlation between his course and that of the science teacher results frequently 
in his requiring certain scientific knowledge from his pupils before they have 
reached the subject in their science lessons. It has been shown that almost 
all the topics of which an understanding is necessary to make the scientific side 
of geography intelligible are included in the school science courses normally 
followed. All that is wanted, therefore, is an adjustment of the syllabus on 
the one hand in the science course, and on the other in the geography course. 
On account of varying conditions in schools and different interests of 
teachers it is difficult, and perhaps undesirable, to lay down hard-and-fast lines 
as to the course in which the rudiments of science required in geography should 
be taught. A Report lately issued by the Science Masters’ Association, on 
‘Elementary Sciences, Nature Study, and Practical Work in the Preparatory 
Schools and in the Lower Forms of Secondary Schools’ (Oxford University 
Press, 1s.), refers particularly to the advantage of freedom in this matter to 
adapt schemes of work to teaching powers or periods available. In this Report 
the scheme of work in nature study includes observations and experiments on 
subjects of astronomy, meteorology, physics, physical geography, and so on, 
which are also to be found in the suggested course in practical geography. 
{he overlapping is said to be intentional, as the subjects may in some schools 
be taught as nature study and in others as geography or science. 
Duplication can be lessened by considering nature study, science, and geo- 
scaphy as a whole, so that each topic fits naturally into a particular section of 
the curriculum. ‘There should be true co-ordination, so that no science subject 
need be taught as such in the geography course (though it may have special 
geographical aspects), and no such subject should enter into the geography 
course until it has been studied in the nature study or science course. Teachers 
of geography should make special efforts to come to an understanding with their 
colleagues teaching the elements of science to ensure that general observational 
work has been begun early, and that a pupil by the end of the first secondary 
school year has some knowledge of the practical uses of the thermometer and 
barometer, and of the recording of simple data derived from the use of these 
instruments. With care it is possible so to dovetail the courses in geography 
and in sciences that each may materially strengthen the other, e.g. precise 
consideration of thermal influences on the earth should be deferred in the 
geography course until after pupils have received instruction in heat in the 
science laboratory. 
In certain types of schools, and provided that suitably qualified teachers 
are available, it is possible to introduce a composite scheme in geography, 
nature study, and physical science, in which each topic considered desirable 
to teach has its appropriate place, and the requirements of the geographical 
argument are taken as the unifying principle of the course. It is maintained 
that the adoption of such a plan up to the stage of the First School Examina- 
tion would tend to improve the teaching both of geograpny and of science: 
for it would humanise the science by keeping prominent the relation of scientific 
activity and results to general human interests, and would at the same time 
facilitate the task of the geography teacher. It has also been suggested that 
where complete unification of the courses in geography and science up to the 
age of sixteen is not adopted, most of the simple observations of biological 
and physical phenomena prescribed for pupils up to the age of twelve should 
