E.—2

14

Matiaha Tipaata, of Tokomaru : Kata Tamihana, of Ranana. Next to these came Parikura Pewhairangi, of Tokomaru, and Etera Rihara, of Rangitukia. It seems quite plain that the influence of these examinations is sensibly increasing, while the good that they do is certainly widening ; for, although the winning percentages remain about the same as they were years ago, the difficulty of the questions set has increased very considerably. Statistics. A statement of expenditure incurred in connection with Native schools will be found n Tables Nos. I. and 11. of the Appendix; Table No. 11. being a classified summary of Table No. 1., which gives full details. The expenditure for 1901 has exceeded that for 1900 by about £3,425. Nearly two-thirds of this increase may be considered the result of increased activity in building, and in the matter of technical instruction, as may be learnt from Table 11. Table 111. gives the ages of pupils. There is a tendency towards an increase in the percentages of children over and under the age limits (5 to 15, for public-school scholars). This will ha\e to be watched. Table IV. shows tha.t the working average attendance for 1901 was 2,59225, as against 2,500-75 in the previous year, while the Regularity of Attendance percentage of Weekly Roll Number is 7959 for 1901, as against 7680 for 1900. This shows satisfactory improvement. Table V. :In this table the race of pupils attending Native schools is dealt with The percentages here are very steady; the most marked feature is a decrease in the percentage of children either European, or between European and half-caste ; but this is only 0-83 per cent. Table VI. shows the numbers of passes gained in the course of the year. The total number was 1,346, as against 1,222 for the previous year. The greatest difference was in Standard 111. In this there were a hundred more passes than had been made in the previous year. Table VII. is a very useful one ; it shows best of all (1) what kind of " form " a school has—■ good, bad, or indifferent, and (2) what amount of success it has achieved. It has one defect: it takes little or no account of the difficulties encountered in the course of the year. Tables VIII. and IX. are not as interesting as they will be if continued for twenty years or so. There is, however, one rather important indication. The ratio of girls to boys on the rolls in December, 1900, was 77-05: 100; in December, 1901, the figures were 81-28 : 100. It was perhaps to be expected that an increased ratio of girls to boys would accompany the general increase in the population shown by the last census. I understand that this would be in accordance with the views of recent biologists. Table X. : We learn from this that there were seventy-eight Government pupils in the board-ing-schools in 1901, as against seventy-four in 1900 ; the number of private pupils was 148. Seven boys were holding industrial scholarships at the end of 1901, viz. : Three as saddlers, one as a coachbuilder, one as a printer, and two as blacksmiths. Two girls are holding nursing scholarships at Napier Hospital. There were also two public-school scholars holding scholarships : One (boy) from Nelson Central Public School, at Te Aute College, Hawke's Bay ; one (girl) from Gladstone, Wellington, at Hukarere, Napier. Also there were two medical students (male) at the Otago University. The Teaching of English in Maori Schools. Almost from the first it has been seen by those engaged in Native school work that the main difficulty is to obtain good spoken English, correct, abundant, and fluent. For a considerable time this difficulty remained to a large extent insuperable. The circumstances of New Zealand made it almost a new problem, and an unusually hard one to solve. As time went on many devices were tried, with more or less success. Perhaps on the whole the results secured would have compared not unfavourably with those obtained *in other fields where teachers have had to teach their own language to children speaking another tongue and still living among their own people. Previous attempts of this kind, however, have generally been made with children of civilised peoples. There is good reason to believe that Mr. H. B. Kirk, M.A., has really solved this difficult problem ; at all events, a scheme of bis has been in use for more than a year by receptive teachers, and the more that has been seen of it the greater has been the reason for liking it. Of course, Mr. Kirk himself makes full use of it; Mr. Bird, M.A., employs it also with excellent effect; my own experience of the method is entirely satisfactory, and I have no doubt that the discovery is of very high importance. The only precaution required is to remember that such a method must have its limits. This system, while it prepares children very thoroughly for all kinds of higher English work, will not, by itself, serve as a complete method for teaching them to read difficult English with understanding, or to write English well. Its principal work will be to teach Maori children to speak English fluently and correctly within reasonable limits and in a very short time. The method is briefly this: The pupils are made by the teacher to converse with him and with one another, the teacher leading the work into channels that he considers suitable. In a word, the principle is conversation among the children, "personally conducted" by the teacher. The secret of the method's success lies just in the fact that the pupils are not taught merely the meaning of this sentence and of that, but are made to talk rationally and quite correctly, and are trained to thoroughly understand what is being said, and to prove this to their teacher by reporting what they have been told, or what they have seen. In fact, by this method children are trained to take part in what is in its way a drama, and to use in this drama correct speech in correct form— speech that is very largely of their own construction. The three cardinal points of the scheme are: (1.) That every child shall be personally and individually brought into what may be called colloquial contact with everything that is said and done, and shall at every single step be made to give evidence, by its own contribution to the work,