SOCIAL EDUCATION

Dominion, Volume 32, Issue 148, 18 March 1939, Page 2 (Supplement)

SOCIAL EDUCATION

Story Of A New Zealand School “The School Looks At Life,” by J. E. Strachan (New Zealand Council for Educational Research). In his explanatory foreword to this account of social education as understood and practised at Raugiora High School, of which the author is headmaster, Mr. F. Milner says:—

This is a record of bold experimenliation in a hitherto well-regimented province of New Zealand education. It is the testimony of a brave and rebellions soul. It surely comes most opportunely. . . . The author’s exposition of his rural school philosophy and his attempt to translate it into educational practice, are reinforcements of the progressive movement. His views are. however, entirely his own, and are certainly not to be construed as bearing the imprimatur of the New Zealand Council of Educational Research. A static mood in education is its damnation ... An earnest man gets to work constructively on his environment, evolves a philosophy, and proves that he has enough latitude to express it. One such is worth a hundred querulous critics.

Briefly stated, Mr. Strachan’s views express the desirability of a more closely-knit connexion between what is called education and the actualities of life as a whole. To him a school lite should contain all the elements that, progressively widening, go to the formation of adult life. The welfare of the child himself should be the first consideration, and the average citizen who unthinkingly takes it for granted that such is always the case, may be surprised at having his attention called to the social and economic difficulties that lie in the way of realizing this ideal. The first consideration for education, as it is generally understood, is that it should fit the child for a job, leaving the wide implications of life as a whole to look after themselves. Time and energy must be canalized into preparation for certain standards to he reached, through examinations which open the door to a means of selfsupport. The author of “The School Looks At Life,” sees in this little of true education which, considering the expanding of the child’s being, gradualy prepares him for life. The school, in his opinion, should be a world in miniature, and, for this reason, he has found the rural school particularly suitable for his experiment, which has as its central theme man’s correspondence with his environment and his indissoluble relationship with nature. Whether agreeing or not with Mr. Strachan’s views and his manner of giving them expression, the educationist must read with interest this record of an achievement which is the outcome of sincerity and conviction. A visitor to Rangiora High School will find there a farm, and a system of trading which gives the students a practical knowledge of business and commerce. He will find a social system in the control of which the students themselves play a large part. He will note many features which do not exactly fall into line with the ordinary, running of a New Zealand post-primary school. The reading- of "The School Looks At Life” will make clear to him some of the principles underlying these differences, and may possibly help to start him thinking and to jolt him out of the “appalling inertia” which Mr. Strachan deplores as one of the chief hindrances to educational research.