No. 7. DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULiTURB. 21 



LOCAL. AND COUNTY ORGANIZATIONS. 



The County Institute Organizations are constantly becoming more 

 efficient. This fact is evidenced by our County Chairmen who report 

 promptly full lists of Committees for carrying out more thorough 

 the work in the various sections, where Institutes and Movable 

 Schools are held. No word of mine can fully express the impetus 

 given to the institutes through the organized efforts of the County 

 Chairman by his Committees and they in turn supported by the var- 

 ious organizations of farmers, such as Granges, Farmers Clubs, 

 Unions, Horticultural and Agricultural Societies, etc., thus com- 

 bining all farm organizations and interests in the great work of ad- 

 vancing agriculture through the agency of Farmers' Institutes. 



SOCIAL, AND EDUCATIONAL.. 



The Evening Sessions of the Institute are devoted largely to Social 

 and Educational Problems, our efforts being towards the adoption 

 of a higher and more practical standard of education for the farmers' 

 children through the means of text book revision rather than ad- 

 ditional courses of study. To illustrate: The arithmetic used in the 

 country school should make use of such terms and problems for 

 solution as the scholar will be called on to handle and control in 

 after life upon the farm. Important among such problems we might 

 nnmo such as fertilizer ingredients, per cent, of nitrogen, phos- 

 phoric acid and potash, their effect on soils. A wide field for illus- 

 tration is afforded the compiler of text books when we consider 

 the great variety of Animals, Plants, Trees, Insects, Soils, Rocks and 

 Minerals, Birds and Flowers with which the farmer and his family 

 are so intimately associated with in their life work. A like principle 

 should apply to teaching physical geography, treating on altitudes 

 adapted to certain varieties of fruits and vegetation. In teaching 

 of this subject, such lines should especially apply in Pennsylvania 

 where we have greater variation of soil altitudes and climatic con- 

 ditions than most other states. We maintain that by a careful re- 

 vision of our school text books in the direction above indicated, a 

 broader view of farm life would be obtained and knowledge of many 

 of the unsolved problems in agriculture developed, thus bringing 

 a greater profit to the farm and making the farm schools of the state 

 a more potent factor in equipping and fitting the youth of the country 

 with a more thorough knowledge of agriculture. 



MOVABLE SCHOOLS. 



The following is a brief outline of the courses taken up at the 

 Movable Schools. I may say that want of time and funds has thus 

 far prevented us from completing the course in all its divisions. 

 We have learned that instruction can be given by visiting dairy 

 herds with the entire class where all have the opportunity of passing 

 upon the points of excellency or the reverse of the dairy cow. A 

 like principle holds true when visiting orchards, where methods of 

 plainting. cultivation, location, insects and fungi are thoroughly dis 

 cussed, also program of Normal Institute together with tabulated 

 data relating to dates and places where institutes were held, at- 

 tendance at same by counties, etc. 



