has been a failure, no matter how many or what animals they have studied, or how neat their notebooks, or how artistic their drawings.

In the determination of the laws of falling bodies, if my classes fail to perceive the continued activity of a constant force by means of the effects; if they do not recognize the uniformity in the apparent diversity; if they do not recognize that here is a law and how to perceive that law; if all that my students get out of the exercise is knowledge that d={gt2; or, even worse, if they learn that in the laboratory they can get the result that the text-book says they can get, that the book has told the truth and they have verified the statement, then I am not only a failure as a teacher, but I am a sham and a fraud, and my laboratory is part of a juggler's outfit, the principal purpose of which is to dazzle the pupil and the public.

If, in the determination of copper in copper sulphate, I fail to make my pupils see that the atoms of copper in the final compound which is weighed are the identical atoms with which we began; if the pupil is unable at any stage of the proceeding to point out where the atoms of copper are, then my work is a failure, and the educational value of chemistry is either accidental or negative.

The results obtained from the pursuit of scientific subjects under the influence of such a conception are likely to be very different from what they would be if it were believed that the knowledge of a few animal forms or a few experiments in physics were the purpose of scientific study. Of course, it is understood that a professional chemist, or an electrician, or an investigator in biology, must know the facts of the particular branch of science that engages his efforts, and must set to work directly and explicitly for the purposes of learning those facts. But that is a phase of work that does not apply to high-school science.

I do not decry the learning of facts, nor would I set up for the pupil this more important but less tangible aim. By a pupil's knowledge of facts the teacher may test in a measure the clearness of comprehension, the awakening of power, that the pupil obtains. But the teacher must look beyond the mere facts of the subject to the true content that furnishes the reason for its introduction into the curriculum.

The day has gone by when a knowledge of subject-matter is considered sufficient preparation for teaching. How much knowledge of mathematics, higher and lower, is necessary to make a person a good teacher of fourthgrade arithmetic ? How much knowledge of literature and language. would guarantee success in teaching third-grade reading? How many university graduates would undertake a position in the grades of a city. school with assurance of success? It is only a tempting of Providence that permits persons too poorly prepared to do grade work to teach in a high school. The application of pedagogical principles is as necessary to high-school work as it is in other grades, and university methods and models are not always capable of universal application.

The teaching of science is still in an inchoate and formative condition. There is no general agreement among teachers of any science, nor between different schools, concerning what shall be taught. Perhaps physics is the science which in high schools is best taught and most clearly defined. But physics in one school means a very different thing from what it does in another school.

The past few years have witnessed many attempts to formulate a course of study in science that shall constitute a point of departure for the teaching in high schools; something that high schools can teach and that colleges can reasonably expect; something that shall be of value to all students who do not expect to go to college; and yet something that shall be a fair equivalent for preparatory studies that are now required for college entrance. This section of the National Educational Association four years ago appointed a committee for the special purpose of formulating such a course. That committee, after much work, failed to agree, and, so far as accomplishing what it undertook to do, it is as if it had not been. No such course has yet been formulated, and I believe that no such formulated course ever will be generally adopted until it has its basis in the activities of the pupil rather than in the facts of science. A successful and meritorious course in science can never be made by addition nor subtraction nor substitution. No series of exercises can ever be presumed to give constant results. It certainly is not possible at the present time, and may never be possible, to state a course of science in terms of mental activity. But until that is done all of our courses in science must be tentative and unpedagogical. Until someone makes a study of the psychology of laboratory science, or shows just the phases of human activity that are most economically cultivated by each scientific subject, our teaching must continue to be more or less empirical and unscientific.

The recent recovery of classical subjects from threatened displacement has followed the recognition that the language of a people is the key to the thoughts of a people, and not merely a quantity of information, valuable or useless as the individual judgment considers it. The revival of history has come about from recognition of the fact that history is an expression of the life of a people, and not merely a catalog of miscellaneous events. A similar change must occur in the teaching of science. J The purpose and reason for science instruction must be sought for in the mind of the pupil, and not in the facts of the subject. For this aspect of the case I plead with all the earnestness of a decided conviction.

The greatest contribution of science to pedagogy has been the "scientific method." The "scientific method" is not a method of teaching, but it is a method of thought. It is a method capable of universal application. This universal method, in all of its ramifications, should constitute the basis for all our courses of study in science, and should determine the method and data of teaching. I plead for a study of this universal

method of thought, and for its exemplification in the things we teach. Then will there be no question concerning what shall be the course of study in science, no hesitation on the part of colleges to accept it as a college-entrance requirement, and no doubt concerning the value of science teaching.

WHAT THE TEACHER OF SCIENCE CAN DO TO MAKE THE TEACHING OF SCIENCE IN SECONDARY SCHOOLS MORE POPULAR

W. S. BLATCHLEY, STATE GEOLOGIST FOR INDIANA, INDIANAPOLIS, IND. The civilization of the world of today is the net result of the study of science during the centuries past. Fifty thousand years ago man was nature's slave a wild animal roaming with still wilder animals over the boundless plains and thru the unbroken forests of Asia and Africa, or mingling with the hyena and cave-bear in the caverns of central Europe. Cowering with fright at the sound of the lightning's voice; gazing with awe upon the sheets of flame and jets of steam as they issued from volcanic furnace; wondering at the mighty strength which hurled the massive rock down the mountain's side, man stood surrounded by the forces of nature, yet ignorant of their power. Naked he was; scorched by the sun by day and pinched by the frost by night; hungry, unless by chance he happened upon a tree of wild fruit or slew by brute force one of his daily companions; houseless, altho surrounded by the material that was to shelter the millions; without family ties or the simplest knowledge of a form of government, man was hardly on a par with his distant cousin, the gorilla of today. Compare with the animal of then the cultured gentleman of now, and what scientist but would hesitate before pronouncing them of the same species!

