59 
shower . maple keys whose distribution-area was thus consider- 
ably widened. 
Now [ the teacher puts herself in the attitude of this little girl, 
and is willing to “help nature,” instead of expecting nature to 
help her by making a dull geography-lesson more interesting, 
she will find that she and nature and geography can all help each 
other. 
In the first and second grades, the home and its timmediate sur- 
roundings furnish abundant material for nature-work. The do- 
mestic animals, and such animals as make desirable pets — the 
dog and cat, the rabbit, the canary, the goldfish — the squirrel 
that frisks in the yard, the butterfly that hovers about the flower- 
bed, the sparrows in the street — all these are good subjects. In 
the plant-world, the potted plants and window-boxes in the school- 
room, the common vegetables and their manner of growth, the 
planting of bulbs and the collection and planting of seeds are all 
things of absorbing interest to the child. The work should con- 
tain a large element of “doing,” the child should take care of 
the pets and plants, he should feed the squirrel and the sparrows, 
he should gather the seeds and plant them. He should learn as 
much of habit and life-history as his years will allow. He may 
ecause learning the names of things is the special business 
of Sf cilaien of this age and younger — he may in these grades 
learn the names of many things that are not studied. It is as 
natural for him to learn the names of the common birds and 
butterflies, trees and wild flowers and bright berries, as it is for 
him to know ae names of the furniture about the house, or the 
tes upon the 
In the third ne the oe may widen to the limits of what 
is ie “home-geography.”’ The yard and its improvement 
furnishes endless material: trees, and their value for shade, for 
beauty, for fruit or nuts for children or for squirrels ; vines, and 
their value for shade or screen, or cover for unsightly walls, also 
their value for fruit, or beauty of flower or autumn-coloring ; the 
manner of the climbing of vines, by twining, tendrils, rootlets, 
twisting leaf-stalks or reflexed prickles; the kind of support 
needed for vines,—stone, wood, or trellis of wire or cord; the 
