A niece of mine at three years of age wrote a four-page letter made up of m's and u's and ee's, turning the sheet sideways. twice in exact imitation of her mother.

The regularity of the lines, the slope and general resemblance to an adult's letter was remarkable; she must have had an image of a letter as a whole.

The same little girl often essayed to read her scribble letters, and after her interest in the postman's morning visit was well aroused, she became aware that names are to be read from envelopes.

One morning, much to her mother's surprise, she claimed a letter, saying, "My name is on it. It says Miss Me.'

Thus in a very natural way do children through their imitative instinct begin their own reading and writing lessons in the nursery and in the kindergarten.

We cannot keep reading and writing out of the kindergarten.

It is customary in the kindergarten to write the child's name upon the piece of work he is making. It is one way to develop the sense of ownership and posses

sion.

When the child recognizes "my name" and not "my name" however vaguely, he has a hold upon reading, though he may be and should be unconscious of the new power.

I must urge that no effort be made to drill or even to call attention to the written work done by the kindergartner. Power in the child should arise naturally simply by observation and use.

In similar fashion a kindergarten child has carried the general appearance of a page in a song book and has offered to find the song he wishes to sing. This is also true of story books illustrated with pictures.

This gives the idea of turning leaves and finding the place.

The attendance is registered every day upon the blackboard as in all grades, and some of the children follow the writing of these number forms with interest.

Children in the nursery often unconsciously acquire the ability to find the rhyme or story which they wish mother to read. They point often as she reads even though incorrectly, and a notion of the sequence of words arises.

The "look of an entire page" is also impressed because of its peculiar marginal indentations.

Miss May Palmer, of the Training Department of the Normal College, remembers distinctly holding in her mind at a very early age this "gray mass" of the printed page with its "ins and outs" of white.

Who has not in later years passed judgment upon story books according to the general "look" of the page?

The natural action of the child's mind in reading is undoubtedly from mass to word, from word to letter, from vague to less vague. This fact is being recognized more and more and is finding its way slowly but surely in teaching reading. Several new series of Readers are built upon it as a sure foundation.

Teachers in this city who have tested this natural method are beginning to have great faith in the preliminary step of superficially reading nursery rhymes for a few weeks, giving the child's mind a chance to follow its own working method until it finds clearness growing out of vagueness. Time is actually saved.

"I plead, therefore, for a recognition," says Dr. Hall, "of the value of superficiality as one of the goods per se in this field; a knowledge that is all extent without much intensity. This is the form in which all knowledge begins."-School Work.

THE APPLE (Lesson One.)

BY SARAH ALICE BALLARD,

THE apple is the best well

known of all fruits. It is believed that it was first cultivated by the Romans. The fruit is very widely spread throughout the Temperate Zone. It is found in Europe, especially in Great Britain, Asia and in America. New York State grows the largest quantities and

apples of the best quality of any section in this country.

The tree is seldom over thirty or forty feet high and the bark is hard, durable and fine-grained. The branches of the tree spread out, forming a regular semi-circle. The leaves are broadly orate, much longer than the petioles, woolly underneath and contain glands. The flowers grow in clusters of six or seven together and are large, rose-colored externally and very fragrant. The fruit is roundish, narrower at the two ends with a depression at each end. They are of various colors: green, yellow, red, and sometimes even black. At one end of the apple is the stem, which joins it to the branch of the tree.

There are hundreds of varieties of apples. The crab apple seems to have been the parent of all the other varieties. There are three main classes of this fruit: the summer, winter and autumn apples.

Apples are used in many ways: as food; as medicine and then they are made into various drinks.

STORY PART. (LESSON 2.) Let us hold up five fingers. Both the apple and the pear have five petals in their blossoms and they are of the same family. The raspberry, strawberry, peach and quince are also of the same family, which is called the Rose family.

When you eat an apple why do you not eat the core? Because it sticks in our throats. Why did God have it so? To protect the little seeds so, as we might have more apples.

Think of a tree hung with little houses and you can eat all of the houses except five little rooms in each house. These are full of little fairy men dressed each in a brown jacket. Why do you think every house has five rooms? Because, they have five petals to a blossom. There is not the same number of men in each house. Let us cut this apple, (have an apple). Let us see how many men there are in each room. Do these fairy men when in their houses stand on their heads or feet? They stand on their feet. The pointed end of the apple is the upper part while the larger end is the lower part, pointing downward.

