45 
little to any marked peculiarities they might chance t<» possess. Such nature 
study forms an excel lenl basis for the subsequent study of more formal agri- 
culture, it lias been tried in both city and country schools, and lias been found 
to furnish n it only a means for arousing and sustaining the Interest of the chil- 
dren, hut also through its economic limitations an outline sufficiently definite 
to enable the teacher to know where to stop, and yet sufficiently flexible to 
enable her to adapl ii t>> 1 ical conditions. 
Nature study such as this, having an agricultural trend, is about all that bag 
been attempted in the way of teaching agriculture in the rural schools until 
quite recently. Within the past two or three years, however, State superinten- 
dents of public instruction, the officers of some of the agricultural colleges, the 
National Educational Association, the American Civic Association, as well as a 
number of other organizations and numerous individuals iii various official 
positions have interested themselves in the introduction of elementary agri- 
culture and gardening in the rural schools. The National Educational As^n 
ciatiOD now has a special committee of educators of national repute considering 
this subject. The American Civic Association has one department devoted to 
children's gardens and another to rural improvement Last June, in Chicago, 
an organization known as the American League of Industrial Education was 
organized to — 
"conduct an educational campaign for an industrial public school system 
which should include the teaching of domestic science and both agricultural and 
manual training in all public schools; * * * to promote the establishment 
of school gardens in connection with all public schools, where every child would 
he taught to he a lover of nature and of the country, and trained toward the 
land as a source of livelihood rather than away from it; * * * to advocate 
the establishment of public manual training school farms in every county in the 
United States and of as many such manual training school farms in the vicinity 
of all cities, by State, municipal, and national governments, as may he neces- 
sary to give to every hoy the opportunity to learn how to earn his living by his 
labor and to till the soil for a livelihood and get his living from the land." 
Some of the State school authorities, officers in agricultural colleges, and 
county superintendents of schools have prepared outlined courses in agriculture 
which have exerted a strong influence toward the teaching of agriculture in the 
rural schools. Such courses have heen prepared, for example, in Missouri, 
Illinois, and Indiana, and for a group of schools under one superintendent in 
Durham, N. H.. and vicinity. 
The Illinois course in agriculture was prepared by the dean of the college 
of agriculture, and gives the following reasons for teaching agriculture in the 
public schools : 
"(1) To cultivate an interest in and instill a love and respect for land and the 
occupation of agriculture. 
"(2) To create a regard for industry in general and an appreciation of the 
material side of the affairs of a highly civilized people. 
"(3) To cultivate the active and creative instincts as distinct from the 
reflective and receptive that are otherwise almost exclusively exercised in our 
schools. 
"(4) To give practice in failure and success, thus putting to the test early in 
life the ability to do a definite thing. 
"(5) To train the student in ways and methods of acquiring information for 
himself and incidentally to acquaint him with the manner in which information 
is originally acquired and the world's stock of knowledge has been accumulated. 
"(6) To connect the school with real life and make the value and need ^i 
schooling the more apparent. 
"(7) As an avenue of communication between the pupil and the teacher, it 
being a field in which the pupil will likely have a larger bulk of information 
than the teacher, but in which the training of the teacher can help to more 
exact knowledge." 
The course is arranged by months, and gives suggestions for a large number 
of experiments and observations bearing on all the divisions of agriculture. 
Considerable reading along agricultural iines is suggested, as well as drawing, 
composition, and other work intended to correlate agriculture with other school 
work. All technical words likely to be used frequently in this connection are 
defined. 
This course lias been in the hands of Illinois teachers one year, and the 
superintendent of public instruction reports " an increased interest throughout 
the State in the study of agriculture." He says : 
