AGE IN EDUCATION

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume LXIII, 13 July 1929, Page 9

AGE IN EDUCATION

CHILDREN WHO DEVELOP LATE The proposal that tho ago of admission to secondary schools should be oloven years was tho subject of a debate in the House of Commons in tho closing session of the last Parliament. A pica was made by Air Percy Harris that the age should not bo rigidly fixed, as many intelligent children develop late in life. “I remember being at a great public school where the former President of the Board of Education, Sir Charles Trevelyan, was a student, and where also was the Chancellor of tlie Exchequer, Mr Winston Churchill. I cun picture him now, very much like ho is to-day—all virility, very talkative, ready to mako specchos to small boys m tuckshqis whenever the opportunity rose. But when it camo to scholastic attainments he himself said—l think he was wrong-—that he was longer the bottom boy in a bottom class than any boy at any time in the history of the school. His was a case of latent development. If lie bad been a poor man s child his education would have stopped, because at eleven be would never have won a scholarship. Whatever wc may think of his political activities, we all recognise his fine literary style. We accept , him as one of the best writers of his age. This lias been possible because he has completed his education. He was able, with the aid of a crammer, to go to Sandhurst, where ho jumped ahead and won the top prize, the sword of honour, because of his intellectual attainments.”