SCIENCE IN FARMING.

Taranaki Daily News, 16 June 1925, Page 10

SCIENCE IN FARMING.

THE NEED FOR TRAINING. GROWTH OF SPECIALISATION. WORK IN PRIMARY SCHOOLS. An interesting address on the teaching of agriculture in the schools was given by Mr. R. G. Ridling (senior Inspector tor agriculture to the Taranaki I‘Lducation Board) at the New Plymouth Rotary Club lunch yesterday. The president (Mr. J. H. Quilliam) presided. The influence oif experience in broadening the outlook of the observer was first of all traced by Mr. Ridling, who wont on to say that absence of experience might depend upon two things. In the first case, 'it might depend on the inability of the observer to receive those experiences because of lack of training, and upon inability to 'hang the experience upon experiences that the observer might have had before. Education to-day aimed very largely at increasing the experiences of children, particularly by training their senses and ■keeping the senses alert. In general, all progression depended upon reasoning power, the power that enabled us to deal with new situations and problems by applying to them the experiences ol past study. The man who farmed by rule o* tllumb methods could not possibly be a progressive, farmer, because he could not handle situations other than those with which he was familiar. The farmer who had been trained, however, could take any new situation, analyse it and then apply such of his experiences as were applicable in finding the solution. As an instance of the application of reason and experience, Mr. Ridling referred to the work of the commission which recently inquired into the deterioration of the back country in Taranaki. Mr. Bruce Levy, acting on the results of his experiences and reasoning, had suggested that the type of grasses being used by one of the farmers was not suitable for the country, as it required too high a state of fertility. His view met opposition, but an experiment with a grass he had suggested had proved him correct. THE FACTS OF LIFE. Continuing, Mr. Ridling said that educationists in history had dealt with their subjects in the abstract; the sciences to-day had become sciences of facts. In the schools the teachers had to deal with immature humanity, which had to be endowed with the ability to handle the problems of life, and to do that the teachers had to endeavour to teach from the. actual facts of life. The materials were to hand all the time in the trees, the weather, the stars, the ground and the people themselves. The teachers called that nature study, but he preferred to call it the facts of life. These materials were used in order to train the children to handle their own lives.

Nature study included practically every known science, and in Taranaki the most important specialised branch of that study was agriculture. In the lower schools it was difficult to do much work upon that special branch because the minds of the children were not fitted for it. The foundations, however, were laid and as the children reached the higher classes it was quite possible to specialise in this work and achieve good results. The specialisation began in the upper classes and was continued in the high schools and in the university and farming colleges. Mr. Ridling pointed out that it was impossible to produce a sound farmer in the same time as it took to tram an apprentice m any other trade into a qualified tradesman. In New Zealand to-day, he said, agriculturalists were not being trained. We were allowing the most important national industry to be carried on the shoulders of men, the largest proportion of whom had not had the experience necessary to enable them to deal with any situation that might arise on their farms. TEACHING AGRICULTURE. This, however, was being changed little by little. In the schools a commencement was being made by teaching agriculture, which could be taught just as could chemistry. Agriculture was an exact science and was gradually coming into its place in the syllabus of worK in the schools. Mr. Ridling made special reference to the good work that was being done by the Boys’ and Girls’ Agricultural Clubs and the influence of the experiments of the children on the work of their parents. More than all else these children were being convinced that there were economic possibilities in farming which farmers had never realised. Further, there was the greater probability that these children, once they were finished with their* school work, would go out on the land. In the higher schools many difficulties wfere met with in teaching agriculture and the greatest of them was the examination bogey. It there was one thing that prevented higher training m agriculture to-day it was the matriculation examination. Further, boys often had to go to work when they reached a certain age, and, unfortunately, where thejr could earn money they could not receive good training. Another difficulty was lack of land. These difficulties would be removed, and he was hopeful that they had reached the stage when something more would be done for agricultural education than in the past. At the New Plymouth Technical College they could not turn out good farmers because of the lack of apparatus and of land. At the West End School there was no land available for use in teaching the children agriculture. Mr. Ridling closed his address by reminding the Rotarians that if they could do anything to help in overcoming these difficulties they would be doing national service. Tiie speaker was accorded a vote of thanks on the motion of Rotarian A. i L. Moore.