The bees love the honey from the apple blossoms and if it were not for the bees taking the honey we would not have the apples. The wind comes and blows down

the blossoms upon the ground, like a regular snow blanket in the summer-time. The little calyx cup of the flower stays upon the tree, and then in a little while a tiny apple begins to grow. The fairy men begin to move in their little houses: first they wear green jackets, then white and finally they put on their little brown coats. The apple is ripe then and these little men want to get out and travel in the World, so the apple is eaten and the little fairies run away, so as to make more houses grow for more little fairy men. The little men do not like one thing in their little houses and that is old Mr. Worm for he will chew them all up. It so happens that Mr. Bird likes Mr. Worm, so he eats him up and by so doing helps to protect the little fairy

men.

FRUIT AND DIVISIONS OF THE SAME.
LESSON 3.

What part of the orange is orange color? called membrane. All except the inside white skin which is

Are the apple and pear the same all the way through? No, they are not the same. The inside of the orange, apple and pear is called pulp-also called flesh. (Compare with the flesh of the body). The outside of the body is covered with skin and pores

within the skin. Under the skin is the flesh. It is the same with fruit. We eat just the flesh of the fruit.

core.

When we eat an apple do we eat the whole of the fruit? No, we never eat the Has an orange a core? No, the orange has just an eye. Can you eat the whole of the orange? Can you eat the skin? No, no one ought to eat the skin or the seeds. Collect seeds in paper box made by children).

If you should close your eyes, holding an apple in one hand and an orange in the other could you tell where the blossom grew? Yes.

only be pulsing with energy, as the engine waiting at the station, but must also be moving onward if only at the rate of the slow going freight. Thus we may call progression the key to success and it leads to more permanent results than can possibly be achieved in any other way. Good can even be educed from evil and good is made better yet by infinite progression.'

This truth is more or less fully recognized in all lines of education and is only expressed in another way when we say that we should teach from the known to the unknown; from the simple to the complex. But there should be more thought given to it than this bald statement, especially in dealing with beginnings as in the starting of little children. We should try to avoid the too common error of shutting our psychologies when we leave the student roll and forgetting to mark them with applications when we enter the roll of teachers.

It should be remembered that our work should be in a spiral form if it is truly good, each phase widening out and also extending upward. While it is true that life as a whole must be progressive yet at the same time it is not an onward sweep but a series of progressive steps. Many have thought that in applying this term of progression to the gifts we always mean a sequence of form within a given lesson, one form evolving from the one just preceding it. This is truly a phase of progression, but there is a larger, broader sense in which the term should be used in practice as well as in theory, and that is from the simple to the complex use of a given material.

The object of this paper is to show one way in which the sixth Gift can be thus used. For this work the Gift was arranged in layers. The program for the day called for the introduction of the Sixth Gift on the following morning, and accordingly a lesson was planned and the boxes given

out.

FIRST LESSON OR STEP

None of the class had ever seen the Gift and so it was a total surprise and the first exclamation was: "See the candy!" "I have some chocolates," meaning the plinths, the columns were "sticks of candy."

One child stood a plinth up and called it a house with a chimney, another discovered that we could have two chimneys, and a third child that we could make a tall one. This naturally suggested (with that class)

a weathervane and then a cross on a church, as they had recently heard the story of the "Little Weathervane."

Experiments were then tried of making the cross in different ways and when one child made a discovery all the others imitated and enjoyed it. After several changes in crosses, a piano with a stool, and a few other minor moves, they played freely with the top layer around the mass. This furnished quite enough experiences. and use of new material for the first time. SECOND STEP OR LESSON

The next time the Gift was given out the class almost unanimously put up the one chimney so that we very quickly reviewed the previous moves as a recall sequence, and then for the advance work made a picture with the top layer of the Gift and repeated it with the second layer; next we put the two forms together to make one object. After that they had free play around the remaining mass with the blocks of these two layers, always calling the attention of the class to the work of the others. In repeating the object made from the top layer with the second layer the class discovered the difference between the plinths and columns. They found that those who made pigeon houses had one taller than the other, while those who made boxes, wells or bridges could make them just alike. Each child named what he had made and attention was called to their similarity or difference. Some children whose objects were not alike voluntarily explained why they couldn't be alike and put them in relation to each other, as for instance one boy said: "I have a pigeon house and a house for little birds." Others asked permission to change theirs and make objects which could be alike.

THIRD LESSON OR STEP

In the third lesson each child played that he had a cake which he cut front and back and right and left; this led to the discovery of a new possibility and they asked to divide it thus:

Saying that there was a piece for papa, one for mama, brother, sister and the little one for the baby because he "being little didn't need so much." What other kind of cake could you have? "A layer cake." Yes, put the cube together. Now all take one layer and make a picture. You remember that last time we made two pictures. Were they alike? Here they recalled and explained, quite freely, what they had done in the previous lesson. Now, today we will see if we can make three pictures alike. How many layers will you use? Nearly the entire class succeeded this time in using the layers alike and yet as a class having many different objects, as wells with covers shut, covers open, boxes, bridges, houses and many other things. Then they had free play around the remaining blocks.

