TRANSACTIONS OF SECTION L. 719 
5. We ignore the delicacy of children’s nerves, Especially fatal is the fallacy 
of brain-exercise : the brain is not a muscle; to venture on a paradox, there should 
be. no work at all in schools. Mental fatigue is daily forced upon children to 
their incalculable injury. 
6. Subjects of curriculum, Two prime needs are: (1) The encouragement of 
the imagination, which in childhood is actually at its best. (2) The exclusion of 
useless subjects. 
Useless subjects will not pass the following tests: (a) A child must learn the 
world of Nature, and later of men, as we now know it. This means Nature-study 
and science generally. It must learn the various aspects in which a thing ia 
knowable—surface, area, form, numerical values. Only so much mathematics is 
necessary as is required to work with science and mechanics. (6) It must know 
itself. (c) It must learn to express its knowledge and co-ordinate it. 
History in the ordinary sense is useless, but biological and evolutionary 
history is essential. 
No languages other than the vernacular are to be learned. The old plea of 
‘culture’ involves many fallacies. Culture comes from luxury and refinement of 
surroundings: it cannot be taught, and its only importance is in the zsthetic side 
of life. 
As to the plea of ‘formation of character,’ there are many fallacies enshrined 
in this and in the ordinary conception of duty. 
Ideal teaching should be the answering of children’s questions in terms of the 
knowledge already acquired by themselves. 
3. The Secondary School Curriculum in France, with particular reference 
to Instruction in Modern Languages. By Professor Lton Moret. 
Since 1902 a complete reorganisation of the whole course of studies has been 
imposed upon all State schools. After a first stage of primary or elementary 
teaching which applies to boys from a very early age, and already comprehends 
a teaching of one foreign language, secondary teaching proper begins with the 
sixth form (boys of ten on an average). The whole course, then extending over 
seven years, is divided into two cycles—one of four years (sixth, fifth, fourth, and 
third forms), the other of three years (second and first forms), philosophy or 
mathematics. The first cycle comprises two sections throughout the four years. In 
one of them (Section B) no Latin is taught ; in the other Latin is taught from the 
sixth form; Greek is optional from the fourth form. In all classes of both sections 
living foreign languages are allotted as many as five hours a week. 
In the second cycle four sections are established in the second and first forms. 
One, Section A, is characterised by the teaching of Latin and Greek; Section B 
by that of Latin and foreign languages; Section C by that of Latin and sciences ; 
Section D by that of sciences and foreign languages. The last is the normal 
course followed by the boys who, in the first cycle, have learnt no Latin. But 
Section D is equally accessible to boys who, having belonged in the first cycle to 
Section A, choose to abandon the study of Latin. In all four sections living 
foreign languages are taught. They receive two hours a week in Sections A and C, 
seven hours in Sections B and D, Of those seven hours, three are allotted to the 
language learnt by each boy previous to his entering the second form, and four to 
the study of a second foreign language. At the end of the first class boys undergo 
the examination for the first half of a bachelor’s degree, different tests sanctioning 
their various programmes of study. 
Boys who have passed successfully that first B.A. examination enter either the 
class of philosophy or that of mathematics, both comprehending a further study 
of living languages, to the rate of two hours for some and of three for such as 
wish to go on with the study of two languages, 
It will be seen from this brief summary of the system that a strenuous effort is 
being made (1) at securing a varied and supple curriculum which may ensure both 
