her and mother of the
share each should assume in the homemaking training. This necessitates
personal conferences or mothers' meetings, or both.

The little girl of primary-school age points the way for both teacher
and mother by her adaptation and imitation of home activities in her
play. In primary grades girls are approaching the height of the doll
interest, which Hall and others place at eight or nine years. A doll's
house, therefore, may be made the source of almost infinite enjoyment
and profit in these grades. Indeed it is hardly too much to say that
no primary room is complete without one. Nor is there any reason why
any school should remain without one, since its making is the simplest
of processes. Four wooden boxes, of the same size, obtained probably
from the grocer, the dry-goods merchant, or the local shoe dealer,
will make a most satisfactory house if placed in two tiers of two
each, with the open sides toward the front. This gives four rooms,
which may be furnished as kitchen, dining room, living room, and
bedroom. Windows may be cut in the ends or back, if the boys of the
school are sufficiently expert with tools or if outside assistance can
be secured for an hour or so.

The best results with the doll's house are obtained if the children
are allowed to furnish it themselves, with the teacher's advice and
help, rather than to find it completely equipped and therefore merely
a "plaything" of the sort that children have less use for because they
can do little with it. An empty house presents exciting possibilities,
and perhaps for the first time these little girls look with seeing
eyes at the home furnishings, for they have wall paper to select,
curtains and rugs to make, and indeed no end of things to do.

[Illustration: The little girl adapts and imitates home activities in
play]

It is perhaps scarcely necessary to call to mind the educational
advantages possible in the planning and making of bedding, draperies,
table linen, towels, couches and pillows, window seats, and other
furnishings, as well as in the ingenuity brought into play in evolving
kitchen utensils and in stocking the cupboards with the necessities
for housekeeping. The free interchange of ideas should be encouraged,
and the spirit of seeking the best fostered.

The conspicuous results in this work are two: we secure the child's
attention to details of housekeeping, and we build up a foundation
ideal of what housekeeping equipment