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SCIENCE. 



[Vol. XX. No. 501 



be obliged, four or six hours a day, to teach, as best they can, 

 perhaps without maps, globes, charts, models, pictures, or any 

 other appliances of a proper sort. This would be somewhat 

 bearable, aye, even profitable, were the pupils sixteen to twenty 

 years old. But it is a terrible thing for children, and a terrible 

 thing for their teacher, to be expected to endure. Such teachers 

 and children have my sympathy. I sincerely pity them. Think 

 of trying to hold in quietness and attention in a schoolroom, for 

 hours at a time, forty or fifty children, whose tender, growing 

 bodies and minds call loudly for air, for sunshine, for exercise 

 and freedom ! What is the use of talking about teaching science 

 so long as in our very attempts to teach it we continue to act in 

 opposition to the laws of nature? A striking example of this in- 

 consistency occurred some years ago in a well-known eastern 

 university. While the professor was lecturing on hygiene, one 

 of his students fainted for want of pure air, the room being 

 closed up and utterly destitute of ventilation. With the view of 

 enlarging and improving the facilities for elementary science in- 

 struction, permanent collections might be made in every school. 

 But really good collections, kept in proper order, cost a great 

 deal, and, consequently, must be few in number. Good museums 

 in cities might be made highly useful to all the common-school 

 children within easy reach of them. They would be a relief to 

 all in winter, and they would at all times be useful to those 

 whose school buildings might chance to be situated near the cen- 

 tre of a large city and at an inconvenient distance from the fields 

 and hills of the open country. Especially should we expect the 

 State university museum to be made convenient, attractive, and 

 instructive to all grades of young and old students. All parts of 

 our public educational system should be consistent and in har- 

 mony. If a university can be equipped in such a manner that 

 visits to its museum and inspections of its collections may be a 

 source of pleasure and instruction to the pupils of the public 

 schools of the State, or even any considerable part of the State, 

 it will surely be so much the better. Well-arranged, well- 

 labelled, and well-lighted university museums may and should 

 serve as great educators of common-school pupils, as well as of 

 the general public, who may visit them from time to time. In 

 California, and at least one or two other States, the express com- 

 panies carry specimens for the State universities free of charge. 

 In New York State and some other places, the students in train- 

 ing at the State normal schools are requii'ed to pay only half the 

 railroad fare to and from these schools, although many of them 

 travel several hundred miles to reach them. A number of the 

 eastern and northern States have for some time been furnishing 

 free text-books for the public schools ; and, in Ohio, not only are 

 free text-books provided for the school children, but the State 

 legislature has also taken measures for the supply of clothing for 

 the pupils where it may be necessary. Now, as before stated, 

 museums of any great value or importance must be few. They 

 are too expensive to be numerous in an ordinary State. They 

 cannot be transported from town to town. Why should not 

 some arrangement be effected by which pupils of school age, and 

 in regular attendance and full standing in the schools, and their 

 teachers might receive free railway transportation at least once 

 a year to and from the State university museum? Knowing 

 what is done for public schools by a few large museums, I am of 

 opinion that greater efforts should be made in this direction in 

 all the States, and also that strong efforts should be made to bet- 

 ter the university collections, keeping in mind the necessities of 

 the public schools. 



Were I asked for other advice I'egarding methods of teaching 

 elementary science, I would say, that the pupils should be 

 started with the study of the familiar, that which is most readily 

 observed and best known. The subject matter should consist of 

 common things, and the language of the teacher should be simple 

 and intelligible to the pupil. Some twelve or fifteen years ago 

 the distinguished scientist. Professor Huxley, published a book on 

 practical biology, in which he adopted and advocated the system 

 of study by which the student begins with the lowest and simplest 

 forms of life and proceeds to the higher and more complex 

 organisms. Owing to the fact that the lowest living beings are 

 microscopic and obscure, this was altogether unnatural and un- 



scientific. Yet, because Huxley adopted it, almost every teacher 

 of biology, in English-speaking countries, adopted it too. Within 

 a few years it became evident that (except with advanced and 

 well-trained students) the results were far from satisfactory; and, 

 accordingly, in the preface of a later edition of the book, Professor 

 Huxley writes that experience has shown that the order ought to 

 be reversed, and that henceforth the student should begin with 

 those forms of life which are somewhat familiar, and proceed to 

 those less known. 



