Publisher's Synopsis
Principles An excellent book of biology for the elementary school pupil and for beginning classes in agriculture and horticulture is concealed under the rather unconventional and unscholastic title "Plant and Animal Children: How They Grow," by Ellen Torelle. We are quite ready to accept the author's assertion that instruction such as this little book conveys is greatly needed in all our schools. This book "aims to make clear the ideas of evolution, heredity, variation, effect of environment, and the evolution of sex without once mentioning these names.
-"Review of Reviews and World's Work," Volume 47
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An excerpt from the PREFACE.
This book attempts to express in simple language the essential facts and principles of growth and development in plant and animal life and to show the relation of these facts and principles to human life. It is written especially for the pupils of the elementary schools. It aims to make clear the ideas of evolution, heredity, variation, effect of environment, and the evolution of sex, without once mentioning these names. In this it is a departure from that tradition in education which has held that such ideas are the exclusive prerogative of the college-bred. The author has demonstrated in practical work in the public schools that children are not only greatly interested in the study of plant and animal life when this study is progressive and related to human life and its problems, but that children are also able to comprehend the subject- matter of botany and zoology when this is expressed in language suitable to their comprehension.
The need for instruction in morals in the schools is receiving widespread recognition. Morals have their foundation in life phenomena and can be taught adequately only with reference to these phenomena. A survey of the whole range of plant and animal life teaches the child inductively that all life, and therefore also human life, is governed by fixed laws, and that ignorance or transgression of these brings its certain penalty....
