Page:Adam's reports on vernacular education in Bengal and Behar, submitted to Government in 1835, 1836 and 1838.djvu/81

Rh has been no account given to the public of the Society’s operations. There is no reason to suppose that the indigenous schools unconnected with it are less numerous than when their condition was first investigated in 1818-19: on the contrary, the impulse which education has since received in Calcutta has most probably increased both their number and efficiency.

The improvements introduced by the School Society into the schools in immediate connection with it are various. Printed, instead of manuscript, school-books are now in common use. The branches formerly taught are now taught more thoroughly; and instruction is extended to subjects formerly neglected, viz., the orthography of the Bengalee language, geography, and moral truths and obligations. The mode of instruction has been improved. Formerly the pupils were arranged in different divisions according as they were learning to write on the ground with chalk, on the palm-leaf, on the plantain-leaf, and on paper, respectively; and each boy was taught separately by the school-master in a distinct lesson. The system of teaching with the assistance of monitors, and of arranging the boys in classes, formed with reference to similarity of ability or proficiency, has been adopted; and as in some instances it has enabled the teachers to increase the number of their pupils very considerably, and thereby their own emoluments, it is hoped that it will ultimately have the effect of encouraging men of superior acquirements to undertake the duties of instructors of youth. A system of superintendence has been organized by the appointment of a Pundit and a Sircar, to each of the four divisions into which the schools are distributed. They separately attend two different schools in the morning and two in the evening, staying at least one hour at each school, during which time they explain to the teachers any parts of the lessons they do not fully comprehend, and examine such of the boys as they think proper in their different acquirements. The destinations of the Pundits and Sircars are frequently changed, and each of them keeps a register, containing the day of the month; the time of going to, and leaving, each school; the names of the boys examined; the page and place of the book in which they were examined; and the names of the school-masters in their own hand-writing,—which registers are submitted to the Secretaries of the Society every week through the head Pundit. Further examinations, both public and private, yearly, half-yearly, or quarterly, as necessity or convenience dictated, have been held in the presence of respectable European and Native gentlemen, when gratuities were given to deserving teachers, and prize-books to the best scholars, as well as books bestowed for the current use of the schools. The tendency of all these measures to raise the character and qualifications of the teachers must be apparent, and it is with reference to this tendency that the labors of the Calcutta School Society have received the special approbation of the Court of