' Spitting ' in the Schools.

New Zealand Tablet, Volume XXX, Issue 12, 20 March 1902, Page 2

' Spitting ' in the Schools.

Everybody nowadays recognises how greatly the spread of disease —and especially of the dreaded scourge, consumption—is promoted by the foolish practice of indiscriminate expectoration and there is a general and most laudable movement amongst public bodies in the direction of taking definite and vigorous steps towards putting down the evil. Only the other day the Dunedin City Council formally confirmed a byelaw prohibiting expectoration in the streets, and it is gratifying to have the Mayor's assurance that the bye-law has already brought about a considerable abatement of the nuisance. The anti-expectoration movement is now being taken up by our education authorities and there is some indication that the Otago public schools at least will have undergone quite a little revolution by the end of the year. The Inspectors of the Otago Board are at present making their annual 'surprise' visits to the various schools, and they are, we understand, putting down with a very firm hand the time-honored but undoubtedly dirty method of cleaning the children's slates by spitting on them. On no account, so the teachers are given to understand, will the practice be tolerated for the future, and no matter what amount of trouble or inconvenience it may involve the children are at all costs to be provided with water with which to clean their slates. The change, salutary though it is, certainly does occasion some little inconvenience and one result is that in many country districts when the school tank has run dry there may be seen the novel spectacle of a couple of happy youngsters toddling off with a pail to the nearest stream (often some distance away) to get a supply of the water which is now an indispensable requisite for ' a clean slate.'

The immediate occasion of the action of the Inspectors is not without its droll side. It appeals that in some of the country schools it is a custom with the teacher who is in charge of the younger children to get them to write a ' copy ' of their own on their slates, and then, in the case of the very young children, the teacher breathes on the slate and gets the children to clean it, after which she substitutes for the child's copy a proper head-line written by herself. The story goes that not very long ago one of the Inspectors was making a surprise visit to a far away country school and was engaged in watching the"work of the Infant room when up came a little girl who, handing over her slate to the teacher, innocently said, ' Please, ma'am, will you " hoo " on my slate,' and the unsuspecting and unsophisticated school-ma'am promptly and vigorously ' hood ' on the slate under the very nose of the surprised Inspector. Exactly what was said on the occasion is not reported, but since then the use of water has been insisted on for slate cleaning purposes. As we have said this step is undoubtedly in the right direction and we commend the matter to the practical attention of all who are concerned in the teaching of our Catholic schools.