t BASES FOR CURRICULUM MAKING 



Ing" must" be 'studied as well as "training for farming." Any 

 one familiar with rural life recognizes that some men are na- 

 tural-born farmers, successful even with very limited oppor- 

 tunities and training. They progress rapidly through the hired 

 man, the tenant and the mortgage stages to independent owner- 

 ship and wealth, as wealth goes in farming. "You just can't 

 keep some men down" applies in this as well as in other occu- 

 pations. Behind the farm management factors of size, diversity 

 and productivity are personal qualities that may condition suc- 

 cess and that may need consideration in curriculum-making, or 

 boy-training, to a larger extent than has yet been recognized. 

 So many men succeed without special training; so many fail 

 with everything, apparently, in their favor. 



Are there special qualities which tend to insure success? 

 If there are, how can they be determined? And when known, 

 can they be induced, developed or grafted on to the ordinary 

 individual? Or, can they be pre-determined and become the 

 basis for effective vocational direction? If there are definite 

 characteristics or qualities that tend to appear in the more suc- 

 cessful portion of the farming population, what relation have 

 they to the selection and organization of subject matter indeed 

 to the whole scheme of secondary agricultural education? 



It is in the hope of opening up this more or less unex- 

 plored field that the present study has been pursued. In arriv- 

 ing at the stage of the inquiry indicated 



Subject matter above the following steps or questions 

 needs early atten- have been considered : How shall pro- 

 tion in educational spective instructors be properly trained for 

 considerations. successful agricultural teaching? The 



further the study of this question was 



carried the greater seemed the necessity for answering a sec- 

 ond question, namely, how can basic questions in teacher-train- 

 ing be disposed of without more surety as to what shall be 

 taught? This, of course, necessitates delving into the secondary 

 agricultural subject-matter problems and here again is confu- 

 sion. Secondary curricula as imitations of college curricula, or 

 more often merely "reduced portions" of collegiate subject-mat- 

 ter, were far from satisfactory. What shall we teach? How 



