ON EDUCATIONAL TRAINING FOR OVERSEAS LIFE. 285 



activities are also known. The Celts, Romans, Saxons, Normans, and English who 

 in living procession have trodden the roads of England have left traces in almost 

 every shire, and in many parishes and villages. The lanes, the names of the fields 

 and farms, the church, and the old houses in the village all tell something of bygone 

 days, and can be brought jn to help the child to reconstruct the pageant of the village 

 history. 



An Outline of a Course. 



The Countryside, : the natural basis. 



In the book ' Lessons on Soil,' by Sir John Russell, is set out the substance of the 

 lessons he gave to the village children at Wye, put, however, into rather more general 

 form so as to make the material more useful to teachers. Beginning with known 

 facts and observations collected by the children, and making a few simple and obvious 

 tests, elicited in the main from the class, it was found possible to build up a coherent 

 account of the surrounding district which stimulated their curiosity, made them 

 observe and inquire, and gave the teacher many opportunities of showing something 

 of the wonder and mystery of the things around them. And, although there had 

 been no vocational purpose, the lessons gave the children a working knowledge of the 

 properties of soils, plant-growth, and cultivation processes that could not — and did 

 not — fail to help them subsequently in their daily work on a farm or in a garden. 



The Countryside : the human factor. 



Simultaneously the child should be taught something of the history of the country- 

 side so that he may know and understand what manner of men and women it was 

 who cleared the site, built the village, laid out the farms, and developed the 

 agricultural system now in use ; how people lived in the old days, and what is the 

 meaning of the traces still left in the villages by the former generations. This would 

 naturally be part and parcel of the full history course ; the child must see his village 

 as a part of the whole ; there should be no water-tight divisions between general and 

 village or agricultural history. Properly arranged, a course like this should prove 

 very effective in stimulating the imagination, widening the outlook, and developing 

 a sense of pride in the village, the county, and the country. 



Man's control : the story of the farm. 



This part consists in the application of the material gathered in the first and 

 second parts to the more detailed study of the farming of the district : the stages in 

 the transition from the old complete self-supply system to the modern specialised 

 production ; the reasons for the change and why the present system was adopted. 

 The economic factor must here be introduced. The difficulties and pitfalls are 

 obvious, but one must trust the teacher to treat the subject dispassionately and 

 without party bias ; the basis of the treatment should be historical. The technical 

 side must also be developed, and this can be merged to any desired extent into 

 definite farm or garden teaching and handicraft. With this can be associated the 

 formation among the scholars of such groups as Young Farmers' Clubs, Pig Clubs, 

 Poultry Clubs, etc. 



For the technical side the treatment should be both historical and scientific : 

 English agricultural methods are deeply rooted in the past and can be fully appre- 

 ciated only when their origins are known. But they have been shaped to their 

 present form by the interplay of economic and natural forces, and the latter can be 

 discussed with a class that has studied Part I of the course. 



The equipment necessary. 



For the first part the equipment needed is relatively simple. The soil section is 

 sufficiently discussed in ' Lessons on Soil.' A parallel course on plants could be set 

 up without difficulty ; the school garden forms the basis of the work : search among 

 existing books would almost certainly discover some suitable for the scholars' 

 guidance. A survey of the district forms an integral part of the course — for this 

 the Geographical Association is able to render assistance through its local branches. 

 A number of the rural school teachers by means of summer courses have already 

 given themselves much of the necessary training. These courses serve the valuable 



