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86

bone enough to say to a pertinacious parent, ' I do not consider that your child will profit by going into a higher class, and I will not promote him.' I still meet with teachers who claim to advance every, child in a class during the year." In this matter we must, however, recognise that teachers are sometimes placed in a very hard position, and that the threat to send pupils to another school if not promoted is not always easy to resist. Mr. Burnside remarks that the doubtful cases of promotion are the promotions from Standard Vto Standard VI. No pupil, he thinks, that cannot easily master Standard V arithmetic should be promoted to Standard VI unless a certificate of competency for Standard VI is all he desires to gain. It is obvious that if pupils are prematurely advanced from Standard V to Standard VI we need not feel surprise if many have to spend more than one year in Standard VI before becoming qualified to gain certificates of proficiency. In some respects, indeed, it may be better for the pupils to spend two years in the Standard VI class than an equal time in any of the classes below. In general the grouping of classes for instruction in particular subjects is as suitable as circumstances admit, and the organization of the schools is in other respects suitable. The granting of an assistant teacher to all schools with an average attendance of thirty-six to forty will make their good organization a far easier task, and should greatly promote their efficiency. For this provision many country districts owe a debt of gratitude to the Minister who has been wise and strong enough to make it. The marking and keeping of the attendance registers receive very careful attention: errors are very rarely met with, and they are always of a trivial character. The registers for admission and promotion are by no means as carefully kept, and are occasionally found to be imperfect. Speaking of the South-eastern District, Mr. Grierson writes as follows : "The Periodical Examination Register is rarely really well kept. The number and the variety of the errors made in entering up this record arc astounding. A large number of the teachers, with full directions before them, are incapable of expressing the number of marks obtained as a percentage of the number attainable. I think very special attention should be drawn to this matter. A careless incomplete record of an examination suggests an imperfect and slipshod examination." The regularity of attendance throughout this district is in general very satisfactory. In this matter the Paeroa District High School has established a unique reputation. It is rare for a good school not to be appreciated, and at all such regular attendance is almost invariable. Where the attendance is unsatisfactory there is too often an excuse-for it in the circumstances of the school itself. It is matter of general remark that in recent years the traditional reluctance of young children to attend school has been steadily waning. In very many of our schools the pupils attend gladly, and feel it a grievance if they are kept away. This is really a striking tribute to the growing efficiency of the elementary school. The more skilful and sympathetic teaching of the primer classes, that has been a feature of recent progress, and the growing mildness of control and government, largely due to the influence of our lady teachers, have greatly helped to bring this happy change about. The time-tables of the schools are seldom unsuitable, and the distribution of time among the various subjects is generally satisfactory. No time-table is complete or easily intelligible without an abstract or analysis; the omission to prepare this is the only point on which Inspectors have occasion to make serious complaint. Nearly everywhere arithmetic claims five hours a week, and most teachers who have tried to do with less report their experiment as unsatisfactory. This is largely due to the size of the classes they have to handle. In the smaller schools teachers cannot afford more than forty minutes daily for the teaching, but the pupils always have five hours' practice or more. The time given to spelling and dictation varies greatly, and is often, 1 consider, excessive. The subject is well taught in some schools in one and a quarter hours a week, and one and a half hours should suffice in any school. The time devoted to writing also varies a good deal. In the two highest classes one hour a week is often found sufficient for the special lessons, but watchful care has then to be bestowed on the penmanship of all written exercises. It is often difficult to provide time for teaching singing with reasonable efficiency. In all schools one hour a week, as a minimum, is desirable. In the larger ones the time now taken up with manual training and with travelling to and from the " centres " makes it difficult to do justice to the teaching of needlework, science, health, and physical instruction, as well as of singing. I am inclined to think that for class Standard IV and the classes above the school hours will have to be increased to six a day, and that in classes Standard I to Standard 111 the time for intervals might be kept outside the"five hours spent daily at school. With our present time-limits it is almost impossible to make the teaching of some of the subjects really efficient. In nearly all schools suitable schemes of work have been prepared in more or less detail. In these the correlation of work in cognate.subjects is too seldom fully or clearly set forth. After a trial of these schemes for two or three years it will be desirable to write them out anew, with such rearrangements and improvements as experience has shown to be desirable. It is very important that the work of each class in a single subject for the whole year should be set out consecutively, the parts taken up for each period after the first coming immediately after it and one another. This arrangement will greatly facilitate an examination of their contents and suitability. In some subjects—composition exercises and nature-study lessons, for example—detailed lists of the topics or subjects of single lessons need not be entered in the schemes : it will be sufficient to indicate the number and, if convenient, the general scope and nature of the lessons, details of which will be entered in special lists and notes that may be varied from year to year. Reading is better taught than any other subject in the school course, and in the great majority of our schools it is steadily improving. - Mr. Grierson says, " In very many of the better schools the reading of pupils in Standard VI has been a pleasure and a surprise. The reading by lower classes of matter previously unseen has usually been fluent and accurate, and not unfrequently characterized by a creditable degree of the expression that comes from understanding. One word