ADULT EDUCATION.

Auckland Star, Volume LIII, Issue 86, 11 April 1922, Page 4

ADULT EDUCATION.

Owing to the pressure of the examination system many schools are forced to cram rather than to educate, and as a consequence numbers of children leave school with a distaste for anything that savours of school work. This fact was dealt with by Dr. Mcllwraith in the course of an address on the aims, of the Workers' Educational Association, and lie thought the result of such education could be plainly seen in the way many people spent their leisure. The association, he said, sought to show the joys of intellectual 'leisure. Examiners have dwelt again and again on the lack of originality shown in papers on literary subjects, and must be due to some defect in teaching these subjects. Pupils have to "get up" a certain period of literature, and this is done conscientiously enough with dates and 'biographical setting. But in the process little room is left for the pure enjoyment of the author, and still less room is left for the employment of any critical faculty. Only too often the criticisms of others are committed to memory, until the whole of English literature comes to be looked on as something distasteful and meant only for the ex-< animation room. Thus it comes about that when pleasure has to be sought it is not sought in the higher fields of literary enjoyment, but it is sought rather, as Dr. Mcllwraith points out, in marble bars and racecourses. It may be doubted whether the masterpieces of literature can be "taught." It might be better to leave the child to browse in a good 'library, as Buskin suggests, and deviate a little from the strict timetable which often enjoins minutes for subjects that might well be given hours. It is not often possible in view of the necessity that exists of preparing pupils for different examinations to excite a real interest in the subject. History is made a mere recital of dates and unconnected facts instead of being made the story of man's endeavour, of the life of the people, of the struggle of humanity towards freedom and light. The true test, however, of education is to be found in the interest excited in a subject in the mind of the pupil. Judged by this test it must be admitted that much that passes for education is found wanting.