SECONDARY SCHOOLS CONFERENCE.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 5163, 23 January 1895, Page 3

SECOND ARY SCHOOLS CONFERENCE.

The conference resumed at 8 p.m., and went into committee on the Endowed Schools Bill. On resuming, the Chairman said that the conference had no resolution to pas 3 as to the merits of the Bill as a whole. Its clauses were then dealt with seriatim, and instead of Clause 3 in the Bill as at present constituted, it was recommended . that the tollbwicg. clauses should be substituted :— -3a. "Subject to the provisions of thia Act, every endowed school shall afiorij fre§ education to one scholar f 6* e?ery At& of the annual income derived by the school from endowments ' made under the authority of any Act of the Provincial or General Assembly, including j contributions made by the School Commissioners acting under the Education Reserves Act, 1877, provided such income be the net available income after deducting the interest on loanß and charges of collection j &c." 3b. "That when a scholarship provided by a governing body opt of endowments includes! provision for board in addition to free education, each such scholarship shall cpnht,.for three free l)laceB if not 1«88 than ■•"JB3O be granted ; for board, and for twpfree places if hot lesß than iJIS be. granted, -provided that the number of pupils, receiving "free i education :BhaU in r no case be leas than b(alf the number required by Clauses." , ' A motion for an ; additional clause, to be entitled " Clause So," was put and lost. [ '. ) The; acting honorary Secretary, . Mr B.K;S. Lawrence,? was instructed to tot-' ward copies of the above recommendations' to the Minister of Education. " , . The Chairman announced that thenext sitting would take' place at 10 a.m. on Wednesday, when Mr ; Hogben., M.A., would read; a paper 6a the" "Natural jiethod-of Teaching Lan'guageß." ; •■; ; I The ConferenooTeaumedthia morning at ,fen o'clock.,, -;, ;,.r.vr :. ■..,,'■ ■■\ Hr Hogben read hi.a paper on the. <? Natural Method of Teaching Languages." He referred -at some length to the methods formerly in use, with speoialreferenue to those employed by Comenius and Locke; All these, he contended, had agreed in condemning the system of beginning the study of a language with its grammar. I In English-speaking countries the method employed might be generally described as [ chaotic, but fcraceß of a niore V natural " ! system were- already beginning to appear, notably in the Barrow and Cheltenham publio •■; Bchools. ). Mr Hogben : foen proceeded to define what he meant by the "natural method." In:the first place, the mother tongue should be employed as httle aa possible/ Th.e foreign language should db W^; RS 4ire«|j .^hicle . for expressing the. ; common, facts of I'". The model leaßona should begin with"objects in the class - r00m. .. Next Bhould come objects r that could be brought thare. According to his own experience, it would, be, found rieoesßary to use very little English in the process. Every word translated 1 postponed the power of thinking in the foreign language; that is, of putting the expression into the foreign language without the intervention, mental or oral, of the j mother tongue. Translation was a valuable exercise, but its should come much later than it usually does. The teacher should bethe only dictionary* at least till the pupil - had ., reached a considerably advanced ; stage. ,The main objeot Bhbnld be to .enable the pupil to get on • speaking terms . as : soon as possible. It waß true that the. chief, object of learning a foreign language was ''for the purpoßGof reading it; but he was ! satisfied that the "natural" method was [the shortest road to this. Nothing harrows a child's graßp of language so much as learning from a book instead of from 'nature. Nothing was gained by reading in a foreign language, unless the Btudent could think in it. Not the least of the advantages of his method would be the interest excited in the minds of the pupilß of the language. He ventured the opinion that proficiency in one foreign language should be aimed at rather than an indifferent knowledge of . ; more than one. The lecturer proceeded to give some practical illustrations of hiij meaning, showing how the object lessona should be begun and carried through their various stages. By means of pictures, books, tables, &c, he explained how the pupil could orally be provided with a fair wotkiDg vocabulary of the foreign language without any previous instruction in grammar or monotonous Bjntax rules. Thiß mechanical part of the subject, he contended, Bhould only be taught after the pupil had made some progreßß and acquired an intelligent interest in his work. On the motion of Mr, Bourne, seconded by Mr Firth, a vote of thankß was paßßed to Mr Hogben for his able paper. Some diecußsion then took place on the details, and a number of questions were put to the author of the paper. Professor W. M. Clarke, at the invitation of the Chairman, gave the conference some information about his experience of teaohing French in Germany, with Bpecial reference to the "natural method" as employed in the Wiesbaden Bchoola. He I thought that it answered very well up to I a certain point, but beyond that there were { great difficulties in the way. The Chairman also pointed out difficulties in Mr Hogben'a aoheme, although ' admitting it had considerable merit. He deprecated any sweeping change. 1 Mr Hogben replied, and the meeting adjourned to 3.80 p.m.