TALES OUT OF SCHOOL.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LV, Issue 16895, 6 July 1918, Page 1 (Supplement)

TALES OUT OF SCHOOL.

BY EDITH HOWES.

THAT TROUBLESOME TEACHER No. I.

Never in all his extremely honourable career had James Macpherson Shaw been so bothered, so unceasingly annoyed, as he had been since the new mistress of the infants had been appointed. For twenty years he had been secretary of tho South Valley School Committee, and for those twenty yearn he had ruled the school, ruled the master, ruled tho committee, ruled the chairman. He had watched tho school grow from less than a hundred pupils to well over five hundred; he had dealt stringently with janitors and with coals, and had successfully combated all new-fangled nonsense and teachers' fads. The school was his. Every item of its history was his boast; its carefully tied-up records were a cherished collection.

But by the new mistress he was defied. She was small; she appeared outwardly harmless; yet ever since her appointment she had been a thorn in the flesh, a gnat, a mosquito buzzing in the dark, anything and everything that expressed insignificance combined with a power to worry and sting. A creature of this type, seemingly obsessed by an insane desire for innovations, was inexplicable and perfectly intolerable to a self-respecting secretary of twenty years' standing. Here was his school, large, wide-fronted, substantial, set in a well-gravelled, strongly - fenced playground, with every offending tree cut down, and nothing breakable nor weakly ornamental anywhere. What more could one possibly want for a school? Yet she was never content.

First, there had been that matter of the windows. None of the windows of the South Valley School opened at the bottom; each lower sash was set rigidly in without cords and weights, and was carefully frosted over so that no child should ever bo disturbed in its work by a contemplation of the world without. This new mistress had begged for open windows, talking some silly twaddle about poison and fresh air, and scorning his horror of draughts, and even boldly affirming that she wanted the children to look out at the sky and the trees and the birds. "The place is a prison," she said. Yes, she said that of the South Valley School! The secretary, remembering her words, crimsoned with indignation, us he sat in his cane-bottomed chair in front of his writing-table. Well, when her request for. cords and weights was refused sho had borrowed a spade and had levered the windows open herself; and now the babies worked in the 6unshino and inflow of tho winds, and were even to be seen at times sitting in twos and threes on the window-sills, obviously drawing a distant tree or the swing o* a telegraph-pole—an annoying sight to anybody with proper ideas of what a school should be, and, most of all,. to James Macpherson Shaw. Then there was the garden episode. She had talked about nature study and outside occupation for the children ; had even spoken of beautifying their surroundings, had described the playground as hideously, bare. What had this talk of "beauty" to do with the ABC and multiplication tables?

Of courßß, he Lad refused the application, had told her plainly that the whole thing was folly and would never be even considered by the committee. Then she had written a letter to the committee, and the fool master had backed it up by another; and to his amazement, and in spito of his forcibly-expressed condemnation, the committee had risen against him. James Macpherson Shaw, and had granted the gardens. So now there were rows of little plots, already red and yellow with -flowers, and thero were even rambler rosea beginning to climb up the picket fence. And though, strangely enough, the youngsters didn t trample on the flowers nor pull them up as he had prophesied, yet they wasted hours out thero, weeding and planting and watching things grow. And now this troublesome teacher had surpassed even heiself. She had come to him talking about "freedom of movement," "self-education," " Montessori principles," and ho knew not what else, and had finished up with a demand for tables and chairs for the infants! "Every child should have its own little chair," she said, while he gazed at her in speechless horror. "It should be strong and light, so that ho can carry it out into the fresh air for lessons, or hang it on the wall when a clear floor is needed for games. Wo have no right to herd the children on those dreadful benches, the clean with the unclean. We have no right to keep them cramped for long hours behind those wicked desks. They need movement."

No right! No right to do what one would with children! The girl was mad. No use to argue with her! Yet he threw one contemptuous query at her: " What would become of the ' dreadful' benches and 'wicked' desks?" The girl laughed lightly. "They are old and cumbrous and filthy with the dirt of years," she replied. "They would make excellent firewood."

Waste and levity! The secretary felt that he had let her off easily when he had simply declared the project absurd and dismissed her with a curt "Goodday!"

But she had not accepted hjs fiat. She had defied him in this as in other disputes. With an unbearable lack of respect, with no regard whatever for hi.-! position and his prestige, she had carried her petition past him to the board; she had talked at fatuous length to inspectors, she had oven submitted plan-drawings of tables and chairs to the architect, She was fighting for the children," she was reported to have said— if he were an ogre, he who bad worked all these years for the South Valley School. He crimsoned again, and a moisture of selfpitv clouded his eyes. He would be even with her. The opportunity had come. The board had referred her back to tho committee; her petition must come through them. And here it lay before him, a carefully-written letter detailing at length the " needs" of the infants, and enclosing the plan-drawings an (Win estimate of cost from a local woodware factory. That petition should never gc before the board, nor even before the "committee! Carefully, and with extreme caution, the secretary lost the letter with its enclosure far down amongst the bundle of school records that filled a chest beside his table.

Three months passed peacefully; then that troubleeomo teacher was at it again. The petition bad never reached the board. Where was it?

The committee had never seen it; tho secretary disclaimed all knowledge of it. Yet she insisted that it bad been written and sent; was reproachful; even hinted at underhand work somewhere; finally wrote the letter all over again, drew fresh plans, possessed herself of another estimate from tho woodware factory. He dared not lose the second letter. It went before the committee, before the board, There was much talk, much delay, but ultimately the chairs and tables were granted, made, and despatched' to the South Valley School.

A year later the secretary led a party of visitors to see his school. In the town reserve across the road groups and rings of infants were occupied, some sitting on little wooden chairs under the trees, reading aloud in turn, or listening to a story, or repeating the multiplication tables; others had left their chairs and were playing round games or running races on the" sunny grass. In the infant-rooms only two classes were leftone drawing on wall blackboards, the other doing colour work at little tables.

" Yes," said the secretary, in answer to the admiring comments of the visitors; "yes, we work on up-to-date principles here, you see. Plenty of movement for the children and open-air %vork. Every class gets its turn outside. I reckon we have one of the best infant schools in New Zealand, though I say it. I have been secretary here for twenty-one years, and 1 am proud of what we have done,"