EDUCATION: TECHNICAL AND SCIENTIFIC.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XXV, Issue 9220, 24 November 1888, Page 1 (Supplement)

EDUCATION: TECHNICAL AND SCIENTIFIC.

(Continued.]

Re fork speaking of technical education in other countries, I want to call your attention to the instruction in elementary science as carried on under the Birmingham School Board. .Mr. Harrison, the demonstrator, after describing the specific subjects, of which either one or two may be taken by a child, makes the following important remarks :—" Generally speaking, for boys' schools mechanics should be chosen, and for girls domestic economy. As a second subject in town schools bithei chemistry or magnetism and electricity fot boys and animal physiology for girls ; in country schools, principles of agriculture for boys and botany for girls. In a new school for the seventh standard there is an excellent workshop, fitted up with carpenter's benches, iorge, lathe, &c., for 40 ooys, to which I shall presently refer. The following method of teaching, said to have been suggested by Professor Huxley, but claimed by Captain Doneliy, is at work in Birmingham :—l. A science demonstrator is appointed. 2. A centre i.chosen, where a classroom is set apart, apparatus kept, and experiments prepared. 3. A handcart is provided in which the boxes containing the apparatus tit, to bo conveyed from the science centre to school after school. The youth who lias charge of it carries in the boxes, unpacks the apparatus, and places it on the table. Then the demonstrator gives the lesson ; and so on to the next schoolfour lessons a flay, twenty a week. At each lesson the ordinary teacher is present, and takes full notes, and during the week recapitulates. The children are required to give an account of it, or answer three or four questions on it, the answers to be submitted to the demonstrator. The following arc the results: —The visit of the science demonstrator is welcomed by teachers and children. Even the halftimes tret leave to come in for that lesson only, sitting with bare arms and rolled-up aprons, just as they have run from their work ; and even big girls bring in the babies in charge from whom they cannot escape. The summary of the benefits acquired ate : 1. The general quickening of the intellectual life of the school. '2. The imparting of scientific knowledge and method to children which will be useful to them in after life, and which will cause many of them to continue their science studies in evening classes. 3. The discovery of children of exceptional ability, and their support by means of scholarships. 4. The instruction of the schoolteachers in scientific principles, which they may apply to the general work of the school. Attached to the paper of Mr. Harrison are three appendices, which are very important, but too long to read. They are on pp 134-143 of vol. xiv. of the Health Exhibition literature, and I shall be glad to show them to any person taking an earnest interest in the matter. They are : 1. The syllabus for mechanics or elementary natural philosophyfirst, second, and third stages. '2. The syllabus for domestic economy—first, second, and third stages. Second appendix, a copy of the examination papers in mechanics, 1884. Third appendix, principles of tools and properties of materials. This last is important, as showing how technical education may be extended beyond that which I have already described —to the nature and classification of the principal varieties of wood and to the properties of brass, zinc, and tin. The same method of scientific instruction is at work in Liverpool. The cost of the apparatus was £120 for five years. In the United States schools of this class are called manual training schools, called so after the school at St. Louis. Boys enter that school at 14. They must pass a preliminary examination about on a level with our fifth standard, and the complete course extends over three years. Mr. Woodward, the founder, says, "Our motto is: The cultured mind ; the skilful hand." He insists that manual training should be considered an essential feature in the general education of every boy. There, he asserts, " they come from all sorts of homes —the sons of employer and employed, of native and of foreign born. Side by side they study geometry and physics ; they learn to draw, to swing the hammer, and to push the file. The only aristocracy is that of intelligence." I do not enter into details about the teaching. It is nearly the same as that I have described. The lessons specially to be learned from an account of them is this : that whereas abstract studies are difficult and hard to understand, directly they are illustrated by actual practice these dry bones live, and, so far from a sacrifice of intellectual trainingbeing the result of work, it gives a taste for hard study and a fondness for books. [Mr. lS'ewcombe here gave interesting details respecting schools of art and handicraft in different parts of the world.] THE SCHOOL AND THE WORKSHOP.

There is one point to which I would call attention. It is a common idea that whatever may be learned in the technical primary school may be better learned in the actual practice of the workshop. The statement I have already made, that boys from such schools are at least as good as those who have been already two years in the workshop, would seem to contradict that impression. It must be remembered that the old and efficient method of apprenticeship is done away with. "It is beginning to be admitted," says Mr. Solly, " that youths are not, and cannot be, efficiently trained in a workshop alone; that it is nobody's interest, business, or duty, except in one or two trades, to teach the lads. Nor, in general, is there the time or opportunity for giving any teaching, except what goes by the name of rule of thumb, wrinkles, or dodges." And again he says—" Simple instruction in the principle and theory of any trade is as far from being sufficient for effectual technical training as it is remote from the province : of the workshop, amid the din, bustle, and driving Hurry of modern work and practical toil. What is only beginning to be seen is that in a classroom they musL be taught to 1 apply by practical manipulation what they

have learned in theoretic'truth ; e.g., geometry should be taught by a carpenter to carpenters, and under his eye they must execute models, set out work, work to scale from working drawings, &c. The future cabinetmakers must learn free hand drawing and the cultivation of taste from a true artist and a good designer, and they must prepare designs themselves; and all this must be followed up by work done under the guidance of an artisan skilled in the use of the lathe and other tools." The summary of the whole thing is that theoretical instruction by books or the blackboard, or even with diagrams and drawings, without the impressive corollary of practical work, is one-sided and defective.

