The best and most profitable division of time for the home work would be about thirty minutes, both morning and evening, each day. During these work periods different things should be done, and during the year it is to be hoped that a large variety of different kinds of work may be included. If the home is in sympathy with the child's work it can help very materially in setting tasks for the child that are of the most profitable nature.
The pupils should furnish the reports themselves over their own signatures for the home work. Putting them on their own honor is valuable and in justice is due them. Since results must be produced in most kinds of work, the teacher can judge quite accurately as to the value of work.
_Weekly report home work._ _Date_.................... _Elementary school_.
----------------+---------------+-------------------------------------------- | | Time spent each day. | +------+-------+-------+-------+-------+----- Work. |Remarks. | | | | | | | | M. | T. | W. | T. | F. | S. ----------------+---------------+------+-------+-------+-------+-------+----- Feeding horses. |1 team, twice | | | | | | |each day | 20 | 22 | 20 | 18 | 20 | 20 ----------------+---------------+------+-------+-------+-------+-------+----- Cut wood |1/2 cord, stove| | | | | | |length | | | | | | 150 ................|...............|......|.......|.......|.......|.......|..... | | | | | | | ................|...............|......|.......|.......|.......|.......|..... | | | | | | | ................|...............|......|.......|.......|.......|.......|..... ----------------+---------------+------+-------+-------+-------+-------+----- ]
Credit for seventh and eighth grades and high school grades should be allowed for efficient home work when properly reported as laboratory requirement in agriculture, domestic arts and manual training. In these grades all careful, systematic work during the summer season, as well as the regular school year, such as corn acre, garden, potato plot, tomato, poultry, pig, canning, sewing, cooking, and butter-making contests, should be used for laboratory credit. Of course accurate records of the work must be made at the time the work is performed. Schools that have an agricultural teacher during the entire year will directly supervise this work. In other schools the reports will be used as part of the next year's regular class work. Suitable report blanks should be used by the pupils and kept in laboratory notebook form.