THE TRAININC; OF !■ ITTEK-API-KKNTICES. 415 



training has been felt by those larger private [non-govern- 

 mental] industrial concerns. Thus, the firm of Siemens and 

 Halske make the following statement in their training scheme 

 for their apprentices : — 



" By a strictly methodical, from easy to difficult, gradually progressive 

 plan of work, the apprentices are so far advanced after one year that 

 they can immediately proceed to a suitable workshop to be made quite 

 efficient."' 



Similarly, the apparatus works of the General Electric Com- 

 pany have arranged a course of training for their apprentices' 

 workshop in which the individual carrying-out of practical tests 

 is worked out. From an inspection of their plan of instruction, 

 it is evident that the course is made gradually to increase in 

 difficulty and, above all. instruction in machinery is given special 

 attention. 



It is. therefore, recommended that the course of training 

 in the apprentices" workshop should not be left to the choice 

 of the instructor. I have drawn up for the workshops at Guben 

 a series of practical exercises, covering various points [in train- 

 ing]. At the end of each half-year, and only when he has com- 

 pleted these exercises, the apprentice may be allowed to assist 

 with other work. There is, then, a guarantee that he has really 

 been instructed in all the branches of his trade as required by 

 the regulations. 



For practical instruction in the third and four years^^ of 

 training, courses in the following departments of the workshops 

 are prescribed : — 



(i) Locksmiths' shops ;^^ (ii) brazing shop ;^* (iii) brass 

 foundry; (iv) mechanics' shops ;^^ (v) at various machine tools ; 

 (vi) vehicles; (vii) forge; (viii) locomotive shop.^" 



The eight departments in which it is laid down that the 

 apprentice shall be instructed are not all of equal importance 

 to his future career. For instanqe, in the brazing shop and the 

 brass foundry, in the turners' shop and at the forge, work is done 

 which a locksmith [for example] later hardly ever has to 

 carry out. It is not, however, advisable to cut short the instruc- 

 tion of the apprentice at this point. ^'^ In one of the large prin- 

 cipal workshops, the apprentices, not long ago, were employed 

 for a month each in the brazing shop and brass foundry, three 

 months in the mechanics' shop, and six months in the carriage 

 shop. This arrangement [of time] is wasteful, and is not 

 without prejudice to the training [of the] apprentice, [especially] 

 as the apprentice is given [on] the same [kind of] work during 

 the whole of the time in the locomotive department [the fourth 

 and last year]. In order that the apprentices may obtain a 

 thorough and regular training, it is advisable that two months 

 only should be spent in the locksmiths' department, one month 

 [each] in the brazing shop and brass foundry, and three months 

 only in the coach-building shop. 



c 