In the next place, I would warn the primary teacher against 

 teaching the details of any subject to very young children. Un- 

 wise choice of material, and the forcing of a heap of details upon 

 children, corresi^ond closely to the old system of teaching spelling 

 by selecting long and very rare words. This far-fetched material 

 should never be used in primary teaching. Only the more con- 

 spicuous and general characters, uses, etc., should be dwelt upon, 

 unless, in very exceptional cases, where, for some good reason, 

 the child may appear to be profited by a minute account of any 

 animal, plant, or mineral. In all cases, the details are most out 

 of place when there is no object of the kind present. As far as 

 possible, the teacher should keep close to the wishes and inclina- 

 tions of the child in the choice of subject matter, and work along 

 these lines, so long as there seems no good objection to his wishes. 

 With high-school pupils, I would recommend the frequent use of 

 the microscope. In the hands of an intelligent teacher, this in- 

 strument may be used to advantage with small classes of pupils, 

 say, above thirteen years of age. A stereopticon or projecting 

 lantern should often be used in all grades of schools. Certainly 

 for a high school, no better investment can be made, and the 

 common schools of any city might, by arrangement with the 

 high-school teacher, who operated the lantern, become recipients 

 of the benefits to be derived from the possession of this piece of 

 apparatus. 



A word or two with regard to physiology and hygiene. I con- 

 sider that the teaching in these subjects should be greatly im- 

 proved. I would not have a great amount taught; but, in several 

 respects, it needs to be made more practical. Time will not allow 

 me to expatiate upon these matters here. Yet I cannot refrain 

 from directing attention to the fact that, for reasons of delicacy, 

 three systems of organs of the human body, either partially or en- 

 tirely, are invariably omitted from the course of instruction in all 

 of our schools. For both moral and sanitary reasons, I am in- 

 clined to think something should be done, and that something 

 will yet be done to provide for a wholesome, intelligent, and prac- 

 tical course in these subjects. It may be that at present little can 

 be done; but 1 venture to suggest that where it is altogether 

 practicable to do so, perhaps in some city high schools, the sexes 

 receive instruction in these studies in separate class-rooms, and 

 from capable and proper instructors. It would, of course, be ab- 

 solutely essential that the instructors have properly constituted 

 minds, and be especially qualified to speak to and deal with young 

 persons, in order that good might come of their instruction. This 

 is undoubtedly a diflScult problem to solve. It must, however, be 

 admitted that it is a very important one. 



Again, the science teacher must have interest in the studies 

 themselves. I have not much faith in the common, little, artificial 

 devices for exciting the interest of the pupil. They are but the 

 nostrums of quack doctors. They remind one of the application 

 of ointment or salve to the external surface of the body to cure a 

 disease which has its seat in impure blood or in a weak nervous 

 system. They are not born of sympathy or interest in the study. 

 The teacher should be interested in the studies as well as in the 

 pupils. It is all right to desire to do good to the children, but 

 there must in addition be a pleasurable enjoyment felt by the 

 teacher in the prosecution of the study itself. In fact, interest in 

 the study — a spirit of inquiry, of enthusiasm, if you will — is of 

 the utmost importance. Teachers and pupils alike need it. 

 Teaching must not be done merely for money ; it must not be done 

 in order to show one's knowledge. The pupil must not ask ques- 

 tions with the view of puzzling the teacher, or of showing his 

 own learning or smartness. Too often do we get students who 

 have been so praised and flattered by their previous teachers, that 

 it is exceedingly difficult and sometimes impossible ever to do 



