traws--as
can be brought into a school room. All the world, especially the
outside world, becomes

"A complex Chinese toy
Fashioned for a barefoot boy."

Many of the most interesting objects and phenomena in nature and of
man's construction can not be observed in the school room at all, for
instance, the river, the bridge, the forest, the flight of birds, the
sunrise, the storm, the stars, etc. Still they must know these very
things and know how to use them better in constructing the mind's
treasures than they are wont to do. In reading, grammar, geography,
arithmetic, and nature study, we desire to ground school discussions
daily upon the clear facts of experience, of personal observation. We
need to clear up all confused and faulty perceptions and to stimulate
children to make their future observations more reliable.

We have already seen the importance of object lessons in this full and
real sense to _interest_. Interest in every study is awakened and
constantly reenforced by an appeal, not to books, but to life. Much of
the dull work in arithmetic, geography, and other studies is due to the
neglect of these real, illustrative materials.

Of the six great sources of interest, (Herbart's) three, the
_empirical_, the _esthetic_, and the _sympathetic_, deal entirely with
concrete objects or with individuals, while even the _speculative_ and
_social_ interests are often based directly upon particular persons or
phenomena. In addition to this it may be said that the interests of
children are overwhelmingly with the concrete and imaginative phases of
every subject, and only secondarily with general truths and laws. The
latter are of greater concern to older children and adults. Object
lessons therefore contain a life-giving element that should enter into
every subject of study.

Nor should these interesting, illustrative object lessons be limited to
the lower grades. They contain the combustible material upon which an
abiding interest in any subject is to be kindled. There are indeed
other and perhaps higher sources of interest, but they are largely
dependent upon these original springs that flow from the concrete
beginnings.

In the second place, object lessons supply a stock of _primary ideas_
which form the foundation of all later progress in knowledge. This is
not a question of interest merely, but of _understanding_, of capacity
to get at the meaning of an idea. Concepts are not the raw mate