seed became wonderfully attractive and its structure 

 intelligible. They had discovered its work and had 

 learned what each part had to do. 



The leaf, at first studied as a mere shape, became 

 attractive to them and was understood, when they 

 studied it as a thing of life, when, beginning with its 

 beginning, they investigated the ways in which mother 

 nature had protected it during its winter sleep, when 

 they watched the opening buds and saw how carefully 

 each little leaf was packed. The bud revealed to them 

 a story of protection, of care, which pointed to a Pro- 

 tector, and showed that the leaves, thus wonderfully 

 cared for, must have a great work to do. As they 

 studied that work, and saw how work determined 

 structure and influenced form, form had a meaning and 

 structure became interesting. 



The lesson came to me slowly ; it had to overcome 

 strong predilections for structure and classification, but 

 it was the more deeply and indelibly impressed. The 

 child, and not the plant or animal or stone, must be the 

 centre. Nature must be approached from the child's 

 standpoint. Material and methods must be adapted 

 to the child's nature and needs. 



If this is so, if we must follow the leadings of nature, 

 we shall soon find that the first essential is to gain the 

 interest of the child. His senses form the gateway to 

 his world. To interest, his senses always respond, the 

 gate always opens ; with interest awakened, with senses 

 alert, every power of the child responds, and there is 

 scarcely a limit to what he can do. This I know from 

 experience. The children show a wonderful power of 

 expression and reasoning, when the impression has 



