ORAL EXERCISES.

Which is the north side of the schoolroom? Which is the south side? Who sits to the north of you? To the south?

In what direction do the pupils face? On which side of your schoolroom is the teacher's table? Which sides have no windows? Which sides have no doors?

If a room has a fireplace in the middle of the east side, which side of the room faces the fire? Suppose the wind is blowing from the north, in what direction will the smoke go?

In what direction from the schoolhouse is the playground?

What is the first street or road north of the school? The first street or road east? South? West?

In what direction is your home from the school? The school from your home? The nearest church from the school? The post office from your home?

LESSON III.

HOW THE STARS SHOW DIRECTION.

You have learned how to tell north, south, east, and west by the sun; but how can we tell these directions at night?

Ask some one to point out to you a group of seven bright stars in the north part of the sky. Some people think that this group of stars looks like a wagon and three horses; others say that it looks like a plow.

The proper name of the group containing these seven stars is the Great Bear. The group was given this name because men at first thought it looked like a bear with a long tail.

These seven stars are called the Dipper. It is a part of a larger group called the Great Bear. Find the two bright twinkling stars farthest from its handle. A line drawn through them will point to another star, not quite so bright, called the North Star. That star is always in the north; so by it, on a clear night, you can tell the other directions at once.

Write on your slates:

Sailors out on the sea at night often find direction by looking at the North Star.

LESSON IV.

HOW THE COMPASS SHOWS DIRECTION.

But there are times when it is cloudy, and neither the sun nor the stars can be seen. How can we tell direction then?

Have you ever seen a compass? It is a box in which is a little needle swinging on the top of a pin. When this needle is at rest, one end of it points to the north.

As the needle shows where the north is; it is easy to find the south, the east, or the west.

With the compass as a guide, the sailor, in the darkest night, can tell in what direction he is going.

North, south, east, and west are called the chief points of the compass.

Other directions are northeast, halfway between north and east; northwest, halfway between north and west; southeast, halfway between south and east; and southwest, halfway between south and west.

Write on your slates:

The chief points of the compass are north, south, east, and west.

Other directions are northeast, southeast, southwest, and northwest.

Sailors find their way over the ocean by the help of the compass.

LESSON V.

QUESTIONS ON DIRECTION.

Your teacher will give you time to discover answers to these questions. She could tell you, but it is better to find them out for yourself.

If I go out of doors, how can I find the north? How can I find it on a starlight night? How can I find it on pleasant days? How on rainy days? How does a sailor find the north?

If you were lost and knew your home was north, how would you find it? Do you know how hunters and Indians who live a great deal in the woods find out where the north is? When you are in the woods, notice the amount of moss on the north side of trees as compared to that on the south side.

As winter approaches; many of our birds will want to go to a warmer country; in what direction will they fly? Point to where ice and snow have their home. What direction is that?

In what direction does your shadow fall at sunrise? At sunset? At noon? When, during the day, is your shadow shortest?

In what direction does your shadow extend from yourself when it is shortest?

What time of day is noon? How can we tell when it is noon? When is the sun highest in the sky?

What may we discover by watching the direction of the smoke from the chimneys? What does a vane on a steeple tell us? What is a north wind? A south wind? An east wind? A west wind?

What kind of weather may be expected from a north wind? From a south wind? From an east wind? From a west wind?

LESSON VI.

WHAT THE WINDS BRING.

Comes the north wind, snowflakes bringing: Robes the fields in purest white, Paints grand houses, trees, and mountains On our window-panes at night.

Hills and vales the east wind visits, Brings them chilly, driving rain; Shivering cattle homeward hurry, Onward through the darkening lane.

Heat the south wind kindly gives us; Reddens apples, gilds the pear, Gives the grape a richer purple, Scatters plenty everywhere.

Flowers sweet the west wind offers, Peeping forth from vines and trees; Brings the butterflies so brilliant, And the busy, humming bees.

Each wind brings his own best treasure To our land from year to year; Blessings many without measure E'er attend the winds' career.

Lillian Cox.

"Whichever way the wind doth blow. Some heart is glad to have it so; And blow it east or blow it west, The wind that blows, that wind is best."

Write all that you can tell about the wind.

What was the direction of the wind during the last snow-storm? Why is the north wind cold? Why is the south wind warm?

LESSON VII.

HOW TO TELL DISTANCE.

To tell where a place is, we must know its direction. But this is not all; we must also know how far it is from us; that is; its distance. To find this out we measure.

You have often heard of an inch, a foot, and a yard. This line is one inch long |--------|. Your ruler is twelve inches long, that is a foot. Three lengths of your ruler make a yard. A yard stick is three feet long.

With these measures you can tell how long your slate or your desk is, or how long and wide the schoolroom is.

The inch, foot, and yard are used for measuring short distances. But when we wish to tell the distance between objects far apart, we use another measure called a mile. A mile is much longer than a yard.

Think of some object that is a mile from our schoolhouse. How long would it take you to walk that distance?

ORAL EXERCISES.

How many inches long is your slate? How long is your desk? How many feet long is your room? How wide is it? What is the distance around the room? How many feet wide is each window? Each door? How many yards wide is the nearest street or road?

About what is the height of the schoolroom? Of the schoolhouse? Of the tallest tree near by? Of the nearest church spire?

About how long is the longest street in the town where you live? Do you know how many blocks or squares make a mile? Name the nearest river or creek. Give its direction from the school. In what direction does the water run? Give the direction and distance of the nearest church. What must you know to go to any place?

NOTE.--Have pupils estimate distances by the eye, then verify by actual measurement. Continue the exercises until the work becomes quite accurate. Correct ideas of distance are necessary in order to understand how large the world is, and how far apart places are on its surface.

LESSON VIII.

PICTURES AND PLANS.

You all know what a picture is. But do you know what a plan is?

A little boy wanted to show his cousin, who lived some miles away; the shape and size of his house, and how the rooms were arranged. How could he do this?

On a large sheet of white paper, he placed lines of blocks in the form of his house. Then, with a lead pencil, he drew a line on the paper along the sides of the blocks. He next took up the blocks, and there, on the paper, was a plan of his house.

Here is a picture of a schoolroom. We see desks, the teacher's table, a chair, a clock, globe, and two maps, in the picture. The picture shows these objects as they would appear if we stood at the door behind the teacher's table and looked in.

This is a plan of the schoolroom, a picture of which is shown above. You see, the plan and picture are quite different.

The picture shows the objects as we see them before us. The plan shows where the objects are, and their direction from one another.

Now let us see if we can make a plan of the same schoolroom on the blackboard.

The first thing is to measure the sides of the room. We will suppose the two long sides are each forty feet long, and the two short sides each thirty feet long. Now we will draw four straight lines on the board for the four sides. Of course, the lines must be much shorter than the sides themselves, else our plan will be too large.

Make one inch in the plan stand for one foot in the room. So the lines for the long sides will each be forty inches long, and the lines for the short sides thirty inches long.

The next thing is to make spaces in the sides for the door and the windows, and oblongs for the desks. But we must remember that an inch in our plan stands for a foot in the object itself, and therefore we must allow as many inches for the width of doors and windows, and for the length and width of the desks, as there are feet in the objects themselves. Thus, if the door is three feet wide, we must make it three inches wide in our plan.

And lastly, we will draw a circle for the globe, and an oblong and square for the teacher's table and chair, that shall show just where and just how long these objects are.