FARM TRAINING.

Hauraki Plains Gazette, Volume XXXV, Issue 4745, 1 September 1924, Page 4

FARM TRAINING.

WORK IN THE SCHOOLS. MINISTER AND DENMARK PLAN. Supplementary or preparatory to the projected collegiate education in, practical and scientific agriculture’/ the work of teaching lads at school to acquire a learning towards rural occupation, is making steady progress. In his annual report on education the Minister (the Hon. C. J. Parr) devotes a good deal of space to the curriculum of agriculture in the primary schools. It was recently agreed, he said, at a conference of teachers of agriculture, farm experts, and representatives of producers, that iin the primary schools the best service that could be rendered to agriculture was to foster a soundly-devised course of instruction in nature study in > a direct and practical manner, to cultivate an interest in living and growing things, plant and animal life, and a general love of nature. Associated with the plan was the small garden plot for the children’s own care. The convenient' age’ in the primary was the period commencing at eleven’ years. In-the secondary and technical? high schools it .was advisable to con-,, fine the study to the scientific basis of agriculture, and to such studies of plant and anima! life, soils and atmospheric conditions, as would enable the youth later on to profit fully by-S’ practical direct coruse in farming. jjenmarK had me must fully-devel-open system of agricultural training in the world, prooabiy. its results ■were remar Kame, for in no country was tiie farm worker so highly trained and pt such high standing. Yet no direct training in agriculture was. given belore the age of fifteen. “hur two or three years after the boy had completed his general education, he must go to work on a farm in Denmark,” said the Minister. ‘‘Then, at the age of about eighteen or nineteen, he goes to the agricultural school proper, and receives a thorough training. The aims of these schools, known as folk high schools, as set out by the authorities, are : (a) To make a broad-minded, moral citizenship ;. (b)-.to foster a deep-seated love of the- soil and native land; (c) to give a correct outlook on agricultuaiTlife ; (d) to free the people from class domination, and show them how best to utilise their growing political power; (e) to lay a broad cultural foundation for the technical subjects to be pursued in the local agricultural schools; (f) , t 0 Prepare the young people to face intelligently the great struggle for existence that presses on all. alike in the European countries.”- Under this system nearly half the pupils who left the primary schools took up agricultural pursuits. Even in the folk high schools a considerable proportion of time was devoted to the study of Danish languageaii’d history, as well as to geography and gymnastics. Yet the Danish authorities attributed to the folk high schools more than to anything else the fact that Danish agriculture was organised on a system more thorough and scientific than could be found in any -zher European country. “In New Zealand it would seem, therefore,” added the Minister, “that if boys passed through a junior high school course, from the age of 12 to 15 years or 16 years, and received a general education, with due regard to nature study and science in relation to agriculture, as well as to general forms of handwork, they could then -most profitably proceed to work either on a farm or at a farm school, such as the Government farms at Ruakurat or Weraroa, and then, after two years or so of practical’ experience, take tip the more thorough study of agriculture.”

Jt should be noted, he said, that in Denmark boys were apprenticed to farmers after they left school, just as they would be in connection with any other occupation.