Page images
PDF
EPUB

given; to give further point to what I think ought to Why be done, at the same time avoiding reference to the should we study the work of individual groups of teachers, I will in these children? concluding remarks refer to Public elementary schools

only.

blems.

It will be granted that the educational processes Educational proshould be adapted to the children, and it must be admitted that the average methods must be adapted to the average child. Are the average methods of education adapted to all children? A while ago it was found out that the deaf and the blind could not be taught in ordinary schoolrooms; these are now in part provided for by small special classes. I desire to draw attention Recognition of to another class—the nervous, irritable children; children exceptional who are irregular in attendance on account of headaches, children. recurrent chorea, occasional fits; habitual truants, whose brain defect can be proven; the child so dull that it remains among the infants and learns nothing. As a hospital physician, I meet with many such children', though doubtless they are but a small percentage of the school population, and from what I see, I think these are practically not educated 2.

cational

Is this to the public advantage? Why are the deaf Their eduand blind educated? A part of the reason is that they neglect. may not become paupers. Why are the children of slight brain defect uneducated-children tending to become passionate, to pick up bad habits and practise them, tending to criminality, or, if too feeble for that, to pauperism? They are not neglected intentionally, but because they are not known to the school managers, it is nobody's business to find them out; they are not classified, and take their chance with the rest. Now my

1 See Table at the end of Chapter VIII.

2 Report of Royal Commission on Blind and Exceptional Children.

Early recognition important.

The cruelty

argument is, we can discover such children, and pick them out by definite physical signs; we can pick out from a class, the child not up to the average, the child tending to failure from want of brain-power.

To say that such children are few in every school is no reason for their neglect; we rejoice that but few have such inborn conditions as make them tend to social failure, pauperism or crime, but we wish that none should thus fail. Let such tendencies be detected early, and pointed out to the educationalist, that he may tend such cases carefully, helping to correct the defects due to brain condition.

Neglect in these matters does lead to unintentional of neglect. cruelty to children, and to what I think more important, to the educational neglect of wrong-brained children. The teachers do not want to neglect them; such neglect is due to ignorance, for which the managers are responsible. Now, as to these wrong-brained children, they are worth helping; in most cases a genius is abnormal; the very faults and nervousness may be trained to become admirable qualities-sensitiveness of mind, nobility of mind; and the fidgety child may become an active man. Such children too often escape from an educational process unsuited to them, but still, better than no education. The nervous, excitable boy, always ill with sick headaches while at school, is excused from school attendance; at home he is idle; too often the parents are neglectful and unwise; and as he grows up, when drink or passion inflame him, he commits some act bringing him within the power of the police. I have seen the education of many such continued with success when removed from large schools, and placed at inferior, but small and quiet schools. Again, the weak-brained, feeble-minded child often gets so teased, that at last he cannot be induced

Weak children

who turn out well.

to go to school; his attendance is excused on the ground of health. What becomes of him after that?

of schools.

This raises the question whether the ordinary school Medical inspection manager is able unassisted to discover the brain condition of the children. Should there be an occasional medical inspection to aid the managers to determine how they may help on the development of the children? This might be met by occasional medical inspection, say once in the year. We are not speaking of questions of hygiene, or cases of illness. At the inspection, an experienced doctor, looking over the school class by class, would soon select those probably requiring some special care; the teachers would present for examination any child they found specially troublesome, often complaining, short-sighted, very passionate, etc.; and the cases of children excused from attendance on grounds of health would be considered; advice might be given on all cases.

At a school I recently visited, a child was presented by the teachers as 'not dull but somehow wrong'; grave brain defect was obvious; the advice given was to keep the child, if possible, at school and out of the gutters.

A boy was brought to me who was frequently absent, and often punished when in school; he had a hare-lip, a defect of the heart, and an ill-developed brain. He has a right to be educated, and ought not to be punished for dulness of brain.

As to training the brain to stand strains, I believe it Training the brain is better for the nervous child to be educated. He must to bear meet the shocks and strains of life, and if properly strains. educated and exercised, he will bear those shocks and strains better than if untrained to think and exercise selfcontrol.

What can be done for these children? A want is

classes needed.

Auxiliary pointed out, and we are prepared to show how this special class of children may be classified, and in individual cases, or a group of cases, we can say what will aid brain development'.

A public danger.

In classes for the dumb, I have seen cases very defective in brain being educated. In the highest class in Darenth Schools I have seen feeble-minded children being educated and sent out into the world. Small classes and special teachers could well manage the dull, the excitable, the wrongly-made children.

As to the expense of teaching a few children in a small class room, instead of in a large room, would not the money be well spent in an effort to lessen crime, pauperism, and social failure? Should the endeavour be made to educate and save the child, or to reform the drunkard and criminal, and redeem the pauper to society?

I should like to see a tentative effort made. Provide inspection for a few large schools, and two small classrooms with suitable teachers, and the truth of these statements would, I think, be soon demonstrated, and the value of classifying the brain-power of the children would be recognised. The school examiner classifies by intellectual functions only. Every weakly or troublesome child who now escapes from public education is a failure of the system, and every such child is likely to be a public harm.

1 See Memorandum by Dr G. Shuttleworth in Report on Children in Schools.

CHAPTER VII.

THE SIGNS OF MENTAL ACTION, THEIR OBSERVATION,
SIGNIFICANCE AND MANAGEMENT.

IN former lectures I have spoken of the signs that Visible you may observe as indications of the physical condition, signs of and the brain state of a child, many points in physiog- states. nomy have been described as indicative of the child's development, and various movements and postures of the body have been given as signs of the condition of the nerve-system. I must now direct your attention specially to such actions as indicate the mental state and functions of the brain.

action ex

pressed by

As stated in former lectures, all visible expression All mental of mental states, and mental action, is by movement and results of movement; it may be useful to give movement. examples of such mental signs as may be observed in school children. We have now to describe special series of movements, and their relations to surrounding objects, and actions in other people.

As a means of giving a practical bearing to my remarks, and to encourage your own observations, I do not propose entirely to dissociate action in the body of a mental kind from that effecting other purposes. It will be found that this association of the two kinds of action is useful in considering the practical questions of management; it will be shown that when the child's

« PreviousContinue »