"HALF-TIMERS."

Auckland Star, Volume XXX, Issue 145, 21 June 1899, Page 8

"HALF-TIMERS."

.Writing to the Ghristchurcli "Press" on _ the subject of "Half-Timers," which by the way 'has just engaged the attention of the House of Commons, Mr N. M. Yatves, a schoolmaster with both English and New Zealand experience, says:—What is the effect (of spending part of their time at factories and part at school) on the minds and bodies of the children? To the first part of the question, I should answer that the never-ceasing mental activity induces an abnormal cerebral development, that places the Lancashire school-boy in the front rank of alert and clever pupils. The school I have mentioned never failed to obtain the "excellent" grant, and the average percentage of passes was never, in my recollection, below 96. The pampered New Zealand youth needs a great deal more instruction than his more alert and precocious brother in Cottonopolis. I would undertake to get better results out of a class of "half-timers" in three months, than out of a similar class of Canterbury boys in six. The mental arithmetic exercises, which arc such a prominent and pleasing- feature of Lancashire schools, are also attempted here, with -what lamentable results the Inspectors will tell you. I have never met a New Zealand boy who could "hold a candle" to the Lancashire boy in rapidity of calculation. I have purposely written boy, for I have met with two of tlhree girls who were not bad seconds. The colonial may maintain the mens sana in corpore sano for a longer period than his Lancashire confrere, but he is hopelessly behind him during his schooldays. We should hear less of larrikinism and immorality if children from ten years and upwards were systematically compelled to produce homework, and plenty of it. It takes a large amount of brain work to wreck a constitution, even a child's, in a country like ours, with its fine climate, pure air, and frequent holidays and periods of recreation. I have not yet had the pleasure of meeting a New Zealand school-boy who threatened to inflict permanent injury to his constitution by an excess of studious application. My experience in Canterbury is that mudh better work is obtained, as a whole, from girls than boys. I attribute this to the fact that girls are called upon to use their mental faculties earlier and oftener than IsQys,/in their work about the house. I should be sorry to see our children in the condition of the Lancashire "halftimer," but I should certainly like to see them approach nearer in receptivity and acumen to their less favoured contemporary.