That will be taken. In the July copy, there is an article on plants which are growing in the school gardens are also found in the bush. There is also a note on outdoor work done in the school garden. We ask any country teacher who has any points he wants to bring out in connection with nature study or elementary agriculture to write in to the editor of the Circular.

10327. Is this issued to schools in the metropolitan area?—The teachers in that area are not obliged to take this. They are all, however, taking nature study on some line or another. This is particularly for the schools actually situated in the country. At the Training College we have two separate courses running, one and two years' course which gives the teacher his classification, and the other a six months' course for teachers who are going out to take charge of these small schools. We have a model small school down there run on the same lines as a small country school, and the students get a course in nature study there which we are trying to extend and make more directly a course which bears upon agriculture. At present we are stuck for want of little money. We want £100 to put up sheds and get some ground ploughed.

10328. Is that a recent development?—Yes. We wanted it for the second course which began in July. but there is a difficulty in getting money. When this work is started it will mean that each of these batches of teachers—and there are about 35 now—will have some training in this direction before they go out, in addition to getting the Circulars afterwards.

10329. What would be the objection to including something in the way of agricultural subjects in the State schools in the metropolis with a view to inducing city children to take an interest in agriculture?—That matter is under consideration. In this nature study work a teacher is generally given a fairly wide scope. We do not lay down absolutely what shall be done, but that the teacher shall give a course of some kind in nature study which will be approved by the inspector. If a man is good at one branch of the subject and is really interest he will probably do better than if he had a syllabus drawn up for him and had no scope given to him at all. The work is often largely connected with the life of the district. At Maylands, for instance, it will be found that the children are taken to visit any of the factories that may be in the neighbourhood. They have been taken to the superhposphate works and other places, and are connecting their nature study with the life of the district. In every school there is a certain amount of work done in connection with such things as plant life, the germination of seeds, the growth of a plant, the fertilisation of flowers, and so on, all of which have a bearing upon agriculture. We do not say that a town school must necessarily take the exact course which we put down here as a suitable for a small country school.

10330. Do you not think in the best interests of this State that it is advisable to give city children a chance of becoming interested in agricultural production? Is it not a wrong line to say that the city child shall be a city child always?—There is a good deal in connection with production which comes into the geographical course. Every child learns about the wheat belt and the importance to Western Australia of the production of wheat and wool, and so on. The child is not confined to his town interests by any means.

10331. Would it result in any loss of efficiency of the child's education if such subjects were included in the curriculum; I mean subjects in relation to agriculture?—Something in relation to agriculture is taken in every school now. I should not say it would be a good thing in the interests of the schools if we gave them a fixed syllabus in every case, and said that each school must conform to it irrespective of the characteristics of the district. I do not think any child ought to be entirely without instruction in agriculture in some way. It is one of the most important industries in the State.

10332. Take the case of a man in a mining town who has four sons. He might want two of his sons to be interested in mining, and the other two in agriculture. If this system was carried out in a school in a mining town two of the boys could not get a knowledge of the theory that they would require to become interested in agriculture?—I think they would get enough to be interested in it. They will not confine themselves so much to it if the life all round them were connected with agricultural pursuits. What is aimed at is to make the school teaching real by connecting it with the home life of the children. On the goldfields a teacher would naturally make a good deal of his arithmetic to connect with the things that the children are always hearing about in their town, such as the number of dwts. to the ton that could be got out of a mine, and so on; whereas in agricultural district it would be the number of bushels to the acre which no doubt the teacher would use in the same sort of arithmetical examples. The teacher would connect the school life with the home life and the ordinary interest of the child in order to make it as real as possible. In many of the outback goldfields districts it is a very difficult to do anything in the way of cultivation in the school gardens. It is impossible to do the same sort of experimental work there which country schools can do. I think, however, that in practically every district the children could be taught something about plant life and plant growth even if the experiments are only conducted in a few kerosene tins. In this way they could be shown something about the germination of seeds. There are various ways by which the children can be given a knowledge of the things connected with agriculture, and by which to a certain extent the teacher can discover whether the child has or has not a great liking for that sort of work. The primary school will never give the child a very great amount of information in regard to actual agricultural operations.

10333. What we are after is some opportunity for the town child to get the germ for becoming a producer. You have lately established two district high schools. Have they a definite agricultural curriculum?—Yes, the science course in these schools is specially directed to agriculture. I have brought the Commission a volume of the curricula of the schools, and particularly refer to page 75, where the Commission will see the alternate science course which is being used in these schools. (Curriculum handed in.) We have had the advice of Professor Paterson in connection with this curriculum so that it would be a preparation for any further work in connection with agriculture that may be taken up afterwards. These district high school students, when going for the junior university examination, take a course there in agricultural science instead of taking physics or any other subject of the kind.