The morning hours are given to class teaching; from 9 to 1, or 9.15 to 1.15, being the usual times. Subjects requiring individual instruction (which are usually extras), e.g. piano, solo singing, advanced drawing, and painting, are taught in the afternoons, also Greek in some schools, special coaching in advanced Latin or Science, and so forth. The principle underlying this arrangement is that of giving the best working hours to serious mental work, and reserving accomplishments which are rather the ornament than the essentials of education, for the latter part, thus assigning to the subjects of instruction their proper relative importance, and keeping the real work of the school undisturbed. This arrangement seems so easy and natural that it would be hardly necessary to dwell on it, were it not that until very lately the opposite system prevailed in some schools that otherwise aimed at thoroughness, and it was not unusual for a girl to be called away in the middle of an important lesson in history or arithmetic, and sent to her music. Under the present plan, the greater part of the girls have finished their school work by one o’clock, and have the afternoon and evening free to divide between preparation of lessons (two to three hours), exercise, and home duties. For the benefit of those who require help in their lessons, or cannot get a quiet room at home, a system of afternoon preparation at school is organised. This generally lasts an hour and a half to two hours—most schools provide a dinner for girls who come from a distance. A whole holiday on Saturday seems the rule everywhere.
Some schools have a kindergarten department attached, where little boys are taught along with the girls, and a transition class where the children learn to read before passing into the school proper. The division is into forms, I. being the lowest, and VI. the highest. Large schools divide the forms into Upper and Lower. Where a school is fully organised, it is usual for a whole class to move up together. Backward girls may remain in the form another year. Unfortunately many high schools are too small to be fully organised, and in these the gaps between the classes are too large, and general promotion impossible. Clever girls spend one year in a class, slower ones two, and the disadvantage for the latter is very serious, since there is a weariness about going over the same ground twice, which is the reverse of stimulating. Large classes can progress as quickly as smaller ones when they are very carefully grouped. Where the pupils are at different stages there is much waste of time, and either the weak go to the wall, or the strong get less than their due. It is, therefore, the first essential of a high school that the numbers should be large, not much under two hundred.
Even when the school is large and the classes work smoothly together, the girls do not all work evenly in every subject. To prevent waste, it is usual to let certain subjects, perhaps Arithmetic and English, determine promotion, and to teach the others in divisions. Two or three forms may take French at the same time, and be rearranged for that lesson, returning to their own rooms when it is over. This moving about affords a pleasant change, and is quite easy when the building is a convenient one. Indeed, suitable premises are almost as important for the harmonious working of a school as large numbers and careful classification. Long narrow corridors and awkward staircases are fatal to order. Ordinary dwelling-rooms adapted for school purposes can seldom be properly ventilated, and according to their position in the room, the pupils suffer from draught or heat, the light falls the wrong way upon their work, the classes have to be graded to suit the size of the rooms rather than the abilities of the pupils. In fact nothing can be more unsatisfactory than the adaptation as a school of an ordinary dwelling-house.
The arrangement that seems to answer best is that of a large central hall used for prayers and general gatherings, out of which some of the form-rooms open, whilst the rest, with extra rooms for small divisions, are upstairs. Of this construction the Blackheath and Sheffield High Schools are good examples. The finest girls’ buildings are naturally found where there is an endowment, as at the North London Collegiate, the Bedford, and Manchester High Schools. Few, if any of the Church schools have specially constructed buildings, and several of the Girls’ Public Day School Company’s Schools are carried on in adapted premises. Some grant of public money for buildings to really efficient proprietary schools would probably be the cheapest and most effective way of helping girls’ education in many of our large towns.
The North London Collegiate, both in point of time and in importance, claims precedence as the pioneer high school. It was in working order when the Girls’ Public Day School Company started, and was doubtless the model set before its promoters. The following account written in 1883 by Mrs. Bryant, who is now head-mistress, is in many ways typical, and applies mutatis mutandis to the general routine of all fully equipped high schools.
‘Entering the school with the girls in the morning, we should proceed first through the entrance hall down to the basement, and into the cloak-rooms. Here each girl has a numbered place provided with hooks for cloak and hat, umbrella-stand, boot-rack, and bag for the house-boots, which she always wears while in school. There are also shelves for books while dressing is going on, and forms for use in changing boots. Since the space allotted is ample, and the girls come in relays, both before and after school, crowding is avoided.
‘When ready, each girl goes upstairs with her books to the great hall, where the rule of silence is strictly enforced. At 9.15, all are assembled for prayers, each form in its place, while the prefects, who are members of the sixth form, and are elected by it and the teachers of the upper division of the school, are scattered among the other forms, as guardians of public order, during the interval of waiting. After prayers, each form marches out with its mistress to its own room. Five class-rooms open out of the hall on the ground floor; these are used by the upper division of the school, including the sixth form, and four sub-divisions of the fifth form. Five more open out of the hall gallery, used by all the sub-divisions of the fourth form, which constitute the middle division of the school. Above these two tiers, there is a third set of rooms, three class-rooms and the drawing school. The lower divisions of the school use these four rooms, besides one of the irregularly placed rooms. Of the latter there are several, lying with the laboratories, lecture-room, libraries, and music-rooms, on the side of the great stone staircase, opposite the Clothworkers’ hall.
