CHILD STUDY

Otago Daily Times, Issue 16120, 8 July 1914, Page 8

CHILD STUDY

ADDRESS BY DR ELIZABETH MACDONALD. At tho conclusion of (.lie business portion of the mooting of the Dumdin Presbyterian Sabbath School Association last evening a paper on "Tho Value of Child Study to tho Sunday School Teacher " was read by Dr Elizabeth H. B. Macdonald. Dr Macdonald prefaced her remarks by a reference to the tremendous scope of tho subject, and said that tho importance-of knowing the naturo of a child before attempting to teach it was obvious. The lecturer dwelt at some length on the differentposit ions occupied by the.Sunday school teacher and the State school teacher. Spiritual earnestness was of vital importance in the former, and there was a treedom from dogmatic pressure which enabled him to act on conviction when ho had studied the child he aspired to teach. Modern child,study was tho study of children by the methods of modern science. We got a clearer understanding of the value of education by a clear -understanding of a child's endowment at birth. The lecturer proceeded to refer to heredity, environment, and eugenics, and touched upon the necessity of the proper feeding of babies, and said that it was a fundamental truth th.it the child muet do its own growing. Whether physically or mentally or spiritually, it must do it all for itself. They all knew this, but they did not trust the child enough. They wanted, to pull him up, to make him grow, and they only injured his vital growing powers. This fundamental truth had been just rediscovered and acted upon for the first time fully and freely I>v Dr Maria Montoseori. Dr Macdonald went on to speak at length on Dr Montessori's schools at Rome,' at which the great principle of freedom for each child to do 'ts own growing was carried out. Continuing, she said that there was no tendency to unnatural noisiness until you had first artificially induced a condition of unnatural immobility, and proceeded to speak of the instinct of the child to learn and occupy itself in a variety of ways, remarking that what we learned naturally, of our own impulse, was a keen delight and satisfaction. Defective early feeding was deprecated by the speaker, and the food supplied in the days of infancy dwelt upon from a Scientific point of view. Tho concluding part of Dr Mac-donald's paper read as follows :■ —" So it comes to this at the, end: that tho teacher's part is to stand aside and watch the growth of the child under his care—to study the child, to lovo him, to get to know hkn from tho inside, to supply his urgent need, and to trust his growing powers. If this were done more conscientiously, more consistently, more wisely, perhaps v/e would not have the great problem of adolescence to face. Perhaps if we, loved moro and trusted more and repressed less, dogmatised, less, coerced Ices, our young people would have learned for themselves as they must learn every lesson for themselves, the lesson of solf-control in the widest sense, and would not need to throw aside so many artificial restraints when manhood and womanhood olaimed thorn. Perhaps with lose crippling and less propping up, with more trustful freedom of self-development, they would not lind themselves suddenly faced: with overwhelming problems—problems which some sink under without any attempt to solve thorn, and which others face manfully, fighting for their v-ery lives, lighting painfully and with tragic waste of precious nervous energy tho battle that should havo been .already fought and won many times with joy ami confidence. The real value of child-study to the Sunday school or any other teacher, or any mother or trainer of the young, is to give a new viewpoint, a new vital interest in the most vitally interesting of all subjects. If we believed:, really in our hearts believed, that by a more wise and loving study of tho young child, by the exercise of a little less dogmatic pressure on our own .parts and of more trust in the growing powers of tho child, we were actually making it possible for him to joyfully develoo his own best , power, to gloriously attain his own ultimate perfection, which of us would not set to our task with prayer and thankfulness? For surely one of the greatest problems of all in this world to tho tihinking man or woman is tone, problem of the undeveloped lives, the stunted, starved minds and souls, tho 'wasted, uniisiied talents, tho joyless emptiness of life to &o many human beings. I think the saddest remark of any to hear from tho lips of a human being- is a very common one ' There is nothing in life,' they say, and those who say so havo oftentimes started out with good endowment of body and mind, have had high horjes and great expectations in their youth, and often have attained what we call success. And others, struggling to attain tho same material good, in their blindness envy those empty lives. To find life hard, a, well-nigh heartbreaking struggle, a sordid tattle, with no certainty of victory at the end, is had enough. But to find life empty, dull, commonplace, joyless, is a far greater tragedy. It is the tragedy of a life without love, without that vital interest in life and nil its manifold manifestations tliafc only comes from love, without the seeing eye and tho hearing ear and tho understanding heart. And it is precisely this that wo must gain for our children if their lives axe to bo rich and full and satisfying—the aim of our training and education must -bo just this, —that they may have opened eyes and unsealed oars and" unlocked hearts, so thart life shall ocasc to centre, round a narrow undeveloped self and widen out to an infinity of love* and service. This, and , nothing less than this, must, bo the arm of the teacher who believes that the Master meant somcthms when Ho paid 'Be ye therefore perfect, even us your Father which is in Heaven is

perfoot." . At the conclusion of the paper Dr Macdonald was warmly complimented upon its contents, and a strong desire* mis exprcssw* that, it micht l>? printed in full for the benefit, of members" of the association.