CHARACTER TRAINING

Dominion, Volume 23, Issue 196, 16 May 1930, Page 8

CHARACTER TRAINING

FUNCTION OF SCHOOLS PLACE OF EXAMINATIONS “It has been said that the qualities upon which people of our race pride themselves are vigour, energy, practical capacity, dogged perseverance, determination not to be beaten, integrity, love of justice, outspokenness, straightforwardness. But these omit all reference to thought and its processes, knowledge and its reward. They are all practical and not intellectual. They cannot, therefore, be said to embrace all those qualities that go to the making of character.” These views were expressed by Mr. W. A. Armour, principal of Wellington College, in his presidential address at the annual conference of the New Zealand Secondary Schools’ Association yesterday. “It is well, therefore,” said Mr. Armour, “for us to consider whether our system of education really succeeds in building up character, and whether character training is the main function of our secondary schools. “The word character Implies something which is inscribed or graven into the texture of our being. It affects the body, the mind, and the spirit, and character-making is the result of experience. Clearly, then, intellectual experiences cannot be left out. The period of a pupil’s school life must be devoted to persistent and systematic training against the life of maturer years. “The ordinary course in any secondary school is composed largely of intellectual studies, embracing the languages, mathematics and the sciences. I venture to say that these, when properly taught make a vast contribution to character-training. They all require intense study, close observation, honesty of effort, patient research, and accuracy. Character is developed and built, up on work, and no school is fulfilling its purpose unless the minds of the pupils in it are receiving training. The Spirit of Service. “Now, I do not wish to be misunderstood. Because I have advocated culture in its best sense as one of the main forces in the building of character, I do not thereby wish to minimise in any way the other great forces which we traditionally, and, I believe, rightly, most often refer to as character builders. “These are the general discipline of the school, the cult of athletics, and all those agencies which endeavour to inculcate the spirit of service. In our own system of education, which emphasises so vigorously the fact that it is secular, one hardly dare even mention religious faith as a factor in character building. Yet undoubtedly it has probably been the most potent factor in the great English tradition of education, and in any reference to character building in the schools of England, it must be ineluded. Fear God and Honour the King. “The only reference I propose to make to religion in this connection, is to quote the words uttered by our Chief Justice, Sir Michael Myers, in an address recently delivered in this city. ‘What,’ he asked, ‘are the main attributes, the main lessons that a boy should be taught? They are “To fear God, to honour the King, to obey the laws, and to do unto others as he ■would have them ■do to him,’” In our school training of to-day, do we make any endeavour to teach our pupils to fear our acceptance of the commonly enumerated agents going to the formation of character, we are indeed apt to miss what is accomplished through the ordinary routine of class work, and we, as teachers, must realise as perhaps we have not always done, that our class-room work should be of such a standard and be saturated with such idealism as will permeate the character of our pupils. The work of the master must be honest if the work of the pupil is to be likewise. Examinations Must be of Right Kind. “There is a very great danger that pre-sent-day conditions in our schools may present a real obstacle to the .development of character. If our examinations are of the wrong kind, and if our. syllabus is dominated too much by unscientific examinations, then freedom- of selection is hampered, and consequently proper training must make way to the hurry and scurry of getting up an examination. We really have reached a point where we can declare, not that examinations should be abolished, but at which patient, scientific research ought to take place to discover, if possible, whether examinations of the right kind are still possible and desirable. It would appear to be, logical to make such an investigation befoie declaring that examinations are useless ana ba ™ f Mso goes without saying that character building in the class-room is seriously interfered with where classes are too large. From what has been said, the thesis, I hope, will be accepted that training in intellectual studies is. part of the work we have to do in building up character. And if the broad view of character training which I have endeavoured to enunciate is a true one, its importance must be paramount m our secondary Se Mr?Armour was thanked for his address, which it was decided to have printed and circulated.