JOYCE] GARDEN A LABORATORY FOR EDUCATION 361 



part of the course of study and is prescribed work beginning in the 

 lower, primary grades and continuing through several years of the 

 pupil's training. Further, we are not afraid in the PhiHppines of 

 the bugaboo that training a pupil in school for the kind of work he 

 will have to do in life is undemocratic. 



The School Garden a Laboratory for Industrial 

 Education 



Alice V. Joyce 



The Hfe of the child begins in the home and his highest ideal is 

 the home where he may rear the family which is to bear his name. 

 Thus generation succeeds generation in this circuitous path. 



In this path of the child while his parents have been caring for it, 

 his teachers have been assisting with his education, there is a 

 natural inclination to be doing something for himself. 



There comes a time in the life of every child, normal or abnormal, 

 when he begins to think and act for himself, according to his 

 physical condition and environment. It is when the boy or girl 

 reaches this period of development that the greatest tact and skill 

 are required to aid him along the cleanest and best channels of 

 thinking and doing for himself. This self-reliance is the pivot on 

 which the life-work is likely to revolve. Its importance can never 

 be over estimated. To develop the motor nerves as well as the 

 sensory nerves, an equal opportunity for their development must 

 be supplied. There is no better opportunity for this dcvclo])mcnt 

 than that of the School Garden which has been truly called ' ' The 

 Laboratory of Nature." 



The first day of school has no fear for the sensitive child, if he has 

 visited the garden with his parents or little Iricnds, has S])cnt hours 

 in the sand garden with toys and garden tools : he has become 

 acquainted with the teachers and feels a part of the school. This 

 happy introduction to the school may influence his entire hfe to be 

 one of order and may create a love for work. 



The Manual Training department strengthens its traininj.^ of 

 boys while building bird-houses; markers for the various plants; 

 comer stakes for the individual ganlcMis; a substantial house lor 

 poultry or bees; a fence to enclose the garden. I'or indoor sludw 



