May, 1912.J 



441 



Education, 



This at present is distasteful to the 

 middle-class Indians who aspire to 

 attain the same position by theoretical 

 training which the British attain through 

 practical and theoretical training com- 

 bined. It is an axiom in one excellent 

 educational 9ystem— the Swedish— that 

 the hand educates the brain, and in 

 point of fact I have found the trained 

 Indian artisan to possess an intellect far 

 more in accord with western thought 

 than the book-learned classes. These 

 men cannot be handled by any but prac- 

 tical workmen as supervisors, and there- 

 fore the dream of technical education 

 per se, supplying a class of efficient 

 engineers, etc., of the higher class is a 

 vain one. If some means could be found 

 of inducing the middle classes, now ex- 

 clusively literary to undergo the neces- 

 sary manual training, the problem of 

 Indian industries would be solved. I 

 have had much to do with Indians in 

 three Presidencies, and I know that the 

 matter is in them, if only means could 

 be found to bring it out, for the higher 

 classes, if they would only take the 

 practical training, would excel the pre- 

 sent lower class workmen just as at home 

 the youths of the better classes pass 

 beyond the workmen of the artisan class, 

 commencing at the same benches and 

 the same manual work. 



That, Sir, is the true industrial pro- 

 blem of India, and the solution lies in 

 imbuing Indians of the better classes, 

 hitherto accustomed to a literary career 

 only, with a sense of the real " dignity 

 of labour." No " technical colleges " 

 will solve this problem. 



C, J. 



COURSE OF STUDY FOR 

 ELEMENTARY SCHOOLS. 



(Report by T. H. Gibson, Inspector of 

 Schools.) ■ 



(Continued from page 355.) 

 J. C. Boykin, Assistant Commissioner, 

 Bureau of Education, Department of the 

 Interior :" There appears to be little 

 actually in the course that can be 

 seriously criticized with substantial 



reason. The characteristics are such as 

 may be expected in view of the con- 

 ditions described in the accompanying 

 letter, namely, the emphasis laid upon 

 language and the prominence of manual 

 work. 



"It may be doubted if it is advisable 

 to begin the study of the structure of the 

 language as early as the first grade, 

 as the reference to 'nominative and 

 objective cases ' seems to indicate. It is 

 not clear how such instruction is given, 

 however, and it is probable that those 

 who prepared the course did not intend 

 that an attempt should be made to teach 

 formal grammar to such young childaen. 

 The amount of memory work and the 

 unusual stress laid upon the correction 

 of errors of speech are noticeable, and 

 tor schools under ordinary conditions 

 might be open to criticism, bub under 

 the circumstances such methods are 

 probably justifiable. 



"The amount of manual work in the 

 Hawaiian schools seems to be greater 

 than is generally required in the schools 

 of the States but such instruction appears 

 to be well suited to the conditions of 

 the People of the Islands, and the speci- 

 mens exhibited at the several expositions 

 have been distinctly creditable. 



"The fault of the course seems to be 

 less in what it contains than in what 

 it omits. There is nothing to indicate 

 relative values ; to show how much 

 time should be given to each branch ; 

 or to emphasize essentials. All is put 

 upon the same basis, and a word or a 

 phrase is as much as is given to any 

 topic, whether it be ' Pioneer period of 

 American history from 1492 to 1850," 

 which might well occupy 40 weeks, or 

 ' how waste matter goes off,' for which 40 

 minutes might be sufficient, 



"The course is meagre to a degree. It 

 is difficult to understand how such a 

 brief list of topics can produce desirable 

 uniformity of instruction in the schools 

 of the territory, or even how it can be 

 considered a 'course of study' in the 

 usual sense. Perhaps it is not so in- 

 tended, for on page 19 it U directed that 

 'each teacher, with the assistance of the 



