SOVIET CHILDREN.

Auckland Star, Volume LXIV, Issue 84, 10 April 1933, Page 8

SOVIET CHILDREN.

TRAINING THEORIES.

AUTHORITIES; HAVE DOUBTS. ANGULAR WJDOCHKA. The Soviet authorities have become restive about the present generation of children, and have begun to doubt the wisdom of'some of their earlier educational theories and innovations, states the Moscow correspondent of the London "Ob'server.''- What has been the education of a Soviet child thus far? From the very firs't the Soviet school aimed to be as different' from the hated Czarist school as. it Dossibly could.

Formerly teaching was. theoretical, abstract; therefore the. Soviet school had to bo made part and parcel of life; children had to acquire knowledge not so much from books as from visits' to factories, from • actually working there a certain number of hours each. month, (they still do); from visits to farms, city institutions. . .

Rigid discipline and absolute respect for authority were characteristic features of a Czarist school. Soviet children; therefore, had to be • given. the right to 'talk in ■ class, to answer in groups, or individually,; or all together, or not at all, as they wished, i ;

■" The . teacher at : first dared not, and later could not, assert his authorityChildren .participated in teachers' .meetings, and took an active part iii shaping school policies , and activities. Soviet children are now taught that there is no God, that religion is an invention of the rich, for the exploitation of the poor, that class.hatred must.never be relaxed.

.Military toys,and models form a large part of the equipment of every school and kindergarten; every, child , knows about the aims of the Red Army, is taught the history of the revolution, the necessity of proletarian dictatorship and similar Communist doctrines. Some Doubts. When, however, Russia, under the Five - Year Plan, began to industrialise, and the need for engineers, mechanics, chemists, became greater and greater, it was found that these children ' were lamentably lacking in concrete, factual knowledge. ''"•'..' ,"

They could make a speech oh the Communist International, but. could not name some European capitals and were vague about placing a decimal point. They read poorly and spelt worse. Their algebra : teacher • had to begin with lesstons in arithmetic>

A reorganisation of the methods and curriculum was then ordered,; drilling in the three R's was enforced; strict discipline was .reintroduced, .together with the examination system.

But recently' 'Soviet educational authorities began' to feel that besides factual' knowledge, Soviet children lacked something, less tangible, though not..less important. From ( mingling so much with adults,- from having to face hard-Soviet realities, from the materialistic education, acquired- many •traits : that' were~ admirable, but few that were .JovatJle.'..

, They, were .self-assertive, . sure of 'theniselves,' aggressive,. loud,' practical; ■there was',Freedom and decision, but also sharpness in their 'mariner.' ( ''. .. The Wew Learning. " Michail Koltzov, the gifted Communist journalist, recently, discussed Soviet education in an article in "Pravda." -He found that-the eix-year-old girl, Ludochka, educated in a i children's home, knew "that it was' disgraceful to be a slacker, that God was only for the bourgeois, that there was no revolution abroad, that rabbits were killed by being struck on the head, that in a certain store felt .boots were sold) without special cards, that, if a bag was stolen, the money' was usually taken out, while the documents were left lying' in a prominent place; -she knew some swear words; she' knew that if a nail was driven- into a- tyre .the truck could not move on.

! "She breathed heavily into my face in order to convince me that she had eaten onions] But she did not know that it' was wrong to drive the nail into the tyre, that you should not eat from a knife; she and her older playmates knew about international solidarity, but did not think of offering a seat in the car to an old man. or woman. 'Why should I yield my seat? He has a ticket and so have I —and I sat down before him,' was the children's argument. "Our children, and that is very noticeable," goes on Koltzov, "are not taught sufficiently the simple rules of collective life. . "If you teach children to pick up things dropped by ciders, to help them in small things, politely to point out the way, when asked, not to interrupt in conversation, will not that be teaching rules:of the old regime?" anxiously ask Soviet teachers. ~ Koltzov assures them, on.the contrary, that. these "bourgeois rules constitute good proletarian ethics." He wants Ludochka to' be taught these rules. He wants Ludochka, when ;she grows up, not only to surprise people by her dialectical, practical mind, but also not to breathe into; people's faces, not to. eat from a knife, be less angular, become, in short, a girl with whom one could fall in love.