TRANSACTIONS OP SECTION L. 629 



3. Discussion on the Education of Feeble-minded Children. 



(i) Farm Colonies for the Feeble-minded. By Miss Dendy, M.A. 



Lifelong care for the feeble-minded is a necessity (1) because they are a 

 serious menace to the State when at large, (2) because they are in great danger 

 and are unable to protect themselves against the common risks of society. In 

 providing such care there are three points to be considered (1) it must be such 

 as will ensure efficient segregation of the sexes both from the outside world and 

 in the institutions; (2) it must ensure the happiness and moral and physical 

 welfare of the person cared for ; (3) it must be as economical as is in any way 

 possible. 



Farm-colonies are the best means of securing that these three objects shall be 

 attained. They should be arranged for the accommodation of both sexes; this 

 makes for economy in management, as the men can produce garden-stuff for the 

 women as well as for themselves, and the women can do the mending and making 

 and washing for the men. They should be far enough from a town to make it 

 difficult for relatives and friends to visit too often ; they should, if possible, be 

 near enough to some market to secure a ready sale for surplus produce. They 

 should be the natural outcome of residential schools for feeble-minded boys and 

 girls, to which schools they should be attached. The school life of the children 

 should be ordered with a view to their ultimately becoming workers in the 

 colony. Children should be admitted under the age of thirteen, so that they may 

 be easily moulded to the life which it is desired they should live. There are 

 great advantages in having the colony and school in connection; it is not 

 desirable to break the chain of good habit which can be so easily formed during 

 childhood. Residential schools will prove to be a great economy when the 

 complete scheme for the care of the feeble-minded is undertaken by Govern- 

 ment; when provision is made for older scholars in colony schools, it will not 

 be so necessary to provide for them in day-schools; nor will it be necessary to 

 provide for very young children in colony schools, if these are worked in con- 

 junction with day-schools. Colonies cannot be made self-supporting; there 

 will always be the cost of supervision to consider. Probably, in the best cir- 

 cumstances, this cost will prove to be the measure of the difference between 

 self-support and dependence. Though the colonists cannot be self-supporting, 

 they can do a great deal towards their own maintenance and be very happy in 

 the doing of it. They will cost far less in farm colonies than in prisons and 

 workhouses. It must be remembered that the feeble-minded are in any circum- 

 stances already a heavy charge upon the community; farm colonies would not 

 impose a new burden; they would simply enable the burden to be borne more 

 easily and at less expense, whilst at the same time checking the evil which 

 makes them necessary. We care for the feeble-minded now, but we care for 

 them partially and intermittently as criminals and paupers. The farm colony 

 would supply complete and continuous' care. 



The object to be aimed at on a colony is that every one of the colonists shall 

 do something ; no idleness must be tolerated anywhere. Idleness is fatal for the 

 health and morals of the feeble-minded. Even imbeciles can learn to do effective 

 work under proper supervision. It is necessary to provide for the complete 

 separation of the sexes after they leave the school-room ; it is well for the little 

 ones to have their lessons together, but they should have separate play-grounds. 

 It is desirable that any colony shoidd begin in a small way; it is much easier 

 to start a scheme on the right lines when a few children only have to be handled 

 at first. Sandlebridge colony began with fifteen small boys and the same 

 number of girls. There are 230 boys and girls and young men and women in 

 residence, of all ages from six years to twenty-three. .Seventy are over the 

 age of sixteen. The first house was opened in 1901. It was found that it was 

 possible so to educate the children as to make a tradition of good manners and 

 good behaviour generally. Children taken in since have been to a great extent 

 educated and trained by contact with these scholars, who were broken in at the 

 beginning of our work. 



It is far more important that boys and girls should learn to be decent, clean, 

 and industrious than that they should painfully acquire a little inefficient book- 

 knowledge. 



(Waverley and Sandlebridge were described.) 



