Shall Theoretical and Practical Agriculture and the Physical Development of Child¬ hood Be Added to the Curriculum of the City Public Schools? A PAPER READ AT A MEETING OF THE American Association for Advancement of Science HELD IN MINNEAPOLIS, MINNESOTA December 28, 1910 UMVcHsi ?y or ILLINOIS LIBRARY CONTAINING MAP OF A PROPO Sfcf&Rig ULT PHYSICAL DEVELOPMENT PARK ILLUSTRATIVE PICTURES ^HOOLAND By A. B. STICKNEY CHAIRMAN OF THE ST. PAUL CITIZENS’ COMMITTEE CONSISTING OF ONE HUNDRED AND FIFTY CITIZENS TO PLAN A COMPREHENSIVE SYSTEM OF PARKS saint paul: McGill-Warner Co. 1910 'W* t I i SHALL THEORETICAL AND PRACTICAL AGRICULTURE AND THE PHYSICAL DEVELOPMENT OF CHILD- HOOD BE ADDED TO THE CURRICULUM OF THE CITY PUBLIC SCHOOLS? ca * <3 0 . m Since the middle of the last century the invention and use of labor saving machinery have wrought a wonderful change in the problems of the City Public Schools. Then child labor was necessary to produce a stingy livelihood for the family. Now the use of labor saving machinery makes a day’s labor of the adult so effective, that child labor is not only unnecessary, but, if permitted, it becomes a menace to the labor of the adult. Then the parents’ problem was to scrimp and save that their children might attend school for short periods. Now the prob¬ lem is to find sufficient occupation for their children. Then there were long hours for work and few hours for school, now there are long hours at school and few hours for work with no work to do. But childhood must be occupied. A farmer being asked how he occupied the long winter evenings on the farm, replied: “Wall, sometimes I set and think, but most times I just set.” The normal child never “just sets.” He is always doing something which he ought to do or something which he ought not to do. It is now taxing the wits of his parents to find such occupation as he ought to do and is willing to do with the minimum amount of compulsion. Hence, now the parents’ problem, in the last analysis, is as much a problem of occupation as of education. The real question, therefore, which my subject presents, is— How, under the present economic conditions in the cities, can childhood be profitably occupied? I would lay especial stress on the word “profitably,” because the years of childhood embrace about a quarter of the years of the average lifetime which is altogether too large a part to be wasted. Under the rule, the principle of which is now recognized, and as the years roll by will be more and more fully established, that child labor shall not be used in productive occupations, it is [Page 3] evident that profits of childhood occupations cannot be immedi¬ ately available. Under these conditions the only compensation, which such occupations can obtain, is physical and mental devel¬ opment that amounts to latent capital stored in the body and mind of each child which will become available in mature years. And as the experience of the ages proves that perhaps ninety per cent of all the children who are born, must, as adults, gain a livelihood by physical labor, it is no disparagement of the value of the education now imparted in our schools, to say that latent capital stored up in a fully developed physique is of as great economic value as the school education. But such a comparison, although in a sense true, is inconsequential, because developed muscle without the brain to direct and developed brain without the physique to support, are equally impotent. The production of a sound body, acting in conjunction with a sound mind, is the true goal of childhood occupation. This is the only goal worth considering. It produces the best economic results, the best manhood and the best womanhood and the best citizenship. Therefore the development of the body and of the brain should be carried together, step by step and hand in hand. In order to reach this goal, childhood occupations must be systematically arranged and conducted under competent super¬ vision and control. Up to the present time, this supervision and control has been divided. The State, through the public schools, has undertaken the mental development of all the children and each individual parent the physical development of his own. The part assumed by the schools has been systematized and carried on under a general plan; the part reserved to the parents has been conducted without system. The City Schools have undertaken the task of furnishing and supervising the occupation of all the children above the age of five years, for about half of the time, in such studies as are sup¬ posed to develop and discipline the mind. The system consists of dividing the children into twelve grades, the division being based primarily on age. Then an extensive range of topics is divided into twelve courses of study adapted to the respective grades, each being made sufficient to occupy the pupils for one school year. One of the fundamental faults of the system consists in ignor¬ ing the differing capacities of both pupils and teachers. The system undertakes to compel some pupils to study branches of learning which they have no capacity to comprehend and to [Page 4 ] compel teachers, well qualified to teach certain subjects, to give instruction in other branches which they do not comprehend and therefore can only teach in a prefunctory