Museum Extension to the Schools 17 



B. Extension of Educational Work in 1915 — Lending of 



Lantern Slides to Teachers — Establishment 



of Local Lecture Centers 



supported by trustees' funds and by special appropriations 

 of the board of education 



Through the Museum's recent educational work the institution 

 has been brought into close relations with the educational system of 

 the City, and through its invaluable collections from all parts of the 

 world, its carefully installed exhibits and its corps of trained scien- 

 tists, the Museum exerts a wide and growing influence in the com- 

 munity. 



With the exception of the system of circulating nature study col- 

 lections, all the methods of Museum instruction employed until 1914 

 necessitated the presence of teachers and pupils at the Museum. 

 While it is desirable that children should visit the Museum as often 

 as possible, the difficulties and dangers of travel and cost of transpor- 

 tation prohibit many thousands of pupils from coming to the Museum. 

 A laborer who earns only $3.00 per day can ill afford to pay twenty 

 cents for car fare to send his son or daughter to the Museum, especi- 

 ally when this child is perhaps only one of five or six all of who 

 ought to have the same opportunities. It was with the desire to take 

 the Museum treasures to these less favored children and to extend 

 the influence of the Museum, that the Curator addressed the follow- 

 ing letter to President Osborn: 



April 15, 1914. 

 My dear President Osborn: 



For the past ten years, the Department of Public Education of 

 the Museum has been devoting special attention to the establish- 

 ment of close relations with the public schools and the educational 

 system of the City. The principal features of this work have been 

 the cabinets of natural history specimens, which have been circu- 

 lated through the schools, and the various courses of lectures for 

 school children delivered at the Museum. The methods adopted 

 have met with such success that the teachers now regard our circu- 

 lating collections and our lectures as important adjuncts, if not 

 indispensable aids, in their work. 



In the past, the lectures have been given only at the Museum, 

 after school hours, and attendance is voluntary. The large attend- 

 ance at these lectures is very gratifying, for few realize what a strain 

 it is upon a teacher to bring safely a class of twenty-five to fifty pupils 

 to the Museum. She must get the written permission of the parents 

 of each child before starting; she must take up this work when her 

 normal day's work is finished; she must guard her pupils from acci- 

 dent on the streets. After the lecture is over, the teacher must take 

 her pupils, at rush hours, back to the school and there dismiss them, 

 and it is often eight o'clock in the evening before she reaches home 

 for dinner. 



