EDUCATION BY TOYS

Te Awamutu Courier, Volume 68, Issue 5944, 17 May 1944, Page 7

EDUCATION BY TOYS

DRUDGERY ELIMINATED NEW ARITHMETIC IN INFANT SCHOOLS A new method of conveying an appreciation of numbers and forms to children of the primer classes by means of experience through games and toys has been approved by the Education Department. The system, which will shortly be in general use, has already been applied with success in a number of Wellington schools. Through it much of the drudgery an 1 monotony of learning tables has been eliminated through the preliminary stages.

The main aims of the programme in number at the infant school stage are ;o help children to sense the need and, falue of number in their everyday Ives and in the lives of those about them; to foster confidence and skill ;n the handling of practical situations involving number; to develop child-

yen’s early arithmetical ideas, including ideas of size, weight and quantity in an orderly fashion, and to lay a foundation in experience and understanding for the more formal work of the standard classes. In the words of an education authority, arithmetic has become “meaningful” rather than mechanical. A great deal of equipment is required such as clock faces to measure time, rulers to measure distances, scales to measure weight and quantities, egg cups, spoons,, ladles and milk bottles to measure liquids. There are also various types of wooden blocks and figures. Much of the apparatus is maue by teachers and’senior pupils. Education boards are now providing many of the education toys through the co-operation of manual training schools and technical schools, and through the workshops of the education boards. Games of’ the snakes and ladders and lotto variety are devised to facilitate counting in ones and in groups and in number recognition. These have replaced the old sums idea. The .children learn to identify figures with the units they represent by means of holes into which small lengths of dowelling can be inserted. Thus the figure eight has eight holes, and sc

on. Visual and manual work go into every lesson, and the progress of the infants in learning the principles of addition and subtraction, multiplication and division, has been remarkable.

Coloured cubes are pieced together or placed in series according to size, games of shop with counters give instruction in money values, the throwof rubber rings on pegs with different numbers facilitates rapid counting, and the fitting together of fretwork pieces teaches dexterity as well as instilling a sense of form. Children have also been found to recognise and react quickly to different times ir music.

Parents’ days provide an opportunity for inspection of the new methods. Indicative of the interest aroused in them is the fact that many donation? of goods have been received by the schools towards their shops, the shevles of which are always amply stocked.

A new booklet on numbers in the infant room is being prepared for use by teachers, and is included in the Education Department’s text books. Among the photographs are those showing children actually engaged in shopping, measuring and general purposeful activity with toys.