A LESSON FOR NEW ZEALAND

New Zealand Times, Volume XLIV, Issue 10284, 20 May 1919, Page 2

A LESSON FOR NEW ZEALAND

A New Zealand soldier stationed on the Khine writes of a school at Oplathis school, and came to the conchasion that in the matter of school archiSector* the Germans had got far abwui of us The classrooms were clean, well-lighted, heated, and ventilated. simpWecorated, and altogether pleasant places in which to live. But what particularly struck me was toe tact that all these rooms were *mali, capable of accommodating only -»» 30 pupils. There was no chance here of crowding 100 or more little martyrs into one Btiflinfi long den, as I had seen done in New Zealand. 1 wondered tow long it would bo before New Zealand parents would rise in tnei> wrath and demand the abolition or that iniquitous system under which, their children are "cribtfa/ cabin d; and confin'd" .in ttieso poisonous school prisons. The way to abolish audi a state of things seemed to me to be to build new schools with small classrooms,' suoh as I saw here in OpUden. . The children in this town, too, flocked round us in the most friendly manner. Their appetite for lollies, chocolate, or anything sweet appeared to be insatiable These children wer»very clean and well-dressed, and showed no evidence of poverty, except perhaps in the matter of footwear. Their teeth also were beautifully carad for. I was at once struck with th« manner in which they carried their schoolbag*. Boya and girls alike invariably carried their bags strapped over their shoulders, Just «a the noldier carries hie pack. lam convinced that if we adopted this stylo in New 1 Zealand we should not see so much of the stooping gait and round shoulders so common in our growing boys and girls.