, page 155.

Materials of Froebel's Gifts.

As to the unpretentious little sticks themselves, the use of these
bits of waste wood is entirely unique and characteristic. No one else
would have deemed them worthy of a place in school apparatus or among
educational appliances; but Froebel had the eye and mind of a true
philosopher, ever seeing the great in the small,--ever bringing out of
the commonplace material, which lies unused on every hand, all its
inherent possibilities and capabilities of usefulness. Froebel was no
destructive reformer, but the most conservative of philosophers.

How the Stick is to be regarded.

The stick of course is to be regarded in its relation to what comes
before and after it,--as the embodied edge of the cube, as the tablet
was its embodied face. The child should at last identify his stick,
the embodiment of the straight line, with the axis of the sphere, the
edge of the cube, and the side of the square.[67] The sticks and rings
are, properly speaking, one gift, contrasting the curved and straight
lines.

[67] "Just as we obtained the tablets from the cubes, of which
they are the embodied faces, so now we obtain also the
laying-sticks from the cube, whose edges they represent. But
they are contained also in the laying-tablets, for one may
regard the surface as produced by the progressive movement of
a line, and this may be made clear to the child by slicing a
square tablet into a number of sticks."--H. Goldammer, _The
Kindergarten_, page 161.

Method and Manner of Lessons.

Although the stick exercises should make their appearance at least
once every week after their introduction, they may always be varied by
stories, and when occasionally connected with other objects, cut from
paper to illustrate some point, are among the pleasantest and most
fruitful exercises of the kindergarten.

The sticks may be used for teaching number and elementary geometry,
both in the kindergarten and school, or for reviewing and fixing
knowledge already gained in these directions, for practice in the
elements of designing, for giving a correct idea of outlines of
familiar objects, and should constantly serve as an introduction to
drawing and sewing lessons, to which they are the natural prelude.

They should be used strictly after the manner of the other gifts,
beginning with careful dictations, in which the various positions of
one stick should be exhausted befo