SATURDAY, FEBRUARY 7, 1891.

Auckland Star, Volume XXII, Issue 32, 7 February 1891, Page 4

SATURDAY, FEBRUARY 7, 1891.

In the report presented by the Inspectors to the Board of Education yesterday, after disclaiming any desire to impose a stereotyped style of teaching on teachers, the following sentence occurs :—" At the same time we shall certainly continue to exercise an undoubted right of criticising those methods which we believe to be faulty." This principle of criticism, applied by the Inspectors to methods of teaching, might be advantageously extended by the general public to the whole educational system. In the sentence we have quoted is contained the true essence of criticism, which should be exercised, not in a captious and iaujt-finding spirit, but to indicate failings and weak points with a view to their improvement. _.

There is perhaps no system to which criticism is applied in modern times, which has so much reason to complain of the unfair way in which ii; is treated as our system of free, secular, and compulsory education. In its very inception, it ran counter to theological dogma and class interests. From the time of its birth sectarian prejudice has regarded it as a monster, and refused to believe in its healthy, vigorous life. This, too, in the face of the clearest evidence. . Indeed, the wild declamations about the system being godless, and only calculated to injure the poorer classes by making them dissatisfied with their position, are so evidently the views of persons who, from theological rancour or motives of selfinterest, are unable to form an upbiassed judgment, that they usually recoil on the heads of those who indulge in them, Even persons who are never

tired of repeating that the Education Act is regarded with dislike by the majority of colonists, are yet obliged to admit that all attempts to alter it in its main features have been strenuously resisted by the people, and that while a good many indulge in the Englishman's privilege of grumbling at an existing institution, this is a very different thing from tampering with its fundamental provisions. Some of the " mixed multitude " may look wistfully back to Egyptian bondage, but the great body of the people regard our educational system, as the ancient Israelites regarded the Pillar of Fire — a symbol of security, and a guarantee of a vigorous national life. The Inspectors, as in duty bound, while dealing with the condition of schools in the Auckland district, as shown by the results of examinations, do not fail to point out the causes which in their opinion have conduced respectively to success or failure. In so doing they discharge a necessary, but at the same time somewhat delicate duty, the members of the Board of Education are necessarily largely influenced in the judgment they form of the working of the educational system by the reports submitted to them by the Inspectors. This is a natural result of the position in which the members of the Board are placed. They are called sometimes to adjudicate upon questions which imply a considerable amount of experience as well as practical acquaintance with educational matters. A member of an Educational Board is not always chosen with a regard to his special fitness for the post so far as attainments are concerned. His election may be brought about by local causes of various kinds. The inspector, on the other hand, is an expert, and speaks with the authority of a master of his profession. The reason, therefore, which the Inspectors assign for the poor results in some of the schools, namely, thefrequen tchangesof teachers, ought to be well weighed by the Board. With a commendable view to retrenchment, there has been a very large amount of shifting teachers from one school to another in the Auckland district for the last year or two. The question naturally arises whether this can be looked upon as the sole or even the chief cause of the fact that forty-two schools are reported as " unsatisfactory," " poor," or "bad," as against thirteen so reported in 1889. If so, then it should be carefully considered after all, such frequent changes are not poor economy in the end.

