AGRICULTURE IN PUBLIC SCHOOLS 



By W. C. LATTA 



Professor of Agriculture, Purdue University, Lafayette, Ind. 



Agriculture is a very comprehensive term. It means sometimes 

 merely the cultivation of the soil for food products; sometimes the 

 several activities of the farm; sometimes the oldest and largest of the 

 three great industries of the human race; and sometimes the science 

 of the culture of the soil. 



None of these meanings will serve for the present discussion. In 

 order that we may think and speak to the point, let us attempt to de- 

 fine, or illustrate, just what is meant by agriculture in the public 

 schools. As makers of definitions, however, let us remember how 

 difficult it is to include and exclude aright. 



We will exclude, largely, the theory, business and economics of 

 agriculture. We will dismiss, also, the technique of agriculture, as, 

 for example, the aims, means, and methods of agriculture practice and 

 the problems of farm management. We will include the phenomena 

 and forces of nature as they actually exist, having in mind first, 

 those most familiar, and later those less known. Then, too, as the 

 normal child is forever asking "why," we will include the relations 

 of phenomena and forces — especially those of cause and effect. Our 

 subject will, also, include the effect of environment on the life of the 

 child, on all life, and on the practice and products of the farm. Our 

 subject will further include the story of nature as a whole and in her 

 various moods, so far as they come within the scope of the child's 

 mind, and vitally, or strikingly, affect or impress him. The keynote 

 of the subject "agriculture in the public schools" should be nature- 

 study; and the minor chord, agriculture. 



At first the child is led to observe and study nature's forces from 

 the standpoint of himself —how they affect his comfort, his pleasures) 

 or his plans. Little by little the true teacher will lead the child to 

 see how these same forces affect the lives of plants and animals, his 

 schoolmates, and men and women, and also how they affect the 

 operations and results of the farmer. 



Thus led, the unfolding mind of the pupil will come to discern 

 more clearly the relations of phenomena to natural forces, the wider 