and meaningless manner. One of the results of this system is that the schools fail to maintain the full attendance because children cannot be coaxed nor compelled to study for consecutive years, subjects which they have no capacity to understand. I have seen statistics to the effect that twenty-five per cent of the children of school ages are truants all the time, and it is a known fact that only about twenty per cent enter the High Schools and about five per cent graduate. What is the remedy? Years ago, at the beginning of the larger financial transac¬ tions with which the present generation is so familiar, a bank was organized in New York City with what was then considered an enormous capital. A customer asked for a loan of $500,000. The directors scrutinized the collateral and pronounced it ample. They admitted that the bank had the money and would like to take the loan but its size staggered them and the loan was re¬ fused. With disgust, the customer replied: “It seems to me this bank needs one of two acts. It either needs an Act of the Legislature to reduce the capital to the capacity of the directors or an Act of God to increase their capacity.” It seems to me that the schools are in the same fix. They need either an act of the authorities to adapt the curriculum to the varying capacities of the children, or an Act of God to even up these capacities. The antiquated but impossible theory of uniform all-around scholarship must be abandoned. The theory of universal quali¬ fication for the presidency of the United States, for judges, sena¬ tors, doctors, lawyers, preachers, or even Captains of Industry is too absurd, when everybody knows that the vast majority have scant capacity to become intelligent “hewers of wood and drawers of water” where they will finally land. The true func¬ tion of the public school is to develop such capacity as each pupil possesses. The work of the public schools should be re¬ garded, primarily and essentially as an occupation of childhood akin to an apprenticeship to actual adult occupations. It would seem that, if the theory and practice of all the livelihood occupations should find an optional place in the curriculum of the schools and the classes arranged in respect to subjects and individual capacities, it would have a tendency to make the schools attractive to all classes and to retain the attendance of most of the children who are now truants, as well as the much larger numbers who quit at the end of each grade above the fifth because both the pupils and parents feel that, under the circum¬ stances, longer attendance would be unprofitable. This theory is confirmed by experience. The first twelve year course of study was built along the lines of ancient prece¬ dents, consisting of two or three years of elementary work, sup¬ plemented with the remaining years devoted to the study of higher mathematics, Latin, Greek and modern languages. This course, beyond the few years of elementary work, did not appeal to the majority of parents as profitable occupation for childhood. It did not interest more than a small fraction of the children, and had it been continued until the present time, it is safe to say that the higher grades and the High School, would be practically vacant. The field of subjects was enlarged by introducing more inter¬ esting and practical topics, including the ipechanic arts. It appears that the introduction of the courses in Mechanic Arts has been an important factor in retaining the boys in the seventh and eighth grades and in the High School. I am told that more than half of the boys of the High School of my home city, St. Paul, are pursuing this course. For the same reason, it is my conviction that the addition of a practical course in agriculture would be greeted with even greater satisfaction by larger numbers, because it would interest the girls as well as the boys. Children’s minds are not all cast in the same mould. Some are interested in mechanics, some are not. Many who are not interested in making things would be interested in growing things. The farm schools for children in the Parks of New York City, under the patronage of the New York University, have become very popular and command an attendance to the full capacity of the space at command. The kindergarten methods of instruction are used with the younger children. Each child is allotted a small plot four by eight feet. The heavy work, like spading, is done by others, but under the supervision of instructors the seeds are planted and cared for by the children in such a manner that it is regarded as play. As the children grow older, and stronger, the whole work is done by them and the size of the lots increased. It is said “That the average child of ten years can do all the work under a teacher who makes it enjoyable.” In these gardens, in [Page 6 ] the New York City Parks, children raise all the standard crops, forty varieties of vegetables and fifty varieties of flowers. I do not advocate adding instruction in agriculture as a mere appendage to the present curriculum or that such instruction shall consist only in the actual cultivation of small garden lots which, as I understand, is the extent of the instruction in the New York City farm garden schools. It is my conviction that the first three or four grade-years of