REFORM IN EXAMINATIONS.
[To THE EDITOR OF THE "SPECTATOR."]
Sut,—The article with this heading in your issue of July 27th touches several points of interest to all teachers. May I comment on two of them,—premature specialising and oral examinations ? Ten or twelve years ago the masters of preparatory schools petitioned the Head-Masters of public schools to recognise more subjects in their entrance-scholar- ship examinations, and to elect scholars on their aggregate marks in several subjects, not on their marks in one alone. They hoped by this change to secure a better education for the candidates, and a better choice of scholars for the public schools. Winchester alone replied : "We choose most of our scholars by their aggregate marks in several subjects." Shrewsbury replied : "We should like to do so." Rugby replied: "We want our scholars specialised, the earlier the better." One Head-Master said, when he mentioned it to his colleagues : "We need not discuss such a proposal as that "I And from that time to this, I believe, the constraining pressure towards too early specialising has not been relaxed. How powerful the public schools are to hinder experiment or pro- gress in the preparatory schools was, I think, adequately recognised in your article. Would that in the future they might use their power with greater wisdom 1 But I wish to
demur to the implication made in your article that "more paper work" means "a higher proportion of purely intellectual tests." It has been said that the good examiner is he who discovers what the candidate does know, the bad examiner discovers only what he does not. True or false, this saying assumes that the possession, or the lack, of knowledge is the thing to be discovered by examination. But is this our ultimate test of ability with grown men and women ? Surely that mind is recognised as the ablest and most pro- ductive which grasps most quickly the meaning of new facts and instantly applies that knowledge to clear up old difficulties or to explore new ones. If this is the highest intellectual test for minds already stored with knowledge, is it not even more necessary for children in their teens whose knowledge has yet to be acquired ? Now this test can only be applied orally. By a few questions you may find a subject which interests a boy, find how much he knows of it, find something in that subject of fact or theory which be does not know. Then tell him that, and see what use he can make of it. That is, to my mind, the best test of his intellectual promise, and it cannot be applied in the written examination. That the examiners who use it must have wide knowledge, quick sympathy, and ready invention, I grant. But you cannot get good work from them unless they have these qualities, qualities which are needed, in a less degree, by every teacher. I believe that Osborne has made few mistakes in those whom it has accepted. Has it made many in those whom it has refused ? When the experience gained there has been made accessible to examiners elsewhere, the art of examining young people will have made a valuable step in advance.—I am, Sir, &c.,
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