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tive a subject of study as ancient history, text-book science as 

 sometimes still taught, or mathematics. 



8. Agricultural Manuals for Science Laboratories. Many 

 schools are ambitious to go farther, and in a somewhat different 

 direction. They prefer not to treat agriculture in its broad geo- 

 graphical or historic aspects, but to use it as a means of introduc- 

 ing some notions of science. 



Here, again, many excellent books and manuals are avail- 

 able, and the opportunities for laboratory illustration may be 

 easily supplied. In fact, a. most valuable line of experimenta- 

 tion may be followed with the scantiest of materials and equip- 

 ment, such as a farmer might often possess. The skilled and 

 enthusiastic teacher is able in this way to make agriculture not 

 only a means of general culture, but a most valuable means of 

 approach to the more abstract sciences. 



9. Agriculture and Enlarged Educational Opportunity. A 

 few schools have gone farther still. They have, by individual 

 or joint effort, carried out certain productive enterprises on land 

 in their possession. They have engaged in gardening, and in 

 some instances have performed experiments with certain forms 

 of live stock. The work has been made the center of correla- 

 tion for manual training, commercial arithmetic and science. 

 The social significance of co-operative effort has been revealed, 

 and a new spirit with reference to country life evoked. 



This work, while not confessedly industrial, does serve a 

 valuable vocational purpose, in that it gives something of the 

 ideal and outlook which ultimately constitute a large element in 

 vocational success. But the contributions to liberal education 

 of the schools in which this form of work has been developed 

 are unmistakable. The widening horizon of the pupil, his 

 greater sympathy with the prosaic occupations of life, and his 

 growing appreciation of the possibilities of art and science ap- 

 plied in every-day callings, tend at every step to render him 

 a person of power and to add to his possibilities of growth. 



There are educators who believe that such a reorganization 

 of the program of liberal education, as here described, whereby 

 special studies and practices shall lead into larger local, indus- 

 trial and social activities, constitutes the greatest opportunity 