the public school should be devoted to a thorough drill in the good old fashioned “Three-R’s- Course” and thereafter the specialization should commence. That beginning with (say) the Fifth Grade, a separate seven or eight year course of study devoted to agriculture and the under¬ lying and collateral branches of learning which are involved in successful agriculture, should be installed. There was a time, not so many years ago, when such a prop¬ osition would have been laughed at. I remember that when the Minnesota State Agricultural College, which is now doing such grand work in teaching even experienced farmers how to farm, the first course of study was the orthodox college course, princi¬ pally Greek and Latin. When the apparent absurdity of ac¬ quiring a knowledge of agriculture by studying the dead lan¬ guages was pointed out, the learned president said: “If a boy wants to learn farming, let him hire out to a farmer.” But the agricultural colleges have since discovered that the range of Nature’s laws constituting the science of agriculture is a field sufficiently large to make up a course of study covering a lifetime. It has thus been demonstrated that it is possible to make up a course of study for eight or ten years of school occu¬ pation. The successful teaching of the natural laws will require the land for illustrations and practical demonstrations. Sufficient land should be available, so that at the beginning of each season a plot could be assigned to the exclusive use of each pupil. This would introduce the pleasure which arises from competition and would awaken ambitions. In this competition there could be no dodging, “cribbing” or gainsaying, as infallible Nature would keep the record which would show in what measure the study in the abstract has been comprehended. Every branch—field culture, garden culture, horticulture, floriculture and forestry— should be practically demonstrated, not by looking at the work of others but by cultivation carried on by the pupils. The public parks could easily afford the land for the crop planting. I can [Page 7 ] think of no more profitable use for such parks, and if properly distributed, skillfully combined with other ornamentation, these experiment plats would become the most interesting park features of the city. In the last years of the course, each pupil should keep a set of books which would show the details of the cost of his crop and the amount it sold for. This would be real bookkeeping, recording actual transactions instead of the theoretical book¬ keeping, recording the imaginary transactions of the professional commercial school and would therefore be more effective in¬ struction. Also in the senior years, physical and commercial geography, relating to production, distribution, marketing and consumption would become interesting and profitable studies. The breeding and raising of domestic animals is an essential part of agriculture and should be embraced in the curriculum but I am unable at present, to say how practical demonstration could be made. The advantages of such a course of study are manifold. Agriculture is the most important industry, the basis of all in¬ dustries and is especially the basis of the prosperity of the West. Its study opens up, both in its direct and collateral branches, a wide field of interesting and useful knowledge, both for boys and for girls. It brings the student in direct contact with Nature and Nature’s laws that can only be mastered by observing, thinking and obeying. Much of the instruction would be given in the open air and the sunshine, thus providing moderate exercise for a large class of children whose physical condition does not permit of the strenuous exercises of the gynmasium. It would therefore be of special benefit to that large class of children who grow stoop shouldered, pale faced, narrow chested and nervous by reason of sitting over desks in crowded rooms and vitiated atmospheres of the school houses. It would inculcate in many a love and knowledge of farming which would induce and enable many city born and bred men and women, to seek an independent livelihood from the cultiva¬ tion of the land and thus lessen the congestion of population in the cities. It would impart a knowledge of the way to make a city lot productive of garden vegetables which would contribute to the household expenses of those who receive small wages. [Page 5 ] Students of the Horticulture College in Swanley, England, at work in their gardens Digitized by the Internet Archive in 2018 with funding from University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign Alternates https://archive.org/details/shalltheoreticalOOstic It would teach the wives how to make their homes more attractive with lawns, plantings and flowers. Such ornamenta¬ tion is woman’s w r ork. There are schools in England devoted solely to the instruc¬ tion of women in horticulture and kindred subjects. Many of the graduates of these schools are now filling posi¬ tions of: Landscape Gardeners, Advising and Visiting Gardeners, Head Gardeners, Teachers of Nature Study, Market Gardeners, Poultry Keepers, Research Workers, Bee Experts, Instructors and Lecturers of Gardening, Etc. Thus w T ould instruction in agriculture open to American Womanhood new careers of industry, more profitable, more