BY POST

Evening Post, Volume CXV, Issue 81, 6 April 1933, Page 12

BY POST

NOVEL EDUCATION

NEW SOUTH WALES

SYSTEM

(From "The Post's" Representative.) ' SYDNEY, March-30. The, largest school in New , South Wales today is One in which the teacher never sees his pupils, nor the children their classmates: —the Education Department's Correspondence School. From, modest, beginnings in 1916, when it was founded as something new'in education systems by Mr. S. H. Smith, who later became Director of Education, it has grown to one of the most important of the Department's activities. In 1916 one teacher was sending .out weekly postal instructions to a few young scholars in the far outback. Today 126 teachers are required to cope with the task' of instructing 5229 students.

The fact that there have been 850 enrolments this year speaks for the progress that has been made. Gone are the days when children rode or walked many miles to the schools. Today, in New South.Wales, no home is too remote for tho aid of the postal teacher. When the idea was first,mooted critics feared that it would never be a success. Contact -^between teacher and pupil, they held; was essential for the child to be given knowledge in a form its untutored mind could assimilate. Results, however, have exceeded expectations of those who favoured the scheme. While comparisons are difficult, it is found that the postal, student keeps well up with the ordinary school student. Primary examinations prove this, and the accomplishments of postal scholars who pass on to the secondary schools give further confirmation. . ,

The system is simple. Each correspondence pupil is provided with three exercise books, and there is a continuity of study. One book can be with the teacher for .correction, another in the post with.fresh lessons, and-the third with tho child. Text books, printed leaflets, and supplementary typewritten sheets, explain the lessons in a clear and concise manner, so that the child, or, at any rate, the parent who is assisting, can readily undorstand. Every child has an. index card, showing progress, while a system of rotary colours reveals whether lie is retarded, up to the standard, or advanced.-. At present tho correspondence school is concerned mainly with primary instruction; Having completed this most of;tho, children are of an ago when they can travo-l or board -near a school. Where necessary the courses arc extended. To be eligible to join the school a child .must live three miles from one of the Stato .schools, ajid the system has.been so perfected that apparent lack of competition does not lead to retarded progress. Teachers working under the postal system declare that they often get;,to know their pupils better than they do the members of the large classes they instruct personally in the big schools. Personal letters between the scholars ■ and the teachers are encouraged, and the children are invited to visit their "school-, room" should they come to Sydney for a holiday. ■ .\ :