176 NATURE-STUDY REVIEW [12:4— April, 191(> 



children to acquire a limited knowledge of the phenomena and 

 forces of nature and affords a wholesome form of recreation, but 

 does not give a child a fair idea of the possibilities of gardening nor 

 does it provide a remunerative form of employment that will go far 

 toward encouraging thrift and industry and in making it possible 

 for children to earn their way. 



In order that children may get the most from their home project 

 work in gardening, a teacher, trained and skilled in gardening, 

 should be provided for each school or for every ioo or 150 children 

 of the gardening age. This teacher should be engaged for twelve 

 months with provision, if desired, for a vacation during the winter. 

 Such a teacher may devote her forenoons during the school year 

 to the teaching of agriculture, nature-study, elementary science, 

 home-making, or other special subjects. Until the people come to 

 believe that it is worth while to teach these subjects in*the elemen- 

 mentary schools, we may require a specially qualified grade teacher 

 to instruct the children of the whole school in the subject of garden- 

 ing. Some cities now are engaging a good supervisor of gardening 

 with a view to training and supervising a number of their own 

 teachers. The teachers selected for the purpose are engaged for 

 twelve months and are given special remuneration to compensate 

 for the additional time and labor expended. 



The instruction afforded should be largely of a practical nature 

 and should be given in the child's home garden. The teacher who 

 is responsible for the work, however, will have much to do during 

 the winter months. She should be able to show the other teachers 

 how the work of the garden may be correlated with other subjects, 

 and she will need to make individual garden plans so that there 

 will be no delay when the gardening season opens. 



After school, on Saturdays, and during summer vacation the 

 teacher directs the work of gardening. After all preliminary 

 preparations have been made and the planting season has arrived, 

 she instructs the children in their own back yards. During the 

 rush season she works with groups of about ten or twelve. For 

 the benefit of the children within a restricted area she demonstrates 

 on one afternoon, the methods of preparing the soil and planting 

 the seeds. The next afternoon, she does the same thing in another 

 section for the benefit of the ten or twelve children there. This 

 program is continued until all the children assigned to her have 

 seen these preliminary operations performed. She then demon- 



