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would be appointed to draw it up would have to insure his reputation, if not his life, before he undertook the task; and without an examination it would hardly be possible to get all our teachers to devote attention to a course of training which is so wide in its scope. Yet it must not for a moment be supposed that our teachers are guided and controlled in their work only by what the examination demands. We have the kind of teaching indicated by the Star in nearly all our larger graded schools, where the principal is imbued with the spirit of the true educationist, where the charge of all the departments is in the hands of a man who would have just as good a school, if not probably a better, were there no written examinations in connection with the Inspector's duties. The one way to have anything taught well in our schools is to have them in charge of good teachers; and the institutions which have the preparation of our teachers are the institutions which for the most part must assume the larger share of the responsibility of the efficient or inefficient schools in the country.

-We wonder whether the persons whom the Star enumerates in the rest of its article on the scientific method of thinking were graduates, undergraduates, or only ordinary people that had never attended a higher course of training in any of our universities. It has been said that no man knows more than an undergraduate, and though not so ironically yet just as unreasonably, it is said that all the evils of the day are to be referred to some defect in our school systems. We have no reason to suspect the truth, however, of what the Star says: "As it is now, we find persons who reason well enough on certain matters with which they are acquainted, talking in the wildest and most irrational manner about things of which they know nothing. The teacher of science should bring home to the mind of every pupil that while there is no sin in ignorance there is sin in talking ignorantly when we might keep silence. We have heard a man who never gave ten minutes in his life to the study of any treatise on electricity asserting dogmatically the impossibility of transmitting motive power on any large scale by electric conductors. We have heard others dogmatizing on questions of physiology who knew absolutely nothing of that science, and others again ventilating views on etymology who, to save their lives, could not have distinguished between an English and a Latin root. Evidently the science master is wanted to show the difference between knowledge and ignorance and to inculcate the pious duty of recognizing our ignorance and not trying to pass it off on ourselves or on others

for knowledge. We are convinced that a new intellectual era will dawn upon the world if science in a broad sense can only gain a proper footing in the schools, and the minds of the young can be brought to understand the method of science and to see its beauty as well as its efficacy. The time has fully come when judgment should begin on all unfounded and immature opinions, and when men and women should be taught to love the truth and to be loyal to it, not only with their lips, but in their lives."

In thus referring, as we have above, to the proper carriage of body and mind, we may be excused for pointing out the necessity of teaching manners and morals in our schools. As a contemporary of ours has said: "It seems to be a matter of universal comment and regret, that the children of the present day are lacking in good manners. Anyone with half an eye can but perceive the tendency of the times in this respect. Irreverence, frivolity, and lawlessness seem to characterize the age. This state of things has been brought about by influences various and complex; but the two prime causes are the immense immigration into this country of a rude and uncultured class of people, and the rush and whirl of affairs. In this ever onward rush, parental discipline has grown lax. It has been quite the custom to make the public schools the scape-goat for all prevailing evils of mind and body, and thus to-day they are held responsible for the immorality and ill-breeding of the youth of this country. Any one who pauses to reflect a moment will see that the cause lies deeper than the public schools. They are not more responsible for ill-breeding than for ignorance, but their responsibility lies in the fact that while they have brought great force to bear against the one, they have left the other untouched." And yet if our schools cannot renovate the country community by beginning with the young folks, much may be done in improving the manners of the coming generation by common-sense morality teaching. To do this is to have a good school. The virtues of obedience to law, industry and honesty are essentials to a good school as they are to society. Make it good and the pupils that are turned out from it will be good citizens. The following advice from the Maitland Journal we willingly submit to our teachers: "One way of improving the morals of your pupils is by correcting everything vile or mean that crops out among the pupils in school or at play. There are ways of doing this with tact and to the best effect, which will occur to the shrewd teacher. Watch the currents of opinion among your pupils and turn

them in the direction of purity and nobility of character. Another way is by directing the reading of the pupils to books that will be interesting and at the same time inspiring. Youth is full of enthusiasm and ready to worship an ideal, good or bad. Instead of that ideal being a pirate or an Indian fighter, let it be an inventor or a benefactor of the human race in some

way. Good books are great teachers. Another way is by inducing the pupils willingly to memorize selections which are full of some great enthusiasm, such as patriotism. Half the moral evils of the world are simply weeds growing where there is no good seed sown. Give a boy or girl something noble to think of, and that will of itself expel a great deal of silly trash or worse than trash from his or her mind. Another way is by a series of talks to the scholars, or better with them, on moral questions. The more informal these are, and the more they draw out from the pupils, the better effect they will generally have. Preaching at your pupils will not often do much good. Such a story as that of Washington and the hatchet, or Lincoln paying his drunken partner's debts, will furnish a series of questions, which it is often well to leave open for discussion several days. In most cases the children themselves will settle these questions of casuistry near enough right, if you can only wake up their interest in them. It is of more importance to set them thinking and talking on moral questions than it is to decide these dogmatically for them. It is the habit of asking whether certain actions are right that is of most consequence. We may add that in some cases it is more politic for the teacher to leave the avenue to really doubtful questions open. In some of these ways it ought to be easy for every teacher to inculcate morals in a public school. And it ought to be easy to do this without being sectarian, or offending any one's prejudices, with a little good sense and tact in the teacher."

