NEGLECTED TRAINING

Sun (Auckland), Volume II, Issue 376, 9 June 1928, Page 8

NEGLECTED TRAINING

LITTLE ART AND MUSIC IN SCHOOLS CAUSE FOR CONCERN ifi'rom Our Resident Reporter .) WELLINGTON, Friday. Neglect of the teaching of art and music in the secondary schools of the Dominion is giving grounds for grave concern. This, in effect, is the report of a special committee of the Council of Education.

At the last meeting of the council a motion was passed urging instru* tion in these two subjects. It wag not made clear whether the council intended that these two aesthetic subjects should be compulsory should merely form an optional past of the curriculum. The committee set up by the con* cil reported to-day as follows: “The information supplied by the inspector shows good ground for concern as to the neglect of these subjects, notably in some of our largest schools, where the opportunities for this instruction should be most readily available. The committee is, however, opposed to making such instruction compulsory but recommend that principals should be strongly urged to utilise every op* portunity for: (a) Both community and class singing; (b) instruction to musical appreciation; (c> instruction in such branches of art as will serve to influence the imagination and the feeling as well as to develop the coordination of hand and eye; (d) tbei teachers be encouraged to specialien in these subjects, and that with this end in view facilities be given to st» dents in training colleges after completion of the regular course to r* ceive special instruction in either music or art.”