354 SECTIONAL TRANSACTIONS.— E. 



mark earning. No time is allowed for excursions, for discussions, for the specialised 

 study of a district or for the individual enterprise of teacher and pupU. 



9. The teaching of Geography in Primary Schools needs improving. Very many 

 children entering Secondary Schools cannot use an atlas. 



10. My observation of students in training leads me to think that they are studying 

 and trying to teach Geography without a sufficiently sound foundation of knowledge 

 to enable them to benefit by the advanced work. 



Suggestions for improving the position of Geography as an educational subject in the 



Union. 



1. Revision of the regulations for school- leaving examinations so that Geography 

 may be offered as a subject in addition to History and Mathematics. 



2. Increased facilities for intending teachers to study Geography at the various 

 Universities and University Colleges. 



3. Vacation and refresher courses. 



4. Advice on, and expert assistance with, the equipment of classrooms with suitable 

 apparatus, textbooks, reference books, readers, &c. 



6. The provision of means whereby teachers, particularly country teachers, may 

 receive the most recent information of events and of facts of a geographical nature. 



Notes and suggestions forwarded by other members of the committee. 



A. Prof. Wellington, Mr. Robb and Mr. Prescott. 



' . . . the Matriculation regulations are the great stumbling block. So vital do 

 we consider this that if these regulations were altered, making it possible to take History 

 and Geography together, we feel that the road would be open to immediate progress 

 in this direction.' 



' . . . The Provincial authorities of the Transvaal . . . encourage Geography 

 strongly.' 



' . . . During the past seven years nearly 150 teachers have passed their three years' 

 courses here (University of the Witwatersrand) . . . They have gone to other subjects 

 in the schools because of the lack of opportunity to speciaUse in Geography . . . ' 



B. Prof. Serton. 



' . . . I think the present regulations give a somewhat better chance to Geography 

 than is indicated in your statement. There still is, in my opinion, far too much 

 physical and far too Uttle human Geography in the different syllabuses. Nearly every 

 pupil takes a lively interest in the human element, while only a few are sufficiently 

 provided with knowledge of Physics to be able to do good advanced work on the 

 physical side. The result is that things are learned by heart instead of being under- 

 stood, and, of course, such kind of work cannot be expected to arouse much interest. 



' I am thinking here especially of certain requirements on the meteorological side 

 and of the remarkable obsession of the plane table, which is stiU haunting the Cape 

 syllabus. It is manifestly impossible to make our schoolboys surveyors — yet for a 

 phantom like this a great deal of useful and really practical work has to be omitted.' 

 G. Mr. R. M. Jehu, Head of Department of Geography, Natal University College. 



' . . . A large majority of the students who take the First Year Course in Geography 

 in my department . . . ' have ' little or no previous knowledge of the subject .... 

 Only in very few schools is Geography taught up to Matriculation stage .... It is 

 certainly high time that the Provincial Educational Departments were made to realise 

 the importance of Geography, and its place in the school curriculum.' 



(c) Prof. J. L. Myees. — -The Correlation of Geography with History and 



Literature. 



All education has two main aims, the formation of habits of intellect, taste, and 

 conduct, and the presentation of current experience of what goes on around us in this 

 world, and the way people behave in it. Now these habits, and those accumulated 

 experiences, have been acquired both somewhere and somewhen. They have, that 

 is to say, their historical and geographical aspects, in addition to their quality as ele- 

 ments respectively in orderly society and in systematic knowledge. Since the general 

 acceptance of the hypothesis of evolution, astronomy, geology, and biology have become 

 no less historical sciences than philosophy or the study of institutions, hteratures, and 

 schools of art ; and increasing use is made of historical presentation of the growth of 



