Where in the course ought agriculture to be given? Since hundreds of students return to the rural schools after one year's normal work a course should be given in the first year as we have planned it at Weatherford. In addition to this year's work, in the senior year students should direct this work in the training-school and make a study of its pedagogical value. Mrs. Price, of Florence, Ala., who sends in a most excellent report, regrets that the course is given so far from graduation, but it may not be so much. to regret after all. If she can get the work into the practice-teaching as she hopes to do, it will be better, and when she makes it permeate all grades she will have quite the ideal condition. Some of our educators are trembling for fear we will carry this wo k too far, and supplant the work of the agricultural colleges. There is no desire on the part of normal-school men to supplant the work of the agricultural college any more than in giving courses in physiology and hygiene they desire to supplant the work of medical schools and training-schools for nurses. The normal schools are not preparing scientific agriculturists any more than they are preparing physicians and lawyers. President Scudder, of New Paltz, N. Y., makes this very emphatic. Our wish is that on our new school grounds there may be represented most of the activities of farm life, the aim being not to make expert agriculturists of our teachers in training, but to interest them in the farming conditions of the country, making them intelligent about farm life in its various phases, and showing them how work can be carried on at the school to reflect the interests of the neighborhood, but still more how the children may be induced to do more careful and intelligent work at their homes under the immediate guidance of their parents. The country school-teacher should realize that the home may be added to the school and the teaching force be tremendously augmented by calling occasionally on the parents to give talks on topics in which they are particularly interested, to supervise experiments that may be carried on by the school and to give practical lessons to little groups of children not necessarily in the school itself but at the different farms in the neighborhood; for in a real sense the barns and fields of the neighborhood are the real laboratory of the country school. Just how much equipment is necessary to give an intelligent idea of farm life is a question for discussion. Many of the schools are carrying on work with garden plots ranging a few square feet to an acre or more. Bridgewater, Mass., has seventeen acres for field crops at their disposal, with one and five-eighths acres in a scientific garden. Greeley, Cal., has four acres. Salt Lake City has a little farm of six acres. Weatherford has a forty-acre campus; ten acres is free for experimental work. Spearfish, S. D., has seventy acres which they have been using to excellent advantage. Normal, Ill., has 160 acres and others have fine tracts. A few schools are equipped for poultryraising, and Rock Hill does dairying. For the needs of the school many express themselves as President Dearmont, of Cape Girardeau, Mo.: The school should have a farm of not less than fifty acres, and experimental work should be done in crop-raising, fruit-growing, gardening, stock-raising, dairying, poultryraising, etc. All state normal schools should have laboratories, gardens, and greenhouses, and those more favorably located should have a small farm for carrying on the farm activities suggested by President Dearmont. I might add bee-keeping for some sections. I question the practicability of stock-raising, especially if, as Professor Upham, of Whitewater, Wis., suggests, arrangements could be made with some nearby farm for such study. However, in many sections milk and its products should receive a careful study. It is true that we need equipment just as surely as we need skeletons, manikins, models of the eye, etc., for the teaching of physiology. The question is how to secure the necessary funds. We might charge tuition, but why should we charge tuition for this subject more than for others. Many feel that the aid should come from the national government. The government has aided agricultural colleges for the purpose of making the farmer and his family more intelligent and enabling them to reap more abundant harvests. The money has been well spent. No one would minimize the great work accomplished by the agricultural colleges of the United States. But on the other hand, no one will deny that the lives of the American farmers are influenced more surely and more quickly thru the public schools than by any other means. The same amount of money properly expended in the normal schools will accomplish more in ten years to popularize agriculture than has been accomplished in the last thirty years by trying to instruct the farmer directly. The agricultural college must wait for the students to come. to them, while the normal schools send their students to the children and the homes in every nook and corner of our land. Whatever principle justifies the national government in assisting agricultural colleges applies with double force to assisting state normal schools. Normal-school men and citizens of many states have been so convinced of this that they have attempted to secure national aid, and two years ago the Burkett-Pollard Bill was introduced into Congress for this purpose. Congress, in the Nelson Act, approved March 4, 1907, has given assistance to agricultural colleges in the preparation of teachers to give instruction in agriculture and mechanical arts, amounting to $5,000 the first year, and increasing until it reaches $50,000 annually. Surely if the national government aids agricultural colleges to prepare teachers it should aid normal schools to prepare teachers. This arrangement to give courses at the agricultural colleges does not meet the requirements of the case because it is impossible for the majority of young people to take special work at agricultural colleges in addition to normal-school training, and if the agricultural college is to give all of the training for the teacher, then wherefore the normal schools? We find that some agricultural college men feel that the government is already furnishing all the aid it should. If that is the case, then the agricultural colleges might furnish men to give courses at the normal schools, and they might establish co-operative experiment stations, as at Macomb, Ill. President Bayliss writes: The Soil Experiment Field is co-operative and is conducted by the University of Illinois and our state normal school. They prepare the plans to be used in conducting the field experiments and we take full charge of the field operations. Such co-operation provides for both scientific and educative values in the work and it is proposed to make the results as far-reaching as is possible, not alone to teachers, but to those interested in agricultural methods and results. These questions confront us: Shall we ask agricultural-college men to give courses at our normal schools? Shall we have co-operative experiment stations with the agricultural colleges? Shall we ask Congress for direct aid ? DEPARTMENT OF MANUAL TRAINING SECRETARY'S MINUTES FIRST SESSION.