FACTS OF THE WAR

Wairarapa Times-Age, 9 July 1940, Page 4

FACTS OF THE WAR

PRESENTATION TO CHILDREN TEACHERS AND THE SPIRIT OF DEMOCRACY. ADDRESS BY MINISTER OF. EDUCATION. (By Telegraph—Press Association.) WELLINGTON, This Day. The influence of the war on the classroom was discussed by the Minister of Education, Mr Mason, in an address last night. He said the modern school was too closely in touch with real life to let the teacher ignore the war altogether. He could not go on teaching the usual school subjects and pretend that the war did not exist. It would break in on his work in a score of ways—in the teaching of history and geography, in the morning talks, in casual contacts with pupils throughout the day. No matter how much he tried to keep out of it the teacher would be drawn into discussions about the war. The Minister said it. was the teacher’s business to present the truth in such a way that it would be understood by children of the age he was dealing with. Therein lay his skill as a teacher. He must choose his facts and words in such a way that it was practically impossible for his children to msiunderstand, and he must assure himself that they had not misunderstood. That was not easy. The very essence of democracy was the clash of opinion, the weighing of points view.

PRESENTATION TO CHILDREN NEED OF CRITICAL ABILITY.

A child could not be prepared for adult life in a democracy simply by hiding from him that differences of opinion existed. Children must have their critical abilities trained, they must have cool judgment that would enable them to see through false arguments and mass propaganda, they must learn to reject all that was shoddy and cheap, while they still respected • the honest differences of opinion that inevitably arose in a free community. “We live in an age in which it seems to be a popular occupation to depreciate everybody and everything," said Mr Mason. “This tendency shows itself sometimes in our estimate of the peoples of the various nations. It is a good thing to cultivate the spirit of brotherhood toward all nations, and to have a proper respect for everything in them which is worthy of respect, and by no means to despise them as being beneath us. There are two fundamental emotions —love and hate. Depreciation rarely, indeed, can be said to have in it the quality of love. If, therefore, we accept the saying. ‘God is Love,’ we shall see virtue in honouring the good in all nations, and not least in our own. “Our children must learn that the differences of opinion that occur in this or any other democracy are only superficial, and that underneath there lies a common purpose—the safeguarding of all that is best in our democratic ways of life, the freedom, the tolerance, the justice, the rights of the common man. I never want to see our schools made places of propaganda, but it is no propaganda to instil into every child in every possible way a deep and living faith in these great human values. It is no propaganda to tell him and tell him again that the great Empire to which we belong is based on these ideals.

“It would appear that the Nazis have managed to develop in a proportion of the German youth an almost fanatical faith in their leader and their system of government. God forbid that we should ever try to imitate their dreadful methods or to achieve the same results, but the democracies cannot afford to let their children grow up without faith in their own race and country, for that faith is the root source of the nation’s power for either peace of war.” SALUTING THE FLAG. Mr Mason said there had been some talk of late of daily or weekly saluting of the flag as a method of generating patriotism. ■He hoped he should not be misunderstood when he said that he personally had very grave doubts whether that method would de what it was intended to do. It was a fine thing that children should respee ; the flag as the symbol of all the ideal:-' of the British Empire, but he wondered if saluting it as a matter of daily routine would not rather tend to dull the emotion that should be aroused by such a ceremony. The salute the flat or perform any other ceremony fr mark a special occasion could make an impression that might last through life; to do the same thing daily might reduce it to an effortless drill that demanded no attention and aroused nc I feeling. It was his respect for the flag that made him fear to see the honourI ing of it become a meaningless habit "I know,” said Mr Mason, "that some may disagree with me on this, and I respect their point of view, because J know that, however we may differ a'' to the methods to be adopted all of uconcerned wtih education in New Zealand must agree that the present struggle of the Empire will be in vain unless we can make our children believe that the things we are fighting for art worth while, and unless we can pre pare them in our homes and in ou' I schools to build anew, when the fight ing is done, a world where tolerance and justice and the quiet virtues of peace can be taken for granted."