ROBERT RAIKES.

Otago Daily Times, Issue 21144, 30 September 1930, Page 10

ROBERT RAIKES.

THE MOVEMENT FOR POPULAR EDUCATION. THE INSPIRING MOTIVE. This is the second of a series of articles supplied by the New Zealand Council of Religious Education to commemorate the work of Robert Raikes, the founder in 1780, of the modern Sunday, school, ’ 11. In the last article we read of the wonderful change that has been wrought in *s®. general life of society since the day of Robert Raikes. We learnt something of the terrible condition of the poor in Ins time, the illiteracy of the people, and the harsh administration of the law in order to keep the people in bounds. Wo r^ ad ßi. too *, ■ % indifferent interest of the Church in the welfare of the masses. We saw Robert Raikes, the dandy, laying the foundation of the modern Sunday school and the modern system of free education. SOLVING THE SOCIAL PROBLEM. •?i. ra ?i Ua^y an 4 trough constant contact with the pressing need of the problem there was forced on his soul the conviction that, the reform of society was lone a ? d that he—failing others—must take the lead so far as his own country was concerned. There is no evidence to show that this conviction came to him as a sudden inspiration. On the contrary he was a benevolent and altruistic-minded affairs feeling his way along the hitherto unexplored road of applied Chrisa ** soda! gospel ” was slowly forged on the anvil of his experience. He tJo«gt-through. And this is what he Vice Is preventable; Idleness Is the parent ot vice; Ignorance Is the cause of Idleness: _ wb «i there was practically no middle class, the upper classes treated the masses as inferior beings of a lower order than themselves. This explains why the starving prisoners in the gaol at Gloucester and other places and the quarrelsome children in the alleys were left severely alone. They were regarded Is W^ C 6 f a 7u ev,ls of tbe ‘‘me, to be tmn of ?te c u by VT* r TO us appHcation of the law. Raikes, feeling his way towards a solution of this pressing social ?r£n ( f m ’ , dlsaß r eed entirely with his friends and contemporaries. They stoutly laintamed that the masses, inarticulate and uneducated, were incapable of improvement. By his constant visits to the prisons Raikes was enabled lo carry his experiments one stage further. With his conviction that "vice was the result of idleness caused by ignorance,” he sought Pnoi d r- te prisoners in the Gloucester Gaol. Gradually, however, it was borne ieform on fi h,m e ?° rts to teach and - t >e , adult mind were mostly a waste of labour. The mature mind of the adult was closed to the acquiring of know! lv, dgc ;.-,7 e th «n turned his attention.to the chiMren, and after much thought he V°„ rk : ad . ° ut hj? new solution for changing social conditions. He added a fourth tenet to his gospel. BEGINNING WITH THE CHILD. We quote his own words again. “To Rrowtb °t vice at an early ‘ • K°° d habits of acting rIA fe re B ardcd him as Tf ad ’ but . ivtle did they understand the deep meaning of his words, and their far?x c ri. ln / ™Ppriance and character. What mfimte pains he took to understand the delicate workings of children’s a i ß u “? olded under his care. Raikes had the discernment to discover rea! ability among the children of the poor and their capacity for education. He wrote: I cannot express the pleasure I rece ‘, ve m discovering genius and mnate good among this little multitude.” He upset the idea generally held that only children genteely born were capable of or worth educating. Great men such as Milton and Bacon had- passed over the possibilities of educating the masses. Close up experience also taught Raikes that the child mind could be best worked twdvo >rofit . veen the a ß es of six and OPPOSITION. i As soon as 'he commenced to educate, feed, and clothe poor little children numtkof °f- people °wn circle expressed their disapproval of his ideas. They said he was interfering with the "designs of Providence, and would in time set the tW, a u ?VG ® tati 2 n in life and make them discontented. So few shared his tha t it caused him to write, I walk alone. It seems as if I have discovered a new country, where no other adventurer chooses to follow." Outside of Gloucester and indeed throughout the whole country prejudices against teaching the children of the poor grew rapidly. At last this agitation became so strong that in Parliament. William Pitt seriously intended to make it a State question, He was prepared to introduce a Rill suppressing Sunday schools. The enemies of popular education coupled Sunday school teaching with open-air preaching and accordingly both should be abolished. At the beginning the Sunday school had to fill the double function of f a , nd , da V school, for large numbers ot the children during the rest of the week were working in factories. It is hard in these days to realise some of these tilings, but the above serves to show the greatness of the emancipation of childhood Even m later years the great Shaftesbury, the emancipator of children in their tender years from factories was himself doubtl ill of the wisdom of educating childhood m view of the possible upsetting of education 7 relatlonsbi P s through such INDUSTRIAL DAY SCHOOLS, Robert Raikes’s second great claim to distinction rests upon his advocacy of popular national education in -England. He established and spread, and advocated in his journal, industrial day schools for the poor, in which education was free.' He devoted subscriptions evenly between the Sunday and day schools. 1 . SCHOOL MONITORS. He also introduced the system of "monitors m schools before Lancaster or Beil was heard of. Lancaster visited Raikes, perhaps about the year 1796, and borrowed this excellent idea from the original thinker of Gloucester. Bell hit on the 1792 at Madras, but that was about 10 years after Raikes divided his school into small classes, putting the elder over the younger, EARLY TEACHERS’ METHODS. The first school was established in Sooty alley, Gloucester, under the guidance of Mrs Meredith. Mrs Meredith agreed to use her kitchen for a school, for which she was paid one shilling per week. The children did not learn much, but were taught to sit still. They also had to come with clean hands and faces. Nest Mrs Critchley, landlady of Trumpet Inn. proved a real helper to Raikes, by opening a school for him in Southgate street, and there, for some time, carried on. She proved very capable, with power to teach and discipline. The boys proved a rough lot* out the threat of telling “ Mr Reekes " was sufficient to quieten the worst offender. Iroiu Mrs Critchley's school boys were drafted to other schools in the city. The first task was to teach the children to r . e ad. l a ! ke l* beißß a P rill ter, printed A.B.C. books for beginners. Later he concentrated on teaching the three “R’s” giving a grounding that would prove worth while. In later years he had ample proof that many of his scholars had thrived on the training received, and were doing well in life. DISCIPLINE. At first punishment had to be severe in order to impress the ragged boys with the idea of respect of order. Many stories are told, but this one will suffice. One boy, who had to be severely caned was known as Winkin’ Jim,” Jim was the terror of the alley in which he lived. Other scholars seemed full of mischief, but Jim was the worst. He had a gift for it Nothing pleased him better than inventing a new way of upsetting the school and making old Mother Critchley wild.” One morning Jim slipped in late, and seemed anxious to avoid attention. Some of the boys saw that he was hiding something under his coat, and waited gleefully to see what would happen. At a moment when all was quiet Winkin’ Jim suddenly released a young badger among the scholars. The little animal darted wildly away from the boys and towards Mrs Critchley. The terrified woman jumped on her chair and screamed to the boys to “catch the varmint,” No one seemed anxious to obey and for a few minutes pandemonium reigned. Needless to say when Raikes arrived, on the scene. Winkin’ Jim and the cane made a very close acquaintance. With the spreading of thp schools and the training given, order was more easily obtained, and less severe methods of punishment could be adopted. Later on the girls of the town begged Raikes to open a school