EXPERIMENT STATION RECORD. 



Vol. XXA^I. July, 1912. No. 1. 



One of tlie significant educational developments of recent years has 

 been the increasing recognition accorded to instruction in home eco- 

 nomics. Although the term itself was unfamiliar a generation ago, 

 at the present time home economics courses are being offered in this 

 country in more than twelve hundred institutions, of which over two 

 hundred are colleges and normal schools. Thirty-five of the land- 

 grant colleges for white students are among the number, and twenty- 

 seven of these offer four-year courses leading to degrees. Extension 

 work has likewise been well organized in many of the States, largely 

 with a view to reaching the women on the farm. In short, home eco- 

 nomics instruction is already emerging from the pioneer stage and 

 becoming an accepted factor in iVmerican education. 



One of the principal obstacles which educators are encountering in 

 their efforts to reduce the subject to sound pedagogical form is the 

 comparatively retarded development of experimental work. It is 

 well recognized that, as is the case with agriculture and other com- 

 posite branches of learning, home economics is largely a specific ap- 

 plication of the principles of chemistry, bacteriology, physics, and 

 other sciences; but, as is also the case with agriculture, there are 

 required to make it most effective special investigations and experi- 

 ments, made from the standpoint of those who appreciate the needs 

 and use to be made of such information. 



Considering home economics as including the economic, sanitary, 

 and esthetic aspects of food, clothing, and shelter as connected with 

 their selection, preparation, and use b}- the famil}^ in the home or by 

 other groups of people, it is a matter of everyday knowledge that 

 many of its practical applications are still largely governed by rule- 

 of-thumb or by tradition. For example, the laws of heat are well 

 understood in the scientific world, but their application to cookery, 

 food preservation, or the heating of houses needs far more investiga- 

 tion than it has thus far received. The present is preeminently the 

 era of machinery, but the improvement of household appliances has 



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