THE COUNTRY SCHOOL 353 



Since the exodus from farms begins with the young people, legis- 

 latures realize that influences which will affect children directly 

 may result in checking that exodus. They also see that regions 

 where farmers are poor and farm methods backward are the 

 most seriously depleted by cityward migration. It is natural 

 then to think that equipping the children to earn more money 

 on the farm will tend to keep them there. Therefore, they say 

 country schools ought to teach agriculture; and they pass laws 

 making so many hours of study of the subject obligatory during 

 the school year. They are not teachers and it is not their affair 

 to say how it shall be taught ; this important detail is left to the 

 state educational administrators. They in turn find themselves 

 confronted with the duty of laying out a course of study which 

 shall fill up the required number of hours, adopting text-books 

 for the pupils' use and telling every teacher what lessons they 

 shall give, regardless of varying agricultural conditions in the 

 state. If the farmers in the legislature are skeptical of the 

 results of this method of attack, they are still glad to have 

 any attention paid to their profession, and they are usually so 

 vague as to a better way of dealing with the problem that they 

 gladly give their support to such bills. Every country teacher 

 knows the futility of simply going through the required lessons 

 in the agricultural text-book, in order to make better farmers 

 or keep children on the farm. The prejudice against book farm- 

 ing is very general in farming regions. This fact alone dis- 

 counts most of the knowledge that pupils might gain from their 

 lessons. Besides this, the same text-book is used for a whole 

 state, regardless of the particular conditions of soil, climate, mar- 

 kets, etc. ; so that it is entirely a matter of chance if the informa- 

 tion has any application to the agricultural needs of a particular 

 district. A visitor asked the teacher in a typical one-room 

 school if she taught any agriculture or gardening ; the reply was : 

 "No, we are not able to manage any at all." Later the teacher 

 returned to the subject, saying: "Of course we use the lessons 

 in agriculture prescribed in the state curriculum." This indi- 

 cates the value the teachers themselves attach to this type of 

 agricultural teaching if it is not vitalized by the addition of 

 practical work adapted to local conditions. 



Even if it were desirable to teach grade pupils trades, farm- 



