OCR Text |
Show I t is generally recognized that knowing how to cook is one of the mailin acquirements which the Indian girl must have if she would become a good housekeeper. and we are t ing to have cooking thoroughly taught, so that each girl, beforexaving school, will be fully qualified to prepare meals intelligently and economically for a small family, to keep accounts, and to take complete charge of the work of a small home. In view of the fact that the cook's time is largely taken up in preparing meals for the school table, the girls can acquire little knowledge of family cooking merely by assisting in the preparation of food on a large scale, and we have endeavored to have the theory of cooking taught in the class room, as is now done in many of the city and rural schools for white children. To this end an outline course was prepared and, with pour approval, included in the cnrriculum at the beginning of the last school year. The course provides a series of detailed directions and sample graded lessons, in which the theory of cooking is correlated with language, number work, coinposition, ctc. Some of the teachers have taken this up in earnest, and it is hoped that better results will be obtained than hitherto in this important branch of any girl's training. AGRICULTURAL INSTRUCTION. The constant aim of all agricultural inst,ruction has been to enable pupils to obtain practical results by simple means, at the same t,ime giving them sufficient acquaintance with the principles of a.gri-culture to enable then1 to understand the reasons for the vanous farming operations. To accomplish this we have endeavored to have the children take up the study of seeds in the class room during the winter-the teacher conducting experiments and illustrating the processes of germination-and in the spring to have them, under the supervision of the class-room teacher, do the actual work of lay-ing out the garden plots, preparing the soil, planting, tending the growing plants, and harvesting the crop. Almost every school where suitable land can be had has adopted the system of having individual gardens for the smaller pupils. This has given excellent results and has increased decidedly the interest in farm work gen-erally. The girls as well as the boys are given instruction in gar-dening. The average farmer's wife usually has to superintend! if not do, a great deal of her own ga,rdening, and it is essential that Indian girls be taught how to do such work. We have endeavored to have tea.chers adapt the instruction to local conditions, and in sections where stock raising is the principal industry they have been urged to give special attention to this sub-ject, and, after instmetion in the class room, to take the pupils to the barn or pasture, where the farmer or dairyman will give instruc-tion in the management and care of stock, including the raising of calves, and will point out the distinguishing characteristics of dif-ferent breeds of cattle-those hest for beef and those best for the dairy. During the last two years superintendents have been urged to do more extensive work in the dairy, and we are glad to report that some of the schools are giving special attention to it. Matrons and housekeepers also have been. requested to have the girls as well as the boys learn to milk, and especially to have the girls taught tthe |