AN OPEN-AIR SCHOOL.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LIX, Issue 18016, 15 February 1922, Page 9

AN OPEN-AIR SCHOOL.

VISIT TO CORNWALL PARK.

PERFECT VENTILATION.

OTTK DEBT TO YOUTH. "And what is that awful old building ■aed for?' 1 asks the stranger. "That," replies the Aucklander, who ■feels that he is rather stretching his joyalty to his town, "is one of our city gchoo's. Old as you see, but it has turned out some great men. Of course it is quite out of date, but it will be rebuilt when we can get a little money together. You must remember our youth-" •Ah !" says the stranger. "But what a disreputable place for the children of a young country to be taught in." "You had a president who went from a log cabin to White House, you know," returns the Aucklander. "Yes! Yes!' says the stranger, "but rjemus oiteu disregards environment. I once saw a glorious anemone growing in coal slack. ' Both philosophise in silence for a time. The conveyance sweeps on into a new part of the city until another buildiug of size comeg into view. Substantially bin t of brick nnd plaster, it has an imuier.se expanse of windows which are open, a:.d it seems to fit the climate to perio.Uon. It is one of the new open air schools, but the Aucklander does not know. His only excuse is that so far schools are rare.

Dawn of a New Age. Bit net for long will such schools be rare. A new age has dawned for the children. Because of the money involved, there will be a tendency fur the oldfashioned type of school which in some cases is as unhygienic as it could possibly be, to continue in use, but the more of the modern type of buildings there are, the louder will be the cry to '"scrap" them. 'The modern business man ''scraps'' plant a»s soon as it is out of date, ap.d the day is coming when the same policy will apply in education. If it is economically sound in business, so s;so is it in education. We cannot afford to impair the greatest asset the country has—the rising generations. To go to ono of the old-fashioned schools, particularly in the congested RJ-ea s of the city, is to feel that the country is not 'playing fair" with the children; to inspect one of the new schools, overcrowded though it be, is to feel inspiration. The new type not only is essential in the interests of health—it is necessary to permit the development of the new idea m education which aims at making men and women as well as teaching them the three R's.; which has exploded the old notion that a class is just so many wax figures in rows, and realises that- it is a little community of individuals varying as much ag a community of adults. Conditions at Cornwall Park School.

Such a school is that at Cornwall Park, which was opened at tho beginning of last year. Anyone with memories of gloomy, draughty classrooms might well envy tie children attending the school, even though it accommodates nearly 100 more children than it should on the 12 square feet standard. Disregarding humanity's natural tendency to slothfuiness, one has difficulty in imagining that any of those feet go "creeping slow to school" even if they do go "storming

out to play." The most astonishing piece of information one hears from that enthusiastic headmaster. Mr. W. Birss, is that no over-crowding is possible in this building as far as ventilation is concerned. Mr. Dirss has inspected schools of every type in many parts of the world, and he is quite convinced there is no better type than that now bang designed by Mr. J. Farrell for the .Auckland. Education Board. These classrooms could be fiHeo with adults, but the air would still bo as fresh as the surrounding atmosphere. The school with its roll of 296 has nearly 100 children too many, but there is no complaint about the rooms being "stuffy." The complaint is about lack of floor space. Probably the teachers,, who in consequence, are teaching np to 70 pupils, would add that such classes are too large for the teacher to give all the individual attention they would like to give, as unquestionably is the case. The building, a handsome structure of brick and plaster, and, last but by no means least, glass, i s complete m itself, but is designed to be trebled. The front elevation faces the north, the one wing it at present possesses being on the west side. A wide right-angled corridor runs through the structure. It is not the dark cavernous corridor many people know, but a bright airy place, for the walls above the plastered and greentinted dado are one mass of glass windows which may be 6wung open. Through these walls and the wide open windows on the weather side one can see suburbia. Instructing the Infants. The babies, some 80 who hare just come to school, occupy a room facing west. So full is it that the teachers have little enough space in which to move. These wee folk sit two at a desk and sometimes three, and a glorious time they are having with plasticine. There is more method about this occupation than the onitiated would imagine, for it certainly ig a fact that in the plasticine basket little Bobby has made, there are nine little plasticine eggs and not eight. Bobby knows, for ho counted. Ihus Bobby has his first lesson in calculation. It is a hot day but not a face is flushed nor an eye sleepy. How could they? For the great windows in their steel frames along the weather side have been folded up and the fresh breezes of heaven play about the room. But there is no insidious draught, for the dado rises a little over four feet to the window ledge. Above these folding windows are others hung od the central pivot plan. These may be swung open in the fiercest storm if necessary. One feels happy about these little people of to-morrow. And so the conditions are in all the other rooTis, though not all are quite fo crowded. On the sunny side it is necessary to have blinds to control the flare, It is observed that all the lighting cornea from the one side. The looms in every respect are most pleasant. The plastered walls are tinted in harmonious shades, the doors, the only wood work above the floors, being coloured to match. Ti.jro are no black boards on easels, a strip \ of black in the plaster itself serving this purpose. As in the corridors there are plenty of flowers and pot plants, and on the ceiling one sees the points of the compass.

Fine Lesson In Self-help. On the walls of the corridors are frames containing pictures illustrating events of history—pictures, by the way which do not look like school property. These frames are so made as to make it easy for changes to b t . made to suit other periods and other lessons. There is a miner's safety lamp and other odds and ends, and huge home-made maps and a series of pictures from illustrated papers, etc.. illustrating many things, from the timber industry to the life of Dickens. In the headmaster's room is a thing that tells the time, the hours being indicated by military buttons of the Empire and beyond. On leaving one sees a vigorous band of boys digging garden plotg and girls tending flowers. No teacher stands guard over them. Others are weeding another place because the committee is " hard up." A fine lesson in self-help. The same children last year undertook to clean the school for 14 weeks when there was difficulty in getting a cleaner. For it they received one pound a week, which was expended in cricket material and basket halls. The fine playing ground was levelled by the teachers and the boys themselves. Behind the school risen One Tree Hill, where theso fortunate children have many a lesson.