EDUCATIONAL INSTITUTE.

Press, Volume LIV, Issue 9817, 28 August 1897, Page 8

EDUCATIONAL INSTITUTE.

A very enjoyable social in connection with the North Canterbury Educational Institute took place at the rooms of the V.M.C.A. last evening. There was a very large attendance, and Mr C. S. Howard presided. During the evening papers were read by Mr Alexander and Mr Alley respectively. Mr Alley's paper, entitled, " The Proper Place for and Functions of Reading in the Primary Schools," pointed out that the teacher was not an original worker in the experimental sense, as the farmer or bicycle manufacturer, in that he worked in a groove. The absence of freedom of classification and the one standard a year system put a discount on all creative energy. ..For twenty-five years teachers had been using one reading book for each class. In some cases two were now coining into use. The primary school teacher pulled well in traces, and it would be better for the system if he sometimes kicked over. The most difficult children to teach in a school were those who could not read- Children from the worst homes, where the circumstances were unfavourable to culture, were the heaviest burden [for the teacher in all subjects that require a knowledge of language, such as composition and history. With these might be grouped the dull and lazy children, and the two formed what might be called the non-readers. These two types diverged and differentiated more and more in the upper departments. Many of these cases spent sometimes even ten years at school without being able to read an ordinary work of fiction with intelligence. Mr Alley attacked the deficiency of the educational system, especially in the matter of having one book only in each class, and that one very often unsuitable. The weak point of the system was rather bookless than bookish. The paper advocated a fuller literary diet generally right up through the school, and the beneficial effects on the non-readers of an additional book to the one prescribed. Short stories were of value from the infant class upwards, grading in difficulty. Silent reading was also referred to as valuable. The beat shaft horse in the syllabus was not arithmetic, but English reading. More scientific teaching would be useful.

Mr Alexander's paper, "Schools in the Old Country," was a description of four leading schools Mr Alexander had visited while on a recent trip Home. Great attention, he said, was paid to singing, and some pupils received as much as four hours' instruction a week, part of which time was outside the ordinary school hours. Kindergarten instruction also was closely attended to. The buildings, though not so handsome as some in New Zealand, were more fit for school accommodation. In general school method New Zealand was in front of the Mother Country, but in scientific and technical instruction far behind. There was more literary work at Home, and every Standard had three reading books at least. The scale of salaries of headmasters was about the same as in N w Zealand, but that of assistants was lower. The English salaries, however, had increased 50 to 70 per cent. The English people, determined not to be behind Germany, had sent Commissioners over to the Continent to get particulars as to German technical instruction. The New Zealand department might imitate them, and send over one of the senior masters, say once in five years. During the evening songs were sung by Misses McGregor and Morrow, Messrs Hunter and West. Miss M'Lachlan and Mr W. Pike sang a duet, Mr H. J. Chapman played a flute solo, and Mr W. A. Hall gave two recitations.