by no means the same thing as "any external
work or production whatsoever."

This is the aim which underlies my method of infant education, and it
is for this reason that certain principles which it enunciates,
together with that part which deals with the technique of their
practical application, are not of a general character, but have
special reference to the particular case of the child from three to
seven years of age, _i.e._, to the needs of a formative period of
life.

My method is scientific, both in its substance and in its aim. It
makes for the attainment of a more advanced stage of progress, in
directions no longer only material and physiological. It is an
endeavor to complete the course which hygiene has already taken, but
in the treatment of the physical side alone.

If to-day we possessed statistics respecting the nervous debility,
defects of speech, errors of perception and of reasoning, and lack of
character in normal children, it would perhaps be interesting to
compare them with statistics of the same nature, but compiled from the
study of children who have had a number of years of rational
education. In all probability we should find a striking resemblance
between such statistics and those to-day available showing the
decrease in mortality and the improvement in the physical development
of children.

A "CHILDREN'S HOUSE"

The "Children's House" is the _environment_ which is offered to the
child that he may be given the opportunity of developing his
activities. This kind of school is not of a fixed type, but may vary
according to the financial resources at disposal and to the
opportunities afforded by the environment. It ought to be a real
house; that is to say, a set of rooms with a garden of which the
children are the masters. A garden which contains shelters is ideal,
because the children can play or sleep under them, and can also bring
their tables out to work or dine. In this way they may live almost
entirely in the open air, and are protected at the same time from rain
and sun.

The central and principal room of the building, often also the only
room at the disposal of the children, is the room for "intellectual
work." To this central room can be added other smaller rooms according
to the means and opportunities of the place: for example, a bathroom,
a dining-room, a little parlor or common-room, a room for manual work,
a gymnasium and rest-room.

The special characteristic of t