OUR EDUCATION SYSTEM.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XXV, Issue 9220, 24 November 1888, Page 3

OUR EDUCATION SYSTEM.

TO THIC KUITOK. Sir,—l have to thank you heartily for the way in which you mentioned my last letter, and also for the prominence you irive to educational matters. Papers like that of Professor Boyeson's, of New York, on the Dress*

ing necessity for reihodelling the national '■ system of education in America, wo who live in the country and have no access to foreign newspapers would never see if you did not place them before us in the Herald. With your permission I will make a few remarks on one or two propositions laid down in an excellent lecture, containing a fund of information, on Education : General. Technical, and Scientific," by Mr. C. P. Nowcombe, delivered before the members of the Auckland Athenaeum. My object in doing so is that we may not see through a glass darkly, buo face to face. In discussing the question of education we all look at it from our respective standpoints, and mine, be it understood, is the country settler's point of view. Speaking of the three R.'s, the lecturer says " Let me here say that there is no heresy more to be condemned than that of the sufficiency of the three R.'s. These are" not education, and they who would send their .. children into the world armed only with these do them a cruel wrong." Further on : " But unless you educate as well as teach, the average working man will not read." Very few people indeed do think that these are stuiicient, but surely the three R's are an essential part of every child's education. They constitute the key which unlocks the portals to all the avenues of our education system. It would take up too much of your space, were I to mention the names of those men, inventors, explorers, artists, geologists, naturalists, statesmen, whose names are emblazoned on the roll of fame, and who went out into the world, armed only with the three R's, some of them without even that. The great majority of those children whose schooling ceases with the three R's, belong to parents who cannot afford to give them more. To use a hackneyed quotation, " This is the pinion that impels the steel." Many of our country settlers, owing to the low prices obtained for their produce, are unable to pay for that help which, under ordinary circumstances, is absolutely necessary. If the folks »vho dwell in towns would only think for a moment what the mother of a family in'.-this position has to do single-handed—all the work of a large dairy, washing day, scrubbing and churning days come round with unceasing regularity, several children to tidy up and make ready for school every morning—God alone knows with what patience in well-doing she faces this huge round of duties, through long weary years while the family is being reared. Ana is this mother to be denied the assistance of her elder daughters, in order that they may acquire a taste for reading ? On whom should we saddle the cruel wrong here? And are we quite sure our children would be readers if sent to school until they were twenty ? Parents do value much of what is taught in the higher standards, and would gladly give their children the benefit of it for several years longer if only our national system could be made to travel hand in hand with practical education. From my limited point of view (many people think my " wision," like Sam W'eller's, is somewhat limited) I had no idea, until I saw Mr Newcombe's statement, that five-sixths of the education in this country ceased with the fourth standard. In view of this circumstance are we justified in wringing out of the over-burdened taxpayer the price paid for the education of the few only who are able to avail themselves of the teaching in the higher standards? I think not. Free education should cease with the fourth standard. Charge fees in the upper standards. Increase the number of scholarships given to the primary schools, and the right ones—the bright ones of the working class-can go up for something better. The public mind is occupied at present with technical education. Townspeople want workshops to be carried' on in connection with the schools, which is a step in the right direction. Here, in the country, " we are not at our wits' end to know what to do with our boys," as the President of the Industrial Association in Auckland stated in his report. We have nature's own workshop, the noble work of reclaiming the wilderness, the calling ready made to their hands of cultivating the soil.' Benjamin Disraeli said, " We put too much faith in systems, and look too little to men." Many of us can apply this to ourselves.l am, &c., Matthew M. Kikkbride. Mangere, 23rd November, 1888.