The Educational screen (c1922-c1956])

February, 1939 Page 45 The Ocean Comes to School HKiH school biolog>- courses no longer require memorization of innumerable scientific names of orders and classes, and the intricate study of the anatomy of an organism representing each type. Svllabi called variously General Biolt^y. Social Bio- log\-. Functional Bic>log>-. are rapidly replacing the old structural type of zoologj-botany. But even in these new courses—which attempt to bring out the unity of life, and the relationship and interdejiendence of man with all other organisms.—there remains of necessity a unit describing the variety of living forms. Students meet the names of the phyla, and attempt to classify the animals they know in the pro]x?r places. This is easv enough witii the horse, oyster, daddy-long-legs, anfi even liat. They know what they look like, and with a bit of logical reasoning can fit them into the de- scriptions of the phyla and important clas.ses. Vet thev are asked also to classify the sea anemone, sea- urchin, barnacle and starfish. Xo amount of logic will allow them to locate sensibly animals which are to them only names. Mere rote is the only solution. And mere rote does not help to establish an organized understanding of biologic principles, nor even a last- ing knowledge of simple facts. Our first solution for this problem was the purchase of an aquarium ass<irtment of living marine forms through a supply house from Woods Hole Marine Biological Laboraton.-. Here was the perfect demon- stration of tide water animals unknown to our inland pupils. Radially SMnmetrical starfish with spiny skins crawled along the glass, even digested bits of clam in plain sight of observers: spiny-skinnetl sea-cucumbers occasionally waved radially symmetrical tentacles in search of food; sea-urchins flourished on invisible nourishment. .\ll were readily identifiable as echino- derms. Hennit crabs scuttled about the bottom. Self- cemented to the glass, clams early became permanent residents. .\ horse-shoe crab, with its prominent exo- skeleton and two-sectional body, burrowed often in the sand. When disturbed, sea-anemones demon- strated their cfimplete lack of skeleton by contracting to a naval-like button : yet they expanded again to take f<:od into their hollow interior and cast oflF the remains through the same mouth through which they had re- ceived it. This was teaching material of the best visual typ)e. It had. however, one serious drawback. Familiarity should precede induced principles, and the children shoukl know the animals before they attempted to classify them. But marine aquaria will not live in wann weather, and our unit on the variety of life was first in the course and came in mild September. We The growing use of camera by teachers il- lustrated in the field of biological science By HOLGER and DOROTHY VAN ALLER* High School, Saratoga Springs, New York could not. if we wishetl to keep the specimens alive for more tlian a day or two. buy tlie animals until Decem- ber or Januar}-. They had not then their maximum value. Tlie next year's pupils liad more help at a better time. Starfish again crawled on the glass and pushed their stomachs out and around a bit of food; ane- mones again contracted and expanded: hermit crabs again scuttled on the sand. Now. however, they were demonstrating their habits of living on the screen in- stead of on the windowsill; and they were doing it in September when their study gave most incentive to learning. We liad taken movies of the animals with the aid of the title-card attachment on our inexpen- sive camera. When freezing weather and our marine assortment came together, there was even more in- terest than before in the living animals. Upon their death, at various times from two weeks to six months, the animals were preserved in fonnalin as permanent study specimens. It took still another year for our tide-water exhibit to reach its present fomi. We had the opportunity to visit Acadia National Park on Mt. Desert Island dur- ing the summer. From the top of Mt. Cadillac the far-reaching view of Maine's infinitely repeated inlets and islands enraptured us. though not so much as * Holirer V«n Aller teaches science in the Sarmtoea Sprines High ScbooL MTk. Van Aller. who has also taasrht. works with him in photojrraphy. On the Maine Coast, where photos of tide-water animals were made at low tide. did the closeups of the shore from Otter Point Drive. There pink granite rocks were sprayed with blue water splashing white. In pools left by the lowered tide cursor},- examination showed life; and more thorough inspection, anemones and limpets and urchins. We walked on barnacles and on whelks clinging to slippery rockwort. Anemone Cave we found appropriately named. .\ week later we returned after careful study of tlie