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objects and phenomena. The " objecb lessois," which are given in the 

 lower standards, are intended to lead the pupils to use their eyes and 

 compare one thing with ano hsr ; and though they have b 3 come in 

 some schools of too d^"' ailed a character to develop the faculties of 

 observ ^tion and reasoning, the fault is chiefly due to the fact that many 

 teachers are not observt^rs of nature themselves, and are therefore un- 

 able to describe natural things exc pt in the 1 mguage of the text-book. 

 Every effort has, however, been maHe by the Education Department 

 to show teachers that this is not the kind of teaching intended to be 

 given as object lessons. Several circulars have been issued containing 

 instructions as to what should be done, and the new Boar l of Educa- 

 tion has shown sympa hy with the work of arousing interest ia nature 

 b}' issuing a circular, from which the following extracts have been 

 taken, to managers and teachers of rural elementary schools. The 

 issue of this document by Sir Gr. W. Kekewich at the v^ry com uence- 

 ment of the work of the Board of which he is the secretary, may, we 

 trust, be taken as an indication that increased attention is to be given 

 lo the teaching of scientific subjects in elementary schools: — 



The Board would deprecate the idea of giving in rural elemen'ary 

 schools any professional training in practical agriculture, but they 

 think that teachers should lose no opportunity of giving their scholars 

 an intelligent knowledge of tiie surroundings of ordinary rural life 

 and of showing them how to observe the processes of nature for them- 

 selves. One of the main objects of the teacher should be to develop 

 in ever}^ boy and girl tiiat habit of inquiry and research s-o natural to 

 children ; they should be encouraged to ask their own questions about 

 the simple phenomena of nature which they see around them, and 

 themselves to searcii for flowers, plants, insects, and other objects to 

 illustrate the lessons which they have learnt with their teacher. 



The Board consider it, moreover, hi;ihly desirable that the natural 

 activities of children should be turned to useful account — that their 

 eyes, for example should be trained to recognise plants and insects 

 that are useful or injurious (as the case may be) to the agriculturist, 

 that their hands should be trained to some of the practical dexterities 

 of rural life, and not merely to the use of pen and pencil, and that 

 the}^ should be taught, when circumstances permit, how to handle the 

 simpler tools that are used in the garden or on the farm, before their 

 school life is over 



The Board are of opinion that one valuable means of evoking inter- 

 est in country life is to select for the object lessons of the lo^^er stan- 

 dards subjects that have a connection with the daily surroundings of 

 the children, and that these lessons should lay the foundation of a 

 somewhat more comprehensive teaching of a similar kind in the uppar 

 standards. But these object-lessons must not be, as is too often the 

 case, mere repetitions of descriptions from text-books, nor a mechani- 

 cal ii terchange of set questions and answers between teacher and class. 

 To be of any real use in stimulating the intelligence, the object les- 

 sons should be the practising ground for observation and inference, 

 and they should be constantly illustrated by simple experiments and 

 practical work in which the cj.ildren can take part, and which they 

 can repeat for themselves at ho ne with their own hands. Specimens 

 of such courses can be obtained on applicat on to the Board of Educa- 



