EDUCATION SYSTEMS

Ashburton Guardian, Volume XLIII, Issue 9840, 7 April 1923, Page 6

EDUCATION SYSTEMS

TINWALD TEACHERS’ TOUR. - PROGRESSIVE AMERICA. An interesting letter dealing with education systems in America, written from New York by Miss Winifred A. Valentine, formerly of the , Tinwald (Ashburton) school, is published in the current issue of the New Zealand Education Gazette. Miss Valentine, who is well known in Ashburton, was in Canada for some months, and later spent some time at the Teachers’ College of the Columbia University, New York. It is understood Miss Valentine is now in London, teaching under the London County Council. Miss Isabel Morrison, also of Canterbury, is with Miss Valentine. In her letter Miss Valentine states:—

“I have just returned from three days’ visit to Philadelphia, and I think perhaps you will be interested in some of the things I saw there. First I visited Carson College, which is really an orphanage run on the cot'tage plan, each palatial “cottage” housing ten children. All of the 80 children are divided into classes of eight, a teacher being provided for each eight children. This might almost be called an orphanage de luxe. The project plan is used entirely, and seems to work very well indeed. In every school I have visited the project plan is used, but not exclusively. Most people seem to find it works excellently when supplemented by drills and routine work. I also investigated the work done by the White-Williams foundation, originally a Magdalen Society founded in 1800 to work amongst delinquent boys and girls. After more than 100 years of work the Society decided, as all such societies must, that they could work twice as eifectively by co-operating with the public schools. Consequently they are now doing a very fine piece of work, which begins right down in the infant classes. The teachers can generally tell which children are in a dangerous position, and when these arereported to the society a social worker is sent to investigate home conditions. From then on the society keeps track of the child, helping him along every step of the way till he is ready to leave school. If he is particularly bright a scholarship is provided to help him through college; if not, the society undertakes to find him a position suiting yhis aptitude and mentality. This seems to me a very valuable piece of. work.

“I visited also a slum school where I saw the best lesson in phonetics I have eeen on this f continent—a very select private Quaker school, where 300 children in classes of 25 each are taken from primary work through junior and senior high school—and a iiuge public school run on an adaptation of the Gary plan. “My classes here continue to be most interesting, though I made an alteration just after writing last. Instead of the “elementary course for supervisors,” I am now taking two classes—“statistics in mental measurements” and “the reconstruction of the elementary school curriculum.” The latter is an examination of the most modern developments in education. At present we are studying the Winnetka plan, so I am very glad I visited there on my way down. Mental testing is most interesting. We will really have to do something about it in New Zealand, but I do hope the Department will proceed very carefully. It is much more difficult than appears on the surface, and could easily do more harm than good. Much better leave it alone than do it unscientifically. “I am just completing my fifth month in America, where I have seen quite a lot of work in Chicago, Philadelphia, Washington, and New York. There are some very fine schools in Chicago, but what interested me most was the school system of Winnetka, a suburb which is reached from the city. The director of the system, who also planned the whole scheme, is Mr Carlton W. Washburn, a disciple of Frederick Burke, of the San Francisco Normal School. His plan is one of individual work, and has, in my opinion, some features that are a decided improvement of the Dalton plan. I did not stop at Detroit, for which I am very sorry, having since heard that the work being done there, particularly in mental testing, is? held in very high esteem by the rest of the authorities. Rochester, too, I believe, is a

place where very valuable work is being done. “I am just completing my fifth month at the Teachers’ College of Columbia University, and I have no hesitation in saying that in these five months I have learned more than 10 times as much as I learned in my eight months in Canada. There is no doubt at all that the United States has a very great deal to give the world from an educational point of view. It is true, of course, that there is a tremendous economic waste in experimental education, but that is due to the fact that there is no central department controlling the funds, and it seems to me that the wonder-, ful investigation that is going on will not be any less valuable because it has been carried on from hundreds of different angles. Something valuable must come of it, for those who are engaged are the people who represent the very highest ideals of the American race—people who, since the war, have a new conception of their duty to the rest of the world and who are facing the task with splendid courage.' I recently heard Professor John Adams, Dean of London University, say that what America is doing now in education will be done in England in 25 years. “It seems to me the visitors coming here to get the ‘high spots’ in education cannot do better than get into touch with the Teachers’ College, which is the Mecca of all Americans. Here the foreigner is welcomed with open arms and everything possible is done to show him America’s goodwill. The spirit of the place is very fine, but the psychology it teaches is revolutionary. I am sure it will take two years to recover from the shocks it has given me and to find out just what"" I do believe, for, needless to say, I have not just accepted everything that has been expounded to me. “I cannot help thinking that something on the lines of this Teachers’ College would be a very fine thing in

New Zealand. I know there are hundreds of teachers like myself w£o,, after 10 years’ or so of practice,, felt that they wanted to get some more theory—say, a post-graduate course at a training college. Even supposing there was one such centre and only a brief course—say, three months—given each year, it would at least supply a fresli stimulus and keep one in touch with the latest ideas. A couple of experimental schools too—one to adapt ideas from other countries before broadcasting them, and one for original work—would be a real asset.

“I am glad the Dalton plan is succeeding in New Zealand, though, of course, it would not find favour with the Teachers’ College. Nevertheless, it is an excellent jumping-off place for changes in curriculum and methods in teaching that are being evolved with such amazing rapidity. The headquarters of the plan are right here in New York at the Children’s University School, where Miss Parkhurst herself is in charge. She is one of the most sensible and inspiring women I have met in my travels, and I have met many.”