THE EDUCATIONAL OUTLOOK.

New Zealand Mail, Issue 1510, 7 February 1901, Page 56

THE EDUCATIONAL OUTLOOK.

(“N.Z. Times,” January 31.)

The meeting of representative teachers in this town, which took place a few days ago, has given place to a conference of the inspectors of the public schools. It is six or seven years since a similar conference was held, and in the interval many changes have taken place 1 in the educational world, as it is known in tins country. The present Agent-General, Mr Reeves, was then Minister of Education and the late Rev W. J. Habeas occupied the position of Inspector-Gene-ral of Schools. Previous to the first conference many complaints had been urged against the plan of education known as standards. Objection was made that there was no liberty given te teachers in the carrying out of their work; that they were little more than machines, and that tha children werd crammed with useless information without the semblance of true education or preparation for the duties of life. The conference that was held made recommendations 1 o the Minister with a view to the granting of more liberty to teachers; and by regulations that were subsequently issued teachers were allow del to pass their pupils in Standards I. and 11., the inspectors being left to examine the lower or preparatory classds and the pupils above Standard 11. Although this was a concession of some importance, it was not such as met with the approval of the teachers; and we find that at the late meeting of the New Zealand Educational Institute the question of further concessions was discussed and certain recommendations were approved and ordered to be sent to the Minister of Education. Among those recommendations were the following : - 1. That in view of the probable introduction into the syllabus of such neiw subjects as manual instruction there is need of a revision of the syllabus. 2. That the Minister of Education be asked to admit representatives cf the New Zealand Educational Institute to any conference held to consider the syllabus. " 3. That in compiling a new syllabus, these general principles should be kept in mind: (a) That a wide choice of work in such subjects as geography, grammar, history, science, drawing and the like should be allowed, so that within certain limits each teacher might lay out his own syllabus for the yeiar’s work; (b) That the privilege of grouping standard classes for certain subjects should be retained and extended. 4. That the retention of the annual pass examination and the issue cf standard certificates tend to prevent that freedom of classification which is the aim and object of the new regulations. According to the paper that was issued to the inspectors by the Minister of Education, “The Syllabus” is set down as one of the subjects for discussion, and is placed first in order of importance among the list of suggestions which the inspectors are invited to consider. We believe that an invitation has been sent to the representatives of the Teachers’ Institute, and that several of them werd present at least during a portion of the time that the conference was in session discussing the syllabus. It is greatly to be regretted, in the interests of education, that the press representatives and the public generally are not admitted to hear the discussion on a question that is of high importance to our soeial, moral and commercial being. The claims put forward by the teachers show the tendency tc. make 1 our system of public instruction more adaptive to the circumstances of the country; and everyone who studies tne question must recognise that an adaptive scheme of education is one that calls for the special consideration and recommendation of the inspectorate. As educational experts, they ought to be! able to formulate some scheme in the direction suggested by the teachers, so that it might not be necessary for all schools and all pupils to- leiarn the same subjects in order to gain promotion. Tastes differ, and the needs of districts are unlike;, and with the exception cf subjects such, for example, as reading, arithmetic and perhaps writing, which are the three highways to all other acquisitions, thdre need not be two schools where the same standards prepare identically the same subjects. This, in a general way, is the claim which, we understand, the officers of the Teachers’ Institute! have put forward on behalf of the teachers in the public schools of the colony. The claims are reasonable, and there should be very excellent reasons given by the inspectors to convince the public that such claims ought not to be conceded. The “Syllabus” is, however, only one

of the important questions upon which tho inspectors are invited to deliberate’. Scholarship and pupil teachers’ regulations, teachers’ certificates, advanced instruction in the primary schools and district high schools, handiwork in primary schools, school attendance, and the examination of private schools, are among the questions that come up for consideration. They are all of great importance in connection with the future education, of the country, and we trust that they will be dealt with in a manner that will mark the year 1901 as the beginning of better things in matters educational. Hitherto we have been too much in the habit of following the lean of other countries, and it must be confessed that the results have not always been satisfactory. Our needs differ in many ways from the needs of people in other countries, and the education of the children should partake of a bias along the line of their future requirements. All friends of education will watch the proceedings of the conference with interest; and if one of the results is the abolition of some of the difficulties under which the teachers and children appear now to labour, a good start will have been made towards the realisation of that system of eiduca--tion under which pupils may proceed, if they wish to do so, from the lowest to the highest educational institutions iu the country. The. more the facilities wo provide, the better will the people become ; and there need be no fear that the country will look askance at any recommendations which the inspectors may see fit to make which aim at improving the educational conditions at present existing, particularly along the lines suggested by the teachers in the matter of a free syllabus, which may be interpreted as “Adaptive Education.”