The Wanganui Chronicle. WEDNESDAY, APRIL 17, 1929. GRADING OF TEACHERS

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume 72, Issue 91, 17 April 1929, Page 6

The Wanganui Chronicle. WEDNESDAY, APRIL 17, 1929. GRADING OF TEACHERS

THE protest voiced by the householders’ meeting in the Northern Wanganui Schools’ district against the itinerancy of teachers will doubtless be heeded by the new Minister of Education, for Mr Atmore is nothing if not radical. When teachers come and go with frequency the school, as a teaching institution, must suffer; for teachers have not the time to become intimate with the individuality of their students before they are impelled to move on to another school. Children are complex personalities. They are developing rapidly and therefore a trait which is apparent at one time, through development gets crowded out of sight by the coming forward of other traits. The handling of a child, from an educationalist point of view, is a difficult problem and to enable the teacher to teach the child properly the association between the two must continue over a long period—the longer the period the better. It is the realisation of the importance of this essential appreciation of pupils by the teacher which to-day makes Mr Atmore the advocate of smaller classes. He will be the first to realise, however, that small classes with continually changing teachers will not he much improvement on present conditions. The end aimed at in securing smaller classes will be impossible of achievement. From the teacher’s viewpoint too the present condition of frequent changes is undesirable. The expense devolving upon him personally when he has to transfer to another school must be a heavy tax on his resources. t But more important still the experience gained in conducting classes for broken periods cannot be of much value to the teacher himself. His efficiency cannot be increased to the same degree as would be the case if he were able to watch the result of his methods of teaching. Nevertheless, it must be borne in mind that such a problem which present conditions offer has not grown up in a night, and that, therefore, it will be necessary for more than y word to be spoken to remove the present inconvenient system and to replace it with a better method. Doubtless, administrative difficulties exist, but they can and should be overcome as soon as possible, so that it may become unnecessary for teachers to be transferred to secure promotion.