ESPERANTO IN SCHOOLS.

Press, Volume LVIII, Issue 17419, 1 April 1922, Page 12

ESPERANTO IN SCHOOLS.

y The conference of teachers of Esperanto which will take place at Geneva auruig j!/aster week is regarued as especituiy important, since it is being lieia ior tne ueneiit or tne League ox iiLiorn,, ana may leaaic ui Uuo wiutapieau teauwig ui iiibpeiaiiu) m bcnooia uie JjuiiuvU '•Uoaervei")in lu2o a nation was brought forward in tne Assemuiy or tie league oi in aliens caiiiug ior an inquay mw tne possibility oi jjsperuuio us a cumpuisory object m sciiuois. liiirteen states, mauding <jtieut Britain, supported the motion, but, owing to tno opposition ot tuie A'renuli delegates, who apparently, disliked the possiunity of i'leuch being displaced as tne language of diplomacy, it was deieated. in last year's Assembly it was, however, carried, and the forthcoming international conference of teachers is being held in order that the necessary information may be presented to the secretariat of the League. In England Esperanto has not been taught so extensively in the schools as in some v other countries, notably Ozecho-iSlovakia. The first in which the subject was taught in England was the Patricrott Council School, Eccles. There it has been taught during the last six years to the whole school, numbering 420 girls and boys, and altogether 2000 children have learned it. There is a class in one of the Huddcrsfield elementary schools, and the children correspond with other children in twenty-nine different countries. It is also taught in schools at Worcester and Keighiey. The evidence is that Esperanfo can be taught to children with remarkable ease, and that the time it would take to give them the merest smattering of French suffices to give them a working knowledge of Esperanto. At the end of a term they can speak and write it jn simple sentences. This is consistent with the claim of Esperantists that an educated adult can learn the grammar of Esperanto with ease within two hours. As to the collateral benefits of the subject, a Government Inspector, reporting on the work at Patricroft School, said: "The acquisition of a language whose root words are so largely derived from ai Latin source has had precisely the same effect as the cultivation of the classical languages in a secondasy school."