Current Events.

-Our latest advice from the Executive Committee of the National Educational Association of America holds out the promise of success for their great Convention, to be held in Toronto, from the 14th to the 17th of July next. The secretary informs us that the prospects are of the most encouraging kind, and that the Toronto meeting is likely to be the largest and most successful meeting yet held by the Association. The display in the Exhibit Department of school work and supplies will be a good one. The Local Committee are doing every

thing in their power to make the visit of the members of the Association a pleasant one, and in this they are receiving the hearty support of the citizens of Toronto and the teachers of Canada. Every arrangement that can be devised is being made for the proper accommodation of visitors, and the providing of excursions by rail and steamboat during the Convention and after. Teachers who can afford a longer stay in the Queen City than the four days of the Convention, should make preparations to do so, as every facility will be given to them to study in a practical way the efficiency of the Ontario school system. The fare to Toronto from all parts is the lowest that can be secured, and those desiring to attend should at once put themselves in communication with the local ticket agent or station master in their district to find from him the cost of such a trip. All other information can be procured from or through the active secretary of the Executive Committee in Toronto, whose address in full is H. J. Hill, Esq., Secretary of the Executive Committee of the National Educational Association Convention, Toronto, Ont. -The Young Canadian has been good enough to recognize the enterprise of our communities in favor of school libraries in some such terms as the following: "The Inspector of Superior Schools in Quebec has started a capital idea and is vigorously putting his idea to the test among the schools under his supervision. By means of illustrated lectures on literary and scientific subjects he secures not only an audience but a fund for organizing a school library in the community in which he happens to be visiting the school. In this way he has already laid the nucleus of such a library in the various school centres, and in some instances school museums have been commenced as well. It is scarcely possible to over-estimate the value of a movement like this, and we tender Dr. Harper our sincere approbation of his efforts in this connection."

-In daring to quote the above encomium, we hope that the movement will receive further encouragement, so that in time we may perhaps be able to make some such report as the following about the school libraries of Quebec: "The high schools of our state," says a contemporary on the other side of the line, "are building up libraries with commendable rapidity and success. They are evidently used extensively by the pupils, and the stimulus to use them comes from the school work. This is in part the result of the assignment of topics, of references and readings by the teachers, and of talking with the pupils about what they read. But a well selected library recommends itself, and, as one principal said, there are books which do not

stand on the shelf a day during the year.' Not only the high school pupils use these libraries, but in some places the intermediate and grammar school pupils are the great readers."

-In returning the compliment which the Young Canadian has been pleased to pay the Inspector of Superior Schools, we would draw the attention of our teachers to the position which that periodical is ambitious to fill in connection with the practical education of the rising generation of the Dominion. It has already given abundant evidence of the ability of the lady who conducts it. Its aim is to foster a national pride in Canadian progress, history, manufactures, science, literature, art, and politics; to draw the young people of the provinces closer together; and to inspire them with a sense of the sacred and responsible duties they owe to their native country. Its leading features are literary and artistic matter, topics of the day at home and abroad, illustrated descriptions of our industries, departments in history, entomology and botany, with prizes to encourage excellence, a reading club for guidance in books for the young, and a post-bag of questions and answers on everything that interests the young. In a word, the aim of the magazine is to provide for the people of the Dominion a periodical for the promotion of a true Canadian patriotism. We need hardly say that we heartily sympathize with such an aim, and hope that our teachers will arrange to give it tangible support. In connection with every school library there ought to be at least one copy of the Young Canadian, so that it may be bound at the end of every year and put upon the shelves with the other volumes selected.

-Some time ago the gold medal of the Scandinavian Agricultural Academy was presented by the King of Sweden and Norway to August Abrahamson, the founder and supporter of the Slojd Normal College at Naas. This honor was all the greater, as the medal had not been awarded for a great many years, and especially as it was an acknowledgment on the part of the Royal Agricultural Society, that educational Slojd, which emanated from Naas and has been introduced into so many of the public schools of Sweden under the name of "the Naas system, has furnished most excellent results. In handing the medal to Mr. Abrahamson, the King said: "I award this medal to you, Mr. Abrahamson, in order to show that the Royal Agricultural Society fully appreciates and acknowledges the great work you have so successfully carried out. I should also add my own personal esteem and regard for one who has done so much for the honor and good of our fatherland."

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