ADULT EDUCATION

Bay of Plenty Beacon, Volume 6, Issue 71, 11 May 1943, Page 8

ADULT EDUCATION

BRITISH ARMY REDUCES CYNIC ISM BY TALKS FOR SOLDIERS

Oliver Cromwell's dictum that, "the good soldier is one Avho kno"\vs for what he fights and love what hei knows" is the basis of the section of the British army's educational system which deals with current affairs.

This article,, from the. Christian Science Monitor, describes the British experiment from the viewpoint of its application to the United States forces. But the story has a topical interest in New Zealand because a phase of the educational syscm about to be introduced into the New Zealand army will deal with current affairs-

The great enemy of the American citizen-soldier asi seen at camps in America and in cantonments, in Great Britain is cynicism, the attiturc that amounts to "what is the use. of anything—nothing,'' says the Christian Science; Monitor. The British have realised this in their citizen army and to combat it/ hav'e introduced a great experiment in adult that, has just entered its second year, the Army Bureau of Current Affairs (A.8.C.A.)

This organisation requires that not less than once a week, i'n working hours, platoons under their lieutenants, or non-commissioned officers sit down, even if it be by the side, of the road, and talk over some topic of the. day.

Week-end schools have been held all over England to teach officers how to hold these remarkable discussion groups with their own soldiers, and how to ventilate an overheated argument, and how to follow the ABCA's advice "to take the chair and not the floor."

No diminisliment in discipline results from these forums, it. is found: in fact frequently a new relationship of confidence and trust is engendered and the grumbling" of the discontented individual which might cause harm if left to itself is corrected by the comments of his fellow soldiers.

The Germans have warped the minds of a whole generation of their youth by their teachings in which they recognise the supreme importance of a faithful army by distorting the whole nature of such teaching; the Russians have no need for such conversations, for they know very well what they are fighting for and have recently abolished their system of commissars, but the British feel they need a vent for soldiers' forums in the wait for conclusive action, even though bombed buildings all around are grim reminders of their tremendous stake in the struggle.

Americans free from immediate attack, need the opportunity of self education in the matter of "what are we fighting for?" more than any of these nations it would seem, and the questions the "Yank" troops ask in Great Britain clearly reveal how much they might, gather by procedure like that of the ABC A.

Outstanding questions raised in the British discussions are as. frank as the following: "How should our schools, be run?" "Postwar reconstruction"; "Town planning."

Deep Interest in Russia

The British soldier cannot get enough information about Russia: and America is almost equal in his interest. An officer isi quoted as saying, "The troops feel these Russians must be wizards to stand up like this to the Boche; and their curiosity is multiplied by the fact that Russia has been as remote from us as Tibet all these years."

Distorted cinemas views' of American like also come in for correction from this give-and-take of question, answer ami argument, put on by ABCA.

The men like the informal interludes. There are many "weaknesses still in the system, and it often takes a steady hand by an cjfficer to know just where to draw the line in a heated argument. The ignorance of the soldiers often comes as a shock to outsiders. British troops frequently have little conception of the cause of the war, cannot name parts of the Empire, cannot . list their own Allies.

Most soldiers have left school at 14. and have not had education since. Similar ignorance in other fields would almost certainly be found among American troops. Indeed, the naive attitude toward. Britain exhibited by the "Yanks'* suddenly dropped in the country, and their hazy conceptions of Europe and the war at large is one of the intriguing phases of meeting them in their

new environment

Discipline Not Affected It is the more remarkable that Britain should take the lead in this adult educational movement because there is a disciplinary barrier between its officers and men, quite different from the informal relationship in the American army. Neither way need be criticised, but the British, have found no relaxation in discipline resulting < from these half-hour debates. An extreme view on one side in such a forum is apt to be corrected by an extreme view on the other until a sort of. corrective balance is struck. ABC A provides careful, cautious detached and objective documents for the aid of the "noncom" or subaltern in leading the debate. Some officers stick to these too rigidly, some are pushed over backward in the intellectual melee and yet on the whole few "incidents" have occurred. It is part of the intellectual ferment in Britain that these discussions find an immediate .interest and safety-valve for many troops. ABCA's work is supplemented by photographic exhibitions in canteens and barracks l and by wall newspapers and current affairs rooms in larger camps, with maps, charts, newspapers, and reference books. American officers arc studying the British methods and indicate they will try to duplicate them as soon as there, is time to get organised. Soldiers who realise what they are fighting for andj as* Cromwell said, "love what they know," make better fighters, it is agreed. And as a preventive, against "losing the peace," as America did after the Great War, nothing would be stronger or a better safeguard against the return to the United States, of disillusioned, and cynical armies, intent on returning the nation to isolationism, than the immediate and full realisation now of. the stake tlicy have in the world battle.