p. 514 | Domestic Education

Seventh-day Adventist Missionary Society · Oakland, California · Nov 16, 1882

Domestic Education.

MOTHERS are frequently so over nice and particular that they refuse to share their household duties with their young daughters for fear something will be slighted or improperly done.

Now this is all wrong. Children, no matter what their position or prospects in life may be, should be taught while young to make themselves useful, and to assist those about them in every way possible.

Girls especially should be early trained to a thorough knowledge of household duties and familiarized with the routine of daily work, even if the trouble they make far outbalances the small amount of assistance rendered. A daughter so trained is not the one that grows up to laziness and helplessness; that comes tardily to breakfast and sits listlessly around, thinking and knowing and caring as little about what is going on in the house as a perfect stranger would, as it interferes with personal comfort and convenience. She is the mother's confidant, the father's comforter, and a blessing to the household.

If it is true, as has been sung, that it is love that makes the world go round, it is equally certain that prudence, patience, and kindred praiseworthy qualities must oil the wheels of the domestic world, if they are to revolve smoothly.

Flocks of school-girls are annually "finished off" and turned out in the world as accomplished young women, nearly every one of whom expects to marry sometime and make a home of her own, and yet among them all, how many have any true idea of the real issues of life, or measure the depth of the sea of perplexities into which they plunge blindly and blissfully?

Trouble for the average young housewife begins in her ignorance of domestic economy and the proper preparation of food for the table.

Who shall count the difficulties and dilemmas that lurk in refractory stoves, the disappointments and discouragements that lie hidden in the flour barrel, or the ambushed trials that rise unexpectedly from pot and kettle? Their name is legion.

It would seem as though every mother who has herself wrestled with the mysteries of household labor, ought to learn a lesson from life's experience and take measures to turn her daughter's trials into triumphs, by making her as thoroughly familiar with the science of the cookery book and the problem of domestic economy, as with the various branches of school education, or the more ornamental parlor accomplishments.

Yes, I know it is more trouble to teach her how to cook than it is to do everything yourself. Very likely there will be more than one failure to record, and she may be an uninterested pupil; duty is not always agreeable, but it is none the less duty.

If the early household lessons have been well learned, the later ones will not be so difficult; if they have been altogether neglected, so much the more reason that there should be no further delay. Circumstances may prevent the necessity of performing much domestic work, but every one should at least know how to direct others understandingly. Girls are not apt to give due importance to these matters; by experience alone can one really appreciate the difficulties arising from ignorance, or estimate the true value of knowledge in regard to a subject so materially influencing domestic health and comfort.—Prairie Farmer.