February* 19, 1920] 



NATURE 



669 



THE SECONDARY SCHOOL 

 CURRICULUM.^ 



THE Secondary School Examinations Council 

 is an august body the members of which 

 have for the most part more experience of uni- 

 versity work and of administration than of secon- 

 dary schools. The council was therefore well 

 advised in selecting, for the investigation of the 

 methods and standards of award of the seven 

 approved first examinations, " panels " of experi- 

 enced teachers. These have now made their 

 reports, which are published for the information 

 of all concerned. The conclusions reached are 

 not so startling as to make the non-committal 

 preface appear necessary in the eyes of a school- 

 master. 



The mathematical investigators in particular 

 have not exceeded their terms of reference, though 

 a hint is thrown out that the present forms of 

 compulsion may require revision. Thus 



"elementary mathematics should include arith- 

 metic " seems a harmless proposition. To some 

 examining bodies, however, "elementary mathe- 

 matics " means algebra and geometry, and is not 

 compulsory. Later there follows the sentence : 

 " So long as mathematics is a compulsory subject 

 for exemption purposes, the present standards for 

 credit cannot well be raised, but they are in them- 

 selves unsatisfactory." It may be inferred that 

 compulsory algebra is viewed with disfavour, a 

 view which is shared by many examiners who 

 have realised the appalling waste of time involved 

 for half the boys and girls who try to learn 

 algebra without attaining the power or even the 

 need to apply it in the simplest way. Compulsory 

 arithmetic is much more defensible, and it is a 

 pity that the investigators have not maintained a 

 clearer distinction between the two. In geometry 

 it is recommended that the theorems on congru- 

 ence of triangles, parallel lines, and angles round 

 a point (i.e. Euc. i. 4, 8, 26; 27, 28, 29, 32; 13, 

 14, 15) should be omitted. We may infer that 

 only the proofs of these theorems are indicated, 

 and that the enunciations {pace Einstein) are to 

 be assumed. 



The science investigators have had to cover a 

 wider field and to consider a greater variety of 

 practice on the part of the different examining 

 bodies. Thus in one examination a paper is set 

 on "Elementary General Science," covering a very 

 elementary treatment of heat, hydrostatics, 

 chemistry, and botany, this paper having been 

 recently introduced for the benefit of rural secon- 

 dary schools. The "panel" is of opinion that 

 further investigation of this general science work 

 is particularly desirable. We may remark here 

 that it would greatly help the movement if speci- 

 men copies of the paper referred to could be circu- 

 lated among teachers and examining bodies. To 

 quote the report: "The examination, like the syl- 



1 Secondary Scho-*! Examinations Council. Reports of the Investigators 

 Appointed to inqitire into the M^-thods and Standards of Award in the 

 Seven Approved First Examinations held in July, 1918. Group 1., English, 

 History. Geography : t-rice 6</. Group II., Classics, Modern Languages; 

 price 4(/. Group IIT , Mathematics, Science; price 4</. (H.M. Stationery 

 Office. 



NO. 2625, VOL. 104] 



labus in the schools up to the sixteen-year-old 

 stage, should be suited to the capacity of the 

 average pupil of sixteen, should cover a reason- 

 ably wide range, and should not encourage instead 

 advanced work within a limited field. Further, 

 it should not be confined to an abstract and 

 academic treatment of the subject, but should 

 require a knowledge of the applications of the 

 sciences to everyday life. It must be remembered 

 that at this age pupils obtain far more value from 

 a concrete than from an abstract treatment of 

 science, and this should be borne in mind both 

 in drawing up a syllabus and in setting a paper. 

 The investigators direct attention in this con- 

 nection to the observations contained in para- 

 graphs 47, 50, and 51 of the Report of the Govern- 

 ment Committee on .Science." Most teachers of 

 science in schools will assent to this. The genera- 

 tion of science masters who began their science 

 at the university is rapidly passing away. On 

 them must partly rest the responsibility for the 

 effort which has been made in the last thirty years 

 to impart an appreciation of " scientific method " 

 to boys at too early a stage. Now they are being 

 followed by a generation of teachers who may 

 have begun the systematic study of science at the 

 age of twelve, and in some cases find themselves 

 deficient in literary attainments. An undergradu- 

 ate starting on geometrical optics is at a disad- 

 vantage if he has never handled lenses or prisms 

 in such a way as to know their peculiarities; but 

 if he has done this, and knows the meaning of 

 the words used, he need not have been through 

 a. prolonged course of optical measurements, nor 

 need he belong to the class of natural science 

 students who come up "knowing how to measure 

 every physical quantity, but with no ardent desire 

 to measure any." 



It mav be remarked here that "general 

 science " is no more than a branch of English, and 

 that its teaching implies the demonstration to the 

 various senses of the meaning of a number of 

 English words. This has evidently been realised 

 by the " panel " of geographers, whose remarks 

 are worthy of quotation. They "are of opinion 

 that geography should be a subject in Group I. ; 

 but they are of opinion that it should be a subject 

 in Groiip III. also." Geography, in other words, 

 is not only a branch of English, but also a branch 

 of science. This is a bold saying, and it may 

 possibly account for the cautious prefatory state- 

 ment : " It must not be assumed that either the 

 council or the board are at present committed to 

 any or all of the suggestions." If geography is 

 to belong to two groups, why not also general 

 science? And why .should not algebra find a place 

 among the foreign languages? The insidious sug- 

 gestion might lead to the collapse of all the walls 

 of partition and to the survival of English as the 

 one essential subject, as seen in a vision by Sir 

 Arthur Quiller-Couch. For the investigators in 

 English report thus : " They are of opinion that 

 (in the interests of the language and of lucidity 

 of expression) a reasonable standard of English 

 should be_ required in all subjects of the examina- 



