MOTHER AND HOME.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 17572, 24 June 1925, Page 9

MOTHER AND HOME.

The choice of a child's first school de- j mands the earnest consideration of ! parents. It is equally important with the choice of a boys’ public school or girls’ boarding school, but, unfortunate ly, many people do not seem to think so, and the nearness of the school to the home, its inexpensiveness and the class of the children who attend it are the only principles which guide them in their choice. Other parents have many ideas on the subject, and often experience a difficulty in finding a school to fit in with their ideas. Schools for small children, however, are improving rapidly, although the influence a school has on a child is still too often overlooked. \A’e all know the old Jesuit saying, “Give me a child for the first seven years of his life—you can have him afterwards,” but we do not always realise how extraordinarily impressionable the early years of a child’s life are. Modern psychologists trace many of the nervous complaints of middle life to unhealthy repressions, hidden fears and unhappy influences of childhood. No one knows exactly how much a child takes in from his environment, and what psychological effect other people’s ways and morals have upon him. Therefore it is very important that from his babyhood he should be kept as far as possible from contact with things that will frighten or harm him, or which in later years will cause him to become a coward or a liar. Ilis first school should be a happy i>lace, where he and his little companions learn from a sympathetic mistress, who is fond of children—(this is very important)—the joys of doing things for themselves, and finding how things are made. No child is perfect, and therefore he will need to have his faults corrected gently, not punished severely, in an atmosphere where honour, truth and loyalty are the things which matter most, and where meanness, jealousy and deceit arc not allowed to flourish. SHOULD A WIFE RECEIVE WAGES? This is a question about which there has been many a heated argument, but the majority of married women are in favour of it, although some of them dislike the sound of the word “wages” when applied to the money they receive from their husbands, anti prefer to call it an allowance. Most people—men and women—think it is only right that a wife should receive regular!y sufficient money, not only to run the home, but for her own personal needs. They argue that a man would have to pay a housekeeper to run his home, so why not his wife? It usually happens that when a modern girl marries she gives up a position for which she has been receiving a salary to do so. If she gives to looking after her husband’s home the same efficiency and care as she gave to her pre-marriage work, it seems unfair that she should receive no remuneration for it, but have to ask her husband for'money every time she wants her shoes mended or needs a new pair of gloves. To a woman who has been used to the control of money, and who, from her childhood, has been given complete responsibility of her own financial affairs, such a procedure is extremely humiliating. Of course, it is impossible to generalise or to lavdown hard and fast rules, for circumstances will always alter cases, but most women should, before marriage, sec (hat they are to receive an adequate j allowance. It may be that they will j have one large sum out of which they must budget the houshold expenses, 1 rent, holidays, and their own personal allowance, but more generally they will : receive a certain sum for household matters and another for their dress, and which, for want of a, better term, must be called pin money. In households where the wife is in receipt of a large personal income, independent of her husband, or where both husband and wife work outside and share the household expenses, then it is another matter, although in such cases the wife often likes to use her own money for some special purpose, such as giving her children a better education than they would otherwise receive, or providing additional comforts in the home. What every wife, rich or poor, wants to avoid is the humiliation of asking her husband for every penny, and having to give him an account of every little sum, while he keeps ali his own finan-