44 Agricultural Instructioji in the Public High Sclwols 



made by teacher and class. Each trip was made the basis of 

 the next recitation. The students were also held responsible 

 on the monthly review for the knowledge gained on these trips 

 and in the subsequent discussions. In this way the trips were 

 kept from degenerating into picnics. 



A visit was made to an orchard that was just being set out, 

 where the members of the class planted some of the trees. As 

 the instructor did not profess to be an expert in the nursery 

 business, the attitude of both teacher and pupils was that of 

 learning together. Another visit was made to an orchard of a 

 successful plum grower, where observations were made on his 

 methods of caring for the ground, the distance at which he 

 planted his trees, and other details. It was noted, for instance, 

 that he had some trees planted but ten feet apart, which were 

 not thriving so well as were the others. The only class work 

 done in grafting has been in the nature of exemplification with 

 sticks having the bark on and not with real roots and scions, 

 and without reference to the proper season. The following 

 is a brief account of the planting done at home, and is here 

 given, not because of any variety of startling features, but as 

 an example of the possibilities. 



The class was consulted as to the materials to be used. The 

 girls wished mostly to try pansies. Many of the boys and some 

 of the girls wished to work with tomatoes, others preferred 

 cabbages. They got the seeds and all started the work together 

 about the middle of March, and brought their plants to school 

 for an exhibit during the week of May 4th to 8th. The in- 

 structor indicated for the benefit of the class what plants he 

 considered to be the " winners." All students made oral reports, 

 those having poor success as well as the others. The work in 

 English was in the hands of the high-school assistant and no 

 attempt was made to correlate it with the agriculture. The 

 pupils were required to read the bulletins and other available 

 literature before starting the seeds to germinating, so as to 

 inform themselves on the conditions of soil, shade, moisture, 

 temperature, and other factors. The class had studied the 

 general topic of soils before starting this germination. One boy 

 made the mistake of planting the seeds of all these varieties 



