Learning is an
individual activity. For learning to be enhanced to target audience, the
extension agent needs to establish a very good interactive atmosphere with
farmers through personal contact. The extension agent should as a matter of
necessity, know the farmers and their present situation very well to enable him
influence them to adopt a new innovation, participate and respond to the
provided agricultural development programmes. The methods under this
classification include farm and home visits, office calls, result demonstration,
telephone calls as well as letters.
Farms and home
visit give the extension officers the opportunity of obtaining first hand
information on the farmers’ situation. Such visit may be made on request or
demanded by the farmers for help, or to enlighten and educate the farmers on a
recommended technique. Farm and home visit are important because they offer
means of personal communication amongst farm families and extension officers. They
also aid the establishment of confidence in the extension officer. The success
of farm and home visits depends on how careful such visits must have been
planned. For farm and home visits to be successful, they should be carefully
planned. On such visits, the extension officer should be observant, tactful and
should always be himself. He should be patience enough to spend reasonable time
with farm family and be able to build a friendly relationship with them, but
should not forget to stick to the purpose of such visits. The farmer should be
allowed to dominate discussion and should be commended for any good idea he
brings up. The extension agent should employ simple language for general
understanding and the spirit of oneness.
The weakness
of farm and home visits are that they take much of the extension officer`s working
leisure time, which implies that it represents high cost per practice adopted. The
period of visit by an extension agent may not be suitable for the farmers. The extension
officer may give more attention to the rich literate farmers as they are likely
to be more responsive to his endeavors. Office calls are made by the farmers; they
are made because of problems which the farmers encounter in their farms which
they want solutions to. Such visits by the farmers confirm the confidence which
the farmer has in the extension officer. Such calls are not expensive and time
consuming unlike farm and home visits. However, they do not make the farmers
feel at home in the office and the farmers may be sensitive to the attitude of
the officer.
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