calculating upon these Minutes as affording a substitute for the economy which is incumbent upon them, in common with all other workers, while their strength lasts." At the Council Chamber, Whitehall, the 6th day of August, 1851. By the Lords of the Committee of Council on Education. READ, Recommendations by the Rev. Professor Moseley, and the Rev. J. C. Cook, Her Majesty's Inspectors, in their General Reports upon Training Schools for the year 1850, to the effect that the Grants now made to Certificated Teachers in Elementary Schools under Inspection be extended to Training Schools. RESOLVED, That in Training Schools under a Principal or Vice-Principal, or Matron and Head Governess, their Lordships will, on the recommendation of one or more of Her Majesty's Inspectors, as they may in each case see fit to require, grant augmentations of salary to resident Assistant Teachers, holding respectively one of their Lordships' Certificates of Merit not lower than the Third Division of the First Class, on the following conditions: 1. Their Lordships to be satisfied with the branches of instruction committed to the Assistant Teacher. 2. The augmentation to be the same, and to depend on the same conditions of Salary and Emoluments as in Elementary Schools. 3. An annual Certificate from the Inspector or Inspectors that they are satisfied with the general management of the School. 4. A similar Certificate that they are satisfied with the skill of the Assistant Teacher. This Certificate to be verified by reference to the written exercises of the Students. 5. An annual Certificate from the Principal that he has been satisfied with the Assistant Teacher's moral character and attention to duty during the past year. READ,A former Minute, dated 21 December, 1846, whereby it is provided, That a retiring pension may be granted by the Committee of Council to any Schoolmaster or Schoolmistress who shall be rendered incapable by age or infirmity of continuing to teach a School efficiently. Provided that no such Pension shall be granted to any Schoolmaster or Schoolmistress who shall not have conducted a Normal or Elementary School for fifteen years, during seven at least of which such School shall have been under inspection. That in all cases of application for pensions, a Report shall be required from the Inspector, and from the Trustees and Managers of the Schools, as to the character and conduct of the applicants, and the manner in which the education of the Pupils under their charge has been carried on. The amount of pension shall be determined according to such Report, but shall in no case exceed two-thirds of the average amount of the salary and emoluments annually received by the applicant during the period that the School has been under inspection. A Minute of the grant of every such pension, and of the grouuds on which it has been awarded, shall be published in their Lordships' Minutes. RESOLVED, That the foregoing Minute be declared to have been intended to facilitate the appointment of competent successors in the place of meritorious, but incapacitated, Teachers, whose removal might, by such assistance, be effected in a manner consistent with their claims on the public. That, in order to define the extent of the charge to be created on the Parliamentary Grant for Education, the pensions to be awarded, pursuant to the Minute of 21 December, 1846, be as follows: : 20 Pensions of £30 each... 100 Pensions of £25 each.. 150 Pensions of £20 each.. Donations or special gratuities 600 2,500 3,000 £6,500 That in order to give precedence to the most deserving cases, all applications for Retiring Pensions be collected for comparison, and decided according to their respective merits, not oftener than twice in each year, until the foregoing list be completed, and thenceforth only as vacancies in it shall occur. That the pension be liable to be withdrawn on such proof as shall be satisfactory to their Lordships that the Pensioner has been guilty of misconduct, or possesses sufficient means of livelihood from other sources. ORGANIZATION.-SCHOOL ROUTINES. One of the most essential parts of the machinery of a good School is an effective routine, a routine embracing every topic it is impossible, if not desirable, to introduce into an elementary School. No earnest Teacher, aspiring to eminent usefulness and success in his vocation, would think of conducting his School, even for a day, without a settled plan and well digested scheme of lessons. Hence, when the number of earnest teachers is so much on the increase, we are not surprised to receive numerous applications for assistance in the formation of School plans. It is evident, however, that we cannot, month after month, publish routines adapted to the peculiar circumstances of each applicant, and though we comply with the request of a Teacher for a Mixed School, having three apprentices, to furnish him with a routine, and now supply one which has been found very successful in its working, under circumstances similar to his own, yet it is desirable to put some limits to the practice. We purpose, however, returning at an early period to the subject, and shall then discuss such general principles of Organization as will enable Teachers to devise plans adapted to their own wants and locality. The accompanying routine supposes the School to be divided into three sections for Reading, denoted by the letters A, B, C; and into six classes for Arithmetic. In the Reading sections, C includes all who are learning the mere elements, or who are capable of reading imperfeetly M'Culloch's 3rd Book;-B, such as can read with ease, or nearly so, M'Culloch's Series of Lessons; A, those who read with intelligence and expression M'Culloch's Course of Reading. During the hour and half, in the morning and afternoon, devoted to the Reading and Gallery Lessons, each section is supposed to pass on