is known as itinerant teacher training. This is described in the report of the Federal Board for Vocational Education for 1924 as follows:

It ordinarily means individual instruction of the teacher at the school he serves by a competent person whose duty it is to carry on such work where needed. It implies going here, there, and everywhere in a State where a teacher is not doing the desired kind of work, and staying with him, or going back to him until he gains enough additional knowledge and skill to meet his problems more efficiently. The third effective means for the professional improvement of agricultural teachers in service is the State and sectional meetings of agricultural teachers for conference, demonstration, and practice.

State supervision.-Before the passage of the Smith-Hughes Act only Massachusetts, New York, Pennsylvania, Indiana, and Wisconsin had provided adequate supervision of agricultural education conducted with the aid of State funds.

The instruction in agriculture in the other 34 States granting aid for agriculture in high schools was supervised by deputy commissioners of education, professors of secondary education, high-school inspectors, and professors of agricultural education connected with land-grant colleges.

At the beginning of the 5-year period of the administration of the Federal Vocational education act some States made temporary arrangements in securing supervision and inspection of instructors through competent persons detailed from State institutions or through the use of persons already in the employ of the State board in some other capacity. (Federal Board Report 1922, p. 37.) In 1922 there were 42 full-time and 27 part-time supervisors.

In general, supervision has been conducted by personal conferences of the supervisor with the teachers, special preparation of material in the way of outlines for directed or supervised practice in agriculture, bulletins covering the main points in the administration of vocational agricultural education in the State, blanks for reports from the schools to the State board; through community surveys to determine how best to adapt the vocational agricultural instruction to the needs of the vocational pupils in the State, and through Statewide, regional, and sectional conferences. (Federal Board Report 1920, p. 79.) Attention was often given to promotional work, improvement of the content of the course of study, methods of instruction, supervised practice, part-time instruction, and improvement of the system of reports and records. Because there have been many inexperienced teachers and the force has been rapidly changing, much attention has had to be given to the solution of specific problems arising in connection with the work in different localities. Successful experience in teaching agriculture has therefore been of great advantage in the case of supervisors.

Agricultural instruction in the schools. Even before the passage of the Smith-Hughes Act it was evident that most of the secondary instruction in agriculture would be given in the local high schools. This plan for such instruction was greatly helped by the provision in that act for practical farm work during six months. While the special agricultural schools have much more extensive equipment of buildings, farms, animals, machinery, etc., and a larger agricultural faculty, they can not provide any large amount of practical work on the school farms in case they have many students. From the beginning of the operation of the Smith-Hughes Act the number of schools in which departments of vocational agriculture were established was very much greater than that of the special schools receiving Federal aid. There are only about 170 special agricultural schools in the United States, but in 1918 according to the records of the Federal Board for Vocational Education, 609 schools received Smith-Hughes

funds and this number steadily increased until in 1923 there were 2,673. These schools ranged from small institutions in the open country to large high schools in villages or cities. Most of the schools employ only one teacher of agriculture. The total number of these teachers in 1923 was 3,012. Their departments of agriculture

are in the nature of part-time schools of the occupational extension type, the instruction being designed to supplement the employment of the pupil on the home farm. In order that these schools may really carry out this type of instruction it has been found necessary to limit the attendance upon vocational agricultural classes to pupils who are actually engaged in some form of farm work. In most cases these schools or departments offer two, three, or four year courses for 36 weeks in the year with half of the pupils' time given to nonvocational high-school subjects. The work in vocational agriculture is usually accepted as a part of the high-school course, thus enabling the pupils completing the vocational agricultural work to secure not only the agricultural certificate but also the diploma granted by the school. The group reached by this instruction is usually composed of pupils who would ordinarily be enrolled in other high-school courses. (Federal Board Report, 1919, p. 37.)

Short winter courses and evening courses for persons out of school are increasing in number. The agricultural instruction increasingly deals with the agricultural needs of the local communities. The science work in the Smith-Hughes school is being more definitely related to agriculture and home economics.

