ENVIRONMENT.
We now pass to the inanimate surroundings.
The first essential is that the soil upon which the school is built should be a dry and wholesome one. Gravel of course is the best, but there are many other varieties of soil and subsoil which admit of perfect drainage.
Healthy situation.The altitude is also a question to be taken into account. The greatest altitude compatible with accessibility is as a rule the best, because then the air will be fresh and abundant, and probably bracing. The aspect is also of importance. This should be as sunny as possible, and the girls’ sleeping and living rooms should be flooded with sunshine for great portions of the day, whatever happens to the rest of the establishment; as comparatively short hours are spent in schoolrooms, the importance of sunshine in them is less great, though they must be bright and attractive, for cheerful surroundings and associations help to produce the cheerful minds which most easily conquer intellectual difficulties. Cheerful surroundings.There must be no gloominess, with its depressing effects upon youthful spirits, anywhere. The nature of the surroundings has much to do in fact with the ideas, pleasurable or otherwise, which will be associated with the recurrence of any given lesson, and will often colour our recollections through life.
Climate.It is desirable also to ascertain the rainfall. There are certain portions of our island where the rainfall is very much heavier than in others, and often places only a few miles apart may differ by being either inside or outside a rainy band. Where outdoor exercise is as important as it always must be for young people, it is absurd to start a new school in a place where the games will be constantly interrupted by rain, or where, when it has rained, the ground is of a nature which does not quickly dry up. Of course what one really wants to know is the average number of rainy days and the seasons of the year when they chiefly occur, rather than the number of inches per annum of the rainfall, but these are details which are not generally easy to ascertain.
Ventilation and warming.Having secured a suitable spot, with abundant space, a large portion of it level for the purpose of play, see that the building is commodious, well-built, well-lighted, and thoroughly dry, and have all the windows hung top and bottom so that there may be plenty of fresh air, and have good fireplaces. Fireplaces are decidedly the most healthy method of warming for all living rooms, but hot-water pipes are unobjectionable, and far more convenient and economical for schoolrooms.
Arrangement of buildings and lighting.Every school of course has its own method of arrangement, but it is preferable where possible to have a central building for teaching purposes, containing schoolrooms, art-room, laboratory, workshops and gymnasium, surrounded by houses of residence, each holding about twenty-five girls. The houses should be warmed with fireplaces, the school by means of any warming apparatus at the time in vogue. In both school and houses it is most desirable to have electric light because it does not vitiate the air.
The accommodation in the building will naturally be arranged in accordance with the ideas of school organisation which it is intended to carry out, different plans being suitable for different kinds of schools.
Water supply and drainage.An abundant and thoroughly wholesome water supply is absolutely essential, and the drainage must be well planned and perfectly laid, so as to stand the various customary tests, and must be properly trapped and ventilated.
Air and space.As regards area and cubic space and other minute details of a hygienic kind, I cannot do better than refer mistresses to Dr. Clement Dukes’ admirable Health at School, published by Cassell & Co., which is a complete compendium of the subject, merely premising that for a book published in 1886 and republished in 1895, a less sweeping condemnation of all girls’ schools might have been made.
I do not myself feel that there is danger of unwholesome crowding in secondary residentiary schools, provided that there are separate living and school accommodation, such as I have already indicated, and also provided that every girl has her own cubicle fully furnished. The smallest area upon which it is possible to arrange the usual cubicle furniture with any degree of comfort, is sufficient to provide enough cubic space of air in a room twelve feet high.
A chapter on the Cultivation of the Body seems hardly complete without some mention of that without which the body cannot grow or even continue to exist, namely, food. As will have been seen from the tables given above, growth during the early years spent at a secondary residentiary school is exceedingly rapid, and food is necessary to support it; also every form of activity of any of the faculties of the being causes waste of substance and necessitates recuperation, which will be obtained chiefly by means of food and sleep. Food must be abundant.Food, therefore, must be abundant; it must be of good quality, well cooked, attractively served, and helped in a tempting manner. Plenty of time should be given for partaking of the meal, but the girls should not be kept sitting so long as to be bored, and conversation should be freely indulged in. There must be variety.I do not myself think that solid meat should be given except at the midday meal, but both at breakfast and at supper there should always be a savoury dish, consisting of fish, eggs, macaroni, rice or vegetables, with occasional admixtures of meat, ham, tongue, etc., to ensure variety; porridge should also be provided for breakfast. The great essential is variety. Besides these three meals there should be a light luncheon consisting of hot soup and bread, or cocoa, or milk, according to taste; and in the afternoon, after games and changing, the refreshment of tea and bread and butter, now and again varied with cake or a bun, before going into afternoon school. Sugar and fruit necessary.Sugar in abundance and milk should always be upon the dinner table, to be partaken of according to taste with the pudding, and jam or marmalade and golden syrup should be provided for breakfast and supper. In this way the quantity of saccharine matter, so essential for a growing child, is supplied. Greediness is not induced because the natural appetites are freely and wholesomely supplied, and the habit of self-indulgence is kept in abeyance for the same reason, because the ordinary diet is so satisfying that there is no craving for sweets and other tuck-shop delicacies. But even so, it is desirable to give sweetmeats occasionally after meals, rather than allow girls even to fancy that they want to go and buy them for themselves. Fresh fruit also is very good and wholesome and should be available when required for health; it will often be needed if the water is at all hard, and should occasionally be given in liberal quantities, say instead of pudding. Vegetables too must never be forgotten. Some people will be inclined to say that girls are not fed as well as this in their homes! That may sometimes be possible, and indeedDisastrous effects of insufficient or unwholesome food. I have known of cases where, from a terribly mistaken view of economy, or from a desire to teach self-restraint, growing girls have been stinted in food, with most lamentable results in after life. I am not, however, afraid that school will ever enter into competition with the home, no matter how good the puddings are; and it is natural that such things should be more considered at school where it is realised that even such minor matters as the bread and butter enter into the general scheme of education, and may influence for good or evil the future lives of the pupils. In some homes, on the other hand, girls receive food much too rich or too stimulating, made dishes and late dinners not being conducive to healthy digestion.
Danger of over-stimulating the emotions.Before closing this chapter a word must be said about the emotions; healthy bodily development is hindered or prevented if they are too early encouraged, as it is also by want of food, rest, fresh air, exercise and interest, or by the excess of either physical or intellectual activity. The emotional nature is over-stimulated by excessive time spent upon music, especially if the music is of a certain kind. Much care is needed, more particularly if there is decided musical taste, to begin with composers who appeal least to the emotional nature, and not to specialise in music at all until a thorough intellectual groundwork has been laid in the general education. Latin, mathematics and vigorous games hold a far more important part in the general scheme of a comprehensive education than is always apparent.