EDUCATION COMMISSION

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LIV, Issue 289, 3 June 1912, Page 5

EDUCATION COMMISSION

AGRICULTURAL CLASSES. By Telegraph—Press Association. Wellington, Saturday. ■ When the Education Commission met'

to-day the following motion was adopted " That respectful representations be ' made to the Minister of Education for ' the necessary authority to visit.the following towns in addition to those men- J tioned in the order of reference,: New .; Plymouth, Wanganui, Napier, Blenheim, - Nelson, Greymouth, Ilokitika, T imaru and Invercargill. • " j (Inspector-General Hogben continued ihia evidence. He emphasised the need'. 1 for more mature study, and stressed tl»e importance of teaching agriculture in schools and at continuation classes in,, country districts. English should alao > be taught at continuation classes in : the country. If they wanted people in the country they had to make country , life more attractive, and if people in j the country could be interested in their j own literature the teaching-of English ] would be a means to an <snd. Pupils J attending these classes would be from sixteen to nineteen years of age, la the .1) past, efforts to get pupils to agricultural t classes had not been very successful, j and, generally speaking, the greatest dif- J ficulty was the lethargy of the farwiflipi community itself. Primary, high and 4 district schools should work together in \ the teaching of agriculture, becauae i separate buildings could not be pro- i vided. 'I