CORRESPONDENCE

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LIII, Issue 15, 11 October 1910, Page 7

CORRESPONDENCE

JUVENILE DISCIPLINE. 1 To the Editor,. Sir,—Though 1 cannot duplicate the ' truant boy incident which "Parent" calls in question, yi. 1 think I can match it. * On a country .oad one morning I saw three tearful b,/s trudging along in com--3 i>anv with a mudle-aged man who carried * m his hand a short piece of supplejack. They went up to two men who were , working on the road at repairing work C and my ears heard an apology from the J boys for some rudeness offered to those men whilst going to school the previous 3 day. "\Mhat those tears and that supple-; r jack meant I leave you to conjecture, J but those boys, now grown to manhood, ' are rapidly climbing to the top of their ' respective professions ,and respected by all who know them. Moreover, I call I that parent not "stern," but sensible, ' .wise and self-respecting. If I may, I would like to thank you for your occa--1 sional and timely strictures on the laxity I and almost absence of parental control J in our day. I trust that we shall yet * see a return to a more sane (estimate of ' parental duty and responsibility, and that [ such old-fashioned virtues as modesty, j I reverence and self-control will once more ! be in the ascendant and take their pro- ' per place in the mental make-up of our people.— i am, etc., ' ANOTHER PARENT. SPARING THE ROD. To the Editor. Sir,—Your leaderette on this caption ' sets one thinking. Why is it necessary I to have so much rod for 'boys—and for ' men, too? It is, I fear, paucity of re--1 source; men want to do something or to have something done and know no other war than "I'll make you, then." This ' is how that phrase came to me many ' years ago, and I think your readers will see the mistake that underlies it. I knew an Irishman and his wife in the early days of Fenianism. He went to a meeting—of course in the "pub"—and they were hot Fenians. With something hotter still in his system he came home full of zeal for the great propaganda and accosted his wife, to make of her his first convert. "Are you a Fenian 1" he asked. "No," she said; "and I never mean to be," "I'll ma'ke you, then," said he, and at ones knocked her down. Poor fellow, that was the ibest argument he knew of, the best way of making Fenians. Now how about the boys? The school teacher says, figuratively to the scholars, "Are you good children?" and then, not being satisfied he or she proceeds in the Irishman's fashion, somewhat modified, to make them. It is the same way in many other spheres of social life. Men feel, "and feel rightly, that under every good work—or bad work, too, for that matter —there must be some force, some compelling, or impelling force to make tilings move; then for want of something better they resort to physical force. Sir, I am not going to lecture; I am only going to state a few facts and then leave your readers to draw their own conclusions. I am fond of visiting schools, and so on my travels I visited schools in London, Canada and the United States. Some were good, some indifferent in my estimation. In London tiiey were very good, orderly, bright and keenly attentive. There was very little of the "rod," but at was not absolutely prohibited. It was in the days of the London School Boards, and their regulations required a punishment book to be kept, in which had to be recorded all cases where corporal punishment was resorted to. The headmaster kept the book and when an under-teacher needed it he sent for it, administered the castigation, made the entry in the book, and returned it to the headmaster, who initialled it. All that was too much trouble to be often gone through, an:l, moreover, it gave time for hasty feelings to cool down. At another time I visited schools in New Hampshire, U.S.A., Some were decidedly free and easy, though nothing really bad. I found one school that was a model for good order, attention to work and cheerfulness. I talked with the headmaster, and asked him about punishments in his well-ordered school. He said that he had used no corporal punishment for six years. I saw no need for any, neither in his room nor in the room for his assistants, which I also visited. I visited many others, not for the purpose of enquiring about their supply of canes or taws, but for another altogether different purpose. In all I found this: that the best teachers used the least cane and got the best work. Quite recently, too, I was discussing this point with the head teacher of a large school in the Dominion, and he did not propose to bann the cane in all cases; but he said that he felt and thought that the use of that instrument of instruction was a sign of weakness in the teacher, and for his own part he made very little use of it; and when he did use it he felt that it was a reflection on himself. Eternal vigilance is the remedy. Your remarks on th. • rude message boys are no doubt true, but the rod is not what is wanted to '.eich them bettor; they want a better example from their el'ers. How many manual laborers are at the same time 'gentlemen? Some are, and such are a real pleasure to meet. The misfortune is that so many confound things; they mistake civility for servility and manliness for boorishness. Then I said no lecturing, so I close and hope vou will excuse me so far.—l am, etc., ' G.H.M.