Correspondence.

Otago Witness, Issue 1585, 8 April 1882, Page 14

Correspondence.

OUR NATIONAL SCHEME OF EDUCATION. TO THE EDITOR.

Sir,— Let us now look at the course of instruction In public schools. The list of subjects prescribed by the Act is a vory fair one indeed ; but unfortunately the same cannot be said of the standards issued by the department, which determine the amount of knowledge required. It is evident that the individual who drew iup the standards must have, been either a remarkably clever boy, or else he must have known little of the ordinary mental capacity of children. By these standards an amount of knowledge is required ofj young children which only an unpractical enthusiast could expect to get. In addition to the four R's we have geography, history, science, drawing, object lessons, vocal music ; and < for girls, needlework and domestic economy additional. Truly this Bhould produce a race wise in its own generation. But whether it will produce a race of practical men and women is very problematical. No .man, the father of a family of boys and girls, or > who has had anything to do with teaching children, would attempt to force upon a community such a system of cram. Ask any conscientious teacher who cares more for the real welfare of his pupils than the percentage of passes he can make, it he is able to teach what tho standards require him to teach. No ; I say most emphatically, no; It is possible to cram a list of facts into a child's memory in such a manner that he may pass well with the inspector, but it ia utterly impossible to educate the child— to place it in a position to go forth unaided into the broad fields of knowledge. But cramming for examination is a dangerous experiment, and one which often fails hopelessly. There ia nothing for the teacher from the beginning of the year till its bitter end, but cram, cram, till his own brain is thrown'into confusion and that of each child into a state of inquietude, dangerous in tho last degree to the future of that child. I havo it on the authority of'a doctor in lar>:e practice in Duoedin, that it is deplorable to contemplate the mental and phytii.cal wreck our system of cram is making of vast numbers of growing boys and girls in the city, and I believe every physician in Dunedin could testify to the samo thing. Nay, further, brain fever and resulting death has been traced to school cram. Oould the In-spector-General have witnessed onepoor child, 10 years of age repeating in delirium the lessons she had learned to pass the fourth standard, his heart might be softened, and he would be more inclined to consider the modifications of the standards teachers havo asked ' for. But is Dunedin tho only place whero children's health is injured by cramming ? I fear not. Tho same cry comes from Wellington and Auckland. AH over our fair islaod the rising generation -our future hope— is being imbeciled by the presumptuous hobby of one man. . Mr Editor, as parents who love our children, we cry out to you and your fellow labourers in the causo of right to assist us by the mighty power of your pen. On behalf of the young just entering ' manhood and womanhood with shattered nerves' and impaired bodies, we implore all right-thinking men and women to protest against this abominable system. Our standards are much higher ■than those of England ; but then Colonial youth is precocious. However, the mushroom growtn of our lads 'and lasses makes 'a greater demand upon their systems, and calls for a lower standard than the English. Instead of the present system producing a generation of men and women with well-informea and well-balanced minds, it ia more likely to produce a parrot-like form of pedantrj'. '

The work of the first and second standards is com. paratively easy, but when the third ia reached .real work, is begun. , On glancing over last year's report iby the Otago inspectors, nine, seems to be about the average age of those who passed the first standard. Having passed the first, each child is supposed to pass one standard yearly. This brings them to the third standard at about .eleven, though many of them will reach it before they are nine. Children of ten or eleven years can fairly overtake the work of the third standard. Up to this point the work is gradual, but between the third and fourth standards there is a great gap. Suddenly the child has to do twice as much work in one year, in proportion to what it had from one of the lower standards to another. The slightest knowledge of phyuiology on the part of the man who drew up the standards should show him his fatal error. At twelve or thirteen boys and girls reach the most trying standard of the whole school course ; while at the same time the rapid development of their systems makes greater demands upon brain and heart. Viewed in the light of medical science, children at this age should have ail mental work considerably lpesened. But, instead of this, the work is suddenly doubled. One reason why the fourth standard is made so difficult is because it meets the requirements of the compulsory clauses. That seemed tc- bo the only reason, and a beggarly one I should say. Why not make the fifth the gauge? The compulsory subjects for examination are by far too numerous, or at least by far too extensive. History could he well relegated to clause 9 of the Bogulations of the Department, requirinir the teacher to show that the subject is being taught, satisfactorily. But in the meantime history is one of the heaviest subjects the teacher haa to deal with. In tbe third standard an outline of the whole period of English history is demanded. No rmn could hope to teach it. The most that can be done is to cram up 20 or 30 events, and trust to God that the inspector will ask questions within that list. The s.s llabus prescribes the periods of English hiatory in chronological order, with a few of the more important events in each period, but (it mußt have t>eon an oversight) it says not who ia to choose the events, the teacher or the inspector. The indefiniteness here, which elsewhere characterises the syllabus, compels the teacher to cram up a full outline of English history. A far more successful way would be to allow the teacher to arrange a syllabus of 20 or 30 events, and teach those thoroughly. The inspector could then examine from that syllabus. But better still would be a text-book issued by the Central Board, with exactly what had to be taught, if history has to be compulsory. I think it should not be, consequently the teacher's syllabus would be best.

The teaching 01 mscory mayor may not be im tottant, and the outline required in the third standard, if only better defined, is a good start ; but in the fourth and fifth a marked difference is made. Clearly, the ma.n who planned the course of instruction in history had fresh in his memory his student's days at college, where the degree subjects are taken in sections. This may be all very well for young men, but it scarcely suits children. In the fourth standard a pretty complete knowledge of the Norman and Plantagonet periods is taught ; then in the fifth, the Tudor and Stuart. The sixth have an outline like that of the third, only, of course, it should be fuller. The history taught to the fourth and fifth standards is almost so much wasted time. Children have such a capacity for forgetting, that ere the fifth standard is passed, the fourth's history is forgotten. Had the Jn-spector-gcneral been a practical educationist he would ,have known that. A more successful way of teaching history would be to start with a skeleton outline, and build upon that outline in each succeeding standard by multiplying the number of events. The same jrauiarks might bo applied to geography, which has the same fault as history, being given in sections instead of building upon the outline given in the second standard ; and before these two subjects can be successfully taught, they must bo arranged as indicated.— I am, &c,

T. A. J. Deconde.

April sth.

There is a man who has lived for some years in Stroud Workhouse, and evidently liked it. At the beginning of last yoar he had a legacy left him of £1000, whereupon he was forced to quit his abode, but remarked that " he did not care how soon he was penniless again, us they would be bound to receive him back." In ten months he had run through his money, and on Christmas Day ate his dinner in the workhouse. There is no accounting for taste.

The latest'^ bit of New York gossip concerning millionaires is (says the Chicago Weekly Tribune) that young Mr Astor, who ran for Congress and failed to receive the Irish voteaf ter having danced at a ball with a cigar factory girl named Lizzie Lynch, owes his defeat to tho money and exertions of Vanderbilt, this being the latter's method of revenging himsolf for the non-admittance of the Vanderbilt family to the social circles in which the Astors move. As the original Astor traded sixbladed jack-knives to the Indians for furs, and the original Vanderbilt sculled people acroos the East River for 25 cents, the claims of both families to a place among the aristocracy of this country seem to be equally slim.