" THE NURSERY SCHOOL."
[To THE EDITOR or THE " SPECTATOR."] SIR,—In your sympathetic notice of The Nursery School in the Spectator of January Srd your reviewer saTs that the book "gives practical shape to a reform which is badly needed," and urges that we " should cease to force little children of less than seven years old to sit quietly for hours at a time on hard seats doing absurd occupations." We all hope that under Mr. Fisher's Act new nursery schools of the best type will spring up all over the land, but the present state of things is not quite so black as the review suggests. The reader would infer that the discipline of babies in English elementary schools is unduly severe, and that the curriculum is nearly as foolish as that in Kingsley's tale of the schoolchildren who racked their brains to remember the name of Muting Scaevola's thirteenth cousin's grandmother's maid's cat. Such a picture does less than Justice to existing infant schools and to their devoted and skilful teachers, most of whom have been trained in the methods of Froebel, and some even in those of Mine. Montessori. Few modern teachers would consent to carry out a time-table providing for continuous occupation of more than thirty minutes for children under seven and few inspectors would pass such a time-table in the first instance. I may have been fortunate in my experience, but I have seen a good many schools both in London and in rural areas, and I have seldom come across babies under five who are sitting at fixed desks and have never met children under seven who it quietly for hours. In most infant schools to-day children sit on little chairs at little tables, and they seldom do anything for more than twenty minutes at a time. Their occupations may seem absurd to our grown-up eyes, but they are of the kind advocated by Mine. Montessori, such as counting beads, choosing colours, sorting shells, &c. Moreover, they sing songs and listen to fairy-stories
and enjoy these follies.—I am, Sir, &c., M. A. L. G.
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