PUBLIC RECORD OFFICE
Reference :-
885
9 PUBLIC RECORD OFFICE, LONDON
ALLY WITHOUT PERMISSION OF THE BE REPRODUCED PHOTOGRAPHIC-
COPYRIGHT PHOTOGRAPH-NOT TO
4.
No. 59.
Instruction
in hygiene
and manita-
tion in Schools.
78
that gentleman whether he would be willing to place his services at the disposal of Government to give effect to our recommendations.
4. Dr. Crétin has kindly expressed his willingness to undertake this task and would be prepared to deliver the lectures for a lump sum of Rs. 600.
5. This amount will be found very fair when it is considered that the lectures. would be written out before delivery and that the manuscript would be handed over to me to be used, with such modifications as a small Committee of Medical Officers might decide upon, as the ground work for an elementary book which might be subsequently printed and issued by the Medical Department for the use of the teachers and advanced pupils in the schools.
6. The difficulty in compiling such a book has been referred to in the minute written by the Director of Public Instruction and myself in November, 1905; but from what I know of Dr. Crétin, from the fact that he has been working several years as a teacher, and a successful one, before studying medicine, I believe that if my present recommendation is accepted, the best possible results may be obtained as far as local wants are concerned.
7. In this connection, I beg leave to draw attention to the consensus of opinion which apparently exists in this matter, as evidenced by the reports, books, schemes, &c., annexed to these papers which are all on lines corresponding closely to those independently expounded in the Memorandum from this Colony in September, 1904.
8. If my present recommendation is adopted it would be highly desirable that immediate notice be given to me so that Dr. Crétin may be officially informed of the fact and be then enabled to start the preparation of his lectures.
9. He would receive from this Department every assistance for his work and for the practical demonstrations, but it would be indispensable to obtain and desir- able to order from Europe, at once, the articles mentioned in Annexure A and perhaps a few others which Dr. Rouget, who is now in France, will, I am sure, gladly indicate to the Crown Agents if requested to do so.
10. I have given some attention to the subject of models, diagrams, &c., during my recent stay in England and France and I believe a sum of Rs. 500 to Rs. 600 would cover these expenses, so that an outlay of about Rs. 1,500, including incidental expenses, would be sufficient to carry out the scheme to the time of examination.
11. The fees to be paid to examiners, the grants to be made to successful teachers, &c., have already been dealt with by the Director of Public Instruction in his report date 23rd September, 1904.
September 29, 1906.
Enclosure 2 in No. 49.
H. LORANS,
Director.
REPORT of the FINANCE COMMITTEE on Minute of His Excellency the Governor,
No. 69 of 1906.
[Meeting of Thursday, the 29th November, 1906.] PRESENT:
The Honourable the Receiver-General, Chairman.
The Honourable the Auditor-General.
The Honourable the Acting Collector of Customs.
The Honourable L.S.R. du Vergé, I.S.O., Storekeeper-General.
The Honourable Dr. H. Lorans, Director of the Medical and Health
Department.
The Honourable Léopold Antelme.
READ: The following Minute of His Excellency the Governor, No. 69, dated 10th November, 1906:-
The Governor has the honour to submit to the Council the annexed corre- spondence having reference to a scheme to introduce elementary instruction in tropical hygiene into the Schools of the Colony.
The Director of the Health Department has submitted definite proposals to meet the end in view, and suggests as a first step to start a course of
79
lectures in hygiene and sanitation to which the teachers in Government and State-Aided Schools might be invited to attend, and when a staff of competent teachers has been thus created, in course of time to extend the proposed new instruction to all the Schools.
The expenditure which will be entailed in giving such lectures is estimated at Rs. 1,500, and the Governor invites the Council to consider the question, and to vote the necessary funds for this very desirable object. After reading the correspondence laid before them, and hearing the Director of the Medical and Health Department, your Committee consider it to be most desirable that the scheme mentioned in the above Minute be introduced into the Schools of the Colony and recommend the Council to vote the necessary expenditure for the proposed lectures, viz., Rs. 1,500. Council Chambers,
JAMES J. Brown,
November 22, 1906.
Chairman.
Laid before the Council of Government, and adopted on the 4th December, 1906.
LÉON KOENIG, Clerk of the Council of Government.
Enclosure 3 in No. 49.
DIRECTOR, Medical and Health Department, to COLONIAL SECRETARY, (No. C/2711.)
December 23, 1906.
I have carefully read this book. It is interesting, and, apart from one or two statements which the author will probably consider desirable to modify in the next edition, it is sufficiently instructive to prove very useful to many.
On the other hand, while it is very complete for the object aimed at as regards certain diseases, e.g., tetanus, reference to others of great importance, e.g., dysentery, or of usual occurrence, e.g., itch, is very scanty. On the whole I find the reading of this book very hard. I may be mistaken, but it does not quite meet who would have to be made familiar with the subject.
conception of a guide or manual for the schoolmasters and youth of the Colony,
Moreover, it is a question to me whether the lectures on hygiene and sanitation should not be delivered in French, and the book be written in the same language to come within the reach of the greatest number.
I am not well acquainted with the educational problems of this Island, but, from what has come to my hotice, I am afraid that the knowledge of English by schoolboys, and by a not inconsiderable number of school-teachers, is restricted to classical, and what I may perhaps be allowed to call official, English. It seems to me that colloquial expressions and the phraseology of what concerns the house and every-day life is rather foreign to them. The importance of the question, under the circumstances, need not be insisted upon as we wish the subject to be thoroughly understood, and not simply committed to memory.
I would, therefore, suggest that the opinion of the Director of Public Instruction be obtained, and a decision on these two points be arrived at, before I report on the questions put in your letter, No. 10729, of December 8, 1906, as the answer will, to a great extent, depend on the views which are adopted.
H. LORANS,
Director, Medical and Health Department.
Enclosure 4 in No. 49.
DIRECTOR, Public Instruction, to COLONIAL SECRETARY.
(No. A/21/07.)
January 10, 1907.
I agree with Dr. Lorans that the book does not seem quite suitable for our purpose. He has pointed out to me that the meaning is not always very clearly expressed, although this may only be the fault of a first issue. About the inaccu- racies to which he refers, I do not pretend to offer a judgment. It seems, too, to go