BACKWARD AND TRUANT CHILDREN.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XXXIV, Issue 10404, 31 March 1897, Page 5

BACKWARD AND TRUANT CHILDREN.

A WELLINGTON PROPOSAL. fIW TEI.EHKAPII.— FRIfiJS 4».S!)t>IATIO.V.J Wellington, Tuesday. The Inspectors of the local Education Boom report re truant and backward children, thab "we think the plan now in vogue in London, Auckland, and elsewhere, of having separate schools for backward children, who to so mo extent need special treatment, has much to commend it. In such schools the work should not go beyond the fourth standard, and wiSh vary many children not beyond the third, as bho other schools would always be open to them. Admission to such schools, classification o' ;"jpils, and promotions from it, should be .nude by the muster twico a year, subject to the approval of the inspector, Such a school is of course a very different thing from a truant school, although many of the backward children will probably bo tound in the olass of truant children. The school for backward children, as suggested, would include many if nob all children (of which there is a class of 20 or 30 in each of our large city schools), who are over nine years of age and not able to pass the first standard. At present such children remain a year or two and attend very badly, and pass out of the schools without reaching the higher standards. If grouped in large better graded classes, with special instruction almost confined to reading, writing, and arithmetic, much more could be done with them during the time they are in the special school and afterwards, when they enter the higher standards in our ordinary school."