114 MASSACHUSETTS HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



for our purposes. Second, the high school grade, and third, the 

 elementary grade. The first two define themselves. The third 

 perhaps requires a word of explanation. The schools have been 

 giving nature study for a number of years. Nature study uses 

 many of the materials of agriculture, and while there is perhaps no 

 very sharp line of demarcation between nature work and agri- 

 culture in a general way, the two things should be kept apart. 

 Nature work is relatively unorganized and unsystematic. It does 

 not confine itself to any one body of knowledge. It aims to teach 

 the child to observe, to love nature, to appreciate the beauty of the 

 commonplace, and to look for the cause behind the phenomenon. 

 Even elementary agriculture is rather definite and fairly well organ- 

 ized. It studies processes. It has an economic bearing. It deals 

 with an industry. It shows the interests of men making a living^ 

 from the soil. Its illustrations are specific, such as come for in- 

 stance by the use of school gardens and the incubator. 



Now the real question that arises after this brief preliminary 

 survey is this: Shall agriculture as we have defined it be utilized 

 to any large degree in the public school system ? So far as college- 

 grade work is concerned this question has been settled. Agricul- 

 tural colleges have been supported at public expense for fifty years. 

 We need not discuss that question further. The point at issue 

 concerns the work of secondary and elementary agriculture. It 

 seems to me that we may at once answer this question also in the 

 affirmative, provided we are ready to acknowledge the value of 

 agriculture as mental training and are willing to assent to the 

 proposition that the school system shall be utilized for purposes of 

 vocational training. 



I do not think it needs elaborate argument to prove that the 

 subject matter of agriculture properly taught gives abundant 

 material for training of the mind. The educational value of 

 science in general and of applied science in particular is pretty 

 commonly recognized. Agriculture ofi'ers a most inviting field 

 for the study of science in its application to the work of men. It 

 trains the powers of observation as almost nothing else does. It 

 brings the student into contact with real processes, with men at 

 work, with the man achieving things, Avith the great current of the 

 Avorld's industrial life. Agriculture in its broad sense has economic 



