237 



Education 



gatory ; this terminated in 1879 by provision being made for departmental and 

 communal instruction in agriculture by means of departmental centres, and further 

 made primary instruction in the elements of agriculture an obligatory subject. 



In the instructions issued to teacners under this law they are advised that 

 'they should commence by employing visible and tangible objects, which they 

 should make the children see and feel, thus putting them face to face with concrete 

 realities ; then by degrees they can exercise them in obtaining from these objects 

 abstract ideas, by comparison and generalisation, and by the use of the reasoning 

 faculties without the aid of actual specimens." The law of March, 1882, made com- 

 pulsory teaching " the elements of physical and natural science with their applica- 

 tion to agriculture." In 1888 a further revision of the methods of teaching 

 agriculture in the primary schools was declared essential. Finally, the French 

 Minister of Instruction issued the following guide to Public school teachers on the 

 25th of April, 1898, to direct them in this routine work of teaching elementary 

 agriculture : — 



"Instruction in the elementary principles of agriculture, such as can be 

 properly included in the programme of primary schools, ought to be addressed less 

 to the memory than to the intelligence of the children. It should be based on obser- 

 vation of the everyday facts of rural life, and on a system of simple experiments 

 appropriate to the resources of the school, and calculated to bring out clearly the 

 fundamental scientific principles underlying the most important agricultural oper- 

 ations. Above all, the pupils of a rural school should be taught the reasons for these 

 operations, and the explanation of the phenomena which accompany them, but not 

 the details of methods of execution, still less a resume of maxims, definitions, or 

 agricultural precepts. To know the essential conditions of the growth of cultivated 

 plants, to understand the reasons for the work of ordinary cultivation, and for the 

 rules of health for man and domestic animals— such are matters which should first 

 be taught to every one who is to live by tilling the soil ; and this can be done only by 

 the experimental method. The master whose teaching of agriculture consists only 

 in makiug the pupils study and repeat an agricultural manual is on the wrong path, 

 however well designed the manual may be. It is necessary to rely on very simple 

 experiments, and especially on observation. 



" As a matter of fact, it is only by putting before the children's eyes the 

 phenomena to be observed that they can be taught to observe, and that the 

 principles which underlie the science of modern agriculture can be instilled into 

 their minds. It should be remembered that this can be done for the rural agri- 

 culturists only at school, where it will never be necessary to teach him the details 

 which his father knows better than the teacher, and which he will be certain to 

 learn from his own practical experience. The work of the elementary school 

 should be confined to preparing the child for an intelligent apprenticeship to the 

 trade by which lie is to live, to giving him a taste for his future occupation ; with 

 this in view, the teacher should never forget that the best way to make a workman 

 like his work is to make him understand it. 



" To sum up : The aim of elementary instruction in agriculture is to 

 initiate the bulk of our country children into that degree of elementary knowledge 

 which is necessary to enable them to read a modern book on agriculture with 

 profit, or to ■ derive advantage from attending an agricultural conference ; to 

 inspire them with a love of country life, so that they may prefer it to that of 

 towns and factories ; and to convince them of the fact that agriculture, besides 

 being the most independent of all means of livelihood, is also more remunerative 

 than many other occupations, to those who practice it with industry, intelligence, 

 and enlightenment," 



