ABSTRACT
The ever-growing part played by the mental powers in looking at pictures is shown by manifold signs. The power of perception grows, not as a result of the development of sense-organs and sense-impressions, but as a result of the increase in recognition, differentiation and vocabulary, in the synthetic power of attention and in thought. A picture containing a large number of details is far beyond a child's powers in its second year. By far the greater part escapes the attention, either because the object does not stand out clearly enough from the background, or because the child's eye, at one glance, can only take in quite a small portion of the whole picture. The interest in one picture and the attention bestowed on it weary very quickly and the child asks for other pictures. Psychological considerations furnish us with some suggestions as to the educational use of pictures in early childhood.
