PRIMARY SCHOOL STANDARDS
Snt,—Your correspondent Mr. Exelby will have every sympathy as be seeks to provide a balanced education in his junior school, but descrip- tive terms of this kind tells us no more than does, say, " sound " in refer- ence to political views, or " significant " as applied to a work of art: quot homines, tot sententiae. My point three weeks ago was that fee- paying parents do not dream of allowing their sons to be educated from eight to eleven along the lines of a primary school curriculum, .but insist on a discipline of language and mathematics to the extent of more than three thousand, lessons which the freely educated primary school boy misses at this stage, and misses altogether unless he is in a small minority
for which the State grammar school provides an all too tardy justice. Are the sons of the wealthier parent to be regarded as ill-served at the independent preparatory schools whose curriculum includes this core- discipline, as well as physical and religious education both very seriously undertaken? Fathers who pay the schoolmaster piper are in a strong position to call the best nine.
Mr. Exelby stresses the physical, moral and emotional as contrasted with the intellectual needs of young boys. He is not alone in this. An interesting calculation shows that my boys here spend less than one-tenth of their lives in the classroom, and so have more than nine-tenths for eating, sleeping, journeying, exercise, hobbies and, be it admitted, home- work. Modern mentors press me (and certainly Mr. Exelby) to diffuse our energies during the precious school hours over more and more super- ficial studies and varied activities, whereas the need of the day is palpably and notoriously for thoroughness and rigour in foundation work at fewer subjects. The training of mind and character is one process, and junior school boys who get next to nothing of difficult, but salutary, drill and precision work are being fed too long on a soft diet ; in an age of egalitarian slogans the solid matter of education is increasingly reserved for the sons of the rich.
Another correspondent who supports me and signs himself " Head- master " has failed, says Mr. Exelby, to grasp the aim and •purpose of a junior school. My colleague will doubtless be able to acquit himself of
this twofold accusation.—Yours faithfully, W. W. FLETCHER. High School for Boys, Middlesbrough.
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