ject remote
from most of their senses, and only dimly visible to their eyes. Similar
lessons were given after 1870 on Froebel's gift II. in which the ball,
cylinder and cube were treated in the same manner: progress was slow,
but sometimes the children followed nature's promptings and played with
their specimens; this was followed by books of "gift-plays," where
organised play took the place of organised observation.

About 1890 or thereabouts the Nature Study movement swept over the
schools, and "nature specimens" then became the material for sense
training: as far as possible each child had a specimen, and by the
minute examination of these, stimulated their senses and stifled their
appreciation of all that was beautiful.

Question and answer still dominated the activity; the poor little
withered snowdrop took the place of the dead camphor or leather. But
underlying all the paralysing organisation the truth was slowly growing,
and the children were being brought nearer to real things.

A third phase in this transition period is that known as "correlation";
most teachers remember the elaborate programmes of work that drove them
to extremes in finding "connections." The following, taken from a
reputable book of the time, will exemplify the principle:

A WEEK'S PROGRAMME

Object Lesson The Horse.
Phonetics The Foal, _oa_ sound.
Number Problems on the work of horses.
Story The Bell of Atri [story of a horse ringing a bell].
Song Busy Blacksmith [shoeing a horse].
Game The Blacksmith's Shop.
Reading On the Horse.
Poetry Kindness to Animals.
Paper Cutting The Bell of Atri.
Paper Folding A Trough.
Free-arm Drawing A Horseshoe.
Clay Modelling A Carrot for the Horse.
Brushwork A Turnip for the Horse.
Brown Paper Drawing A Stable.

Underneath it all the truth was growing, namely, the need of making
associations and so unifying the children's lines. But the process of
finding the truth was slow and cumbersome.

A fourth phase of the early Infant School was the strong belief of both
teachers and inspectors in uniformity of work and of results. It is
difficult to disentangle this from the paralysing influences of payment
by results and large classes: it was probably the teachers' unconscious
expression of the instinct of self-preservati