PRESIDEKT's address — SECTION J. 709 



Tise of language has been to express the individual facts and experi- 

 ences. If he stops there his vision is limited ; he cannot see the unseen 

 that lies beyond the bounds of concrete experience. He fails to grasp 

 wide generalisations. His mind is littered, and arrangement is neces- 

 .".ary. The inductive process is now to be given a chance to turn the 

 littered work-chamber of the mind into a well-ordered laboratory, to 

 make, as the author already quoted expresses it, " terms exactly con- 

 terriiinous with thoughts, and thoughts conterminous with facts." As 

 variety is the keynote of the primary course, exactness, precision, 

 thoroughness, should direct the aims and methods of the secondary 

 school. This being so, it is here rather than in the primaiy course 

 that the curriculum is in danger of being overloaded with too many 

 subjects. In the secondary school the need for thoroughness of 

 mastery entails a limitation in the mmiber of subjects studied. This 

 type of school should, however, be further differentiated from the 

 primary school by the attitude of its students. Instead of the pupil 

 instructed by his teacher, he should be more of a student guided by 

 his teacher. It is a noticeable fact that in our Universities a large 

 number of first-year undergraduates fail to satisfy their examiners at 

 the end of that year. It is well that the student who shows himself 

 unfit for the higher portions of his University course should be 

 " plucked " in his first year. But, after all, tliis is the remedy for an 

 evil that should be prevented. The causes should be removable. One 

 cause may possibly be found in the failure of a University entrance 

 examination to guarantee an adequate preparation on the pari: of the 

 student. The examination is not a sufficient test of an educated mind. 

 It needs to be supplemented by applying the same principle of 

 " graduation " to the student of the secondaiy school that is applied to 

 the undergraduate of the Universitj'. An academic degree is conferred 

 by the University upon the student who has not merely passed a final 

 examination but who has " graduated " through his courses. If the 

 doors of the University were open to those who had not merely pre- 

 pared for a final examination, but had in a similar definite way 

 " graduated " through the secondary school, there would be the less 

 need for '"plucking" in the first year at the higher institution. 

 Anothei- cause is doubtless found in the sharp transition of the 

 student from the dependent and externally controlled attitude which 

 the secondary school imposes on him to the self-dependence and free- 

 dom which University life allows to him. The remedy for this touches 

 an important principle in secondary education, and one which does not 

 yet find sufficient application in practice. The student should as he 

 passes through this stage of his education be thrown more upon his 

 own resources. The laboratory method that is now gaining a footing 

 in the teaching of science should be applied to other subjects of the 

 school course. The student, especially in the latter part of his course, 

 should pass much of his time in personal investigation into the subject 

 .of his study. The school library may be as much a laboratory as the 

 chemistry room. The adoption of this principle involves a much 

 more liberal equipment than is usually found in secondary schools, 

 but its value for practical efficiency fully justifies liberality in this 

 direction. To the student passing on to the University the transition 

 from such a secondary-school atmosphere would be less likely to make 

 him a first-vear derelict. 



