108 STATE BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. 



ferent branches of agricultural science. A graduate of this college, Lib- 

 erty H. Bailey, has recently published a comprehensive Cyclopedia of 

 Horticulture in five volumes, and he is now X'l'eparing a Cyclopedia of 

 Agriculture. 



Along with this progress in the development of collegiate and gradu- 

 ate courses in agriculture has come an urgent demand for instruction 

 in agriculture lower in grade than the college course. To meet this 

 demand, agricultural high schools have been organized in connection 

 with the agricultural colleges, in Maine, Minnesota, Nebraska. Okla- 

 homa, Rhode Island, and Washington ; one-year and two-year practical 

 agricultural courses and short winter courses for busy farmers have 

 been organized in over TO per cent, of our agricultural colleges; and 

 summer school gardening for the training of teachers in elementary 

 agriculture, nature study, and school gardening are maintained in at 

 least eight of these institutions. Another feature of the agricultural 

 college work, not contemplated when these institutions were organized, 

 is the extension work in agriculture, including farmers' institutes, read- 

 ing courses and correspondence courses in agriculture, the organiza- 

 tion of experimental unions and co-operative experiments, and the de- 

 velopment of nature study and school garden work with children, in- 

 cluding the publication of nature study and school garden leaflets, the 

 direction of school garden work in normal school and high schools, the 

 distribution of seeds and the preparation of plans for this work. 



But the agricultural colleges have not been able fully to meet the 

 demand for secondary and elementary instruction in, ^ agriculture, con- 

 sequently separate agricultural high schools have been organized — State 

 schools in Alabama and California, county schools in Wisconsin, and 

 private institutions at Doylestown, Pennsylvania ; Winona, Indiana ; 

 Mount Hermon, Massachusetts; Woodbine, New Jersey, and elsewhere. 

 Furthermore, a good beginning has been made in the development of ele- 

 mentary instruction in agriculture in the common schools. One of our 

 recent M. A. C. graduates is teaching agriculture and chemistry in the 

 high school at Elyria, Ohio. In Wisconsin, public school teachers are 

 required to pass an examination in agriculture. In Illinois and Mis- 

 souri, elementary agriculture has been included in the prescribed courses 

 of study for common schools, and in Alabama, Georgia, North Carolina, 

 and possibly other southern states, recent legislative enactments make 

 elementary agriculture one of the required subjects in the rural schools. 



And, finally, the development of nature study work and school garden- 

 ing in the public schools of both city and country is progressing under 

 the influence not only of ten or twelve agricultural colleges, but also of 

 fifteen or twenty normal schools, the United States Department of Agri- 

 culture, and state departments of public instruction all over the United 

 States. In this way preparation is being made for putting school gar- 

 den instruction on a pedagogical basis. 



Now, what do we mean by school gardens? A school garden may be 

 defined as a garden that performs some educational function in the 

 school with which it is connected. It is a garden laboratory — a nature 

 study laboratory. Nature study work, as ordinarily conducted, is passive. 

 School gardening is active. It gives the child something to do, and 

 "education by doing" is gaining recognition wherever really progressive 

 educators are in charge. 



