g6 
On Technical Education. 
[February, 
self-interest is concerned, of very little or no importance 
compared to that of their passing : he will therefore devote 
special attention to those who are most likely to pass, — to 
those who have, he finds, the best verbal memories ; and 
that this really takes place will be proved, I think conclu- 
sively, when the number of pupils in the different Science 
Schools are contrasted, which will be done in a future article, 
with the number that present themselves for examination in 
the elementary stage, and these again with the number which 
go in for the highest, honour, examination. Here is a 
fundamental difference between the system of teaching car- 
ried on under the Science and Art Department and the 
system carried on in Germany. “ It is our principle,” stated 
an eminent German teacher in one of the Trade or Business 
Schools in that country, “ to adapt our instruction' to the 
wants of the average boy, — to see that he is brought up to 
the prescribed mark at the proper time and if England 
wants a good educational system — one that will be for the 
advantage of the nation, whether it be general , scientific^ or 
technical — it must also be one principle ; but this cannot be 
as long as we adopt the system of payment on results, espe- 
cially as that system is carried out by the Department of 
Science and Art. 
Another evil of the payment on the result system is that 
it compels the teachers, owing to small sums they can earn 
by teaching one or two subjects to one class, either to teach 
many subjects in one or two schools, or to teach one or more 
subjects in several schools ; the teachers have, therefore, to 
give so much time to teaching, in order to obtain little more 
than a bare competency, that little or no time is left them 
for prosecuting their own studies so as to keep them on a 
level with the progress which is taking place in the subjects 
they teach. In what a different position, in this respeCt, is 
the teacher under this system to the teacher in Germany ; 
in that land of learning three lessons a day is considered very 
full work for a teacher. It is thought in that country that 
a teacher should give no more lessons than he can give with 
the whole force and freshness of his mind without undue 
exhaustion ; and, above all, he should have time for prose- 
cuting the private studies which enhance the value and 
efficiency of his work, and he is only called upon to give 
instruction in cognate subjects. 
In looking over, some little time ago, the Department of 
Science and Arts Report, published in 1881, I noticed many 
faCts supporting what I have just stated as regards the time 
the teachers paid on the result system have to give to 
