“See-Saw”
Straley reports, “A kindred scenario of rowdy children judged by a tree appears in a story from the final series of Gatty’s Straley elaborates, “See-Saw” (1871) introduces a tree stump, used as the base for a see-saw, complaining about the children who ride the plank and “do nothing but play pranks and enjoy themselves” (II.120). Wakened by his grumbling residuum of a felled tree, a snail named Sir Helix Hortensis comforts the stump by telling him that he performs a noble duty “holding them both [the plank and the children] up, which is more than they can do for themselves [II.121].”The tree stumps’, which is personified, role of bearing the weight of the kids and the plank exemplifies the instrumental role of nature in the children’s life. In the absence of the stumps, the kids would not enjoy themselves. The life of the tree and the children’s lives are intertwined; nature supports children’s childhood and their happiness like the stump.
“Lamarckian Hierarchy"
Straley explains, “ Life and Her Children and Winners in Life’s Race rely on a Lamarckian hierarchy of animals, but they innovatively rank species according to their commitment to parenting: from the insect who "has no interest in her children after they are born" and the fish guilty of "casting their eggs to the bottom of the sea" all the way up to the gestating mammalian mother who ensures that her unborn babies "go wherever she goes, the food which she takes feeds them, and they lie hidden, safe from danger, till they are born, perfectly formed, into the world." The hierarchy denotes the evolution of maternal instinct. In some creatures, the instinct is strong whereas in others it is non-existent. The instinct denotes the divergence between motherhood and fatherhood and it governs the nature of the bonds which mothers (both animals and human) form with their offspring.
“Girl Scouts”
Straley writes, "Mitchell writes that within the first year of the Boy Scouts, six thousand or so girls had independently followed the Scouting rules, performed the tasks, and wrote to the headquarters requesting badges. Like Buckley's fierce tigress, these girls did not seem worried that being physically capable would desex them…Agnes Baden-Powell's and Low's handbook for Guides and Girl Scouts could assert: "it is the duty of each one of us, both for our own sakes, and for the benefit of the future generations, to perfect our physical frame." The girl scouts are determined to transcend their biological sex when they engage in counting activities that transform their physical frames. The girls are motivated because the spouting engagements would be beneficial to their futures as mothers. Their dedication to excelling in scouting is comparable to the ferociousness that is exhibited by tigresses.
“Darwinism in the Nursery”
Straley states, “Darwinism in the Nursery” (1891) argues that the intensity of the infant’s grip, the muscularity of his arms, and his smaller lower limbs present “a striking resemblance to a well-known picture of the celebrated chimpanzee ‘Sally’ at the Zoological gardens. In “Babies and Monkeys” (1894) Buckman claims that “the scar which the loss of the tail has left on children’s bodies” links babies to a particular class of primates.” Morphological similarities between babies and primates imply that human species originated from primates. The comparisons influenced the literary works completed during Darwin’s time. Moreover, Darwin’s theories influenced pedagogical frameworks too.
