PRIMARY EDUCATION

Greymouth Evening Star, 13 June 1930, Page 5

PRIMARY EDUCATION

DK STRONG’S CRITICISM.

[per press association.]

WELLINGTON, June 12. The view that the progress in th lower classes in the New Zealam primary schools was much too leisure ly was put forward by Ur T. B. Strong Director of. Education, in an addres: to the Council of Education to-day. In Australia, he said, the syllabui was much more comprehensive thai ours. He thought, however, that con siderable advance had been made. ii New Zealand in the direction of giving the primary school teachers greatei liberty in making the instruction more practical and less formal, and in giv ing due emphasis to the cultural side In one aspect, however, it failed. He had been led to that conclusion be cause his observations in Australis had confirmed the opinion that he had held for some years. It was pro. bably one of the most important results of his visit abroad. The primary school syllabus appeared to far! because it did not provide a rapid enough advance from stage to stage While some of the classes had a reasonable amount of work .to do, others were almost marking time for some time during the school y ear. The point, he said, was a debatable one. The progress in the lower classes in the New Zealand schools was much too leisurely. Some knew it was. This was a view which he had brought forward before, and which had met with considerable opposition. His own efforts to put more work on to the lower classes, and so make room for a greater advance in the higher classes, reaching of higher standard of attainment in Standard VI., had been opposed, and he had had to give way. 5 In comparing the syllabus of today with the syllabus of the past, he always noted there was a tendency to take something out rather than to put something in. He knew that there was a popular opinion that the syllabus was overcrowded. He did not think it was overcrowded, and he was led to the conclusion that more could be done, particularly in the lower part of the school. It was a very serious matter, and one that affected all branches of education in New Zealand from the primary to the university; and he thought that it demanded

very close investigation. He was forced to the conclusion, from his observations in New South Wales and Victoria, that they did reach a higher standard o£ education in less time than we did. He was well aware, he said, that this was unpleasant criticism from him, for, as a New Zealander, he was proud of our system. It was one of the weaknesses of the system, and we had to see to it. He proposed, next week, when all the Inspectors of the Dominion met in conference, to take up this matter very seriously with them. He had the subject in mind for a number of years past, but yet had had no definite basis on which to found an opinion. He was more convinced, however, from his visit to Australia that there was some ground for the criticism he made. It had become the fashion with some educationalists in New Zealand to decry without ceasing our education system. One of these at a recent meeting in Wellington was reported as saying: “We can pay too much for a system of education that is out of dajte, such as ours is, as well as being unsuited to the needs of New Zealand.” Dr Strong continued: —“Professor Condliffe, in his recently published book, “New Zealand in the Making,” is so ignorant of the New Zealand educational system as to say that there has been practically no change in our schools since 1871. Statements like these are so absurd as to carry their own reputation. I am not going to suggest that the New Zealand education system cannot be improved. Judging by what I saw recently in Australia, and by what I have read of systems in other countries, our own can be improved, and if the people of New Zealand will provide money, they can have improvements.”

UNIVERSITY FAILURE.

AUCKLAND, June 13. “I feel bound to say that the University of New Zealand is trying to carry cut an impossible task and not doing it particularly well,” said Sir George Fowlds, speaking at the Auckland University College’s capping ceremony. “The time is coming when we will either have four separate universities, or a university incorporating Auckland and Victoria University Colleges and Massey College, as the University of North New Zealand.” Sir G. Fowlds added that he personalty favoured the latter proposal.