A KNOUT FOR TEACHERS.

New Zealand Mail, 15 February 1900, Page 52

A KNOUT FOR TEACHERS.

AX INDICTMENT UF THE NEW REGULATIONS.

WEAKNESSES OF THE SYSTEM

(By a Lady Teacher.)

? The following is the title of a circular which is ■’ being among the teachers in thb" public schools Suggested New Regulations for Inspection and Examination of Schools. To come into rorce as from Ist January, 1900.” It is a highly interesting document, and to my mind would have been more appropriately named had it been t simply called "A Knout for Teachers.” For years the teachers have been groaning under the syllabus instituted, by the Government for the education of the children of the colony. Lately it was reported that new lines were to supplant the old arbitrary system of passing standards. and the teachers were glad. At last, they thought, we shall be able to teach, and cramming will be a thing of the past. Vain hope! Relieve me, the devil you know is better than'the devilyou don’t know. Instead of an improvement on the old system, the new is worse. Yes, v orse in every way. The torture of preparing children for the annual exam, is too well understood by teachers. The majority of the children are as a rule in a state of nervous apprehension for weeks previous to the inspection. Now, matters have been intensified. The teachers are to examine all their classes themselves, and the inspector is to go round afterwards and examine the classes again to see what progress the classes have made, and aiso see how the teachers have done the work which they themselves have been performing for years. Is it likely that the teachers and inspectors will always agree in matters regarding the fitness of pupils for higher classes? Most certainly not. Differences are bound to occur, and the unfortunate teachers will find themselves more stilted in their work and more subservient titan ever to those very officers who should be their best friends.

Inspectors are only human beings after all. They are not going to take more responsibility on tlieir shoulders than they car. help, and they will throw as much as possible' on the teachers. Teachers are merely " crammers ” under our present svs terns. and are simply “ buffers between the people and the Boards who appoint them. They are blamed for everything, and now they are going to have new responsibilities in addition to their accepted tortures.

It is quite enough,for teachers to prepate tlieir classes for the \ early inspection without having to examine and pass their classes as well. And after all this additional work is heaped on them, tnev are to then undergo a scrutiny by the inspectors and put up with all kinds of censure. In my opinion, the teachers ought in a body to sav. •• o e will teach according to the syllabus, overburdened as it already is: but the examinations shall not be conducted by us.”’ What is more, the parents have it in their hands to say that they do net intend to allow their children to undergo two examinations. for that is what it amounts to. Up to a certain age no child should be .permitted to sit for examination at all. The amount of vital energy that is lost at these inspection visits is never estimated. The teachers and children eacii lose as much energy during these visitations as would be expended by a dozen athletes training for a month. Why do not medical men step forward and put in a word for those who will be the future parents of New Zealand ? After the teacher has mastered what hs has to do while acting temporary inspector. and written out his lists and explanations and reasons why and wherefore, and examined the classes and undergone the inspector’s criticism, he will require a doctor for a month and six months’ leave. This interesting document also goes into how the requirements of the syllabus should be taught. First, the writer takes reading, and gives his views as to ,how it should be taught. Probably he.has never taught the subject; and if he has, in all probability he was not present at the inspection, and infers that the results were all right. Before long the Board will have to employ an AI elocutionist, who will have to be imported . Probably we shall see an advertisement in the paper as follows: WANTED, an Elocutionist to teach teachers. Salary JEI per week, with .second-class travelling expenses paid. None but an M.A. need apply. Also must be able to do -odd jobs about premises in case the carpenter, etc., are out on strike. If the people kept their ears open when they pass the schools at reading time they would’ really wonder how teachers preserve tlieir hearing as they do. Simultaneous reading is-what this dreadful din is called: and the poor children are expected: to be capable of feeling the simple humour or the simple pathos, and of understanding all that 'is being yelled and grated out of fifty or more larynxes. High treble and hideous bass voices are following a teacher, who dictates as dramatically as the poor thing , can. Spelling, writing and drawing are all taken in this same wholesale way. They even go as far as saying that drawing is useful in cooking. Now, with regard to these subjects, it does not seem to matter what the brain capacity of the pupil is. They are all to be perfect at everything on the syllabus; and if they ail do not come up to the mark of per-

fection, the teacher will be branded as, incompetent. Children, unfortunately, are not all on the same intellectual level, and cannot be driven like a flock of sheep. There are hundreds of practical people who have never had a single lesson in drawing; and are they one whit the worse for it? Here and there we may find someone who feels the world has lost a Millais or a Rubens by his not being taught drawing, at the Wellington Technical School; but still we are oblivious of the loss.

The paragraph on grammar is just as funny. The inspector is to employ tests or exercises, and everything is to be straightforward and unambiguous on the part of the inspector; thereby implying that the immaculate inspector can be or has been ambiguous at times. How clever it- all looks on paper, and no doubt the genius who drew up the-plans is intoxicated at its perfection; but those who write theoretically should put theory into practice and see how it answers. The elementary science prescribed is to be understood as denoting ‘‘ such a knowledge of conspicuous natural phenomena as constitutes a general basis of the particular knowledge of separate sciences.” If the children could only see the above quotation, they would simply bulge with fear and consternation. Blit what is meant is explained. A child is t-o know why a whale is not a fish and why a spider is not an insect. It is particularly necessary that a teacher should know what “ohms, volts, atomic weight, and the vascular system” are. though the knowledge is cut of the reach of the ordinary primary school pupil. Why, it is enough to upset one’s vascular system to think what a teacher has to go through.

The privileges the inspector is to take upon himself are unlimited, and it- is to be understood “that he is not to be looked upon as a severe and frowning critic, bent on proving their ignorance and finding opportunity to put them to shame, but as one who comes as a courteous and gentle friend who will use his best skill to put them, at their ease.” How well it all sounds! But the realisation is quite another thing. Still, there is one consolation which teachers can ling to their hearts, and that is, if they get kicked out for incompetency, there are others who are also incompetent behind the scenes. Also, that it is better to get kicked out or reduced in salary or position, while there is time to look about for something else, than to endure condemnation in old age after they have given their best years in the service of educating their fellow-creatures.