NEW SCHOOL AGE

Waipa Post, Volume 44, Issue 3178, 17 May 1932, Page 8

NEW SCHOOL AGE

FAR-REACHING* EFFECTS OF RAISING.

PROTEST BY TEACHERS.

Far-reaching effects will follow the raising of the school age from five years to six, according to the New at the annual conference of the New Zealand conference of the New Zealand Educational Institute, in Wellington. A remit regretting the decision of the Government to exclude five-year-old children from the schools and directing the incoming executive to give careful consideration to its effects with a view to submitting evidences to the Minister in support of a claim for a repeal of the clause in the Act, was carried unanimously. The remit set out that the Dominion's present modern infant departments catered fully for the physical and mental requirements of young children, that the resulting redistribution of staffs would cause grave disorganisation of schools for many years, to the detriment of the children, and that a considerable reduction of "staffs •of the schools would add to the present depressed economic conditions.

In moving the motion, Mr F. A. Garry, Auckland, said that the exclusion of the five-year-old children had a threefold bearing—a bearing in relation to children, society and the members of the teaching profession. They had to consider the physical and mental requirements of the young children. For these the modern infant school provided the conditions to meet the requirements. Sir Truby King had recently pointed out that children should be allowed to develop physically. The speaker did not think that there was anybody in the profession who would dare to say that the position differed from that of education. Other countries where the school age was six were often quoted, but they had systems for kindergarten schools. One of the commonest difficulties which they had to face was connected with children who came from a certain class of home, and if they were allowed to continue in the environment of their homes, some of the difficulties increased and they were much more difficult to control at six.

A very considerable number of teachers would lose their positions—one could not say how many yet—but it would be a considerable number. The great majority of schools throughout the country would have their staffs disorganised. The transfers would cost a lot of money which might be saved by not interfering. Many of the teachers woud be put into positions which they would not like, and the changes would have a very material result on our schools. On the motion of Mr O. A. Banner, Auckland, the conference unanimously passed a remit that the Minister shou'd be requested to set up an expert committee to investigate the question of teachers' training as follow: (a) Present and future needs; (b) relation of training college and a university college faculty of education; and (c) student scholarship and bursary systems.