188 NATURE STUDY REVIEW [9:6— Sept., 1913 



among other things education should create in the boy or girl 

 several wholesome and permanent interests^ — thus affording them 

 pleasant occupation for their leisure moments. The big cities 

 afford only too many mediocre attraction for the child, as well 

 as the man of leisure, and if the children do not have some whole- 

 some interests to indulge in for entertainment and past time, 

 some will be found going in the direction of these attrac- 

 tions. 



I believe, the creation in the child of a permanent interest in 

 plant culture, is one of the most important functions of the School 

 Garden Movement. Once we create, in the children, this perma- 

 nent interest in plant culture, we have done much toward giving 

 them pleasant occupation for their leisure moments and we have 

 solved, once for all, the problem of beautifying otir cities. I do 

 not mean to say that every child will want to make gardening or 

 some phase of gardening his hobby, but I firmly believe that, 

 if only the work is properly administered,- all will find in plant 

 culture a permanent interest, — one that is most absorbing and 

 extremely fascinating. 



Judge Caldwell of the juvenile court of Cincinnati, says, that 

 whereas, before establishment of playgrounds, three or four 

 juvenile delinquents were sent to him, each week, from certain 

 districts, now, since the establishment of playgrounds, none are 

 sent from these districts. I am told by many, in charge of school 

 gardens near playgrounds, that children will leave the play- 

 grounds to work in the gardens. This in itself is proof that the 

 garden work is most alluring and fascinating to the child. 



But why should not this interest be permanent? In all the 

 visits made this past summer I nowhere recall seeing boys or girls 

 above the age of fourteen years working in the garden. At places 

 I was told it was not wise to take into the garden children above 

 14 or 15 years of age, since they would be but little interested in 

 the work. I think I can see a reason for this lack of interest among 

 older boys and girls. In the school gardens, where these condi- 

 tions exist, the plots assigned to each were of a certain given size 

 and shape, with a certain fixed number of rows, each containing 

 a certain fixed number of plants. A certain vegetable, and no 

 other, must be in the first row. And the same is true of all the 

 other rows. Can we wonder that the children tire of this after a 

 couple of years? 



