Teacher's Corner & the Nature Club
The original Key closed with a course of nature study for home and school — lesson plans by grade, and a programme for a neighbourhood Nature Club. They are gathered here.
Nature Study for Children
The Kindergarten Age
"How will the Nature Library help with children too young to go to school?"
I hear this question from mothers whose knowledge of Nature is slight. These books form a perfect mine of riches for any one on whom devolves the care of children between the ages of three and five. The less the mother or her helpers know, the greater is their need. An insatiable hunger for knowledge possesses children at this period. The mental horizon widens with every new experience. Knowledge in so many lines is at its very beginning. Recall, if you can, the moment when you saw for the first time a bird's nest! Then came the fact that homes of birds are like this. What wonder that a torrent of new impressions begets a torrent of questions that sets some grown-up people almost crazy! You cannot stem that tide, but you can guide it into proper channels. Nature study is the proper business of these littlest children. The Nature Library is a strong arm for the untutored parent whose child brings in one day an acorn, another a toad, the cocoon of a moth, a katydid, a mushroom, a snail, or a butterfly and eagerly inquires its name, and what it does, or what it is for.
The superb pictures in these books cover every plant and animal that a child may be expected to bring in, or ask about when outdoors. Recognition of things and the fixing of names upon them in the child's memory is the main business of education at this stage. Pictures seen again and again fix the impressions made by seeing the thing itself, alive. The text fortifies with facts the elders who must answer questions.
There is little matter suitable for reading aloud to little children. But material for story-telling is unlimited. Tell stories around the pictures, and note the eager attention they receive.
Suggested Lesson: the Cotton Tail
This little wild rabbit is discovered nibbling lettuce in the garden. Call the children out, and creep softly up as close as you dare go, and all take a look at him. Somebody speaks, and off goes Bunny, his white tail bobbing up and down, until he disappears. Look at the lettuce head, stripped almost to the heart.
What is hare's lettuce? See "Wild Flowers,".
While interest is at white heat take down "Animals," and turn to the pictures, p. 76. There sits your Bunny under the cabbages. Above is a nest of new-born young. Just such a nest may be discovered in the raspberry patch, for briars are the favourite hiding place of this rabbit. If a nest can be found, by all means let the children see it: the blind, helpless babies, the lining of the nest, fur pulled out of the mother rabbit's breast to keep her offspring warm.
Read p. 75, and follow the author's example, by setting a box trap to get a half-grown cottontail to keep for a while under observation, and tame it. There will be no necessity of teaching. The children will learn the ways of rabbits without any help but their own eyes. Br'er Rabbit stories fit into the programme here. Tame rabbits in a neighbour's hutch will interest both the gray rabbit and the children. It is entertaining to all to see how these strangers act toward each other. Look at the pictures of the Snow-shoe Rabbit in its winter coat, p. 86, and the little mouse-like hare cousins, the Pikas, p. 92.
The teaching required is a matter of guidance and oversight, not telling facts and drilling them into the memory. See that the child is getting the habit of clear seeing, and clear thinking about what he sees. Don't exhaust the subject by pointing out things overlooked. You exhaust the child's patience by a mistaken notion that thoroughness is a virtue. Children will get all they are capable of absorbing. A few years later they will swing around to the rabbit again, and with capacity to learn those things that were beyond them in the earlier years. A few clear-cut impressions are enough to fix the name indelibly to the creature--that is the business of the first lesson.
Throughout the year the books on birds will be useful for their pictures, particularly those in colours. The Thanksgiving turkey, on p. 288, goose, p. 138, pigeons, ducks, sea-gulls, Bob Whites, all are in "Game Birds." The song birds are in "Bird Neighbours." Nests and nestlings in "Bird Homes." The goldfish in the aquarium and the shad for dinner send the children to the wonderful pictures in President Jordan's book on "Food and Game Fishes." Turtles, snakes, snails, clams, insects, trees overhead and the mosses and fungi that grow under them--all claim the attention of the wide-awake child and each starts questions that somebody must answer. The Nature Library anticipates these questions and answers them.
Ages 6 to 7 Years — Grade 2.
Fall Study — Crickets and Grasshoppers
Teachers' References: Insects.
PLATES XXXIV. to XXXIX. inclusive.
Poems by Keats, Leigh Hunt, Holmes, and Riley.
How to catch these insects,.
Where to get the net.
How to make an insect cage.
Subjects:
(1) Short-horned grasshopper, life history.
(2) Long-horned grasshopper.
Katydid, life history.
(3) Crickets.
House cricket.
Mole cricket.
Snowy tree cricket.
Field cricket.
Let the children collect the young ones and full grown insects. Have a sod in the bottom of the cage, and sprinkle it occasionally. Also put in fresh clover leaves, bits of raw apple and carrots, and tall grasses, for the insects to perch upon and eat.
The children will learn to recognize and call the different kinds by name. Let them see the grasshoppers' wings spread in flight, showing the fan-like under wing. See plates. Why are the hind wings larger than the other pairs?