It is not necessary in this connection to review in detail the various stages of man's civilization from the moment that he first used fire to warm his body and cook his food, on up thru the ages of stone, bronze, and iron, to the present age of steam and electricity. Suffice it to say that his advancement was brought about by the mental operations of independent observation, experiment, classification, deduction, and generalization. These are the operations which lie at the base of all scientific training, all scientific knowledge. In our secondary schoolshigh schools and academies he alone is a successful teacher of science who can lead his pupils properly to observe and experiment. After these come the higher steps of comparison, deduction, and, finally, generalization, or the proper correlation and unification of observed facts and phenomena. These more advanced steps of scientific training are, in my opinion, suitable mainly to the curriculums of colleges and universities. But to the great majority of high-school pupils a college or university

course is impossible, and the question naturally arises whether the training which the pupil secures in secondary schools from the studies of chemistry, physics, botany, or zoology repays the time and expense devoted to these studies. The answer to this question depends largely upon the training received. If text-books are studied by themselves, and facts and theories alone are taught, my unhesitating answer would be an emphatic No. If texts be used only as aids, and information regarding the subject in hand be gathered from every available source—if, in other words, individual observation and experiment be the main idea inculcated by the teacher-the science work of secondary schools will lead up to that independent thought which is the greatest object to be desired among the masses of the present and future generations.

The leading biologists tell us that man differs from the higher animals in that he possesses the power of "abstract thought." Abstract thought! Many possess the power, but how few ever use it! How few ever think, in

the true sense of the word! Too many, far too many, persons go thru life content if they are never hungry, never cold. Their thoughts, their ideas, are of the simplest kind, and come to them without being sought. To think is to labor, and if it bring not gold it is, to the majority of mankind, so much time wasted. There is, to such persons, little pleasure in thinking other than about food and clothing and shelter.

In order best to develop individual observation and the resulting power of independent thought, the study of the sciences should begin in the elementary schools, with the observation of the more common natural objects, and with simple experiments; and up to the high school no text should be used, but the observation lessons should be made the basis of, or correlated with, work in language, drawing, and literature.

In the high school a combination of laboratory work, text-book, and thoro didactic instruction should be carried on conjointly, one-half or more of the time being given to laboratory work, i. e., actual work by the pupils, with plants and animals, chemicals, or physical apparatus, as the case may be. Of all such laboratory work accurate notebook records, accompanied, where possible, by exact drawings, should be kept, and all laboratory work should be under the personal supervision of the teacher at the laboratory desk.

Successful science teachers are born, not made, and no man or woman who is "born tired" can ever hope to become an Agassiz or a Jordan. In other words, seven years' experience in one of the largest high schools of Indiana proved to my satisfaction, if I did not know it before, that no one can be successful as a science teacher unless he or she is willing to work, and work hard. Well do I remember the question put to me by a lady teacher from a neighboring town who was visiting my zoölogy class and watching the children at their dissection. "But, Mr. B.," said she, "does not this require a great deal of work on your part ?" "Certainly,

She

madam, and work is what I am paid for." She elevated her nose a degree or two and soon left the room; and returned, as I afterward learned, to her old method of teaching Steele's Zoology by rote. belonged to a class of science teachers the members of which we may designate as "fossils"-a class which happily is growing less in numbers as the years roll by, but which today is still much too large. The members of this class who teach zoölogy never see or use a specimen unless it be a horned toad from Texas or a dried sea urchin from Buzzard's Bay. They have no zoölogical works of reference except the pictures in the back of Webster's unabridged dictionary. They spend days in descanting with their classes upon such important biological facts as the "comparative length of the tail in the different species of monkeys," or, as in a case gone down in history from one of the leading high schools of Indiana, "On which foot of the ornithorhyncus does the webbing extend past the toes ?"

That I am not using hyperbole in speaking of their teaching, let me read you verbatim from their standard author, Steele, the sole fact which he gives concerning the leading family of one of the seven great orders of insects. Here it is:

Acridida.—The grasshoppers or locusts of the western states belong to this family. They come in such multitudes as to give sunlight the yellow tinge of dense smoke and to eat a large field of grain in an hour.

And yet it was proven conclusively, no longer ago than 1896, that a large majority of the high schools of Indiana where zoölogy was taught used Steele's book alone and taught such bosh by rote. What a travesty upon nature teaching! What a blot upon our boasted advanced scientific methods!

As, yielding to the demands of the times, the "fossil" zoölogy teacher steps aside, he often makes way for one of another type which we may call a "special microscopist." The latter is a product of the one-sided development theory at present so conspicuous in some of our higher institutions of learning. He is an evoluted histological and embryological specialist, with a B.S. after his name, and a summer or two's experience at some seaside laboratory to give him added prestige. He is an expert in the use of the microscope and microtome. He knows every detail concerning the embryology of the sea-squid and the development of the amphioxus, but he does not know a jumping-mouse from a long-tailed shrew, an oriole from a cat-bird, nor a hessian fly from a chinch-bug. The only field of nature which he has ever explored, or which he deems worthy of exploration, is the field beneath the lenses of his microscope.

When he assumes the biological chair, he does so for two reasons: first, to replenish his exchequer; second, to use his position as a steppingstone to a higher one, where his methods are in vogue.