-TUESDAY, JULY 8, 1907 The department met in joint session with the departments of Elementary Education and Art Education in the First Methodist Church, Los Angeles, Cal., and was called to order at 2:30 P. M. by the president, Frank M. Leavitt, assistant director of drawing and manual training, Boston, Mass. August Ahrens, director of manual training, State Normal School, Warrensburg, Mo., presented a paper on "The Development of an Adequate Course of Study in Manual Training for the Elementary Grades" from the point of view of the teacher of the manual arts. Fletcher B. Dresslar, associate professor, Department of Education, University of California, Berkeley, Cal., discussed the same topic from the point of view of child-study. Mrs. Alice Woodworth Cooley, president of the Department of Elementary Education, introduced Chas. H. Keyes, supervisor of South District Schools, Hartford, Conn., who discussed the topic from the view-point of the school superintendent. Thomas A. Mott, superintendent of schools, Richmond, Indiana, led the general discussion and was followed by L. E. Wolfe, superintendent of schools, San Antonio, Texas; Cree T. Work, president of College of Industrial Arts, Denton, Texas; Miss Emma C. Davis, supervisor, public schools, Cleveland, Ohio, and Arthur H. Chamberlain, Dean of Throop Polytechnic Institute, Pasadena, Cal. The chair then appointed the following committees: August Ahrens, Warrensburg, Mo. SECOND SESSION.-THURSDAY, JULY II The department met at the First Methodist Church and was called to order by President Leavitt, who made brief introductory remarks on the general topic, "The Relation of Industrial Education to Public Instruction." B. W. Johnson, director of manual training, public schools, Seattle, Wash., discussed the subtopic, "Manual Training versus Industrial Training in the High Schools." Jesse D. Burks, Principal of the Teachers Training School, Albany, N. Y., discussed the subtopic, "Can the School Life of Pupils Be Prolonged by an Adequate Provision for Industrial Training in the Upper Grammar Grade?" The subtopic, "Industrial Training as Viewed by the Manufacturer," was discussed in a paper by Magnus W. Alexander, engineer in charge of drawing-office, General Electric Co., Lynn, Mass., and vice-president of the National Society for the Promotion of Industrial Education. The Committee on Nominations presented the following report: For President Jesse D. Burks, Albany, N. Y. For Vice-President-Anna C. Hedges, Brooklyn, N. Y. For Secretary-William E. Roberts, Cleveland, Ohio. The report was accepted and the nominees elected. The Committee on Resolutions presented the following resolutions, which were adopted: WHEREAS, The accumulative work of the department during the last two years seeking a more rational statement of courses of manual training, seems now to indicate a necessity for some definite work by a special committee; be it therefore, Resolved, That the manual-training department of the National Educational Association, now in session, recommend the appointment of a committee for the purpose of collecting data of the manual-training work done thruout this country, that suggestive courses adaptable to various conditions found therein may be formulated by them. Resolved, That this committee consist of three persons now actively engaged in manual training, with power to add to their number a superintendent of schools, a teacher of art, a child-study specialist, a grade teacher, and a representative from such other departments as may be deemed advisable to increase the efficiency of their work. Resolved, That the aforesaid committee of three be appointed by the president of this department. Resolved, That this committee be appointed for a term of two years, being requested to make a preliminary report at the next meeting of this association. Resolved, That a committee of one be appointed by the president of this department to make formal application to the board of directors of the Association for an appropriation to defray the expenses of the committee. THIRD SESSION.-FRIDAY, JULY 12 The department met in joint session with the Department of Indian Education. Elbert H. Eastman, director of fine and industrial arts, Brigham Young University, Provo, Utah, read a paper on "Rational Art and Manual Training in Rural Schools." M. Friedman, assistant superintendent, Haskell Indian Institute, Lawrence, Kansas, presented a paper on "Manual Training in the Indian Schools." Miss R. M. Hodge, teacher of manual training, public schools, Los Angeles, Cal., discussed the topic, "The Relation of Primitive Handicrafts to Present-Day Educational Problems." The president then appointed, in accordance with the resolutions adopted at the second session, the following committee. ON INVESTIGATION B. W. Johnson, director of manual training, Seattle, Wash., Chairman. Miss Euphrosyne Langley, associate in manual training, School of Education, University of Chicago, Chicago, Ill. Cree T. Work, Denton, Texas, was appointed to make application to the Board of Directors for an appropriation to defray expenses of the committee on investigation. The department then adjourned. AUGUST AHRENS, Acting Secretary. PAPERS AND DISCUSSIONS THE DEVELOPMENT OF AN ADEQUATE COURSE OF I. FROM THE POINT OF VIEW OF THE TEACHER OF MANUAL ARTS An analysis of the topic as worded implies that we develop a course of study in manual training in terms of exercises and tool practices, and that we give reasonable attention to the adequacy or the inappropriateness of the materials commonly used in construction. The present status of manual |