Leaving this point for the consideration of the Board, we should like to ask whether too much stress is not laid upon the injurious effects produced by changes of teachers. That the continuous work of a school is interrupted by the advent of a new teacher, everyone knows, but is it always injuriously affected for any perceptible, period dhlesSf the new man is deß&efflf Mferior to his predecessor ? Where, as in the case of some of the town schools, the members of the staff are above the regulation number, a class may suffer if a duly qualified teacher is removed to a country district and a pupil teacher appointed in his place; b ut r we presume the Inspectors' remarks under this heading are not limited, nor indeed chiefly apply, to town schools. In the smaller country schools it ought to be possible to make a change of teachers without any marked effect in the number of passes, unless such change takes place very shortly before the time of examination. The whole of our edur cational system is so devised that the new teacher is able with ease to take up the running. He has the same syllabus, the same text-books, and is expected to teach precisely the same subjects as his predecessor. He may deem certain branches of study unsuited for the class of children he teaches, or,may think too much time is spent on a subject, in his opinion, of minor importance, but with this he has nothing to do. In his opinion some subjects might be dropped with advantage and others substituted j but, all the same, he must give the regulation time and teach in the regulation mode. So far, therefore, as human ingenuity can devise a plan by which one teacher can take up the work of another without subjecting children to tbe disadvantages arising from the use of a variety of methods, our educational system provides for it. Much of the progress made by the children will no doubt depend upon tne personality of the teacher. A vigorous, capable man with his heart in his work, who takes the place of an inefficient or indolent teacher, will soon set his mark upon the school, even when the work is estimated on a percentage of failures, passes, or marks, and more especially when there is taken into consideration those matters which justly carry great, weight with the chm acter of the work done and the general tdne;an<l -is^ipiiriief of theschboi; :"' But while there may be an element of truth in ascribing the unsatisfactory condition of some schools to frequent changes of teachers, there are no doubt other and even more cogent reasons. The Inspectors indicate one, when they allude to methods of teaching being in most cases satisfactory, though sometimes marred in the application. This is a delicate wayof saying that some of the teachers are not equal to a practical application of methods which they have laboriously acquired. Nor is this to be wondered at. A teacher, like a poet, is born—not made. Nothing is more common than to find a man of profound theoretical knowledge utterly incapable of reducing it to practice. The power of reception by no means implies the gift of imparting, In an educational system like ours, which has scarcely got heyond the experimental stage, the, difficulty is sure to be felt. Regarding for a moment the p&rsoimd .-. of our teachers*: we_toia ; among tbe oldest members some who

were employees of the Provincial Government, here and there a clergyman, and in a few instances persons who did not adopt the teaching profession till a somewhat late period in life, while the younger members, as the President of the Educational Institute recently pointed out, undergo no thorough systematic training. In a country where an ever-increasing number of young girls are seeking employment, we cannot wonder that the teaching profession has become crowded. To many young girls who, in the ordinary course of things, would have had no resource but domestic service or dressmaking, the alternative of becoming a teacher, with what to them was excellent pay, was simply delightful. When we remember the early days when the Department required a large number of teachers, when the terms of admission were comparatively easy and special aptitude for teaching not Insisted upon,, we cease to wonder that numbers who had no special liking for teaching, except that it was "genteel," were attracted. That with all the disadvantages under which we have laboured, we have in the main such an excellent body of teachers is matter of congratulation. The process of "weeding out" has been to some extent resorted to, but the cause we have indicated still operates, and has, no doubt something to do with the existence of so many " unsatisfactory '* schools.

It would be altogether unfair to the teachers if we did not bear in mind that in nearly all cases where a school is in a chronic state of inefficiency, a great deal of the responsibility rests with tbe parents. A teacher may be V original" enough even to satisfy the Inspectors, but if be is not backed up by parents he cannot effect much. Owing, perhaps, to financial depression, there is an increasing tendency in some quarters to send children to earn their own livelihood at an early age. In others, as Mr Harrison pointed out in the address he delivered at the Conference of the New Zealand! Educational Institute, parents just send their children often enough to es« cape legal penalties. In some of the strawberry districts near the city, children are kept from school for weeks in winter to plant, and in summer to pick the fruit for' market. The country schools experience a similar difficulty during the harvesting season. In the town the truant officer is regarded by, many youngsters with -about the same feeling with which the London Arab views the " beak." There will always doubtless be a residuum, .ormed of the offspring of drunken and dissolute parents, and to these must be added the children of those thoughtless people who quite lose sight of parental, responsibility. It is encouraging, neverthelessto find that the Inspectors reports " The schools in the Auckland district; continue to merit favourable mention for discipline, general tohe, N and behaviour of the scholars." v i ■■;'"■