Our own children used to settle this by taking out the furniture, etc., and arranging different homes around the room.  I can remember the never-ending pleasure given by similar play in my own nursery days, when the actors were the men and boys supplied by tailors’ advertisements.  Many and varied were the experiences of these paper families, families, it may be noted, none of whom demeaned themselves so far as to possess any womankind.  For that nursery party of five had lost its mother sadly early and was ruled by two boys, who evidently thought little of the other sex.

Professor Dewey tells us that “nothing is more absurd than to suppose that there is no middle term between leaving a child to his unguided fancies, or controlling his activities by a formal succession of dictated directions.”  It is the teacher’s business to know what is striving for utterance and to supply the needed stimulus and materials.

To show how under the inspiration of a thoroughly capable teacher this continuity may be secured and prolonged for quite a long period, an example may be taken from the work of Miss Janet Payne, who is remarkably successful in meeting and stimulating, without in any way forcing the “striving for utterance” mentioned by Dewey.  On this occasion Miss Payne produced a doll about ten inches high, dressed to resemble the children’s fathers, and suggested that a home should be made for him.  The children adopted him with zeal, named him Mr. Bird, and his career lasted for two years.

Mr. Bird required a family, so Mrs. Bird had to be produced with her little girl Winnie, and later a baby was added to the family.  Beds, tables and chairs, including a high chair for Winnie, were made of scraps from the wood box, and for a long time Mr. Bird was most domesticated.  Miss Payne had used ordinary dolls’ heads, but had constructed the bodies herself in such a way that the dolls could sit and stand, and use their arms to wield a broom or hold the baby.  After some time, one child said, “Mr. Bird ought to go to business,” and after much deliberation he became a grocer.  His shop was made and stocked, and he attended it every day, going home to dinner regularly.  One day he appeared to be having a meal on the shop counter, and it was explained that he had been “rather in a hurry” in the morning, so Mrs. Bird had given him his breakfast to take with him.  The Bird family had various adventures, they had spring cleanings, removals, visited the Zoo and went to the seaside.  One morning a little fellow sat in a trolley with the Bird family beside him for three-quarters of an hour evidently “imagining.”  I did inquire in passing if it was a drive or a picnic, but the answer was so brief, that I knew I was an interruption and retired.  But a younger and bolder inquirer, who wanted to conduct an experiment in modelling, ventured to ask if Mr. Bird wanted anything that could be made “at clay modelling.”  “Yes, he wants some ink-pots for his post-office shop,” was the answer, with the slightly irate addition, “but I wish you’d call it the china factory.”