The Press. WEDNESDAY, DECEMBER 18, 1901. THE TEACHING OF FOREIGN LANGUAGES.

Press, Volume LVIII, Issue 11151, 18 December 1901, Page 6

The Press. WEDNESDAY, DECEMBER 18, 1901. THE TEACHING OF FOREIGN LANGUAGES.

The Inspector-General of Schools, in his report upon secondary education in the colony, has, this year, something to say upon the teaching of foreign languages that possesses an interest for others besides the members of the profession for whom the report is primarily written. It has always soemed to us that' in the case of a great , majority of children the time spent upon acquiring a rudimentary knowledge of the grammar of a foreign language ie tor often time wasted. The Inspector-General gives pointed expression to this view in claiming that the teaching of a foreign language has comparatively little educational value, > unless that language be brought to what he aptly calls "the paying point." That he defines with, sufficient clearness aa "the point at which the pupil becomes capable, within the limits of the vocabulary he -has acquired, of using it as a language —viz., for . speaking, leading, or writing, or for more than one of these purposes."; Now, as the average "school life" of a boy or girl in a secondary school in New Zealand does, not exceed two, or at most two. and α-half, years, it is obvious that, in the present condition of things, the "paying point" is reached only by a very small minority of pupils trho take languages. For in the majority of - our ! schools most of the pupils take up French and Latin. No one needs be told that tie time that can be,devoted to their «tuds •will not enable any but the very clever few to reach'"paying point" in either—'but especially' in Latin—in the time we have named.' Mr Hpgben, therefore, advocates that it would be far more profitable to teach five-sixths of the pupils one language only, and to endeavour to bring that language to the" "paying point, ,, and to teach tjwo languages .only to the other sixth, composed of the more highly-gifted pupils, suah as are destined for a professional career, and whose parent* intend to give Item a longer time at a. secondary school than the period spent, by the majority. By thus narrowing the sphere of study it would be possible to convey some practical,, living' knowledge of the language, a knowledge that • would give access to its literature, and enable the pupil to proceed beyond the stage of mere gerund-grinding or mechanical construing.

So far the Inspector-General will probably carry most schoolmasters -with him. Even in English public schools, whichtillthe last few years, have clung with conservative tenacity to old ideas, these views have already received wide acceptance. Hie next contention will probably meet with less agreement among- members of the profession. It is, that the one language chosen for Btudy BhotM he a modern, iiviag language, in preference to an ancient, dead one—French and German, rather than Latin and Greek But even here, so rapidly are views of education changing, he is able to quote in his support a former headmaster of Harrow and a professor of Greek at , Cambridge. Dr. Weldon, till & few days , ago Bishop of Calcutta, and formerly headmaster of Harrow School, admits that the result of his own experience is "that there I "is no inherent difference between ancient J "and modern languages" aa regards their educational value. Sir Richard Jebb, of Cambridge, declares his opinion "that the " advocates of modern languages can boldly " affirm that they are worthy to be studied "as instruments of the highest culture." Lord Rosebery, whose opinion on any question of culture and education is entitled to ■the very highest respect, adnata that "a "man may be an educated and cultured " gentleman, although he has not eeriously "studied either Latin or Greek, and that "France and Germany possess invaluable -with the advantage that they "are in.languages that are living, and not "dead." Once dispose of the contention that a dead highly-inflected language has paramount value as an instrument of education, and admit that a living, synthetio language may possess as great value as intellectual training, and it seems to us that the claim of Latin and Greek to their present pride of place in education loses its most valid argument. Tha advantages of a modern over an ancient language in the schools of New Zealand is even greater than

in the, schools of England owing to the shorter "echooMife," wliieh is here the rule. It is possible for an intelligent boy in two or three years' study to learn, if not to speak, at least *o read, and write French with some facility; it is quite impossible in tfce flame time to learn much more Latin than will ettoble him "duly to decline his noun," or painfully to worry through, a> trite and commonplace passage of the worthy,, but undistinguished, Eutropius.