dig¬ nified, more in harmony with true womanhood, than domestic service, commercial clerkships or office typewriters, or even the round of “teas and bridges” during the years preceding mar¬ riage, and if continued after marriage would furnish pleasant occupation for otherwise idle hours. That the parents and pupils would receive such a course with enthusiasm and the wonderful results which would be obtained has been demonstrated by experiments which have been con¬ ducted by the Agricultural Department at Washington. About two or three years ago, the department organized the Boys Corn Raising Club in some of the southern states. In the first year only a few hundred w r ere enrolled, but in the second year, 1910, 46,225 southern lads, ranging from eleven to sixteen years of age, contested for the prizes. The story of the achievements of these boys reads like a fairy tale. Each boy cultivated one acre. Jerry H. Moore, of South Carolina, fifteen years old, produced on his prize acre, 228 bushels of shelled corn, a record which has been excelled but once in the history of corn raising and then only by two bushels. The average yield in South Carolina was about fifteen bushels per acre. Jerry Moore’s yield was fifteen times the average. So great has been the enthusiasm, that Earl Hopping of Rogers, Ark., a stripling of fourteen years, won his laurels by surmounting seemingly impossible difficulties. He prepared and [Page 9] planted his acre, using his father’s one span of mules. Then crop troubles came on and his father told him he could not have the use of the mules any more, and Earl was up against it in the matter of cultivating his corn. Most boys would have quit then and there, but Earl had a different sort of stuff in him. He had a team of goats and he rigged up a small cultivator from parts of a discarded machine. With that outfit he cultivated his acre, and husbanded it to such an advantage that it yielded fifty bushels—three times the average corn yielded for the State of Arkansas. The boys who join the club are given scientific instruction by a government demonstrator. During the winter and early spring months, they study farm problems in books from the government’s traveling libraries and they are given practical demonstrations on experimental acres. Each one cultivates a single acre. He may get it free from his father or he may rent it, but he must charge a certain rental as expense in reckoning his profit. He must select his own seed, fertilize and plow the ground, plant and cultivate the crop, and finally harvest it and select and arrange his own samples from which the quality of his corn is to be judged. He must keep books carefully, and be able to show exactly what his crop cost according to the government’s standards. The value of the crop is fixed by the government at $1.00 per bushel, but the boys usually get more, as their corn is in great demand. It is estimated that the work of these boys, directly and indirectly added more than 79,000,000 bushels, valued at $62,- 500,000.00 to the corn crop of the Southern States in 1910. Who will say that Agricultural Schools are not worth establish¬ ing. I Page 10] Let us now consider the physical development of childhood. The public schools devote their efforts entirely to the devel¬ opment and the discipline of the mind and while much is done to improve the sanitary conditions surrounding the confinement, they take no responsibility in regard to the development of the physique. The children enter the crowded school rooms at nine o’clock in the morning and, with slight intermissions, sit at desks in vitiated atmospheres until four o’clock in the afternoon, making six long hours of confinement. But this is not the whole story. The course of study is so swift that even the brightest minds can only keep up the pace by spending other hours in confined study at home. How much penalty the physique of the rising generation is paying by reason of such confinement, has been little studied or discussed. In the last few years, science has made wonderful discoveries as to the dangers growing out of the germs of disease which lurk in crowded tenement houses, in dusty streets and in filthy barns, but no special study has been made as to the dan¬ gers which lurk in twelve years’ confinement in the public school rooms. There has been no meter devised which can measure and record the loss of vitality which is due to such confinement. But the pale faces, the narrow chests and the stooping and lop¬ sided shoulders of many pupils almost inclines one to believe that the confinement of the public schools, while not resulting so often in immediate death, is as detrimental to the pleasures of living and as dangerous to the vitality of the race as all the “bugs” which science has discovered. What is the remedy? My own limited study and observation convinces me that three or four hours per day is all that should be devoted to such confinement and that the balance of the traditional six hour school day should be occupied in the practice of domestic sciences, mechanic arts, agriculture and such subjects as require the exer¬ cise of the muscles as well as the brain. But such moderate muscular exercise is insufficient. The proper development of the physique requires many hours of each [Page 11] day devoted