TENDENCIES IN EDUCATION.

Manawatu Times, Volume XLVI, Issue 2004, 21 December 1921, Page 4

TENDENCIES IN EDUCATION.

Dealing with the influence of pre-sent-day psychological research, in a lecture in Christchurch on "Recent Tendencies in Education," Professor Shelley stated that it was now known that the child mind was not a miniature adult mind. Experiments had proved conclusively that the learn'ng of poetry did not train the memory for anything but poetry. The old idea was tliat the study of mathematics trained the mind in logical thinking. It trained the student to think logically in mathematics but did not improve his chances of reasoning out sociological problems. Psychological research had also proved that the general intelligence or "educabllity" of the student could not be determined either by his ability to learn by rote or by his ability to do mathematics. A great deal of the time usually given to arithmetic was wasted. Many girls were unable to grasp the subject, and he thought that, in schools, threequarters of the children wasted threequarters of their time trying to keep terms with the syllabus. Ability to do mechanical arithmetic indicated very little. Ability to solve problems perhaps meant a little more.