WHERE IS EDUCATION AIMING?

Timaru Herald, Volume CXXV, Issue 18554, 29 April 1930, Page 13

WHERE IS EDUCATION AIMING?

TEACHING ART OF LIVING AND USES OF LEISURE. People are naturally much exercised by the problem of finding five or six million pounds to raise the minimum school-leaving age by one year (writes Guy Kendall, headmaster of University College School, Hampstead, London). They have not paid much attention to the far more important question whether, if the millions can be found, they will be profitably spent. Money spent on good education is worth a great sacrifice. Spent on bad education it is worse than money thrown away.

Since the publication of the Hadow Report the cry has been “secondary education for all.” That means that primary or elementary education, as such, will cease at about the age of 11, after which time four years at least will be devoted to some s.ort of training which is vaguely called “secondary.” A short while ago an inspector told me that he was busy with the problem of organising “the teaching of French in the new schools.” The remark seemed ominous. Hitherto one of the conventional hallmarks of the secondary school has been the teaching of at least one foreign language. The inspector riiade me shudder. One knows only too well the vain struggles of so many boys and girls throughout the country to master even the elements of French. It is the subtlest accomplishment, needing a real gift for language to acquire at all competently, even when taught by a “live” method. Three-fold Object. I say this by way of illustration only. Much the same might be said of algebra or physics. It is to be hoped that the authorities will not be so foolish as to thrust any such conventional accomplishment on all, or even many, of these hapless children. But, if we are to avoid the fallacies of a purely academic education for all, we must pause to think what is the meaning of education as a whole, and its chief objects in particular. Here I must dogmatise freely and say that to be educated is to learn the art of living, and that its objects are three-fold, those of learning, how to become a bread-winner, how to become a good and healthy citizen, and how to make the best use of leisure. These objects are by no means distinct. Many educational activities are found to be directed to all three at once. First then, can the lengthening of the school years do much to increase the economic value of our young population? Here we are on dangerous ground, for if this object is much stressed, there will be an outcry (not wholly without due cause) that we are trying to exploit the masses in the interest of the few. After all, these pupils are the majority of the young generation. They must get a living, but they must also have a due share of that “only true wealth,” which is life. Since, however, the “living” necessarily comes first, how can we help them in school to be efficient bread-winners? The Barber’s Economies. It is commonly said that the average factory workers—and these form a very large proportion of the total population—can learn his monotonous and mechanical job in the course of a single day—perhaps even an hour. How far it is worth his while to understand the process in which he is but one tiny cog it is difficult to say. Perhaps knowledge of what he is doing, and why, is, for psychological reasons, worth while even for the promotion of efficiency. Some think so. Again, it is commonly agreed that we must avoid at all costs turning out an army of unwanted clerks—the destination of so much of our “secondary” system. Can we then do anything to make the agricultural labourer more efficient and more alive? Perhaps so, especially as agriculture becomes more and more scientific. Country folk possess a good deal of traditional and empirical love which has its value. But scientific knowledge is always better than rule of thumb.

Next comes “good citizenship.” Here we are in clearer regions. It was always assumed by the pioneers of electoral democracy that the voter must be educated. What proportion even of the most highly cultured at the present time can form a well-founded judgment on the economics of the coal industry or the problems of Indian government? I had my hair cut the other day by a man who repeated to me, parrot-like, edter the manner of a memorised lesson, the arguments of Empire Frep Trade, which he had learned from a newspaper. I am not concerned to say whether they were good or bad arguments, but, as an eminent authority once said of teachers in training, “It is as though they took a cold bath and failed to react to it.” As to the moral and civic discipline of school life—l say nothing about religious instruction for obvious reasons, except that it simply cannot be ignored—the newer schools are so quickly assimilating all that is good in the “public school tradition” that I need not enlarge on the importance of extending its benefits. So far I have failed to give much definite advice. I have only hinted at difficulties and dangers. But on the third point I have much more decided views. To teach the right use of leisure is not only all-important at the present time; it is comparatively easy. It is all-important because it determines so much of our production—think of the vast extent of our amusement trades, the cinema above all, to say nothing of drink and tobacco—and because I maintain the paradox : that educated leisure is much cheaper j than uneducated. It tends, therefore, to reduce the economic standard of j life while it raises the moral standard. ' How much pleasure and relaxation do the educated enjoy merely by conversation and discussion with the educated? And it costs nothing at all. Moreover, it is easy, because there is no healthy activity in the world, I mental or physical, which cannot be- ' come a good hobby. Mathematics can become so no less than wireless, and dancing and golf, and football (when played and not merely “watched”). Still more can science, and above all, literature and every kind of art and craft; and, in any case, good physical training is simply vital to the race. Academic Shibboleths. ! Such are the problems that await our newest schools. Whether then can solve them depends on how far they can set themselves free from academic shibboleths and develop new lines of their own. Their organisation is to follow the recommendations of the Hadow Report. That is, the elementary stage of public education will be followed by secondary schools for the most gifted, “modern” schools (much like those now called “central”), and “senior” schools for the rest.

If the suggestions I have made are sound, the Modern Schools will not imitate secondary schools too closely. Of the Senior Schools, it is rumoured that at least two-thirds of their time will be given to "practical” work. What this means is uncertain at present, '-'’’lie curriculum will be difficult to draw up so as to avoid mere “bread-

and-butter” training on the one hand or dilettantism on the other. It used to be held that the classical education, though useless for direct application, was the most useful of all indirectly. It taught “the art of thinking.” Whether this magnificent claim was justified, except for the very few, is more than doubtful. But, if there is any truth in it, what held good of the classical scholar should hold true of the craftsman and the artist. That is to say, anything intelligently taught, which requires thought as well as dexterity, will be an abiding possession, having values which may carry a man far into the practice of that “art of life” which I have called the object of education.