‘Each class room contains 5600 cubic feet, and is fitted for thirty-two girls. All have Swedish desks, except the elder girls, who have separate desks with chairs. There is a raised platform for the teacher, with a chair and table. All the rooms are fitted with cupboards, and in most there is a small circulating library, which the girls can use on payment of a small subscription. The pine wainscot, brick walls, and tiled fire-places of the class-rooms, make a good background for the decorations of the Kyrle societies, which exist in each class; and all the rooms have pictures on the walls, as well as notice-boards and time-tables. Another institution of the decorative kind is the window garden, with which many of the rooms are provided, and in which the girls take, for the most part, great pride.
‘In these rooms the hard work of the day goes on till 1.30, with an interval, as near the middle as possible, of twenty-five minutes, for a light lunch and drill. In five separate relays, the girls proceed to the dining-hall, which, with the kitchens and housekeeper’s room, lies under the great hall. Here they can buy buns, biscuits, bread and butter, fruit, coffee, milk, and lemonade, and, while talking as loudly and as much as they please, they are required to take their stand in orderly lines across the room. From the dining-hall the girls proceed to the gymnasium, a very fine room, 100 feet long by 30 feet broad, where they have musical drill for a quarter of an hour. Monday and Thursday, however, are days for special calisthenic exercise, lasting half-an-hour each day. Then work is resumed till 1.30, when the school is dismissed in relays, as before stated.’
Even more important than the routine of a school is its curriculum; and here the need of the reformer’s hand is still felt acutely. The subjects included in the Girls’ Public Day School Company prospectuses are the following—Religious Instruction, Reading, Writing, Arithmetic, Mathematics, Book-keeping, English grammar, composition, and literature, History, Geography, French, German, Latin, the elements of Physical Science, Social Economy, Drawing, Class-singing and Harmony, Gymnastic Exercises, and Needlework. To these Greek must now be added, since it is taught in every school that prepares for college. The prospectus says ‘any or all of these may be taught,’ which means that the head-mistress has, within certain limits, a right of selection. Hence the tendency of schools, even under the same management, to vary greatly. Not only is there as yet no consensus of opinion in England as to the best curriculum for girls’ schools, but even the general aim to be kept in view seems by no means determined. Mrs. Bryant lays down the incontrovertible dictum that ‘the ideal of the curriculum is a balance of subjects so that all normal faculties and interests may be cultivated.’ But there is another side which cannot be neglected, and the claims of the ideal vanish into insignificance before the demands of practical life and outside examination. In spite of the repeated promises that examination is to be servant and not master we must not hope to escape from its dominion as long as it is the ‘open sesame’ of colleges and professions. A rough test, it is still the best hitherto devised, and serves on the whole to separate the sheep from the goats. Since we must, therefore, acknowledge its sovereignty, it behoves us to see that it exercises a wise and benevolent tyranny. However much we may protest, the curriculum of a school will always be largely determined by the nature of its leaving examination, since this regulates the work of the upper forms, and these more or less mould the lower. Some schools reduce this examination work to a minimum, reserving it entirely for the highest form, while others use the machinery of outside examinations to determine the whole of their work. The North London Collegiate belongs to this latter class. The upper part is organised according to two parallel courses. Of these A. leads to the London degree examinations, that is to Matriculation or in some cases Intermediate Arts, and Course B. to the Cambridge Senior and Higher Locals. All these examinations under certain conditions admit to the Women’s Colleges at Oxford and Cambridge, and hence act the double part of a leaving and entrance examination, but this school also makes use of the lower examinations, e.g., the Preliminary and Junior Locals. Hence the work of these classes must be directed to the set subjects required for these examinations, and must include the particular periods of history, works in literature, and French and German books that are laid down by the examiners, even though they may not seem the most suitable in other respects. Many educationalists think this disadvantageous to the general plan of a girls’ school, which should proceed on stated harmonious lines from the lowest to the highest class. Mrs. Bryant, however, thinks that the advantages outweigh the disadvantages, since ‘by their means the more advanced body of opinion can be brought to bear on the inert or prejudiced mass, which lags behind in the movement of educational progress.’ In spite of this valuable testimony the consensus of opinion is rather on the other side. The schools of the Girls’ Public Day School Company have almost entirely abandoned the miscellaneous junior examinations, which lead to nothing, in favour of those conducted by the Joint Board of Oxford and Cambridge. This is the test applied to the leading boys’ public schools since 1873, and it is the nearest approach in England to an Abiturienten examination, since the higher certificate, if taken in the required subjects, exempts its holder from the first public examination at Oxford and Cambridge. The Board awards higher and lower certificates, and undertakes a general examination of the schools. The papers are sent to the school, and the examination is conducted there under the supervision of the head-mistress. The lower forms are also examined viva voce by a delegate of the Board, and reports on the general condition of the school and on the paper work are sent to the governing bodies. In this way the progress of different schools can be compared, and a general control kept, while there is little disturbance to the school course, since the questions are set on the work actually done. The Council of the Girls’ Public Day School Company itself awards certificates to girls who gain sixty per cent. of the marks in five papers.