St. Landry clarion. (Opelousas, La.) 1890-1921, 1911-06-24
KANSAS TEACHER SAYS
GUESS WORK SPOILS
BABIES.
SociOlogists Are Aiding Cam
paign to Construct Better
Citizenship.

1OpShd, hduss JUNE 1V.
Fathers and mothers go RICH
on rearing children in the good,
old-fashioned way, guessing a
what should be done to make
better men and women, while
the old man is out in the barn.
yard studying carefully how tt
grow better wheat and corn and
how to raise more meaty steers
and fatter pigs" says w. A. Nc
Keever, professor of philosophy
of the Kansas Agricultural Col
lege.
Crop production, stock rails
ing and breeding are sciences
taught by schools, but child-rear-
ing is a guess, combined with
heresay and superstition, con-
tinues McKeever. In our
eagerness to herald to the world
the magnitude Of our corn and
wheat crops, the superiority of
our beef cattle and thoroughbred
swine, and the tremendous pro-
ductiveness of our good, old
fashioned hen, we often lose
sight of the real issue, the splen-
did crop of strong sons and fair
daughters the country is produc-
ing.
'Drouths and deluges may
destroy our grain crops, disease
and degeneration may play havoc
with our cattle on a thousand
hills, and our treasured porkers
in the fields of alfalfa; yea, our
boastful helpful hen may occa-
sionally cease her productive
labors. All these calamities may
come upon US, each in its turn
and yet our glory may not be
dimmed, provided only that our
boys and girls to be
safe-guarded in the home, so
and disciplined in the
school, the church and other in
situations that they will develop
into Wellrounded, magnificent
specimens of manhood and
womanhood.
GO where you will, through
out the length and breadth Of
fair land, and I challenge
you to find a more pleasing as
oect than that of a rosy-cheeked
l2-year-old girl, CARRIED in a
.oose-ftting house dress and a
white apron, while with a
snowy tea-towel in her hands she
S engaged in drying the dinner
fishes.
1T is much to be regretted
hat we do not give its just mea-
sure of honor and praise to this
home life. There is Ger
ainly need of a great poet or
FAINTER who will, by means of
ugh art, divert the attention of
many young girls from the airy
which they are now :
Oursuing and help them to fix !
heir affections upon the things {
hat make for more substantial {
haracter. ]
In the colleges there are spe- :
ial courses in pig raising, poultry :
ng, horse breeding, production i
f special types in cattle for beef {
nd milk, crop rotation and seed +,
election, but the fathers and !
1others go on making expert c
1ents in rearing children. Child /
en- may be Well-born but their G
respects for a useful career are Z
ften blighted through ignor- :
nee on the part of the parents. 3
I want to see established col
zee courses in child rearing, so t
lat parents can know how to I
ain and care for their first =
orn without hurting the moral a
I'D physical fiber of the child
trough a long series of expert
.ents and trials which teach lit
e to the parents and does much
IS to make the child a useful i,
tizen when he grows up"
McKeever has been working
! a series of bulletins on child
airing. -Four of them have
zen published and another will N
on be printed. The bulletins Sc
e distributed free and the it
oney to pay for the printing is
ID distributing is furnished by G
lsiness men and students of b