Sessional_Paper_1902 — Page 477

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given to the clever and ambitions children of poor parents. With the shifting and very ignorant population of Hongkong, the most that can be done is to pick out and encourage all promising material, and so contrive things that the ablest men of the next generation shall be on our side.

The Government examination suggested in (b.) should be designed to take the place of the Oxford Local Examination, to which schoolmasters and the public generally appear to attach somewhat too much importance. What is required in Hongkong is an examination that will test the ordinary work of a school, and not one the preparation for which entails special tuition; one suited to local educational conditions and not designed to prove the attainments of English boys educated in England.

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VERNACULAR SCHOOLS.

23. In the Vernacular Schools instruction in the Chinese Written Language is essential.

It is essential that Western Knowledge should be a compulsory subject in every Standard.

The argument which was used to defend instruction in the Chinese Written Language in the Anglo-Chinese Schools, justifies also the existence of Vernacular Schools.

In Vernacular Schools it will not be possible for the bulk of the scholars to acquire any practical acquaintance with Western Knowledge and with the Chinese Written Language, and also with English (written or spoken) as well. Very important as the study of English is, Western Knowledge is still more so; and where the two studies cannot be conducted at the same time, Western Knowledge must take precedence.

24. The Vernacular Schools as at present constituted are defective in both essentials. Western Knowledge is arranged to begin in the fourth year of study, but nine-tenths of the scholars leave school after three years or less; consequent- ly to them it is never taught at all. As for the instruction in the Chinese Written Language, it is given too much with the object of memorising the Classics, and too little with the idea of teaching the children to read and write. Explanation of what they read is not given till the fourth year, so that again nine-tenths of the children derive no practical benefit from their study.

25. The following remedies are suggested :—

(a.) That Western Knowledge be carefully taught from the lowest class

upwards.

(b.) That the Chinese Written Language be taught on more practical

lines.

As regards (b.) two main points have to be borne in mind: the average period of study in the Vernacular Schools is three years or less, while the principal object to be attained is not the study of the ancient classical literature but to learn to read and write simple prose. It is necessary that the meaning of the characters should be taught from the outset, and that the commoner characters should be selected and taught first. If this were done, a child whose education was cut short after two or three years would have learnt little, but that little would be of use, not resembling as at present a cypher without a key.

There is no reason why this practical instruction should not be based on the Confucian and Mencian Classics, while to banish these would be an unnecessary challenge to the fundamental principles of Chinese social life.