A villager stopped me on my way to school this morning. "Look at that,"
he cried, pointing to a broken branch on a tree in his garden, "that's
what comes o' yer nae discipline ideas. That's ane o' yer laddies that
put his kite into ma gairden. Dawm it, A'll no stand that! Ye'll jest go
doon to the school and gie that boy the biggest leathering that he's
ever had in his life."
I explained patiently that I was not the village constable, and I told
him that the broken branch had nothing to do with me. He became angry,
but he became speechless when I said, "I sympathise with you. Had it
been my garden I should have sworn possibly harder than you have done.
On the other hand, had it been twenty years ago and my kite, well, I
should have done exactly what the boy did. Good morning."
Although it was no concern of mine I called the boy out, and advised him
to try to think of other people. Then I addressed the bairns. "You
might convey to your parents," I said, "that I am not the policeman in
this village; I'm a schoolmaster."
I think that many parents are annoyed at my giving up punishment. They
feel that I am not doing their work for them; they think that the
dominie should do the training of children ... other people's children,
not their own. I find that I am trying to do a very difficult thing. The
home influence is bad in many cases; the children hear their parents
slight the teacher, and they do not know what to think. The average
parent looks upon the teacher as an enemy. If I hit a boy the parents
side with him, if I don't hit the boy who hit their boy, they
indignantly ask what education is coming to. Many a night I feel
disheartened. I find that I am on the side of the bairns. I am against
law and discipline; I am all for freedom of action.
* * *
At last I have attained my ambition. As a boy my great ambition was to
possess a cavalry trumpet and bugle. I have just bought both. I call
the bairns to school with "Stables" or the "Fall In," and I gleefully
look forward to playtime so that I may have another tootle. The bairns
love to hear the calls, but I think I enjoy them most.
I try hard to share the bairns' joys. At present I am out with them
every day flying kites, and I never tire of this. The boys bring me
their comic papers, but I find that I cannot laugh at them as I used to
do. Yet, I like to see _Chips_; Weary Willie and Tired Tim are still
figuring on the front page, but their pristine glory is gone. When I
first knew them they were the creation of Tom Browne, and no artist can
follow Tom in his own line.
I miss the old "bloods"; I used to glory in the exploits of Frank Reade
and Deadwood Dick. I have sat on a Sunday with _Deadwood Dick_ in the
covers of a family Bible, and my old grandmother patted my head and told
me I was a promising lad.
Then there was Buffalo Bill--tuppence coloured; I never see his name
now. I wonder why so many parents and teachers cuff boys' heads when
they find them reading comic papers and "bloods." I see no harm in
either. I wish that people would get out of the absurd habit of taking
it for granted that whatever a boy does is wrong. I hold that a boy is
nearly always right.
I see in to-day's _Scotsman_ that a Sheriff substitute in Edinburgh has
sentenced two brothers of nine and ten to twelve stripes with the birch
rod for stealing tuppence ha'penny. The account remarked that the
brothers had previously had a few stripes for a similar theft. That
punishment is no prevention is proved in this case.
The Sheriff Substitute must have a very definite idea of righteousness;
I envy him his conscience free from all remembrance of shortcomings in
the past. For my part had I been sitting in judgment on the poor laddies
I should have recollected the various times I have travelled first with
a third ticket, sneaked into circuses by lifting the tent cover, laid
farthings on the railway so that they might become ha'pennies, or, with
a special piece of luck--a goods train--pennies. Then I should have
invited the boys to tea, and sent them home with _Comic Cuts_, two
oranges, and a considerable bit of chewing gum. Anyhow, my method would
have brought out any good in the boys. The method of the judge will
bring out no good; it may make the boys feel that they are enemies of
society. And I should like to ask the gentleman what he would do if his
young son stole the jam. I'm sure he would not send for the birch rod.
The damnable thing about the whole affair is that he is probably a very
nice kindly man who would not whip a dog with his own hand. His
misfortune is his being part of a system.
* * *
I have just added a few volumes to my school library. I tried to
recollect the books that I liked as a youth; then I wrote for catalogues
of "sevenpennies." The new books include these:--_The Prisoner of Zenda_
and its sequel, _Rupert of Hentzau_, _King Solomon's Mines_,
_Montezuma's Daughter_, _The Four Feathers_, _A Gentleman of France_,
_White Fang_, _The Call of the Wild_, _The Invisible Man_, _The War of
the Worlds_, _The War in the Air_, _Dr. Nikola_, _A Bid for Fortune_,
_Micah Clarke_. I find that the average bairn of thirteen cannot
appreciate these stories. Margaret Steel was the only one who read _The
Scarlet Pimpernel_ and asked for the sequel. Most of them stuck half way
with _Zenda_. Guy Boothby's novels, the worst of the lot possibly,
appealed to them strongly. The love element bores the boys, but the
girls rather like it. One boy sat and yawned over _King Solomon's
Mines_; then he took out a coloured comic and turned to the serial. I
took the book away and told him to read the serial. Violet Brown prefers
a book about giants from the infant room to all the romantic stories
extant. After all, they are but children.
* * *
I am delighted with my sketching results. We go out every Wednesday and
Friday afternoon, and many bairns are giving me good work. We usually
end up with races or wading in the sea. There was much wonder when first
they saw my bare feet, but now they take my feet for granted.
