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teacher of ordinary intelligence can give them, and gradually become acquainted with the science of which they form a part in the way already pointed out. More or less time may be given to this part of the instruction, depending upon the condition of the school and the skill of the teachers. It may be made to constitute the best half of teaching, awakening mental activity and storing the mind with the most useful knowledge. These object-lessons may frequently be made general for the whole school, thus effecting another saving in time.

Rural Affairs. It is a fact much to be deplored that in country schools there are no exercises which take into consideration country life. The occupation which absorbs the greater part of the life of the people, and all its varied and contingent interests, are scarcely recognized in school-work. Children fresh from the farm, with an extensive but unsystematized knowledge of the farm processes, and an active interest in them, are set to tasks which have no relations to these activities, and which usually are abstract and uninteresting. A rational system of instruction would seem to indicate that the first step in the school-work shall be to make the child conscious of what he already knows, to arrange the knowledge in proper order, and to stimulate observation and inquiry in the very direction in which the mind has already been developed.

These country children know a great deal about plants, their names, their forms, their uses, and their manner of growth. A little guidance only is necessary to awaken a great interest in the general subject of plant-life, leading on by short steps to systematic botany

and vegetable physiology. They know also a great deal about domestic animals, their characteristics, their habits, and their products. Starting from this knowledge it is easy to lead them to make further investigations in the same direction, cultivating their perceptive powers in the most efficient manner, and storing their minds with knowledge that reaches out toward the material world on the one side, and toward the phenomena of life upon the other, and indispensable as a basis to a wide and general culture. The knowledge which the child has in regard to bees and other insects; to the succession of farm processes from seed-time to harvest; to the manipulations necessary to produce a crop and prepare it for the market; and to the processes and products of household labor and economy-all can be turned to good account in the process of education, doubling the interest in study and increasing the products many fold. As a result of such a system of instruction children would find rural life full of interest in all seasons of the year.

In following this method, the teacher is but obeying one of the most fundamental of all the laws of mental development, proceeding from the known to the unknown, and making the previous experience of the child the basis for its future growth. Besides the advantage to the child itself, this method aids education in other ways. It takes away from instruction the reproach of being unpractical, it excites an interest in all school affairs on the part of parents, and it leads to continually more intelligent action in home and farm affairs. We may hope it will also have the effect of leading to a higher appreciation of country life and of arresting the

present tendency of migration toward the cities, and of the abandonment of the farms for trade or for the professions. "Abandoned farms" are in the last analysis but a result of discontent, either with the meager profits of farming or with the dullness of the farmer's life. More attention to Nature Studies and a better training in the Manual Arts should go far to remove the causes of this discontent. If the farmer is as well trained for his work as the mechanic he will succeed as surely, and he will find even his odd moments precious.

APPENDIX.

THE STORY OF A SCHOOL.*

BY JAMES JOHONNOT.

In this age of wholesale educational machinery the faithful record of any school, individual in its character, ought to be of interest to all who seek better results in practical ability than our present systems of instruction succeed in giving. But when the school departs widely from recognized standards, its record is of double value, as calling in question prevalent customs, and affording a new criterion for the judgment of current methods. The tendency of instruction is to become set in its ways. Teachers follow precedent and reach formalism.

But from time to time particular individuals are found who ask the reason of this or that practice, and call in question its value as a means of culture. Hence arose the "teachers' institutes" in this country. They were first organized in the State of New York, in 1846. They grew naturally out of the progress in liberty of thought. Time-worn methods of teaching were brought up for discussion, and judged by their results and in the light of reason.

Credit is surely due the founders and conductors of institutes, in that they brought about and persisted in this habit of questioning and discussing educational Republished from the "Popular Science Monthly," February,

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practices and principles. This was their special field of work. Their method was the true one, but the laws of life and of mental development were not then well enough understood, even by the best thinkers, to furnish safe guidance in this difficult work.

"The new education" means a revolt against all precise, ready-made forms, and an adoption of such methods as science may from time to time discover and point out. The "Story of a School" tells of the trials and triumphs of an experiment designed to test educational principles at which I had arrived through many years of "institute" instruction. In this constant comparing, discriminating, and sifting of methods I had obtained a special preparation for normal-school work. Herbert Spencer, in his treatise on education, had laid a solid foundation for scientific education, and Prof. E. L. Youmans had with voice and pen succeeded in arousing among thinking people a lively interest in the subject.

In the year 1872, through the agency of the Hon. John Monteith, Superintendent of the Schools of Missouri, I received a call to take charge of the newly established normal school at Warrensburg in that State. In the interview with Mr. Monteith I said suggestively to him, "You do not want me, and your board of regents will not want my services when they learn the conditions I shall exact." "What may these be?" said he, with some curiosity in his tone. "Entire control of the school, without interference from the superintendent or from the regents," was my reply. Laughing, said he, "You are the very man we want," and added, by way of caution: "You understand that lib

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