_ Against this principle we protest. 
already exist. 
NATURE 
S09 
v 
THURSDAY, OCTOBER 27, 1870 
== 
THE REPRESENTATION OF SCIENCE AT 
THE SCHIOL BOARD 
N impression seems to prevail that only those persons 
should be placed on the Metropolitan School Board 
who are already acquainted with the details of education. 
We hope the new 
schools will be great improvements upon those which 
When we are told by the Bishop of Man- 
chester that a third of these schools only are efficient, 
that a third are inefficient, and that a third are wholly 
useless, if not pernicious, it is high time that the whole 
system should be looked into by those who will come fresh 
to the inquiry, unencumbered with the ideas that have 
led to such disastrous results. We think, then, the 
_ public should look to that instructed body of men who 
_ are known as cultivators of science to represent them on 
the London School Board. Already we are glad to see 
signs that the class of persons we have named have found 
favour in the eyes of London electors. The selection of 
Professor Huxley and Dr. Elizabeth Garrett, as candi- 
dates for Marylebone, is highly creditable to that dis- 
trict of the metropolis ; but their hands must be upheld 
by a very much larger number of candidates, if common 
sense and intelligence are to prevail at the councils of 
the School Board. 
The points to which we think the earliest attention of 
the School Board ought to be directed, and in which men 
of science are likely to give the greatest assistance, are 
the following :— 
1. The sanitary condition of the schools—It is well 
known that in many cases our schools are foci of con- 
tagion, and the means of spreading contagious diseases. 
Children are frequently sent to school, not only from 
families where contagious diseases are present, but actually 
with disease upon them. No trouble should be spared to 
prevent this, and if necessary a short clause should be 
added by Act of Parliament to the Education Act, in order 
to punish those who in this way are the means of spread- 
ing around the destructive diseases. Nor is this all that 
is required. The school-rooms should be well ventilated, 
clean, and not overcrowded. Every Government school 
should be placed under the superintendence of the medi- 
cal officer of health of the district in which it is placed, 
and he should report periodically to the School Board on 
the state of the school and on any departure from sanitary 
rules. Cleanliness should especially be encouraged and 
insisted on amongst the children attending the school, and 
if no means exist at home, baths and lavatories should be 
provided at the schools. 
2. The times of study.—lIt is a fact well known to the 
physiologist, that the attention of the human mind can 
only be given with success to a particular subject for a 
limited time. The younger the brain is, the less the time 
during which knowledge can be taken in or retained. 
In opposition to these obvious facts, children are kept at 
their studies or in school for much longer periods than 
they can successfully learn. The consequence is that they 
remain in the close school-room whilst they ought to have 
been in the yard at play. This system is doubly wasteful, 
VOL. IT. 
, to be revised in our primary schools. 
| prosperously will they do their work. 
| for both health and learning are sacrificed. The whole 
system of hours of study, and of play or of work, requires 
The importance of 
play-grounds in the open air can hardly be overrated. It 
is only the practical physiologist who can appreciate the 
real value of muscular exercise, and the influence of fresh 
air from time to time during the day, to enable children 
to pursue their studies with success. 
3. The course of studies to be pursued.—Here is 
where the Augean stable of a past education needs to be 
purified. The notion that when a child has learned to 
read, write, and cipher, he is educated, must be eradi- 
cated. These are at best but means, and are only the 
instruments by which education is conducted. It will be 
for the man of science to show his colleagues on the 
School Board that perhaps the better half of a liberal 
eduction may be obtained without books at all. This is 
the error that lies at the foundation of all our systems 
of education, whether conducted in our highest, middle- 
class, or national schools. The education of the senses 
by which the man is to get his living and to perform 
his duties in life is entirely neglected. Where attempts 
have been made to introduce the study of the natural 
sciences, it has been done solely by the aid of books, and not 
with that demonstration of the facts to the senses which 
is the only way in which such knowledge can be made 
useful. In a word, henceforward there must bea Portion 
of every day taken up with teaching children by objects, 
specimens, or experiments, the nature of the great laws 
by which the universe is governed. We cannot argue 
here on the necessity for this knowledge. Look at that 
great German army, recently spoken of as the most won- 
derful military engine ever seen on the face of the earth, 
What makes itso? The intelligence of each individual 
of which it is composed. It is the same with wheels and 
pistons, spindles, hammers, chisels, and ploughs, as with 
guns and bayonets : the more intelligent the man is who 
wields or superintends them, the more successfully and 
Ten years ago 
Mr. Whitworth astonished the Manchester manufacturers 
with the account of the machines he had seen in America, 
“Why should we not have such machines here?” said 
the Manchester men. “ Because,” said Mr. Whitworth, 
“you have not intelligent hands to work them.” And for 
these long ten years we have gone on talking about edu- 
cating our working classes, and allowing priceless treasures 
to pass out of our hands. Every portion of Europe, as 
well as the United States of America, is stealing some- 
thing of our rightful wealth and increasing our pauperism, 
because of our stolid indifference to the introduction of 
those branches of human knowledge which alone can 
properly develop the powers of industry and application, 
of which the English people are so wonderfully capable. 
This great question of the introduction of Na‘ural 
Science into all schools must be taken up by our School 
Boards throughout the kingdom. To delay it is to shelve 
it, and to commit an irretrievable error. It is now or 
never. If the present opportunity is neglected, all is lost. 
Let no heed be given to the cry that it is impossible to 
find teachers. If teachers cannot be found they must be 
made, and all o!d teachers must be told that unless they 
qualify in this respect they will be of no use. The cry of 
the cxample of our Universities must not be listened to, 
DD 
