[Illustration:  Pattern of a modelling apron]

[Sidenote:  Gardens]

In still another way the earth may be utilized, for children may make gardens of it.  Indeed, there are those who say that no child’s education is complete until he has had a garden of his own and grown in it all sorts of seeds from pansies to potatoes.  But a garden is too much for a young child to care for all alone.  He needs the help, advice, and companionship of some older person.  You must be careful, however, to give help only when it is really desired; and careful also not to let him feel that the garden is a task to which he is driven daily, but a joy that draws him.

[Sidenote:  Kites Windmills Soap-bubbles]

(2) The Air.  The next important plaything is the air.  The kite and the balloon are only two instruments to help the child play with it.  Little windmills made of colored paper and stuck by means of a pin at the end of a whittled stick, make satisfactory toys.  One of their great advantages is that even a very young child can make them for himself.  Blowing soap-bubbles is another means of playing with air.  By giving the children woolen mittens the bubbles may be caught and tossed about as well as blown.

(3) Water.  Perhaps the very first thing he learns to play with is water.  Almost before he knows the use of his hands and legs he plays with water in his bath, and sucks his sponge with joy, thus feeling the water with his chief organs of touch, his mouth and tongue.  A few months later he will be glad to pour water out of a tin cup.  Even when he is two or three years old, be may be amused by the hour, by dressing him in a woolen gown, with his sleeves rolled high, and setting him down before a big bowl or his own bath-tub half full of warm water.  To this may be added a sponge, a tin cup, a few bits of wood, and some paper.  They should not be given all at once, but one at a time, the child allowed to exhaust the possibilities of each before another is added.  Still later he may be given the bits of soap left after a cake of soap is used up.  Give him also a few empty bottles or bowls and let him put them away with a solid mass of soap-suds in them and see what will happen.  When he is older—­past the period of putting everything in his mouth—­he may be given a few bits of bright ribbons, petals of artificial flowers, or any bright colored bits of cloth which can color the water.

Children love to sprinkle the grass with the hose or to water the flowers with the sprinkling can.  They enjoy also the metal fishes, ducks, and boats which may be drawn about in the water by means of a magnet.  Presently they reach the stage when they must have toy-boats, and next they long to go into real boats and go rowing and sailing.  They want to fish, wade, swim, and skate.

[Sidenote:  Dangerous Pastimes]