THE Wairarapa Age MORNING DAILY. WEDNESDAY SEPTEMBER 18 1912 A REVOLUTION IN EDUCATION.

Wairarapa Age, Volume XXXII, Issue 10712, 18 September 1912, Page 4

THE Wairarapa Age MORNING DAILY. WEDNESDAY SEPTEMBER 18 1912 A REVOLUTION IN EDUCATION.

While wo in'.New Zealand are disc~>~\".'\cr the question of a reform in our educational system, Italy, Switzerland, and other countries are putting revolutionary reforms into practice. Maria Montessori, an Italian physician'and teacher, lias introduced a system for imparting instruction to the young: which appears to be far in advance of the froebel system. The

Minister of Education in New -South Wales is- giving it a trial, and already remarkable results have been attained. Briefly, the system comprises .an appeal to the intelligence of the infant child/ through the sense of touch. 11 a Montessori school there are no benches or desks, but. instead, little armchairs which the children may drag about wherever they wish. The teacher's do not object even if the children pit or lie oil the floor. .No coercion is used. No task is imposed. !Tot even regular

hours are insisted upon ; but it is the ■traintkli. Tlier;* arc. colour games to so interesting that every child will want to com? and will want to stay. The are conducted with special' apparatus invented by Madame Moutessori. There are pieces of cardlward, sntin and sandpiper through which the sense of touch is trained. T here are colour games to plav with, and -little puzzles in the tying of knots and bows. For' the older children there are geometric designs and sand-paper letters pasted on blocks. To put it in popular phraseology the Moutessori system is "seme

training," embracing practical life exercises, wherebv the child is taught the value of touch, in conjunction with other senses. ' This sense of touch is the underlying principle which governs all mental impressions. Tn learning to rend, instead of droning out daily A B C. as in the old wav, the child is blindfolded, and ■each one has its own linen eye band, and has put before it a card on which has l)ee,n pasted a letter cut out in sand-paper. The only guide the child has is its sense of touch, and; whilst familianV ing itself with the name of the letter, the teacher orally gives the phonetic sound, tlmy accomplishing word-build-ing. • This plan i* a rapid one, a child being known to learn to spell 50 worcta in a -fortnight. The same sense

of touch is applied in ccrting fabric, a lesion consisting of correctly arranged bundles of sample pieces of velvet, -silk, satin, cotten, plush, leather and wool. All this i"r> done blindfolded, and d.:ily the teachers, as "-ell as the scholars discover tho infallibility of the sense of touch. .