college students in psychology. The class
thought the stranger was to address them, and looked at him with mild
curiosity. But, after standing before them for a few moments, he
suddenly withdrew, as had been arranged by the instructor. The class
were then asked to write such a description of the stranger as would
enable a person who had never seen him to identify him. But so poor had
been the observation of the class that they ascribed to him clothes of
four different colors, eyes and hair each of three different colors, a
tie of many different hues, height ranging from five feet and four
inches to over six feet, age from twenty-eight to forty-five years, and
many other details as wide of the mark. Nor is it probable that this
particular class was below the average in the power of perception.

SCHOOL TRAINING IN PERCEPTION.--The school can do much in training the
perception. But to accomplish this, the child must constantly be brought
into immediate contact with the physical world about him and taught to
observe. Books must not be substituted for things. Definitions must not
take the place of experiment or discovery. Geography and nature study
should be taught largely out of doors, and the lessons assigned should
take the child into the open for observation and investigation. All
things that live and grow, the sky and clouds, the sunset colors, the
brown of upturned soil, the smell of the clover field, or the new mown
hay, the sounds of a summer night, the distinguishing marks by which to
identify each family of common birds or breed of cattle--these and a
thousand other things that appeal to us from the simplest environment
afford a rich opportunity for training the perception. And he who has
learned to observe, and who is alert to the appeal of nature, has no
small part of his education already assured.

6. PROBLEMS IN OBSERVATION AND INTROSPECTION

1. Test your power of observation by walking rapidly past a well-filled
store window and then seeing how many of the objects you can name.

2. Suppose a tailor, a bootblack, a physician, and a detective are
standing on the street corner as you pass by. What will each one be most
likely to observe about you? _Why?_

3. Observe carefully green trees at a distance of a few rods; a quarter
of a mile; a mile; several miles. Describe differences (1) in color, (2)
in brightness, or light, and (3) in detail.

4. How many common birds can you identify? How many kinds of tre