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HAWKE'S BAY. Extract from the Report of the Inspector of Schools. The instructors in woodwoik, cookery, and dressmaking—viz., Mr. Gardiner, Misses Ivey and Lousley, and Mrs. Thomas—have sent in reports on the special work done during the year, from which the following summary is made: — Mr. Gardiner says that " Classes in woodwork were held throughout the year at Napier and Hastings as centres. Two hundred and twenty pupils received instruction in nine separate classes. Two special classes were carried on, also a teachers' Saturday class. Owing to the lack of adequate accommodation and appropriate equipment the classes were conducted under extremely disadvantageous circumstances. The attendance and progress at the special evening classes in mechanical and architectural drawing has been very encouraging, but these classes will never fulfil their legitimate functions until the school is provided with sufficient and suitable models to enable the teaching to be from the concrete to the abstract, from things to principles. In view of the erection of a new technical school for Napier, and the extension of manual, training, and technical classes in other centres, proposals will be submitted for realising in some measure one's own ideals in this direction." Mrs. Thomas reports having given instruction to 321 girls in eight schools in the southern portion of the district during the first six months of the year, and to 209 girls belonging to the Gisborne District High School and certain country schools in the Poverty Bay district during the second half of the school year, alternating her instruction with the instruction in cookery. She points out certain inconveniences in several schools, and considers that schools where dressmaking classes are carried on should be provided with a separate room and such necessary materials as paper for drafting, tape measures, tracing-wheels, scissors, and sewing-machines, all of which are necessary for progress of work. It will be observed that the special instruction, important as it is, benefits but a comparatively few of the senior boys and girls in the district. Under present arrangements much difficulty is experienced by instructors in visiting even the larger schools, but the difficulties will be minimised when the technical-school buildings now in course of erection are finished at Napier, Dannevirke, Waipawa, and Hastings. It is doubtful, however, whether more pupils will be instructed under the improved conditions. The smallness of the country schools presents a difficulty to the introduction into them of manual and technical training. It would be a very good thing to foster in all country schools a knowledge of elementary agriculture, including soils, rocks, native plants, and common weeds as far as each district is concerned. But specialists must do the work in the country just as they do in the towns. If education is to have a utilitarian bias in the schools it should be in the direction of adaptation to environment and probable future needs. Itinerant teachers could do the work in the country, and by a slight modification in the present manual and technical regulations dealing with "school classes" it would be possible for a teacher to instruct the senior pupils belonging to twenty or more schools during the year. The large attendance of teachers at the Saturday classes in elementary agriculture, such as were held in Napier at the beginning of the year, shows that the teachers are alive to the importance of this subject as a branch of instruction in the schools. Statement of Receipts and Expenditure for the Year ending 81st December, 1906, in respect of Special Classes conducted at Dannevirke, Gisborne, Hastings, and Napier. Receipts. £ s. d. Expenditure. £ s. d. Balance at beginning of year .. .. 175 2 7 Salaries of instructors .. .. .. 517 18 6 Capitation on special classes .. .. 244 10 7 Office expenses (including salaries, stationCapitation on account of free places .. 019 6 cry, &c.) .. .. .. .. 47 17 5 Rent .. .. .. .. ■ • 138 19 2 Advertising and printing .. .. 25 3 0 Furniture, fittings, apparatus .. .. 516 8 Lighting and heating .. .. .. 16 8 1 Material .. .. • • ■ • 64 6 4 Rent .. .. .. .. .. 144 12 6 Subsidies on voluntary contributions .. 100 0 0 Examinations, &c. .. .. .. 918 6 Pees .. .. .. ■ • ■ ■ 159 210 Material for olass use .. .. .. 62 2 7 Voluntary contributions .. .. 100 0 0 Teachers' fares .. .. .. .. 17 7 6 Sale of sorap lead .. .. .. 410 0 Cleaning .. .. .. .. 10 18 0 Government grant (teachers) .. .. 250 0 0 Furniture, fittings, apparatus .. .. 618 0 Transfer from Technical Fund .. .. 14 4 5 Balance at end of year .. .. .. 398 8 0 £1,257 12 1 £1,257 12 1 G. Crawshaw, Secretary. Extract from the Report of the Technical Classes conducted by the Gisborne High School Board of Governors. In conjunction with the Hawke's Bay Education Board, the Gisborne High School Board, as controlling authority in Poverty Bay, carried on for the first half of the year school classes in cookery and woodwork, and for the second half classes in dressmaking and woodwork, at which pupils .from the following schools received instruction: Gisborne, Mangapapa, Makauri, Wairangaahika, Ormond, Kaitiratahi, Tikaraka, Matawhero, Te Arai, Patutahi, and Maraetaha. Two hundred and thirty-two boys'attended the woodwork classes, and 224 girls the cookery and dressmaking classes. Those living contiguous to the railway-line were carried free, whilst the fares of those served by coach were paid by the Technical Classes Committee. The Department kindly renewed permission for the pupils from the country schools to attend one day a fortnight, taking two lessons on the same day, an arrangement that worked very well, and which we hope to see continued. There was also a class for physics, which was attended by the pupils of the Gisborne School only.

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