FOURTH LESSON OR STEP

In the fourth lesson they reviewed the divisions, made three objects alike and then repeated it with the other three layers, thus making six units which were later-after they had been named and enjoyed by the class-put together to form one object in any way that they wished without destroying the units. The class now inspected these large objects and helped in selecting one, but care was taken by the teacher as a leading spirit, that the one selected should be the one which best illustrated the use of the Gift. This object chosen, the class all copied it, being the first definite work of the class working as a unit at creating.

FIFTH LESSON OR STEP

This began with a review of the division. into six layers, but attention was called to the way some had placed the layers on the table. After four had been taken off, this led to a few minutes of arranging and naming.

This was followed by free arrangement of the six layers and all copied this one which was named in various ways. This shows the general form, not the position of the blocks. The children were asked to lay

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3

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them with the small blocks at the back and to have the layers with plinths and those with columns alternating. with columns alternating. This was the beginning of dictated work with this Gift.

The children now experimented with the small blocks in sets, using the general form described above, but not moving the others. Care was taken that all should profit by the experiments of the others, either by letting them tell what they had made, copying each others', or letting half of the class go at a time and interview the rest as to what they had made. Opportunity was also given to draw on the blackboard the top or front view of their objects according to its difficulty, especially when making the units. The children were now capable of handling the material as a whole and understood

how to put together without excitement or trouble, which is one advantage of giving the first work in layers and gradually increasing the number. They were now ready for free work with all the material and after they had had some experimenting with the Gift as a whole they would be ready for dictated work, with all of it. Either before or after having dictated work they would have a symmetry lesson developed in the previous lesson, (the 5th).

By this time the class should have the material so well in hand that they can follow any method of giving a lesson and get much profit from the use of the gift. This is, as may be understood, suggested only as one way in which this Gift can be used progressively. The work described was actually carried out with a class and the children did develop not only the ability. to use the material, but also much freedom of expression.

JESSIE T. AMES,

Supervisor Drawing, New York City. One desire which we all share is to have beautiful surroundings for the little children. This we all know and feel and wish. But how to make a beautiful room is what we want to know. In any case, the room will be stamped with the individuality of the teacher, for decoration, primarily, is design, and design, primarily, is a very personal thing. Therefore the place is bound to show a personal expression of her understanding of what makes for beauty.

Let us take an imaginary room and see what its possibilities are. (See Plate I). We will show this corner in which one sees

a long horizontal window-here on the left, a blackboard, within reach of the children; on the right, a low bookcase in the corner and a door near the blackboard. The wainscoating runs all the way around the room,

about two feet from the floor. If the room is high studded the picture rail should be low. If low studded, the rail should be high. In a cold and dark room the color scheme should be warm. A brown made. of broken tones of orange is often good. Where the room is exposed to sunlight tones made up of olive with an admixture of white, prove a pleasant choice. This color itself is made with green and a slight amount of red and sucks up the light very quickly. The tones must run one from another. The ceiling white plus a little of the color, the walls a middle tone and the ground the darkest of all. This hall in which I am now speaking shows most pleasant tonal harmony. The browns of the walls, woodwork, curtains, ceiling, etc., all go to make up a unified scheme of color. Now we must look to see what spaces are

must primarily fit the space in which it is destined to be hung. With this in mind. we will choose a long, slender one to be placed between the blackboard and the door, and a somewhat wider one for the other side of the board. Some elbow room must always be left around the frames and small, scrappy pictures are to be avoided. Keep the wire flat and vertical, in harmony with the lines of the room. Above the window a triple or double or single picture may be hung, following the general shape of the window. window. If you have many places which you wish to decorate and your purse is limited, begin with the largest and most To the left of the window we might place conspicuous space and plan to fill it well. satisfy the eye, tell as one spot with their two or more pictures hung together. They surroundings, and are in harmonious line. hanging them in the same manner, flat Casts may be used in place of pictures, against the wall by two wires. For instance, over the blackboard we will hang one large piece flanked by two smaller ones. these three, though broken in space, still count as a unit. It is often desirable to use strung together. These hung in a friezea number of small pictures, either singly or like way often make a happy color tone carried out in a regular border around the

room.

And

Plate II shows the end of a room broken into five interesting oblongs of varying sizes and proportions, by horizontal and vertical lines. Pilasters made of flat pieces of stained wood may be used to cut this space into the panels. In the center hang one large cast. In the narrow frieze above place the Baurbini casts, which tone so beautifully with the wall. These, though small and inconspicuous spots, make good