Meanwhile, there was great activity in the building of schools in Wales; National Schools, British Schools and Voluntary Schools were opened in large numbers. The fact, however, that a village or town received a state grant and even built a school did not always imply that the school had a long life. David Williams, Head Teacher of the Copper Works School at Llanelly, replaced Nefydd as agent of the British Society in South Wales in November 1863, and by 1870 he could report that 98 new schools had been built and 120 others opened, making a total of 302 British Schools in Wales in that year, 97 of which were in the North and 205 in the South. Though statistics of the National Schools in existence in that year are not available, it is safe to assume that they had increased considerably since the formation of the Welsh Education Committee. By 1870, therefore, there were more schools in Wales than ever before, as well as a few Training Colleges for teachers.[1]
5
IN 1846, JAMES KAY SHUTTLEWORTH, THE SECRETARY OF THE COMMITTEE of the Privy Council on Education, instituted a scheme for training better teachers to improve the Monitorial System which had held the field for a generation. Prospective teachers were to be apprenticed as "pupil-teachers" or "stipendiary-monitors" in certain selected schools for five or four years respectively. During that period they were to receive a small salary; they were to be taught by the Head Teacher for at least an hour-and-a-half before or after school each day; they were to be given opportunities to observe other teachers at work; and they were to undertake some teaching themselves. At the end of their apprenticeship, the pupil-teachers were eligible to compete for grants to enter a Training College as "Queen's Scholars," and if, after completing their College course, they obtained their Certificate, they were entitled to receive an annual Government grant in addition to their ordinary salary. In this way many teachers entered the profession, and old Log Books contain numerous references to them. Naturally, some of these apprentices were less diligent than others, and this was particularly true of the monitors; the temptation to miss their early morning lessons proved too great for many, and one exasperated Head Teacher wrote that as "the monitors do not attend early instruction punctually (and this class was held between 8 and
- ↑ A good picture of life in these schools at this period, and of the struggles of some of the more promising pupils to enter one or other of the Colleges may be gleaned from the interesting autobiographics of three persons, each of whom was a remarkable person in his own way: Robert Roberts, "the Wandering Scholar", Sir Henry Jones, and Dr. John Lloyd Williams.
