Excerpt from The Third Year Book of the National Society for the Scientific Study of Education, Vol. 1

The spirit of nature-study requires that the pupils be intelligently directed in the study Of their immediate environment in its relation to themselves; that there shall be, under the natural stimulus Of the desire to know, a constant effort at a rational interpretation of the common things observed. If this plan be consistently pursued, it will naturally follow that the real knowledge acquired, the trust worthy methods developed, and the correct habits of observing and imaging formed will lay a sound foundation for the expansive seien tific study which gradually creates a world-picture, and at the same time enables the student, by means of the microscope, the dissecting knife and the alembic, to penetrate intelligently into its minute details.

The study of nature ultimately resolves itself into a study Of energy. The great aspects under which energy may be Observed color, form, and force - are presented to the children through an inquiry into their functions.

In nature-study as in everything else, the work must begin with what the individual has already acquired, and it should pro ceed from this according to the natural laws of mind-growth. The pupil's knowledge of nature, which must be recognized as the basis for further study, has been gathered by a more or less careful observation of his surrounding landscape. The function of the teacher is to assist the learner through experiment, and by following the suggestions derived from experience in an elaboration of the details of this great indefinite picture. If properly conducted, the study will lead to a fuller recognition of natural laws which are Simply the statement of the sequence of phenomena, that, so far as observed, remains constant.

It is a fact of tremendous import for teachers to remember that there can be no rational Observation of anything that is not stimu lated and guided by the suggestion Of law. This is true whether the pupil is a child or an adult. Failure to understand the impor tance of this point is responsible for the unspeakable confusion which now exists in most teachers' minds regarding the selection and presentation of material in nature-study. The examination by children into the minute details of a subject is not only a physical impossibility, but it is also an absurdity, for the simple reason that for them through these minutiae there can be no manifestation of law. Illustrations are abundant. The older botany, when tried with the children, failed for precisely this reason. The children could see, physically, the venation, margin, shape, etc., of leaves; but their work fell below true observation, and consequently interest died out, because as presented, no reason or law suggested itself in explanation of these facts. When the same facts are reached through a broad presentation of the plant's relations to light, heat, and moisture, they at once become true and interesting objects Of observation and fruitful sources of thought, because the perceived relationships suggest reasons that explain them. The same is true whatever may be the aspect of presentation - that of beauty as well as that of use. For the idea of beauty rests finally upon the perception Of fitness, of adaptation; and adaptation points to the statement of a law.

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