to the gallery for the examination and analysis of their previous lesson, or for collective teaching by the Teacher; this and all other employment put down for the Teacher should be most conscientiously attended to. "Apprentices" denotes that the lesson is to be prepared in the classes for the Teacher by an Apprentice, and such assistants as it may be deemed advisable to give him from amongst the Candidates for Apprenticeship, of whom in a good School there will always be a fair number. When we return to the subject of organization, we shall give a full analysis of the Routine here presented, and of the principles on which it is based. PUNCTUALITY. Punctuality is often the very hinge | of success; while vexation, loss and ruin frequently result from the lack of it. In no profession it is more necessary than in that of a trainer, whose habits should form a correct model for his pupils' imitation. He should so arrange matters as to be always punctual, not allowing even a favourite study to detain him beyond the usual time. Nothing is more likely to secure an early attendance of his scholars than the assurance that they will find their Teacher in the play-ground, ready to greet them a quarter of an hour before schooltime. Every good Teacher will, of course, have a well-arranged routine of study. This should be neatly drawn up, and suspended in some conspicuous part of the School-room. The time for commencing and finishing the various departments of study should be punctually attended to. One lesson should not be prolonged so as to intrench on the time allotted to the succeeding one. Let there be a time for everything; let everything be done in its own time. A careful attention to this will go far to prevent confusion and disorder, and to promote general improvement. The punctual dismissal of the children is a matter too often neglected. They should be sent home at the proper time, for their parents expect them, and great domestic inconvenience may be caused by their detention beyond the time. Let this principle be carried out in all things. Be strictly punctual in keeping your word. What is the secret of that mother's influence over her children? They know she keeps her word. The School is a family. If you would have it well regulated, be cautious in making promises, but faithful in keeping them. Say,-you have promised them a lesson on some specified subject at a certain specified time; fulfil that promise to the very letter. It would be easy to enlarge on the importance of this subject; but every thoughtful Teacher must be convinced, that, not only is his own comfort and success dependant in a great measure on punctuality, but that one essential part of preparation for the duties of life is the formation of habits of regularity in childhood. To enumerate all the advantages of this practice, or the evils of an opposite one, is not our design. These are patent to every careful observer of men and things. Let trainers remember on this point, "Jnst as the twig is bent, the tree's inclined." EXTRACTS. "The difference betweeen a useful education and one which does not affect the future life rests mainly on the greater or less activity which it has communicated to the pupil's mind, whether he has learned to think or to act, and to gain knowledge by himself, or whether he has merely followed passively as long as there was some one to draw him."--Arnold. "The child should indeed be always treated as a child, but as a child about to become a man. As long as possible, the age of innocence and gladness should be allowed to endure,-the infantine ignorance of the world, its difficulties and perils; but it is a serious error to forget that it cannot last always. And the public school is a school for society where many of the passions which agitate life are already experienced.”— Willm. GEOGRAPHY AND POPULAR 2. What countries are separated by the Frith of Forth? 3. What other countries lie between the same parallels of latitude as Great Britain ? In what respects do their climates differ from ours, and why. SECTION III. 1. Name the principal countries of the Torrid Zone. 2. Name the chief West India Islands, the Ionian Islands, and the principal groups of Islands in the Pacific. 3. What are the provinces of Austria, and what are their chief cities? By what different races of men are they inhabited? SECTION IV. 1. What chief articless of commerce come to us from between the Equator and the latitude of the Straits of Gibraltar; what, from thence to the latitude of London, and what from north of that latitude? 2. What influence has the elevation of a country above the sea level, on its climate and productions? Give examples of this. 3. Why does more rain fall on the West than on the East coast of England? Name some rainless and some riverless districts of the world. There is a remarkably fertile country where it rarely or never rains; name that country and account for its fertility. SECTION V. 1. Describe some of the most prevalent currents of the air of the ocean 2. Account for the formation of dew and for its deposition in different quantities on different substances. Why does ice form itself on the surface and not at the bottom of the sea? 3. The Ferroe Islands, St. Petersburgh, and Iakoutsk in Siberia, have nearly equal latitudes; the mean winter temperature of the first is 38°, that of the second 16°. and that of the third38°; account for this difference. SECTION VI. 1. Shew that the earth cannot be an infinitely extended surface. Give one reason only. 2. Why do the northern stars appear to descend as we travel southward? Why do they appear to descend by exactly as many degrees as we change our latitude? 3. Why are some eclipses of the sun partial and some annular? Why are not the same eclipses visible in all parts of the world? Why do they not return every month? How often do similar eclipses return, add why? |