THE LATEST EDUCATIONAL CRAZE.

Waikato Times, Volume 107, Issue 17966, 11 March 1930, Page 9

THE LATEST EDUCATIONAL CRAZE.

(To the Editor.) Sir,—<ia reply to Miss Greville and “Ex Teacher,” kindly permit, me to.say it is hateful for me to be in the limelight, and I wrote as I did not In a spirit of derision hut more from ; sense of duty to those mothers who might not he aware of the absurdities perpetrated and misuse of public money in order to maintain the socalled classes for backward children. My reference to the serviette ring sent home by the teacher for my appreciation was generous. There was nothing of the craftsman's art about it, I can assure you. When the boy gave it to me, he said with tears in his eyes, “Oh, mother! 1 do not want to go back to those classes again; I learn nothing. In the afternoon teacher sings to us and we have to go to sleep on the floor; but I only pretend to. The whistling lessons are real fun — teacher is good at it.” This is the kind Of thing I characterised as “rubbish,” and the more I hear of the happenings at the school on the hill the more satisfied I am that my previous use of the word was no misnonie. All children have an inborn love of justice. Miss Grcville’s reference to specialists .and to trained and highly qualified experts is unfortunate. Surely it is not necessary for a teacher to matriculate and attend a training college for two years in.order to qualify to make paltry face-cloths or tawdy rings of the class I have referred to; or to teach whistling or to mesmcr've children in order to compel them lo go to sleep while at, school, and other similar “accomplishments.” I am inclined to think it is not a question of expert or specialist’s knowledge, but a case of the maiden aunt looking upon ■herself as highly capable of teaching her married sister how to ’rear her children. This country is over-run — not with experts, but with theorists and faddists. In the whole column written by Miss Greville and “Ex-Teacher,” the only sentence which carried conviction was the reference to the impossibility of the teacher of a class composed of 50 or 60 children giving individual attention to tiie scholars. That, Mr Editor, to my mind is sound logic, and is the crux of the position. If a boy is backward the teacher cannot afford the time and patience necessary to keep him level with the others, and naturally he slips back further and further"until he gets into the doldrums.: He is looked upon as a failure, and that often leads him to get discouraged and lose faith and confidence ■in himself and in his schooling. The same thing happens every day in every walk of life. The reason that our technical schools are such an unqualified success is because the mechanical brain is given opportunities entirely lacking in the purely academical sphere. To me, education is not learning lo speak French or learning to recite Shakespeare by the yard, hut the one word. “experience” (written large). Children are not all of one pattern, like bricks in a wall. Sir, I have even heard of a prominent professor who could not swim or pull a rowing boat being saved from drowning by an untutored native. The. first afternoon ihc boy who has been the. centre of this controversy, afLer returning home from attendance at a private school called out, “Oh, mother! Look at the lessons' I have lo do; teacher gave me such a lot”; and he showed me quite 50' words he had to spell to the satisfaction of his teacher next morning. There was no “cal” and “rat” business about it, hut such words as “companionship” “thoroughness,” and the like. His face was radiant at the thought of not being classed as a chump. New hope and new joy seemed to burjn in his very soul. H is probably beside the question, but 1 feel compelled to say that it is one of the very worst things that can happen to a woman afflicted with mental anguish at middle life to he sent to a mental asylum. The hopeless despair resultant from mixing with the worst class of patient kills hope and ambition and altogether has a sad and demoralising effect on the new patient’s outlook. Love, patience, cheerfulness, is the antidote. I trust the same words will be the slogan for the future treatment of the class of mental patient just referred to and also for the child who is styled backward because he cannot from temperamental reasons keep pace with the verybrightest intellects in his class. Placing such a child with subnormal children, as has been done in the Hamilton West School, is unpardonable cruelty in,the eyes of— MOTHER.