Page:Elementary Color (IA gri c00033125012656167).djvu/99

 practically accomplished before much time is devoted to the consideration of such materials as flowers, fabrics and miscellaneous papers, because until the child understands both hues and tones he can do nothing in either analyzing or naming colors.

As soon as these six scales are familiar to the pupil the selecting of various objects and placing them in general families may be very valuable work, but until that time the classification of colors cannot be carried out very accurately, or at best the families will be very likely to include some uncles, and cousins and aunts, and yet, on the other hand, if even the distant relatives are recognized in preference to strangers the choice will give evidence of a sympathetic feeling for color relations, favorable to future progress and indicating something of the natural color sense of the child.

If such occupations as paper cutting and pasting, or weaving of mats have a place in the school, combinations in two or three tones of the six standards can now be made. At this stage names are of little importance, but they will come in play early, as it is natural to give names to everything, and as soon as the child knows the definite names which belong to colors they will be used.

Immediately following the first idea of tints and shades or tones, the grays should have attention, because in the occupations with papers they will play an important part. For this purpose white, black and the neutral gray papers are included in Selection No. 2 of the paper tablets and should be made familiar to the children while the tints and shades are beingstudied. The suggestion that a neutral gray is a tint of black or a shade of white may or may not aid a child to better understand the relation of the neutral grays to the color chart, but it is a thought worthy the attention of the teacher, as expressing a fact important in the consideration of color impressions. This gray may also be illustrated on the wheel by the