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The children's dietary, which will be ample, will be on the same lines as that which has been found to be beneficial in similar institutions in England and elsewhere. The ground is being utilised, and already a plentiful supply of vegetables and fruit is available. Milk, butter, and much of the meat are produced on the estate, and in time we hope to be able to bake our own bread. The hygiene of the skin is of importance, and frequent baths are beneficial in promoting cutaneous exhalation. The promotion of cleanly habits will receive careful attention, and the clothing of the children will require careful consideration. This should be warm, yet light, and woollen undergarments will be worn in winter with proper gradations as to warmth in summer. With regard to the clothing, it will be made to conform to the ordinary fashion, and care will be taken that no uniform or distinguishing style of dress will be introduced. Feeble-minded children often take a pride in their appearance, and this, carefully cultivated, may be used in the formation of good habits. I will now pass on to the educational training of the children. The normal baby has no innate notions or ideas, but comes into the world ignorant of everything. The organs of sense are not themselves sentient — i.e., the eye does not see, nor the ear hear. You notice the normal baby commence to explore his surroundings : probably his first impression comes to him through the sense of sight, as when a bright light is brought near him, or a highly coloured ball. He will amuse himself for hours by his sense of touch, experiencing various sensations, as hardness or softness, roughness or smoothness, heat or cold, roundness or extension, from the objects brought to him. He will, unconsciously at first, make comparisons of these various forms of contact, and notelater the differences, and, in the end, may make some very simple reasonings or deductions. The impressions he receives, in the first instance through the sense of touch, are gradually amplified by the sense of sight, and, eventually, same very slight knowledge of his immediate surroundings is gained by the co-operation of his remaining senses. Thus we see that, in the normal child, with the evolution of its senses and perceptions its intelligence is constantly growing. This normal development does not take place with the mentally deficient child. We find, even quite late in the child's life, that it has gained very little such knowledge as does the ordinary child. Naturally, we can only assume that some obstruction or hindrance, either serious or superficial, is causing this delay in development. We must approach the brain through the organs of sense, and, as Sequin puts it, " "as the organs of sensation are within our reach, and those of thought are out of it. t Informer are the first we can set in action " ; and, further, that " the physiological education of the senses must precede the psychical education of the mind." These points we shall bear in mind at Otekaike, so that the physiological education of the senses will be taken early in hand. All kinds of suitable exercises will be taken in this connection, always bearing in mind, as Dr. Shuttleworth reminds us in his able work, that " the training of the muscular system by suitable exercises to ready response—i.e., the co-ordination of muscular movement, which is merely an extension of the training of the senses—paves the way to the more purely intellectual training." We shall endeavour to increase the intelligence of the children by directing their attention to their own surroundings, and interesting them in every-day occupations. Feeble-minded children live a very isolated kind of existence until they are made to appreciate their own surroundings.^ Nowhere is the maxim of Pestalozzi truer than in the training of feeble-minded children—" Neither art nor book, but life itself, is the groundwork of education and teaching." The teaching of feebleminded children must proceed on similar lines to those adopted in our infant schools—the instruction will aways be pn sented to the children in a concrete form, and many of the kindergarten occupations and games will be made use of. With regard to the teaching of speech, we shall use every available method to accomplish this end. All parents are anxious that their children should be able to speak, and often a father or mother will say to me, " Yes, my boy understands all you say to him, but he cannot speak. Can you give me something which will make him talk ? " It is difficult at first to definitely diagnose as to whether a child lacks language because he lacks ideas, whether it is a loss of power to co-ordinate the complex muscular mov. ments necessary for speech, or whether the inability arises from disease or imperfect development of the speech -producing part of the brain. Sometimes one finds that a child has a difficulty in keeping his lips closed, which frequently is concomitant with slavering. In these cases we resort to simple exercises to improve this condition. Movements of the tongue and jaw in certain directions are often found serviceable. An analysis of the vocal sound is made, and these pupils are taught the sounds in the order by which they can be most easily acquired. Wo generally endeavour to make the speaking lessons as attractive as possible, as in the kindergarten exercises. In fact, these lessons often take the. form of phiv. in which, frequently, music forms a valuable adjunct. Regular and systematical physical exercises will form an important feature in the training of the children at Otekaike. We hope to form a cadet corps in course of time, and if our efforts in this direction happily prove as beneficial to the children at Otekaike as it has done at the Western Counties Training Institution at Star Cross, in Devonshire, England, and at the Royal Albert Asylum, Lancaster. England, we shall be more than amply repaid. At the Star Cross Institution they have a thoroughly well-equipped and up-to-date gymnasium ; and, in my conversation with the Superintendent last year, he attributed no little of his success to the judicious and regular training which his boys received m the. gymnasium. I saw the boys at Star Cross go through a gymnastic display when I was there, and. after seeing many of the normal school-children go through similar exercises, I could not but help thinking that, in a competition, the ordinary school-boys would have to be content with something less than the premier position. • The importance of drill and open-air exercises cannot be exaggerated as a means of correcting spasmodic motions, of strengthening the body, and of helping the child to obtain more control over his muscles. Drill may be made one of the first steps towards educational work, as it calls forth the faculty

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