TRAINING FOR COUNTRY LIFE 27 



The main point is that in rural education a distinctly rural tone 

 should be studied and preserved. 



In other countries which have the best show to make of rural 

 life and rural prosperity — with the sole exception of Switzerland, in 

 which, as already observed, in view of the distinctly rural tone very 

 strongly impressed upon the entire economy of the country, such pre- 

 caution is considered unnecessary — Governments make a point of 

 insisting that rural teachers should be rural folk, brought up in rural 

 parts, in order to be able to pitch their talk to their pupils in a 

 rural key. When it is urged that education shall be "ruralised," 

 it is not so much a change of subjects taught that is asked for 

 as a change in the manner of teaching the subjects on the pro- 

 gramme. Now here the way to be followed appears to lie plain 

 before us. The best way of teaching children and young folk 

 admittedly is by illustration. And in no quarter do apt subjects 

 for illustration abound and lend themselves so readily to the purpose 

 proposed as in the country. The dry " dull grey" — as Goethe calls 

 it — nutriment of " theory " is not readily assimilated by infantile 

 minds, nor, even if assimilated for the moment, retained long. 

 Illustrate the thing by drawing upon the store of objects and pro- 

 cesses familiar to your pupil, and the essence of the teaching is sure 

 to be seized upon at once and firmly retained. Now, under this 

 aspect rural schools have an advantage, if it were only used, over 

 urban, which is really incalculable. But it wants a teacher fully 

 acquainted with rural things to turn it to adequate account. Rural 

 life is inexhaustibly rich in similes and illustrations apt to go home 

 to infantile minds. And so varied are they that in truth there is 

 nothing in teaching to which some telling illustration cannot be 

 found in the rural world. We have the best precedent for their use 

 in the Bible. Connect the subject to be driven home with some rural 

 process, clothe it in a familiar rural garb, and it will not only go home 

 readily, but stick. American writers keen upon this matter, urge 

 that above all things this process should be applied to subjects of 

 arithmetic and mathematics, that the dry bones of mere figures 

 should be covered with living flesh and blood borrowed from 

 familiar occurrences in home consumption and field produce, animals, 

 measures of fields, roads, and the like. 



Advancing one step further, it will be understood that in the 

 majority of cases, in rural teaching the formation of an aptitude for 

 the practice of agriculture wants to be kept distinctly in view. 

 However, on the point whether or not specifically agricultural know- 

 ledge should be set down as an obligatory subject, opinion is for the 



