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Fifty-eight cases under the care of the Bexley Authority,
who were attending at the clinics during 1955 will continue
to attend into 1956. One of these children attends at the
Crayford Clinic, three attend at the Sidcup Clinic and the
remaining fifty-four children attend at the Murchison Avenue
Clinic.
Cleanliness Inspections.
(See Table III).
During the year the School Nurses carried out 12,233
examinations of children in School and 26 were found to
have some infestation with vermin. In nearly all cases, the
condition was cleared up by parents who were assisted,
where necessary, by the School Nurses. The infestation rate
is commendably low and speaks well for the standard of
child care in the Borough.
Attention is drawn to the foreword to this report for
details of the new arrangements in regard to these inspections.
PHYSICAL EDUCATION.
I am indebted to the Physical Education Advisers, Mr.
J. M. Pell and Miss J. Hulton, for the following report:—
During recent years some experiments and investigation
has been in progress in an effort to determine the most
effective type of Physical Education for building strong
healthy members of the community. It is now time to take
stock to see whether our present schemes are on the right
lines and whether we are achieving our aims.
The realisation that a child has need of many and
varied outlets for development, makes it more than ever
necessary to formulate provision during the full school
course for a wider range of physical activities than formerly,
which will be fully developmental and which may be
usefully continued as receation in adolescence and adult life.
If we are to enable an individual to reach his full capacity
there can be no standard formula or mass production
methods that can be applied to large groups of children
with their differing backgrounds and personalities, taught
under widely varying conditions. But this freedom from
standardised lessons does imply greater responsibility for
the teacher; it places great demands on the teacher's powers
of observation and requires more detailed understanding of
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