456 REPORTS ON THE STATE OF SCIENCE, ETC. 



by enthusiastic bodies of young farmers. This keenness on the part of 

 young farmers for education is very impressive ; much of it is due to the 

 county agricultural organisers, but it became possible only because of 

 the good work of the country school teacher, who, with the sympathetic 

 help of the inspectors, has been struggling to give the country child a love 

 of the country and a knowledge of the things in the countryside. 



The Committee felt that this type of work could usefully be extended 

 to other schools so as to turn out boys and girls fitted for life in the Empire. 

 Discussions with teachers, however, brought out the difficulties felt by 

 those who had not hitherto made much use of the school garden. The 

 chief trouble in schools other than elementary schools was the overloaded 

 syllabus ; teachers pleaded that they were bound to prepare most of their 

 children for certain examinations, and any extended use of the school 

 garden would be possible only for special classes or courses for children 

 that might proceed overseas. Whether one wanted it or not, the special 

 course always tended to become the dufiers' course, and it would be fatal 

 if the idea got abroad that only the dufiers from our schools were trained 

 for overseas. One thing which impressed the visitor to Canada or other 

 parts of the Empire was that the overseas Dominions were prepared to 

 welcome boys and girls from this country, but only on the condition that 

 they represented our good material and not our failures. The Committee 

 therefore set aside the suggestion there should be special classes at school 

 for boys and girls who wished to go overseas. That being so, the solution 

 seemed to lie with the University Examining Boards, wiich determined the 

 type of question set at the important school examinations. Those teachers 

 who had tried the experiment of using the school garden, and giving a 

 rural bias to their work, knew that the subject was as well adapted for 

 mental discipline and for orderly systematic development as any other. 

 Therefore the Committee was examining the possibility of inducing the 

 University Examining Boards to modify the syllabus, without in any way 

 detracting from the standard, so as to include tests that would show 

 whether these children had been adequately educated. If more schools 

 could take the matter up they could give to those children who loved the 

 country and the wide open spaces the necessary bias and background, 

 and equip them to take full advantage of the special training that would 

 come later, and would in any case best be given in that country to which 

 the child was going. 



Mr. T. S. Dymond said that the Overseas Training Committee were 

 very anxious that there should be some concrete outcome of that meeting, 

 and had drafted a resolution which, from the speeches which had been 

 delivered that afternoon, he believed would be accepted unanimously. 



' That, with a vaew to the promotion of Imperial interests overseas 



and the unlimited opportunities of land settlement, the Council 



be requested to draw public attention to the demands of the 



Dominions for the settlement of young people of good education, 



and to urge that adequate preparation for overseas life should 



be given in schools.' 



A suggestion having been made from a lady at the bade of the hall 



that the resolution be amended to include ' young people of both sexes,' 



the chairman .said he thought that that was alreadv included in the term 



