74 EEPOKT— 1888. 



fidential, and nothing of a personal nature will be published without your 

 previous consent. 



In making any commnnication to the Committee, it will be convenient 

 if you will kindly affix to the manuscript the paper which is enclosed. 



I am, Sir, 



Your obedient Servant, 



Wyndham R. Dunstan, 

 Honorary Secretary to tlie Committee. 



Five hundi-ed copies of this letter were circulated, but only eighty-six 

 more or less extended replies have been received ; they include the majority 

 of the largest public schools in Great Britain. These replies have been 

 the subject of careful consideration by the Committee. 



The schools which have reported represent a total number of 23,350 

 pupils, and of these 8,418 receive instruction in chemistry; that is, 36 per 

 cent. It will be useful to summarise in this Report, by means of extracts 

 from typical replies, the chief points of general interest which have been 

 alluded to, particularly those that were raised by the three questions sug- 

 gested by the Committee in their letter. 



' 1. Ihe olj'ccts tvith ivliich chemistry should he taught in schools.' 



There is almost unanimous agreement as to the high educational 

 value of the science of chemistry. Teachers seem agreed that chemis- 

 try should be taught in schools with two objects : first, and mainly, on 

 account of the mental training and intellectual discipline it affords ; and 

 secondly, for the sake of its applications in the different professions and 

 trades which the boys may subsequently follow and also in its direct 

 bearing on the facts of everyday life. This view of the importance of 

 chemistry as a part of the school curriculum is well exemplified by the 

 following extracts taken from the reports made by various schools, both 

 large and small, and representing boys who afterwards follow a diversity 

 of trades and professions. 



I. ' Chemistry should be taught in schools — (1) As an educational 

 subject or mental discipline. In studying chemistry the pupils are led 

 to cultivate habits of observation, because the statements made in chemistry 

 are based on facts actually seen ; of reflection, because the accurate state- 

 ment of even the simplest observed fact requires not a little reflection ; 

 and of reasoning, because reasoning is required before one can decide that 

 any one particular result in an experiment is due to some one particular 

 antecedent circumstance out of several. Chemistry also is especially the 

 science in which experiment can be most readily had recourse to by the 

 pupil. (2) As a valuable branch of instruction. Supposing that the 

 mental powers were not developed and strengthened by the study of 

 chemistry, it might still be desirable that pupils should not leave our 

 public schools wholly ignorant of the composition, properties, and uses of 

 the materials of everyday life.' 



II. ' Science and history alone of the subjects taught in schools per- 

 form a twofold function. They give connection of ideas, logical power, 

 and education in the fullest sense, while at the same time they store the 

 mind with useful facts likely to make the possessor a more valuable 

 member of the body politic. Hence chemistry may be taught to all boys 

 just in the same way as ancient languages and higher mathematics, with- 

 out any thought of the future career of the pupil, or whether chemical 



