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1937, makes it more imperative to preserve and give these children
every opportunity for living healthy, useful, interesting and enjoyable
lives. In Walthamstow we have been impressed by the many
excellent agencies working towards this end. The pre-natal clinics,
child welfare and maternity centres, nursery schools, the provision
of milk and meals, are all parts of a comprehensive scheme to ensure
healthy lives. A sound scheme of physical education can do little
to promote strong, healthy development or give joy to the underfed,
unhealthy child, but is very necessary to supplement the good
work of the above-mentioned agencies. Underfed children should
be carefully tended and their disability remedied before physical
exercises are imposed. Children who are capable of withstanding
the mental work of the classroom are equally capable of taking
part in a physical training lesson under a capable teacher.
"2. Physical Education in the Schools.—The physical
education of the children in the Primary Schools starts with
admission, and the present Board of Education syllabus of Physical
Training gives ample scope and guidance for progressive development
until they leave. In the Infant Schools at least one, and
often two, lessons are given every day. There is no formality
about these lessons, movement and enjoyment being the main
features. Gradually movement becomes more controlled, mobilisation
more rapid, and before leaving the Infant classes the elements
of the team system have been initiated.
"In the Junior Schools the tables of exercises are arranged to
meet the needs of increasing strength, skill, control, and the widening
mental outlook of the children. No syllabus, however excellent,
can be satisfactorily interpreted unless the teacher possesses the
necessary energy and enthusiasm to make the subject a force and
source of real inspiration. In some schools all members of the
staff, and in all schools the majority of active teachers capable of
teaching the subject, have now attended refresher courses in Physical
Education, and improved results are becoming more and more
apparent in the work in the schools.
"Great interest is taken in the subject by both teachers and
children, and on the whole the work is active, enjoyable and
purposeful. The tendency towards aimless physical activity is
being gradually replaced by sound training in movement, mental
response, and in the development of character and initiative. This
progressive development from the Infant School through the Junior
School is, however, not always achieved, and in spite of the guidance
afforded by a detailed syllabus the standard of attainment at the
end of the Junior School course varies widely.
"When the children arrive at the post-primary stage (11 plus),
gaps in the orderly progression of physical education appear.