Things to Be Found Out by Observation
Why is it hard to see a katydid which is sitting on the underside of a leaf?
Why is the common grasshopper of dusty roadsides invisible when it alights?
How and what do grasshoppers eat?
What is the use of the brown saliva?
How does the roadside grasshopper make the snapping noise when he flies?
Does it happen every time he flies?
What are grasshoppers' and crickets' "horns" for?
See the swelling of the body as the insect breathes.
Locate the large eyes.
The ears of grasshoppers are oval windows on the sides of the first joint of the abdomen.
They show just under the hind wings in Pl XXXVII., Fig. 10.
The ear of a katydid is a swelling in the second joint of one of the small legs.
Does each katydid have a pair of ears?
Look in the same place for the ears of crickets.
What animals eat crickets and grasshoppers?
Find eggs of these insects if possible
Hear the snowy tree cricket chorus in the evening.
See the different insect fiddlers play.
Distinguish the day and night singers.
How did crickets get their name?
What frog sings like a cricket?
What bird sings like a meadow grasshopper?
Ages 7 to 8 Years — Grade 3.
Spring Study — Frogs and Toads
Teachers' References: Frogs; Shells.
How to make a balanced aquarium for tadpoles. Make a moss-garden, out of a shallow box with moss-covered bottom, and make the walls of wire screen. In this keep frogs and toads. Sink a shallow dish of water in one corner of the cage, and keep it filled.
For closer study let each child have on his desk a live specimen in a small wire cage or in a glass jar with a screened top.
The teacher will find Miss Dickerson's studies very useful for reference in guiding the studies of her pupils. Don't tell them what they can find out for themselves.
Some Things to Be Learned
Where and when are eggs of toads and frogs to be found?
How do tadpoles breathe?
How old are tadpoles when their mouths first open?
How distinguish tadpoles of toad and frog?
What do tadpoles eat?.
What animals eat tadpoles?
Restoration of lost tails.
How do tadpoles get rid of their tails?.
Where are the ears of frogs and toads?
Which end of a toad's tongue is attached?
What snakes eat frogs and toads?
Ages 7 to 8 Years — Grade 3.
Subject — Flowers That Invite Humming-birds and Insects
Teachers' References: Wild Flowers; Trees; Insects; Moths; Butterflies; Bird Neighbours.
Flowers have colour and perfume to attract insects. Nectar is hidden so that the insect must brush past stamens and pistils to get at it. The hairy body gathers pollen dust, which is unconsciously distributed from flower to flower. Thus insects are among the important agencies of cross-fertilization. By this process vigorous seeds are set by the plants.
Flowers with the deepest corolla tubes are fertilized only by humming-birds and insects with very long tongues, such as the sphinx moths, and the long-tongued bees. The following are references to Vol. IX. Many more can be found.
Some flowers that attract the humming-bird: Bush honeysuckle; coral honeysuckle; trumpet-flowers; painted-cup; jewelweed; columbine; fire pink
What is the humming-bird's favourite colour?
Some flowers that attract Sphinx Moths: Sweet wild honeysuckle; Chinese honeysuckle; evening primrose; Jamestown weed; moonflower; white lilies; yellow orchis.
Some flowers that feed long-tongued bees: Canada lily; water lily; trillium; turtlehead; gentian.
What is the favourite colour of bumble bees?
Some flowers that feed butterflies. Milkweed; fire pink; hepatica; fringed orchis; violet.
Some flowers that feed short-tongued insects. Indian hemp; sweet pepperbush; blood root.
An afternoon lesson outdoors shows insects feeding on flowers.
Ages 9 to 10 Years — Grade 4.
Spring Studies — Animals That Live in Shells:
Snails, Slugs, Clams, Oysters
Teachers' References: Shells.
IN BALANCED aquaria and a snailery these animals may be kept and studied alive. Children collect specimens, as far as possible, and bring in empty shells for study. Visits to fish markets, and to shell collections are profitable. If near the seashore, a clam bake and a visit to an oyster fishery are possible.
Study a common land snail alive.
Where are its eyes?
Feel its file-like tongue ribbon.
What and how does it eat?
How does it travel?
How does it breathe?
Why has it a slimy trail?
Where does it live naturally?
How does the shell grow?
If cracked, is the shell repaired?
How far in does the snail withdraw?
What part of the body shows when fully contracted?
Compare with pond snails in spring.
What do snails' eggs look like?
Compare a land slug.
Where is the breathing hole?
How and on what does it feed?
Keep clams in aquarium.
Study little neck clam.
Surf or hen clam.
Soft shell.
River clams.
Pearls.
Pearl buttons.
The giant clam of Australia.
Oysters.
How is an oyster made?
Upon what and how does it feed?
Life history.
How long does it live?
Enemies.
Oyster harvest.
Oyster culture.
Green oysters.
Oysters of New Zealand.
