The Stratford Evening Post WITH WHICH IS INCORPORATED THE EGMONT SETTLER. TUESDAY, OCTOBER 17, 1911. EDUCATIONAL.

Stratford Evening Post, Volume XXXI, Issue 53, 17 October 1911, Page 4

The Stratford Evening Post WITH WHICH IS INCORPORATED THE EGMONT SETTLER. TUESDAY, OCTOBER 17, 1911. EDUCATIONAL.

The “Lyttelton Times” takes a rather gloomy view of some of the work in our State schools, though probably not without cause. In its comment our contemporary says the Canteron ry Education Hoard acknowledged a very serious detect in the education system when it carried a motion urging the teachers to pay more attention than they appear to nave been doing to the subject of recitation. It was hardly necessary, perhaps, for some of the members to elaborate the indictment by the Board’s inspectors of the manner of reading and learning poetry in tlie schools. Slipshod pronunciation and worse grammar arc all too frequently apparent in the speech of the majority of children who attend the schools, and there is very urgent need of an earnest attempt to secure improvement in the way suggested by the inspectors. The spoken word unfortunately seems to possess little power of influence, and since few children are able to profit by the example set them in tiie speech of their teachers, more elaborate moans of strengthening their weaknesses must be employed. No better means than that approved by the Board can be found. The “Times” is inclined to think that the formal lessons in “grammar,” which are the terror of the average schoolboy, well might be superseded by more vigorous effort in'the learning of good English and the art of elocution. Of •nurse, as one member of the Board pointed out, there is a danger of overcrowding the syllabus, but wo believe that the peril could bo avoided by judicious pruning hero and there ;ud calreful arrangement, which would secure the results desired. Re-

citin*:, properly taught, is a- subject of the same type and one which the •\-ritcr hopes to see taking its proper plate before long in the programme of the primary schools.