MODERN EDUCATION.

Auckland Star, Volume LV, Issue 249, 20 October 1924, Page 10

MODERN EDUCATION.

i WHERE TECHNICAL SCHOOLS! FAIL. ; j OUT OF TOUCH WITH THE j PRACTICAL. ' i liy UICHAUD HOK.' j I In Xew Zealand utter aboul twenty | . i years of tPfhniiiil pducaiimi we )ia\e , . readied a remarkable position: ; ! Knijiloyers encourage their apprentieos ! .land employees to attend technical night r i ' classes: but do not nor reeomineiul j . : much preference 10 technical pupil* n-ho ! . I are without previoiH practical experience j .i of the occupation they wisli lv adopt.' .'even though the applicant may have I . .-pent three years a! a technical school j studying for thai particular occupation, j ■ Moreover, there is said w> he a prejudice amongst employers apsiinst technical ' , students who are without previous practical experience of the work they ! 1 I wish to do. and there is no reduction j ,! made in the term of their apprentice- I I ship. ! I When we remember that we are spend- j I ing over three million pounds a year ,on education, this want of proper i I association and coordinat ion of theo- , retical with practical education requires serious attention. Modern methods of business and production and the demands j of democratic education have made tin.-* I . a world-wide problem. Denmark, which is said to have the best system of agrfcultura! training in the world, has divided the lime devoted to education into periods: Firstly, the primary period, during which the child is developed physically and taught the elementary essentials, without attaching much importance to examination . results. Secondly, the practical period of two years, during which the pupils learn farm work by actually working on the farm. Thirdly, the academic ' period at the folk high schools. In America Henry I'ord has evolved . technical schools for boys between the , ages of twelve and eighteen, where the ■ school time is divided into blocks of weeks: One week in the class and two ; weeks in the shop, and Ford says: "From : the beginning we have held to three • cardinal principles—First, that the boy • was to be kept a boy and not to be changed into a premature working man; second, that the academic training was to go hand in hand with the industrial instruction: third, that the boy was to be given a sense of pride and responsibility in his work by being trained on articles which were used: He works on articles of recognised industrial worth. The actual processes and actual conditions are exhibited to him —he is taught to observe." In short, the Ford system is designed to teach the boys to observe, think, and make, and at the same time gives them a sound academic education. [ Over sixty years ago K. Hoe and Co., of New York, established a technical and academic school for their employees where they were encouraged to become better workmen and better citizens, special time and facilities being given to those who desired it to carry on their studies and investigations during the day time. The boys were encouraged in every way to not oiily become efficient workmen and managers, but also to understand their business, its requirements and possibilities. The immediate improvement in the Hoe printing press most needed was clearly explained to every boy, and the one who could make that improvement first was once promoted. The idea is to make every employee a good citizen, efficient in his work, able to think, and on the alert for possible improvements. In reference to general education Pestalozzi laid down the principle that school children should be encouraged and taught how to think, how to pray, and how to work. Our system may teach them how to thiuk, but does little towards teaching them how to pray or how to work. Our t education system has been modelled on the old European academic systems that were largely designed for the benefit of a more or less leisured class;" while we in New Zealand have to develop a system for the benefit of all the children, now and in after life— and in order to do this we want a higher standard of utilitarian instruction associated and co-ordinated with sound academic knowledge. The problem for the great majority of our school children in after life will be how to obtain the necessities, conveniences, and comforts of modern life under good, healthy, useful conditions; and they should get into touch with their life work during the plastic adolescent period, say, from 14 to 18 years of age, and this can be done without overtaxing them with night work, and certainly without exploiting their labour. The powers of perception and reflection, mental alertness and manual dexterity for their life work, can be most efficiently developed by actual touch and association with useful work during this period, and at the same time the pupils encouraged to love work and respect the useful worker, while literary learning and academic acquirements may be continued for the remainder of their lives.