320 
PROCEEDINGS OF THE VICTORIA INSTITUTE. 
Education Department in its Report for 1889 remarks that 
“the methods of instruction for older scholars and infants are 
very different, and cannot be efficiently carried on in the same 
room. Every school therefore, except the very smallest requires 
a separate department for infants.” Furthermore, my experience 
fully bore out the experience of other countries that the instruc- 
tion and care of young children, can, as a rule, safely be confidec 
to women only and that it is only trained women that are really 
competent for the. work. 
The neglect of the most important part of the school work 
is partly due to the preference the teacher feels for conducting 
the instruction of more advanced scholars. But it is simp y 
building without any foundation. Many of the teachers w 10 
persisted in this course in spite of advice were simply incompeten 
to teach advanced scholars hence their schools exhibited every 
year the same dismal failure the cause of which they cou 
not understand and indeed which they would not admi • 
In some cases where by dint of incessant hammering anc 
better still by stopping the merit grant (called results ees) 
I managed to drive the teachers to attend to the point, a cons an 
and steadyimprovement followed. But I think that in all sue 
cases the Inspector should have power to restrict the teaching ^o 
the lower standards so as to avoid the waste of the w o»e 
. teaching power of a school upon two or three . children who av e 
passed those standards. In many country schools it is simp y a 
farce for a teacher to profess to teach fifth or sixth btanc ar 
and the mischief wrought to the school by such pretence is very 
great. 
In making these observations it will be understood that I 
am not criticizing the schools as they now are. I speak o w ' 
I found in my experience and it is possible that , im ?^ or . 
ments may have been made in these matters. (High y i P 
taut suggestions on the points alluded in this and othei 
of this paper will be found in my general report for 18 -‘I- 
Into details of school organization and management, I s 
notenter now. If any one desires to know what oug 
the routine of school work, I can refer him to the loti P al _ » , £ 
of my special report of 7th May, 1889, or the 17th P a |’ a » , v 
my general report for 1889. This will serve as a mo e , 
the daily work of a school should be carried under a we „y.j; s h 
time-table. What is required in the first place, is 0 n y 
a sound system of public education, as the preliminat j iave 
further improvement. Under such a system you wo . , 
graded schools, such as I partially obtained in °i 
