AT MYERS KINDERGARTEN.

Auckland Star, Volume L, Issue 67, 19 March 1919, Page 8

AT MYERS KINDERGARTEN.

A very pleasant evening was held at the Myers Kindergarten on Thursday, when the young students who have finished their two years' course under the direction of Miss Hopkinson, were presented with tlieir diplomas. The big room had been decorated with purple Michaelmas daisies for the occasion, and in the side rooms displays of tne students' work was to be qgen. Especially good were some plastacine models oi common (lowers, like nasturtiums, daisies, and butter-cups, which had been tinted with oil paint in natural colours, and gave a very realistic effect. With these were shown botanical drawings, as well as specimens of handicraft, eiieh as woven baskets, dolls' houses, toys, boxes, and various golliwogs, teddy hears, and woolly dogs so beloved of the little scholars. In the directors' report presented by Miss Hopkinson, mention was made of the kindergarten work done in various parts of the. city, and the need for its extension. Miss Hopkinson explained that the ecope of the work was very far reaching, and the teachers hoped that the children of the kindergartens would make better and happier citizens. There was the other and wider aspect to be considered, said Miss Hopkinson, and that was the invitation to the mothers to come and take part at intervals in their children's interests. '' We talk about Lhe education of man," said the speaker. " Have we realised that it is the education of the women that chiefly matter. Jt is the woman who has charge of the home, and who. consciously, or unconsciously moulds the character of the future citizen. It was upon the mother that the gri-at burden fell, and to her if she was wise and well-educated came the glory —for who knew to what height the child might attain. To the little child our responsibilities were very great, and to influence them for right was the problem of all conscious people. The mothers .=hould be educated on this subject, for until mothers all realised their responsibilities in this matter there would never he ideal education. The world of to-morrow was in the hands ol the little child, how so much more then in the hands of the mothers of today.' Miss Hopkinson concluded her diploma speech with the quotation from Jbsen the land that has the ideal that every child shall be brought up a noble man will lead the world. After the ceremony was ended, a musical and elocutionary programme was given by Misses Xorrie, Walton. Smallfield, Davies. and Patton, while choruses were sung by the massed students. Supper was then provided, and a pleasant evening closed.