[The need for a map will come early in the first part of the course, and the need for a globe in the second.] HISTORY This grows naturally out of the geography syllabus and might be taken side by side or afterwards. The development of industries. The growth of spinning and weaving from the simplest processes, bringing in the distaff, spinning-wheel, and loom. The making of garments from the joining together of furs. The growth of pottery and the development of cooking. The growth of roads and means of transit. [This will involve a good deal of experimental and constructive handwork.] CHAPTER XXVI EXPERIENCES RECORDED AND PASSED ON Reading and writing are held to have lifted man above the brute; they are the means by which we can discover and record human experience and progress, and as such their value is incalculable. But in themselves they are artificial conventions, symbols invented for the convenience of mankind, and to acquire them we need exercise no great mental power. A good eye and ear memory, and a certain superficial quickness to recognise and apply previous knowledge, is all that is needed for reading and spelling; while for writing, the development of a specialised muscular skill is all that is necessary. In themselves they do not as a rule hold any great interest for a child: sometimes they have the same puzzle interest as a long addition sum, and to children of a certain type, mechanical work such as writing gives relief; one of the most docile and uninteresting of little boys said that writing was his favourite subject, and it was easy to understand: he did not want to be stirred out of his commonplaceness; unconsciously he had assimilated the atmosphere and adopted the standards of his surroundings, which were monotonous and commonplace in the extreme, and so he desired no more adventurous method of expression than the process of writing, which he could do well. Imitation is often a strong incentive to reading, it is part of the craving for grown-upness to many children; they desire to do what their brothers and sisters can do. But _during the first stage of childhood, roughly up to the age of six or even later, no child needs to learn to read or write, taking "need" in the psychological sense:_ that period is concerned with laying the foundation of real things and with learning surroundings;--any records of experience that come to a child can come as they did to his earliest forefathers--by word of mouth. When he wants to read stories for himself, or write his own letters, then he is impelled by a sufficiently strong aim or incentive to make concentration possible, without resorting to any of the fantastic devices and apparatus so dear to so many teachers. Indeed it is safe to say of many of these devices that they prove the fact that children are not ready for reading.