TO THE TEACHER ix 



accident. The purpose is to make the study of agriculture 

 interesting and helpful by connecting it immediately with 

 the homes. The teacher who will faithfully carry out this 

 concrete method of instruction will find growing in his pu- 

 pils a firm and abiding enthusiasm in the subject never to 

 be hoped for in mere text-book study. The great purpose 

 and the highest success is to get the lessons of the text 

 translated into life and action. The work on agricultural 

 projects assigned in connection with the course should, as 

 far as possible, be done under the guidance of the teacher 

 and should receive school credit. 



Demonstrations and experiments. The difference 

 between demonstrations and e:\-periments should be clearly 

 understood by the class. The idea in an experiment is to 

 investigate, discover or verify some truth. In a demon- 

 stration some well-known truth is illustrated, shown or 

 demonstrated to others, with the purpose of convincing 

 them of its merits and leading them to adopt it in practise. 



8. Seasonal Order of Study 



Seasonal order impossible in text. It is wholly im- 

 possible to arrange any text on agriculture so that the top- 

 ics will follow the seasons throughout the year. If this 

 could be done it would make the teacher's work much sim- 

 pler and easier. But seasonal variations do not come 1 at 

 the same time in different regions, nor does the order of 

 the crops and gardens follow the arrangement of the^ school 

 year. 



Order to be based on crop sequence. Because of 

 these facts, it must be left to the teacher to select such an 

 order from the text as best fits the crops and seasons of 

 his region. It is not necessary that the chapters be taken in 

 succession as they occur. For northern schools opening in the 

 late summer, the corn chapter undoubtedly will be best for 



