SCIENCE-GOSSIP 



271 



SCIENCE IN SCHOOLS. 



By J. W. Tutt, F.E.S. 



npHE following is an abstract of a paper read by 

 *■ Mr. James W. Tutt, F.E.S., at the Conference 

 on " The Teaching of Science in Schools," held at 

 the Medical Examination Hall, Victoria Embank- 

 ment, on November 15th last, under the presidency of 

 Mr. Graham Wallas, chairman of the School Manage- 

 ment Committee, London School Board. We much 

 regret that the space at our disposal will not permit 

 us to print the whole of Mr. Tutt's valuable criticism, 

 but careful selections have been made chiefly of those 

 points that bear on the practical work of this important 

 subject. 



Opening with a short analysis of the difference 

 between the natural and physical sciences, Mr. Tutt 

 points out that the true object in science teaching to 

 children should not be so much to present them with 

 an array of facts, as to train them to habits of accurate 

 observation for themselves. He maintains that this 

 is effected better from the teaching of natural than 

 physical science. The former, he says, might be 

 advantageously included "in the schemes for object 

 lessons, class subjects, and specific subjects in ele- 

 mentary schools ; and in higher grade schools as a 

 subject for results in which grants are paid by the 

 Science and Art Department, or, as an alternative 

 scheme to physics -in schools of science. " 



" It would appear from the Education Code that 

 natural science in schools has a very fair chance. It 

 happens, however, that neither the Edu:ation Depart- 

 ment nor the School Board has been able to organise 

 the possibilities at hand. It may be therefore 

 advisable to view the teaching of natural science 

 under the various heads in which it may be included 

 in the school curriculum. 



"Professor Blackie it was, I think, who called 

 science 'classified facts.' The difference between 

 mere isolated lessons on objects and science being 

 the want of homogeneity usually involved in the 

 former and the connected homogeneous nature of the 

 latter if it be really science. The Education Depart- 

 ment in its latest Code (Instructions to Inspectors, 

 1899, pp. 63-64) gives some excellent generalisations 

 on the nature and value of object lessons. Then 

 series of object lessons are suggested, some of which, 

 crystallised into workable form, would make very 

 good introductions to the study of elementary science. 

 Unfortunately, some at least of these series of sug- 

 gested lessons were evidently drawn up by men igno- 

 rant of the excellent Preface that was to be attached 

 to them, and hence, instead of finding in the Code 



thoughtful logical series of real lessons leading up to 

 work in elementary science, we find many totally 

 impossible object lessons, and subjects named that 

 must necessarily be mere instruction and memory 

 lessons. The Preface states that good object teach- 

 ing ' leads the scholar to acquire knowledge by obser- 

 vation and experiment, and no instruction is properly 

 so called unless an object is presented to the learner 

 so that the addition to his knowledge may be made 

 through the senses.' This states clearly the educa- 

 tional view of object lessons as an introduction to 

 real science ; but the Department goes on to mention 

 some of the objects to be presented in 'town schools ' 

 to the learner, so that ' the addition to his knowledge 

 may be made through the senses.' Such are the cow, 

 the horse, the donkey, river, Atlantic liner, quarries 

 and quarrymen, railways (general sketch), and 

 many others. The whole thing is absurd, and 

 the subject which should form the basis of all 

 science taught in the higher standards of a school 

 is rendered nugatory through the ignorance and 

 inability of some one in power to understand first 

 educational principles. To call these, and talks 

 about pictures, ' object lessons,' is nonsense, and the 

 Department, as shown by its Preface, knows it. I 

 am insisting on this phase of the subject, because I 

 know my fellow-teachers may say, as I have often 

 said myself when the claims of other subjects have 

 been pressed, that there is no room in the time-table 

 for an additional subject. I want to show that we 

 already have in our time-tables a subject which, 

 properly treated, may be made subservient to the 

 best uses of natural and physical science. If it were 

 the business of some one who knew and understood 

 his work, to see that the object lesson lists of every 

 school were not made up of isolated scraps, but had 

 a certain homogeneity and consisted of thoroughly 

 graduated lessons every one of which could be 

 actually illustrated by the object described, the 

 child might then be trained in the habit of making 

 accurate observations and, under guidance, of giving 

 an accurate description of the observations made. 



" We should thus convert our object lessons into a 

 highly important and useful educational instrument, 

 having a distinct purpose in the school curriculum 

 and forming the foundation of a real scientific train- 

 ing to be given in the upper standards 



" The class subjects of elementary science, as the 

 name implies, ought to consist of a series of con- 

 nected and graduated lessons. They should proceed 



