105

for communicating them. As the character of our schools improves, I hope to see this very useful practice become universal.

The teaching of geography and grammar has now become general. In some schools one, in some the other of these branches takes the lead, according to the bias of the master; in most it is still elementary; but it is every where gaining ground. So also an acquaintance with history, which allies itself so naturally with a knowledge of geography.

The introduction to geography, written expressly for the use of children in New Zealand, and published at the Auckland College press, has been found very useful in this respect. Where the supply has not allowed of making it a class-book, it has been sometimes employed as a text-book by the teacher, who, with a large map open by his side, to refer to at every fresh name mentioned, reads a few paragraphs, and then, by a regular series of questions, ascertains how far the lesson is understood or recollected by the class. In connection with this, it is useful, after a question has been rightly answered by one pupil, to require the answer from another without repeating the question. It keeps up the general attention, and rouses the indolent to exertion. On first trying this plan, I found, in many cases, a great want of mental activity. No one attended but the child spoken to; and, purposely avoiding any difference in tone of voice or manner, I have put a question which had already been rightly answered over and over again, and proved the general inattention by the repeated mistakes. The good-humoured expression of a fear that they are very sleepy or tired, or have the misfortune of being deaf, makes a call upon their attention in the first instance, and then a short explanation of the reasons for having up ten or a dozen boys at once, instead of singly, and that what is said to one is meant for all, has an immediate effect; and perseverance in this plan for ten minutes produces from every child in the class a ready and satisfactory answer as soon as called upon. In this way, the reading of a short chapter in some one of the many introductions to history now published, forms an agreeable change and relief to the usual school routine; particularly when it is preceded by questions to find out how much of the former lesson has been recollected; and I was much pleased, on my last visit, to find in several instances how completely and thoroughly a lesson of this kind, given on a former occasion, had been understood and recollected. With regard to other branches of education, the elements of Geometry have begun to be taught at the Nelson school; Drawing has been introduced into that at Richmond; and Singing both there and at Hope school. The utility of all these, and the great advantages to be derived from them, are now fully appreciated elsewhere, and will, I trust, shortly lead to their general introduction among ourselves; and I hope to be able in my next annual report to speak of a marked improvement in these respects. Meanwhile, the Return, No. 3, will put it in the power of any one to verify at once the estimate there given by the masters of the state of the schools; as in each school a register is kept, of which the present return is an abstract, the accuracy of which can be directly tested in each individual present.

The Return, No. 2, shows the number of children under tuition in the schools as compared with the total number in the same districts, as given by the Census of 1856. The next census will enable me to make this comparison in a more accurate manner, and with much greater detail; but even in its present state, it furnishes an approximation which may not be without its use.

I have, &c.,
J. D. GREENWOOD,
Inspector.

To the Chairman of the
Central Board of Education,
Nelson.

RETURN