PREFACE 



FOR several years the author has been giving a survey course 

 in agriculture for teachers and prospective teachers attending 

 the summer session of Miami University. Many of these students, 

 who were teachers of agriculture, have expressed a wish that the 

 contents of the course be assembled and organized into a textbook 

 adapted for use in the problem method of instruction. 



An attempt was made to organize the material of this course 

 around the farm as the unifying center. It was then submitted 

 to trial in both regular and Smith-Hughes courses in high schools. 

 The results of this test seemed to justify making the material thus 

 organized available for instruction in the form presented in this 

 book. 



The author spent some time visiting high schools of Massachu- 

 setts where agriculture was being taught by the project method. 

 Through the courtesy of Dr. Rufus W. Stimson, Director of the 

 Massachusetts Agricultural Education Service, the author was 

 able to see many of the projects in actual operation and to study 

 the plans from which they were developed. 



He also visited the agricultural colleges of many of the great 

 farming states to inspect the work of training teachers for agri- 

 cultural instruction. At this time he came into contact with a 

 number of men interested in problems of agricultural education 

 and with specialists in various scientific aspects of agriculture. 



Mention is made of this fact in acknowledgement to those 

 men for their contribution, though made unconsciously, to the 

 preparation of this book. The field of agriculture is too large for 

 one person always to be sure of his ground even in an elementary 

 textbook. For this reason the author feels greatly indebted to 



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