PRESIDEXTIAL ADDRESS. — SECTION" III. 45 



his best endeavours to get a school on or near his own farm. Added 

 to this was a natural anxiety on the part of parents in being required 

 to entrust their children to the care of irresponsible persons for a 

 great part of the day, and possibly during inclement weather. In 

 America, however, such short-sighted opposition has been gradually 

 overcome, as experience has shown that with the exercise of reason- 

 able care there need be no danger to the children. 



One of the most important advantages of such central schools 

 consists in the possibility of obtaining suitable sites and accom- 

 modation, of improving the quality of the teaching, and of modify- 

 ing and adapting the curriculum to the needs of the pupils. 



As regards the question of sites and accommodation, a suitable 

 piece of ground — not less than two morgen, which is the size 

 stipulated for in this Colony when a new township is granted — 

 should be selected. The site should be formally transferred to 

 Government or to the local authority. Care should be taken 

 that an adequate supply of water should be available, not only 

 for household purposes, but also for the school garden and for 

 experimental nature study. Suitable buildings of a simple kind 

 would have to be erected, including a dwelling house for the Prin- 

 cipal as well as any necessarj^ quarters for assistant teachers, and 

 probably also, in some cases, for boarders. I em.phasise the necessity 

 for dwelling houses being provided for the tea.chers, as it is only 

 in this way that they can retain that position of independence 

 and self-respect which will enable them to exercise strict control 

 over their pupils and to be a source of moral influence in the district. 

 In small country schools where the building belongs to the farmer, 

 and where the teacher is perforce an inmate of his house and often 

 little better than a retainer, there is too frequently absent that 

 feeling of security and independence which is so essential for genuine 

 work and for the inculcation of the first attributes of character. 



The question of curriculum is one which is constantly discussed 

 and about which there is a great diversity of opinion. Some writers 

 press for an education of a utilitarian kind, closely and specifically 

 adapted to the requirements of everyday life. In their view the 

 children should be taught to realise that schools and schooling 

 are things that enter into the fibre of their ordinary lives, and 

 that what they learn in school is directly applicable to their daily 

 surroundings. They maintain that it is in this way that the 

 children get their truest education, and not by philosophical or 

 psychological methods, or — as it has recently been described— 

 " by sitting in benches and being pumped at by some outsider." 

 Others again constantly decry against such a training, which they 

 consider to be the outcome of purely economic and consequently 

 uneducational demands on the part of parents and employers. 

 These insist that intellectual and cultural training should be first 

 considered, and that any specialisation of even a minor character 

 should be reserved until the later stages of school life. 



The true path probably lies between. As Dr. ]\Iuir states in the 

 report from which I have already quoted : 



" The subject is often discussed as it the only question at issue was the old 

 dispute as to whether considerations of practical utility or a high ideal of human 



