A CENTURY OF EDUCATION

New Zealand Listener, Volume 5, Issue 113, 22 August 1941, Page 12

A CENTURY OF EDUCATION

EDUCATING NEW ZEALAND. By A. E. Campbell. Centennial Surveys issued by the Department of Internal Affairs. Printed by Whitcombe and Tombs. (Reviewed by H. C. D. SOMERSET) SYSTEM of education in line with the best thought on the subject, lively enough to keep pace with the growing needs of the community, and at the same time capable of giving to everyone ‘the means of enjoying a life of creative activity, is one of the essentials of democracy generally conceded but seldom understood. The breakdown of democracy in Europe in recent years has called for a re-valuation of principles; and systems of education have been subjected to a considerable amount of criti-cism-most of it misinformed. In view of these facts the Centennial survey, Educating New Zealand, is most timely in its appearance, The book was begun by Dr. C. E. Beeby, who decided to relinquish the task through pressure of work after he was appointed Director of Education. A. E. Campbell, who took

over the book before the first chapter was completed, has succeeded in telling, in the short space of less than 200 pages, the essential story of education in New Zealand. " A Happy Choice " It was a happy choice that gave A. E. Campbell charge of this work. A teacher himself, and son of a teacher, he has lived in an atmosphere charged with the problems of education. Since graduating from Victoria College and Wellington Training College he has successively taught in schools, edited National Education, and has held the post of University Lecturer in Education, In 1939 he was appointed to his present ' position as Director of the New Zealand Council for Educational Research. _ The book gives a clear picture of the ‘main features of education in this country; but it does a great deal more. It would have been all too easy’ to write something of a guide-book to education with eulogistic passages befitting a Centennial. Far from doing this, however, Mr. Campbell kas made for us an original ‘contribution to social history by relating ‘the story of the schools to the larger story of New Zealand colonisation. The book has a clear-cut thesis which may be expressed briefly as follows. Upon the infant settlement-itself a product of nineteenth century industrialismeperated two forces, one historical and the other geagraphical. The geography of the new land dictated new methods of work, so the colonist became adaptable and welcomed change. With new ways of work, however, went a nostalgia for the customs of the land which set its stamp on social life and profoundly affected our educational system. Let me quote from the first chapter: ", .. the historical principle of maintaining cultural continuity played a greater part in forming the educational system in New Zealand than did the geographical principle of adaptation to a new environment." . English and Scottish Influence The book is an essay on this theme. The author shows how our system of education was influenced by the English and Scottish systems-both of them

academic in outlook: Writing of the eighteen nineties he says, "You have a country just emerging from the pioneering stage, a country proud of its practicality and adaptability, a country already describing itself as ‘The social laboratory of the world.’ Its education, you may think, will be close to the concrete, absorbed in the present, rather boyishly experimental. What you find is just the reverse: practical classes for young adolescents are relatively few and have been established in the face of general opposition and _ indifference, while the great bulk of the secondary school population are engaged-and, it is widely believed, very properly en-gaged-in attempting to master chilly intellectual abstractions.’"’ He shows this principle at work in primary and secondary schools and in the University; he pays a tribute to George Hogben who became Inspector General of Schools in 1899 and initiated a new era by his’ liberal syllabus of instruction of 1904 no less than by his creation of the Technical. School, so ably developed by La Trobe and Howell. The Technical School and some few experiments in adult education constitute the main developments of the system that are peculiarly our own. Mr. Campbell’s style is crystal-clear throughout, and the bcok is filled with passages of rare critical insight. It is an essay in educational thought and does not pretend to be exhaustive in treatment; but it shows in no uncertain way whence our educational ideas came and the direction in which we are moving. It should be read by every parent in New Zealand, every teacher, school-commit-teeman and Member of Parliament.