1919] AGRICULTURAL EDUCATION. 195 



AGRICULTURAL EDUCATION. 



[Canadian studies in rural life for boys and girls] {Agr. Gaz. Canada, 5 

 {1918), No. 7, pp. 112-121, fig. i).— In the public schools of Prince Edward 

 Island home projects are being given preference to the garden at the school. In 

 1915 there were 156 school gardens and 2,688 home projects ; in 1916, 113 school 

 gardens and 1,60-1 home pi'ojects ; and in 1917, 93 school gardens and 2,250 home 

 projects. Home projects included in 1917 grain raising, vegetable growing, 

 beans, potatoes, flowers, poulti-y, live stock, and chores. 



The recommendations and summary of findings made in the report of the 

 commission on vocational training for boys and girls, appointed by the New 

 Brunswick Government in September, 1918, are given. In accordance with 

 these the legislature of New Bnuiswick, at its last session, passed the Voca- 

 tional Education Act, 1918, in which prevocational education is defined as mean- 

 ing the education to enable the child to select its course of study and training, 

 and vocational education as an education, the controlling purpose of which is to 

 fit for profitable employment, and which includes industrial, agricultural, com- 

 mercial, and liome economics education. The Province is to aid in the mainte- 

 nance of vocational and prevocational schools established under the act, on a 

 joint basis with the local communities, the total to be expended in any one year 

 being limited to $50,000. 



Every high and consolidated school in Manitoba is now taking part in some 

 form of boys' and girls' club work. The juniors are engaged largely in raising 

 chickens and in gardening, while the older pupils find the most interest in the 

 pig and calf raising contests, and in growing registered seed. The depart- 

 ments of agriculture and education cooperate very closely in an effort to cor- 

 relate the educational and economic phases of club work. 



From November to April, 1917-18, 22 short-course schools in agriculture, gas 

 engines, and home economics, extending over two weeks each, were held in 

 Manitoba. It was found most convenient to organize the schools in three cir- 

 cuits, for each of which there was obtained a carload of equipment consisting 

 of three tractors, four stationary engines, a lighting plant, a grain cleaning 

 oufit, about fifty 16 by 20 inch bromids of champion live stock, and a full supply 

 of the various grains grown in Manitoba, as well as all the troublesome weeds. 

 A staff of expert lecturers was engaged for each circuit. The forenoons were 

 usually given over to lectures for the whole school, while the practical work was 

 done in the afternoons when the school was split into sections. The regular 

 women's classes in home economics were well attended, and probably 8 per cent 

 of those taking gas engine work were women. 



The department of education for Alberta has reorganized and extended the 

 instruction work for public school inspectors at the summer school. The most 

 important additions are the lectures on the generalized aspects of agriculture, 

 which include farm management, rural economics, and rural sociology. 



A discussion of the duplication of agricultural teaching in general secondary 

 schools and special schools of agriculture, such as there are in Alberta, is in- 

 cluded. It is stated that there does not appear to be any real overlapping or 

 duplication of work from the teaching of agriculture in these two types of 

 schools, which differ from each other in the characteristic purpose of the agri- 

 cultural teaching. Since little instruction in agriculture is given in the normal 

 schools and the agricultural courses in the summer schools are purely optional, 

 the course in agriculture in the high schools is more explicitly designed as a 

 course for teachers in the public schools. The best results of the special school 

 are the making of good farmers and home makers, while the best results of the 



