

THURSDAY, DECEMBER 29, 1870 

SCIENCE AT SCHOOL BOARDS 
’] “HE country may, we think, be congratulated on the 
election of School Boards in London and the pro- 
vinces, Although from our point of view it may be 
deplored that so few men of Science, or persons having 
any pretension to understand what Science means, have 
been elected, it must be felt that the beginning of a great 
work has taken place in this country, the end of which no 
one can at present foretell. The nation, for the first time 
in its history, has taken the subject of education into its 
hands. The Education Act will be open to alteration and 
revision in the Houses of Parliament, and from step to 
step we may hope to see at last a department of Govern- 
ment representing the wishes of the people, dealing alike 
with the education given in our universities and our ragged 
schools. The great aim of the country must be to give to 
every child born in the kingdom the best education adapted 
to secure its happiness and usefulness in this world. There 
is no doubt that this will be the feeling that will prompt 
members of the various School Boards to carry out the 
powers which have been given under the Education Act. 
We exceedingly regret that the various Boards have 
been elected rather upon a religious ground than upon the 
general principle of what is desirable to be taught in the 
schools. As we read the Act, there will be little oppor- 
tunity left to the Board to increase or alter the conditions 
of “religious teaching” in any of the schools. It would 
have been better, perhaps, to have excluded all religious 
teaching from the primary schools, on the grounds, first 
that the feeling of respect and even awe which ought to 
attend the teaching of the Bible, is likely to be diminished 
by making it a common reading and task-book in 
schools ; and secondly, that the clergy of the Established 
Church and of the various denominations, who are amply 
paid for their religious ministrations, ought especially to 
undertake religious teaching, and conduct it under circum- 
stances that would render it most efficient and useful in 
the moral training of a child. There is also a third 
objection, and that is that the rate ought not to take the 
money of one set of people for the purpose of teaching 
the religion of another. There are certain moral obli- 
gations underlying all the higher religious creeds, to 
which no parent could possibly object, which ought to be 
taught and insisted on everywhere in universities as well 
as primary schools. 
With regard to the other subjects to be taught in the 
schools, we would call attention to the danger there is that 
any extension of the means of education should lead to 
an imitation of the system now in existence. That system 
consists almost entirely of giving lessons out of books 
and teaching children words independent of the facts they 
represent. The present Chancellor of the Exchequer has 
well said, “I think it is more important for a man to know 
where his liver is seated and what its functions are, than 
to know it is called jecuy in Latin and yap in Greek.” 
Of course there is no chance of Latin and Greek being 
introduced into our primary schools, although if they are 
such a precious means of developing the mind as they are 
assumed to be, there seems to be no reason why they should 
VOL, III. 

161 
not. But the substitute for these branches of human ac- 
quirement is found in our lower schools in the shape of 
reading poetry, history, geography, and the like. If the 
sentiment of the Chancellor of the Exchequer exists in the 
new School Boards, the time seems to have come when 
some effort may be made to give up a certain amount of 
time in all schools to the teaching the facts of the external 
world. This is what is usually called scientific training,and 
has been almost universally regarded in our systems of 
education as something that may be dispensed with. But 
Science is after all but a systematic arrangement of 
observed facts by which the laborious investigations of the 
few may be made the possession of the many. 
It may be urged in favour of this teaching that it 
educates (draws out) portions of the mind which cannot be 
cultivated by means of words and figures or moral lessons. 
A boy may be able to read all languages and master all 
problems in mathematics, and be a moral paragon, and 
yet commit some stupid blunder, from ignorance of some 
obvious chemical, physical, or vital law, that may cost 
him his life, or, what is more important still, may lead to 
the death of others. Our whole national history is full 
of terrible instances of punishment for breaking obvious 
and easily understood natural laws. 
That Natural Science can be taught in schools there 
is no doubt. It has been introduced in a limited way 
into our great schools, as Harrow, Rugby, and Eton; 
and, so far as it has gone, it has not only not been 
attended with any diminution of acquirements of other 
branches of knowledge, but rather the contrary. In some 
of the national schools in Ireland, Science has been intro- 
duced, and we can bear testimony to the amount of useful 
information acquired by a class of boys in chemistry at 
the National School in Sligo. 
The most difficult question for the School Boards to 
determine will be how to begin. In nine cases out of ten 
they have no men of Science to direct them. There is 
one comfort in London, that the Board will have a host in 
Professor Huxley, who, if they will listen to him, is un- 
doubtedly capable of giving good advice. He will be 
ably backed by Miss Garrett, who, with her medical 
education, will be fully able to appreciate both the sub- 
jects and methods of any attempt to teach Science in our 
schools. Mr. Lucraft, the working man’s candidate, has 
also advocated the teaching of Natural Science in schools. 
If the other candidates said anything on this subject, the 
reports of their speeches have not yet reached us. Still 
we may hope and we would especially recommend to the 
reading of allmembers of School Boards a“ Report ofa Com- 
mittee appointed by the British Association on Scientific 
Education in Schools.” It isa parliamentary paper, pub- 
lished in March 1868. We do not think this paper had 
the attention paid to it demanded by its intrinsic im- 
portance ; and we are glad to recommend it, as especially 
adapted for the reading of members of School Boards and 
of all interested in education. 
Without having any cut and dry system to offer to the 
public, we would advise that some attempt be made to 
teach some quantum of Natural Science somehow. The 
present masters will probably be utterly ignorant of any 
branch of Science, but there are plenty of students of 
Science who would undertake at first to instruct, perhaps 
in several schools. They should be instructed to teach 
K 