With few exceptions the State plans provide as the qualifications of teachers of vocational agriculture graduation from a 4-year college course planned for the training of teachers of vocational agriculture and at least two years of practical farm experience. (Federal Board Report, 1919, p. 39.)

In 1922 the Federal board reported that

The methods of adaptation of instruction to local conditions commonly used are: The survey of farm enterprises of the community, the organization of courses on the basis of farm enterprise, the formulation of courses of study by the local teacher, which courses are later approved or modified by the State supervisor.

The results of this adaptation are: Increased interest on the part of pupils in the work studied; vocational education in agriculture which actually functions in the community and which, as a result, elicits the support of farmers; and, on the whole, more thoroughgoing and efficient work done by the teachers.

The importance of the supervised farm practice as an essential feature of secondary instruction in agriculture with a vocational aim has been more fully recognized as the work under the Smith-Hughes Act has progressed. The home project is required equally in connection with all-day, part-time, and evening instruction. But there is an increasing demand to go beyond the formal requirements of the Smith-Hughes Act as regards farm practice. Students are required or requested to undertake farm work outside the assigned home project in order to develop skill in particular directions. Group or class projects have increased in number. The financial returns of supervised farm practice have greatly increased. For the fiscal year 1921-22 the labor income of vocational pupils in the all-day white schools amounted to $2,953,566.

In 1922-23 the 57,099 students enrolled in project work used 134,904 acres of land, 72,741 animals, and 691,808 birds. The previous year 79 per cent of those enrolled completed their projects, with a total labor income of $3,573,321.50 or about $96 per student.

Most of the instruction given under the Smith-Hughes Act has been through all-day courses given to children regularly attending school. But young people out of school and employed on farms as laborers or tenants may come back for part-time or short courses and more mature men and women who are farm tenants or owners may come to evening classes. The part-time courses cover from two weeks to three months and from four to eight hours per day. The instruction outside of the regular courses is often given through short-unit courses dealing with particular farm enterprises, such. as potato growing, milk production, poultry husbandry, etc.

In 1924 there were 62,912 boys and 2,446 girls studying agriculture in all-day schools, 2,143 boys in part-time classes, 3,063 boys and 193 girls in short-unit courses, and 13,248 men and 1,979 women in evening classes. In all there were 85,984 persons receiving instruction in agriculture under the Smith-Hughes Act, as compared with 15,453 in 1918.

Special efforts have been made to develop instruction in vocational agriculture for negroes in the Southern States. It has been impracticable to get an adequate supply of well-trained teachers, but their number is increasing. Teacher training is done in the land-grant colleges for negroes and at Hampton and Tuskegee Institutes. Thirteen States have employed a negro teacher trainer, who visits the vocational agricultural departments of negro schools and assists in the improvement of teachers in service.

The white supervisors also have actively promoted the negro work. In 1922-23 there were 202 departments of vocational agriculture in negro schools, with an enrollment of 4,880. There were also nine part-time schools with 201 students and 18 evening classes with 813 students. In the project work 5,656 students were enrolled. In 1921-22, 78 per cent of the negro students completed their projects, the labor income being $332,457.21. Since very few negro farm boys enter high schools it has been necessary to carry the vocational agricultural instruction into the grades, and the schools for this purpose have been carefully selected.

The most successful work of this kind has been done with pupils whose parents are landowners. It is very difficult to reach the renters on the large plantations.

The influence of the Smith-Hughes work has gone beyond the schools receiving funds under that act. Incomplete statistics published by the Federal board in 1924 showed that in 13 States there were 227 schools with 197 teachers and 3,656 students in courses of vocational agriculture. Ninety of these schools were receiving State aid.

