ebel, _Education of Man_, page 79.

The mind in later childhood should be what Froebel describes his own
to have been. "I often felt," he says, "as if my mind were a smooth,
still pool scarce a handbreadth over, or even a single water-drop, in
which surrounding things were clearly mirrored, while the blue vault
of the sky was seen as well, reaching far away and above."

When the derivation of plane and of straight and curved line and their
place in the gifts are clearly understood by the child, there will be
no difficulty in gaining an equally clear apprehension of the point
and its position in the series. This may be done somewhat as follows.
When the children are playing with blocks on some occasion, we may
direct the conversation to the essential characteristics of the cube,
its faces, edges, and corners. Do they remember which one of their
playthings is like the face of the cube; do they remember cutting clay
tablets from the clay blocks?

It is most unlikely that this experiment will have been forgotten, but
if it has been, it may be easily repeated. Speak next of the edges of
the cube, and let the children recall the derivation of the stick.
That portion of the cube not yet discussed will now be seized upon by
the children, and they will ask if any of their playthings are like
the cube's corners. Can they think of anything; shall we not try to
make something?

Now the clay appears, cubes are quickly fashioned, and each child is
allowed to cut off the eight corners of his block. He has no sooner
done this than he sees the nearest approach we can make to a point,
and proceeds to make a design from them while he recalls the beans,
shells, lentils, etc., he has used before in a similar way.

It is well here to suggest making the bits of clay into tiny oblate
spheroids, and laying them away to dry so that we may make a group
work invention of them to-morrow. Better still, however, is the
instant introduction of sticks or wires to connect with the clay
points, and thus form at once the skeleton of the solid, which will
give an ineffaceable impression of the relation of point and line to
each other.

Pleasure of Child in Point-laying and Stringing.

The pleasure the child finds in point-laying is not confined to the
kindergarten, for playing with beads and pin-heads is an ordinary
nursery occupation in all countries, and which of us cannot recall
long happy hours on the seashore, or by the brookside, when we
g