SCHOOL LIBRARY REFERENCE BOOKS 245 hood, they would see how these look when printed in the local press. Note the effect of these upon other students or neighbors who read them. Many bulletins are issued by the United States Bureau of Farm Management and by similar departments in state colleges from time to time. These should be read and studied either for class use or for reporting in literary societies, community meetings, or clubs. Train students to read much on the subject of farm management. Their minds will thus be kept upon the subject more than if they gained all of their management lessons from class discussions without doing much reading. By reading students will be able to learn principles and to summarize results better than if they hear discussions only. Teachers should assign readings to different students and have these students report at some specific time the results of their reading. Interesting stories in farm management have been published. Induce students to read these for mere entertainment and the results will be helpful in the management of their farms. FIG. 118.-This New Jersey student established a vocational" market at his home near the public road for the motoring public. (A. W. Hand.) School Library Reference Books in Farm Management.3 -Teachers should obtain the latest list of books on this subject from the States Relations Service, United States Department of Agriculture. Secure from this list all of the best and latest books on the subject. A few books on rural economics and agricultural economics should be included. If the typical method of conducting the class work is to be followed for all or a part of the time during this course, there should be several copies of some of the best reference books on the shelves. This will enable the instructor to assign a number of students to the same authority in the preparation of topics for the same recitation. Books of a popular nature which touch upon farm manage3 See Chapter XVII. ment should be included in the list if there are funds sufficient to warrant this investment. They will aid in causing students to give more attention to the subject of farm management without realizing that they are really studying at all. Suggestions for the arrangement of library books are given elsewhere.1 Bulletins on Farm Management. From the same source above suggested get the latest list of bulletins relating to farm management. Obtain all of these that are still available and classify them for use in the school. Write to your own experiment station and to a number or all of those in other states and ask for a list of the available bulletins on this subject. Send for these bulletins and include all that in any way relate to better management on any of the lines of farming. There are many such bulletins published. These should be carefully grouped according to the suggestions given in another chapter. Farm Management in Journals.4 There are several periodicals published which are devoted chiefly to farm management. These of course should be placed on the reading tables. Also include those journals which have good departments of farm management. Some journals publish excellent accounts of farm management by good writers. These are not always grouped in departments called "Farm Management." They are nevertheless just as valuable for students to read. Some schools make it a practice to send the agricultural journal to the home of students on Friday night to be returned Monday morning. If this is done, it is a good plan to have each student ask his parents to express their opinions of some particular article in the journal. This may start some home discussion. It may assure the teacher that the magazines are being well used and it establishes a connecting link of thought between teacher and parents. EXERCISES 1. Make plans of a farmstead with which you are very familiar, showing many of the details, such as arrangement of buildings, wells, lots, walks, roads, and fences. 2. Plan and replan the lay-out of fields on this farm to make them the most ideal. 3. Make a card index of the pure-bred stock of a neighborhood. 4. Make application for registration of pure-bred stock for at least one breed in each of the kinds of farm animals-sheep, cattle, horses, hogs. 5. Make a form for keeping egg records; another for incubator records. 6. Select, or make, a set of forms for use in cost accounting for at least three of the field crops of your state. 4 See Chapter XVII. 7. Conduct a field exercise with your classmates, or others, to make a study of the farm methods in some particular lines. 8. Make a study of the rules, methods, and management of a marketing association in your region or elsewhere. 9. Conduct a trip for the study of markets in a good market center. 10. Conduct a study of a nearby warehouse, creamery, packing plant, elevator, or other institution of your region. 11. Make a farm-management survey of a small neighborhood. 12. Make one or more charts to aid in teaching farm management. 13. Take local photographs to teach important points in farm management. 14. Make a full outline of several typical lessons in farm management. 15. Make inventories of one or more farms. 16. Compare annual inventories of one farm, made in successive years. 17. Get blanks from the agricultural college of your state and of neighboring states and from the U. S. Department of Agriculture showing different systems of farm accounting. 18. Make a graph of the weekly price of corn, hogs, or some other farm product. QUESTIONS 1. State the specific aim in a course in farm management. 2. Give the content of such a course. 3. What are some of the special methods in teaching this subject? 4. Give good topics for beginning class work in farm management. 7. Why should students practice the making of applications for registering pure-bred stock? 8. Why should students learn to use forms for keeping records of production in poultry? In dairying? 9. Suggest a number of field exercises in farm management. 10. Give topics to be included in a farm management survey. 11. How could you use farm management charts in farmers' meetings? 12. Suggest some suitable views for lantern slides for use in farmers' meetings. 13. How could you teach farm management in rural schools? In town grades? 14. Suggest suitable topics for farm management in a short course. 15. Review a typical lesson in farm management. 16. Suggest a number of topics for debate in farm management. 17. What are some of the things for a student to discover in this field? 18. What are some of the things for him to solve? 19. What are some of the things to be observed in this field? 20. Mention a number of things to do in farm management. 21. Suggest some reading assignments for this course. 22. Make a list of good reference books for high-school libraries, relating to this course. CHAPTER XII HOW TO TEACH SOILS "The specific aim of the work in soils is to enable young people to obtain such a knowledge of the most important principles of the formation, properties, and management of soils, applicable primarily to their own vicinity, as will prepare them for the successful production of maximum crops and the maintenance of soil fertility."-Report of Committee on Agriculture of the N. E. A. Commission on Reorganization of Secondary Education. Field Covered. This subject includes the origin and classification of soils; relation of composition to plants and animals; soils and plant relations; soil and crop production; soil water, drainage and irrigation; tilth and tillage; soil organisms in relation to fertility; chemical elements of fertility; liming in relation to fertility; the harmful agents in soils; crop rotation in relation to fertility; application of principles to soil management; soil erosion; systems of farming in relation to fertility; determining the needs of soils; profitable crop production; dry-land farming. The content of the course on soils of any school should be made to suit the region. The soils of other localities need not be studied except in college courses and in teacher training courses. The work given in the course on soils should be of a vocational character, i.e., the theoretical and abstract phases of the work may be largely omitted in the teaching of vocational agriculture. For example, in those parts of the United States where irrigation is not practiced because it is not necessary, the study of irrigation systems and methods of handling irrigation water should be omitted. In regions where drainage is seldom or never needed, the problems of drainage should be omitted from the course of study. In level prairie states the problems of erosion should be omitted. The study of soil formation may be considered prevocational in character. Such studies are better suited to elementary classes than to studies pursued in vocational agriculture. The study of marsh-land farming, or the study of sands and their management, or the study of depleted clays and silts is chiefly of local importance and suited to special regions. Relation of Soils to Other Subjects. Much of the study of soils, so far as they are related to the production of horticultural crops, may be pursued in connection with the study of horticul RELATION OF SOILS TO OTHER SUBJECTS 249 ture. In the course in gardening make considerable study of garden soils and their management. In the course in fruit growing study fruit soils and their management. These subjects must contain such soil studies even if the students had a special course in soil work. In the course in field crops some work in soil management must be given (Fig. 119). The general work in soil improvement FIG. 119.-Teach students and farmers the importance of knowing the limiting factors in the soil's production. (W. W. Weir, "Productive Soils.") and soil management is closely associated with field crop work. It is difficult to study the subject of field crops without considering much of the work in soils. Yet many schools find it advisable to offer a course in soils and fertilizers independent of the field crop work. In such cases it is probably best to let the course in soils be given at the same time as the course in field crops. In some schools, however, the course in soils is given after the course in field crops. In either case it is for the purpose of giving a more extended and thorough treatment of soils and fertilizers than is possible when combined with agronomy. |