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Varying numbers were tried out in the groups, and fifteen was fixed as the greatest number of children a student should take. With some groups, particularly those engaged in plaiting, carving, and work with the microscopes, six or seven normally constitute a group. While the work usually rotated among the students so that every student at some time took each type of group-study, some particularly gifted students, especially Maori specialists, continued the whole section on the type of work which they intended to teach later in their careers. The work taught by the students comprised— Maori. j Other. Plaiting a kopare. j Rocks. Cloaks. I Minerals and the microscope. Stone-tool making. j Fungi. Firemaking. Tea. The drill. ! Fibres. The canoe. The kauri. Maori games. j Marvels of fish. The tangi. The moa. Carving. I Birds and the forest. Pronunciation. Four New Zealand birds. The meeting-house. | Silk. The pa. j Penguins and seals. The Maori and the forest. 1 Life in ancient Egypt. The store-house. j Development of ships. Maori fishing. | Plankton. Maori and birds. J Marvels of the microscope. String games. I Red Indians. At the beginning of 1939 a change was made in the method of allocating the lectures by students. The purchase of four film-strip projectors and a 16 mm. silent projector made it possible to put much more preparation into the students work. In this way six lectures were prepared, and these same six are taken by successive groups of students. Each week a student takes a different lecture, so that each has experience in the whole series. The lectures prepared are " A Visit to the Great Barrier Reef," " The Story of Iron," " Transport Through the Ages," " A Maori Pa," " Life in the Old Stone Age," and a general survey of the animal kingdom. Four of these talks use film-strip projectors for the extensive series of slides, as well as the specimens, which are handled, and the exhibits in the Museum itself. In as many as possible of these group lectures the children had material to handle ; and among the most successful were those in which handwork was done —plaiting, carving in plasticine, string games, taking part in the tangi, for example. The microscopes loaned by Professor Kirk, the Geological Survey, and the Wellington Hospital were the nucleus of a very highly appreciated section. It seems essential that a micro-projector should be added to the equipment at some time. In addition to these groups, three questionnaires were used in the Museum. These comprised series of questions, the answers to which were found in the exhibits. They were much liked by the children, and some hot arguments took place over the precise meaning of certain structures. 111. P .REPARATION OF SCHOOL CASES. The preparation of school cases is a very important part of the Education Officer's work, for only in this way is the Museum able to reach distant schools. At the beginning of the period thirty glass-fronted museum cases were provided by the Carnegie Corporation. These have been made up as exhibits, and, in addition, 105 boxes of specimens and pictures have been prepared. A great deal of the material for these was provided by various Government Departments, public bodies, and commercial firms. A full scheme was worked out during 1938 for the provision of school cases for all schools, both primary and secondary, with a roll number of fifty or over from Palmerston North and the Wairarapa to Blenheim and Nelson. Each school would receive a new exhibit every fortnight. This scheme was ready for operation at the beginning of 1939, but administrative difficulties between the Wellington Education Board and the Education Department have so far held up the work, and the cases have been lying unused in the Museum. A further series of cases is almost ready for distribution to schools in the Wellington District itself. In this series the schools will borrow exhibits in the same way as books are borrowed from a library. IV. Museum Clubs. During 1939, Museum clubs were established on the following lines : Small groups work after school hours at the Museum in clubs devoted to casting and modelling, wax-plant making, Maori carving, Maori culture, entomology, and native-plant study. So far, the clubs have been confined to secondary-school pupils, and until a larger staff at the Museum has time to devote to education work it would seem impossible to extend this work to primary schools. The present staff of the Museum has been most helpful in the establishment of these clubs, though their progress lias been greatly handicapped through lack of room, which is one of the critical factors in the extension of the educational work of the Museum. D. W. MoKenzie, Education Officer.

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