WRITING AND ARITHMETIC

New Zealand Herald, Volume XLIII, Issue 13278, 10 September 1906, Page 5

WRITING AND ARITHMETIC

WANT OF NEATNESS AND ACCURACY.

[BY TELEGRAPH.— OWN CORRESPONDENT.]

ChbisTCHURCH, Saturday. The complaint made by the Wellington Chamber of Commerce as to the incapacity of boys leaving school to write clearly, and do any arithmetical work accurately, found an echo on Friday night at the meeting of the managers of tho technical classes. The director (Mr. John Howell) reporting on the short examinations which had been held by the instructors, said the only adverse criticism he had to make was that in the commercial classes too little attention was paid by students to neatness and legibility of handwriting, and to accuracy in numerical work. In the course of discussion one member of tho board said neatness in writing, and accuracy in arithmetic wore practically la lost art among boy, fresh from school. The impossibility of getting useful boys, from the schools was a very serious matter, and the education board or oilier authorities should see to it that some improvement was made. Another member said that children nowadays bad so much scribbling to do that they could not give their attention to writing. Children were kept too busy, and had too much homo work to do. The system was nt fault, and it was the system that should be altered. A third speaker had no complaint to make, he had put ten children through a public school. In the secondary schools the writing was not good, hut lie held that the district school did good work in teaching writing. Mr. Hurst Seager said that his experience of boys from both primary and secondary schools was that they could not write well enough to address a letter. They could not do a simple sum in arithmetic, and they could not express en idea in clear English. Dr. Hirst said that ho had no doubt that the education board would bo pleased to receive a report on the matter, but it should state whether there had been any recent deterioration. Probably the poorness of the handwriting was due to tho gradual enlargement of the syllabus until it was so full that masters were unable to make their pupils perfect.