EDUCATION IN AGRICULTURE.

The education now being given in New Zealand is that which is least of all fitted for the development of the great industry of the countryagriculture. It absolutely unfits boys for it, and entices them to neglect the pursuit which we ought to encourage, and draw them into the towns. There are only two things that I know of that are being done for education in agriculture against numberless things for its discouragement, viz., the cramming of a few pages of a text book on agriculture in our elementary schools, and the establishment of the college at Lincoln, and both are distinguished failures. What is true of the scholars is also true of the teachers. The prizes of the profession are in the towns. To become a successful teacher of the sciences which illustrate the business of agriculture brings neither honour nor profit. It will be a long time before all this is changed, as it ought to be, but the sooner a beginning is made the better. [Mr. Newcombe then described the course of instruction in agriculture given at some of the Continental schools. He also quoted several well-known authorities to show the importance of instruction in the work of agriculture.] Now, I have dwelt on all these, not with any hope or expectation that our children in provincial schools will ho brought to any great perfection in the knowledge of these sciences, but to show what is really the best thing for those persons to study who are to have the task of cultivating the land, to do it full justice, to give fair play to the stores of natural wealth waiting for the labour which is to cover the land with the rich harvests of fruit and grain. What, then, is the preparation now being given to those children who, having mastered the difficulty of reading, writing, and arithmetic, are being directed to such studies as are to invigorate their minds and prepare them for the serious duties in life awaiting them, some cf which I have indicated. [The lecturer then read the examinations for children in the sixth standard, j

This is the kind of education which Dr. lladatone describes as framed upon th« raditions of the middle ages. I ask you now, Is not the list of studies I have described as qualifying the scholar for the vorkshop or the farm as likely to draw out. the powers of the mind as these historical esearches, these samples of English literaure, these grammatical gymnastics, these irithmetical puzzles? Is not a system o' education seriously defective which does lot avail itself of the [lowers of observa--ion and the curiosity excited thereby, as veil as of the training of the hand ? kVould anything serious happen if the hole of this sixth standard examination vere abolished, and one in science and landicraft put in the place of it ? Who lit knows anything of children is no; iware how delighted they would be to cudy anything that they knew would be ilustrated by practice? EXCLUSION AND INCLUSION. I may be asked, Would you, then, loolish the other studies, such as history ? dy answer is, I would teach only that •vhich is modern—that is, the reign oi tJueen Victoria, dwelling only on the .salient points—the great Afghan War, •nth a little about Lord Auckland, tin.* hen Governor-General, and whose family lame (Eden) is so well known to us ; the Crimean War, with its tragic and heroic episodes ; the great anti-corn law agitation, with the names of the distinguished men who won in it imperishable lame ; the contest in America, and tiie way it affected England—the distress in Lancashire and the near approach of war, but ending in the abolition of slavery ; the influence of gold discoveries in Australia and California; the great exhibition in 1851 and its effect upon trade; the mutiny in India and liie change of government; the humane legislation on behalf of factory operatives and of women and c.iildrcn working in mines ; our alliances and treaties for war and commerce with France, and, subse quently, the great war in Germany, ending in the siege of Paris ; England's relation to her colonies, the inauguration of a new policy by the Canadian Government Bill, the wars in South Africa and the interesting questions of the predominance of the English or Dutch races ; the progress of reform, associated with the names of Russell, Disraeli, and Gladstone; the struggles in Ireland, with the agitation of O'Connell and his successors ; tlio removal of Jewish disabilities ; the removal of the taxes on knowledge, resulting in cheap newspapers and books; then, also, the wonderiul inventions and discoveries of these fifty yearsthe marvellous railway system, with the charming story of George Stephenson and the locomotive ; then th'j electric telegraph and the telephone, quickening all the operations of business, and bringing us nearer together ; tiie first steam trip across the Atlantic tho development of the cotton trade ; the humanising influence of the temperance movement. All this, and much morj, would I teach, with a errand list of nobles in science, art, literature, and philanthropic efforts—names enough to stir the blood with youthful ambition, if only a little enthusiasm be imparted to the narrative by the teacher. Again, I may be asked, Would you, then, exclude the literary exercises, the poetry, Ac., which forms an important part of a sixth standard and junior scholarship examination? I answer, Yes. I believe the practice originated with Mr. Matthew Arnold. I have the greatest respect for so high an authority. In a speech from which I have already quoted lie says:—"The reason why I have taken such interest, as you know, in introducing the exercise, so novel to our schools, of learning passages of standard poetry by heart is this: that to give a child possession of 200 or 300 linos of sterling poetry is to give something to nature to work upon, something that we cannot manipulate by our codes and schedules, out are obliged to permit natural feelings to work upon freely—a whole for his thoughts to crystallise around." Now, I have considered that passage very carefully. I can, however, come to no other conclusion than that the hope of getting children of 13 to 15 to appreciate sterling poetry, and to be influenced thereby in their tastes, is a very uncertain one. They learn the passages, of course, because they cannot pass without; but that they are retained and reflected upon it I do not believe. The whole thing is premature. Perhaps when the tendency which a good general education should give has led the learners to read the better sort of books, and they have had their crude opinions sifted by reading, by lectures, and by discussions, they may turn to these standard poets with an educated taste. But now they are on the threshold of the new life, with the serious duty of earning their living. In the presence of that, select poetry is incongruous, and must stand aside. [To be continued.]