AMONG SCHOOL GARDENS 



In a hot southern town, boys dug two 6x12 foot 

 holes to a depth of 2 feet and brought good soil 

 from a distance to fill them. On these two beds, 

 they grew beans, onions, lettuce and radishes so 

 successfully that the board of education purchased 

 a lot in which they were offered 1 1 square yards 

 for a garden. The plot was almost a plantation of 

 rocks. The lads, however, worked until they had 

 removed all and had sifted the soil for the garden. 

 The following Saturday fifteen boys worked all day, 

 some going dinnerless, to get their garden ready for 

 planting. A group of Philadelphia mill girls spend 

 their noon hour in the garden. Children of the 

 Seward School, Rochester, have gradually developed 

 a good scheme of school ground decoration from 

 the native material on the large open lot next the 

 school house. This is partially swampy, and has 

 supplied willows, ailanthus, elderberry, dogwood 

 and thorn apple for transplanting. Vines also were 

 obtained. Where temptation existed for pupils 

 to lean against shrubbery or to cut across the 

 lawn, they decided to plant a young thorn bush. 

 Their lawn was sown with grass seed sifted from 

 the dust of their fathers' hay mows. 



A child gets profit and pleasure out of the gar- 

 den in direct proportion as he puts himself into 

 it, and inversely as the teacher does his work for 

 him. It is so much easier, under the guise of 

 showing a child how to use his tools, to do most 

 of the work on the small farms. The teacher 

 never, after the first lessons, should take the 



266 



i 



