EDUCATIONAL FALLACIES.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LI, Issue 15501, 7 January 1914, Page 4

EDUCATIONAL FALLACIES.

Sir, — am sorry to learn that "pedagogy is becoming as isolated as the archaic metaphysics." Judging from an article in the Herald, there is also a slump in logic. I cull the following from this leading article:—l. Smaller classes and bigger staffs mean increased pressure upon children in order to conciliate modern Mahatmas. 2. If little children who are obviously better at play were turned away from primary schools, they would row to happier, more intelligent, and more useful lives. 3. (a) The pu.-pose of raising the school age is to improve the physique of tie nation; (bl the physique of the nation has not been improved; (c) therefore our present educational system is a failure. I am only a " modern Mahatma " —in other words, a schoolmaster your exposition of modern pedagogies has filled me with astonishment. Mahatma. Northern Club, Auckland.

—The able leader under this heading should be read by every citizen, and half a dozen times by every educationalist in this "Dominion ; arid the Herald i 6 to be congratulated upon its courage in view of the fact that our education system is a blindly worshipped fetish which it is almost sacrilege to discuss. In the public mind education seems to be the one good thing that cannot possibly be overdone, and it is as dangerous even to criticise it as it would be to doubt Papal infallibility. Numerous commissions consisting of professional educationalists have been set up, and they have discovered fresh ways and means of pouring out more money ; out what we want is a commission composed of employers who should endeavour to ascertain whether we are geting value for our money. Education is no good if it does not put the individual in a better position to earn a good living; but I wonder how many employers are prepared to say that the young men of today are more capable or industrious than were those of 20 years ago.

The general opinion is that boys and girls are too old and too swollen-headed when they leave school to tackle work capably and seriously. This over-educa-tion is not onlv a tremendous burden on the State, but there are thousands of boys and girls to-day wasting their time at school and living on their parents when they should be at work and contributing something to the home. Every child should be entitled to a thorough grounding in reading, writing, and simp'o arithmetic at the State expense, and this should be compulsory. If his parents ?o desire he should pa»« the sixth standard, but if he wauls more than this let him pay far it or else win a scholarship. This promiscuous showering <>f free places at secondary schools i? nil nonsense, and is education run mad. It merely remits in the turning out of hordes of young men who ought to have been working for their living years ago. Inn who are filled with the idea that they have learnt everything worth knowing ami are quite capable of running the entire business of the Dominion. They go about in knickerbockers and spectacles, and shave clean to make themselves look young: their judgment of picture shows and cigarettes is incontestable, but they could not add a column of figures right in ten tries or write their names so that anyone else could read them, though doubtless their knowledge of Kuclid is \ ery good. Hut where is it going to stop? Are they going on till a man must be a Master of Arts before he is a lumper or a Bachelor <if Science before he is allowed to practise as a plumber'.' Or shall we do away with trade altogether and turn the place into one big university '! It would be much more dignified, and money is no object apparently. If our schools do not better fit their pupils for fighting the battle of life, gigantic sums of money are being wasted in this community today, and i! we go on as we are going the time will ccme when we shall have to make way for some other nation which dissipates less of its resources on so-called " education" and pays more attention to the serious business of life. H. E. Vaijle. Queen Street.