to systematic physical exercise, tempered in respect to strenuosity to the physical condition of each child and properly supervised. Besides the hours after school must be occupied. In former days and perhaps even now in the country, there is work to be performed and chores to be done sufficient to occupy the time, and to maintain the physique. This is no longer the case in cities. The people who live in flats or on city lots, have absolutely no chores to be done or other work for their children to perform. The question what to do with the children after school hours is puzzling the brains of all thoughtful parents. The problem increases in difficulties as the children grow older; in accordance with the German adage ‘Tittle children, little troubles—big children, big troubles.” The obvious answer is: Let them play. It is an answer easier said than done. A gentleman said to me: “I live on a fifty foot lot. I have two boys who go to school and when they get home they want to play. There is no room on my lot so they take to the street. In a few minutes they are joined by others. Naturally they make a noise. Then my neighbor tele¬ phones for a policeman.” But want of space is only part of the difficulty. The child cannot play alone. It must have associates. The lone child will only mope or walk the busy streets, observing the crowds, the shop windows and the fakers, or visit the moving picture shows, the pool rooms, etc. Experience also proves that, under parental supervision, or rather lack of supervision, many of the boys will take no phy¬ sical exercise, but, forming gangs, they will occupy their time in caves and deserted shacks, smoking cigarettes, playing cards and bandits and all kinds of kindred vices. Under present con¬ ditions, what parent knows or can ascertain who his children’s associates are, what they are doing or where they rendezvous after school hours. I am told that more than half of the attendance of the after¬ noon performances of the dime theatres and moving picture shows consists of unattended school girls. But how can the mother, tied to her household cares and her social duties, supervise the out-of-door health giving play of her daughters? How can the fathers, tied to their desks, their lathes or their shovels, supervise the play of their sons? It is my contention that every argument which justifies the public, through the instrumentality of the schools, in the super- [Page 12] Wholesome Environment for Growing Children York City Department of Parks, Children’s School Farm, DeWitt Clinton Park, 54th Street and 11th Avenue. Space 250x135 feet, affording pleasure and profit annually to 3,500 children and adults. vision of the education of the mind, applies with equal force in favor of a like supervision of the physical development of child¬ hood. The strongest of these arguments is necessity. The individual parent has theoretical jurisdiction of the play of his own children. But for reasons already stated, he has no means of exercising it. And, as to his neighbor’s children, who must join in the play, he has not even theoretical jurisdiction. Hence parental supervision of childhood play is impossible. This impossibility creates the necessity for public supervision through some instrumentality like the schools and as physical and mental education are kindred and contemporaneous occu¬ pations, it seems desirable that both should be carried on by one and the same general management. The necessity for organized supervision of childhood plays has found expression in the “children’s playgrounds,” equipped with gymnastic apparatus and more recently in the Boy Scout Movement. Both of these movements have been received with favor by children and by parents. But the physical develop¬ ment of childhood requires more. It requires a curriculum covering the whole field of sports, wisely planned and system¬ atically conducted, day by day, under intelligent supervision, paid by the public and coupled with an authority derived from the law, equal at least, to that now conferred upon the public schools in respect to the mental development. Voluntary efforts, like the boy scout organization, only reach the volunteers. It does not reach the lazy and the mopes who most need physical exercise. Physical exercise, both for boys and girls, should be tempered to the physical capacity of each child and should be carried on winter and summer as far as practicable in the open air. Records should be kept of the tardy attendance and the non-attendance of each pupil and promptly notified to the parents and the truant officers. If practical agriculture and physical development is added to the curriculum of the public schools, the public must furnish sufficient fields to cultivate and ample playgrounds. As chairman of the Citizens Committee to plan a compre¬ hensive system of parks for the City of St. Paul, I commenced, some months ago, the study of park problems. I found that the city already possessed about 1400 acres of parks and several small playgrounds of about one acre each, adjacent to public school houses. I also found that, to secure for the use of the public all the remaining natural features of beauty in the city, [Page 13] would require the addition of about four thousand acres. The question occurred: Can some of these acres be made