[Appendix 1).

'E.—2.

substitutes, and one senior woman left ill and one junior woman also. The numbers therefore now are —first-year students, eleven men and forty-nine women, total, sixty; second-year students, three men and thirty-four women, total, thirty-seven. The work has been distributed as follows :■ —

Tho following class results were obtained as the result of the year's University work: First class, 7; second class, 55; third class, 111. It is, of course, very desirable that the training of primaryschool teachers should be connected with University work, but I am convinced that the connection would be a more valuable one if promising students were granted an extension of their Training College bursary for a third year foi- the purpose of intensive University work : there would be less pressure and better results. Education, as a University class up to degree standard, does not, I think, produce the best results. The principles of education, and the generalizations of which tho working-out is embodied in the history of education, are the outcome of, among others, the sciences of psychology, ethics, and philosophy. All of those are found to be too abstract for the young student under twenty years of age, as the training-college student usually is. The teachers of these subjects agree in the opinion that the young student cannot grasp wide and abstract generalizations well, and this is my experience of " education." As a degree subject it, would be more profitably taken by older students, say in their third year. During the year new regulations as to associated schools have come into force, teachers of associated classes being paid for their services. The Department has interpreted the regulations as not making provision for any payment to the head teacher of a school in which there are associated classes. This is, I think, an oversight, as the success of any scheme of associated classes must depend largely on the sympathy and assistance of the head teacher. The practising school continues to be hampered by the want of a school garden for the rural model schools. Even the students' garden plot at the Botanical Gardens is only held on sufferance. I must again point out the absurdity of two model rural schools without any garden provision. The want also reacts very seriously on the teaching of nature-study, which becomes mainly a matter of mere eye observation of things in which a town child is not greatly interested, unless he can culitivate. and produce them. The mere observation of beauty and use is of little interest to young children if their physical activity is not concerned. To make matters worse, the immediate neighbour-hood of the school is closely built on, and house-gardens are few. During the year Dr. Paterson examined all the pupils of the practising school, assisted by the senior students, to whom she also gave lectures. A very considerable number of physical defects was detected among the children, the most common being slight lateral curvature and round shoulders, undoubtedly caused in most cases by wrong attitudes, which are aggravated in their effects by the out-of-date seats aird desks at the practising school. The instructors have drawn up a set of corrective exercises which, the class teachers will use under their supervision, and which I hope will effect an improvement.

X

First-year Students. Men. Women. Seoond-year Students Hours per Weok. Men. Women. College classesMethod, &c. Physical drill Vocal music Elocution Drawing Hygiene Physical measurements .. •. Agriculture Home science Nature-study Handwork Woodwork Needlework Kindergarten ll 11 11 12 11 8 12 41) 49 48 ■19 49 17 3 3 3 3 8 34 31 34 34 18 33 8 and 3 2 2 and 1 1 3 andl 2 3 3 1 1 2 1 I 11 II 11 44 48 48 3 36 18 35 University classesEnglish Latin French .Education Domestic science II Mental science Physics Chemistry Applied mathematics Economics History 7 9 5 8 1 1 .".3 9 io 16 6 3 3 3 1 6 1 2 2 6 6 4 31 33 3 3 and 4 5 and 4 5 and 4 5 3 5 7 8 5 3 3 i l 3 4 2 1