BROOKLYN BOTANIC GARDEN 
LEAFLETS 
Series VIII Brooklyn. N. V., April 7, 1920. 
No. 1 
REAL TESTS 
“Why do you come to the Botanic Garden?’’ was asked of a 
ten-year old boy this summer by a member of Dr. Jean Broad- 
hurst's class in Nature Study. Dr. Broadhurst, of Columbia 
University, always brings her summer school class to see the 
work done for children at the Brooklyn Botanic Garden. Each 
year she asks the members of her class to find out, if possible, 
why our 320 children come to the Botanic Garden, and so this 
small boy was asked why he was here. The young woman after- 
wards said that the boy straightened himself up, thought a 
moment, and then replied: “I am here for three reasons; first, 
for elementary instruction ; second, because I like it; and third, 
because I get a crop.’’ This boy’s reply was so good and so 
comprehensive that it would almost seem as if he had been 
primed and cocked for this answer; but not so. 
In the first place, every boy and girl who comes to the Botanic 
Garden knows that his instruction is in the line of elementary 
education. The present age and stage in education is such that 
we heat a great deal about scientific tests, the Binet Tests, the 
Otis Tests, etc.— all the tests which are being applied to the 
student to find out his mental and physical ability. The results 
of these tests are sometimes overwhelming. There must come a 
feeling that no educational test, no physical test, can adequately 
guage the real ability of a young person. Something falls in be- 
tween, and that something is what might be summed up under 
the head of results from life tests. The answer of the small boy 
applies to the life test. First, in any department of work a child 
must receive a certain body of knowledge— summed up bv this 
child as “elementary instruction.” Second, he must be able to 
use practically that body of knowledge, summed up in the child’s 
third answer; and lastly, he must be able to enjoy whatsoever he 
is doing. Enjoyment is one of the basic principles of life. With- 
out it no work carries over. It is difficult to arrange in an orderly 