economi¬ cally useful? Seeking for information, I found a book entitled “Children’s Gardens for Pleasure, Health and Education,” by Henry G. Parsons, Director of the Department of School Gardens, New York University From this work I found that considerable areas in the New York City Parks are devoted to “Children’s Gardens,” which, the author says, “are places where children grow vegetables and flowers under the guidance of persons trained to show them Nature’s laws in operation and at the same time show them how to apply the knowledge of these laws in the work and observa¬ tions of life.” These garden schools w T ere started on a vacant lot by a woman and a mother Later they were transferred to the parks under the control of the Park Commission and still later, the manage¬ ment was turned over to the University cf New York. I next examined the Children’s Playgrounds adjacent to the school houses of St. Paul. Each of these are equipped with small gymnastic apparatus. They are, in a way, under the control and supervision of a nonde¬ script playgrounds committee which is an adjunct to the Park Commission. The school teachers and authorities have no con¬ trol or connection, whatever, with them. Besides, these play¬ grounds are too small to permit of any comprehensive system of physicial education. These two points of view have induced me to plan a com¬ posite agricultural school and physical development park, which I shall urge the city to adopt. The park contains 140 acres, 23 acres for experimental farm and garden plots, 40 acres for floraculture and forestry, a south¬ ern slope of 18 acres for the cultivation of fruit trees and fruit bearing shrubs, and still another slope of eight acres for vineyard culture, thus affording opportunity for practical work in every branch of field agriculture. It also contains a 40 acre athletic field, large enough for the full curriculum of physical develop¬ ment. The whole park should be substantially fenced and bordered on all sides with trees and shrubs. [Page lit] Map of a farm school and physical development park as planned by the author » “ Twenty-three acres for experimental farm and garden plots^—at rest “Farm and garden 'plots'’—at work ■ A combination School and Athletic Building ► Main Floor of the Main Building % Younger Pupils’ School House with Wide Veranda inside the Protection of the Farm Garden Fence. f The Wide Veranda of thcYonnger Pupils’ School House » * f l b 9 % The park would also contain a combination school and ath¬ letic building. This building is unique in both design and purpose. The ground floor has a large hall, flanked on each side by bath and toilet rooms and by large working greenhouses, and at the end a conservatory in which to exhibit the best results of all the agricultural work. There are bath, toilet, library, agricul¬ tural museum and laboratory rooms. In the second story which covers only a part of the first story, there are class and study rooms for the older pupils. The great hall with the bath and toilet rooms, in connection with the athletic fields, would afford ample accommodations for the physical development department and during the evenings it would afford an opportunity for lectures, concerts, dancing and other amusements, not only for the pupils of the school but for all the people, both old and young. Unlike the school houses which are in use only six hours per day during only 200 days in each year, I would keep this building open and busy from eight o’clock in the morning until ten o’clock at night for 365 days in the year. A lodge for the residence of the physical director would be built inside the gate of the farm garden tract and in proximity to the main building. Inside the protection of the farm garden fence on the north side of the field, for the use of the younger pupils, I would build rows of one-story school houses with wide verandas facing the south, accessible to the cool southern breezes of the summer months and protected from the cold northern winds of winter, so that, during all the sunny days, the children could pursue their studies in the open air of the verandas, retreating to the enclosed rooms only during the inclement days. The land constituting this park, although surrounded by population and easily accessible, is unoccupied. It is estimated that the plant would accommodate 2,000 to 2,500jpupils, and it is also estimated that the land and improvements together would cost about one-half per pupil of the cost of the high schools of the city. I have tamely and inadequately presented my subject. Much has been said and written about conserving the naW ural resources of the country. A great National conservation ' congress, composed of thousands of delegates from all sections, I has been held in St. Paul. It was addressed by the President of ! the United States, by the Ex-President, by governors of states, senators, congressmen, scholars and captains of industry. The [Page 15] 3 0112 062264970 conservation of coal, forests, water, credits, and fertility of soil was discussed. But the conservation of the greatest resource of the Nation, the health and happiness of the children, in fact the conservation of the future American Citizen and the human race itself, was given no prominence. I am advocating this greatest of all conservations.