62 
to illustrate absorption, transpiration, nutrition and photo-syn- 
thesis ; the study of the forest as a unit and some of its problems, 
such as injurious insects, fungi, storms and fires ; questions of 
reforestation, and the planting of acorns in the fall, with a trans- 
ig of the seedlings in the spring to home or country resi- 
ce. 
Birds are a source of never-failing interest and the a quite 
naturally links itself to the work on trees in the fifth g 
In the sixth grade of the Horace Mann School the aeeare! vahidy 
is wholly physical ; in the seventh, there is at present no place 
assigned to it in the curriculum. e hope, however, at an early 
date to insert some work on the sea-anemone and coral with a 
view to making clear the formation of coral islands; and with 
lantern-slides to arrange a short course in geographical botany, 
showing desert-plants with their ecological adaptations ; trees, 
plants, and scenes characteristic of the different zones ; the change 
in the vegetation of a mountain from base to summit ; and forests 
of different types. This should to some degree unify the earth 
for the seventh grade boys and girls. At the mention of the 
name of a continent they should be able to form a different con- 
cept from that of a certain outline filled in with pink, and blue, 
and yellow 
In a cenin grade of the same school, which is the beginning 
‘of the five-year course of the high school, the facts and princi- 
ples of nature-study are gathered up, together with new material, 
in which the frog plays a part, and are applied to human phys- 
iology. Yeasts and bacteria ene into the work of this year, and 
although these subjects are up-hill work for a time, they are 
worth while in the end. 
This then is the present trend in nature-study — to be able to 
give a reason for the faith that is in you for presenting every sub- 
ject that you bring before the children; and to speak no idle 
word ; to set the children at work doing things — planting bulbs, 
making flower-beds, setting out vines, shrubbery and trees at 
school, at home and abroad; to keep pets and to take care of 
them ; to set up aquaria for fish and tadpoles and all manner of 
swimming things; to encourage them to make bird-houses and 
