THE SCHOOL YEAR.

Auckland Star, Volume XLIV, Issue 90, 16 April 1913, Page 7

THE SCHOOL YEAR.

REVIEWED BY INSPECTORS.

In their annual report-on the public schools of the. Auckland Education District, as -well as on those private schools whose inspection was undertaken in compliance with the provisions of the Act, the inspectors to the Hoard state .that iit the close of the year the number of public schools dn operation was 594, being an increase of 23 since the previous'year. Twenty-four Soman Catholic diocesan schools, seven other private schools, and the Anglican Orphan Home were also, inspected. The number of children on the rolls in the preparatory classes: and in the standard classes was 45,0(50, of whom 42,886 were present at .the annual examination. The mean of the average age of the pupils -was eleven years eight months. There -wna an increase for the year of 2,676 on the : roll number, and 2,049 on the number present at the annual examination. The total enrolment in the Roman Catholic diocesan schools and the Anglican Orphan Home was 3,140; of these 2,997 were present at the annual examination. The number of pupils on the roll of other private schools inspected wee' 533. A few excerpts are given below from the comments of the inspectors upon some of the school subjects. .-,. Reading. —In the majority of ,ecboc4s this subject continues to be well taught, and, on the whole, is steadily improving. In the largcr~scbools it is quite unusual to find pupils tlmt are unable 'to read with some degree of fluency suitable passages previously unseen. This gratifying result is the outcome of the wider course of reading adopted, which has been fostered to some extent by the issue of the School Journal, by the supply of free books, and by the greater use of school and class libraries. In an appreciable number of schools,' however, there is still much' ito be done in the matter of improving this subject, and in stimulating the "reading habit." We freely Tccognise that if reading is to become a subject of utility its teaching must result in pupils being able to discover the thought-content of the passage read. Teaching that fails to secure this cannot be regarded as sound. What we depreciate, however, is the devotion of too much time merely to the meaning of words isolated from their context, with, the result that the effort becomes one of memory rather than of intelligence, and fchet the reading lesson, with its immense possibilities, degenerates into something dreary and depressing, apt to be regarded by pupils as one , of the hardships to which all young people must submit. An intelligent grasp of the mracraph and of the lessen as a whole is jvll that is needed, and this can be secured without -the minute and searching analysis to which isolated words are sometimes subjected. ARITHMETIC. This subject remains practically in the condition noted during the previous year, a result attributable probably to the course outlined in the syllabus, a COUH3O so wide that it is difficult to'do justice to it—except at the expense of other subject's. It is hoped 'that the changes foreshadowed in the amended regulations will afford much-needed relief. In the standard classes mental arithmetic was not always a pleasing feature, in that calculations were lacking in rapidity and were frequently inaccurate. Though it ie highly desirable that mental work should precede ami accompany instruction in all operations dealing with new rules, a. certain amount of timo should be regularly devoted to revision (mental revision) of rules already mastered. GEOGRAPHY. The remarks' made in recent reports still apply to the teaching of this subject. Wo etill find teachers that are unable to deal with physical geography, even in its elementary stages, without the aid of the text book, who ignore the possibilities of practical treatment which Nature, in many cases, has so lavishly placed at their very doors. It is not unusual to find children able to give formal definitions of "baein," "eroeion," etc., ac applied to rivers, and. yet unable to give an intelligent account of the action of the stream flowing past the school. We would again repeat, what has so often been said, that much of this subject should be regarded as a form of nature study, which loses greatly in value as a means cf training if not treated in such a way as to lead pupils to realise that it deals with changes in operation around them, that they themselves can observe and interpret.