are times, many ot them, in tins work, when information simply is ot 

 immense value, and it would be wrong to withhold it. Any one of the 

 lessons if properly given will prepare the pupils to best receive and 

 make use of valuable information; information which may then and 

 later be the basis of wider thinking. 



Then again, a problem honestly attempted but still unsolved, if 

 explained, maj' give the pupil the method and encouragement which 

 will give him the desire and power to solve many another more diffi- 

 cult problem. 



Then also, giving certain information about a thing that pupils could 

 not find out for themselves, on the knowledge of which many simple 

 explanations follow, may often be the best way to open up a source of 

 problems. For example, a knowledge of the fact that the pollen grain 

 must fertilize the ovule to produce the seed, a fact they cannot find 

 out independently, gives us opportunity to set many solvable problems 

 about the distribution of pollen grains. 



DIRECTIONS FOR USE. 



These directions are here published in the order in which they were 

 given out. It was not expected that all grades would make use of them, 

 or that each teacher who did use them would follow the exact order. 

 Many of the things could obviously be studied by all grades, if in each 

 the teacher would select and adapt the work to the grade in hand. For 

 example, such is the case with most of the work here given on plants 

 and animals. It is also clear that much of it could be repeated often 

 with profit and interest. Even with adults the recurring phenomena of 

 the seasons with the changes in the plants and animals in adaptation 

 to them never fail of interest. 



While the work which here follows may seem "unsystematic" and to 

 have "no logical sequence," it will be noted that in both the non-living 

 phenomena and in the plants also which have been selected there is 

 progression. For example, the physical phenomena will give those 

 conceptions of the properties and composition of air and water neces- 

 sary to understand them as factors accomplishing great work in 

 nature, and in their important relations to the organic world. The occa- 

 sional interruption of the continuous contemplation of these phenomena 

 will not in any way interfere with the final organization of them into a 

 so-called "logical order" or systematic view of the whole. 



This list of directions should not be con.sidered by any means as a 

 course of study, but must be looked on in the relations which I have 

 attempted above to make clear. Many of the directions cannot be 

 made clear without diagrams, which cannot be here introduced. In 

 the actual work with the teachers the material and apparatus were 

 present and their use was demonstrated. 