Modesty is strong here. The other day the big girls came to me and asked
if they could come to school slipshod.
"You can come in your nighties for all I care," I said, and they gasped.
We sit outside all day now. My classes take books and wander away down
the road and lie on the banks. When I want them I call with the bugle.
Each class has a "regimental call," and they come promptly. They most
of them sit down separately, but the chatterers like to sit together.
I force no bairn to learn in my school. The few who dislike books and
lessons sit up when I talk to the class. The slackers are not always the
most ignorant.
I am beginning to compliment myself on having a good temper. For the
past six weeks I have left the manual room open at playtime and the boys
have made many toys. But they have made a woeful mess of the cutting
tools. It is trying to find that your favourite plane has been cracked
by a boy who has extreme theories on the fixing of plane irons. But it
is very comforting to know that the School Board will have to pay for
the damage. Yes, my temper is excellent.
* * *
On Saturday I went to a Bazaar, and various members of the aristocracy
talked to me. They talked very much in the manner they talk to their
gardeners, and I was led to muse upon the social status of a dominie.
What struck me most was the fact that they imitate royalty in the
broaching of topics of conversation; I knew that I presumed when I
entered new ground of conversation. The ladies were very polite and very
regal, and very well pleased with themselves. One of them said: "I hope
that you do your best to make these children realise that there are
classes in society; so many of their parents refuse to see the good in
other classes!"
"For my part," I answered, "I acknowledge one aristocracy--the
aristocracy of intellect. I teach my children to have respect for
thinking." She stared at me, and went away.
I am not prejudiced against the county people, but any superiority of
manner annoys me. I simply have no use for ladies who live drifting
lives. The lady-bountifuls, or should it be the ladies-bountiful? of
Britain would be much better as typists; in these days of alleged
scarcity of labour they might come down and mix with the lower orders.
Their grace and breeding would do much to improve us, and we might be
able to help them in some ways. I am not being cynical, I have a genuine
admiration for the breeding and beauty of some society women.
The doctor and the minister are seldom patronised. I cannot for the life
of me see why it is more lowly to cure a child of ignorance than
measles.
I have heard it said that the real reason of the teacher's low social
status is the fact that very often he is the son of a humble labourer.
There is some truth in this. At the Training College and the University
the student meets men of his own class only; he never learns the little
tricks of deportment that make up society's criterion of a gentleman.
But for my part I blame the circumstances under which a dominie works.
In Scotland he is the servant of a School Board, and a School Board is
generally composed of men who have but the haziest notion of the meaning
of education. That is bad enough, but very often there is a feud between
one or two members and the teacher. Perhaps the teacher does not get his
coals from Mr. Brown the Chairman, perhaps Mr. Brown voted for another
man when the appointment was made. It is difficult for a man who is
ruled by a few low-idealed semi-illiterate farmers and pig-dealers to
emphasise his social position.
Larger areas have been spoken of by politicians. Personally, I don't
want larger areas; I want to see the profession run by the members,
just as Law and Medicine are. It is significant that the medical
profession has dropped considerably in the social scale since it allowed
itself to work under the Insurance Act.
My ideal is an Education Guild which will replace the Scotch Education
Department. It will draw up its own scheme of instruction, fix the
salaries of its members, appoint its own inspectors, build its own
schools. It will be directly responsible to the State which will remain
the supreme authority.
I blame the teachers for their low social status. To-day they have no
idea of corporate action. They pay their subscriptions to their
Institute, and for the most part talk of stopping them on the ground
that it is money wasted. The authorities of the Institute try to work
for a better union, but they try clumsily and stodgily. They never write
or talk forcibly; they resemble the Labour Members of Parliament in
their having an eager desire to be respectable at any price. I don't
know why it is, but when a professional man tries to put his thoughts on
paper he almost always succeeds in saving nothing in many fine phrases.
What is really wrong with the Educational Institute of Scotland is
hoary-headedness. It is run by old men and old wives. A big man in the
Institute is usually a teacher with thirty years' experience as a
headmaster. Well ... if a man can teach under the present system for
thirty years and retain any originality or imagination at the end of
that time he must be a genius.
I object to age and experience; I am all for youth and empiricism. After
all, what is the use of experience in teaching? I could bet my boots
that ninety-nine out of a hundred teachers use the methods they learned
as pupil-teachers. Experience! I have heard dominies expatiate on
innovations like Kindergarten and Blackboard Drawing. I still have to
meet a dominie of experience who has any name but "fad" for anything in
education later than 1880.
I have never tried to define the word "fad." I should put it thus:--A
fad is a half-formed idea that a sub-inspector has borrowed from a bad
translation of a distinguished foreigner's treatise on Education, and
handed on to a deferential dominie.
* * *
An inspector called to-day; a middle-aged kindly gentleman with a sharp
eye. His chief interest in life was tables.
"How many pence in fifty-seven farthings?" he fired at my highest class.
When he found that they had to divide mentally by four, he became
annoyed.
"They ought to know their tables," he said to me.
"What tables?" I asked.
"O, they should learn up that; why I can tell you at once what
sixty-nine farthings are."