ST. PATRICK'S SCHOOL.

Grey River Argus, Volume XVI, Issue 2169, 22 July 1875, Page 2

ST. PATRICK'S SCHOOL.

[to the editor.] . - : - Sir, — A table published in the Inspector's report, showing the order of merit of the various schools, is likely, to mislead those who have not carefully read the preceding part of the report. You will, I believe, agree with me that, in order to arrive at a correct estimate of the relative positions of any two schools, from, say, their first classes; the:e classes must be about the same in numbers, if the average attendances of the two schools be about equal. .: Now, my average attendance and that of Mr Thomas are about equal; but my first class contains 19, and his only 8. Now, eight of my pupils obtained, in arithmetic, an average of s§, while his eight (the whole of the class) obtained only 4J. But owing to several of my pupils failing, my average was rendered lower than his. I may sta^e, by way of explanation, that I make reading the ground of classification—the plan adopted in the State ' schools of Victoria. But several of my first class are not a fifth as good in arithmetic as in reading. For instance — One of my boys whose reading was praised very highly, and considered worthy of a special mark, . did not do a single one of the questions in arithmetic. Now all these children, though differing so widely in knowledge of arithmetic, had precisely the same questions. Again comparing St. Patrick's School, Greymouth, which obtained second place in dictation with Sb Mary's, Hokitika,! which obtained' first. The first clas3 at St. Mary's contains only four pupils ! Now the average for these four was 4J, and the average for my first class was 4 3-11. But two of my pupils had not any mistake, and one of them scored just one, while some had ; two or three. Now it will be seen by this that the average of four of my class in mistakes was lower than that of the class at St. Mary's. / I am^ &c., J. C. Aheabn. Greymouth, July 21, 1875.