WINTER SCHOOL.

Hokitika Guardian, 16 May 1922, Page 1

WINTER SCHOOL.

MONDAY, MAY loth. PROF. SHELLEY’S LECTURE. Professor Shelley lectured at 10.30 a.m. Oil the “Modern Outlook in Education” treating in a broad philosophic fashion of the factors that control

the life, not only of this generations. Education he claimed should not he confined to the training of youth at particular ages hut should continue through out life, indeed was life itself. |

The world was on the eve of great developments in social life. Previous civilisation had become decadent and were swept away, to be replaced by cruder, more vigorous life which was gradually disciplined and fashioned into a new civilisation. In the past this new current of life had usually come hv the irruption of a conquering barbaric race sueli as the Dorian people who revitalised Greece. There in the fifth century liefore Christ, a city about the size of Christchurch in a district no bigger than Canterbury produced within a

century dramatists, sculptors, orators, thinkers whose influence was living and powerful to-dav.

It seemed as if the decadent civilisation of the early modern or Renascence period was being revitalised by the tremendous development of man’s power over Nature. The nineteenth century had seen a wonderful liberation of natural forces sueli as the control of transport through mechanical invention. The Industrial Revolution had bequeathed a legacy of indisciplined forces which it had taken a century to grapple with. The first great problems that emerged were economic and as a result the century had seen the gradual evolution of economic science until to-day it was 1 icing recognised that the expert economist must ho consulted in matters of political and social interest just as the natural scientist’s aid was invoked in technical problems.

But the problems of the present day in all departments of life were primarily psyschological. Even in industry industrial unrest was primarily a matter of status rather than reward. And so it was that one found in literature, and art and drama the problems studied were psyrhnlgical. That is we were beginning to study men rather than things. One result of all this was the increased importance attached to education. In all departments of life the call was for the educational export Education was the one remedy in which everybody believed. So that the opportunity for the teacher and the teacher’s responsibility were never greater than to-dav. MR 11. BKLSHAW’S ADDRESS. “Rural Education and Rural Citizenship,” was the subject of ail address by Mr IT. Belshaw, M.A. The maintenance of a vigorous and intellectual rural population is one of the most vital problems of modern times. The country is the seed bed from which even the cities are stocked with people and the city life is vitalized by the current from the country. The problem becomes doubly important in New Zealand which is primarily an agricultural and pastoral country, and there is the necessity for a close study of the conditions of rural life. Our

educational system must be formulated with a full understanding of the needs of the rural child and of the rural community. An efficient educational system must take advantage of differences in environment. The New Zealand system is town made and is imposed oil the country without any reference to its peculiar needs.

The countryman is isolated and as a consequence of this isolation mid of the inherent weakness of our educational

system there are clangers of the development of n “clodhopper” class. The rural school also gives tile child an unfortunate Idas towards town occupations and the lack of suitable centres for social intercourse emphasises this tendency with the result that the brightest country youths are often attracted to the towns. It is the function of the educationalist not only to encourage the maximum development of the individual hut also to provide social centres for tile establishment of a separate and natural rural culture independent of town standards. Tile present educational system fails in both of these objects.

The Farmer’s Union, the co-operative society and the church might do much as natural centres of communal life, to engender a natural rural culture, but the country school should be the most important educative and socializing influence. The artilicial harrier between school and farm should he broken down by a closer co-relation of school with farm and of school subjects with each other. Teachers should he trained specially for rural conditions and not in a city training college with its different environment. The school might well become a social centre if several small schools were consolidated and had a hostel for teachers attached. Community of interest would then he created amongst the children and rural institutions would naturally group themselves round the rural scliol so that’ the isolation of country life would he to a large extent removed. Each school should he allowed to develop as much ns possible ajong its own lines. The present system -of centralized control resulted in drab and monotonous medio'iTity. Rural schools developed nsy above would be useful centres for the training of teachers for country work, and all teachers at any rate all rural teachers should spend a portion of their training time under rural conditions. It would only ho by such methods as these that the problems of the country would bo solved and the dominance of ’the town removed.