Children love intensely the forms of nature—the clouds, the trees, the flowers, the animals—all of the great beautiful world outside of themselves, and it is their impulse to become acquainted with this world; for this they feel enthusiasm and love. Marjorie Fleming, the little playmate of Scott, who at the age of six could recite passages from Shakespeare and Burns so that the great bard would sob like a child or shout with laughter, may be taken as the universal voice of childhood. She writes in her diary, "I am going to a delightful place where there is ducks, cocks, hens, bubblejacks, two dogs, two cats and swine which is delightful." In another place she says, "Braehead is extremely pleasant to me by the company of swine, geese, cocks, etc., and they are the delight of my soul."
The waste of time in our public schools has been commented upon and some of the causes have been pointed out; but is not the chief reason the fact that much of the work of the school is unrelated to the world of the child? At least the child does not see the connection. He leaves at the threshold the things which he loves and desires intensely to investigate, and begins his intellectual development with abstractions, with "the three R's." It is said that teachers cannot succeed unless they love their work. How can we expect children to succeed and not waste time, not become disheartened at work that, so far as they can discover, has little more relation to their interests than to the mountains of the moon?
We look to nature study to supply the missing links between the child's life and his school work; to afford opportunities for the interested observation of things, and to furnish a strong impulse toward expression. It has been well said that the best result of the primary schools is the power to use correctly one's own language. The chief obstacle in the development of this power is the want of an impulse to express. What can afford a stronger tendency to describe than the attempt to report observations that have been made with interest, even with delight?
IV
PLAN OF STUDY
Begin as soon after the first of January as possible. Assign two periods a week of from ten to twenty minutes each for bird study in the school. Continue the work during these periods until after the celebration of Bird Day in May.
If no other bird is to be found, the English sparrow will answer. Place the following questions upon the blackboard:—
The English Sparrow