WORKERS' EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION.

Auckland Star, Volume XLIX, Issue 127, 29 May 1918, Page 9

WORKERS' EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION.

An address entitled 'Thoughts on Thlnticg" was given at the Wesley Hall, Pitt Street, on Monday night, by Mr A. B. Chappell, tntor to the W.E.A. class on psychology. Mr J. D. Robertson, who presided, saia that the study of psychology was not only useful, but fascinating, and the psychologist would play an important part in all departments of life, particularly the educational 9eld, in the future. This lecture was for the purpose of introducing tne subject to the public, and he recommenaea prospective students to avail themselves ol the classes. Mr Cheppell made a comparative analysis of animal, child, and adult psychology, dealing With the physiological basis ol mental science through sense impressions. Instinct, imitation, memory, imagination and reasoning, leading to the formation or intellectual impulses and habits. These developed convolutions In the grey matter cf the brain, ana made tracks in the braincells, along which it was easier for future thoughts to now, thus literally making one a bundle of habits. The practical ana ethical value of mental science lay in setting up and strengthening the good habits, which would tend to supplant the less deelrable ones. The lecturer said it was unwise to crush out the imaginative ana fanciful faculties of children, as it was through these, together with the sensations, that the future mental growth tooK place. The life of Helen Keller, who was both blind and deaf, was used as an illustration of the great mental development that conld take place through the medium of, and In response to, the stimulus of tonch.