Special Training For 39 Teachers

Press, Volume XCIX, Issue 29390, 17 December 1960, Page 14

Special Training For 39 Teachers

A scheme which will put 39 additional speciallytrained teachers into Christchurch primary and intermediate schools by the end of 1961 will be inaugurated early next year, and it is likely to be continued annually as a means of strengthening instruction in certain subjects. Those chosen for special training will be experienced practising teachers with special interests already and also young teachers of high potential. These teachers will be selected only on the recommendation of their headmasters, and only if they consent.

This is how the scheme will work:—

A small surplus of probationary assistants is available in this district. These are students who have completed their two years at Teachers’ College and have still to spend a year in schools before they are certificated. They are not yet qualified and therefore can not truly relieve the shortage of fully-trained teachers Whereas a trained teacher may take a class of 40 to 50, a probationary assistant is permitted to take only 30 with an absolute ceiling of 35. These “extra probationary assistants” (already called E.P.A.’s) will be assigned for the full year to the schools from which specialist trainees are drawn. In the first term the E.P.a. will take over a class (which will benefit from reduced size) and have the assistance of the specialist-designate for the first four weeks. The latter teacher will also be available to assist the headmaster in strengthening work in any other part of the school. The E.P.A. will thus have more than usual help and other classes will benefit also. Course in Music

After the first month, the E.P.A. will be on his or her own The candidates for special training will then attend the Christchurch Teachers’ College fulltime for six weeks. This first course will be in music. The first fortnight’s work will be personally directed by the Education Department’s Supervisor of School Music (Mr R. Walden Mills) and then the Teachers’ College lecturers (Mr Keith Newson and Mr Robert Perks) will take over in company with the senior inspector of schools (Mr Hugh Findlay), who has a fine record in school music. Besides these lecturers, the 13 members of the first cadre will draw exoerience from their own numbers. There may be one with special skills in instrumental work; another in choral work. For the last three or four weeks of the first term the specialist trainees will go back to their own schools for general duties and also to lay down new music programmes which may be implemented later. Other Subjects The topic of the in-service training course for the second term has not yet been settled; but it will probably be chosen from arithmetic, social studies, and science. This next cadre of 13 will be replaced in their own schools by the members of the first cadre—not E.P.A.’s. The changeover will occur in weeks No. 3 to No. 8 so that the second group can have their six weeks at the Teachers’ College The initial cadre, who serve as relievers in the second term, will be back in their own schools as supernumeraries again for the remainder of the term. While they are in the second cadre’s schools, they are likely to interest themselves in music there. Remedial Reading

The same pattern will be followed in the third-term course on remedial reading, directed by Miss Ruth Trevor, the Education Department’s consultant, who will be assisted by local teachers from remedial reading ■ clinics. Again the first cadre will be relievers in the schools from which candidates are drawn. They will thus take their music to yet another group of schools. This first cadre will bear the brunt of chopping and changing; but by limiting it to them it will save upsets to more schools. Even with their own special course and their relieving duties, the first cadre will still be in their own schools for 21 weeks out of the 42 of the school year.

This scheme has the approval of headmasters of all Christchurch district schools from grade IV upwards. They have accepted the statement that, with an extra probationary assistant and their own teacher available for mobile duties for half of the year, they will be better off next year and afterwards have the benefit of the specialist training so long as the chosen teacher remains at that school. Mr Findlay said that after subjecting the scheme to the headmasters’ criticism and gaining their approval he felt it would work well and that teaching in the schools would be immeasurably improved in special subjects. Candidates for the course should not be confused with the Education Department’s appointed specialists; but they would certainly have much richer and much more up-to-date specialist training than would be possible in any other way than a full specialist year in Teachers’ College.