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55
NON-NOTIFIABLE INFECTIOUS DISEASES:
Extracted from returns made by Head Teachers:—
German Measles 34
Chicken pox 171
N.B.— I learn that owing to a misunderstanding, the teachers
ceased sending in these returns of non-notifiable infection
after May; therefore the above figures are really valueless,
or at least not complete.
Open Air Education.
During the year six children were sent to residential schools
for special courses of open air treatment for exceptional defects.
Much is being done for the children of the area under the
direction of the Physical Training Organisers, Mr. G. H.
Atkinson and Miss F. M. Bentley, to whom I am indebted for
the following report on Physical Education for the year 1944 :—
STATEMENT ON PHYSICAL EDUCATION FOR
THE YEAR 1944.
General. Physical education, like any other branch of the
school curriculum, depends for its results upon regular and
systematic teaching progressively adapted to the changing
development of the individual pupil. Any break in the continuity
of this process leaves a gap which, especially in the case
of Physical education, cannot easily be closed at a later stage
of the child's growth.
It is, therefore, a matter of some concern that during the
totter half of the year under review the enemy's flying bombs
and rocket weapons created such conditions of disorganisation
in our schools that normal progress in this subject became impossible.
With the evacuation of a large proportion of our
schoolchildren to safer areas it was necessary to regroup the
remnant classes and to replan schemes of work. This involved,
in many cases, the amalgamation of children of different agegroups
under teachers unfamiliar with the standards of work
Previously attained by their pupils. Added to these difficulties.
the children who remained behind suffered further disadvantages
from frequent stoppages of school work during danger
Periods, am. from lack of proper sleep, which left many of them
tired and lis less, and consequently unable to derive full benefit
from their lessons.
It is not surprising, therefore, that in all our schools there
is evidence general lowering of the standards of work in
all branches of physical education, and it is anticipated that
considerable time and effort will be required to restore these
standards wards to a satisfactory level.