The amount of Federal funds available for vocational education in agriculture in secondary schools increased from $547,027.79 in 1918 to $2,036,502.12 in 1924. There was a further increase to $2,526,826.66 in 1925 and the maximum of $3,021,887.39 was reached in 1926. In 1918, 50 per cent of the available amount was expended in the States and 94.9 per cent in 1923. That year the Federal funds were used as follows: For supervisors, $31,612.67; evening schools, $38,504.07; part-time classes, $22,753.08; short-unit courses, $21,909.35; all-day schools, $1,554,919.58. The total cost of

uver

agricultural instruction in 1923 was $4,647,042.04, of which $1,669,698.75 was Federal money, $1,108,461.22 was State money, and $1,868,882.07 was local money.

The results of five years' work of the schools receiving the benefits of the Smith-Hughes Act are summed up by Professor Myers in the report on his study of the effectiveness of vocational education in agriculture (490). Reports from 722 schools in 35 States showed 8,340 persons out of school who had had one or more years of instruction in vocational agriculture. On the average these persons had spent 2.7 years in high school, during which time they had been in agricultural classes 1.7 years. Fifteen and seven-tenths per cent of them had had 3 or 4 years of agricultural instruction, and of these 80 per cent had graduated. Of the total number of students, 50.4 per cent had graduated and 22 per cent had been to college. Of those who went to college 36.5 per cent went to agricultural colleges. Four thousand four hundred and eighty-eight, or 54 per cent, of the total number were engaged in farming, though 13.6 per cent of the farmers had followed other pursuits for a time. Of the total number 5 per cent were in occupations related to agriculture, 8 per cent had gone to agricultural colleges, 14 per cent to nonagricultural colleges, 10 per cent were in nonagricultural occupations, and 9 per cent were not accounted for; 311 had become teachers in rural schools. Of the farmers, 10 per cent were owners, 6 per cent managers, 7 per cent renters, 48 per cent partners, and 29 per cent laborers.

Part 8. AGRICULTURE IN THE ELEMENTARY SCHOOLS

During the past 25 years there has been a definite and widespread movement for the teaching of agriculture in the public elementary schools in the United States. The desire for this has been expressed at different times from the beginning of the movement for agricultural education in this country. After the establishment of the agricultural colleges the National Grange in 1878 passed a resolution favoring such teaching. The public school system, especially in the rural districts, was not in condition to attempt this work at that time. Preparatory efforts to improve the curriculum of the elementary schools were, however, under way. Out of them came definite and feasible plans for elementary instruction in agriculture. These earlier movements may be grouped under the heads (1) object teaching, (2) nature study, and (3) school gardens.

OBJECT TEACHING

The basing of elementary instruction on objects rather than on books had been taught and exemplified by Pestalozzi and his followers. Joseph Neef had used this method in his private schools in this country from 1809 to 1825. The first definite object teaching in connection with a public school in the United States was at the State Normal School at Westfield, Mass., about 1845, under the influence of Horace Mann. It was taken up very actively at the normal school in Oswego, N. Y., about 1860, by E. A. Sheldon and after 1875 was developed there in connection with the teaching of elementary science. William T. Harris introduced it in the St. Louis schools during his superintendency there between 1867 and 1880.

Great impetus was given to this movement through the wide publicity caused by the radical reorganization of the elementary instruction in the schools of Quincy, Mass. Charles Francis Adams was a member of the school committee of that town. Becoming greatly dissatisfied with the results of elementary instruction according to the conventional plan, he succeeded in bringing in Francis W. Parker as school superintendent. From 1876 to 1880 Colonel Parker based the elementary curriculum in the Quincy schools on object teaching. His great energy and enthusiasm inspired the teachers under him. The pupils worked with a great variety of objects in and out of the school, did modeling in sand, and visited the fields and woods to gather plants and other things. The study of language, geography, etc., was correlated with the object study. After this Colonel Parker carried this method into the schools of Boston as a supervisor and in 1883 began a 16-year term as principal of the Cook County (Chicago) Normal School in Illinois, whence his influence was widespread.