Responsibility of the teacher__. Relation of supervised practice to instruction_----- Providing ample supervised practice for each member of the class_- Supervising the preparation of the plan_-_-_- Provision for supervised-practice study. Providing reference material.. Checking skills of individuals_-_- Preliminary visits to pupils' homes... Opportunity for individual instruction_. Checking records of the pupils_----- Recording visits; memorandums, etc__ Time and frequency of visits_____. Measuring the pupil's farm practice__ Score card for judging the success or failure of pupils in home Use of the pupil's record in teaching-- School contests and supervised practice_. Responsibility of the State office---- Typical supervised practice program (Georgia). A State program for competitive work.. State organization for distribution of pupils' products.. Uniform methods of keeping records in State office_ Studies and investigations_-_- School credit for supervised practice---- Approval of teachers' programs for supervised practice--- * FOREWORD The vocational education law, enacted February 23, 1917, provided: "That in order to receive the benefits of such appropriation for the salaries of teachers, supervisors, or directors of agricultural subjects the State board of any State shall provide in its plan for agricultural education *; that such schools shall provide for directed or supervised practice in agriculture, either on a farm provided by the school or other farm, for at least six months per year." This bulletin is a revision of Bulletin 83, "Supervised Practice in Agriculture," and of Bulletin 21, "The Home Project as a Phase of Vocational Agricultural Education." It has been prepared for the purpose of interpreting the national vocational education act as it relates to directed or supervised practice activities and for discussing the means through which the provisions of the act may be carried out. The manuscript for this bulletin on "Supervised Practice in Agriculture, Including Home Projects," was prepared under the direction of Dr. C. H. Lane, Chief of the Agricultural Education Service, by Robert D. Maltby, agent for agricultural education in the Southern Region. Mr. Maltby was assisted in the preparation of the introduction by Arthur P. Williams, agent for agricultural education in the North Atlantic Region. The introduction, which deals with the aims and values of supervised practice in agriculture, is directly related to certain functions in the instructing process as described in Bulletin 103, "Methods of Teaching as Applied to Vocational Education in Agriculture." This bulletin is specifically directed to vocational teachers of agriculture, to agricultural teacher trainers, and to State supervisors of agricultural education for the purpose of assisting them in discharging their respective responsibilities with respect to provisions of directed or supervised practice in agriculture. J. C. WRIGHT, Director. VII SUPERVISED PRACTICE IN AGRICULTURE INCLUDING HOME PROJECTS Aims and Values of Such Practice and Responsibilities of Pupils, Teachers, State Administrators, and Local Boards of Education General aims. PART I INTRODUCTORY AIMS AND VALUES OF SUPERVISED PRACTICE One of the chief aims of supervised practice is to insure contact by the learner with the farming vocation in which he is being prepared to engage. All education should be specific, but vocational education, by reason of its definite objectives and requirements, should be particularly so characterized. In other words, when we say that vocational education is designed to fit persons for useful employment, we have in mind a particular employment or vocation and not general usefulness. Apprenticeship has long been used as a means of securing this specific first-hand knowledge and experience. However, directed or supervised practice on farms will accomplish in a large measure the desirable results of apprenticeship training, while at the same time providing larger opportunities for teaching and learning. The school and the farm both have their particular functions to perform in successful and efficient vocational education in agriculture. Another way in which such practice can function is in aiding the teacher to make intimate contacts with farm homes through his work of supervision of the home practical work of his pupils. In no other way can he better secure a knowledge of the rural community which will serve as a basis for the development of worth-while ideals and appreciations of rural life in connection with his teaching. 102843-26- -2 Supervised practice as an end in itself. The slogan "earning while learning" has been a strong selling point for vocational education in agriculture. Vocational education, in common with any type of education, has in it deferred values, but its immediate returns are large and gratifying. As a result of the pupils' successful farm practice, it is reasonable to expect that there will be definite improvement in practices on the home farm in succeeding years. In fact, this usually occurs, and the returns from such improved practices, because they are cumulative, are likely to be far greater than that from the supervised practice of the pupil. Furthermore, this improvement in practice on the farms where the supervised practice is conducted spreads gradually to the whole community and becomes the leaven which permeates the local farming and raises the general standard of rural living in that locality. Supervised practice as a means of learning. We assume vocational education to begin in the age period of adolescence, when the pupil is looking back on childhood and forward to manhood. The toys of his earlier life are discarded for man-sized tools and equipment. His make-believe play and the impersonation of heroic characters give place to contact with and participation in real life. It is the beginning of a constructive period when the urge of whole-hearted, purposeful activity and self-expression becomes the dominant note in the boy's life. Such is the fertile soil in which projects and practical work thrive. Such are the rich opportunities and conditions which should be capitalized in vocational education. Psychological and educational principles underlying the scheme of supervised practice and teaching by means of projects are fundamentally sound. With efficient teaching there must be interest in the thing taught and a desire to learn on the part of the pupil. Supervised practice furnishes such motives for study and learning because, with most live farm boys, the desire to earn, produce, manage, and control overcomes the distaste for study and concentrated mental activity incident to success in practical ventures. Learning is always facilitated by having a definite objective in view which the learner understands and appreciates. Supervised practice furnishes such tangible and specific objectives. The growing consciousness of individuality on the part of the boy seeks to express itself in the form of ownership of things. This pride of possession can be capitalized with projects just as the desire for self-expression and for excellence in individual accomplishment can be made to function in other types of supervised farm practice undertaken by pupils. Such learning is conducted in a particular environment familiar to the pupil, where |