h medicines
are likely to do the baby much more harm than good, especially in summer
when the digestion is so easily disturbed. It is so much easier to keep the
baby well than it is to cure him when he is sick, that wise mothers try to
take such care of the baby that he will not be sick.

Do not fail to give the baby a drink of cool water several times a day in
hot weather. Boil the water first, then cool it, and offer it to the baby
in a cup, glass, or nursing bottle. Babies and young children sometimes
suffer cruelly for lack of drinking water.

LESSON VI

QUESTIONS ON TEXT

1. What are the chief causes of sickness and death among children during
the summer time?

2. What are the best preventatives for baby ills during the hot months?

3. Discuss the importance of bathing and tell how to bathe the child.

4. What is the best way to dress the child during the heated time of the
year?

5. What provisions should be made for his sleeping?

6. Discuss the use of patent medicines.

7. What should be done regarding the drink of the child? Why?

8. What can best be done by the well-to-do and by the community as a whole
to protect and preserve the babies?

_Reference_: Selections from "Child Nature and Child Nurture," by St. John.

CHILD ACTIVITY

_This Activity Is Expressed in Simple Reflexes, Complex Instincts, or
Internally Caused Impulses_

As already mentioned, the physical needs of the infant are supreme. Proper
nourishment, the right temperature, bathing, and an abundance of fresh,
pure air constitute all of his requirements. The child is endowed, however,
with an enormous capacity for movement which is the outward expression of
his awakening mental life.

The first great mental fact to note is that the infant is born with the
capacity to respond to stimuli both from without and within. Touch the lips
of the new-born child with the nipple or even the finger, and immediately
the sucking instinct takes place; let a bright light shine into the open
eye, and the iris at once contracts; plunge the little one into cold water
or let it be subject to any bodily discomfort and at once the crying reflex
takes place. The simple, direct responses to stimuli such as sneezing,
coughing, wrinkling, crying, response to tickling, etc., are termed
reflexes. The more complex responses which are purposeful and are designed
to aid or protect the organism, such as sucking, clinging, fear, anger,
etc., are ca