230
THE NEW ZEALAND GAZETTE.
[No. 7

cost price and profit or loss, or when cost price and selling price, are
given; to find commission and commercial discount; to find compound
interest, interest being payable yearly or half-yearly; compound propor-
tion by the unitary method, the steps of which may be curtailed as the
children become more and more accustomed to the process; the meaning
of ratio should be understood—e.g., 5:12 should be known as equivalent
to 5/12, &c. Easy cases of partnership. Troy weight. The meaning of the
following terms in the metric system of weights and measures to be
known and illustrated: (a) kilometer, meter, decimeter, centimeter,
millimeter; (b) kilogram, gram; (c) liter=cubic decimeter; very simple
examples to show their use. Square root. Simple cases of mensuration
of plane surfaces and of solids bounded by planes. Suitable mental
arithmetic and problems. Shorter methods of working sums required in
earlier standards.

STANDARD VII.

(a.) Simple direct cases of stocks; exchange; cube root of numbers
reducible to prime factors not greater than 11; easy cases of present
worth, that is, to find the principal when the amount, time, and rate are
given; harder cases of sums required in Standards V. and VI.; shorter
methods of working sums required in earlier standards; mensuration of
the cylinder, sphere, pyramid, cone, hexagon, to be demonstrated experi-
mentally, and, as far as possible, by the pupils individually.

(b.) The meaning of a simple balance-sheet, and of ordinary com-
mercial terms, such as “assets,” “liabilities,” “solvent,” “insolvent,”
“creditor,” “debtor,” “profit” and “loss”; also of a statement of
receipts and expenditure, and of a debit or credit balance. Working of
sums arising therefrom. (b) may, with the approval of the Inspector,
be substituted for an equivalent amount of the work required in
Standard VI.

GEOGRAPHY.

GENERAL.

40. This subject should be based as far as possible upon the actual
    observation of natural phenomena by the children; where the actual
    phenomena themselves do not come within the range of the children’s
    observation, models should be used if possible. Pictures rank next
    in value to models. Models of wet sand or clay or plasticine form an
    extremely useful means of instruction, and in most cases it will be an
    advantage for the children to make such models themselves, either from
    their own observation or from the teacher’s copy. Carefully selected
    pictures taken in conjunction with maps form a good vehicle for lessons
    on subjects lying more or less outside the children’s experience. The
    more remote the place, or the less familiar the subject, the more neces-
    sary is the use of pictures or of other auxiliaries. The children should be
    taught to make maps or plans of the district from their own measure-
    ments, increasing in exactness from year to year with a view to making
    them understand how maps are made. As an instance of what is meant,
    the children in the early stages might be taught to measure approxi-
    mately, by pacing, the length and breadth of the playground, the distance
    from their homes or other well-known points to the school, &c.

The mathematical geography will be of far more value if it is based
upon actual measurement and observation, and if drawings and models
are made to illustrate the facts observed, so that the children may gain
thereby clear conceptions of the daily and yearly movements of the earth,
and of such phenomena as tides and eclipses. The action of rivers can
be studied from nature in the neighbourhood of almost every school, and
even the effect of a shower of rain as seen in the playground or the public
road may be utilised for this purpose. The action of the sea and of ice
and snow may in some cases be learnt first-hand; if that is not possible,
models and pictures should be used.

Some of the physical phenomena lend themselves to illustration by
experiments—e.g., the fact that warm water floats upon cold water, and
that a block of ice floats in water with the greater part of its bulk below
the level of the surface of the water. The action of water and rivers may
be illustrated by experiments outside in the playground, or even indoors
by means of a wooden tray with fine shingle, sand, and clay, and a
watering-pot.

It is recommended, therefore, that in teaching geography full use
should be made of such aids as the following: globes; models made
with plasticine, clay, carton or cardboard, wire, &c.; school museums;
wall pictures of typical phenomena; hand-pictures; school museums
with collections of plants and plant products, of minerals, rocks and
fossils, of animal products, of national coins, weapons, ornaments, &c.