The Board of Education & Backward Children
The object of the Board of Education’s recently issued pamphlet on The Education of Backward Children* is :??
“to suggest to teachers generally some educational principles on which to base their practice in teaching backward children, particularly those who are backward because they are dull.”
Two features of the pamphlet will certainly fulfil that end. First, the description of different types of backward children and the very full reference to the complexity and diversity of causes contributing to backwardness are most illuminating, and secondly, the necessity of flexibility in school organisation, discipline and curricula where the needs of backward children are to be met receives strong emphasis. In Chapter VI, The Dull Child and the School Curriculum are to be found some very concrete and valuable suggestions on building curricula and on teaching method.
It is to be noted, however, that there is a general vagueness on certain vital issues. The importance of early diagnosis of children’s difficulties is stressed and although there is reference to the desirability of the use of objective standards, there is a noticeable absence of particulars that would guide teachers in their use, or even indicate to those teachers who are ignorant of such measures how they might acquire knowledge of them. Further, attention is drawn to the fact that before remedial treatment can be properly planned, a teacher requires information on the ” nature and extent of intelligence ” in the children to be treated, yet no indication is given as to how far teachers may be expected to make the accurate assessments and diagnoses themselves, or when they should consult an expert, c g., School Medical Officer or Educational Psychologist.
H.M. Stationery Office, 1/-.
116 MENTAL WELFARE In the main, the pamphlet as a source of information is disappointing. It certainly presents ” some educational principles in teaching backward children ” but if many of them are to be put into practice, the majority of teachers will need to ask by what means are they to be accomplished? In very few cases, will they find, in this pamphlet, an indication of the lines along which to work in search of an answer.
Although the pamphlet ” does not deal primarily with organisation or with administrative policy “, the final chapter is headed School Organisation and Classification and it is to be hoped that this section will be read by teachers of backward, forward and average children alike. Unfortunately, however, in the same chapter is to be found a half-hearted mention of some of the interesting experiments that are afoot to deal with the urgent problem of catering especially for backward children. There is no detailed description of these experiments such as might be suggestive to Local Authorities faced with the difficulty of finding a type of organisation suited to their area. Brief mention of ” special ” or ” transition ” classes is followed by poorly substantiated adverse criticism and the comments on Experimental Schools indicate some confusion regarding the function of this form of treatment.
Besides the inadequacy of the treatment of this section on recent experiments, there is another noticeable omission. No reference is made to feeble-minded children who are not at the present time in Special Schools though it is well-known that the majority of these children are in the Elementary Schools and are among the first to create a problem for the teacher on account of their backwardness in school work. A pamphlet on the Education of Backward Children surely demands reference to suitable educational provision for this group.
The expression by the Board of their appreciation of the organisation and methods of good Infants Schools, their wish to see the extension of such organisation and methods to other departments and their approval of a ” real life ” approach and purpose in work for dull children will be welcomed by teachers and everyone interested in child welfare.
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