Vocational Guidance for Girls | Page 8

will keep in view the ultimate good and usefulness of his child. He will
regard his fatherhood as his greatest service to the state.
[Illustration: Pals. The wise father will be companion as well as adviser
to his children]
The children reared by this ideal father and mother in their ideal home
will grow as naturally as plants in a well-cared-for garden. With
examples of courtesy and kindness, of cheerful work and
health-producing play, ever before them in the lives of their parents,
they may be led along the same paths to similar usefulness. Their
educational problems will be met by the combined effort of teachers
and parents, and natural aptitude as well as community needs will
dictate the choice of their life work.
That this ideal family is far removed from many families of our
acquaintance merely proves the necessity of training for more efficient
homemaking, and indeed for a better conception of homemaking ideals
and problems. If we are to teach our girls and our boys to be
homemakers, we must consider carefully what they need to know. If we
are to counteract the tendencies of the past two or three decades away
from homemaking as a vocation, we must show the true value of the

homemaker to the community, and the opportunities which domestic
life presents to the scientifically trained mind.
Education for homemaking necessarily implies teachers who are
trained for homemaking instruction; and we may pause here to notice
that no homemaking course in normal school or college can be
sufficient to give the teacher true knowledge of ideal homes. She must
have seen such homes, or those which approximate the ideal. Perhaps
she has grown up in such a home. More probably she has not. If not, it
must then necessarily follow that the lower have been the ideals in the
home where the teacher had her training, the more she should see of
other homes, and especially of good homes. Her whole outlook may be
changed by such contact; and with her outlook, her teaching; and with
her teaching, her influence.
If all girls grew up in ideal homes, it seems probable that homemaking
would appeal to them quite naturally as the ultimate vocation. Indeed,
we know that many girls feel this natural drawing, in spite of most
unlovely conditions in their childhood homes. The task of mother,
teacher, and vocational counselor (who may be either) in this matter is
a complicated one. Some girls are not fitted by nature to be
homemakers. Some may with careful training overcome inherent
defects which stand in the way of their success. Some have the natural
endowment, but have their eyes fixed on other careers. Some have
unhappy ideals to overcome. The fact, however, confronts us that at
some time in their lives a very large majority of these girls will be
homemakers. It is the part of those who have charge of them in their
formative years to do two things for them: first, to train them so that
they may understand the tasks of the homemaker and perform them
creditably if they are called upon; second, to teach all those girls who
seem fitted for this high vocation to desire it, and to choose it for at
least part of their mature lives.

CHAPTER III
ESTABLISHING A HOME

Certain very definite attempts are being made in these days to meet the
evident lack of homemaking knowledge in the rising generation. And
since definiteness of plan lends power to accomplishment, we cannot
do better than to analyze as carefully as possible the various lines of
knowledge required by the prospective homemaker in entering upon
her life work.
What are the problems of homemaking? And how far can we provide
the girl with the necessary equipment to make her an efficient worker
in her chosen vocation?
Country life and city life are apparently so far removed from each other
as to present totally different problems to the homemaker and to the
vocational educator of girls. And yet underlying the successful
management of both urban and rural homes are the same principles of
domestic economy and of social efficiency. The principles are there,
however widely their application may differ. While we may wisely
train country girls for country living, and city girls to face the problems
of urban life, we must not lose sight of the fact that country girls often
become homemakers in the city and that city girls are often found
establishing homes in the country. Nor should we overlook the truth
that some study of home conditions in other than familiar surroundings
will broaden the girl's knowledge and fit her in later life to make
conditions subservient to that knowledge.
Both rural and urban homemakers must be taught to appreciate their
advantages and to make the