Oysters that grow on trees.
What bird eats oysters?.
Danger in eating oysters.
The oyster season.
Pearl oysters.
Pearl diving.
Ages 9 to 10 — Grade 5.
Winter Study — Animals Useful to Man
Teachers' References: All volumes describing animal life
Suggested Lists of Useful Animals
Mammals: Furbearers, wool-producers.
Used for food.
Useful by preying on harmful forms.
Domesticated as beasts of burden; dairy and food animals.
Birds: Seed scatterers.
Destroyers of harmful insects; weed seeds; harmful rodents.
Domesticated groups.
Used for food--flesh and eggs.
Useful for feathers, as eider duck, geese, etc.
The millinery trade in plumage.
Trained Birds: pets, hunters, carriers.
Frogs and Toads: Destroyers of harmful insects.
Scavengers of stagnant water.
Frogs as human food.
Reptiles: Destroyers of harmful rodents and insects.
Turtles, as food; furnish tortoise shell.
Fishes: as food; produce isinglass and glue.
Mollusks: as food--oysters, etc.; mother-of-pearl--for buttons, etc.; pearls; cuttle bone; ambergris; inks and dyes; money--wampum, etc.
Insects: Fertilize flowers, setting seed; produce silk of commerce, honey, was, dyes, ink, etc.; destroy harmful insects.
A valuable part of these studies is the gathering of illustrative materials for a school or home collection. For instance, a series showing life history of the silk worm moth, with a series of silk, from cocoon to manufactured fabric. The first can be obtained by breeding the insects; the second by application, or a visit, to some silk factory. An idea of the classification of the animal groups is conveyed by their proper ranking in these lessons, from higher to lower orders of life.
Ages 11 to 12 — Grade 6
Fall Nature Study — How Seeds of Wild Plants Are Sown
Teachers' References: Vol. XI., Trees; Vol. IX., Wild Flowers; Vol. I., Bird Neighbours.
A COLLECTION of seeds of trees and other plants is easy to make; each kind has its own adaptation to some method of distribution. A suggestive but incomplete list is given below to start these studies of seeds.
Plants that throw their seeds: Violet, witch-hazel, jewelweed, touch-me-not.
Seeds that catch a ride: Burs, stowaway, seeds, nuts and fruits eaten by birds, etc.
Seeds that sail and float away: Sycamore, ailanthus, dandelion, aster goldenrod, maple, ironwood, catalpa.
Seeds carried by animals: Nuts, edible fruits and seeds, burs, etc.
Ages 11 to 12 — Grade 6
Winter Study — Woods and Their Uses
Teachers' References: Vol. XI., Trees; Vol. XIV., Mosses and Lichens; Vol. X., Mushrooms; Vol. VIII., Insects.
Studies of wood growth:
How is wood formed as a tree grows?
What is the meaning of the rings?; knots and knot holes?; the "grain" of wood?; bird's eye and curly grain?
Why does bark crack vertically?
How can a hollow tree live?
How is standing timber measured?
What are the enemies of trees?
What causes decay of wood?
How woods are preserved against decay.
Studies of wood in manufactures: Buildings; furniture; paper.
How woods are finished.
By-products of lumbering: Tan bark, turpentine, tar, rosin, varnishes, alcohol, acids, gums, drugs, sugars.
NOTE: It is customary to substitute "Elementary Science" for Nature Study in the seventh and eighth grades in schools. This is an introduction to the sciences of Physics and Chemistry. It is Nature Study in the inorganic realm, and is carried on by simple laboratory experiments.
The Nature Club
An Indoor Programme — September
Subject — Protective Mimicry Among Common Insects
Special References: Vol. VI., Butterflies; Moths, Insects.
A Five minute talk: What does "protective mimicry" mean?
Illustrated talks: "Sheep in Wolves' Clothing."
(1) Butterflies: Viceroy mimics Monarch.
(2) Flies: Syrphus fly mimics wasps and bees.
(3) Caterpillars armed with horns or whips.
(4) Caterpillars with glaring eye spots.
(5) Caterpillars that take threatening attitudes.
(6) Insects that look like twigs.
Walking sticks. Cankerworms.
Tomato worms.
(7) Insects that look like leaves.
Luna moth.
Katydid.
Cocoons wrapped in dead leaves.
(8) Moths that imitate lichens on bark.
Voluntary citations of instances of protective mimicry by members. Striking illustrations of this are given in every volume of the Nature Library dealing with animal life.
Small wire screen cages or glass jars containing the living insects should illustrate each talk. Where living insects cannot be had, cabinet specimens may be substituted. Each should be designated by its name, pasted on the jar or cage containing it. These should be passed around, so that each member can verify by his own eyes the statements made. The average club can prepare for five out of the eight topics here suggested, for the insects are common ones, of wide distribution.
An afternoon ramble may very profitably be the next club meeting. Devote three hours to field study of insects, which exhibit protective mimicry. It is a fascinating study.