950 



Rural School Leaflet. 



HOME GARDENS 



The public garden, whether on school grounds or on vacant lots or 

 in parks, should be the place in v.-hich children receive instruction in the 

 growing of plants, that their knowledge may be used on the home 

 grounds. In the school-garden should be grown types of shrubbery 

 and flowering plants, as well as vegetables, that children may learn 

 something of them. They will then be able to utilize their knowledge 

 wherever they may be in after years. 



Encourage children to have gardens at home if possible. There 

 they should plant the things they want to grow, vegetables, flowers, 

 vines, shrubs, or trees. With very little effort a teacher willl be able 

 to get the children interested in growing at least one or two things the 

 first year. In the Ithaca schools thousands of penny packets of seeds 

 are given out in the spring, and the children seem to have an increased 

 interest in buying them as the years go by. 



In some comimunities the civic improvement society encourages the 

 children in gardening by offering prizes for the best home gardens. A 

 committee is appointed to visit the gardens and to take sufficient interest 

 in them to be able to judge the merits of each at the close of the season. 

 It would be difficult for the public school teacher to take this extra work, 

 since visiting the gardens would necessarily demand a good deal of times 

 but if the civic improvement society will work with the public schools, 

 the teachers will be willing to give their co-operation. If the season's 

 work is closed by a flower and vegetable show, it adds greatly to the 

 interest. 



