[Lesson XIV.] Undoubtedly the child who lives near birch trees is acquainted with them, for the birch is a tree that offers many attractions to the child. This lesson should extend and enrich these experiences by relating them to the serious activities of people in early stages of culture.
Where the child has the opportunity to see birch trees, but is denied the privilege of removing the bark, help him to see why it is necessary to take that privilege from him and, if possible, provide him with birch bark that can be purchased from dealers in such materials.
Even though birch trees are plentiful enough to permit the removal of the bark by the child, he should be taught to do it carefully and to take only what he needs to use. The same habit should be cultivated with reference to plants of all kinds. In this way the exercise of blind instinct, which in our present environment results in destructive habits, may be so directed as to form a social habit of wise economy in the use of natural resources.
A visit to a museum will suggest many uses for birch bark. Where such a visit is impracticable, well-selected pictures may serve the same purpose.
Instead of furnishing the child with a pattern of a basket, let him make one, first, by the use of paper and, later, with the birch bark. Encourage him to make such corrections as need to be made in the pattern before cutting the bark.
Where birch trees do not grow, it will be best to substitute for the study of the birch a study of some other tree whose bark or branches yield materials for basketry. In prairie regions a study of native grasses may precede this lesson, which may be read and appreciated to some extent, though not in the way it will be where the child is familiar with the birch tree.
References: Longfellow, Hiawatha. Lowell, The Birch Tree. Katharine E. Dopp, The Place of Industries in Elementary Education, pp. 64-67, 121-127. The Tree-Dwellers, Basketry, pp. 138-139. (See articles in encyclopedias and natural histories on the birch.)
[Lesson XV.] If you have never seen a river in the time of a flood, prepare for this lesson by talking with some one who has, by studying rivers and floods, and pictures of the same, and by making use of experiences that may be gained everywhere during and after a heavy rain. Model the upper part of a river valley, showing the river with its tributary streams and ravines. Show the high rocky banks where the river is narrow and the low banks where the stream is wider. Determine at what place in the river a dam would be apt to be formed during the melting of the snow in the springtime, and what parts of the valley would be flooded first. Then get a clear idea of the way that the flood that is referred to in this lesson took place by modeling an underground channel that connects with the river on the one hand and with the outer world on the other. Such an underground channel, when dry, is a cave of the type that is referred to in this book. Nearly all of the bone caves in England where the remains of the cave-men have been found are of this type. The ravines that are found in limestone regions are regarded by Mr. Boyd Dawkins, who has made a special study of the subject, as caves that have lost their roofs, and the valleys as ravines whose sides have become worn by the process of weathering.
By the use of concrete methods you can help the child to understand these facts very well. He can understand, too, that “the dark narrow passage” referred to in the lesson was a narrow part of the underground channel that led to the river, and that when the water in the river rose to the level of this passage, water would begin to pour into the cave. (See Field Lessons, p. 165.)
[Lesson XVI.] This lesson shows the cave-man’s need of fire, and the need of coöperative effort in withstanding the devastation produced by the flood.