The Mechanical Age

Radio Record, Volume II, Issue 14, 19 October 1928, Page 12

The Mechanical Age

RE we mechanising our children? In these days of complicated mechanical toys and mechanical amusements the thoughtful mother is con fronted with another problem-will her child’s imagination be impaired or will it be stimulated by so much machin ery? The Hon. Mrs. St. Aubyn gives the following views on this important sub ject :-- WE have all of us heard the story of the child who broke a watch in order to see the wheels go round,

and we have all been warned how destructive boys can be. But I have a-shrewd suspicion that no little boys now break watches in order to see the works, because we train our children from babyhood onwards to understand how toys work and to put things to gether-it is an age of constructive. not destructive, teaching. I olden days the only toys were rag and sticks As civilisation advanced and life became more complieated, so did the toys. The plain wooden dolls, to be seen at museums, were replaced by Dutch dolls with movable legs, rag dolls, wax dolls, china dolls, celluoid dolls, and, final ly, washable composition dolls. Animals varied from woolly ones to grotesque ones. Educational methods then suggested a need for constructional toys. From that. evolved jig-

saw puzzles and elaborate mechanical engines. 1 addition to his constructive toys the modern child is educated at his first school to use his fingers and his brain. his co-ordination of mind and muscle is taught in our nursery schools to children of even two years old. The child, therefore, has fingers he has learnt to control, a mind with which he has been trained to think things out, and toys through which he has been taught how to put things together. N these days cars are cleaned at home, also repaired. Cogs, wheels, electricity and wireless are a main topic of conversation, and to keep the child quiet he is given boxes of toys consisting of these wheels, cogs, screws and spare parts, and, assisted by his enthusiastic parents, is enDabled to build and design houses and engines, in fact, to become an amateur engineer before he has left the nursery. T'HE nursery itself, apart from the tops, has this mechanical note running through it, such as an electric fire or electric iron, cots which screw and unscrew and need washers. Labour-saving devices and patent gadgets are adjuncts of the modern nurSery: At very many children’s parties kinemas are a favourite amusement. The shop windows are full of mechanical toys and the streets of mechanically propelled engines. In fact, life for us and our children is undoubtedly to a great extent mechanised. Will this mechanical age kill the child’s imagination or merely stimulate it to further creation? "THE child who is unimaginative without doubt is assisted to use his thoughts to some practical end. Whether, however, this mechanical age will produce the type of mind from which emanates literature-the type mind which is above pure mechanics -still remains to be seen.