Part 11 (1/2)

The difficulty in this connection is that the principles of teaching have not yet been worked out satisfactorily Our knowledge of the operations of the ations in this field of research are few in number Their conclusions are not necessarily related to teaching practice but cover a wider field The study of applied psychology with special reference to the work of the teacher needs to be encouraged since it will serve to enlarge that body of scientific principle which should for work It is by no means necessary, or even desirable, that teachers should be expected to spend their tiical research Their business is to teach and this requires that they should devote the in practice the truths ascertained and verified by the psychologists For this purpose it will be necessary that they should know soht and proved It is also an advantage for teachers to learn soraphies of so-called Great Educators but rather with the object of learning what has been suggested and attee furnishes the teacher with the necessary power to deal with new proposals and with the many ”syste Instead of beco an attitude of indiscriminate scepticism he will be in some measure able to estie ofwhether they have any ger the teacher to learn his craft solely by practice often has the result of confining him too closely to narrow and stereotyped methods, based either on the imperfect recollection of his own schooldays, or on theand serves to destroy the qualities of initiative and adaptability which are indispensable to success in teaching

It will be noted that no extravagant de in teaching Thehitherto practised have been based too frequently on the assumption that it is possible to fashi+on a teacher fro hi method and to hear a course of demonstration lessons This plan may fail completely since it is possible to write excellent exaive a prepared lesson reasonably ithout being fitted to undertake the charge of a for can be acquired only in the class-room under conditions which are nor in the practising school of a training college When this truth is fully apprehended weteacher is required to spend his first year in a school where the head ular staff are qualified to guide his early efforts and to establish the necessary link between his knowledge of theory and his requirements in practice

The Departed to develop syste and should be in close touch with the schools in which teachers are receiving their practical training

The plan suggested will be free froteachers, namely, that it is too theoretical and produces people who can talk glibly about education without being able to nise the truth that the young teacher hasand that there are certain general principles which he must know and follow if he is to be successful in his chosen work The application of these principles to his own circu, as in any other art, the elehs in its importance any matter of formal technique or specialall teaching should be known and thereafter the teacher should develop his ownin his practice the bent of his nition of a principle does not of necessity involve uniformity in practice Freedom in execution is possible only within the limits of an art The problem is to define these limits in such a liberal manner as will allow for variety and individual expression

The saying that teachers are born, not made, is one which may be made of those who practise any art, but the poet or painter can exercise his innate gifts only within certain liard to certain rules It is no less fatal to his art for him to abandon all rules than it is for him to accept every rule slavishly and apply it to hience

The acceptance of the principle that there is an art or at least a craft of teaching is a condition precedent to any atte a profession in reality as well as in naed in teaching should have so the conditions under which they work andthe qualifications of those who desire to join their ranks This de work and a consequent effort to bring all teachers together asa certain unity or solidarity in spite of its apparent diversities To forreat difficulty since the various types of teachers have in the past tended to separate the its own association and machinery for the protection of its own interests Apart fro staffs of the various universities, there are in England and Wales over fifty associations of teachers, ranging from the National Union of Teachers with over ninety thousand subscribingonly a few score adherents These associations reflect the great diversity of teaching work already described, but all alike are seeking to promote freedom for the teacher in his work and to advance professional objects Such aspirations have been in the minds of teachers for many years and from time to ti a professional Council with its necessary adjunct of a Register of qualified persons Seventy years ago the College of Preceptors, with its grades of associate, Licentiate and Fellow, suggesting a coe of Physicians, was established with the object of ”raising the standard of the profession by providing a guarantee of fitness and respectability” The College Register was to contain the names of all those ere qualified to conduct schools, and ade itself in order to provide adiscredit upon the calling of a teacher by reason of their inefficiency or misconduct The scheme thus launched was, however, not comprehensive, since it concerned chiefly the teachers who conducted private schools and did not conteed in universities, public schools, or the ele under the then recently established scherants Teachers in schools of this last description were apparently intended by the governarded as civil servants, appointed and paid by the State Subsequent legislation overnrants are still subject to a measure of control, and those in public ele allowed to teach It will be seen that the effort to organise a teaching profession was hampered from the start by the fact that teachers were not entirely free to set up their own conditions, since the State had already taken charge of one branch, while further difficulties arose fro work and from the circumstance that some of these forms were traditionally associated with yman

Hence it was that despite several atteanise a profession the difficulties seemed to be insurmountable Between the years 1869 and 1899 several bills were introduced in Parliaister of Teachers but all met with opposition and were abandoned The Board of Education Act of 1899 gave powers for constituting by Order in Council a Consultative Committee to advise the Board on any matter referred to the Coulations for a Register of Teachers It was not until 1902 that an Order in Council established a Registration Council and laid down regulations for the institution of a Register The Council thus established consisted of twelve members, six of ere nominated by the President of the Board of Education while one was elected by each of the following bodies: the Headmasters' Conference, the Headmasters'

association, the Head Mistresses' association, the College of Preceptors, the Teachers' Guild, and the National Union of Teachers

The members of the Council were to hold office for three years, and afterwards, on 1 April, 1905, the constitution of the Council was to be revised The duty assigned to the Council was that of establishi+ng and keeping a Register of Teachers in accordance with the regulations framed by the Consultative Committee and approved by the Board of Education Subject to the approval of the Board the Council was empowered to appoint officers and to pay theistration and the accounts were to be audited and published annually by the Board to whom the Council was also required to subs once a year

Under this scheister was set up, with two columns, A and B In the former were placed the naovernment certificate as teachers in public elementary schools This involved no application or payistered automatically Column B was reserved for teachers in secondary schools, public and private Registration in these cases was voluntary and deuinea in addition to evidence of acceptable qualification in regard to acadeh teachers of experience were adulations were intended to ensure that, after a given date, everybody as accepted for registration should have passed satisfactorily through a course of training in teaching As designed in the first instance Column B furnished no place for teachers of special subjects and it becaard to music and other branches which had come to form part of the ordinary curriculuister divided into groups according to the nature of the accepted applicant's work Such an arrangenored all university teachers and assigned the others to different categories depending in some instances on the type of school in which they chanced to be working and in others on the subject which they happened to be teaching

A professional Register constructed on these lines had the see information as to the type of work for which the individual teacher was best fitted On the other hand it was held that the division of teachers into categories was unsound in principle and the teachers in public eleestion that they belonged to an inferior rank and were properly to be excused the payment of a fee They pointed out that many of their nuher than those required to secure admission to Coluistered, of whoraduates The views thus expressed were shared by many other teachers and it speedily becaister could not succeed In the Annual Report of 1905 the Council stated that under existing conditions it was not practicable to fraister of Teachers such as appeared to be contemplated in the Act of 1899 In June, 1906, the Board of Education published athe reasons which had led it to take the opportunity afforded by iister, and in the Education Bill of 1906 a clause was inserted which reation to fraly opposed by ed by these bodies that although one scheister was still possible and desirable