Nature Lovers Have a Meeting
Created | Updated Jun 9, 2019
Nature Lovers Have a Meeting
Editor's Notes: No, that isn't Willem's. Unfortunately, the editors of the January 1915 issue of Nature-Study Review didn't see fit to divulge the artist's name. According to their letterhead, the American Nature-Study Society's journal was 'devoted primarily to all scientific studies of nature in elementary schools.' Whether the elementary school students were doing the studying, or whether the nature was primarily to be found among the first-sixth graders, is not clear, anymore than who painted those excellent woodpeckers. Nevertheless, Nature was encountered here, and indeed, studied. They even had meetings about it. Here's a meeting report and editorial which we found extremely edifying.
The Annual Meeting and Election of Officers
The opening session of the meeting was held in the Zoology Building at the University of Pennsylvania. It was a roomful of the members of the American Nature-Study Society who greeted Mrs. Comstock as she rose to give the address as retiring president. True, the room was not a very large one and yet it was as generous a representation of our membership as has been present at a winter meeting for many years1. The address which appears in this issue was heard with greater pleasure than our readers can have in reading it for in cold print it lacks, somewhat, of the charming personality which has made its writer so efficient a president these two years past.
Following this address M. A. Bigelow of Teachers College (the initials were incorrectly given in the December number), gave a paper on the Relation Between the Introductory Science of the High School and Nature-Study and Biology. This was provocative2 of a good deal of discussion. It will appear in full in a later number of the Review. Mr. C. H. Robison of the Upper Montclair, (N. J.) Normal School led the discussion which continued for more than an hour, many of those present taking part3. The afternoon meeting was a joint session with the School Garden Association of America. It was held in the Botany Building to get the use of a lantern4. Mr. V. E. Kilpatrick, President of the School Garden Association, was in the chair. Commissioner Claxton could not be present but Miss Ethel Gowans, one of the able aids of the Commissioner in the newly established division of school gardens, outlined in a very clear way the work they are trying to push5. The Commissioner desires to aid teachers to fit themselves for school garden work, to stimulate garden work particularly in the south where the people suffer for lack of fresh vegetables, to facilitate the disposal of garden products and to assist in the instruction in canning garden stuff that otherwise would go to waste6. We shall present in the February number an article from Miss Gowans outlining the qualifications and preparation desired in the garden instructor.
The paper of Miss Margaret Aherne on the Plan of Nature- Study, in the Gary, (Ind.) Schools elicited many questions. It is to be published in the February number.
Mr. O. G. Shields gave many instances of wild animals finding their way to food; of domestic animals finding their way home by the use, he believes, of a sense or senses we humans do not possess7. This interesting paper will be published in an early number.
Mrs. J. Willis Martin advocated more publicity for school garden work, a campaign to educate the tax-payer on its values so he would demand for his children instruction in garden work as he now does for the three R's.
Miss Ella Carter gave a delightful talk on the Philadelphia School Garden and illustrated it with a number of fine lantern slides8.
The Thursday morning session was devoted to a discussion of the Principles of Organization of Nature-Study work incorporated in the several outlines of Nature-Study, published in the December number of the Review. Miss Laura E. Woodward, of the Trenton, (N. J.) Normal School opened the discussion.
Many more of those present participated and the spirited discussion lasted all morning. Instead of attempting to formulate at this meeting the principles of organization for which the Society wishes to stand, it was deemed expedient to ask the Council to draw up a set of such principles for publication in the Review. These to form the basis of additional discussion in the pages of the Review and at the next meeting of the Society with a view to adopting them more or less modified at that time.
The afternoon session was held at the Philadelphia Normal School for Girls. Dr. Adeline F. Schively spoke on the local nature-study situation. Then the nature-study equipment, samples of work and the building of the Normal were inspected under the guidance of Mrs. L. L. W. Wilson.
The business was transacted after the addresses on Wednesday morning. The ballot resulted in the election of the following officers and council directors … [we spare you and ourselves the trouble of rescuing these names from the OCR chaos].
The question of calling a meeting for the Summer at San Francisco in connection with the Exposition was left to the Council to decide after consultation with the California Branch of the Society.
A resolution was passed instructing the Secretary to extend greeting from the American Nature-Study Society to the corresponding society in England, the School Nature-Study Union, at its session in London, January 4-9.
Editorial
With this number we begin Volume XI. A decade of achievement is worth pausing a moment to consider9. Surely a magazine that has maintained itself thus long is filling a real need. Moreover it has never appeared healthier. In a year and a half the subscriptions have increased fifty per cent. It needs only to be more widely known to double its number of patrons. Then it would easily be self-supporting. Fortunately for the nature-study movement in this country there have been and still are those willing to sacrifice time and money to further its interests, so much do they
believe in its importance. Do you believe in nature-study10? Read the retiring president's address in this number to appreciate what it has done and is doing. Do you not believe in it enough to recommend the Review to your friends ?
The marvellous material progress of our century is due to our conquest of Nature11. Let us be humble in our pride, however12. We have subjugated but a tiny fraction of the mysterious forces that weave the pattern of our destinies. The illustrious savants who will continue the conquest are school children now. Our daily- bread depends as never before on a comprehension of physical and biological phenomena. The average man, not the expert alone, must be scientific. This will be even more true for our children.
The world's intellectual life has always been tremendously stimulated by Nature13. Our declaration of mental independence is her gift. Our aesthetic sensibilities are reactions to her stimuli. Our moral sentiments are conditioned by her revelations to us. Can we but bring the child into sympathetic touch with her, open his eyes to her beauties, lead him to see the significance of his daily environment, no less wonderful than commonplace, teach him to think in terms of actualities and be obedient to the dictum of her facts, guide him to a realization of her might, mystery and brooding care, can we do but a tithe of all this we shall educate that child. Nature-Study strives for this. It asks that the child be left in part at least in the care of Nature who has been the
beneficent instructor of the race.
Editor's Note: I have a headache now. I'm going to go outside and listen to the birds sing while some portion of Nature still remains outside the 'conquest' of idiots from New Jersey.
